by Jake Elwood
The trees, he discovered, were laid out in a perfect grid. He could see now that they were in straight lines, like the intersections on a sheet of graph paper. His embarrassment increased. Never mind that. The Hive is on this planet. Focus. Lives are at stake.
The near wall of the crater loomed behind him. His assignment was to make his way across the crater floor, keeping out of sight, and gather intelligence. Above all he was to look for human survivors. They would be the best source of information.
The ground became rough, and the perfect grid of trees gave way to a jumble of rock with apple trees sprouting here and there wherever there was a pocket of soil. The ground rose, the trees ended, and Nicholson found himself climbing through a tangle of shrubs. He used both feet and one hand for as long as he could, then reluctantly slung the rifle across his back and used both hands to climb.
The ridge was no more than ten meters high, and the crest too choked with vegetation to offer much of a view. He unslung the rifle and kept watch as the others clambered up to join him. Then he slung the rifle again and clambered down the other side.
Some kind of crop grew on the far side of the ridge. Even Nicholson could see that the knee-high plants formed straight lines with dark furrows on either side. He had no idea what the crop was. The orchard was on flat ground, but this part of the crater was filled with low, rolling hills.
Gillett stepped up beside him, unslinging her rifle. "Is that a building?" She pointed.
Nicholson squinted into the distance. He could make out a dark shape poking above the corner of a hill a couple of hundred meters away. He took a binoc from his backpack and lifted it to his eyes. He zoomed in, watching the image jump and wobble despite electronic correction. He could see a flat rectangle, covered in green siding.
"It's a building, all right. I can't tell what kind. We'll check it out."
She nodded, and they waited while Hudson and Parrish clambered down the slope. Then Nicholson led them off in a curve that would put the bulk of a hill between them and the distant building. They paused in a sheltered hollow.
"Hudson," Nicholson said softly. "You go around the hill that way." He gestured to the right. "Parrish, you go the other way." He pointed left. "Gillett, you and I are going over the top. Stop and hold your position when you can see something."
They nodded. The other men moved out, and Nicholson started up the hill, Gillett a few steps behind him and off to one side.
She dropped to a crouch as they neared the crest, and Nicholson copied her. By the time they reached the top they were wriggling on their stomachs, leaving a trail of mangled plants behind them. Nicholson rose up on his elbows so he could see over the crop.
A cluster of buildings nestled at the base of the hill. There was a small house, a long Quonset hut, and a couple of rectangular structures that seemed to be made from logs. One log building had a door that hung ajar. As Nicholson watched, a puff of wind caught the door. It banged against the wall, and the sound reached him a moment later.
Aside from the door, nothing moved.
"Looks abandoned," Gillett murmured.
Nicholson said, "Hudson. Parrish. What do you see?"
"Just an empty farmyard," Hudson said.
Parrish said, "I can hear something banging, but I can't see where it's coming from. There's a covered pad on the side of the house. It looks like they parked a vehicle there. The vehicle's gone, though." After a moment he added, "I can see an open window. They must've left in a hurry, if they're gone."
"Let's take a look," Nicholson said. "Stay sharp." He rose to his hands and knees, crawling forward until he was below the crest of the hill. When he was low enough not to be skylined he stood and trotted down the hill, Gillett beside him. He could see Parrish and Hudson coming in from either side.
They spread out as they reached the yard. Nicholson headed for the log building with the swinging door. He poked the barrel of his rifle through the doorway, then quickly stepped through and moved to one side.
The inside was shadowy and smelled of dust. A couple of windows high on one wall let in shafts of sunlight. He could see motes of dust glittering and dancing in the light. The building was small, maybe half a dozen paces from wall to wall, and filled with crude wooden bins. Bushel baskets filled one bin. The baskets looked as if they might have been woven from palm leaves. The baskets were empty, and so were the other bins.
He stepped outside. Gillett came out of the other log building and shrugged.
