The Last Mission Of The Seventh Cavalry. Charley Brindley

been thinking about?” Sparks asked.

      Sarge looked at Sparks and raised an eyebrow.

      “We know the satellites are still up there, right?”

      “Yes, because your GPS unit picks them up. That’s one of the reasons I think we’re in some kind of a sink hole.”

      “You know what else might be up there?”

      Sarge looked up at the sky. “What?”

      “The space station.”

      “Hey, you’re right. Can we contact them?”

      “I don’t know what frequencies they use, but I’ve been broadcasting on all of them.”

      “If we could contact them and tell them where we are, they could tell us where the nearest city is.”

      “Maybe.” Sparks stared at the sky for a moment. “I might be able to rig up a strobe light and point it straight up. As the space station orbits the Earth, they see the whole surface every few days.”

      “What good would that do?”

      “I think I can set the strobe to blink Morse Code, maybe something like ‘S.O.S. Contact 121.5.’ If they happen to see the blinking light, they’ll figure out it’s sending Morse Code.”

      “You ever see a satellite photo of Europe at night?”

      “I know, there’s millions of lights, but if we’re in a hole of some kind, like you said, then there would be miles of darkness all around us. That way, our strobe light might stand out. And it would be much brighter than any campfire.”

      “It’s a good idea, Sparks. You need somebody to help you with it?”

      “No, I’ll just have to cannibalize some of our electronic gadgets to rig it up.”

* * * * *

      It was almost 2 a.m. on the third night after Sparks set up his strobe to blink Morse Code. Everything was quiet until the radio crackled to life.

      “Hello.”

      “Hello,” Sparks mumbled and pulled the blanket up over his head.

      “Hello down there.” This was followed by a block of static. “Anybody home?”

      “What?” Sparks threw back his blanket.

      “Sparks!” Sarge yelled. “Someone’s on the radio.”

      “Holy shit!” Sparks rolled out of bed and grabbed the mic. “Who is it?” He dropped the microphone, then picked it up. “Who’s there?”

      “This is Commander Burbank on the Space Station, transmitting on 121.5.”

      “Commander, this is Richard Sparks – I mean McAlister. How are you?”

      “I’m fine, Richard. Where are you?”

      “We’re right here, on the Rhone.”

      “Give me the mic, Sparks,” Sarge said.

      “Tell him what happened to us.” Sparks handed the mic over to Sarge.

      “This is Sergeant Alexander of the Seventh Cavalry.”

      “Seventh Cavalry?” Commander Burbank said. “Are you kidding me?”

      “No, sir. We were on a combat mission over Afghanistan when our aircraft was hit and we bailed out. Somehow, we came down in France. Are you guys okay up there?”

      “Yes,” the commander said, “at least so far. We lost communications, and when we saw the whole Earth was dark, we checked the recorded videos for the past twenty-four—”

      “Wait a minute,” Sarge said into the mic, “the whole Earth is dark?”

      “Yes, yours is the first man-made light we’ve seen in the past seven nights.”

      “How can that be?” Sarge asked.

      “Don’t you guys know what happened?”

      “All we know is that our aircraft was ripped apart just when we were bailing out over Afghanistan. Ten minutes later, we came down in France, in two-eighteen BC.”

      “What!?”

      The other soldiers were awakened by the radio, and they came over to listen.

      “Yes, Commander,” Sarge said, “at least that’s what we think, or else someone’s pulling an elaborate hoax on us. And no, we don’t know what happened.”

      “Well, I doubt very seriously you’re in two-eighteen BC,” Commander Burbank said. “We have two video cameras pointed at the Earth that run all the time. After we lost communications, then saw the Earth was completely dark, we reviewed the videos. Seven days ago, there was a polar shift.”

      “What does that mean?”

      “The axis that runs through the center of the Earth shifted fifteen degrees. The North Pole is now in Greenland, and the South Pole is in the South Pacific Ocean, near New Zealand. As we watched the video, the surface of the Earth rippled from coast to coast on every continent, like a blanket being snapped from one end. Then giant tidal waves swept across all the oceans. The surface of the Earth was instantly rotated about four thousand miles.”

      “Holy shit!” Sarge said.

      “Every man-made structure on earth was completely destroyed. There might be someone alive somewhere, but you’re the only one we’ve had contact with.”

      “Oh, my God!” Karina said. “Mom, Dad, Grandmother Walker…they’re gone? It’s not possible. All dead?”

      “Hello, is that a female voice I hear?” Commander Burbank asked.

      “Yes,” Sarge said. “That’s Private Karina Ballentine.

      “Private Ballentine,” Burbank said, “we’re all grief-stricken up here, too. As we watched the replay, we saw all our homes and families disappear.”

      “I don’t believe it,” Kady said. “My brothers and sisters, and my mom. They can’t be gone just because the poles shifted from one place to another.”

      “What about airplanes?” Sparks leaned in close to the mic. “There must have been thousands of planes in the air.”

      “Every aircraft under ten thousand feet was destroyed, as yours was.”

      “But the airliners fly at thirty-five thousand feet. Wouldn’t they survive?”

      “Probably, but now there’s no place for them to land. When those airliners began running low on fuel, they had to come down. Some might have ditched in the ocean or on rivers, but not many. A few people might survive a crash-landing, but then what?”

      “Yes, I see what you mean,” Sarge said. “We came down by parachute, and with supplies and weapons, but they didn’t.”

      Autumn leaned close to Sarge to speak into the mic. “Commander, what’s going to happen to you and your crew?”

      “Is that another woman I hear?” Burbank asked.

      “Yes, sir. I’m Private Autumn Eaglemoon.”

      “How many people are in your unit?”

      Autumn looked around at the others. Several were in tears, and all were in shock and disbelief. “Sixteen.”

      “Well, Private Eaglemoon, in answer to your question, we have six months of food and water, so we have a little time to work on a plan. The two Russian escape pods are really our best hope, but with both NASA and the Russian Mission Control Center at Korolev gone, there’s no way to control where we come down. If the preprogrammed descent sequence doesn’t work, we might hit the Sahara Desert or the middle of the Pacific Ocean.”

      A moment of silence passed as everyone tried to digest the reality of what had happened.

      “We’ve dreaded nuclear war for decades,” Autumn said, “but this is so much worse, it’s total annihilation.”

      “Maybe,”