Blood Red Sand

by Damien Larkin

  The female soldier continued to press the barrel of the gun into his helmet, but he refused to look away. He had stared death in the face many times in his long career. Today would not be the day he faltered.

  “Knock it off, Noid,” an Irish-accented soldier said from the corner of the room.

  The Black Visor named Noid held her gun in place for a few seconds longer until standing up and holstering it. With a sigh, she shook her head and swung her assault rifle back into her hands.

  “Prick,” she mumbled.

  The Black Visor leader glanced back at her but said nothing more as he returned his attention to the corner of the room. A taller, stockier soldier who stood at his side reached out a meaty, gloved hand towards what appeared to be a cowering figure. After a few seconds, McCabe registered someone wearing unusual civilian garb, but that paled in comparison to the sight of the stranger standing at full height.

  McCabe had seen plenty of peculiar things in his career with the British Army but nothing resembling the man in the corner. He looked to be the tallest and thinnest human being McCabe had ever laid eyes on. The civilian’s tanned skin seemed an unnatural shade of colour, unlike any skin tone he had crossed in his well-travelled career. The stranger’s eyes were larger and farther apart, too. Everything about him looked like a disproportionate human being, yet he also had an alien presence in how he stood and glanced around the room with fretful eyes.

  The Irish Black Visor commanded Noid to join him and muttered something to her. Without delay, she started speaking fluent German to the stranger. To McCabe’s surprise, the strange-looking human responded in German, albeit with an unusual tone and inflection. McCabe watched in dumbfounded fascination as they spoke briskly to one another before the Irishman started barking orders.

  “Prepare to move,” he said. “Mo, stick with our guest. Smack, take point. Noid, you got the rear.”

  “What about them?” another female Black Visor asked, gesturing towards the captured British soldiers.

  The Irishman paused and focused on McCabe, as if remembering they had taken prisoners. While the other three Black Visors prepared to escort their guest out of the room, the Black Visor leader took to a knee in front of him.

  “Name.”

  “Sergeant William McCabe,” he spat.

  The Irishman looked towards his colleagues then back at him. “Sergeant McCabe. Your name isn’t on my list. That means you’re either going to die here or you’re one of the lucky few who will escape this place. What will it be, Sergeant?”

  “Kill his MOF ass,” Noid cursed from the door.

  “They’re not MOF yet,” the stockier male soldier replied. “MEF first. Then MOF.”

  McCabe remained silent and continued glaring into the black visor of the soldier above him. In his line of work, getting killed remained an occupational hazard. If these renegades planned to murder him, he had no plan to play along with any sick mind games beforehand.

  When McCabe didn’t reply, the Irish soldier chuckled to himself. Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out a folded piece of paper. He slipped it open and slid it across the floor into McCabe’s field of vison.

  “This is a signed order authorising MJ-12 personnel to take any necessary action to ensure the success of this mission. In reality, this is a blank cheque for us to do what we want, Sergeant. If you stay out of our way, we’ll stay out of yours.”

  McCabe glanced over the words on the document. It looked official, but whether it was authentic or a forgery lay beyond his paygrade to determine. He said nothing when the soldier stood and signalled at the other female soldier under his command. Reaching into one of her EVA suit’s compartments, she pulled out a metal syringe.

  She took to her knee beside Jenkins, and ignoring his curses, opened one of the valves on his breathing apparatus. She pressed her thumb down on the syringe and with a hiss, injected something into it. Within seconds, Jenkins fell unconscious.

  “Don’t worry,” the Irishman said, supressing a laugh. “We only kill when we have to. He’ll wake up as fresh as a daisy in twenty minutes or so.”

  McCabe struggled to shift away when the female soldier pried at his EVA suit.

  The Irishman tapped on the document with his foot. He looked down at McCabe. “Give that to Mad Jack,” he said and laughed again. “Tell him I’ll see him soon.”

  McCabe opened his mouth to curse at the cocky Irishman when the world turned dark. For what felt like a lifetime, he drifted somewhere between sleep and consciousness.

