“So we find cover.” In my mind’s eye, I can see the overturned ships on the shore. Discarded playthings left by some monstrosity of a child. “How far to the coast?”
Granger’s boots shuffle as he faces west—using his HUD compass, no doubt. “Distance,” he uses a voice command from the owner’s manual. “Distance to shore,” he specifies.
I strain to hear approaching sounds of any kind. Footsteps. Humming solar engines. Those jeeps couldn’t have vanished without a trace. The hostiles are still here, somewhere. And they’re watching.
“It’s saying five and a quarter kilometers. Quite a trek in these suits. In this heat.”
“Describe the terrain.”
“Well, uh—”
“Just tell me what you see. Sand dunes, rock formations—anything that would provide adequate cover?”
“Yeah, there’s plenty of both. It’s a desert wasteland out here, man. But I see a few outcroppings of rock that look promising.”
I hold out my arm. “Lead on.”
“How’s your O2?” He guides me forward.
“Fine.” Without the gauges on my HUD, there’s no way to check pressure levels. “For now.”
“Guess you’ll know for sure when you start choking.”
I clench my jaw.
Granger clears his throat, breaking the silence. “Just saying it like it is, man.”
Again, I consider removing the helmet. Insane, sure, but I have only two options: suffocate as the suit’s oxygen runs out, or breathe in the contaminated air outside. I try to swallow. The dryness is still there.
“We’re here.” Granger places the palm of my gloved hand against solid rock. “Granite boulders maybe four meters high. Should give us enough cover.”
I sense a shift in gradient. “How steep is this hill?”
Granger chuckles. “You sure you can’t see?”
If the hostiles abandoned their vehicles, they would have taken to higher ground in order to command a better vantage point. Which means my trusty engineer and I will remain exposed until we hold a similar position.
“We need to climb.”
“You really are blind as a bat. Cuz there’s no way you’d even think of hauling your ass up this hill if you could see what I’m seeing. One slip on the way up, and we’ll be acquainting ourselves real intimately with a few jagged rocks below.”
“We have to get to higher ground. We’re not alone.”
“I sure as hell hope not! The others made it—we’ve just got to find them.”
“They’re watching us.” I keep my voice low, though I doubt it matters. Despite the fractured outer layer, my helmet is soundproof. But my ears are still ringing, and I don’t want to overcompensate by shouting at the internal mic. “They haven’t left.”
Granger’s breathing on the comm channel cuts out for a moment. His boots shuffle. “You mean—the hostiles? Where?”
“Can’t say.” The short hairs on the back of my neck are standing at attention right now. A marine always knows when he’s being watched. I can’t understand how Granger doesn’t sense it too. How many tours of duty has he seen? You don’t last long in the field without a second pair of eyes in the back of your head. But then again, the guy’s an engineer—a whole different breed.
“Captain, I don’t see anybody. But if you’re right, then finding some firepower should be our top priority.”
I tap my helmet and curse. I can move properly in the suit now, but I still can’t see a damn thing. “Afraid I won’t be much help.”
“Fine. I’ll go look around. Meet you back here.”
“We stay together. That’s an order.”
“Listen, you just stay put, and I’ll—”
“I gave you a direct order.”
“Sorry, Captain. I hate to do this, but it looks like I’m assuming command here. You’re in no condition to argue—not until your HUD’s back online, anyhow.” His boots trudge away. “Don’t even think about court-martialing me later. You know I’m right.” He takes off across the sandy hardpan.
I grunt in acknowledgment. There’s no reason to believe we’re not the only two survivors from the chopper. We stand a better chance sticking together. Apart, we’ll be picked off easily—and without Granger’s eyes, I’m completely lost.
