Forge and Steel

by David VanDyke

  Bull didn’t say anything. In the background, he heard the synthesized Meme voice asking for an answer, and Lockerbie telling it to continue standing by.

  Think, Bull, think!

  What should he do?

  Chapter 4

  Bull’s gut told him to take the deal and get his people back. People he knew. People he served with. His brothers and sisters in arms. He couldn’t let them down. He couldn’t leave them in the hands of the Meme to be altered, conditioned, experimented upon, not to mention the intelligence the enemy would gain from doing so. As far as he knew, the Meme had never gotten ahold of more than one or two humans at a time. One hundred fifty would be a windfall.

  So, two reasons to take the deal.

  Yet, every bit of his training told him that the mission was paramount. That sacrifices were necessary for the defense of humanity. That letting the enemy use hostages to get what they wanted would simply invite more hostage-taking.

  The voices of instructors he respected echoed in his head, telling him that his first duty was to the overall objective. That if he put people ahead of the mission, he would inevitably decide not to take the risks that needed taking, which would lead to a vicious cycle of playing it safe, trying “not to lose” instead of playing to win.

  And Bull played to win.

  But sometimes, he knew, winning turned out to be impossible. Sometimes, snatching survival from the jaws of disaster constituted the only possible victory.

  Yet that wasn’t this case. He could complete the mission, with “only” seventy-five percent casualties. First Platoon, with its forty-four Marines, plus four Aerospace crew, would survive, and they’d bring their Meme defector home. The information in its mind could save a lot more lives than three platoons-worth of Marines.

  In fact, that information might change the course of the conflict. Earth really knew so little about the Meme Empire, its capabilities and its current status. The other defector, Raphael, had been out of contact with its fellows for thousands of years, so its info was very old.

  The information from this Meme might win battles....maybe even the whole war. The value of the things it could tell them about genetics and biology alone would be incalculable.

  “What do I do?” Bull hadn’t intended to say that out loud, but found he’d whispered it.

  “Get our people back,” Lock said immediately. “Screw this Meme defector. Let them have it. We’ll be no worse off. A draw.”

  “Minus two KIA,” Reaper snapped. “If we do, no Meme will ever try to desert again. During the First Cold War, the West never forced any defectors to return to the Communists for exactly that reason.”

  “Oh, so now you have an opinion, Reap?” Bull said.

  “I’m just rebutting Lock. I didn’t intend to influence your decision, but you asked, and now the damage is done.”

  “Maybe it would be better if you both brought your arguments into the open so I can hear them.”

  “If that’s what you want, sir.” Reaper raised an eyebrow and a slight smile played about her lips.

  Bull hated when she did that. It meant she’d defaulted to instructor mode and he was the student, even though technically he was in charge. He felt like he always ended up in a lose-lose discussion...except somehow, she helped him come up with the right answers. Which was, he supposed, more like a win-win.

  Damn all smartass crusty senior NCOs, anyway.

  “I want you both to do what I just told you,” Bull said. “Make your cases. Maybe you’ll tell me something I haven’t thought of.” There. That should retake the high ground.

  “Go ahead, Lock,” Reaper said, deceptively mild.

  “Okay. We can’t leave a hundred fifty of us and get only one of them. It gives them a bigger windfall than we get. More importantly, it would be breaking faith with our own. I don’t know about you jarheads, but Aerospace doesn’t leave our people behind. We sure as hell don’t leave them behind alive to be experimented on and turned into slaves or worse. How’d you like to be one of them and be abandoned? It’s wrong!”

  Bull watched Reaper’s face freeze at the slur on Marines, and then she seemed to force herself to relax. “Nobody in EarthFleet wants to leave anyone behind. And you’re right. It’s wrong and it sucks to be them. But sometimes the choice is between wrong and wronger, and I believe it would be even more wrong to send back this defector. The repercussions would be enormous, not to mention the lost intel – which is not ‘one compared to one hundred fifty’ in value. Meme memory is like a database, nearly perfect, potentially encompassing thousands of years of life. Every time one of them divides to reproduce, it keeps all of its ancestors’ memories. That’s what we’d be losing: dozens of lifetimes. I hate like hell to say it, but EarthFleet needs this creature and its knowledge more than we need all those Marines.”

  Bull held up a hand and thought it over for a long minute, fully aware that time was running out. At a certain point, it would be impossible to turn and run back to make the trade the Meme demanded.

  “Is that our only choice, though?” Lock broke in. “Why not try to eat our cake and have it too?”

  “How?” Bull asked.

  “We could fake the exchange and double-cross them. Attack, get our people out and probably the Meme too.”

  Reaper snapped, “We might lose everyone. They can EMP us again and then they’d slaughter us all. It would be better to wait until the Warthogs show up. We could offload the Meme in a survival pod, then go back for a straight-out assault, supported by the gunships. That way we have the defector for sure, and we might get some of our people back. And we make damn sure they’re not left behind, alive or dead. That way, the Meme get nothing out of this.”

  “You’re one cold bitch, you know that?” Lock said.