  Sounds came to him first. He made out the intermittent blasts of gunfire somewhere far off in the distance until voices echoed closer to home. Sudden coldness caused gaps of light to break through the blackened clouds swirling around him. A heartbeat later, McCabe found himself sitting upright, gasping from shock.

  Drips of cold water continued to trickle down his helmet-less face. He looked up. To his surprise, Major Wellesley stood over him. The officer’s EVA helmet was tucked under his left arm while he analysed the letter in his right hand.

  McCabe tried to spring to his feet, but whatever the Black Visors injected him with had turned his legs to rubber. He nearly fell face-first, but the strong hands of a half-dozen MEF soldiers raised him upright and held him steady.

  Major Wellesley folded the letter and slipped it into his EVA suit’s compartment. Then he extended his hand. “Well, Sergeant McCabe, it’s a shame we couldn’t meet under more pleasant circumstances, but I’m glad to see you’re still in the land of the living.”

  “Yes, sir,” he replied groggily and shook the officer’s hand in greeting.

  “This installation is ours,” Major Wellesley beamed, “and in no small part thanks to you, Sergeant. It appears you have a few stories of your own to tell.”

  The major’s left eyebrow arched, but McCabe’s weary mind couldn’t think of anything else to say, so he settled on a default response. “Yes, sir.”

  “I look forward to hearing all about it when the job is done, of course. In the meantime, rest up with your men while I assess the situation. We’ll be moving shortly.”

  “Moving, sir?” McCabe blurted out as he swayed in the hands of his soldiers.

  “Why, yes, Sergeant. Have you taken a knock to the head, old boy? We’re off to take New Berlin!”

  WEHRMACHT HQ, NEW BERLIN COLONY

  12.40 MST

  DAY 1

  Generalfeldmarschall Seidel stood over the map in front of him and resisted the urge to slam his fist onto the table. Thanks to Reichsführer Wagner’s ineptness, that frankly bordered on treason, the enemy was in the process of regrouping. He watched the red models continue to change and move as orderlies updated the map with the latest reports streaming in.

  It was true; the SS had annihilated the orbiting Allied fleet, but too many soldiers had escaped to the surface. On any other day, it would have been as simple as marching out to confront the enemy and grinding them into the dust. With most of his forces en route from cancelled exercises, New Berlin looked exceptionally vulnerable.

  “…seized control of the Russian Liberation Army’s main base.” General Schulz moved his hand over the now-British controlled position. “Overall, we believe they have amassed three under-strength battalions, with at least several companies’ worth of soldiers scattered between there and here. This means they’ve cut our supply lines with Germania and New Munich colonies.”

  General Schulz paused and glanced resignedly at Seidel before carrying on with his overview.

  “The bulk of the fighting so far seems to be taking place at New Munich colony. Enemy forces have launched a co-ordinated attack and gained a foothold within the city. General Lang has been killed in the fighting, so General Berger is assuming command of the Wehrmacht forces in the area. Reinforcements have been dispatched from Germania, but by the time they reach there, General Berger believes that the British will have occupied and entrenched themselves in half the colony. To be fran
k, Herr Feldmarschall, the British invading us on the same day as our planned war games has put us at a massive disadvantage.”

  “A disadvantage,” Seidel murmured as he placed a cigarette between his lips and pulled out a lighter. He lit the cigarette, took a drag, and cocked his head back to exhale a plume of smoke. A thousand other words rushed through his mind, but disadvantage wasn’t one of them.

  “It isn’t a disadvantage,” he said after a few moments, “it’s a betrayal. The SS have betrayed us all. Make no mistake about it, gentlemen.”

  The entire war room fell silent at his words. Junior officers buried themselves in reports or pulled on headsets to relay orders or receive updates. The assembled generals around the map-laden table glanced at one another in unease. Every one of them resented the SS’s growing power. The Wehrmacht had borne the brunt of the fighting in the last war, yet here on Mars, the SS strutted about like conquering heroes.

