“Are you as sick of this as I am?” Dragon asked me. It was two months after our fruitless mission in the Tomb of the Kings and we were in armor, trudging knee-deep through grisly exoseg parts. We were deep in the heart of what appeared to be the oldest exoseg complex, far underneath the Forest of Bones. I hated exoseg duty, but somebody had to do it, and Squad Beta had been selected.
“Stop whining,” I replied. “You know you love it.”
“I’d rather be back in that laundry we discovered-you know, the one with the tea and the incense?”
“Shut down, will you?”
“Relax, we’re on private. Seriously, Thinker, I finally realized what you were trying to do back there. I thought you were nuts at the time, but I understand it now. You were looking for a shortcut. It was just too damned bad there was nothing there. If it had worked, we could have avoided all this exo nonsense.”
“Well, it didn’t work.”
“Yeah, but you were thinking! It could have worked! I never thought of it. No, it was a fine idea, Thinker. You’re always thinking-they’ll probably make you a One someday.”
“Are you laughing at me?”
“I’m serious, Thinker!”
“Alert! Alert!” Sweety suddenly interrupted. “Situation Violet! Probable advanced attack! Probable advanced presence! Probable imminent combat! Readings inconclusive, maximum alert!”
The alert galvanized us.
“Prep for combat, Thinker!” Sweety warned me. “Probe has identified a cenite hatch ahead-please see the zero. I will give you every warning.”
“All right, gang, this is it,” Snow Leopard informed us calmly. “Combat advance. Whatever it is, we attack. Coolhand, take the second element.”
“This has to be the Systies, right?” Warhound asked tensely.
“Silence in the ranks, guys,” Coolhand replied.
When in doubt, advance, an old Legion saying. Now this. I could taste death, and it had nothing to do with exosegs. This was what we’d been looking for since we first dropped!
We advanced.
We found it moments later under a tangled pile of exoseg dead, a circular cenite hatch on the tunnel floor, slimy with a deceptor cloaking field, leading, surely, to our doom. No identifying marks.
Snow Leopard finally broke the silence with a whisper. “If it happens quickly, I want anyone who survives to maxburst whatever you see. Just scream it out, you hear me? Once you know what it is, you let Command know. I don’t want Beta to go out without at least getting off a message. They got the same probe report we did, so they’ll be waiting to hear from us. You hear me?”
We heard him. But we weren’t going without a fight.
“Psycho, Snow Leopard. You get those nukes warmed up.”
“They’re dead, Snow Leopard. If I see something move, they’re going to be dead.”
Snow Leopard kept his voice down. “Merlin, how can we open this? Quietly.”
Merlin pondered the hatch. “Laser, all around the edges. We’ll have to use laser. But when it opens, things may happen.”
“Acceptable. Merlin, open it. As soon as we can confirm what the enemy is, we call it in maxburst. That’s the mission! That’s the only mission! You girls think you can handle that?” He had often used the phrase in Hell, but it was no longer funny.
“Tenners, let’s do it.”
The hatch came off, burning and hissing. Coolhand, Dragon and Priestess hauled it off. Snow Leopard, Merlin and Psycho paused for just a frac, at the brink. Metal steps led down to a metal deck, and that’s all we could see.
“See you in Hell.”
“Death!” A hoarse whisper, from us all. Death, our angel. Death, to watch over us all. And then Snow Leopard, Merlin and Psycho vanished down the stairs. Warhound, Ironman and I followed right behind them leaping down into the portal, ignoring the stairs, guns up.
“Maximum alert!” Sweety whispered icy futures in my ears immediately. “Combat alert! Advanced presence! Human presence! Silenced power systems ahead! Muffled commo systems ahead! Nuclear alert! Radiation alert! V alert! Enemy laser systems powering on! Enemy targeting systems powering on! You are being targeted for attack! Recommend immediate counterattack!”
We ran, flat out, weapons up, my heart pounding, along a pristine metal tunnel, straight to our deaths.
“Fire, Psycho! Fire!” Snow shouted. The tunnel flashed up ahead, a sudden white hot nuclear light glaring all around us, a tremendous concussion, the earth trembling, Warhound and Ironman frozen in mid-stride beside me. Sweety still whispered her magic in my ears, bless her!
“Major enemy power systems powering on, gravity systems powering on, antimat drive generators powering on, strategic space superiority systems powering on! Tactical acquisition combat systems now on and scanning! The enemy is targeting you now! Recommend immediate counterfire! Tac nukes powering on! Multiple coded enemy alerts broadcasting now! I have identified the enemy! United System Defense Alliance tactical systems in use! Ignition! Ignition! Ignition! Ignition! You are under multiple attack! Fire all weapons!”
We dove to the deck in agonizing slow motion, a controlled crash, firing even as we skidded along the metal grating on our armored bellies. I fired high on auto xmax and knew Sweety would handle the arc. The air cracked wildly as we all fired, and then the world exploded. A bolt of white lightning flashed ahead of us and a great shock wave exploded all around us and suddenly the tunnel walls turned liquid, glowing streaks and globs of red-hot metal splattering through the air like fireworks, dazzling my eyes.
