by B. V. Larson
“That doesn’t work for me,” I told Graves. “I want a partner.”
“Ah,” he said, “I was expecting this. You want that little tech to come along, don’t you?”
Shaking my head, I lifted a long arm and directed a finger at Harris. “No sir. I need a fighter. The best sidekick a man could hope for. Senior Veteran Harris.”
Graves glanced at Harris who appeared to be in shock. Then he looked back at me and crossed his arms.
“State your reasoning, Adjunct.”
“Wait one damned second!” Harris complained. “Are you seriously listening to him, Centurion? He’s just out to screw me over for laughing. McGill’s the most vindictive, cold-hearted, son-of-a—”
“That’s enough, Harris. McGill usually has a good reason for even his oddest requests. Let’s hear it, McGill.”
“Well sir, it goes like this: two of us are harder to take out fast than one. If we go, the point man will engage any threat. He’ll probably die, but the other man can port in right after him, see what’s going on, and port back out again.”
“Who’s going to be that point man?” Harris demanded angrily.
“You’re way out of line, Harris,” Graves warned him.
Harris backed off and sulked a few paces away, giving me the stink-eye all the while. I didn’t react. I pretended I didn’t even notice him.
“What about it, sir?” I asked.
“Hmm,” Graves said. “It would mean risking two suits instead of one, but the exploration should go faster.”
“Much faster,” I said, without being sure why it would go any faster at all.
Graves nodded. “Correct me if I’m wrong, McGill, as I put flesh on the bones of your idea. Your theory is to have two men jump, with the intention of having one of the two come back almost immediately, if they run into trouble. The first returning scout could then tell us if there was a problem and give us basic information on the environment.”
“That’s exactly right, sir,” I lied.
Naturally, I had no such elaborate plans. But if I’m anything, I’m an opportunist. When I hear a good idea, I steal it immediately.
He looked thoughtful. “If neither man comes back, we’ll know that destination is deadly. But, barring an extreme threat on the other side, we’d have twice the eyes and manpower to secure intel.”
“It’s a win-win,” I agreed.
“I do like that…” Graves continued.
“Seriously?” Harris demanded, his voice cracking high. He was unable to contain himself any longer. “What’s to like about this plan, Centurion? He’s just trying to get out of the jump. He’ll send me, then when I don’t come back, he’ll say ‘hey wait a minute, we can’t risk another suit!’ and my ass will be permed, just like that.”
Graves glanced at him then turned back to me.
“What about such a scenario?” he said to me.
Shaking my head, I still avoided Harris’ eye.
“That’s not going to happen. I’m going out there with Harris. We’ll go ten seconds apart, just like before. If no one comes back in five minutes… well… consider us lost and crank up the revival machines.”
Graves nodded, thinking it over further.
“I like it. Good, creative mission-planning. Sometimes, thinking outside the box is a good thing, McGill.”
“That’s what I always told my teachers back in school—for all the good it did me.”
Graves left, chuckling quietly.
When he was gone, Harris pulled out his combat knife. I took a step back and tensed up, ready for an attack. It would be nothing unusual for him to take a shot at me. We’d been fighting out our differences with lethal aggression since we’d met.
“Attacking an officer, Harris?” I asked. “That’s grounds for serious punishment.”
He shook his head angrily and put the blade up to his own neck.
“No sir! I’m just speeding up the process by slashing my own throat right off. I’m not porting out with you again. I’m not playing second banana on another suicide mission.”
“Serious?” I asked. “Is it too cold in the pool to find your own balls?”
He glowered in hate. “Respectfully, Adjunct—fuck you! I’m not afraid of nothing!”
“Excellent,” I said, turning away and heading for the door. “Cut yourself or not, Harris. If you do, I’ll have you revived. Then I’ll take the expense out of your next paycheck. Either way, you’re going with me on the next jump.”
“Shit…” Harris said, defeated.
I tossed him a glance over my shoulder. “Don’t worry. If we get into trouble, we’ll fight like the dogs we are: back-to-back, just like in the old days.”
Letting out a sigh that sounded like it came from the depths of his soul, he put away his knife and walked after me toward the lab. He truly had the defeated air of a man marching toward the gas chamber.
Less than thirty minutes later, we were suited-up and good-to-go. Lisa did the final check, just like last time. Graves watched us closely.
Lisa tapped Harris’ dial, and then he twisted it to a fresh notch and jumped away. She stepped to me next.
She looked worried. She touched the Galactic Key to my dial, and I put my hand on hers. She slipped the key into my palm, but it looked like we were having a moment, saying goodbye.
To cover, I snaked a kiss while she was in range. She made a small tsking sound and backed away. Graves shook his head, and several others rolled their eyes.
Grinning, I slammed my helmet closed, pocketed the key, and ported out.
The jump was a short one. Just the blink of an eye. That part surprised me—how close could this destination be?
The answer came after a very brief change of scenery. When I jumped back into reality, my impression was that I was still on Earth.
It was a cold, northern place. A wilderness. There were pines overhead, blocking out most of the sunlight. A recent snow had thickly caked the pine limbs and much of the forest floor.