  “With all due respect, Herr Feldmarschall, to say such a thing could—”

  “I don’t care!” Seidel said and crashed his fists down hard on the table.

  Models and markers on the map tipped over.

  “I repeat, I do not care! The SS knew the British were coming, and they said nothing. They have left us defenceless. New Berlin will fall and all they care about is their petty little experiments. I would gladly trade every one of their secret projects in exchange for a mechanised infantry battalion. Those traitorous, morphine-addicted idiots!”

  An awkward quietness reverberated throughout the room. Even as he spoke those words, he knew he was signing his own death warrant. It wouldn’t take long for his outburst to reach the Reichsführer Wagner’s ears, and retribution would follow close behind.

  Still, saying what he genuinely thought aloud for once felt liberating. For years, since their forced exile, he had chaffed under the SS yolk. He had watched from the sidelines as they consolidated their grip on the increasingly isolated Führer and pushed their mysterious agenda forward. Now, the unthinkable had happened. Everything they built stood on the verge of annihilation, and with that knowledge came a strange recklessness. The SS could line him up against a wall and shoot him, or he could die in a hail of British bullets. Either way, the end was nigh, and he wanted to die with at least some truth on his lips.

  Turning his back on the table, Seidel strode to the large windows of the war room. He glanced out at the apartments below and the giant dome above that housed the colony. A decade ago, he had set foot in New Berlin for the first time. Back then, it looked like nothing more than a dome and hastily assembled barracks and refugee centres. Now it gleamed like a sprawling metropolis, an equal to anything that could be found back in Europe or North America.

  General Schulz cleared his throat. “I must take full responsibility for this. It was my suggestion that we organise battle readiness drills between all Wehrmacht forces on Mars. If I hadn’t—”

  “No, Herr General,” Seidel said, while drinking in the sight of the colony. “The responsibility is mine and mine alone. If the SS have betrayed us, so be it. There is little more that we can do except fulfil our oaths and give our lives in defence of New Berlin. How long until the British attack?”

  The room snapped to life again.

  The general shuffled through papers before he answered. “The British don’t seem to have any armoured vehicles of their own, but their possession of the RLA outpost gives them access to hundreds of lightly-armoured troop transports. Assuming they mobilised immediately after securing the facility, they could be here within three hours.”

  “And our reinforcements?”

  General Schulz cleared his throat as he riffled through another stack of reports.

  “Approximately four hours. They have to make a detour around certain areas due to our pact with the natives, but—”

  “To hell with the pact,” Seidel hissed. “Order the First and the Third Panzer Divisions to make straight for the—”

  A flash of light filled his sight and stopped the next words in his throat. He watched in shocked silence as a building on the far side of New Berlin exploded in flames. A second later, the deafening noise filled his ears. He blinked again, willing it to be false, but the image of the blazing building remained.

  Generals rushed to the window for a better view. Junior officers barked orders into their radios, demanding reports.

  Seidel spun about and stormed over to the nearest radio operator. The terrified junior officer looked up at him. His eyes were wide in terror as Seidel glared down at him.

  “Are the British here?” Seidel demanded. “How did they gain access to the colony?”

  The trembling junior officer shook his head, unable to tear his gaze away. “No, Herr Feldmarschall,” the radio operator said. “There are no reports of the British in or near New Berlin. This was…was something else.”

  “Out with it, man!”

  The young officer pressed the headset closer to his ear. He whispered for confirmation before nodding to himself and answering the question. “It was the Jews, Herr Feldmarschall. They blew up an armoury and launched a gun attack on a police station. The Jewish labourers… They’re in open rebellion.”

  140KM SOUTH-EAST OF NEW BERLIN

  13.10 MST

  DAY 1

  An unshakeable sense of foreboding washed over Sergeant McCabe as he sat in the crammed troop transport. His encounter with the Black Visors left him unnerved. Not so much for their precision strike but for their hasty, undetected escape with the bizarre-looking human. He knew from the minute he received his briefing on this mission that there was nothing normal about it. But now, with the indifference of the major, it took a more sinister element. Whoever their MJ-12 paymasters truly happened to be, it remained clear they were hiding a lot from the rank-and-file.