I curse the hazard suit, the scientist who prepped it, the UW itself. What were they thinking, sending us into this war zone? The particulars of your mission will appear on your heads-up displays, once you’ve reached the drop site. Well, that’s not happening. You run into any unexpected difficulties, you radio. Don’t delay. That’s what we’re here for. We’re your backup. Also out of the question. Even if my HUD was functioning and I could contact the Argonaus, I don’t recall seeing a second chopper on that flight deck. Captain Mutegi will have to send a bird inland from one of the other vessels in the naval blockade. But would he risk a second chopper after what happened to ours?
I have some trouble wrapping my mind around it. These hostiles are well-equipped. Their solar jeeps ran at full power, and that Stinger was obviously fully functional. It blew a LoneWolf UAX-38 out of the sky, for crying out loud. But who the hell are they—and what idiot armed them?
A gust of wind blasts against my back, throwing me into the rock. I groan out loud, surprised by the sudden force of the blow. I half-turn, as if to glance back. But that’s pointless; the suit won’t allow it, even if I were able to see.
Everything’s still.
“Papa?”
A shock jolts through my system, but it has nothing to do with the hazard suit’s power coming back online.
“Papa, is that you?”
I’m not hearing this. It can’t be happening. The voice isn’t coming through my headset on the comm channel. I can hear it with my ears. The ringing has stopped, and I hear the small voice as it approaches with footsteps shuffling toward me through the dust.
“What’s wrong, Papa?”
I can feel the voice in the center of my chest. I squint against the red glare blinking OFFLINE on the HUD. My eyes sting. My lips part without sound.
It can’t be Mara. Not my little girl. Not out here. It makes no sense. She’s with her brother, with their mother in Eurasia—
I’m losing my mind.
I’m better than this. Trained better. UW marines are disciplined to withstand every brand of hardship. Nothing can break us.
“Papa?” The voice comes within reach.
“Stay back.” I force an arm outward, palm extended. I’m cornered here with no retreat. I’ll have to climb uphill in spite of Granger’s warning if I plan on moving away from this voice. “Identify yourself.”
“But you know who I am.” Mara sounds hurt.
It’s not Mara. It’s some kind of trick. The hostiles—it has to be one of them with a bizarre telepathic ability that reaches into the subconscious, somehow able to pull out what I hold most precious and use it against me.
But that’s insane. I’m totally losing it now.
“Did you fire on us?” I keep my tone steady, under control. It’s a wonder she can hear me at all through my helmet.
“You’re not safe here, Papa. They’re going to be looking for you, and they are very hungry.”
I hear her take another step toward me. “I said stay back!”
“I know you’re scared, but you have to think. Where should you be right now?”
Up. That’s my first thought.
“I can help you,” she says. “If you let me.”
“Who are you?” I demand.
“You know who I am.”
I shake my head. “It’s not—you’re not—”
“You want to see me again, don’t you, Papa?”
Of course I do. It’s the only thing that gets me through every endless day apart from my family: the hope that when this tour of duty ends, we’ll be reunited.
“You’re not my daughter,” I manage at last. “I don’t know who or what you are, but you’re not her.”
Not my Mara.
Silence follows except for my own labored breathing.
“You’re a smart man, James. But I guess that’s why I married you,” comes the voice of my wife.
Emma.
I feel a sudden chill despite the temperature inside my suit—well over seventy degrees centigrade by now. This isn’t real. I squeeze my eyes shut and force a deep breath. My mind has snapped. That’s all. I just need to remain calm and focus on something else. Anything.
But all I can think about is my family, and I can’t push their faces out of my mind’s eye.
“Do you remember the last thing you told me?” Emma asks.
Like it was yesterday. The UW soldiers in their crisp grey uniforms and black boots, escorting my wife and children from our home. The scene so diplomatic and orderly. Such a pretentious façade. My family taken hostage, the official government representatives acting as their captors—until I return.
“I’ll be back before you know it,” I offered at the time, seething, detained at my own front door by a high-ranking official.
Emma glanced over her shoulder at me as they were led away. She smiled. Not because she understood what was going on or because she was okay with it. She smiled at me because she loved me.
