Birth of the Alliance Read online

  In other words, they needed to create nanomachines.

  V

  Scutarium

  1723 A.D.

  It was a warm summer day in the city of Philadelphia. The population of the city had more than quadrupled since Will’s first visit, growing from a mere three thousand then to more than twelve thousand now, almost a quarter century later. It was a warm day, not terribly hot, but the humidity meant Will was sweating inside his clothes. The general odor of eighteenth century cities was one he’d never grow used to, especially after so much time spent breathing the fresh, clean air in the Cavern.

  Hope had relayed to him the names of over fifty people she’d identified as potential Alliance candidates. Will had watched them, assessed the thoughts and emotions and deepest held beliefs and behaviors, and narrowed the list to two dozen. He’d made verbal contact with fifteen, and found that they were intrigued by his message. He told each of them that he must travel to New York, but would return in a month or two, and if they were interested in further conversations they would talk then.

  Pleased with the crop of potential new recruits, Will purchased a newspaper and dined at a local restaurant. He found the writing exemplary, the stories fascinating, and asked the owner of the establishment the name of the publisher and directions to his shop.

  The man glanced down at the newspaper, nodding in recognition. “That’s the New England Courant, correct? I believe the publisher is quite young, a lad named Franklin.” He provided directions to Franklin’s printing shop. Will thanked the man, paid for his meal, and set off for the printing shop operated by seventeen-year-old Benjamin Franklin.

  An hour later, Will was aboard the Nautilus, staring at his copy of the New England Courant as if it was made of gold. Will had asked a few questions about points made in a few of the articles, and Franklin had obliged his reader, jotting notes in the margins for elaboration. Will had been amazed at the maturity displayed by the youngster. In this era, a seventeen year old was expected to be a man, and Franklin exuded maturity Will would rarely find in one under the age of thirty in the twenty-first century.

  He was still staring at the written notes when Hope teleported in. When he didn’t acknowledge her, she zapped him with a small bit of Energy, causing him to look up. “What?”

  “What’s got you so mesmerized?”

  Will held out the newspaper. “This.”

  Hope took the paper. “It’s a newspaper that someone doodled on. This is exciting because…”

  “It’s not the doodling, specifically. It’s who did the doodling that’s so fascinating. One of the most revered men in history. Of course, he’s only seventeen at the moment.”

  Hope shrugged. “If you say so.” She activated the Nautilus’ navigation system, setting a course for the island of Eden. “Think this will be the last run to Eden?”

  Will considered. “It’s probably the last trip I’ll have to take. I should be able to get the rest of my gold and silver into the Nautilus this time. The new vault in the Cavern will be rather full.” He chuckled. “I hope I’m done hauling fresh soil; I think there’s still dirt in here from the last of those runs.”

  Hope chuckled.

  Will’s fortune, amassed over centuries of profitable business deals, dividends, and minimal spending, funded the construction and operation of the Cavern, as well as the individual research efforts. He also supplied a modest allowance to each person as they left the Cavern the first time; they were expected to earn their own fortune thereafter.

  If the Alliance ran out of money at some point, he knew where they could get their hands on billions of dollars in three centuries.

  “I don’t know if we’ll be able to come back here often, though. At some point the Nautilus will be put to use taking people to and from the Cavern, and side trips here just won’t be an option.”

  Hope tilted her head. “Why not build a second submarine, then?”

  Will sighed. “I'd like to build a fleet of them, actually. We'll need quite a few just to move people out into the world, but that won't happen often. We'll need more to ship materials in and out. We do need to consider the cost, though, and I don't have quite as much free time as I did when I built the first one.” He gave her a weak smile.

  “You don't need to build them,” Hope said. “You told me one of the men in the Cavern built the underwater pods to transport people to and from the Nautilus, move them back and forth between the sub and the Cavern, right?”

  “Right, that's Aaron, but—”

  “You don't have to do everything yourself, Will,” Hope said. Her voice was soft and gentle, but her words cut through him, the incision of hearing a fatal flaw laid bare. “You have good people working with you now, people who are eager to make progress just like you are. Why not let Aaron take charge of building additional submarines? You’ve got well over a hundred people living there now, right? He can probably get a full team and build one or two every year.”

  “Aaron's due to leave, to go out into the world.” He knew it was a weak excuse.

  Hope did as well. “Aaron's immortal now. When you head back, just make the suggestion that building replicas of the Nautilus would be a great idea. I suspect he'll stay behind to do that. It wouldn’t surprise me if he’s been waiting for the opportunity to step forward and do so.”

  Will shook his head. “I doubt it. He's immortal, yes. But he's also been living in the Cavern for many years. He's ready to go outside again. I can't see him staying behind.”

  Hope shrugged. “Perhaps. But you might be surprised. And even if Aaron chooses to head out, there are others who worked on those underwater pods with him, right? He didn’t do it all himself.” She raised an eyebrow at him, and he looked at the floor. “Any of them could work on the effort to build the subs while Aaron’s gone. Or while you’re gone.”

