Hell Heart

by Robert E. Vardeman

  “Find their observers,” he ordered. “Remove them!”

  The soldiers fanned out doing what they did best. They melted into the landscape, and even José was hard-pressed to spot the guerrillas as they moved forward. They might stand out to IR equipment, especially if they fired their rifles, but they moved too quickly for detection to matter.

  He hoped.

  “Come on!” he cried, rushing forward. José wished now that he’d launched the attack before dawn, using the cover of darkness as an ally, infrared detectors or no. As he went, he tossed out IR flares, invisible to the eye but a burning, blinding spot to any electro-optical sensor. Confuse, then move in for the kill. It was all they could do against a superior force.

  Sporadic firing told him his troops had found the Union observers. That they were on duty so early was one more sign of a traitor in his ranks. Or could Diego actually have guessed that Revancha was the real target? Had José grown so obvious that even Diego could anticipate his next move?

  The garrison could not stay on alert endlessly. Its soldiers would tire and make mistakes after a day or two of back-to-back shifts. That meant Diego must have issued the orders only recently—probably with incentives of money, whiskey, and campesino women—to coincide with the El Manguito attack.

  “He is smarter than I thought, my little brother,” José murmured to himself.

  “What did you say?” asked Consuela, dropping to one knee. She lifted her Kalashnikov, then squeezed off a three-round burst that took out an enemy soldier advancing on them.

  “Nothing. They are coming out of their holes. Fight, chica, fight!”

  José took his own advice without waiting for a response. The garrison commander risked much by sending his troops out to meet the guerrillas head-on. He might feel confident on his own territory, territory mined and waiting to kill unwary invaders, but he was wrong. José and his force now controlled the exterior of the CANDU.

  “Report,” he snapped into his radio. Now that their advantage of surprise was blown, maintaining radio silence no longer mattered. He had to know how the fight went elsewhere.

  “No resistance,” came Gunther’s surprising report. “They drew back when we opened fire. We’re inside the main gates.”

  “Watch out for mines, both remotely detonated and contact. They’ve been blocking our way over here. The Union soldiers are coming out to engage us directly,” José said.

  “Affirm—” Gunther’s voice was cut off and lost in a haze of static as José’s radio went dead. An alert Union comm officer must have sent out a high-powered burst that fried the radio’s chips. Listening in might give some small tactical advantage, but removing the enemy’s ability to communicate gave the greater edge to the defenders.

  José tossed away the now-worthless radio unit. The Neo-Soviets knew nothing about building such devices anyway. He needed to steal a good Union-made one, with variable encryption and microburst capability.

  He hit the ground at the corner of a warehouse near the reactor, skidded on his belly, and brought up his rifle. Meeting with no resistance, he pulled a grenade from his belt, triggered it, and tossed it through the open door of the warehouse. The resulting explosion a few seconds later was strong enough to take out any Union personnel lurking inside. The building would serve well as a staging and assault point for the final push toward the central reactor building. Consuela went in first, and José followed with a half dozen freedom fighters.

  “Empty,” Consuela said, looking around in confusion. “The entire warehouse is empty.”

  Her words echoed in the cavernous space, ordinarily piled with equipment and supplies. Despite the enemy’s hasty withdrawal from the building, they had taken every piece of important equipment. It must have been well planned. Diego had warned his force at Revancha.

  “They suspected we would attack and prepared for it,” José said urgently. “To the reactor building. Quickly, or we will lose all chance of taking it!”

  Nervous, but still determined, José’s men formed up behind him as he ran for the back door of the warehouse, closest to the reactor. He had just reached it, Consuela close on his heels, when all hell broke loose.

  * * *

  Diego Villalobos leaned forward, studying the green ghost-spots darting across his battlefield display. He sucked in a breath and let it out, thumbed his comm unit, and said, “The guerrillas are at the outer fence. Prepare for assault. Repeat, all units prepare for assault.”