“You must stay alive, James. So much depends on you,” she says now in this hot, alien place where neither one of us belongs.
I frown, back in the moment. “How do you know my name?”
“There will be time for questions later. For now, we must get you to safety. You cannot hear them, but they are coming.”
“The hostiles.” I strain to listen for the sound of their jeeps.
“You could call them that. To others, they are known as goblyns. Or daemons.”
“And what are you, exactly? I’m not going anywhere until you tell me that.” I take a bold step forward, reaching blindly. “Some kind of mind-reader?”
My gloved hand makes contact with a bare shoulder—my wife’s? I know its shape better than my own. But I draw back sharply, as if I’ve been burned. How could I feel such a thing with my glove on?
She takes my hand in hers, and I feel her skin against mine. “Come with me.” Her grip is strong and sure as she pivots to lead me up the hill.
A hot tear spills over the corner of my eye and skids down my cheek. I resist, even as I yearn to go with her. It’s not her. It can’t be!
“What are you?” I don’t pull away.
“You are here for a purpose, James Bishop.”
My mission: first contact with the only D-Day survivors on the continent. Is this one of them? Did the biological weapons and nuclear fallout turn them into telepathic shape-shifters?
Science fiction. Get a grip!
“We cannot allow you to be harmed.”
“We?” I let her pull me forward and upward, but I hold my other hand out to the side, remembering the rocks Granger was so concerned about. “There are others here like you?”
“Yes.” Her voice drops near a whisper. Even so, I hear it as clearly as if she’s brushing my earlobe with her lips. “But we are not the same.”
You’re telling me. “Not exactly human, are you?” A heat-induced hallucination. That has to be it. She isn’t really here talking to me. I decided on my own to climb to higher ground. It only makes sense.
“We are spirits of the earth.”
“Like ghosts?” I almost chuckle. Might as well enjoy the ride.
“Careful there—lift your right boot a little higher.”
I raise it as high as I can, fighting the unwieldy suit for every centimeter. “So you’re able to appear as people from my life? How does that work exactly?”
“We are able to see your memories.”
“You can read my mind.” Figured as much. A hallucination would obviously know my own thoughts. “Okay then. What am I thinking right now?”
Her grip on me does not falter. “You think I am a figment of your imagination, induced by hyperthermia. Your suit is offline, and you feel as if you’re being cooked alive inside it.”
Not bad.
Engines hum in the distance. They have to be real; no reason for me to hallucinate them into being. So even with my fractured helmet, I’m able to hear ambient noise. Good to know.
“Get down!” She pulls me to the ground, and I drop to my knees, feeling sand and gravel shift beneath me, slipping away. “Do not move.”
I don’t plan to. Gritting my teeth, I refrain from cursing the OFFLINE message glaring in my face. It’s ridiculous to ask a hallucination such a thing, but I have to know: “Any chance you could fix this?” I bob my head a little to draw attention to the helmet. “I can’t see a thing.”
And it’s driving me crazy!
“We are unable to interact with your technology,” she whispers into my ear again—as impossible as that is. “We can only interfere with it.”
Sweat dribbles down from my upper lip, and I spit against the inside of my face shield. “They’re not ghosts, are they?”
“The daemons?”
Hostiles. “Whatever. Yeah.”
“They were like you once. But they were...damaged.”
I frown. How can these be my own thoughts? “What do you mean?”
“I must leave you now. But I will return. Remain here, and be still.”
Winds gust with a sudden burst, and I flinch as gravel pings against the exterior of my helmet. I reach for her, patting at the ground. My gloved fingers collide with granite. I feel along the uneven surface and find that it reaches high above me. She’s led me to safety, and now I’m trapped on three sides by igneous rock.
I shake my head. No one led me here. I found cover on my own.
Focus. I strain to listen.
One of the solar jeeps draws near, maybe five to ten meters below. Difficult to gauge exactly by the sound. It grinds to a halt as boots hit the sand, two, three pair, charging off in different directions. No verbal communication that I can hear.
