'Dad, I think I found out some stuff. It sounds crazy, but I think it's true and because of it, we may all be in danger. I'm really scared.'
He stopped and looked at her.
'Alice, all those years ago when everything suddenly went to hell, I was just as scared. Your Mom was expecting you and with all the chaos in the last few days, I had no idea how I could protect my family.'
'So what did you do?'
He smiled, the light from torches burning around the settlement's walls reflecting in his glasses.
'I got help. Sometimes the bravest thing you can do is to ask for help. I went to a General in the Indian Army who had become a friend, and he let us shelter with his unit in their barracks when the Biters came out. He and I started this settlement once we had to leave the cities after they became unlivable and we realized that there was no more government and no more help coming our way.'
Alice wrapped her hands around herself, not just because of the chill, but because she needed to brace herself to tell her story. Her father put an arm around her and they continued walking as she spoke. He didn't interrupt her once, though he did see his face cloud over with a flash of anger when she related what had happened with Appleseed.
Finally, he stopped and seemed to be staring off into the distance. When he said nothing for several seconds, Alice tugged at his hand.
'Dad, I know it sounds crazy. That's why I was so afraid of saying anything to you.'
When her father turned to look at her, Alice was shocked to see his eyes well up with tears.
'Alice, when the first infections emerged and within a day or two all law and order broke down, a lady had come to meet me at the Embassy, pleading with me to pass on some information to my superiors in Washington. The Ambassador was in the US so she wanted to meet me. Just before she was to come and visit me, I got a call direct from someone in the White House that I was not to meet her or to entertain anything she had to say. I thought she was another wacko who had lost it in the madness of those days and I did not meet her.'
Alice felt her heart almost stop as she guessed what was to come next.
'That lady's name was Dr. Protima Dasgupta. She was an Indian-American researcher who had recently left the Government. My background check showed that she had been working on some Classified projects, which had such a high level of secrecy that I couldn't even find out what they were.'
'So everything she said is….'
Her father exhaled loudly, as if clearing his mind and trying to come to grips with what he now faced.
'Alice, I don't know if everything she said is true or not, but what's clear based on what you saw is that there is more to the Biters than we've always been led to believe. In the five days after The Rising when the media was still on, did you know what was on TV every single day?'
Alice had never watched TV but knew of it from her parents and sister so she just shook her head.
'Reports about how horrible these creatures, these mutants were. Reports about how our brave troops were fighting a new war on terror. Every single channel was screaming about how these creatures needed to be wiped out. But what was funny was that ordinary folks had no real protection-most National Guard units in the US were pulled back to barracks. Then all of a sudden, wars started breaking out all over. If I were a conspiracy nut, which I most certainly am not, I could start connecting all those dots and say that what this Queen or Dr. Protima has to say may well be more true than not. But that's not what worries me most. Something else terrifies me.'
'What, Dad?'
He looked at Alice, his eyes dead serious.
'Till Protima lives, there is a chance that this secret could come out, and getting to her is the only chance Zeus and it's masters have of wiping out the Biters as per their plan and then bring the surviving humans under their control. Appleseed now suspects that you know where she may be. He will be coming for you.'
Alice tried to put on a brave face.
'Dad, can we hold them? We have almost two hundred men and women who can fight. We can all shoot well, and we know this area better than they ever will.'
He shook his head sadly.
'No, sweetheart, we won't be able to hold them. You've seen a lot more death and evil than I would have ever wished upon a child of mine, but the most evil thing in this world is what one man can do to another. If Zeus comes here with their air power and heavy weapons, we won't last more than a few minutes. They will wipe us out and take you away.'
Alice didn't know what to say. Part of her felt guilty for having involved her father. The rational part of her knew that the dangers would have been just as great and just as real even if she had not told a soul, but telling her father and seeing how scared even he seemed made it even more real, and infinitely more frightening.
***
'Gladwell, we don't know if even a word of this is true.'
The speaker was Rajiv, a former banker who had become one of the pillars of their settlement ever since he and his wife had stumbled onto them while running from a horde of Biters. Alice had sat quietly for the half hour her father had taken to relate her story. He had thankfully spared her the ordeal of having to speak in front of more than two hundred people, most of whom looked increasingly skeptical as the tale progressed. Alice saw more than a few of them get up and leave. She knew they were among the many who had lost family and friends to the Biters, and even an insinuation that the Biters were anything but a mindless, bloodthirsty horde offended them. What made it worse was that the first accusation came not from one of the rabble-rousers but the normally placid Rajiv.
Alice's father looked at Rajiv, pleading with him.
'Why on Earth would Alice make all this up?'
Rajiv looked sheepish and shrugged his shoulders.
'She is but a girl. Maybe she just got scared in the tunnels down there and imagined things.'
'Or maybe this is just you trying to hold onto your so-called freedom!'
That stinging accusation came from the rear of the group, and Alice saw her father flinch as if he had been struck physically. His accuser was now standing up, and as three or four more men stood up, felt emboldened to continue his tirade.
'For years, Zeus has been coming to us. What they want isn't much-our boys to join their army, a share of whatever we find by way of salvage and maintaining a tally of our weapons with them. In return, we get some fixed rations, ammunition and safety.'
Alice saw her father's face tighten.
'We are FREE! That counts for something. We all owed allegiance to others, and several of you served in Government or in uniform, so we all know what that meant. But that was different-that was allegiance to a nation, to our identity. Zeus are a bunch of hired guns, and their real masters never reveal themselves openly. Have you forgotten about those settlements who signed up and then had their weapons taken because Zeus decided they were needed elsewhere? Who saved them from attacks after that? What about those who were resettled into farms to grow food, half of which is taken away by Zeus for their masters with no payment. What about all those young people who are taken away and never seen again-and the rumors that they are being used as bonded labour in the factories and mines of the elites who control Zeus. Why become their slaves when we can be free?'
It was an old argument, one that had consumed many meetings before, but tonight the revelations about what Alice had found had given it a new, bitter edge. The man who had been arguing with her father refused to back down.
'We all know how you feel about it, and you also know that there have been some of us who disagree. Some of us who are tired of fighting to survive every day, or scavenging for food every day for our families. And now you conveniently have this fairy tale from your daughter where Zeus and their masters are some sort of super-villains who destroyed the world.'