  The Pegasus whined, lifted, and shot forward. Diego had halted his forces almost a kilometer outside Revancha to keep from spooking José. The plan had worked. Just as he’d guessed, the guerrillas had struck with a shock squad hitting the front gate to pull Union defenders away from the back fence. Diego watched as the guerrillas rushed across the road he had ordered mined. Some died—not many, but enough to slow the attack.

  The Pegasus kicked into high-speed approach. Diego saw the dots begin to merge on his screen and shifted to less detail on a larger area display. Two squads of guerrillas had taken cover in the warehouse he’d ordered abandoned.

  “Major Hinojosa,” Diego called over the comm to the Revancha commander. “Warehouse is occupied.”

  “Blow it, sir?”

  “Blow it!”

  The center of Diego’s battle display blossomed with the intense heat of detonating bombs. Any guerrilla in the warehouse was far past caring about the reactor now. He wondered with a brief pang if José had been caught in the blast. It was the position he would have taken, were he leading the guerrilla attack. Then Diego concentrated more on the ebb and flow of battle on other fronts. The guerrillas coming in the front gate fought like maniacs.

  “Driver, get us around to the front gates. Trap the Zapatistas between the Revancha defenders and our guns.” He extended one hand to brace himself as the Pegasus swung about and raced for the worst of the fighting. Diego felt the need to get into battle again.

  He did not find the battle. It found him.

  An RPG blasted out the side of the poorly armored Pegasus, sending it slewing to one side. Diego grabbed his Bulldog rifle and bailed out, hitting the ground and rolling until he could find a target. He squeezed off a round and took down a guerrilla. Then the survivors from his Pegasus added their fire to that of another Union squad.

  He ordered his soldiers forward, squeezing the guerrillas between two deadly barrages.

  “Sir, a few are escaping along the fence line,” one of his men reported.

  “Let them go,” Diego said. “Attention, everyone, we’re going to squash the guerrillas near the reactor the same way we did these. Take out as many as you can, but do not pursue. I repeat, do not pursue. We’re here to defend the reactor.”

  Diego joined with the lieutenant commanding the company at the front gate. Together, with a force of more than fifty soldiers, they ran through the reactor complex toward the central building. Lacking his battle display, Diego almost overran the fighting. The guerrillas had been caught just short of the reactor.

  “Stop them. The ones with the explosives,” he shouted. He fired full-auto at a trio of Zapatistas trying to plant a bomb on the external wall of the reactor-pressure vessel. It was thick 401 stainless steel, and he doubted they could breach it, but why take a chance?

  Shooting the three was an easy task for a full rifle company.

  “Report,” he demanded into his comm unit. “Where’s the worst of the fighting?”

  “At the reactor, sir,” came Major Hinojosa’s triumphant voice. “We’ve got ’em on the run everywhere else.”

  “Clean up the stragglers, Major, then swing around and form another line behind my position. That will trap the Zapatistas within two lines of our soldiers.”

  Diego worked harder to get his troops into position. He was glad that they had fought against the Cyclops, even with their severe losses. It had made them more confident going against mere humans—and turned the ground around the reactor into a killing field.

  “Got
the surviving Zapatistas cornered at the northeast corner of the reactor,” Diego reported. “Not more than thirty or forty of them left. Everyone, check your charge levels, reload, and get ready. We’re going in for the kill. No quarter, unless they surrender!”

  Diego Villalobos slammed a new clip into his Bulldog, loaded a grenade in the launcher, then gave the order to attack.

  * * *

  “They’re everywhere,” Mary Stephenson said, injured and propped up against several fuel barrels—the only cover they had been able to find. “We got rat-trapped good and proper, José.”

  “You don’t need to tell me.” José was sick. He had barely escaped the warehouse before it blew. Nearly all of his men had been killed in the blast. Flaco had been shot dead in front of him by a Union rifle. He had lost contact with Gunther but recognized a few of his men struggling to reach the jungle and get away. Mary was severely wounded and unable to walk on her own. Consuela was covered in blood, most of it her own, and he had too many minor wounds to count. They had come close, very close, to the reactor—but not close enough. And now any chance they had had of capturing it was drifting away in the wind.

