Phantoms of the North: An Alice in Deadland Adventure (Alice, No. 6) Read Online Free

things had turned out
with the Central Committee in the Mainland and its masters in the Executive
Committee that men with too much power almost always led to tyranny. Not so in
Konrath’s case. He had rallied much of the population in the Homeland around
him, slowly but surely bringing safety to them by crushing the few remaining
pockets of diehard Zeus troopers and the bandits who infested many parts of the
Homeland. However, there was one problem he did not have a solution for, and
that was what this video call was about.
    ‘Hi, Alice. Hope everyone in
Wonderland is well. I hope Edwards has been able to make his mobile vaccine lab
work.’
    ‘General, I mean President, we’re
all well.’
    Konrath chuckled. ‘Please just
call me Jake. We’re well beyond those formalities.’
    Edwards peeked over Alice’s
shoulder. ‘Yes, the mobile lab is up and running and everyone in Wonderland is
now vaccinated. How’re things stateside?’
    A crease appeared on Konrath’s
brow.
    ‘The fighting is still on in some
pockets, but it’s a matter of time before the last Zeus troopers surrender or
die. The bandits know their time is up and many are turning themselves in. So,
on the positive side, we have lots of people who are seeing freedom and the
hope of a united nation after ages, but you all know the big downside, don’t
you? What do I feed them?’
    This was the problem Konrath had
been grappling with. When he took over the reins, Konrath had realized just how
bad things were in the Homeland—much of the US heartland had been devastated in
the nuclear and biological strikes by the Chinese during The Rising, and to
make things worse, in the final stages of the fighting against the Executive
Committee, it had adopted a scorched-earth tactic, using napalm and fuel air
explosives on areas it wanted to deny the resistance. As a result, the US, once
the biggest food producer in the world, had very little arable area. It was now
apparent why the Executive Committee and its minions in the Central Committee
had gone to such lengths to take over the remaining fertile areas in what had
been India and China and get slave labor to work those farms from the Deadland.
    Alice had the reverse dilemma. The
areas in the Deadland that had been North India still had huge swathes of
fertile land, and with the growing population of Wonderland, she also had many
more mouths to feed. However, she didn’t have the means to farm all the land.
Manual labor would never get the kind of yields they needed to feed such an
expanding population. In contrast, the US, a much more industrialized nation
before The Rising, had huge stocks of agricultural machinery, but fewer arable
areas. The deal was simple—machines and experts to use them would fly in from
the Homeland and start working farms near Wonderland, with the produce shared
between Wonderland and the Homeland.
    ‘Jake, I think our plan seems like
the only solution to both our problems. Please send your people over and we can
get started.’
    As they disconnected, Alice
wondered just how far their plans would go before they began to unravel in the
light of the day’s events. The experts and settlers from the Homeland would
start working large farmlands in what had once been Punjab, not more than a
couple of hours away from the evil that Alice now knew lurked in the deserts
beyond.
     
    ***
     
    TWO
     
    The convoy drove through the night
without any headlights on. Alice was in the Jeep up front, together with Salil
and three more men. She turned to one of them.
    ‘Norbert, you okay back there?’
    Norbert Szucs tried to put on a
brave face and nodded. He was a doctor, one of Edwards’ team who had come down
from the Homeland, and had played a major role in the refinement of the
vaccine. Alice had had him come along in case they found others like Sayoni who
needed medical assistance. Like the others, he was carrying a rifle, though he
hoped he wouldn’t have to use it. He was much better at