Bridger: a Dystopian Serial

Welcome to America

Instead of the long hike across the valley and along the mountain ridge, they took the aircraft to the plateau where the portal to Alaska was.

Char's throat was tight with the emotions unexpressed when she left Seth, Leander, and her soldiers. She stood in the center of the plateau under the wing of the aircraft as Taig spoke to her soldiers. Marlene huddled almost right in her armpit, shivering in the cold.

"Too bad it's also winter in Alaska," Marlene muttered.

Taig turned from her group of soldiers. "Leader Char, are your people ready?"

"Yes," Char said flatly. She wasn't sure she was.

She'd hoped having sex with Seth would distract her long enough to sleep. He slept. She lay awake rehearsing what she would tell Erwell.

"Good," Taig said. "Come, then." She smoothed down her blue sash. Her eyes were pale in her porcelain face. She held out her hand.

Char gripped her cold fingers and advanced with her toward the portal.

The now-familiar sucking sensation greeted her. Char felt her whole body compress, then stretch out to immense lengths.

Then everything snapped back together. Char couldn't see anything for a moment, but she smelled something familiar: burning garbage.

Her eyes opened. The black night sky swirled with stars above her. She heard the soft whir of the wind turbines and took a breath of smoky air.

"Welcome to America," she said.

Leader Taig stood still beside her, eyes shut. "Your air smells sick."

A half-second later the spotlights glared in their eyes.

An amplified voice boomed over the snowy ground. "Don't move!"

Char raised her hands above her head and stepped to the front of the group. Anxiety rose up like bile in her throat.

<>

Leader Taig with her black robes and blue sash towered over Erwell and the two government officials. The eleven Na'odani had been forced to relinquish their staves, but even so they filled the boardroom with their presence. Except for Venn, who stood with Char, his face pale and drawn. His eyes flicked between his leader's face, and the faces of the soldiers packed into the room around them.

Actual army. The security detail was on patrol.

Two government men and Erwell stood at the end of the boardroom table with their eyes still set in shock and their faces moulded into rigid masks.

Char drew a deep breath and felt her chest muscles resist. Erwell hadn't said it yet, but Char had a bad feeling that whatever deceptions she'd pulled to get them into Kaa hadn't worked out for her.

Erwell cleared her throat. "Tell us why you've brought these... um... people with you, Charlane."

"Director Erwell," Char began, her tone more commanding than she felt. "I recognize that the protocol we were given did not involve engaging with the Na'odani people. However, after an incident with the inhabitants of Kaa, the Na'odani found us in foul weather and with injuries and took us in."

"Indeed," Erwell said sharply. "But why did they come here?"

"We have come," Leader Taig interjected, "to speak to you about the kemzog stone you have taken from Bridger Venn, and also about the conditions under which you Americans can come into Kaa."

Erwell and the officials stood silent, blinking up at Taig.

"I am sorry." Taig spread her hands in the same gesture Leader Hya had used. "But on behalf of the high council of Eskalon, capital of Na'o, I cannot allow you to enter Kaa until the kemzog stone has been returned and conditions have been settled upon."