by Sam Bradbury
Moving through we found a section of toughened glass cells, and three of our guys imprisoned there – three guys who had been waiting to die, and who wept with relief when we turned up to let them out. Breathlessly they explained that the rest of the team was in the holding cells. Seven men, the last of Bandit Recon.
‘Stay sharp,’ said Narville. ‘They’re not going to give up the other prisoners without a fight.’
Klaxons continued to howl around us.
‘Sir,’ I said to him, ‘that speech Stahl was making … it didn’t sound like they’re going to honour our white flag?’
Just as I said it I realized this was one vital bit of intel I’d so far withheld from Rico – you can guess his reaction.
‘Our what?’ He started, looking like he’d just been slapped.
I ignored him for the moment. ‘They’re up to something, sir. We saw this computer mainframe. They’re constructing a –’
‘Sevchenko,’ interrupted Narville, ‘this isn’t the time or the place.’
‘Wait a second,’ said Rico, not about to be put off. ‘A white what?’
I turned to him. ‘Vekta capitulated last night.’
‘The general ordered the immediate surrender of all ISA forces,’ confirmed Narville.
‘Surrender? And I guess you were just going to follow those orders?’ barked Rico.
Narville rounded on him. ‘If it meant saving the lives of my men and getting them home … yes, Sergeant, I would have.’
I butted in. ‘Respectfully, sir, but depending on their plan … there might not even be a home to go back to.’
Narville looked at me like I was someone with a hunch. And that my hunch was about as welcome as a fart in an Exoskeleton right now. He was right, of course. I was just a guy with a hunch, it was about as welcome as a fart in an Exoskeleton and just as much use – unless I could get something more concrete.
‘I only need a couple of minutes,’ I pressed. There had to be a data centre around here somewhere – in the vicinity of the labs was the most likely position for it. If I could find it, who knows what I might be able to discover.
‘Okay,’ agreed Narville, although he didn’t look happy about it. ‘Make sure it’s only a couple of minutes. Take Velasquez with you.’
Rico didn’t need telling twice. He stayed behind with me as Narville and the three Bandit Recon moved off, heading for the holding cells. They’d find the complex in disarray and with any luck the Higs would assume that the invaders were making their escape right now, not fighting our way more deeply into the facility. What kind of dumb-ass would do that, huh?
Rico and I moved off in search of a data centre, Rico giving me an aggrieved look.
‘I’m sorry, man,’ I shrugged. ‘It slipped my mind.’
Chapter Twenty-one
I was half right about the defence we met. And we made it to the data centre with minimum resistance. Rico tried to figure out a console by the door as I stood guard, the warning alarms still wailing overhead, but there was no sign of more guards and it felt as though we had this section of the facility to ourselves – for the time being at least.
With a satisfied grunt Rico stood back, the doors to the room slid open and cautiously we walked inside, expecting to meet guards or computer operators, but finding none. Around us hummed machinery. Graphs and figures danced on screens along the walls. Standing there I realized that the screens reminded me of my father’s office, and it was enough to throw me back in time and hit me with a sudden sense of longing and loss that was almost painful.
But as quickly as it came it went, and Rico was moving across the floor to a console that dwarfed the others, undoubtedly the main control terminal. A screensaver of the Stahl Arms logo rotated lazily above a keyboard and it flicked off as we approached, sensing us, and was replaced by a holo-image of a spinning globe.
I felt a slither of worry in the pit of my stomach, Stahl’s words running through my head. The greatest military campaign in our nation’s history. What bigger target than our mother planet? Earth.
In front of us was a heliodisplay, on it a list of folders represented by icons. I jabbed randomly at them, opening files containing lists of figures, graphs showing profit and loss – lots of profit, not much loss, I noted – opening folders to find something – anything – of interest. At my shoulder Rico pointed out a folder on the screen.
‘Try that one,’ he said.