Nearby stood a half-dozen hulking figures. They wore fluttering black cloaks and held massive swords in their hands.
I was standing in the midst of a group of enemy heavy troopers. Fortunately, they were distracted. Several of them were walking away with something.
That something was Harris. He was held up over their heads, with all three of their swords thrust into his back. Sprouting from his guts were the sword tips, gleaming silver and splashed with fresh red blood.
Without really thinking about it, I knew I’d ported into an ambush. These hulking soldiers had been standing here, on guard, waiting for someone to pop into existence in their midst. The moment Harris had done so, they’d butchered him.
He was still alive. I could see his right hand twitching and reaching feebly for the dial on this chest. He seemed unable to reach it.
Fortunately, the spectacle of Harris lifted high like a gigged frog had everyone’s attention diverted.
My instinct was to try to jump home, but I didn’t. Not right off.
There were nine of these huge men. Any of them would stand three meters in height if they were to stand up straight, but they generally hunched over. Slope-shouldered, they were as massive as they were tall—but I knew from experience they weren’t invincible.
Running in the opposite direction, away from where they were carrying Harris, I shot the first heavy trooper I met in the ankle.
The odd grin on his face faded, and he toppled with a grunt as his leg could no longer hold his vast weight. I vaulted over him and ran into the forest.
Now, you have to know a few things about litter-mates in order to understand what happened next. For them, killing Harris and holding him up like a trophy was all good fun-and-games. But seeing one of their brothers go down, well, that was unacceptable.
They quickly lost what small minds they had and charged after me. They dropped Harris to flop in some snowy ferns and thundered after me.
I could hear them grunt and crash through t
he forest and the snow. It sounded a lot like getting chased by a small herd of horses.
My next move had to be timed precisely—and I didn’t have much time to pull it off.
Popping out a plasma grenade, I twisted the detonator and waited a few seconds, all the while hearing them get closer, then I dropped it in the snow.
They never even noticed. They were so intent on catching me and tearing me limb from limb, that a small object in the snow at their feet wasn’t worth their attention.
The grenade went off, but the explosion was weird. In water, the gravity-based weapon tended to have the strange effect of grabbing up splinters of liquid and casting them in every direction like shrapnel. In snow—well—that was just frozen water. The effects were dramatic.
Tiny crystalline particles exploded in every direction, shredding the closest three and wounding three more.
Two were left uninjured. As shooting one of their brothers had pissed them off, well, blowing down two-thirds of the family drove the last of them totally berserk.
There was no way to outrun them any farther. I turned at bay and raised my rifle.
It was smashed from my hands. The power of that blow was almost enough to shatter my wrists.
Fortunately, I was armored, but that wasn’t enough to stop weapons driven with the force these apes had behind them. I only had one chance to kill them before they could kill me.
Pulling a move I’d seen Harris do with a knife, and which had always impressed me, I threw my small blade into the face of the second brother in line.
His eyes were huge. His mouth was open, blowing like a smith’s bellows with foaming spittle clinging to the corners of his fat lips.
It was right into that open mouth that I neatly flipped my combat dagger. It flicked end over end once and sank into the soft upper palate. I can only assume it severed the spinal cord or hit the base of his brain. Either way, he went down hard, sending up a shower of snow.
The last brother raised his sword up again. He was in no less of a raging state.
I rushed in under the blade and when he swung it down, I grabbed his wrist and added my weight to his mighty blow, pulling him forward and off-balance.
These heavy troopers must not have been trained in basic Judo. The monster did a face-plant in the snow, but he sprang up again a moment later, roaring.
By that time, I had my laser pistol out. Two quick shots into his face took out both eyes.
He didn’t die right away. Roaring and wheezing, he followed me around slashing and thunking his sword into tree trunks blindly. Hot blood sprayed everywhere, melting the snow into pink, icy slush.
Doing my best to make a get-away, I ran off into the forest again. I was down to my pistol, but I circled around to where Harris lay on the ground.
That had been my goal all along. I didn’t want to lose another teleport suit.
Strangely enough, Harris was still alive. He had horrible wounds, but his combat kit inside the squid suit had pumped him with drugs and cordoned off arterial bleeding. He probably wouldn’t last long—but he’d made it this far.
“You’re still here?” he rasped.
“I came back for you.”
His next word came out after a lot of wheezing.
“Liar,” he said.
“I’m sending you back,” I said, “but I want my suit cameras to get a little bit of intel. This has to be the enemy camp on Earth, and we’re right in the middle of it.”
Harris lay back in the snow, each breath a struggle. “Take your… fucking… time...”
Laughing, I checked his suit’s power-levels. As I’d expected, there was still enough juice in the suit to make it home. The jump was a very short one.
I twisted his dial, and he vanished.
I trotted down a nearby path, one that had obviously been used by the giants. Huge footprints had crushed down a wide trail in the snow exposing the dark mud underneath.
There, through the trees… What was that?
Wavering lights washed over me, bluish and silver—if that made any sense. Could a light be so bright that it looked not white, but reflective? I didn’t know, but that was the impression I got.