  “I'll try.” It was a surprising relief to say the words. Will knew that at some point, others would have to do things out of necessity. He alone among them knew he wouldn't be around forever. The diary had made it clear to him several times. At some point not long before his actual birth, there was no reference to this historic Will Stark. And after the time machine whisked him away, there was no reference to any version of Will Stark. Hope was right. It was best to get people used to doing things without him, making decisions without his input. They sought him out often in the beginning, when everything was too new and too strange to grasp, but they survived well in his recruiting absences.

  He had to prepare them for life without him at some point, anyway. Might as well start with something like building submarines.

  Three days later, they approached the island Will called Eden. At some point, this place would be found by the outside world. But it was outside the currents favored by sailors, making it unlikely to be found by those using ships powered by the wind. Perhaps he could build a dome over it and make it invisible, and retain it as a private hideaway.

  He looked at the island of Eden on the viewscreen, and a sense of wistfulness developed. “It’s hard to believe I might not see this place so often in the future. It’s funny. I lived here almost full time for centuries. But I was so fixated on building this ship that I never really explored this island. There are large parts of it I’ve never seen.” He looked at Hope. “Before we leave this time, I’d love to explore this place and really understand what’s here.”

  Hope's face lit up. “I'd enjoy that. Perhaps we'll discover something amazing. Maybe there’s been an entire tribe of people living here the whole time.” She grinned.

  Will felt a chill at those words, and shivered. “I certainly hope not.” The idea that people had lived on another portion of the island, that he’d never even sensed them, was frightening.

  The submarine surfaced from the deep river water and berthed next to the dock Will had constructed centuries earlier. Both of them teleported to shore, and Will tied the submarine to one of the dock posts. The couple moved into the building that had served as Will's
primary home for centuries. It was nearly empty at this point; Will had transported his prototypes, notes, and most of the money he'd removed from his old Aliomenti vaults to the Cavern over the past few decades. The couple moved what remained of Will's possessions into the Nautilus, and then set out on foot upriver.

  Will had focused his minimal exploration downriver, for the focus of his time had been the creation of the submarine and the ability to sail down the river out into the ocean. The river had provided sufficient fish for protein intake, and the downriver trees and fields supplied sufficient fruits and vegetables to round out his nutritional needs. He'd never felt the need to travel upriver, away from the mouth, until now. Now, when it was potentially gone for good? Only now did he look. Perhaps that was the problem with immortality. When you think you have all the time in the world, you put off doing the simple things because you think you’ll always have the time to do them. The only thing immortality granted was the ability to make a longer list of things you regret not doing, and fewer excuses for not doing so.

  The familiar cool breezes of Eden embraced them, bathing them in a fresh, salty scent. The gentle burbling of the river and the more distant roar of the surf created an ambience of peace. Will sighed. If this island was off limits to them one day, it would be a devastating loss.

  They walked for nearly an hour, staying within sight of the river, pointing out the colorful trees and fragrant plants that bloomed on the untouched island. The river began to narrow, and they noted that the river began atop a rocky hill. Of greater interest to them were the dozens of caves with openings yawning on either side of the river, carved into the rocky hill. The river, now no more than a stream, was easily crossable, even without the Energy abilities the couple possessed.

  Will glanced at Hope. “Shall we take the time to explore?”

  Hope nodded, her face brightening. “Let's split up, though. I'll go left, and you go right. We’ll touch base if we find anything interesting in the caves.”

  Hope headed off to the left, hurdling the stream with an easy grace, and entered the first of the caves. Will entered the first cave on the right.

  He was stunned. The walls of the cave were lined with huge, visible veins of gold, most notably along the wall nearest the river. Will gaped. There appeared to be a literal ton of gold in this cave.

  Will spent a few minutes checking out the next three caves in sequence. There was a small quantity of gold in each, though in the caves farthest from the river it was found on the ground, rather than on the walls. Will found that odd. Perhaps a storm or earthquake had shaken the metal loose from the ground.

  Hope! You should come see this. I’m in the fourth cave on the right. Huge amounts of gold. We may need to bring the submarine back again to mine all of this.

  Will moved deeper into the cave. While this cave wasn’t quite so burdened by the yellowish metal as the others, it would probably be the easiest to mine.

  He paused. Hope?

  Still no response.

  He started moving to the entry of the cave, then saved time and teleported to the river. Hope?

  There was still no response, and Will began to panic. Had something happened to her? She couldn’t be more than a mile away; their effective telepathic range was probably somewhere in the vicinity of the moon. Where could she be? With no better approach available, he started teleporting to each cave in turn, looking inside for her and shouting her name until his voice echoed, and then moving to the next when he failed to locate her.

  “Will!”

  He spun around quickly, spotting her on his side of the stream. There was a faint hint of Energy and a burst of the flute-like sound that her Energy produced in his mental ears. Had she teleported there in search of him? If so, where had she been?

  He teleported to her side in an instant, and embraced her as if she’d survived a horrible trauma. “I tried to contact you and you didn’t respond. Are you okay? Were you hurt?”

