"Attention! Legion squad approaching the Mound!"
"Damn! Now what?"
"That's got to be Blue Gold!"
"Psycho! Psycho! Can you hear me?" I bent over his helmet. Priestess was suddenly there, dropping her E, taking over from Tara, working on Psycho's wound. I snapped open his visor. He was in shock, pale and twitching. His lips moved.
"Bastards got me…" he gasped.
"No, they didn't, Psycho!" I insisted. "It's a God-damned scratch! Don't be such a pussy!"
"I'm finished…" I could barely hear him.
"You can't die, you jerk! You owe me a hundred credits! Quit whining—Priestess is patching you up right now!"
"Psycho, your wound is not fatal," Priestess reported. "Your right leg has been damaged. The Legion will build you a new one, trooper—no worries! Try and relax!"
"Relax! Scut, how are my balls? Tell me the truth!"
"Your balls are fine, Psycho," Priestess replied. She was almost laughing.
"You've got it cracked, Psycho!" I said. "You're off to the body shop—you're a damned hero, those little nurses will be fighting to see who gives you the sponge bath. Stay awake, Psycho!"
"Don't lose my Manlink, Dragon!" His Manlink! he's lost his leg, and he's worried about his Manlink. Only in the Legion!
"I have multiple tacstars, one level down," Sweety reported. What the hell? We could feel them, the vibrations rumbling up through the deck. A fireball erupted down-corridor. Dragon had the Manlink on autoflame—everything down there was wreathed in burning gas. The heat lit up our A-suits.
"Deadman, the civilians…" We had barely had time to glance at them. The Systie tacstar had blown them to shreds. The corridor was littered with shattered, twitching bodies, the walls spattered with blood. Dead—all dead. The little girl was back with her mommy, at last.
"Move, troopers! Back to Export—now! Bring Psycho!" Priestess and I dragged Psycho along the deck as the others fired everything they had to cover us. There was nothing at all we could do for the civilians, not now.
###
The Systies had marked the door EXPORT. We weren't sure what it meant, but we were hoping it would lead to the Ship. Merlin had already opened it. We tumbled in, dragging Psycho behind us.
"Damn it! Take it easy!" he complained.
"Eleven, Twelve, Eight at the door," Snow Leopard ordered. "Keep their heads down."
"Tenners!" It was another freezing metal room, coils of oily cenite twisting up the walls to a dark ceiling. Four bizarre chest-high solid metal structures rose from a slick wet floor. Tables, I thought, for the O's. There was another door at the far side of the room—PACKS ONLY, it read.
"All right, this is it. Get it open, Merlin."
"I'm on it." Merlin popped the panel, picking at the device with his techprobe. Our psybloc crackled away and my tacmod was still unreadable. Systies or O's could hit us at any time. Dragon fired another tacstar. The micronuke flashed white-hot in the corridor and the shock wave buffeted the room. That should slow them down!
"I have broken the Systie comnet," Sweety announced. That was a good trick, considering the deceptors. She immediately fed us what she had caught.
"…can't hold downstairs!" a Systie said. "How's your attack?"
A burst of static, then the response. "…outflanking them. We've got…" More static, an overwhelming roar.
"Fire down the other end, Dragon!" Snow Leopard shouted. "They're outflanking us somehow!"
"I have multiple tacstars one level down," Sweety said. "The floor may soon collapse." We could feel the blasts. A terrific battle was underway below us. Who the hell was down there? Dragon fired more tacstars—we were going to tear this place apart if we weren't careful. And we weren't.
"Opening!" Merlin announced. The inner door slid open. I crouched behind one of those massive circular metal slabs, my E and SG both pointed at the outer door. Twister was by my side and Priestess was tending to Psycho. Tara and Gildron sought cover behind another of the tables.
The outer doorway exploded, a titanic crash and a blinding flash. My faceplate went black, then lit up again. That massive metal table had caught the force of the blast so I was still upright and conscious when the Systie trooper stepped into the doorway, a terrifying vision wreathed in nuclear flame, clad in dull bronze-colored DefCorps armor, firing an SG on auto x. I fired my E on laser and caught him in the chest. The laser screeched and hissed on his armor, spitting sparks, and his arms twitched and the SG snapped down erratically and then Tara and Gildron and Snow Leopard and Merlin and Twister fired auto x, and the Systie went down like a metal doll, flashing with hits, tracers bursting away from him like fireworks.