  Outwardly, McCabe tried to act like himself. He chided the soldiers around him to maintain battle readiness and observed them taking turns cleaning their weapons and equipment and eating what little food they could share between themselves. To their credit, they were taking everything in stride and acting like true professionals. Even after fleeing their downed ships, coming under immediate fire, and engaging in a firefight with pro-Nazi Russians, he could describe their mood as jovial. He knew deep down that they were scared, but, like him, they put on a brave face and turned their thoughts to the task at hand.

  “How long till we reach this place, Sarge?” Private Jenkins asked as he cleaned his Lee-Enfield.

  “An hour or two, Jenkins,” McCabe replied.

  “Think they’ll have any more of those…things there, Sarge?”

  The muted conversations in the transport died off as everyone turned to McCabe. Despite his best efforts to keep his section quiet about their encounter, word of the Black Visors and their “alien” charge had spread quickly throughout the ranks. In a few hours, the story had morphed beyond recognition, describing the Black Visors as supermen and the mysterious human as a bug-like alien with eight legs.

  “Stick to the task at hand, lad,” he said in a dismissive tone.

  Groans murmured throughout the transport compartment at his answer. From the dozens of eyes that kept gaping at him, he realised the soldiers held no plans on giving up that easily.

  “I mean, he looked like us, but not like us, know what I mean?” Jenkins continued, oblivious to McCabe’s glare. “How can someone look like that? Was it a birth defect or what?”

  “Shut it, Jenkins,” Corporal Brown snapped from the other side of the transport. “Do as the sergeant says and drop it.”

  “I can’t, though,” Jenkins said absentmindedly, still reassembling his weapon. “I mean, it’s a hard thing to forget. And the way they spoke German to him, of all things. Why not English?”

  “Because the Nazis probably taught him German, dim-wit,” Private Murphy shouted over a chorus of derisive laughter.

  “Still,” Jenkins said, ignorant to the merriment at his expense,
“it’s a shame I don’t speak German. I’d love to know what they were talking about.”

  The entire compartment erupted into another round of laughter. For a moment, McCabe hoped that signalled the end of the interaction, and he experienced a rush of relief. Looking around, everyone resumed their various conversations and tasks. But then his gaze met Private Woodward’s stare.

  “You speak German, don’t you, Sarge?” the private said, causing the laughter to die off. “You told us so. Said you picked some up in the last war. Do you know what they spoke about?”

  This time, McCabe knew he couldn’t deflect the question. He could order them to mind their own business, but something about this entire situation didn’t feel right. Although it went against protocol, he wanted the men under his command to know the sinking truth as much as he did. Maybe then he would be able to process the bizarre events of the last few hours.

  The compartment turned quiet when he sat up in his seat. Everyone stopped their tasks. Bodies froze in mid-action, cigarettes lingered between fingertips, and sandwiches lay uneaten as all eyes fixated on him.

  “They started by asking his name,” McCabe said, after clearing his throat. “He replied and said something like ‘Gaya’ or ‘Gya’ or something.”

  Intrigued babble broke out at the revelation but died under a sea of hushes. Everyone leaned in closer.

  “Then they asked where he came from and that caused a bit of confusion. The…this Gya person didn’t seem to understand at first. When he did, he replied with two words.”

  “What were they?” Jenkins shouted, with his face lighting up in excitement.

  Everyone in the compartment hushed him silent again. Some hands reached out and slapped him, causing the private to fidget from the flurry of soft blows. Fobbing them off, he returned his attention to McCabe.

  “Big Red.”

  A chorus of mumbling cut across the compartment as the soldiers tried to decipher the meaning. Raising his hands to quiet them, McCabe waited until he had their attention again and elaborated. “I think this Gya meant Mars. That must be what his…people call Mars. Big Red.”