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Doomsday Eve

<h2>II</h2> Kurt Zen heard the lion cough in the sky overhead. He knew that it would hit in about four minutes and that it would seem to open a tunnel upward from hell, that the mountains would shake and tremble, that the air would vibrate and rattle as if a dozen thunderbolts had exploded at the same instant, and that a good number of the troops laboriously circling the incline of the ridge above would die. He knew that more of them would die a horrible lingering death as a result of the radioactivity that would be released by the blast. "Pardon me, Nedra," he said to the nurse, who was just ahead of him. She had stopped to stare upward. "Hit the dirt!" Zen yelled at the troops. A few had already heard the lion cough in the sky and had begun to take cover, following the pattern of experienced fighters who never need an order to dive for the nearest hole. He saw, as he shouted, that the number who had already begun to hit the dirt was pitifully few and he knew the reason for this. Most of these men were green conscripts on their first fighting mission, the results of digging deep into a population that had already been scoured to the bone for manpower—and for everything else. Conscripts were likely to stare at the sky and die with their mouths open. "What is it?" the girl asked. "What's wrong?" "Don't you hear that blooper in the sky overhead?" "No. That is, I heard something make a noise up there. But—" Mixed emotions moved across her face but fear was not among them. Instead, she seemed to be curious. "But what is a blooper?" From a nurse, or from any living American, such a question was incredible. Zen stared at her in amazement. "Did I say the wrong thing, ask the wrong question?" "You sure did," Zen answered. "Come on." "But where are we going?" "There!" He nodded toward a prospect hole, one of the many that had been dug in these mountains by miners. As soon as he had heard the blooper cough its interrupted rocket blast when it changed direction in the sky, he had instantly looked for a hiding place. This tunnel seemed to fill the bill. "Is something going to happen?" the nurse asked. "In less than two minutes you will find out," he answered. His long legs had already started taking him toward the hole. After hesitating for an instant, the nurse hastily followed him. The prospect hole extended less than ten feet into the side of the mountain and was not timbered. This was good. It meant no heavy beams would collapse around their heads when the hills began to shake. A quick examination revealed that the stone of the roof seemed to be solid. Zen stopped within three feet of the entrance. "Why don't we go farther back?" the nurse asked. "We're in far enough for protection from bits of flying metal but not too far to dig ourselves out if the roof should collapse—I hope," Zen answered. Somewhere outside a man screamed, in terror. The thing in the sky coughed again, closer now. BRRROOOMMM——BrrroooMMM——BrOOOm! The blooper struck. The sound was that of the simultaneous firing of many cannon. The walls of the prospect tunnel seemed to twist and wave. Loose stones dropped from the roof and a fine dust seemed to extrude from the walls. A boulder half as big as a small house hurtled past the entrance, snapping pines like matchsticks. A slide of loose rocks followed it. In the distance another slide could be heard growling back at the sky as it grew to avalanche proportions. The nurse's fingers tightened on Zen's arm, then relaxed. Every nerve in his body was as taut as a steel wire as he waited for her reaction. Other than the tightening and relaxing of her fingers, there was none. Her hands remained on his arm and she remained in the tunnel with him. To Kurt Zen, this was disappointing. "What kind of nerves do you have? Most women would have been in my arms and would have had their noses buried in my chest." "I'm sorry, colonel, if my education in how to be afraid has been neglected." She coughed at the dust. "Aren't you really afraid, Nedra?" he asked. "No." "Then you aren't an ordinary human!" The instant he had blurted out the words, he was sorry he had spoken. It was possible to give away too much too soon. "Then what am I?" Her voice was calm. He dodged her question. "Aren't you even afraid to die?" "When so many have died already, why should I hesitate to join them?" the nurse answered. She released his arm and brushed dust from the shoulders of her uniform. She glanced up at him and it seemed that some kind of a radiation flowed from her eyes, a wave of it that sent a tingle over his entire skin surface. Outside, another smaller boulder went bouncing past the entrance to the tunnel. Fumbling in his pockets for cigarettes, Zen found a crumpled package. He offered one to the nurse but she thanked him and refused it. He did not insist. Cigarettes were too precious to waste on people who didn't really want them. Outside, another man began to scream. The nurse moved automatically in that direction. He caught her arm and held her back. "Wait until the rocks stop rolling, Nedra." She did not protest. Looking up at him, she said, "You think I'm one of the new people, don't you?" Zen coughed and swore at the cigarette, insisting that the tobacco was moist. This was a lie and both knew it. But—what to say? Her question was a complete stunner. "What makes you think that?" he asked, desperate for words. "I just think it. It's true, isn't it?" As an intelligence officer, Zen was accustomed to asking the questions, but this nurse had completely turned the tables on him. He took a deep drag on the cigarette. "I don't know. Are you?" He made his voice as casual as was possible. Her eyes studied him. The trace of a smile came over her face and tugged at the comers of her