A booming maxburst of full power commo filled my helmet, Snow Leopard reporting in. “Systies! It’s Systies! Command, Beta! We’re in combat with Systies! Positive ID! Major power systems coming on! They’re launching ships! Nova! Nova! Attack! Attack! Put it right on top of us!” Deadman’s death, we had done it! Systies, and we had passed the word! Now we could die in peace. Beta was history.
A nuclear sun seemed to burst right in my face, ripping the fabric of our reality, the shock wave lifting me up like a mote of dust and bouncing me off the melted ceiling, the noise shattering my ears, my faceplate solid black and the light still burning into my brain. My E bounced off my faceplate, ricocheting all around me at the end of the strap.
“Beta, attack! Fire all weapons!” I could hardly believe my ears. Snow Leopard was still alive! The world roared all around me. I lay in a river of fire. Sheets of flame, rivers of flame, rippled along the deck. The whole tunnel vibrated. I scrambled to my feet. I still had my E. Our own deceptors cracked wildly everywhere. Uncoordinated enemy fire went wild. My faceplate bloomed with a dazzling array of flashing red lights, frantic alarms sounding in my ears. Sweety relayed data non-stop, but it wasn’t getting through to my brain. A beautiful, glowing flower of biogas was splattered in eerie slow motion over what was left of the walls and ceiling and deck, ricocheting everywhere, lovely transparent fingers of doom. An icy thrill ran over my skin. Warhound rose up from in front of me, fire licking over his armor. Alive!
“Warhound! It’s Thinker, where’s Ironman!”
“Attack. We have to attack.” Another explosion blasted the tunnel ahead of us.
“Move up!” I shouted. Warhound and I moved forward shoulder to shoulder firing high on auto xmax and Sweety had the arc. The smoking tunnel ahead lit up with laser fire, then multiple flashes, grinding explosions, and another shock wave, knocking us flat.
“Deto!”
“Get up! Snow Leopard’s alive! Attack! Beta, attack!” I did not know who else survived, but I had heard Snow Leopard up ahead calling out the alert and knew we had to back him up. Warhound and I charged forward, firing blind.
“Sweety, give me a target! Beta sitrep!”
“Shielded enemy ahead, deceptor bursts, I cannot read them. Snow Leopard and Psycho ahead, I do not read Merlin, Ironman is behind you, Dragon and Priestess and Coolhand at the rear. Faint readings from Gamma, Delta, and Alpha, rapidly approaching on blackout. I estimate Central is responding with a full strategic strike, but all elements are on blackout. I read numerous tac nuke strikes and an initial anti burst in the air. I detect major enemy antimat launchings, currently underway. Multiple ignitions! You are under attack! Fire all weapons! I have the arc!”
We fired, a vicious burst of auto xmax tearing along just under the ceiling. More cracks, just over our heads.
“Keep firing, guys! Snow Leopard, report!”
An exquisite red starburst with a white-hot core, dazzling us, an eerie supersonic hissing. A tremendous crack, the earth shaking, blazing yellow streaks snapping past us, my armor ringing, my faceplate peppered with scars.
“Keep it up, Psycho! You’re a freaking genius! Don’t stop!” Snow Leopard, alive, and suddenly the smoke cleared for an instant and there they were, Snow Leopard and Psycho and Merlin, thank the dead, even Merlin! They huddled in a jagged hole torn out of the deck, severed power cables draped around them like writhing snakes, water and steam spraying wildly from a pipe, the tunnel peeled open ahead of them as if smashed by the fists of the Gods. Lights flickered on and off, fiery black smoke choking the air, a scary electric crackling.
Warhound and I hurled ourselves into the hole. I landed on a thick power cable. Ironman jumped in right after us. I was overjoyed to see him. Psycho had the Manlink on his shoulder and he fired even as we watched, crackling, dazzling tacstars flashing magically downtunnel. Snow Leopard and Merlin knelt beside Psycho, their E’s glowing, their armor pitted and smoking, and a tunnel of fire, molten metal, glowed all around them.
“Advance, Beta!” Insane or not, we’d follow our One all the way to Hell and fight our way through to the other side if he wanted. We advanced, stunned and silent, terrified, firing almost non-stop.
We found the first Systie almost immediately. He had been caught in one of Psycho’s tacstars. His heavy armor had been ripped apart like paper. His faceplate shattered, face swollen purple, the eyes bloody pulps, a black tongue showing between his lips. He had been a big man, but now he was nothing. Instinctively, I made the sign of the Legion.
Even through the damage, though, I recognized what he had once been. “Systie commando. Lord! Look at that insignia! 15th DefCorps! Deadman, what are they doing here?”
“They’re here! Never mind why! We attack! Quit gabbing! Move up, Beta!” Snow was all business.