I did. It opened and a new image unfurled just to the left of the still-revolving Earth. This picture showed a room – a room I recognized; we’d passed through it in their labs. It had been empty, its distinguishing feature the grotesque splatters of blood all over the walls, a charnel house. It was empty in the video we watched too, but as the video rolled a Hig lab technician dressed head to toe in a hazmat suit appeared, looking up to the camera. Next the door opened and a grunt entered, dragging one of our guys with him, one of Bandit Recon – Poulou, his name. He looked half dead, exhausted. The Hig scientist gave him a cursory glance, appeared to be saying something to someone off-camera and then walked out of shot, just as Poulou scrambled to his feet, looking scared and wary.
‘Test subject two-twelve,’ came a disembodied voice. I could hardly bear to watch.
Next a panel in the ceiling of the room slid open and a small silver sphere dropped to the floor beside Poulou. He stared at it, eyes widening as it seemed to shudder and vibrate, then began to glow green. It was the same green Rico and I had seen collected from the pit outside Pyrrhus. The same green that had leapt from the barrel of the executioner’s gun in the broadcast room. The most powerful weapon I had ever used and here it was in the hands of the enemy, being tested and developed. I barely needed to watch to know what happened next. I was getting used to seeing how petrusite behaved.
Tendrils of evil green light untangled themselves from the sphere and engulfed Poulou and, sure enough, he began shaking as though gripped by an invisible giant hand – until blood began to pour from first his nose, then, sickeningly, his eyes. His screams became gurgles as he was torn apart. Rico and I watched open-mouthed.
Then the test image flicked off, and the files must have been chained because another one opened automatically, this one showing drawings and schematics of something that turned out to be familiar. It was the battleship we’d seen being constructed in Workshop One. Three-dimensional wire models of it rotated before our eyes, pivoting up and down from prow to stern. Gracefully the image shifted to show the top of the ship, which bristled with cannon emplacements, the dark slits of observation ports and a cloaking cone.
Even as a model the ship inspired fear and awe in equal measure. Data showing its capabilities flashed up on the screen as the camera crawled over the hull and swung to below the ship, zooming in on a large cannon turret constructed on its bow, and again I barely needed the read-out to inform me what it was. A petrusite cannon. A devastatingly large petrusite cannon by the looks of things. The file showing the ship’s stats was chained to another and suddenly the revolving globe image of Earth flicked on and off as the animation was woken from sleep. What we were now seeing was a simulation – showing a fleet entering Earth’s orbit. A fleet led by Stahl’s behemoth. The cannon on the bow glowed green then opened fire and what looked like hundreds of bolts of petrusite leapt from it onto the Earth’s surface.
It took me a second to work out the targets. Earth’s major cities. As we watched, the green impact dots spread, creating a large emerald amorphous cloud that slid, covering all in its path. Pretty soon the green seemed to cover the Earth’s entire surface. I thought back to Poulou, how the petrusite had seemed to contain him within a globe before he disintegrated. Next to me Rico echoed my thoughts.
‘Jesus Christ,’ he said simply.
Spinning figures showing the expected death toll appeared on the screen, passing the hundred millions. Then the words – PROJECTED SURRENDER: FIVE DAYS – flashing triumphantly before the simulation ended and cleared. The globe flicked on a
nd off again and went back into sleep mode. Around us the room hummed.
So that was it. Suddenly everything made sense. The irradiated petrusite. The kidnapping back in the jungle … everything.
Stahl had been using us as pawns in a plan to not only wrest control of Helghast for himself, but to expand his empire – to Earth, causing the death of millions upon millions of people. The whole show due to start – Christ – tomorrow.
‘We’ve got to tell Narville,’ I said.
Chapter Twenty-two
Jorhan Stahl was no longer feeling quite so pleased with himself.
Quite the opposite: he was most displeased. Not with himself, of course, but with the hapless incompetents surrounding him. Those bumbling fools who had allowed two ISA men – oh, and not just any old two ISA men, but the two king killers, Sevchenko and Velasquez – first into the facility and then into the broadcast room itself, where they had begun an assault from which he had only just escaped with his life intact.