  Hope shook her head. “I’m fine. I tried to contact you as well, but nothing happened. That’s when I ran out of the cave I was in and teleported back to the river to look for you. Are you okay?”

  Will nodded. “I’m fine, but this is puzzling. How in the world can we both have failed to successfully communicate with telepathy? That’s been automatic for at least seven centuries now.”

  She put her hands to her temples and massaged them with her fingers; a mannerism she’d developed during their long separation, one which he knew meant she was in deep thought. “We were both in caves. Neither of us could hear the other’s telepathic messages.” She closed her eyes, then opened them. “What did you find in the caves you explored?”

  “Huge amounts of gold available for mining the walls. What about yours?”

  She shook her head. “Then there’s nothing there worth checking. I think the cave I was in must have some kind of material in it that… I don’t know, absorbs Energy or something. But there’s far more there. Come on!” She set off at a jog to the left of the river.

  Will glanced back at the caves that would fund most nations for centuries, and then jogged after her.

  He followed Hope into the third cave. It wasn’t as large as the first cave he’d entered, but was larger than the others he’d been in. The rocky hill sloped down from the left to the right, meaning that the caves Will had visited would be “shorter” than those Hope had chosen to explore.

  It wasn’t the size of the cave that caught his attention, though.

  The first thing he noticed was the strange, blue-tinted rock that lined the entirety of the inside, much as the gold had plated the walls of the caves he’d seen. It gave the cave walls an almost watery appearance, and he had the strange feeling that he was inside the cabin of the submarine. The crystal-like stone and its bluish tint made him feel like he was under water.

  Could this blue rock be the secret to the shielding effect he and Hope had experienced?

  He turned his attention away from the walls and toward Hope, and momentarily forgot about the rock.

  The inside of the cavern was littered with skeletons, most of which were seated at wooden tables spread throughout the interior of the cave. An interior section of the cave included a small graveyard, and when Will moved in that direction, he found tombstones engraved with words written in a language he didn't recognize.

  Eden had been inhabited long before he'd arrived.

  Or, as Hope had suggested, had the people in this cave been living here for at least part of the time he’d been on the island?

  “This whole scene doesn't suggest a peaceful end. They wouldn't have sat down at tables to die like that, would they?”

  “That’s what I was thinking as well.” She looked at the ground and toed the dirt. “Do you think they were poisoned?”

  “That seems likely,” Will agreed. “If there was poison in the food they were eating, and it acted quickly… well, you’d find a scene like what we have here.”

  She glanced up at him. “But who did that to these people? And why?” Her features tightened. “And… where did the killer or killers go, after?”

  The chill Will had experienced returned. “Perhaps the killer is one of the dead.” He shrugged. “I don’t think we’ll ever truly know. These people have been dead for a very long time, since long before I ever arrived. The only thing we know for sure is that others found this island at some point. Whether the people here are the last of those who found it, or whether there are others who left and kept knowledge of it alive… we just don’t know.”

  Hope nodded. “I don't think we’re in any imminent danger of attack. But I feel awkward standing here, like I'm disturbing the dead. We should leave.”

  Will nodded. “I agree, but there are some things we need to do first.” He pointed at the blue stone. “I think that stone is what caused the telepathy issues earlier. We should test that theory, and if it’s correct, we should mine some of the stone and take it back to the Cavern with us.”

  Can you he
ar me? Hope asked.

  Will acknowledged her. “So we can communicate when we’re both in the cave. Count to one hundred and try again.” He turned and jogged from the cave, teleported back to the river, and counted to one hundred himself, slowly, then walked back to the cave. He projected to Hope as soon as he left the cave, but heard nothing from her.

  When he walked into the cave, though, he could hear her thought immediately.

  “I take it you couldn’t hear me at all?” Hope asked.

  Will nodded. “And I was projecting back to you the entire time. It’s not exactly a thorough test, but I think it’s safe to say that this blue rock is a natural Shield for Energy. I’d like to take enough back with us on this trip to line a room where people can practice their Energy skills. It could also be a place where people who are able to do so could teleport in without fear of detection by Sebastian or other Aliomenti.”

  Hope sized up the cave and the volume of rock. “Think there’s enough to line the entire inside of the Cavern? As much as I'd hate to damage this cave, it would be wonderful to know we could train safely anywhere in the Cavern, not just in a single room.”

  “I like that idea,” Will replied. “I don’t think there’s enough, though, and I’d hate to just take all of it. When we get this rock back to the Cavern, we can figure out how it works, and ideally make materials with the same effect. If we can manufacture it, we can line the Cavern without any difficulty.”

  “And we can plate the inside of the subs as well,” Hope added. “And depending on the form the manufactured rock takes, we could even send people with enough of the… substance… to line the inside of their homes out in the world.” She paused, and then smiled. “I supposed we should name the blue rock something other than ‘blue rock’ though.”

  Will thought about that. “Latin seems to be the language used to name all manner of substances. This rock acts as a shield, and the Latin word for shield is scutum, or scuta if it's plural. Why don’t we call it scutarium?”