"Clear the corridor!" Snow Leopard and Merlin and Twister and I charged the door, but skidded to a halt in the doorway when we realized that most of the corridor floor had collapsed—it was a flaming hole, with the dead Systie draped over the edge. The coiled cenite walls were pitted and smoking. I fired auto x down the corridor in one direction while Merlin and Twister took the other side. Laser bursts snapped past us and auto x exploded along the walls. We popped back into the room.
"A clear difference of opinion," Merlin remarked. I could hardly believe he was so calm. Merlin normally couldn't test-fire his E without getting nervous.
"Seal the outer door, Merlin! Permanently! Priestess, the casualties!" Priestess was already on it. Valkyrie, Scrapper and Dragon lay on the floor, their armor smoking. They had been near the door when the tacstar hit.
"Life signs all right…Dragon all right. Valkyrie tenners. Scrapper is all right! I'm doing mags!" They were stirring, struggling to get off the floor. Thank the dead! The armor had saved them—the star had exploded outside the room, otherwise we'd all have fried.
"Outer door sealed!" It slid shut noisily as xmax popped outside. Merlin wrecked the controls with his laser.
"All right, in we go," Snow Leopard said quietly. "We've got to secure that ship before anyone else gets to it." I had been trying to avoid looking at the inner door. It was open now, and it was glowing. It was bright in there—brilliant.
"Psycho, we've got to leave you here. I'm sorry, but we'll need the Manlink. Dragon, give him your E. Thinker, give him that SG."
Psycho pulled himself up to a sitting position, leaning against one of those massive metal tables, facing the outer door, his bloody stump plastered with gel and sealant. He was flying on mags and I knew he didn't feel a thing. "You go right ahead, guys," he said, "and don't you worry about your rear. Nobody's getting past me. You can bet your lives on that!"
"You got plenty of psybloc grenades?"
"I'm all set. Get out of here."
Valkyrie and Scrapper and Dragon were on their feet, weaving. "Deadman," Dragon said. "I'm still seeing double."
"Let's go, Beta," Snow Leopard said. "On me. Psycho, we'll be back for you." And he stepped into the inner doorway. We followed. I paused, for a last look at Psycho. I was going to miss the little creep.
"I expect to collect that hundred credits, Psycho," I reminded him.
"Either way I win," he replied. "Now get outta my sight."
###
We found ourselves in a brightly-lit corridor of mirrored, translucent glassy walls, frosted with ice, a road of glass under a high, shiny ceiling twice the height of a human. It led straight ahead. I could see movement behind the walls—it looked like water rushing over the glass. I swung the butt of my E at the wall and it bounced off. The air was freezing and frost was forming on my faceplate.
"Maintain attack interval!" We rushed forward blindly. Many Uldo civilians had trod this glassy road, I knew—those destined for EXPORT.
"I don't like this!" Our psybloc units were still flashing—we were now, truly, in the Land of the O's, and we could expect our hosts to appear at any moment.
"One, this may lead to the ship," Valkyrie said, "but the O's have to know we're here!"
"I know that, Eleven," Snow Leopard said. "Squad halt. Look alert! This is far e
nough. Dragon, the Manlink. Blow a hole in the wall—this side." I skidded to a halt and raised my E. I made sure it was on canister x.
"How you doing, Twister?" I asked.
"Is it too late to ask for sick leave?"
"Just stay alert. Pop a mag."
"I've been chewing them like candy!"
A tremendous bang, the air swirling, a hurricane of mirrored shards. Dragon had blown a hole in the corridor wall.
"Black Jade, Blue Gold!" The transmission came through on Legion combat freqs, cutting right through the deceptors. "We've secured the ground floor! Systies are one level up! Repeat, we've secured…" A splattering roar overcame the transmission. Blue Gold! Those were the Legion troopers who had been tracking us. Their aircar had been destroyed, and we had walked away from their nova. A chill ran over my skin.
"Nobody answers them!" Snow Leopard snapped. "Under no circumstances will anybody in this squad communicate with Blue Gold! Beta, on me!" He stepped out of the smoking hole in the wall. We followed.