lips. "Do you mind if I ask you a question?" "Go right ahead." The man had stopped screaming outside but another boulder was going past. In the distance, the avalanche was trying to grind to a halt but it sounded as if millions of tons of rock were on the move to a safer location. "Are you one of the new people?" the nurse asked. The cough was real this time. Zen could not suppress his surprise. "What on earth makes you ask a question like that?" "I just felt like asking it," the nurse replied. "Am I wrong?" "Who are the new people?" "Why, everybody has heard of them. They're the new race that is going to provide the nucleus for new growth after all ordinary men and women have been destroyed in this war." Surprise showed in her violet eyes. "Do you mean you have never heard of them?" "I've heard the usual rumors that are afloat," Zen said, shrugging. "But all the stories have impressed me as a pack of lies. Really, I think the enemy has started most of them, to get us to relax our war effort." "Do you honestly think that?" Her voice had a puzzled note in it. "I mean, honestly and truly." "I think what the evidence tells me to think, nothing less. In this case, I have seen none of the so-called evidence." Shrugging, Zen moved toward the opening of the tunnel, then drew back as a mass of rock crashed outside. "It's raining boulders out there," he said. "What do you know about the so-called new people?" "Not much," she answered. "You're a very lovely liar, but the fact that you are lovely doesn't make you any less a liar," Zen said. She was very beautiful with her violet eyes and bronze hair, but an overworked intelligence officer could not be concerned with these things. "Thank you, colonel," she said. "But I do not relish being called a liar." Her face showed hurt, just the right amount of it, but at the same time her eyes laughed at him. "However, I guess there is nothing I can do about it, is there?" Somehow she contrived to look like a small girl who has been unjustly accused of some deed she has not committed. In the distance the avalanche had ground to a halt. Now, no more boulders were bounding down the hill. A vast, puzzled silence held the mountains. In that silence, Zen fancied he could hear the thoughts of the frightened men who had remained alive thus far, and were wondering how to prolong their precarious existence. They were also wondering if staying alive was worth the effort involved. Why not give up now and be done with all tragedy, with all tears, with all trying to find the road to the future? Up the trail a man began to scream. Like a homing pigeon that has finally found the right direction, the nurse moved toward the sound. Zen caught her arm again. Looking puzzled, she stopped. "Please, colonel. I am needed up there." She nodded up the slope in the direction of the screaming man. "You are probably needed by many others," he commented. She did not seem to understand. "But I am a nurse. It is my duty to help those who are wounded." "I know." He was a little startled to find himself in sympathy with this impulse. "But, not yet." "Why not?" "Because that slope is still too hot to be safe." He held up his left wrist. Instead of a watch, he wore a miniature radiation counter there. The needle was creeping up toward the red line. "The radiation count is about forty right here at the mouth of this prospect hole," he pointed out. "That is interesting," the nurse said. The tone of her voice said it was not important. "Halfway up the slope, it will hit a hundred. At the top of the ridge, where the explosion took place, the count may reach a thousand." In his opinion, he had said enough. In her opinion, he had not said anything at all. "That makes no difference. Wounded men are up there. I am a nurse. My duty is clear to me." "If you try to help them under these circumstances, you will become a casualty yourself." "But what of the men who need help?" "They will simply have to get out of the radiation zone themselves, or wait until the area is clear and help can reach them." "You are heartless!" "Not at all," he denied. "If anything could be done to help them I would be doing it. Don't you understand what has happened? That was an Asian N bomb that exploded. In an N bomb the immediate effect is minor. The real purpose of the weapon is to spray the area with high intensity radiation, to make the ground unfit for living for months. Any living creature caught within the direct blast of the radiation is doomed, and neither you, nor I, nor the medics, can do anything to help them—" He broke off as another man began screaming up the slope. The nurse was irresolute. "But that man needs help," she pointed out. "Certainly he needs help," Zen agreed. "Well—" Zen watched her carefully. She seemed to understand his words but something else pulled at her far more strongly: the screaming of the injured man. Each time the soldier cried out, she started in his direction. "Well, well, thank you, colonel." Turning, she moved with a sure stride up the slope. Zen swore under his breath and started after her, then caught the motion as the question rose in him as to why she should throw her life away. She knew the meaning of radiation in lethal quantities. Unquestionably, she also knew what would happen to any normal human who ventured into a hot zone. Was she, then, a normal human being? Was he actually witnessing one of the miracles performed by the new people? If she came off the mountain slope alive, it would certainly prove something. Zen cursed again. She was going where he could not safely follow. If she returned unharmed, he had enough proof to warrant following her to the ends of the earth, if need be. <hr class="chap" /> <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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