by B. V. Larson
“It’s… it’s a dogman. One of those freaks that the Claver’s cooked up. The guys who captured me when I first got here.”
“I see that. Good work. You can die now. Graves out.”
Knife-work. That’s what it was all down to now. My rifle was dry.
I tried hard to kill them all. I figured that maybe, just maybe, there was a single unit of them. About a hundred troops coming up my way.
They had several disadvantages. For one thing, I’d killed at least twenty already. For another, they were walking uphill. The last element was the most important, however: they were stuck in that sick cloud of misty gore.
I kept shuffling back, staying out of the cloud. They were forced to rush forward, blinded, coming at me one or two at a time. If it hadn’t been for the shiny railway lines at our feet, they could have flanked me and killed me easily. But as it was, their attack was channeled. They could only face me as they reached me—and I’m pretty good with a knife. To the best of my knowledge, only one man was better—Harris.
The fight was long and grim. A dogman would come up to me, take a poke, and get jocked. Sometimes, I would grab his arm and push him out past the barrier, where he was immediately crushed by the ocean. Other times, I would chop off his hand at the wrist, or fake him out with a feint at the face, and then stick him in the guts.
Sometimes they shot me. I had leaks in my suit, and some of my limbs were beginning to go numb. That was from my armor automatically shutting down compromised regions to prevent me from bleeding out.
I didn’t care. I just kept fighting them. There wasn’t anything else to do, and if you want to take down a Varus man with damn-near thirty years of experience in the legions, well sir, you’d better mean business.
In the end, I caught a glimpse of flashing lights behind me.
That was it, then. They’d somehow gotten the high ground. Maybe there was another path. Or maybe we were shallow enough that a man could safely walk through the barrier and survive.
I was pretty near exhausted, and I almost didn’t care. But that was a quitter’s attitude. I didn’t let myself go down. Graves wouldn’t have, I told myself. Not until he was dragged down and killed by this endless mob.
So, I dispatched another hapless dogman by kicking out with my size thirteen boot. I hit him in the chest and sent him into the next man, who was so freaked out by the overload of death that he gutted his friend before he recognized who was suddenly in his face.
In that single moment of confusion, I dared to turn and look upslope. How many of them were behind me? How close were they?
What I saw through my stained and scarred faceplate surprised me. A single figure approached at a jogging pace. His suit lights were bright, and they were set in a familiar pattern. The man—the shape of him. It had to be a human.
Suddenly, I knew.
“Carlos?”
“I’m coming, big guy! Look out!”
Wheeling back, I saw a pair on the hunt. They were coming in low on all fours, under the cloud of gore. These two puppies were smarter than most, and they almost got me. I was jabbed in both legs, but then Carlos showed up and helped me kill them.
He stepped in front of me then. “Go on. You did your part.”
Turning, I tried to escape up the hill. I really did. But my legs just didn’t work anymore, and my suit was running out of power.
“I can’t run,” I said.
Carlos glanced at me. “Okay. Have it your way.”
Then, we began to fight. It went on for a long time. At that point, I figured that I’d killed about a hundred dogs. Before they brought us down at last, we must have killed a hundred more.
In the end I was on my back, gasping in my suit. Carlos was standing over me like a lion protecting his kill.
He was good. Better than I’d thought he would be. I admired his economy of motion, his practiced killing strokes and jabs. He fought like it was second nature to him—and I guess it was.
I had shit my suit by then, but I didn’t even care anymore. Then I died, probably from blood loss—but at least the enemy knew they’d been in a real fight.
-52-
When I was finally revived, it was up on the starship in orbit. Dominus held a fixed position over the island where all the fighting had taken place.
Brushing aside bio-people like they were fans wanting an autograph, I stepped out of the chambers on Blue Deck and laughed. What a fight that had been! I was proud of myself, and I was proud of Carlos, too.
But my good mood quickly faded. People were running around the ship, and they were following arrows to various destinations.
“Uh-oh…” I said aloud.
I contacted Turov—or at least I attempted to. She didn’t answer at first. Finally, however, on the fourth attempt she did answer her tapper and her tiny face looked up at me from my forearm.
“McGill? What are you doing on Dominus?”
“I guess I finally died down there, Tribune.”
“Right… of course. It’s going badly on that shitty island. Do you know of any way to penetrate that dome?”
I thought about the shaft at the bottom of the sea. “Yes,” I said. “Down in the ocean there’s this—”
“Whatever. Get up to Gold Deck—now!”
Forcing my legs into a gait that was half-stagger and half-run, I did as she commanded. Less than three minutes later, I was crowding my way onto the bridge.
I was already regretting my earlier bout of honesty. I could have enjoyed a hot shower and a good meal, maybe. But noooo, I had to go and open my big mouth about finding a hole in that big glass wall.
“Tribune?” I asked. “What can I do for you?”
“I’m sorry, sirs,” said the marine that had my arm in a lock—or so he supposed. In truth, he was just sort of hanging onto me, panting and looking stressed.
“Oh, jeez!” I said. “I’m sorry boy, I didn’t see you there. Maybe I should just walk back to the entrance and let you usher me in properly.”