"There's some farm equipment in the Quonset." It was Hudson, speaking over his implants. "No sign of life, though."
Parrish said, "The house is clear too."
They met at the front door of the house. "Stay out here and keep watch," Nicholson said to Hudson. Then he entered the house, Gillett on his heels.
He found himself in a kitchen, small by the standard of houses on Earth, downright palatial to a man who served on corvettes. There was a wood-burning stove, and a counter with a couple of electric burners. A large pot sat on one burner, the top spattered with tomato sauce.
There was a table, crudely made from wooden planks. The plates were plastic, and they were heaped with moldy food.
Gillett sniffed. "I can't smell it," she said, gesturing at the table. "This house has been abandoned for quite a while."
A floorboard creaked, and Nicholson's fingers tensed on his rifle. It was just Parrish, though, appearing in the kitchen doorway. "Looks like a husband and wife and two kids lived here," he said. "Gone now, though."
"I'm going outside," said Gillett. "This place gives me the creeps."
Nicholson looked around the kitchen. If the house held any more clues, he couldn't see them. He followed Gillett into the yard.
A dirt road led from the yard, through more rolling farmland, and off toward the middle of the crater. Trees lined both sides of the road. It made for easy walking and decent cover, and they set off down the middle of the road.
Fifteen minutes of walking brought them to another farmyard. They stood at the end of a long driveway looking at a house and a single large outbuilding. A trailer sat in front of the house, stacked with half a dozen crates. A couple more crates sat on the ground beside it. Quite a bit of wind-blown debris, mostly dried leaves by the look of it, had accumulated on the upwind side of the crates. The yard was long abandoned.
"They started to pack up their stuff," Hudson said. "Then they changed their minds. Left it here and ran."
"Looks that way," said Nicholson.
"You want us to check out the house?"
"No. Let's keep going."
He paused, though. The driveway was the first break they'd seen in the double line of trees. The house was on a low hill, and he could see for several kilometers in every direction. He didn't like it at first. The crater walls, not too far apart this close to the side of the crater, made a comforting visual barrier. They made it seem more like a proper city, where you could never see too far.
When he looked the other way, he felt goosebumps rise on his arms. More hills rose, not far off, hiding the ground from view. But he could see the crater walls curving away and fading in the distance with majestic grandeur. What was it like to live here, he wondered. To see this view every day?
A plastic tricycle lay on its side near the front of the house, by a little wagon, meticulously hand crafted from wood. What would it be like to grow up in a place like this, to walk out your front door and run around in real grass, to see kilometer after kilometer of trees and plants and growing things?
Gillett said, "Lieutenant?"
"This must have been a nice place to live," he said. "Before the Hive."
She nodded. "I don't suppose humans will ever live here again."
"No. Probably not." Not unless the war goes far better than we have any right to expect. "Come on." He turned away from the yard. "Let's go find the people who lived here."
Man, I just love that guitar solo at the end. Gives me goosebumps every time. You're listening to Sharo
n Crowfoot on Radio Free Naxos, the voice of free men and women across the entire star system. You might be hiding at the base of the crater wall listening to a Rover radio with the last bit of juice left in the battery. You might be back in your house, jumping at every noise, wondering when the aliens are going to come through the door, or through your wall. It might be weeks since you've seen anyone except the people you're hiding out with, if you're lucky enough to be part of a group. But I'm here to remind you that you're not alone. We are the free people of Naxos. We are scattered, but we are united, and we will prevail.
Now settle back and enjoy a modern masterpiece. This is the Trash Can Trio with Back Alley Jam.
CHAPTER 10 - NICHOLSON
Ariadne had a period of rotation of less than eighteen hours, which made for a very short day. The floor of the crater was in shadow, indirectly lit by a blaze of sunlight reflected from the east wall of the crater, when Nicholson heard music coming from somewhere down the road.