  “They are closing in on us, like a noose about our necks.” José took a deep breath and forced himself to calm down. He recognized some of the Union soldiers advancing on them as belonging to Diego’s personal squad. Underestimating his younger brother had proved disastrous. Now it was time to salvage what he could.

  “Can we at least get to the reactor and disable it?” The disheartened looks he got told him that road was closed. “What of the rail guns?”

  “One left. Four RPGs with grenades,” Consuela said.

  José came to a swift decision. This was no time to be faint of heart. Diego would have him in a flash if he hesitated, and his capture would doom the Zapatista movement. The Consulta would be disbanded and hope for independence in Chiapas gone.

  “Use the rail gun to take out a segment of the attackers directly north of us,” he ordered. “Fire fast and fire often. Those of you with the RPGs, run for the jungle the instant you see the way open up. Then, from the jungle, use your grenades to cover the rest of us.”

  José reached over and squeezed Consuela’s hand. “Only a few of us will escape, chica. I am sorry for this.”

  “No victory without daring,” she said, smiling back at him with an effort.

  The rail gun began spewing depleted-uranium ingots through the Union line. The wave of advancing Mexican Contribution Force soldiers rippled and fell back, giving the four Zapatistas with the RPGs their opening. The supporting fire José and the others laid down held open the narrow path to escape.

  “Now, go, chica, go. Direct the RPG fire.”

  “José, you can’t stay behind. You—”

  “Consuela, go!” He shoved her in the direction of the jungle that had shielded them so admirably over the years. She ran, head down, while he fired his Kalashnikov into the Union ranks to cover her retreat. He turned to Mary, bent, and started to pick her up. Her legs were too damaged to walk.

  “Don’t be a fool, José,” she gasped, swatting him away. “Go on. I’ll keep ’em off your neck. Just promise me one thing. They beat us today. Don’t let them win the final battle!”

  “Mary,” he said, putting his grimy hand to her equally grimy, bloody cheek. “With a dozen more like you, we would have won long ago.”

  She yanked the Kalashnikov from his hands, wiggled around, and started firing both her own rifle and his. José knew it was time to go. He followed the others, vaulting over those who had fallen, feeling the hot sting of lead singing past him. He had almost reached the cover of the jungle when the lower-pitched sound of Mary’s Kalashnikov, easily discernible over the higher-pitched Pitbulls, fell silent. Just short of the protective greenery, José paused and looked back.

  And locked eyes with his brother. Diego was standing near the barrels where José had so recently been crouched, his rifle raised and pointed in José’s direction. Even at this distance, José could see him hesitate, then lower the gun. The two stared at each other a moment longer, and then José turned and dived into the safety of the jungle.

  The four guerrillas with RPGs, under Consuela’s able direction, had saved them. Many of his people had escaped under the covering fire. Even the one armed with the Harbinger rail gun had made it out of the deadly trap Revancha had become. But they were still few—pitifully few. Most of their comrades lay dead behind them. For them, the fighting was over.

  “Explosives,” José ordered. “Set bombs with proximity fuses, drop them, and then run like the devil himself is on our heels.”

  The devil did not follow, but Diego did.

  18

  * * *

  I will see you court-martialed for this, Sergeant!” Alex Allen shouted, glaring at Suarez. “How dare you break comm silence against my orders?”

  “That was the colonel’s order, not yours,” Suarez replied with carefully calculated insolence—just one hair’s width this side of insubordination. “You’ve been pointing out for hours that you’re the only one in charge now, and nothing Colonel Villalobos said is to be obeyed.”

  “I am the commander of the San Cristóbal garrison now,” Allen said angrily. “Lieutenant Travis reports directly to me and to no one else. Is that clear?”

  “You betcha,” Suarez said. After a discernible pause, he added, “Sir.”

  Allen continued to glower at the stocky soldier, who stood, hands behind his back, legs planted solidly, completely unperturbed by the waves of hostility coming from his superior officer.