Not so his dignity, of course. He had humiliated himself on planet-wide television. The entire Helghast race had seen he, Jorhan Stahl, made to look foolish. And, what’s more, a cowardly leader. The kind of leader who would use his men as shields without a second thought; the kind of leader he purported to renounce. The idea had been to increase the people’s respect for him. Not to lose it altogether.
Around him, the base was in pandemonium because, having rescued their captain, the rogue ISA men had set about freeing their comrades, starting a battle that continued to rage. Stahl’s factory remained under his control, but only just, and more by luck than great planning.
He found his hands gripping into fists as he made his way quickly to the data centre, two very alert troopers with him, one ahead, one behind. They tensed as Stahl’s personal assistant came hurrying down the corridor towards them, his eyes wide above his mask.
‘Sir, Chairman, sir …’ the assistant began.
‘You told me the assault was at an end,’ barked Stahl. He pulled his pistol from his coat as he walked.
The assistant, half-running to keep up with him, looked down at it and swallowed. ‘That was the information we were given, Chairman,’ he pleaded.
‘Where was my security?’ barked Stahl.
‘I’m sorry, sir,’ babbled the assistant, ‘we are at full strength. Preparations for the attack on Earth have –’
Stahl stopped. His guard stopped. The assistant stopped. Stahl raised his pistol and put it to the assistant’s eyeball.
‘Can you think of one good reason why I shouldn’t kill you?’ he asked, pleasantly enough considering the circumstances.
The assistant squeezed his eyes tight shut, his legs bending as the barrel of the gun pressed into his face. ‘No, sir, I can’t.’
‘I thought not,’ said Stahl, and his finger went white on the trigger.
‘Sir,’ screeched the assistant, now on his knees, ‘I’ve thought of a reason.’
‘Yes?’ said Stahl, interested.
‘It would be a waste of bullets, sir.’
Stahl sighed. ‘I’m a weapons manufacturer, you idiot. One thing I’m not short of is bullets.’
He brought his other hand forward to prevent splashback and pulled the trigger. The back of the assistant’s head hit a glass lab wall and he crumpled to the floor as Stahl continued on his way, wiping his bloodstained hand on his trouser leg.
Now he reached the data room and his two guards moved forward, announcing the room as clear before Stahl strode in.
‘Chairman,’ insisted one of the men, ‘we have to get you out of here.’
‘Not yet,’ snapped Stahl. ‘I have to upload the battle plans to my cruiser. Orlock is going to jump all over …’
As though summoned, the image of Orlock flicked on in front of Stahl, who stopped, frowned, then continued running his hands over the heliodisplay in search of the right files, not stopping as Orlock glared at him over the relay.
‘I don’t really have time to listen to you gloat,’ said Stahl, acknowledging Orlock at last. But he continued working, files and folders zipping around the display under his fingers, which moved as though he was conducting an orchestra.
Orlock continued regarding him silently and Stahl felt himself wither a little under the admiral’s gaze. Damn the man.
‘What? ’ he demanded, at last.
Orlock allowed himself the ghost of a smile, and when he spoke it was with an extra authority that Stahl could hardly miss.
‘You are to turn in your petrusite weapons, hardware, personnel and yourself to my control.’
Stahl froze. In front of him on the heliodisplay icons hung in the air mid-transfer. Very deliberately he looked at Orlock.
‘Don’t be absurd.’
Now he saw Senator Gunsteling sitting there too. That toady. That sick, snivelling … bootlicker. And where the fuck was Senator Kuisma when he was needed? What the hell was the point of Stahl blackmailing him? Well, Stahl knew what the next broadcast on the Stahl Broadcasting Network would be. The Kuisma Show.
Senator Gunsteling interrupted his thoughts. ‘Chairman Stahl, not only have you failed to execute Visari’s killers, you managed to humiliate yourself in front of the entire nation.’
Yes, Stahl had to admit, there was a measure of truth in that. And, that being the case, perhaps his best defence was one not of defiance but of contrition. He calibrated his response accordingly, saying, ‘Gentlemen, I understand you’re upset. I’ve made you look bad. But the people won’t give a damn about today the instant Earth becomes our territory. If you change my invasion plan, you risk all of that.’