He and Gillett took to the ditch on the left, while Hudson and Parrish moved to the opposite ditch. They advanced slowly, staying close to the trunks of the trees that continued to line the road on either side, climbing a gentle slope. They slowed even more as they neared the crest, scanning the ground ahead before slipping from the bole of one tree to another.
At the top of a low ridge they stopped. Gillett stood behind a tree while Nicholson knelt in a patch of brush. As he peered through the branches he saw small red berries decorating the bush in front of him, and he wondered idly if they were edible. There was something marvellous about the idea of eating wild food. Sure, he understood on an intellectual level that people had done such things for millennia before the rise of modern civilization. He'd just never encountered it in person.
Tilting his head to one side let him see past the bush and into a broad pocket of land surrounded by hills to the front and right, and rising ridges of stone on the left that went up and up, growing steeper until they merged with the vertical east wall of the crater.
The trees that had lined the road for the past several kilometers ended just below the crest of the ridge. The road ended too, fading into a pair of ruts in a waving expanse of grass. In the middle of the grassy pocket, almost a kilometer from Nicholson and his team, stood a cubical structure maybe five meters on a side. It was made of metal, covered in ducts and pipes and tubes, and it made Nicholson think of electrical substations. A revolving light on the top of the cube flashed and blinked. He had no idea what it signified.
A light breeze ruffled the hair on the back of Nicholson's neck, and sent waves rippling through the grass. The music faded away, then came back as the wind changed direction. It sounded like a dance tune, highly synthesized, the kind of thing teens loved and their parents hated. It seemed to be coming from the cubical structure.
He took out his binoc and zoomed in on the cube. The image wobbled and shook, and he lowered the binoc, shuffling over until his shoulder was against the trunk of a tree. He braced an elbow on his knee and lifted the binoc again.
With his arms stabilized the image finally became clear. The structure was human-made. He could read safety warnings stenciled on the side. He scanned the structure carefully. A large pipe near the base had a logo painted on it, and he could make out some text. It said, "Ariadne Water Services".
"I think it's for pumping fresh water," he said, and handed the binoc up to Gillett. "Have a look."
She stared for a long time, then lowered the binoc. She didn't speak.
"Well?" he said at last. "What do you think?"
"I think it's Soul of Love. Not the original, though. Somebody did a crap electro-pop remix."
Nicholson turned to stare up at her.
"Why do people do that?" she said plaintively. "The song is a classic. We don't need a horrible new version."
The distant music faded. Someone spoke for thirty seconds or so, the words an indistinct mumble. Then a sprightly jazz tune started.
"That's better," said Gillett.
"You know, you're really no help at all." She gave him a hurt look, which he ignored. He reclaimed the binoc and scanned the horizon. The only movement was the waving grass. He stood. "Let's go check it out."
The four of them walked to the end of the road, spreading out to make a poorer target. It was a pointless precaution, Nicholson was sure. This side of the crater was abandoned.
He passed the last tree and took a step onto the grass. Red light flashed in a copse of trees on the far side of the bowl, the side of his face felt briefly warm, and wood crackled behind him. He hit the ground, not sure why but obeying his instincts. The others copied him.
He looked back, and felt a chill run down his spine. A large branch just above head height on the closest tree was broken close to the trunk. The branch hung straight down now, and he saw a wisp of smoke rising from a blackened area on the stump of the branch. It took a moment for his brain to catch up.
"Laser fire," he said. "Take cover."
The four of them rose together, scrambling behind the closest tree trunks, then darting over the crest of the slope. Nicholson threw himself down on his stomach in the middle of the road. Gillett hit the ground in one ditch, Hudson and Parrish in the other.
"Gillett. Inform the Achilles." He twisted his head the other way. "Hudson. Crawl forward and take a look. For pity's sake keep your head down."
Hudson nodded and wriggled forward.
