Battle On The Marathon

by John Thornton

  “Lieutenant Gonzales, we have arrived at the sidewall of the habitat,” Dietermeyer reported a short time later. His transmission was coming in over the command channel, and I was glad Gonzales had linked me to that. “We saw several burned-out farms, and some piles of dead livestock, but no other living people. A squad of Bread’s Bakers were at the egress point. They are escorting the habitat dwellers away. Between us and Arcadia there are a few tributaries, and the Bakers warned us that Jellies have been seen in those waters. The Bakers say there are only fords across those tributaries, and not actual bridges. I think with our boosters we can bounce over them. Please advise.”

  Lieutenant Gonzales answered, “Proceed to that first tributary, use your discretion on the safety of crossing. If in doubt, stay out of the water and use the main road instead. I trust you, but we are moving as quickly as possible toward Arcadia. Meet us there as fast as you can.”

  “Understood.”

  On the way to the fifth bridge, Evan called out and told us we had to slow down the pace. So, the horses were again watered, and our speed went down to the walking of the horses.

  Lieutenant Gonzales ordered us to spread out even more, but to stay within normal visual range of each other. This was easy to do for those near the river, but for the soldiers who were out beyond the road, they had to walk up and down the rolling hills and that took more effort to stay in visual contact.

  Kaaa-vooomph!

  One of our soldiers just disappeared as a bombardment landed in the gulley where he was walking. He did not even let out a yelp or cry as his body was blown into a multitude of parts. The reactive armor flickered a bit in its individual fragments as they sailed off in all directions. A secondary explosion of one of his amvex grenades took place, but luckily it had been thrown away from anyone else. The bombardment must have set it on its smallest yield, which was still a potent explosion.

  We came under random bombardment from that point onward, but no others landed right on us. Not then. A few even landed in the river, and that sent sprays of frozen water, as well as revealing that the brown Jellie gunk was coating the bottom of the river. For those detonations from the bombardment caused plumes to shoot upward, and the surface water was fairly clear, but the junk from the bottom which was blasted upward was the toxic poison from the Jellies.

  The light was fading from the sky tube far overhead, and I knew we were more than halfway to our destination. I expected the usual activity of birds and animals which occurred at dusk, but I had yet to see anything like that in all of Bread. Not even stray dogs or cats. It was strange, and bothered me more than the bombardments. I felt like I was already in a dead biome.

  We crossed more bridges without incident, but by then the light was faded out, and the sky tube was just a bare sliver of silver across the high ceiling of the habitat. I wished it were moon-night, but alas it was not.

  “Soldiers, be prepared to activate your strobe lights,” I sent out the message on the full-unit frequency. “We might give away our positions if we activate them too soon, but…” I switched to the command-only link and asked Lieutenant Gonzales, “What do you think? Using the strobes now might scare the Jellies off.”

  “I do not think Jellies get scared. They are wily, wary and at most irritated by us. Not frightened of what we can do,” she replied. “I have been debating in my mind what to do with the strobes as well. If there are other habitat dwellers waiting in here they might see us, but the risk of the Jellies zeroing in their artillery is too great. You started that conversation, so you tell the soldiers to activate the strobes only if we see that abominable purple glow.”

  I switched back to the full-unit frequency and finished, “Use the strobes the moment you spot the Jellies’ purple lighting. Not until then. Keep alert and sharp!”

  We proceeded onward, and the dark had a soothing effect on my nerves. The occasional bombardment happened, but they landed far off and not nearby. I wondered if the Jellies were just randomly tossing around munitions.

  “This is Samuels! We are under attack. Jellies from across the fields! Returning fire! Th… au….ing and are…”

  The transmission went dead. We had just crossed the fourteenth bridge.

  “Lieutenant? Should I take some soldiers and reinforce Samuels?” I asked hastily.

  “Go!” Gonzales commanded. “The Jellies cannot occupy that location. We must dump the cargo up there for it to be effective. Beware of some ruse!”

  I sent word out to six other soldiers and we sprinted along. I heard Lieutenant Gonzales telling Dietermeyer of the situation.

  Running in reactive armor is not so bad. Unlike the armored spacesuits, the reactive armor assisted in movement and enhanced performance. The boosters gave us a slight bounce, and so, we could make good time. Soon the horses and wagon were left behind.

  I took the lead in crossing bridge fifteen, but there was nothing there. I kept checking my helmet’s display, but Samuels and the recon team were not showing up on it. Just like the soldier who had been killed in the bombardment, there was no signal from any biometrics.

  Reaching the sixteenth bridge, I saw the glow of a Jellie in the river’s dark water. It was about midway across the river, and roughly two hundred meters upstream from the bridge. The glow was diffuse, and that meant the Jellie was hiding underneath the water. Our weapons would be less effective because of that.

  “If that one stays put out there, fine. Do not waste ammunition on it. Varbama you keep an eye on it. It if moves, no matter what direction, report it to me. The rest of us are heading up to that bridge. From there we might get a clearer picture of the battle that happened.”