Turov finally noticed us. “There you are, McGill. Stop playing with the guards.” She shooed the marines away, and I stood next to the center console.
Captain Merton and Galina were bent over the main holotank, eyeing a life-like three dimensional image of the glorious island I’d been spending so much quality time on.
“The tribune says you have a way to penetrate this dome, McGill. Explain it to me.”
“Uh… hasn’t Graves or anyone told you about it?”
“We’re out of communication with the troops inside that dome. Radio, teleportation—it’s impervious to all that.”
I looked at Merton and managed to force a smile. He seemed stressed, but that might just have been due to Galina riding him so hard on his own bridge. That had to be humiliating to any captain in Earth’s fleet.
Using quick words that got to the point, I explained about the tunnel to the bottom of the sea, and how it seemed to go right through the dome.
“That’s interesting… but pretty much useless. We can’t go down there and run in troops, or send a lifter to that depth to gather survivors. Thanks McGill, you’re dismissed.”
Relieved, I did a spin on my boot heel. When getting out of duties, it was critical to remove yourself from sight, sound and mind as fast as possible.
Unfortunately, Galina looked up again from the holotank just as I was touching my cap to the irritable marines.
“Just a minute. What the hell were you doing down there? Why were you walking on the bottom of the ocean—again?”
“I… uh… I was following orders, sir. Graves sent me down to investigate. There were a whole lot of dogmen down there, see, and—”
“Dogmen? You mean those genetic freaks Claver has been breeding?”
“Yessir. The very same.”
Galina and Merton exchanged glances. She took three steps toward me. “McGill… do you realize this ship is in a state of emergency action?
“Sure does look like it.”
“Right… and did you chance to wonder why that is?”
“Well… I only just caught a revive, sir. I’m a bit behind on current events.”
“Not at all. I think you might be more ahead of the curve than you realize. The island is being overrun by those damned dogmen. We can’t talk to the men trapped down there, but we can still see what’s happening.”
“The island is overrun? How? Just Carlos and I must have killed a hundred or more.”
“Very commendable, but they aren’t coming from just the lab complex. They’re rushing in from a dozen spots on the island. Apparently, you only found one of the secret pathways down deep into the sea.”
I was totally surprised. My jaw sagged, and I gave my head a little shake. “Really? There’s more than one tunnel into the ocean?”
Galina and Merton again glanced at one another. They looked suspicious—suspicious of me. “I told you he would never confess everything at once. He admits the minimum, then makes good his escape. Notice how he’s halfway to the doors already?”
“Hold on,” I said.
Merton talked to Galina like I wasn’t there. “I don’t know. He seems as baffled as the rest of us. If he knows so much, how did he end up fighting to the death in that tube down there?”
Merton and Turov were all focused on one another, and I knew that this was the right moment to slip out—but I couldn’t do it. Curiosity got the best of me.
“Sirs? Can I ask exactly why this ship is panicking? I mean, even if we lose the island, it’s not that big of a deal, is it?”
They turned back to me. Merton put his hands behind his back and answered me sternly. “The Skay border guards have discovered us. They’re converging on our location right now, and our codes no longer seem to be working. We don’t have many hours left before we must flee this star system.”
“Oh…” I said, thinking right away of Armel’s predictions. He’d been right, we’d been drawn into his trap and fallen for every trick these rebels had waiting for us all along.
Galina frowned at me. “We need an immediate way to get those troops out of there, McGill. Either that—or the survivors are as good as permed.”
“Shit… could we just have them commit mass-suicide, or something?”
They both looked like they smelled dog shit.
Galina seemed pissed at the mere thought. “That’s against regs, and it wouldn’t look very good on anyone’s track record back at Central, now would it? Besides, we’re out of touch with them.”
That’s when I caught on. This was a losing campaign—or at least, it was a loser at this moment. Galina had learned from Deech long ago that you couldn’t get failures associated with your name if you wanted to climb ranks—and she liked rank-climbing.
They went back to wrangling over the map. I stepped up behind them, and I peeped over their shoulders. Sometimes, being as tall as a streetlight had its advantages.
“We can’t do it,” Galina said. “The brass would never be fooled. They would know we panicked and acted out of desperation.”
“Tribune Turov,” Merton said, “we are beyond the point of worrying about our reputations. The enemy is closing in, and we need a quick solution. Either that, or the people below face capture by the Skay.”
“That’s a lot of lost gear…”
“They don’t have any extremely valuable equipment left. Most of the revival machines and the three lifters are all safely aboard my ship. Surely, you can’t be fussing over a few thousand weapons and spacesuits!”
Galina faced him angrily. “I’m not fussing, Captain. I never fuss.”
Now, right there, that was a flat-out lie. I’d known Galina for decades, and I could swear on a stack of bibles as an eye-witness to at least two dozen acts of fussing—but I calculated it was a bad time to bring that up, so I stayed quiet.
“What’s your solution, then?” Merton asked her in a low tone.
Galina did some hard thinking. I didn’t like to see that. Her eyes were narrow and evil-looking. She had a devilish way about her when she was caught out in a bad situation.
