Battlefield Earth

Chapter 2

Jo

The place was huge. Offices, offices, offices. Barracks. Storerooms. Their footsteps resounded hollowly, disturbing the mille

The first find was a stack of duplicated routing plans for the base. A Scot found them in a reception desk drawer. They were not very detailed, apparently intended to route visiting officers around. The Scot got permission to distribute and, racing up, miner's lamp bobbing, shoved a copy into Jo

Level after level existed. There was not just a maze at one level but also mazes down, down, and down.

He was looking for an operations office, someplace where dispatches might mount up, where information was collected. Operations...operations...where would that be?

Behind him an argument broke out. It was Angus and Robert the Fox at the other end of the corridor.

Angus's voice was raised. “I know it's all by elevators!”

There was a murmur from Robert.

“I know it's all electrical. I’ve been through all this before at the first school! Electrical, electrical, electrical! It takes generators. And they're just piles of congealed rust! Even if you got one to run, there's no fuel– it's just sludge in the tanks. And even if you put in juice, those light bulbs won't work and the electric motors are frozen solid.”

Robert murmured something.

“Sure the wires may be all right. But even if you got juice in them, all you'd have is an intercom and we've got that. So stick to miner's lamps! I’m sorry, Sir Robert, but there's just so much dinosaur you can revive from a pile of bones!”

Jo

Operations...operations...

They found a communications console, the communicator's remains at the desk. Under the dust that had been his hand was a message:

“URGENT. Don't fire. It isn't the

Russians.”

“Russians? Russians?” said a Scot. “Who were the Russians?”

Thor had come, absent without leave from his shift at the lode but intending to get back. He was part Swedish. “They're some people that used to live on the other side of Sweden. They were run by the Swedes once.”

“Don't disturb any messages,” said Robert the Fox.

Operations...operations...

They found themselves in an enormous room. It had a huge map of the world on a middle table. Apparently clerks with long poles pushed little models around on the map. There were sidewall maps and a balcony overlooking it. Miner's lamps flicked over maps, models, and the remains of the dead. Impressive and well preserved. There were lots of clocks, all stopped long ago.

A crude, hastily made cylinder model rested on the map just east of the Rockies. A long pole was still touching it, the last action of a dead arm. Another map on the wall was plotting the course of something and the last “X” was straight above this base.

It was too much data to sort out in a moment. Jo

They found themselves in a nearby room. It had lots of consoles. “Top Secret” had been the name of this room.

One console said “Local Defense” and had a chart and map over it. Jo

Then suddenly he found himself looking at marks of the string mines in the meadow below them. “TNW 15.”

There was a firing button: “TNW 15.” But there were rows and rows of these buttons.

TNW? TNW?

The reedy voice of the historian piped up behind him. " 'TNW' means 'tactical nuclear weapons.' Those are the mines!”

Angus came over. "Och! Electrical firing buttons. You push the console button and up they go.”

“Might also be fused for contact,” said Jo

Psychlos thought these mountains were radioactive!”

“What's a 'silo'?” said the parson at another board. “It says 'Silo 1,' 'Silo 2' and so on.”

“A silo,” said Thor, “is where you keep wheat. They used to have them in Sweden. You put wheat in them for storage.”

“I can't imagine why they'd be that interested in wheat. Look at the way these buttons are marked. 'Standby,' 'Ready,' 'Fire.' "

The historian was hastily rifling through a dictionary he habitually carried. He found it. " '1. A cylindrical upright storage facility for wheat, grain, and other foodstuffs. 2. A large, underground structure for the storage and launching of a long-range ballistic missile.' "

Jo

Chapter 3

They were in a storeroom area now. Angus had found a huge ring of keys and was scampering ahead of Jo

Jo

They were at a heavy door that said “Arsenal” and Angus was changing keys about to open it. Some faint hope that it might contain nuclear weapons rose in Jo

Boxes! Cases! Endless rows of them!

Jo

Angus danced up with a book, fluttering the well-preserved pages. " 'Ordnance, Types and Models'!” he crooned. “All the numbers and letters will be here. Even pictures!” “inventory that,” said Robert the Fox to a Scot beside him who was making lists.

“Bazooka!” said Angus. “There, up there! Those long boxes! 'Antitank, armor-piercing missile projectiles.' "

“Nuclear?” asked Jo

“I think” said Robert, “this is just their local arsenal for possible base use. They wouldn't be supplying the whole army from this spot.”

“Lots of it,” said Angus.

“Enough for a few thousand men,” said Robert.

“Can I open a box?” asked Angus to Robert.

“One or two for now just to ascertain condition,” said Robert and waved a couple of the following Scots forward to assist.

Angus was flipping through the catalogue, miner's lamp dancing on the pages. “Ah, here! 'Thompson submachine gun'...” He stopped and looked up at the boxes. He shook his head and looked back at the page. “No wonder!”

“No wonder what?” prompted Robert, a bit impatient. The recon drone must have passed overhead by this time, and they had had no lunch and needed a break to recharge their air bottles outside.

“That ammunition we found was very well preserved. Airtight. Well, it maybe had to be. This sub-Thompson was a century out of date when we found the truckload. They must have just been sending them to the cadets to practice with. They were relics!”