“Ignition! Ignition! Ignition! You are under attack!”
“Fire! Fire!” Psycho let loose, we all let loose.
“Command Beta! We’ve ID’d a commando unit of the 15th DefCorps! Repeat, commandos, 15th DefCorps!”
“Confirm, Beta! Maintain your blackout!”
We finally reached the end of the long access tunnel and looked around at the twisted wreckage of a major base complex. Ceilings, decks, bulkheads all riddled, twisted, torn, shattered, shredded, and glowing, the metal running like white hot lava, hissing and spitting. Gaping holes peppered the deck and ceilings. We could see more levels down below, and A-suited soldiers, running. A confusing array of heavy equipment was scattered everywhere, tumbled in chaotic patterns, half buried in rubble. We sought shelter where we could. I ducked behind a heavy tracked vehicle, my heart racing.
A titanic blast hit ahead of us, ripping the air violently, spraying us with shrapnel, leaving me huddled in terror, deaf and frozen. I saw Psycho pop up like a toy soldier, the Manlink on his shoulder, fire another tacstar burst, and duck. A tremendous bang, freezing my blood.
Someone landed beside me. Hard. I turned and found myself staring into Boudicca’s faceplate. I got a quick glimpse of her glowing, ecstatic face, wild eyes, the Legion cross black on her forehead. She was biting her lip. Only an instant and then she leaped up, firing her E on full auto xmax, calling her troops.
“Death, Gamma! Death! Fire all weapons! Advance, Gamma, advance! Follow me, Gamma! Follow me!” And all of Gamma suddenly appeared, up and moving forward, and the world shook to their firing.
“Beta-advance! Fire controlled xmax!” We followed Snow Leopard, and my armor rang with hits as soon as I stepped forward. I aimed the E high and fired auto xmax, and Sweety did the rest. I didn’t bother looking at the tacsit.
Sweety was still talking. “Enemy troopers ahead! I see six, marked, fire xmax now! Ignition! Enemy tacstars! Fire all weapons! Fall now!” The deck hit me in the face. A ringing in my head, but nothing hurt any more. A great roaring. Get up.
“Get up! Attack! Biogas ignition! No effect! Recommend stunstar to take enemy prisoners! Ignition! Fire xmax! Major antimat launching sequences continuing! I detect a major launching completed! Numerous deceptor launches! Airburst antis! Major enemy troop concentrations directly ahead! Enemy V, laser, nuke, tacs now on you! Fire all weapons! Psycho fire tacstars, fire! Ignition! Multiple attacks, fire and fall!”
I fired and fell, just as we had practiced a thousand times in Hell. Again a white-hot sun licked at my armor.
“Get up! Attack! Psycho, give me some stunstars! I want prisoners!” Snow Leopard walked into the firestorm just ahead. Every muscle in my body screamed in agony. Engulfed in flames, I found something in my way. A massive chunk of metal, hanging from the overhead by a thin strip. I kicked it away. I thought I saw Valkyrie walking past me, calmly firing her E from the hip, wreathed in flames. I immediately thought of Priestess, somewhere behind me. I raised my E and fired. I could not afford such thoughts.
Sleepwalking, I stepped over the smoking armor of another Systie soldier, his A-suit torn open by unimaginable forces. Several of them sprawled, pitted and dead, frozen in grotesque positions, flames licking all around them. Someone screamed. I thought for a moment it was me. A sharp, eerie whistling, all around me. Suddenly pure white smoke enveloped me, and the air sparkled like diamonds. Biogas! I held my breath, instinctively.
I almost stumbled over another A-suit. This one moved, and I was about to shoot when I realized it was Legion armor. Ironman had fallen to his knees, his left arm missing below the elbow, armor burnt and smoking, raising his other arm to me. His eyes appeared strangely calm and vulnerable. Blood spurted from the wound.
“Medic! Priestess, Thinker, on me! Ironman’s hit!” I tore open my medkit, ripped out a pressure dressing and forced it up past the jagged edges of Ironman’s armor and into the wound. His blood squirted all over my armor.
Priestess arrived in a frac, working on Ironman immediately. He slumped into unconsciousness. I cradled his helmet in my arms. I thought of when I had first met Ironman, in Providence, and of everything that had happened since then. He was just an innocent kid, a schoolboy who had somewhere taken a wrong turn and found himself on Atom’s Road, still full of wonder at it all. Ironman-our last link with innocence. Deadman, don’t let him die!
“I’ve done the wound,” Priestess said calmly. “The biogas, we’ve got to seal the suit, now. Help me with the sealant.”
We stuffed sealant into the jagged remains of the A-suit’s left arm, while lasers snapped all around us, drilling ragged lines into a nearby wall. I aimed my E with one hand and fired blindly on auto xmax. Ironman’s armor was badly scarred and pitted, but appeared to be functional. Shrapnel suddenly rained on us, pinging off our armor.