  “Understood!” Varbama responded. His voice was nervous and a bit on edge.

  “Stay alert. You know where that one is, stay situationally aware. The cargo is coming up the road, it must get through.”

  The rest of us spread out and approached the bridge. I put an infrared scanner filter on my optics, but that showed nothing at all. I quickly glanced over the crops in the fields, thinking maybe one of the solders had gotten out of the reactive armor and was hiding. Nothing was in the crops. No people, and not even a rabbit or a racoon. Weird.

  The bridge showed signed of multiple explosions. The side we were on was still connected to the bank, but just barely. The girders, cables, and roadway were a twisted and jagged mess. I saw that the horses could never pass over that bridge.

  “Sergeant, an amvex grenade or two did this,” Wanagi reported. She was squatting down and fingering some of the wreckage. “There are remains of a Jellie carapace here. Maybe more than one.”

  “Reactive armor too,” one of the others said with controlled emotions. “Human remains.”

  I kept scanning, hoping to find something more intact, but nothing was showing. Then suddenly, on my helmet’s display a biometric signal flickered on. I was nearly right on top of it.

  “Sergeant! I am here! Do not shoot!”

  “Samuels?” I looked toward where the display indicated she should be. It looked like just part of the wheat field. I switched to the full-unit frequency broadcast and said, “Samuels is out here, alive. Watch for her!”

  The signal winked off. Then it winked back on.

  “Sergeant, I am moving out in the crops, but do not shoot me!”

  The signal turned off. It was bizarre.

  “Jellie approaching!” one of the soldiers yelled. “No purple glow! I see its shape in the shadows!”

  Bruppp! A bullpup fired.

  Samuels’ signal winked on.

  “Cease fire!” I barked the command.

  “Right! It is me! It is me! I will flash the purple twice. Just watch!” Samuels voice was elated, not frightened or in panic. I wondered if she was in shock and terribly wounded. Were her reactive armor and her biometrics failing? Was she delirious or hallucinating?

  Her signal shut off, but then the purple glow of a Jellie turned on in the field. It flashed twice and shut off.

  “
Sergeant! That Jellie is down some hole over here!” a soldier replied.

  Samuel’s signal winked back on.

  “I am here. I cannot move much, but I am down here,” Samuels stated.

  “Everyone hold positions!” I snarled. I thought it was some strange alien trap, but I rushed to that position anyway.

  The field was waist high, and only a few meters into it, there was a tunnel opening. It was about four meters across, and dropped down a few meters. Looking down in there, I could see the rough outline of a Jellie, but there was no glow.

  “Samuels, where in the bloody blazes are you?” I yelled out.

  “Inside this Jellie!”

  I switched on the spotlight from my helmet. In the hole was a Jellie carapace, which still looked dark purple in the light, but was not glowing at all. Along one side of it, I saw a deep crack, and an arm waving out from inside it.

  “Purple light coming on, then off. It is me!” Samuels stated.

  The glow came on, and luckily my optics filtered it somewhat. It then shut down.

  I called the others, “Secure the bridge, give me long range information on that town, Arcadia. The dump site must be ready when our lieutenant and the cargo gets here.”

  “Understood!” Wanagi responded.

  I slid down the dirt side of the tunnel and was ready to let loose with every weapon I had, but I walked over to where the carapace was cracked. I knew I had seen a human arm waving from there.

  Shining my beam of light into that crack, I saw the reactive armor of one of my solders.

  “Samuels, what is happening here?”

  “Sergeant, my recording equipment is kaput. If I let go of these—controls, I guess we call them—I might not be able to grab them again. We must figure out how to repeat this. Record what I am doing.”

  “Samuels, how did you get inside there?” I had already checked the recording apparatus and the components in my suit were working well.

  Samuels’ was nearly ensconced by the Jellie’s carapace. Nonetheless, I stuck my head in and with all my recording devices going, I surveyed what was happening.

  “The Jellies got the drop on us, and the rest of the recon team is dead,” now Samuels’ voice ached with grief. “As she was dying, Sarah set off an amvex while they were ripping her body apart. Tiny tentacles snaked inside her helmet while thick ones restrained her body, but Sarah never gave up. That finished all the nearby Jellies. One jumped into the river, and then this one wobbled off to this hole. As this one retreated to its hole here, it was leaking that brown gunk and its light was sputtering. I followed it in and stomped its tentacled, disgusting, alien body to death. This is like some Jellie environmental or spacesuit. Controls and all. Still somewhat functional. But it apparently blocks all our signals. I had to stick my arm back out to send a signal. I can make this thing turn on the purple light, roll side to the side, and probably a lot more. But the amvex blast did damage my gear. See, if I pull on this protuberance, the light comes on.”

  Samuels manipulated some of the knobby things inside of the carapace. The irritating purple light came on and off as she pulled on it.

  “I found one thing and when I pull on it—I only did it once—that horrible audio interference blasted by communication gear. I thought that might have ruined my whole suit. But, you give me enough time, and I will drive this thing up and out of this hole. It will be like my own personal servant.”