And I held my breath when I saw where we were. Pale green light softly illuminated crystal walls behind colonnades of vertical tubes covered with glittering ice and wreathed with airy walkways. We were inside a huge cenite cavern within the Mound, and an emerald city rose all around us. It was a city of tall spidery multi-faceted crystal columns shining like diamonds in the icy air, all interconnected, the walkways and the ice tubes slowly moving. The flat ceiling blazed with phospho green lights high above.
We crouched at the foot of one of the towering columns, by a field of luminous miniature white flowers. I could hear a faint roaring. The air was misty and cold. There were a few tall, slender trees ahead, with pale wet bark like lizard skin, topped by masses of dark spiky leaves.
"Look!" Off to one side, an icy black lake—a waterfall, thundering down from a cliff of porous white rocks, filling the air with mist. And I knew it was a glimpse of the Omni's home planet. I had never even imagined such an eerie, lifeless landscape, such a bright, dead city.
"Deadman!"
"We've got to get higher!" Snow Leopard said. "The ceiling is flat—there are more levels above. The ship will be on the highest level." Snow Leopard was right—the columns were buildings and their tops merged with the brightly lit ceiling.
"Attention! Energy source! Three enemy probes approaching!" We crouched in the slowly settling cloud of smoky debris from the hole we had blown in the corridor. It was a tube, covered with frost, and it headed into a nearby building.
"Grenades! Biodee!" Snow Leopard snapped.
"Negative," Sweety corrected. "These are not genetic weapons! I have high and rising psyprobe energy readings. I have concluded these are psyprobe directional amplifiers. Three targets!" We could see them now, three shimmering silver orbs arcing lazily through the air, circling our position. Five or six psybloc grenades burst white-hot all around us. I kept my sights on the nearest probe.
"Fire auto x," Snow Leopard commanded, and we all fired at once. The shriek of auto xmax shattered the eerie silence of the alien city and the three probes exploded, glittering phospho blue core, spitting white tracers, flashing out of existence.
"Targets destroyed," Sweety said.
"Nothing to it," Dragon added.
"They must have thought we were civilians," Valkyrie said. "Those probes are what the O's use to control them. The Systie said 'you can't resist them', remember?"
"How long before they figure out something's wrong?" Dragon asked ominously.
"We're not important," Merlin said. "I'd like it to stay that way!"
"Move out!" Snow Leopard snapped. "On me! Attack formation! We've got to…"
The air exploded above us, an ear-splitting crack of lightning, a brilliant writhing phospho fireball, icy-green flames, the shock wave driving me to my knees.
"Biotic field, human range! Unidentified power source, laser guidance, recommend…"
"Tacstars!" Snow Leopard shouted it out before Sweety could, and a tacstar exploded directly above us, right in the center of that glittering fireball, a white-hot core, golden tracers peppering us all. Dragon had fired almost instantly. The O's had used this weapon on Mongera, and without the tacstar to diffuse the fireball, we would have had only instants to live.
"On me!" But another fireball erupted right over us, before I could even get to my feet. Hot green death, and I could only twitch, screaming inside my A-suit. My guts churned—a tremendous pressure built up in my head. Blood burst from my nostrils. It was the O's biobloc, and our bodies were about to self-destruct.
Another tacstar, a titanic bang, a holy nova of life, and my A-suit rang and smoked with hits. My faceplate flashed with critical warnings and Sweety was relaying vital information to me but I was receiving none of it. Dragon fired full auto tacstar, and the O's little slice of home was about to change.
"Fire full auto tacstar!" One shouted to make himself heard. I scrambled to my feet, stunned, raising my E. Tacstars burst all around us and the sharp crack of canister fire interrupted the ripping and banging of the tacstars. The O's trees fell, disintegrating, the lake boiling, vaporizing, the waterfall gone, the rocks blown to splinters. The airy buildings exploded, flashing white-hot, glittering with tracers. The shock waves rocked us. And through this flaming wilderness, a tall shimmering unearthly figure walked in a mag field of pale violet air, a dark looming skeletal creature, its features hidden by the force field. It was the O. He raised a dark spidery arm and he was holding something. He was right in my sights.
I fired auto canister, my E flashing and bucking. Another fireball blasted me off my feet. The answering tacstar almost deafened me.