  Reaper’s face twisted. “Someone has to be,” she rasped. “Making military decisions on the basis of sentiment is stupid.”

  Bull realized that Reaper was forcing her words out, not from anger or contempt for Lock’s arguments, but because she was choking on a lump in her throat.

  She doesn’t want to leave them behind any more than Lock does. She’s making herself give the advice she believes is best. Heart or head? Bull asked himself.

  A movie hero would deftly combine both into a plan that would miraculously achieve all of his goals. Everyone would come out all right, with a couple of sacrifices along the way for a bit of pathos, and they’d all live happily ever after until the next episode.

  But that wasn’t the way it worked in real life. What had Reaper said? Wrong or wronger. The bad choice or the worse. If he couldn’t make a good decision, at least he should be able to make the least-bad one.

  Or he could call back to ask for instructions, and then do what he was told. But every minute that went by carried them farther from the base. Besides, that would be a coward’s move, avoiding responsibility.

  His instincts said to keep the Meme and go back, try to fight the Marines out of the base. Also, if he took the deal, the chain of command might approve, but the line doggies would never look at him the same, knowing he’d sacrificed so many of them for something so nebulous as “good intel.”

  So what was more courageous? To carry out the mission and be hated by the troops? All he had to do was say no to the voice on the comm and keep going.

  Or to give in to the Meme demands, go back and make the swap and get his people out of there?

  Both choices seemed cowardly.

  But maybe...

  “Lock, keep trying to establish comms and relay that SITREP. Keep up the chatter with that Meme, too. Tell it we’re discussing their proposal. Stall them. Reaper, follow me.” Bull unplugged and jogged back toward where the Blend stood under guard.

  “What’s the plan?” Reaper said.

  “Watch and see,” he snapped, not in the mood for her second-guessing. When they reached the insectoid, he said, “You. You call this Meme your master?”

  “Yes.”

  “Are you will
ing to die for it?”

  “If I must.”

  “Can you pilot this ship?”

  “I can, though not as well as one of the Pure Race.”

  Bull turned to Reaper. “Go get that inflatable Meme pod and four Marines with working cybernetics.”

  “For what?”

  Damn the woman. “Do as you’re told, First Sergeant.”

  Reaper raised an amused eyebrow. “Aye aye, sir.” She trotted off.

  As they waited, Bull spoke with the Blend, explaining its role in his plan.

  When Reaper returned with the pod, he ordered it inflated and readied, checking his chrono. This would take exquisite timing if it were to work.

  “Tell your master to open up the skin of the ship and let our vehicles inside as I explained, and seal it behind them so the other Meme won’t be able to tell,” he told the Blend. “Then you take over piloting and send your master out.”

  The Blend turned to the opening and stepped half-inside for a moment, apparently communicating with the Meme hidden there. Then it returned to its positions. “You will treat my master well.”

  “If you follow through on your part of the deal.”

  The Blend stared at Bull for a long moment. “I choose to believe you, for I have no other choice. My master must escape.”

  Sergeant Suarez, standing nearby, snorted in disbelief and muttered, “Sounds like love for sure.”

  The Blend turned toward Suarez. “What could you know of love, wretched underling?”

  Surarez took a step toward the insectoid and raised her weapon. “Fucking Meme bug –”

  “Stand down, Suarez!” Bull roared. “Go relieve Acosta and send him here. Quick march!”

  “Aye aye, sir,” she said through gritted teeth, and then faced about and double-timed off.

  “Well, you’re making friends,” Bull said as he turned to the Blend once more.

  “I will not accept criticism from the lower orders. I speak with you because you command, and because I must.”

  “Because I’m the one who decides your master’s fate, you mean.”

  “This is true.”

  Bull keyed his handcomm. “Lock, you guys inside?”

  “Yes, Bull. The ship’s skin pushed both sleds into the big interior space and sealed up behind us. Freaky shit. What’s going on?”

  “Like you said, we’re going to try to eat our cake and have it too.”

  “What?”

  “You’ll see soon enough.”

  Bull checked his chrono again, and then detached his Final Option bomb from beneath his thick belly armor. He breathed a sigh of relief when its detonation timer booted right up. The fact that it had been shut down must have preserved its electronics. He turned it off and snapped it back into place.

  He was about to prompt the Blend, when it turned and entered the dark hole. A moment later he stepped back involuntarily as a cloudy gel began to flow out of it.

  No, not a gel: an amoeba, a Meme. He stared at it in horrified fascination as it rose bonelessly, waist high, and focused a stalked eyeball the size of a grapefruit on first him, then Reaper, and then the other Marines.

  Those stared as well, some gripping their weapons convulsively.

  “Everybody relax,” Bull said. “It can’t hurt us. Reaper, the pod.”

  Reaper took the open end of the large hose and set it down in front of the Meme. Then she waved at it as if to say, get in.

  The eyeball bobbed, withdrawing into the interior of the mass of jelly. After a moment’s pause, the thing’s body flowed smoothly and with startling speed into the tube. Five seconds later, it had disappeared completely into the pod.

  “Have that carried to the skin of the ship.”