For a moment Nicholson just laid there, listening to the urgent thump of his heart. He could smell dust from the road, and his own sweat. There was also a vague greenish smell, the smell of rich soil and living things on all sides. The evening air was cool, and he found himself savoring the moment. Nature. Fresh air. Open spaces. I never knew I was missing it …
Finally, gritting his teeth, he started worming his way down the middle of the road. He timed it so he reached the top of the crest at the same time as Hudson. The two of them lay still, gazing across the bowl, waiting for the distant laser to strike again.
Nothing moved, and no weapon fired.
"I think I see something," Hudson murmured. "Bottom of that hill on the left."
Nicholson was reaching for the binoc when the damaged branch fell from the laser-scorched tree. He flinched, barely managing to suppress an undignified shriek. When his breathing was under control he brought the binoc to his eyes.
A vehicle came rolling around the base of the hill. It was an electric Rover, and he could see two people in the front, perfectly ordinary human beings. One of them was actually steering, something you hardly ever saw on Earth these days. The Rover took a meandering course, zigging and zagging across the grass, making it challenging for him to zoom in.
He managed it, though, and found himself staring at the magnified face of a young woman. She had a scab on her cheek surrounded by a dark bruise. She wore a light jacket, and he saw her smile as she spoke to the person beside her. Then the Rover swerved and she disappeared.
Nicholson lowered the binoc in time to see Hudson bringing up his rifle. "Stand down," he said. "It's a couple of colonists."
Hudson gave him a dubious look. "They're coming right at us. What if they're collaborators?"
He thought of the woman's smile. "They're a little too relaxed to have murder on their minds."
Hudson nodded. He kept a hand on the rifle, though.
Nicholson rose to one knee when the Rover was almost to the end of the road. The front of his armor was covered with dust, and he gave it a couple of ineffectual pats before turning his attention to the Rover.
The vehicle slowed as it moved onto the end of the road, and he heard gravel crunch under the tires. The others stood up as the Rover rolled to a stop. The woman was at the controls. A lean middle-aged man sat beside her, grinning as he looked at each of the sailors in turn.
"Sorry about the shot," the woman said, gesturing behind her at the fallen branch. "It was the quickest way to stop you." She jerked a thumb over her shoulder. "The whole area i
s full of booby-traps."
Nicholson stood. "In that case, I guess you're forgiven. I'm Lieutenant Nicholson." He indicated the others. "This is Gillett, Hudson, and Parrish."
"I'm Tanya," the woman. "This is Ron. Welcome to the Naxos resistance."
CHAPTER 11 - NICHOLSON
Quiet! I think it's finally working."
Nicholson broke off a conversation with Gillett and crawled over to join Ron at the edge of the trees. There were eight colonists with the four navy personnel at the ambush site, and six more at a secondary firing position in the rocks along the crater wall. Ron was the only one Nicholson could actually see. Two of Ariadne's moons were in the night sky, but they did little to dispel the darkness.
The water pumping station was a kilometer distant, still blasting music from its speakers. The revolving light continued to spin but was mostly drowned out by a bonfire that blazed beside the big metal cube. The idea was to draw in the aliens. The resistance had been manning the ambush site for two days, doing everything they could think of to draw the attention of the aliens. Now, it seemed they had finally succeeded.
A flying machine swooped in, hovering low over the pumping station. It was an ugly craft, covered in lumps and protrusions, so unfamiliar in construction—so alien—that Nicholson couldn't get any sense of size until it was quite close to the cube. The ship was three or four meters long and about half as wide. A white beam like a spotlight shone down on the cube and the fire, then swept around in a lazy circle.
Nicholson murmured, "Shoot now, while it's not moving."
Ron shook his head. "Sometimes there's ground troops. I'm waiting for one of them to step on a mine."
"Look," someone said, and Nicholson saw movement at the edge of the fire's glow. A line of creatures came into view, ugly, insect-like things with four curving needle-like legs, a strange hinged torso, and a couple of needle-like arms. They were roughly human-sized, but built nothing like a human. The first creature probed at the ground ahead, then advanced a couple of steps. The rest followed carefully, directly behind it.