“Beta! Attack! We need more firepower!” Snow Leopard called out.
“Go, Thinker,” Priestess insisted. “We’ve got to leave him, I’ll mark it.”
“Will he be all right?”
“Yes. Go!”
Whatever used to be here was now unrecognizable. It had been a major Systie base, full of heavy equipment and starline containers, buried far underground, hidden in the heart of the exoseg complex, worlds within worlds, so deep and silent we had never even suspected its existence. Now it was smoking junk, still burning brightly, torn and vaporized and shredded and melting. Command would be hitting the base from above, and I did not see how we could survive.
A blue flash with white streaks of streaming debris lit up just ahead, followed closely by a sharp concussion wave. More shrapnel. I could barely see out my faceplate, it was so scarred. I moved forward into thick clouds of black smoke.
Sweety continued talking. “Enemy stunstar! Beta and Gamma ahead, engaging the enemy. Fire xmax, Thinker, I’ll guide it!”
A blinding flash up ahead, a tacstar. The shockwave, rocking me. I aimed high and fired a burst of xmax. Lasers flashed past me.
Suddenly a great roaring vibration echoed from above and a massive section of ceiling came down in awesome slow motion, low grade metal beams melting like icicles in the flames, carrying down the world from up above. A great glowing mass of equipment, ripping and tearing and popping.
It all fell in on us. Sweety squeaked a warning and Psycho, on my left, fired a tacstar right up there, fighting to the end, alarms shrieking, nowhere to go but stand there, head up, and face my death.
I raised my E and fired, full auto xmax, screaming.
Light. Heat, rushing through my veins. Whispers.
“Get up, Thinker! Get up!”
“Thinker! Answer me, Thinker!” Dreaming. Sweety’s voice. Priestess’s voice. Valkyrie’s voice.
My eyes flickered open. Light, glimmering. A dull roaring. Shadows. A face. Dark eyes, through a red faceplate. Priestess. Priestess! Kneeling over me, her black armor streaked with white scars and covered with dust. A confusing tangle of wreckage surrounded us. Lights flashed.
“Thinker! Speak to me!”
“Priestess…love you!” I reached up a hand and she collapsed onto me gasping, her eyes closed. We enjoyed the moment, faceplate to faceplate. I looked right into her face and I saw a child looking back, cheeks streaming with tears. Deadman, what were we doing out here, on the bad side of outside, beyond the edge, locked in a lunatic struggle for the future with an enemy who should not be here. I held her tightly. We would get through this, somehow, and then it would be Thinker and Priestess, forever.
“I’m so happy, Thinker!”
“We’ll be all right, Priestess. What’s the sit?” My entire body throbbed in agony, but Sweety told me I had no injuries. It’s not easy to hurt yourself in an A-suit.
“It’s a mess,” Priestess replied. “This whole section has collapsed. I thought I’d never find you. Get up, we’ve got to go! Everybody is here now. The Second and the Third and the Fourth. Central did airburst antis right over the base. It’s a miracle we’re still alive! The Systies launched all their ships to get away. I don’t know what happened. Get up, we’re still fighting!”
We crawled through a tangled maze of collapsed walls and ceilings, festooned with spitting, hissing power cables and twisted structural beams and shattered consoles and huge metal poles. We struggled past bombed-out aircars, heavy construction equipment, and burning crates of rations and supplies, riddled with holes. Thick billowing smoke rose and emergency lights glared and flickered, revealing bodies, smashed and crushed, in armor and out, pale and fragile and still. Weapons littered the wreckage.
Lasers snapped somewhere up ahead. What a mess! We crawled over a pile of wreckage and the collapsed ceiling scraped my helmet.
“Elektra, Farside, Gamma have this area secured,” Sweety told me. “Mopping up activity underway. The enemy successfully launched seven starships. They had evidently prepped for our arrival. Although all power systems were off, they were set to initiate launches as soon as they powered on.”
“Thinker, Snow Leopard! You with us yet? On me!”
“Snow Leopard, Thinker. Tenners!” I replied. We slid down a great pile of smoking rubble. To our right we could see up several levels through gaping holes in the floors. A pair of massive blast doors rose up even higher, sealed tight, burned black. It was quiet except for the fire, consuming this secret world.
“Priestess, how’s Ironman? Did we lose anyone?”
“Ironman is with Beta now. He’s stable. We called an evac but they’re still trying to get through. The place is an absolute mess. As far as I know, we’re all here. We thought they got Psycho, but you can’t kill Psycho, he’s laserproof, you know that.” She sounded tired, but thrilled to be alive.
“I’ll kill you, you filthy Systie worm! I’ll kill you! You’re dead, you understand? I’ll cut off your worthless head! Talk, you subhuman pig!” Boudicca seized the fat, greasy Systie by the throat and slammed him up against the wall. Boudicca had her helmet off, but was otherwise totally armored. The Systie looked naked in comparison, clothed only in a litesuit. Boudicca was enraged, her face burning, her flaming red hair accenting it, her teeth like fangs. The Systie turned purple, strangling, his naked fingers clawing at Boudicca’s armored hand. The Legion Cross on her forehead seemed to throb.