"In here!" Scrapper crouched over a smoking crater in a field of burning earth. The tacstars had blown huge holes in the deck, revealing a hidden world below.
"Squad on Twelve!" Snow Leopard commanded. Dragon stood over the hole firing auto tacstar as we dove in. I had trouble moving my right leg. I got one last glimpse of the alien city, the tall column towers exploding outwards, the air filled with debris and flashing with tacstars.
Not important, are we? Maybe the O's will notice us now!
We scrambled away, suddenly in darkness. My darksight activated. We were under the O's city, running through cold wet cenite tunnels, bending over to avoid cables and pipes lining the roof. Another green flash burst behind us. Eight fired a tacstar in response and the blast almost deafened us all.
"Beta, One! Count!" We counted off, a rush of voices—we were all there, crouched in a confusing maze of pipes and walkways running through coiled cenite tunnels lined with ice.
"Move! Move!" We ran blindly away from the hole. A screeching blast of flame suddenly filled the tunnel, shooting past us, enveloping me in fiercely burning blue-hot gas.
"NOVA WARNING! Exterior temperature rising! Now exceeding acceptable tolerances!" I outran it, then turned to fire auto canister into the hell raging behind me. Tara and Gildron were beside me, also firing. My heart raced. There were more flashes back there. Someone screamed.
"Get out! Get out!"
"Run!"
"Heads down!"
"It's the O!" The firing was deafening. I continued, switching to auto xmax. Then I switched to flame, blasting it all, letting it all burn. I knew there were none of our people back there.
"Medic! Medic!" Someone called out. I looked around. Tara and Gildron and I were alone, a cenite ceiling close overhead, a cenite grate underfoot. We had somehow been separated from the others. The tacmap was useless. A deceptor burst. Another tacstar erupted somewhere behind us.
"Follow me!" I charged forward in a panic. An open hatch on the left—a black pit. I jumped in, feet first. I landed in water, knee-deep. Tara and Gildron hurtled in after me. It was a large water pipe, a sewer, full of dark sluggish liquid—filthy wet walls.
"One, Three, I'm…" I didn't get to finish.
"Beta, One! Split up and get that ship!" Deceptor static drowned him out, then he came back again. "…the upper levels!
Get out of here, and get to…" Gildron snarled, looking around, his E up and ready to fire.
"Look out!" someone screamed.
"Oh my God! Help! Help!" Scrapper shrieked, the tacnet roaring with static.
"Run! I'm coming!" Priestess responded. Priestess!
"Priestess!" I shouted. "Priestess! Where are you?" Someone screaming, a terrified, primal scream. Priestess!
"I'm dying…" I could barely hear it—was it Priestess?
"I'm coming!" someone shouted. "Priestess, I'm coming!" Who was it?
"Come on, Tara!" I sloshed through the liquid, my heart pounding. Where was Priestess? What the hell was happening? Tara was right behind me.
"Black Jade, Blue Gold! Hang on! We're almost there!"
"Beta, One! Ignore all…" And then the deceptors overcome it all, a horrid screeching.
"Careful, Wester!" Our sewer roared, the water gathering strength. We slid down a slimy chute and found ourselves in another huge pipe, this time almost waist-deep in frothing oily liquid.
"Beta Four, Eight, Thirteen approaching!" Sweety suddenly announced. They were on us in fracs, splashing wildly, their armor burnt and smoking.
"Deadman! Thinker!"
"Who were the casualties?" I asked. "Where's Priestess? Answer me!"
"I don't know," Dragon replied, "but it was bad. Scrapper was gone—somebody screamed, and Priestess ran right into that last burst to help. Right into the flames! Deto! I couldn't do a thing!" Dragon sounded really shaken—I had never seen him so stunned.
"Where are they? Where are they?"
"I don't know!" Dragon insisted. "We were separated!"
"The tacmap is all chaff," Merlin said. "Where the hell do we go?" The tunnel was lined with gaping hatchways, all leading to unknown worlds.
"One said split up," Twister said. "Get to a higher level, and secure the ship." Her teeth were chattering.
"But we can't go up to the city again—the O's will cook us!"
"But Priestess…"
"Our psybloc is off the scale!" Tara warned us.
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