‘Chairman, this is not a negotiation,’ replied Gunsteling. ‘You will do what your autarch commands.’
Stahl was forming words to come back on that, having no intention whatsoever of doing what was commanded by the … and then the word hit home.
‘Autarch,’ he spat. ‘Who – you mean Orlock? You made him Visari’s heir?’
In his voice both contempt and despair.
‘Chairman, if you refuse to do as commanded you will be considered an enemy of the state,’ said Senator Gunsteling. ‘Your assets will be frozen. We will hunt you down, drag you through the streets and execute you over your own broadcast channels. Do you accept the autarch’s rule?’
Stahl thought. He looked at the screen for long moments, his mind racing. Then, at last, he nodded his head yes.
‘Good,’ said Admiral Orlock – no, Autarch Orlock – adding, ‘The invasion fleet is gathering in orbit around the space elevator. Deliver the weapons in person. Immediately.’
And with that Orlock ended the link and Stahl was left to seethe and lash out, cracking the glass of a screen.
‘Prepare my fleet,’ he barked at a trooper. And, when the man did not immediately move away, screamed, ‘Now, you idiot.’
Yes, thought Stahl. He would deliver the weapons. He would deliver them in person. And plenty more besides.
Meanwhile, in the Senate Room of Visari Palace the new Helghast autarch leaned back in his chair, feeling very pleased with himself indeed.
He turned his gaze on Senator Gunsteling. ‘The moment I have the weapons, I want Stahl killed. Is that understood?’
Gunsteling nodded and wheezed, ‘As you command.’
Chapter Twenty-three
The Higs had got their shit together by now and we met heavier resistance this time: Hello, Higs using blue arc cannons. Pleased to meetcha, Higs in jet packs. And finally, in the vehicle compound, well, how you doin’, ATAC?
It came at us just as we escaped into the yard, which was a vast asphalt expanse of storage hangars, repair bays and supply stores lit by harsh fluorescent white floodlights and coated with a layer of ice. And today, at least, it also contained an Agile Tactical Air Component. It rose from the horizon with an ear-splitting sound that was half buzz, half hum.
My heart sank. I hated these things. Single-pilot flying combat machines, they were armed with a missile launcher an
d dual LMGs, were lightning-fast and just as nimble. They looked like flying black bugs and even sounded like them – like all good war machines they were designed to strike fear into the heart of the enemy and I got to say it worked. Worked on me, at least. It hung there, a colossal black moth, regarding us across the vehicle yard, hovering, tilting slightly as though to inspect us from different angles, like a creature observing its prey, ready to strike.
Hearts hammering, we dived for cover, making it to a long repair bay just as the LMG of the ATAC began to whirr, and suddenly shells were slamming into the ground around us. For a moment we caught our breath in the repair shed, white striplights overhead bleaching us out, then heard the noise of the ATAC suddenly increasing and turned to see it behind us, hovering in the open doorway at the other end. Shit. Once again it opened fire. Once again we were scrambling for cover.
Inside the repair bay an Ice Saw and an out-of-commission APC were ripped apart by thousands of machine-gun bullets, one of them bursting into flames, and as we dived back into the icy night, the bay exploded behind us, the Ice Saw tossed into the air and thunking down, flaming on the asphalt. With a shriek of boosters, the ATAC rose and panned left, ready to finish us off, but suddenly finding the flaming Ice Saw blocking its view and needing to bank further left for a clear shot.
It gave us just the chance we needed. Rico and I nodded to one another and took off in opposite directions – Rico towards a hangar, me making a dash towards what I hoped was a supply store.
What I really hoped was a supply store, because behind me I heard the roar of the ATAC swinging round, and then the whoosh-screech of a missile that only just missed me, making a flaming crater of the asphalt, showering me with debris, searing my skin and, probably, stopping the pilot getting a good visual. I had the door to the supply store in sight now. Without stopping I brought my assault rifle to my shoulder and rattled off a clip at a panel to the side of the door, praying it was the old-style doorcon – the Circumnavigator is what grunts used to call it back in the day.