“That’s enough, Boudicca!” Snow Leopard intervened, pulling her away from the Systie. Snow Leopard also had his helmet off, sweating and filthy, his blond-white hair plastered to his skull. The Systie slid down the wall and collapsed on the floor, gasping hoarsely, covered with blood and peppered with wounds. Another Systie slumped miserably in the corner, in litepants and no shirt. What looked like half of Beta and Gamma crowded around the prisoners, and they were in an ugly mood. I could not tell what function the room had served. Broken glass and rubble littered the floor.
“I’m going to kill him!” Boudicca surged past Snow Leopard and seized one of the Systie’s hands in her armored fist. She began to squeeze, slowly, a cenite vise. The Systie screamed in agony, groveling on the floor, with Boudicca slowly crushing his hand. I heard the bones snapping.
“Let go of him, Boudicca! He’s a Legion prisoner! I don’t care if we are pledged, you touch him again and I’ll see you lose your squad!” Snow Leopard wrestled her away from the prisoner. She pulled her hand away viciously and blood spattered on the deck. The Systie howled mournfully, his bloody hand still outstretched before him.
Boudicca again tore herself away from Snow Leopard’s grip, raising her E to the Systie’s head. “Talk, you scum! Your prisoners! Where are they! Talk, or you die!” She made a terrifying sight, a rabid wolf of a girl spitting venom. With that Legion cross burned into her forehead, she could have posed for a Systie hateprop show on the Legion.
The Systie continued to scream, his mouth locked open, his body twisted in agony. Boudicca had some support from the troops.
“Kill him! Do it!”
“Cut his arm off!”
“Set him on fire!”
“Put down your E! He can’t talk like this!” Snow Leopard tried to control her.
“He’s dead, I don’t care what he says, he’s dead!”
I watched this show in stupefied wonder, then I went on private to Priestess. “What’s all this about, Priestess?”
“I don’t know, Thinker. I just got here!”
“Talk, you maggot! You want to die slow? I’ll put you in a pit of acid! Talk, damn you!” Boudicca was going off the deep edge.
The Systie was a big man, but he was soft, clearly not a soldier. His face twitched, and his lips moved. “The ship,” he said. “We were supposed to be on the ship.” He had a very strange accent.
Boudicca seized him by his tunic, and pulled him up until his puffy, round face almost touched hers. “Prisoners! Speak, you fat slug! You took a prisoner! Where are your PWs! If you don’t tell me, I’m going to kill you, right now! Tell me and you live! Speak!” She screamed in his face, spittle flying wildly.
“They used stunstars…”
“Tell me something I don’t know, Systie!”
“They wanted some prisoners, to find out…”
“Where! Where did they take them!”
“We don’t know, they didn’t tell us! We’re not with the DefCorps!”
Boudicca slammed him to the floor in disgust, and raised her arms over her head, a gesture of supreme frustration. “I’m going to kill him!”
“I’ll talk to him, Boudicca. You’re too upset,” Snow Leopard said. “Take a drink, have some water. They’ll talk. Don’t worry, they’ll talk.”
Boudicca turned, and I had never seen her look so shattered. She appeared stricken and her eyes were moist. “All right, tenners, try, but if they don’t talk, I am personally going to strangle them both. You hear me, Systies!” She spun on her heel, hissing at them, and they recoiled from her fury.
A growing sense of dread washed over me. The fat man, on his knees, held his shattered hand before him, trembling and crying. Blood poured freely down his arm. “Can’t we stop the bleeding?” he sobbed. “We’re a civilian. We’re not a soldier. We didn’t shoot at the Legion. We don’t belong here.”
“Shoot him!”
“Shut down, Boudicca! Thinker-” A sharp blast outside interrupted Snow Leopard. We went to ground, and several troopers went charging out the doorway. Priestess made a move toward the wounded Systie. I stopped her.
“Get out of my way, Thinker!”
“Just wait a few moments-just a frac, all right? He’ll be all right.”
Snow Leopard interrupted us. “Thinker, you and I will interrogate the prisoner. Take off your helmet. Priestess, wait until the interrogation is complete.”
“The man is wounded,” Priestess said, pale and furious. “I formally request permission to treat his wounds. Now! He’s losing blood. I can bandage his hand while you’re interrogating him. And I am filing a report on how he got this wound!”
“Wonderful,” Snow Leopard said calmly. “All right, proceed, Priestess.”
I cracked open my helmet, and the stink of the place hit me immediately. It smelled of burning power cables and death. My eyes stung from the smoke in the air. Lasers snapped outside.
“Thinker, you may do the honors.” Snow Leopard wanted this done correctly, I could tell.
Priestess was already prepping the Systie’s hand.