Near the end of the trail, I found a massive clearing. Trees had been felled for a kilometer around. In the midst of this space, which had been churned to black slush, were thousands of heavy troopers. And in their midst was a huge alien machine that was producing the silver light effect.
The machine resembled an archway. It was constructed not of metal, but of something that looked more like stone. The middle of it was a maelstrom of distortion and twisting light. Ripples of altered space traveled silently away from it in every direction.
There was a ramp that led up to the alien artifact, and it was thronged with more and more heavy troopers. Out of the void in the middle, they marched in a continuous mass, one group of nine brothers following the last.
There was one other figure, however, that caught my eye. He was singular and smaller than all the rest. He stood at the base of the archway, tending to it.
He’d once been known as “Old Silver” due to his extreme age as a mercenary without dying. I’d fixed that, and now he was just known as Claver.
A bullet snapped and splintered into a tree near my head. I realized I’d been spotted.
Without further hesitation, I twisted the dial on my chest and teleported home.
-29-
When I made it back to the lab, I staggered into the middle of a group of concerned faces. I leaned tiredly on the hands that came up to support me.
“Wounded, McGill?” Graves asked in an uncompromising tone.
I looked at him. “I’m not sure,” I admitted.
“Medic!” Graves shouted over his shoulder.
Carlos rushed up and began looking me over.
“I’m sorry man,” he said quietly as he worked. “If I find a bad injury—I’m sorry.”
Nodding, I didn’t complain. I knew what he meant. We were in desperate straits. He was hinting I’d have to accept a recycle if I’d been disabled. By the time I healed up from anything serious, this war was likely to be over.
Carlos read my tapper and ran instruments over my body.
“No breaks, no organ failure…” Carlos pronounced at last. “He looks like he got banged around pretty good. Contusions and trauma, but I think he’ll be okay.”
“That wrist is swollen,” Graves said critically. “Can you hold a rifle with that arm, McGill?”
My wrist did hurt, but I straightened my spine and reached out to clasp Graves’ hand. I grabbed his gauntlet and squeezed real hard. I grinned while I did it, too.
Graves let his face twitch, but otherwise he didn’t show any discomfort from my grip.
“All right,” he said. “You’re good to go.”
“Where’s Harris?” I asked, looking around. I spotted a crumpled form on the floor nearby. The ghoulish techs were already stripping the teleport suit off him.
“Don’t even look at that,” Graves said. “That’s not Harris. Not anymore. He’s downstairs on blue deck inside a revival machine. He’s a seed now, being spun up like cotton candy on stick.”
Nodding, I understood the situation. Graves had finished Harris after seeing how badly hurt he was.
“I’m ready to make my report now, sir,” I said.
Graves beckoned me to follow him to his office. I did so, and he watched the vids I’d forwarded to his tapper. My body-cam recordings showed all the action.
Graves grunted and frowned as he watched them. I did my best to put a good face on things, but the mission-time had been so short there wasn’t much I could do in the way of bullshitting. All he had to do was watch the action unfolding on his arm. He didn’t need a summary.
He lowered his arm and looked thoughtful.
“Body-cams don’t lie,” he said. “You fought like demon, McGill.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“You also went off-script. Way the fuck off.”
“Well sir, there’s always a certain amount of leeway in judgment calls that are being made on the spot by the commander in the field. I don’t think—”
“That’s right,” he said. “You didn’t think. You should have ported out the second you saw Harris was down. That was the whole goddamned plan. Your goddamned plan, I might add.”
“Yeah… well… yeah, I know. But I saw an opportunity.”
“To do what? Lose two teleport suits and a lot of time? To get yourself killed along with Harris?”
“To gain valuable intel on what the enemy is doing on Earth. They’re right here on our home world, Centurion. Doesn’t that interest anyone? I took a risk because I wanted to know what they were up to, and I think I brought that information back to Central.”
We glared at one another for a few seconds. To my surprise, Graves lowered his eyes first.
“All right,” he said. “You did okay. I’m just worried. I feel like I should chew you out because you took a risk, but that’s short-sighted. If I’d wanted a mission commander who didn’t take risks, I should have sent someone else.”
This almost floored me. Graves rarely admitted he was wrong about anything. In fact, I couldn’t recall a time when he had made a mistake. His judgment was legendary. You couldn’t get closer to a full blown apology from him.
“I’m sending this up to Drusus right now,” he continued. “Don’t be surprised if he contacts you personally for details.”
“All right,” I said, standing up. “Am I dismissed?”
“Yeah,” he said. “Take two hours off. Get something to eat. I’m sending you two out again as soon as Harris is on his feet and his head is clear.”
“Uh…” I said, not relishing another trip with Harris.
“You wanted him, McGill,” Graves said sharply. “You practically demanded that he go along. Now, you get to live with that.”
“Right… thank you, Centurion.”
Leaving the office, I grumbled all the way down the hall to the elevator. When I reached the mess hall floor, I tiredly slumped on a bench and ate a tray of food.
The truth was I felt sore and exhausted. I’d been more than banged around. You don’t fight a squad of five hundred-pound ogres without taking your licks, trickery or no.