The footsteps stop. Everything is still.
Then a guttural roar tears through the silence. A blast of wind howls past me, showering me with grit. I fight to raise my arms instinctively to shield myself. Something cracks nearby like a dry branch or a broken spine, and another feral wail erupts into the air.
Shots fired—automatic weapons. Submachine guns by the sound of them, standard-issue UW Uzi Type 4’s or something similar.
Another scream and another crack, this time accompanied by the sound of a rib cage crunched, piercing the heart and lungs and muting the victim mid-shriek. What the hell is going on down there?
More shots, aimed now in my direction. I cower as the rounds chip the granite above me. My hazard suit sports some next-gen Kevlar, but my helmet is a different story. I don’t know how much more abuse it can take, and I don’t want to stick around to find out. But what choice do I have? Like Granger said, I’m blind as a bat.
Where is he now? And what about the others?
The machine gun below is silenced abruptly as a third and final scream takes its place. The wind returns, raging among the rocks and pelting me without mercy. I have never been in the middle of the Sahara or the Gobi during a sandstorm, but I imagine it to be something like this: powerful and wild, a ravenous beast.
Then everything is still once again.
I remain crouched as low as this cumbersome suit will allow, my arms out to the sides, braced against the granite. I listen, barely breathing. There is no sound.
I start to rise but rethink that idea. One well-aimed shot is all it would take to shatter my helmet in its current condition, and then I’ll be at the mercy of the contaminated air. But I can’t stay hidden indefinitely. I have to find Granger and contact Captain Mutegi. That’s the priority.
“Captain—how the hell did you make it up there?”
I reel around in an awkward slow motion, fighting against the suit. “Granger?” I call down. “You’re alive.”
“Can’t say the same for these guys.�
� He clears his throat. “Or whatever they were.”
“What do you see?”
“I thought you said his HUD was malfunctioning,” says a familiar voice on comms.
“Sinclair?”
Granger chuckles. “Gang’s all here, Fearless Leader.”
“And the hostiles?”
“Scared off, man,” Morley says. “Two jeeps took off due east, soon as that dust devil started up.”
“They must have known.” Harris sounds like he’s investigating something, thinking out loud in the process. “They’ve seen such an occurrence before.”
What the hell is he talking about?
“Help me get him down from there,” Granger grumbles, his boots digging into the hillside below me.
“I’m fine.” All I have to do is backtrack the trip I took with my hallucination-wife, recalling each step in reverse. “But feel free to catch me if I slip.”
“Have you ever seen anything like it?” Harris says. “That whirlwind seemed to have a mind of its own, and what it did to these...creatures—”
“Describe them.” I judge the placement of each boot before giving it my full weight.
“They’re…unlike anything I’ve ever seen.”
Granger curses. “You can say that again.”
“Humanoid physiology, Sergeant,” Harris continues, “but they have evolved to adapt to these harsh conditions. Their skin is...”
Morley groans and retreats a few steps. “Oh, don’t go touchin’ it like that!”
“I’d have to describe their flesh as charred, burned beyond repair due to extreme exposure to the sun. Or radiation, perhaps, from a nuclear blast. Impossible that they would still be alive, if that were the case.” Harris clears his throat. “Their eyes are lidless, but with a yellow, free-flowing mucous that appears to coat and protect them. No nose to speak of, but the nasal cavity is coated as well. Viscous, but fluid. And quite pungent.”
“You touch that stuff, I’ll blow your hand off.” It sounds like Morley has cocked back the hammer of a semiautomatic pistol.
So, he’s armed.
“Stand down, soldier.” I descend the bottom of the hillside and face the voices of the others, doing my best to exude the appearance of authority despite my inability to see any of them. “Give me that sidearm.” I stretch out my gloved hand, palm upward. “Have you already outfitted the other members of our team?”
Spirits of the Earth: The Complete Series: (A Post-Apocalyptic Series Box Set: Books 1-3) Page 44