“Thank you, Snow Leopard.” I turned my attention to the fat man, still on his knees. Snow Leopard and I squatted before him. Priestess pressed on a field dressing. “Systie, this is a combat tactical interrogation,” I told him. “You are a combatant, and you are being interrogated by field elements of the 22nd Legion of the Confederation of Free Worlds. We are now in a combat situation, and your cooperation is essential to our tactical success. If you refuse interrogation or attempt to deceive us, you will be shot dead immediately as a combatant. If you cease resistance and cooperate to our satisfaction, you will be granted official ConFree prisoner of war status and will come under the protection of the laws of the Confederation and of the Interstellar Code on prisoners of war. Do you understand the situation?”
“Yes. Yes, we do…we want to cooperate.”
“Do you understand?”
“Yes.”
“Will you cooperate?”
“Yes…” he seemed in agony.
“Good. Why is the System on this planet?”
His face paled, his eyes went wild, and he gasped for air. “Please…no…don’t ask us…”
“Thinker, forget that,” Snow Leopard interrupted impatiently. “Ask him if they took any prisoners.”
“Yeah, sure. Systie, did you take any prisoners? What the…” The Systie froze, his face trembling, his eyes glazed over. Blood burst suddenly from his nostrils, two bright red jets. His mouth popped open and his eyes rolled back in his sockets and he shuddered and toppled over backwards, stone dead.
Stunned, we just stared at the body. Priestess was astounded, her medkit still in her hands.
“Good!” Boudicca declared. “Now kill the other one!”
“Coolhand! Did you see that?” Snow Leopard asked.
“Yes,” Coolhand replied. “That’s got to be psych programming.”
“I agree. This is what happened to our two Systie recon guys.”
Snow Leopard pondered the possibilities. “This is really interesting. It was the first question…not the second.” His gaze turned to the other prisoner, still miserably huddled in the corner, shirtless. We gathered around him. He raised his face, bravely. He was young and muscular, and covered with old scars. He shivered, whether in cold or fear I did not know.
“Systie,” I began. “This is a combat tactical interrogation…”
“We understand,” he said. “We are a soldier, we understand. We will cooperate. We will tell it all we know.” He had the same accent as the other one.
“Prisoners!” Snow Leopard insisted. “Did you take prisoners? Speak!”
“Yes, at least one prisoner. We heard it on the net, but we did not participate. We think it was…yes, it was the Seventh, their security elements, the 3rd and 4th squads.”
“Details!” Snow Leopard was doing the interrogation now. I listened.
“They used a stunstar, and it worked. They only had a few marks to get back to the ship before launching, but they made it back with the prisoner. We remember they gave a cheer. That was their mission.”
“And the ship,” Snow Leopard asked. “What ship was it?”
“The Seventh was on the Preference. That’s where they took the prisoner-to the Preference.”
“Trooper,” Snow Leopard asked. “If we ask you about the purpose of this installation, are you going to die on us?”
The Systie took a deep breath. “We don’t think so. It knew it was coming, we could see that. It was a baser. But nobody ever told us anything important. We’re just a soldier. Fifteenth DefCorps, Stratcom, the Starfleet Commandos. It was a good outfit…” he paused, overcome by emotion. “We’re sorry about Legion comrade. System lost some good men, too.”
“So why is the System here? Why the base?”
“We’re just a soldier,” he repeated. “The base was highly classified. It was a horror show. They said the basers never left. They just stayed there, forever. Our outfit was here to provide external security and strategic defense. But it was a big operation. Lots of star carriers, coming and going. Lots of heavy equipment. It was a mining operation of some sort. Unitium, somebody said. We weren’t supposed to know. We never got near the mining area. They had their own internal security.”
“Unitium? What are you talking about? What’s unitium?” Snow Leopard sounded puzzled.
“We don’t know! And we don’t ask questions.”
Shocked expressions and a long pause followed.
“Unitium?” Merlin mused. “Let’s see-unitium is an extremely rare, natural mineral with some unique properties that looked theoretically useful for the acceleration of promat. At one time, it was of interest in connection with some containment problems associated with star drives. But we solved those problems, and we didn’t use unitium.”
“Why would the System be interested in this stuff?” Snow Leopard asked.
“I can’t imagine why they would,” Merlin replied. “They’ve already stolen all our stardrive technology. Nobody cares about unitium.”
Snow Leopard turned back to the Systie. “Where were you guys when we got here? This place was dead!”
The prisoner took a deep breath. “Legion really surprised us, when its starship hit the screens. We picked up that much. It was not expected! And it seems we were not supposed to be here, either, because we were all set. We went to dead systems immediately. The whole base was built for strategic deniability. It was a class camo job. But we never thought anyone would actually land here! So when Legion showed up, every major power system in the base and on the ships was cut. The whole time Legion’s been on planet, we’ve been sealed and dead, not a move, not a peep, just rotting underground, and the command so scared they wouldn’t even let us send out recon elements for the first few months. It’s been a stinking mess. We don’t know what they were planning. Surely, they didn’t think Legion was going to go away, not after we lost two of our recon units. Did Legion pick up on them? We figured it did.”