  Reaper signaled the four Marines to pick up the pod full of Meme and carry it off, with her in trail.

  “Blend, can you hear me?” Bull called into the hole.

  “I hear you.” The opening widened and the interior brightened.

  Inside, he saw the insectoid manipulating organic control surfaces that looked like large hairs, tentacles and pimple-covered expanses of skin. Concave screens covered in clear slime showed what must be representations of space around the ship.

  “Are we heading back to your base?”

  “It is not my base.”

  “To the Meme Empire base.”

  “Not yet.”

  “Are the other Meme suspicious?”

  “I do not understand the question.”

  “Meme operate in threes, so there are two other Meme on the base, correct?”

  “Correct.”

  “Do they suspect I’m not following their instructions for the exchange of assets?” Bull asked.

  “How can I know?”

  Bull growled. Damned literal-minded creature. “Do you believe they suspect anything amiss?”

  “No.”

  “Go ahead and release the pod.”

  “Complying.”

  The pod and the Meme within it would be pulled through the organic wall and excreted into space. It would drift toward the oncoming Warthogs and Fleet ships until one of them retrieved it. A beacon on it would make that easy.

  “Pod released,” the Blend said.

  “Now turn the ship around and head back to the base at the same speed as before.” Bull unclipped the handcomm from his shoulder and placed it next to the creature. “This is a simple communicator. Its frequency is already set. Push the large button when speaking, release to listen. Clear?”

  “I am a highly intelligent being with a near-perfect memory, human. Of course it is clear.”

  “Then use it to tell me when this ship is docked tight.”

  “I shall do so.”

  Bull stared at the bug a moment longer, feeling an odd flash of comradeship. “Good luck.”

  “Given our opposition, we shall need it. Farewell, human commander.”

  “Bull. My name is Bull.”

  “I am Maydar. Die well, Bull.”

  “I ain’t gonna die today, Maydar.”

  The bug seemed to shrug. “I believe I will. But it shall be as the One Above All dictates.”

  Bull raised a hand and turned away. Meme believed in some kind of god? Yet, why should he be surprised?

  He made sure his HUD was set to automatically monitor the handcomm freq and cue up any transmission, and then switched to the platoon channel. “First Platoon, this is Bull. All personnel return to sleds and load up. Gunny, report when all present.”

  When he reached the sleds, now parked inside the empty chamber as if on a flight deck, Marines were loading up and taking their seats. “Strap in if you can. Shut down all systems, including cybernetics, and be ready to reboot at a moment’s notice.”

  “Third and Fourth squads as well, sir?” Kang asked.

  “Everybody. We’ll be far less vulnerable to EMP with our systems off, and the sleds should give us a lot of shielding.”

  “What is it we’re doing, sir?”

  Bull realized he hadn’t explained his plan to anyone yet. “We’re going back to get our people.”

  A brief, spontaneous cheer broke out among the troops.

  “But the defector...” Kang trailed off, confused.

  “We’re Fleet Marines, Gunny. We don’t negotiate for hostages, and we don’t betray defectors by sending them back to be tortured and killed. So we’re going to play Trojan Horse.”

  Kang cleared his throat. “Ah, sir...they’ll use the EMP again.”

  “I’m counting on it. From what the bug told me, they only have the one device, and it takes a long time to recharge. So here’s what we’re going to do...”

  Chapter 5

  “We have docked with the base, Bull,” Maydar said over the handcomm. “I am receiving instructions intended for my master, to surrender for dissolution. I cannot maintain this pretense for long.”

  “Tell them we’re holding you until our people are released to fly away in their sleds.”

  “I told them, as yo
u instructed. They refuse. They insist on the prior surrender of my master.”

  “Tell them to let the ones they have go and we fifty-two will be hostages. Then they get your master, and then we go.”

  “I will tell them.”

  What seemed like minutes passed, though when Bull checked, it was only thirty seconds.

  “They do not understand your attempting to change the bargain. The two Pure Ones seem to be arguing. They suspect treachery.”

  Bull smiled grimly. “They’re right about that.”

  “I do not understand, Bull.”

  “About what, Maydar?”

  “Why did you not trade my master for your underlings?”

  “I’m not entirely sure myself, so I can’t really explain it to you.”

  “You humans are a peculiar species.”

  “So I’ve been told.”

  “Yet it pleases me to see you possess a sense of morality.”

  Bull snorted with suppressed laughter. “I thought you Blends were supposed to be the hedonistic narcissists, bereft of all ethics.”

  “Most are, but some few, like me, retain their sense of propriety through the blending process. Such is more likely when blending with an asexual worker insectoid form like this one.”

  “What, only the queen and the drones get any fun?”

  “If you are referring to sex, then yes.”

  “And you think we humans are weird.”

  “We think you humans are corruptible because of your many vices.”

  Bull grinned. “Most are, but some few, like me, retain their sense of propriety.”

  “And a sense of humor, I see. Then we are alike.”

  “Maybe so.”

  “The most senior of the two of the Pure Race has prevailed. They shall not alter the agreement. They insist you send out my master.”