Orbs II: Stranded Read Free Page A

Over.”
    Their mission had been a lie from the beginning. A damned rotten lie straight from the mouth of Dr. Hoffman, the CEO of New Tech Corporation—the man she had thought would lead humanity to a sanctuary on Mars. But there was at least hope: Someone else had survived the invasion, someone who needed help. And if there was one, Sophie knew there would be others.
    Dr. Emanuel Rodriguez crossed the mess hall and plopped down on the metal stool across from Sophie. He slid a glass of water to her and with a hesitant smile said, “It’s starting to sound like a broken record’s playing over here.”
    Sophie frowned and studied the clear liquid in a way she never had before. At first glance, there was nothing special about it. Then again, gasoline had seemed ordinary before the resource had become scarce.
    She met Emanuel’s concerned gaze and tried to return his smile.
    “You all right?” he asked.
    “Yeah, there’s just a lot on my mind. Sergeant Overton still can’t get a message through to this other Biosphere, and their SOS stopped replaying four days ago. Something catastrophic must have happened,” Sophie said.
    Emanuel sighed. “Well, then I should probably keep this next comment to myself. I don’t want to add to your stress,” he said, reaching for her hand.
    She smiled but pulled away from his touch, reaching instead to massage her side. The weeks-old injury was healing nicely, but there was still the sporadic pain, and the scar that would be with her for the rest of her life. A slight twinge of pain followed her fingers but quickly faded away.
    “Just spill it,” she said.
    “It’s the readings from the drone we sent outside. The temperature is still rising. In the past five weeks, it’s already gone up two degrees—and that’s about to become three. If this keeps up—”
    “We may die before the Organics drain the oceans after all?”
    Emanuel nodded. “I’m concerned about the carbon locked away in the polar ice caps. When they melt, it will be released, increasing the greenhouse effect. That’s probably why the temperature is rising faster than Alexia calculated.”
    “My God,” Sophie whispered.
    Even after five weeks of living in this new world, Sophie still hadn’t fully grasped what had happened outside the Biosphere doors. Sure, she’d seen the empty streets, the orbs, and the alien monsters, but it wasn’t until she crunched the numbers that it finally became very clear—the planet, and all the life upon it, was taking its last breaths.
    She had to remember the positives—the things she was thankful for, starting with the fact that the Biosphere was functioning well and Biome 1 was close to producing its first harvest. They still had power from the solar panels and backup generators for an indefinite amount of time. The reverse magnetic pulse generator they had taken from Luke Williard’s bunker was still fully operational. Without the RVM, they would have perished weeks ago. And Sophie couldn’t forget Alexia. The AI had proven more useful than she ever imagined.
    Sophie reached for the glass of water and took a slow sip, savoring the liquid as it slid down her throat. “What about the oceans?” she asked. “What do we know about their current levels?”
    Emanuel shrugged. “It’s hard to tell. The only way to really know isto send another drone.”
    Sophie crossed her arms and watched Emanuel as he compulsively pushed his glasses farther up his nose. It was something he always did before testing a new hypothesis.
    “I think we should send the second drone,” he said.
    “We already discussed this.”
    “I know, but things have changed. The temperature is rising faster than we thought.”
    Sophie sighed. They only had two robots. One was in the field, and the other was out of commission. They could fix it, but she didn’t want to risk losing them both. “I’ve said it before: We need to wait for the other drone to get back safely.”
    The PA system suddenly