  “What did Lieutenant Travis report from El Manguito?” Allen asked at length, annoyed that he had to ask—finally. The glint in Suarez’s eye told him the man thought he’d scored a point.

  “The Cyclops are more difficult to eliminate than anticipated,” Suarez said. “She reports four killed. There may be as many as three more still roaming the region. Lieutenant Travis wants to secure the port and be certain the civilian population is protected before she goes after the remaining mutants.”

  “The local garrison commander can tend to that. I don’t like San Cristóbal being so . . . vulnerable,” Allen said. What good was command if he had only twenty soldiers? That wasn’t even platoon strength. He fretted, briefly weighing the advantages of having Lieutenant Travis’s squads back at San Cristóbal versus the disadvantages of having the truculent officer here herself. He hadn’t gotten the impression that she thought much of Diego Villalobos, but he suspected she thought even less of him. What he had in mind was too important to risk interference from a squat, stubborn mule of a woman.

  “All right,” he said at last. “Leave them where they are and let them assist the garrison commander in hunting down the remaining Cyclops.” His mind made up, he turned his attention to the other potential threat to his command: Colonel Villalobos. He was hoping for a truly spectacular screwup at Revancha—maybe something along the lines of a massacre. Forty or fifty dead Union soldiers, and Allen would look even more appealing to the brass, once his version of Diego’s incompetence was confirmed. That, plus the prize that lay out in the jungle, just waiting for him to come get it, would ensure his quick rise back in the ranks.

  “While you were illegally using the comm equipment, did you happen to pick up anything about Colonel Villalobos?” he asked Suarez.

  “The colonel himself was unavailable,” Suarez said, sounding disappointed. “I spoke to Major Hinojosa, who’s in command at Revancha, and he reports a complete rout of the guerrillas. At least a hundred, maybe more, dead. Minimal casualties on our side. No damage to the reactor.”

  Allen drummed his fingers on the desk, irritated at this turn of events. But in the end, it would make little difference. From what he had gathered, the brass in Mexico City HQ hated Villalobos enough that they would seize on any excuse to get rid of him—one insignificant victory in battle would not be enough to change that. As long as he performed better than Villalobos, his command wa
s safe. And he only needed to keep it long enough to get that meteorite.

  “So where is the colonel?” he asked.

  “He pursued the surviving guerrilla forces into the jungle,” Suarez reported. “No word from him since.”

  With any luck, we’ll never hear from him again, Allen thought, and then dismissed Villalobos from his mind. He had to stay focused on destroying that pit creature and getting his hands on the meteorite.

  And asserting his authority over this sergeant. The man’s insubordination was troubling. Allen had not thought any of Villalobos’s soldiers had that much loyalty for their commander—former commander, he corrected himself. But Suarez had been nothing but trouble ever since Allen had taken over. The problem would soon spread to Suarez’s men—unless Allen slapped him down now.

  “See to patrolling the post perimeter, Sergeant,” he ordered. “I want visual observation as well as electronic surveillance at all times.”

  “There aren’t enough soldiers for that,” Suarez replied without inflection.

  “For that, sir!” Allen snapped. “You will address your superior officer in a military manner!”

  “Put me in the guardhouse. You’d be down to one sergeant and two corporals.”

  “I don’t bluff, Sergeant.”

  “I don’t either, Captain.”

  The two men locked eyes across the desk, but in the end it was Allen who dropped his eyes first. As much as he hated to admit it, he could do nothing to the senior enlisted man. If he were to order Suarez placed under arrest, he had no one to replace him. Worse, Allen was not entirely certain the other soldiers would obey such an order. Any sedition in such a small number would doom his command.

  And his precarious position definitely ruled out any expeditions to the crater. Even without the fact that such a sortie would leave the garrison completely vulnerable to attack, he wasn’t certain he could depend on these ragtag men and women to hold their ground against an alien creature so powerful and unpredictable. He knew that well enough from his experiences in Alaska.