Finally, she turned toward me. She did this slowly, and a smile grew on her face as she contemplated my long arms and befuddled expression.
“We’ll use McGill. He’s done this sort of thing before. Everyone will believe it.”
“Uh…” I said.
Captain Merton was eyeing me now as well, judging me. I felt like a prized pig at the fair. “Yes,” he said as if coming to a sudden, definite decision. “I’ll see that my marines stand down. You arrange the rest of it.”
So saying, he stepped away. I watched him go, frowning. I didn’t like this turn of events—mostly because I had no earthly idea what was going on.
“James…” Galina said in suddenly sweet tone. “Let’s go have a talk, shall we?”
“Uh… okay.”
I followed her like a gorilla following his mistress. The marines smirked as we left the deck, so I gave them a quick look at my middle finger.
This didn’t faze them, however. They just smiled more broadly than ever.
Galina walked me off the bridge and down the passages to her private quarters. She chased away every hog-impersonating guard we met along the way.
At last, she lingered at the doorway to her quarters. There, she turned and touched my arm.
I don’t mind telling you that I was affected. She was just as pretty as she’d been for the last twenty years or so, after her killing back on Tech World and revival as a teen. Nowadays, when she was revived she was physically around twenty-one or so, but I’m not a picky man. She was still well within her prime years.
“James, would you like to come inside and spend some private time with me?”
My eyebrows shot high. I hadn’t hoped for this kind of a direct invitation. Without hesitating an instant, I moved to walk past her.
But I found a small, skinny arm barring my path.
“Hey… I thought that was an invitation.”
“It was. But you have to do something for me, first.”
Our eyes met, and I caught on quick. “This isn’t going to be a nice thing, is it?”
“I’m afraid not.”
Heaving a sigh and crossing my arms, I looked her up and down one more time. Part of me said I should have some pride. That I should just turn around and walk off. I would feel better in the morning if I did, and I knew it.
But that wasn’t so easy for a man like me.
Galina studied me and waited for my answer.
At last, I shrugged. “Exactly what needs doing?”
She smiled then, and that smile was an evil thing to behold. I’d seen her make that kind of face before, and it would have given a lesser man a chill.
She had me, and we both knew it.
What exactly needed doing was something I’d done before but never enjoyed. I had to march down to fire control, brush aside the navy pukes and man the broadsides.
This time, it wasn’t just some solo cowboy horseshit. I had two stout men at my back. They were both noncoms from other units. I didn’t know them personally, but they had that grim-faced murdering look that so many veterans had in Legion Varus.
Why couldn’t Galina just order the strike herself? That should be obvious to anyone who was paying attention. If she fired Dominus’ big guns of her own volition, well sir, that would mean it was her fault that billions of credits worth of gear was destroyed and a third of her legion was exterminated like stray dogs in the street.
Brushing aside a load of cursing ensigns, I told the veterans to grip both trigger-handles at opposite sides of the control chamber, and we rolled down the big blast shields.
Outside the ship, sixteen cannons swiveled and locked onto the dome far below. You couldn’t even see it from up here, above the clouds, but some techs had done the math and given us the numbers to punch in. It was all a done deal.
“Fire on three, gentlemen. One… Two…”
There was a scuffle in the passa
ges outside, and I glanced back, worried that something had gone wrong with this horrid plan. Just in case it had, I picked up the pace.
“Three!” I boomed out, and the whole ship bucked.
At least, that’s what it felt like. As if the deck had stood up and saluted our chins.
One of the veterans, the man to my left, managed to bean himself on the console. He slumped down onto the deck. He got up again, moaning. These guys weren’t trained to man the cannons and ride out the tremendous kick they gave your boots when you fired them.
The man to my right fared a little better. He’d gone to one knee, but he was still in the game. He struggled back up painfully. “Sorry sir, but I think I might have cracked something.”
“Ride it out, soldier. We’re pulling out of here.”
“Not so fast, McGill.”
The veteran who was in better shape whirled and brought his weapon up. That was a mistake, of course. A marine behind Galina gave him a few rounds. Falling back against the console, he clung to it for support.
Smiling, Galina walked into the room and surveyed the scene proudly. “James, you’ve done it again. This is gross insubordination.”
“That’s right, sir. It surely is.”
Both the men who’d accompanied me looked bewildered, shocked, and a little ashamed. Who knew what stories of glory they’d been filled with? I didn’t know, and I didn’t care.
I was, however, a mite pissed off. Galina hadn’t said anything about rushing in and arresting us instantly. She’d obviously been waiting for me to pull this stunt, so she could pull hers right after. That just didn’t sit right with me. She was going off-script—and she’d written it.
“Gentlemen, on my command,” I said loudly.
Galina swaggered into the room, barely looking at me. She was strutting happily.
“Fire!” I shouted without warning.
The two men were on their feet now. One was dying, the other had buckling knees, but they were trained professionals. They reached out as one, gripping the twin triggers, and they yanked them for a second time.
Outside the ship, the big guns spoke again. Sixteen more fusion warheads were sent hurtling down toward Green World. There were going to be some tidal waves after this, I was sure of that much.