  I carefully recorded all that Samuels was saying and doing. Looking back outside, I saw in the light the remains of the organic Jellie. It did look like Samuels had literally ripped it out of the carapace and stomped it to death. The only part not crushed down into the mud was the hooked spike from its central stem.

  “They killed my friends, and I got payback with this one. Plus, this is a bonanza of information on how these disgusting creatures work,” Samuels said. “Our friends did not die in vain. Not this time. I have a key to the Jellie technology.”

  “Where are the other soldiers’ bodies?” I asked.

  “Sarah went up with the blast, Rodney and Alinani died in the initial attack. Hit us with their bombardments right as they emerged from this hole,” Samuels replied. “I was on the bridge, and could not get to them fast enough. Sarah tried, but three Jellies grabbed her, but she showed them. The last two were this one, and the one that jumped in the river.”

  “Sergeant Kalju!” Dietermeyer’s voice came through. “We are about a kilometer out from your position. We have seen Jellies burrowing into the ground. Those buggers look like a prairie mole funneling dirt.”

  I clicked it into the full-unit frequency, “Beware, Jellies are underground in hidden places. Not just in the water.”

  “Sergeant Kalju? Is the drop site secure?” Lieutenant Gonzales asked. “We are coming in fast and furious. Jellies on our tail.”

  “Wanagi give me a situational update!” I barked.

  “Bridge secure. Town looks empty. No sight of Jellies, except that one in the water, but it is immobile,” Wanagi replied. “I could drop some grenades on it from my position.”

  “Did you catch all that, Lieutenant Gonzales? Site is secure! One Jellie under observation in the river, we will eliminate that threat. Moving on it…”

  Samuels interrupted me, “Hold on, Sergeant, that one might be wounded or disabled too. The amvex was at maximum and they were nearly on top of Sarah when she let them have it. If we can just get inside its cracked shell, we can have a second one of these carapace suits to make into our personal robots. Kill the wretched, squirmy things inside, but steal their technology. It will serve the scrum right if we take their engineering skills and use it against them.”

  Lieutenant Gonzales’ voice cut through, “We are coming in with enemy on us. Plan for a dump and run. Covering fire appreciated.”

  “We have you covered!” I replied.

  Without warning a protuberance jutted out from the bottom of the carapace Samuels was inside. It missed me, but it moved fast and in a jerky way.

  “Oops! Found the leg activator. Maybe more of an emitter as it looks like this works via alien organomimetics. I stimulate a cluster of stuff inside, and by some connection—not sure what, maybe chemical, electrical, or ethereal—the exterior carapace is instructed to alter its appearance. See, with my two hands I can form two legs.” She grabbed a different section of the interior of the carapace.

  Another appendage jutted out from the opposite side of the blob.

  “Why is the inside malleable, while the outside so tough we can barely scratch or cut it?” I asked as I continued to record all that was happening.

  “That brown gunk is some kind of disgusting lubricant. It is still coating the inside here, and I think that is what keeps these controls usable. It is also like air to us for the organic Jellie. Drag them out of their gunk and they are a fish out of water, literally.”

  A white globe materialized out of the front of the dark carapace. I dove behind it as the icy detonation blew up against the wall of the tunnel. A shower of dirt, roots, and icy fragments fell down around me.

  “Sorry, sergeant! I was shifting my legs around and it looks like that is where the weapon ejector systems are located. With so many stinking tentacles, the Jellie inside here could work all sorts of stuff. I think with two or three of us inside here, we could really make it work. I can envision retrofitting some type of remote devices and making this a drone or probe. Sweet possibilities.”

  “Including weapons?” I asked as I picked myself up.

  “Absolutely, well not absolutely, absolutely, but I am pretty sure I can do that. Well, let me try. Climb in and I we will work it out.”

  “Samuels, I am going to get you another specimen to add to your toybox. I will send someone else back to help, but I am getting that other Jellie.”

  “Nasula, get over here and help Samuels!” I ordered.

  “I am already here,” Nasula said as she looked down from the edge of the hole. “How can I help?”

&nbs
p; “Get inside this thing and follow Samuels’ instructions, but do not kill any of us!” I climbed up and out of the hole just as Nasula jumped down to assist. “Oh, and Samuels, keep the purple off until I tell you. We need to talk, and that seems to block our signals.”

  “I noticed that too!”

  I rushed over and found the rest of my team spread out in effective defensive positions. The four of them were in the best concealed and covered places around, although there were limited emplacements.

  “Yaakov, you and I are going swimming,” I instructed to the nearest soldier. “That Jellie out in the river needs investigating. Alia, you keep all our amvex grenades except one each.” I unloaded my amvex grenades to another solider. She said nothing but pocketed all of them except the one I put in my front pouch. “These are really our only effective mass weapon right now, even with the enpols being able to burn through the carapace. Yaakov give all but one of your amvex grenades to Jurgen.”