The prisoner wouldn’t stop talking, pouring out his frustrations. “After a while they knew Legion was homing in on us and the plan was to abandon the base, because we did not have the strength to fight. And we guess it worked, except Legion surprised us again, popping up in the middle of the base like that. We don’t think anyone knows how Legion did that, and we’d guess it interrupted the basers. Because otherwise we’d all be dead.” He wiped his face on his forearm.” The plan was to antimat the base.”
Antimat the base! It was one of those fascinating little bits of trivia that you’re really glad you didn’t know about beforehand. That would have ruined our whole day. I opened a canteen, took a swig, and offered it to the prisoner. He grasped it eagerly and drank deeply.
“Tell me about the exosegs, trooper,” Snow Leopard said.
The Systie stared vacantly at Snow Leopard. “Well, what does it want to know? All they told us was don’t ever leave the base. It seemed like good advice. The exos eat people. And worse. It’s an evil business. They have something to do with the levies. We didn’t ask.”
“Tell me about the levies.”
“We weren’t supposed to know about them, but it’s a small base. We’d see the natives-lots of them-men, women, kids-heading for the transports. It wasn’t voluntary, we can tell it that. They were in shock. Some couldn’t even move. Somebody once called it ‘the levies’. There was a connection with the exosegs. I don’t know what it was.”
“The exos are native to Andrion 3. Why are they here?” It was a dangerous question. I knew Snow Leopard very well, and he was about to decide whether or not this Systie was lying to us.
The Systie just looked at him. “Andrion 3? What’s that?” A tense little silence ensued, and then the Systie resumed, nervously. “Look, we don’t know any Andrion 3. In the System we do what we’re told, and we don’t ask questions. They told us we could call this world ‘Site X’. That’s all. We don’t have the slightest idea where we are. We never did. And we never heard of any Andrion 3. That’s the truth. Legion asked for the truth.”
Snow Leopard kept looking at him, silent. Finally he spoke. “What was your last port of call?”
“It was Coldmark, out in the Gassies. It’s a USICOM world. It’s the end of the line. We were on the Rule of Law, out of Port Promise. Very far out of Port Promise, we can tell it. We thought Coldmark was the armpit of the galaxy until we got to Site X. X was bad duty. It’s an evil place. We’re glad we’re done with it. Legion is welcome to it.” His head dropped again. He shivered. He was drained, and ready to crash. “Is it going to shoot us or not?”
Snow Leopard ignored his question. “What happened to you, trooper? Why didn’t you make it back to your ship?” Snow Leopard had decided the Systie was telling the truth, I could tell.
The Systie took a deep breath, and made another effort to control his emotions. “Some of our guys were trapped when the fifth level fell in. We knew the ship was launching, but they were still in there. We tried to get them out.” He hid his face from us. We did not ask him whether or not he had found his buddies. It would not have been polite.
Exhausted, I couldn’t even form a complete thought. I noticed Boudicca propped up against a wall, one armored fist on her brow, eyes closed, jaw clenched. Her other hand came up to her eyes and she sat there miserably, trembling. I could not see her face. If I had not known her so well, I’d have sworn she was crying.
That wave of dread returned and I suddenly knew. I took a deep breath. “So what’s all this about a prisoner?” I asked Snow Leopard quietly. “Who…who did they grab?”
He looked at me wearily, vaguely surprised. “You didn’t know? It’s Valkyrie. She’s missing. Looks like the Systies got her.”
The forest was burning in the night. That was the view when we reached the top. We had climbed all the way up through the shattered Systie base, threading our way through the twisted wreckage, avoiding the worst fires, crawling up like worms, alert for stragglers. But we found only the dead and what the living left behind. We also found mines and pockets of biogas. Lots of nasty surprises. Ironman had been evak’d by an amtac, slicing in from above.
We surfaced in a forest of flames, a charcoal forest glowing red in the night, burning brightly. Great torrents of sparks and incredible rushes of flames rose up to the heavens, sooty smoke hiding the stars. Fire lifted into the night, exploding wildly, a chilling, beautiful spectacle. We stood in the ruins, cracked our helmets open, and breathed in the hot night air, lush with smoke and full of the taste of ashes and death. The glowing bones of the base crawled with soldiers from the Third, dropped in from topside on the glowing aftermath of our antis, but we were the first to surface from below. We had crawled up through Perdition, and I never wanted to see it again.
The Systies had dug their base and unitium mining operation in from one side, leaving the forest above them for cover. Pits of flame glowed in the charcoal forest like volcanoes. Their ships had been well concealed under blast-proof launch silos. Now the silos opened to the stars, spitting rivers of flame as the base burned. The ships were splitting vac, far beyond our reach. Where the forest had collapsed, the skeleton of the base glowed cherry-red.
