And now this.
The Residents’ Committee of the condominiums where she lived on the edge of Marina Del Rey had sent maintenance staff around to tape all the widows in case of air attack, and check fire extinguishers. Other measures were spelled out in an instruction sheet that Dee had just retrieved from her mailbox: a list of first-aid and emergency supplies that everyone should acquire; the ground floor of the community block would be made into a casualty clearing station and bomb shelter; part of the parking lot was to be kept clear for emergency vehicles. Gasoline restrictions were already in effect, and coupon books were being printed to ration essential foods. A Labor Directorate had been established in Sacramento, empowered to shut down nonessential businesses and transfer labor to war-related work. She didn’t know yet how her own job at the travel agent’s would be affected. Guesses yesterday had been that a percentage of those in the business could expect to be assigned to other work. Vehicles and weapons assembly and munitions production were being expanded with emergency priority and already taking in drafted trainee labor. Males over eighteen were registering for the draft. There had been missile attacks on West Coast military bases and two aircraft assembly plants near Los Angeles.
Dee sat in her kitchen area drinking a coffee and blinked disbelievingly as she checked through the rest of the mail after skimming the morning’s paper. These things didn’t happen in the U.S.A. They happened to other people in other places that had never been quite real anyway. . . . Then she remembered that there no longer was a U.S.A. No, even though she had heard the air-raid warning sirens tested yesterday and seen the damage on last night’s news, she couldn’t believe it. Older folk talked about the erosion of freedoms her generation had never known, such as being able to drive coast-to-coast without having to give a reason, or not being profiled in the federal records system, and said that things had been heading this way for a long time. But all the same, Dee had grown up feeling a fond familiarity for the country she’d learned about at school with its flag and list of presidents, Fourth of July tradition, and national institutions that ranged from the Football League to the Postal Service. It couldn’t be over. When her father died, she had taken weeks to accept it and continued seeing figures on the street that for a moment she would believe were him, telling herself there had been some huge mistake. She felt something similar now, as if suddenly she would wake up and everything would be back again the way it was supposed to be.
The door chime sounded from the hall. Dee got up, went out, and peered through the spy hole in the door. It was Mike Blair from the Hyadean mission.
“Hi,” he greeted as she let him in and led the way back to the kitchen. “I probably should have called first. Have you got a minute?”
“Sure.” Dee gestured toward the newspaper and mail scattered over the table. “I can’t believe all this, Mike. Tell me it isn’t real.”
“I know. I’ve got the same problem. We don’t do this to each other because someone tells us to. That’s what people in other countries do.” He spread his hands. “But what else do you do when the other guys are coming over here with bombs? And the crazy part about it all is that they probably think exactly the same about us.”
“Can I fix you a coffee or something?”
“Thanks, no. I’m in a rush.”
“So what gives?”
“I talked to Wyvex earlier today. And guess what. He got a call from Vrel. Vrel’s okay!”
“What?!” Dee stared disbelievingly. “Really?!”
Blair grinned and nodded. “I just told you—really.”
Dee threw her arms around Blair’s neck, and kissed him on the side of his face. “So what happened? Where is he? What’s going on? Did Wyvex say when he’s coming back?”
“South America someplace. It sounds as if he’s with some kind of Hyadean news outfit. They’re making sure they’ve got clearance into the Federation. It could be in the next day or two.”