I looked up at the stars, blinking. Another river of fire glowed high above, a ghostly highway in the heavens, a glittering stream of golden sparks and silver comets, traced across the velvet sky. As I watched, some of the sparks lit up and exploded silently, mini flashes of nuclear light, flaring briefly, then fading, breaking up into a shower of angel dust, winking in the night. It was a vision of ice and fire.
We learned on the comnet that Atom had reacted to Snow Leopard’s first shouted warning in microfracs, crash-launching into stardrive immediately, but not before instantaneously launching the cruisers and the fighter force and a full strategic strike. Fleetcom doesn’t like risking its battlestars unnecessarily and in this case Atom’s presence was not necessary to deal with this minor disturbance. She would be safe in stardrive and could return at any time.
A lot of surprised pilots woke up quickly, some of them with faces scalded by cups of hot dox, but they all had alarms shrieking in their ears and the stars suddenly dancing in their screens and a red-hot weapons panel instantly alive with fully armed antis and nukes and chainlinks and targets coming on the screen, and Andrion 2 rushing at them, enemy deceptors lighting up their lives.
Most of the Systie ships had gotten through, hiding in the deceptors, but some of them had not, and these still tumbled through space, the wreckage skipping along the atmosphere, lighting up the night sky-glowing, burning, spitting flames, exploding. Exhausted and stunned, we watched the show. Aircars hovered over the base like a swarm of bloodsucking gnats, dazzling white searchlights stabbing mercilessly down into the dark, revealing the Systie’s secret world. Legion fighters orbited high above, specks of blue flame in the night, and two of them dipped low for a better view, suddenly flashing past close overhead, twin sonic booms shattering the night, rattling my teeth. I never could watch them without a hopeless thrill.
Even then, exhausted and drained, I could feel it. Raw power, and the will of the Legion, a mailed fist in the heavens for us all, and we knew it was ours, and ours alone. All we had to do was call it in, just like Snow Leopard did. Just one feeble squawk and they’d be there, Atom’s fist, dropping in from topside, ripping the atmosphere open like a rotten fruit, bringing all of Atom’s power and glory, bringing instant death to all our foes. They had torn the top right off this base and now it glowed in the night, the mark of the Legion, our mark, burnt into the face of this distant world for all to see.
A miracle, I thought. We had all survived. Ironman was safe in evac, and all the Legion’s skill and knowledge were with him.
The rest of Beta was right here, helmets off, breathing the hot night air and watching the flames as the base burnt and the Third fought the fire. We had kicked in the door and walked right into their best. Snow Leopard, staring into space, silent at last, pale and drained, hair plastered to his skull, hollow eyes now bloody red.
Coolhand, also silent, squatted in his armor, watching the show, hypnotized, content. Merlin stood, stunned, staring at the burning charcoal forest and the volcanoes spitting flame and the fleets of dancing aircars and the blinding searchlights flashing over us, and the lovely sparkling trail of destruction up by the stars, taking it all in as if he never wanted to forget it.
Psycho, spent at last after his orgy of destruction, his face all cut and swollen, both eyes blackened, still toting his Manlink on one hip-the Manlink that saved us all. Psycho called her the Mother of Destruction, and we called her the Tacstar Goddess.
Warhound sat in his armor, holding his head, eyes closed. Dragon stood off by himself, scowling, cradling his E in his arms. This was one of his unapproachable times. What did he think about, I wondered. Flashes from lost wars? Lost worlds, lost causes, vanished soldiers?
Priestess, precious Priestess, her head on my armored shoulder, her scent a hot musk in my nostrils, her hair soaked in sweat, Beta’s perfume of the day. I could easily lose myself in dreams of Priestess, with her lovely soft hair kissing my cheek. I would only have to close my eyes.
An aircar slowly passed over us, raising a swirl of smoke. And a vision came to me: the Phantoms of the March. Surely this was what Longwalker and Starlight had discovered, all those lost dead years ago. They had run into the Systies, and somehow escaped. The Phantoms of the March, an alien army. What else could Longwalker have believed? He thought they were ghosts.
I was too tired to sleep, too tired to close my eyes. I could only stare into the night. I saw Valkyrie, misty in the smoke, the breeze rustling her blonde hair. Valkyrie, a captive of the Systies. It was obscene. She worshipped freedom, and even the Legion could not hold her. She did as she pleased, always. How could they put her in a cage? What would happen to her?
Horrified, I looked up to the stars, the smoke of the burning forest stinging my eyes. Valkyrie was still alive. I was positive I could feel her, across the light years. Alive.
Priestess looked up at me calmly. “I don’t hate her. I’m jealous whenever she’s around and I’d fight her again over you, but I don’t hate her. The Legion will find her. We will find her! And when we do I’ll kick her butt. And then I’ll kick your butt-and you’ll still be mine.” She smiled and laid her head back on my shoulder.