by Michael Todd
“All right, let’s move out,” he said. Everyone straightened reluctantly and fell into formation.
The sergeant made a quick head count and his gut tightened instinctively. “We’re missing two people,” he said in a low voice. “How the hell are we missing two people?” The rainstorm had made the Zoo, normally shadowy even on clear days, almost as murky-dark as night.
Corporal Black stepped beside him. “It looks like…uh, Private Kim and PFC Jozwiak,” he said.
“Dammit,” Wallace grated. He refused to consider leaving anyone behind who might still have a shot at survival. At the same time, the survival of the others was in doubt if they backtracked. The mercenaries were no doubt still in pursuit. They would not have expended as much effort and as much ammunition as they had only to scare the soldiers off.
“Black,” he said and handed him the wounded man on his shoulders, “you’re in command. Lead everyone due north—or as close as possible to due north—along the approximate path you scouted earlier. Your objective is to get out of the Zoo entirely ASAP. I’ll go back to look for Kim and Jozwiak.” He raised his rifle to his chest. “I’ll be right back.”
“Yes, sir,” the corporal replied but looked surprised. He turned to the rest of the unit. “You heard the man. Move out, northwards.”
As they sloshed forward, Wallace headed back the way they had come at a trot.
They’d lost too many people already. Today, and on other days. A whole platoon had died around him in the grove before Kemp’s palace. But his losses had not been total. On the last mission, the one to give the smarmy foreign diplomats their requested tour of the Zoo, Wallace had kept more than half of his team alive and had successfully protected the politicians. This morning, he had already sent Gunnar, Peppy, and the three wounded back. He was confident that they were already safely at the base. And there was still half of his remaining force left—including, hopefully, Kim and Jozwiak.
And he wasn’t particularly tired. That had to count for something.
Chapter Seven
Wallace’s backtracking had been futile in its main objective, but at least he knew what had happened and what else was still happening.
Kim was definitely dead. Jozwiak was missing in action and presumed dead.
He had found Kim’s body only a few hundred feet back in the Zoo. He’d been snatched off the faint trail they had followed and ripped to shreds, probably by one or more of the stray catsharks from the pack that had attacked them earlier.
There was no sign of Jozwiak. However, Wallace noticed a thick, fat, squirming green vine along the ground nearby. It wound up the trunk of a tree and hung down between a crisscross pattern of rafter-like branches. Those were the sentient vines, the man-eaters. All the troops at the Zoo had been briefed on how dangerous the things were and how to spot them, but Jozwiak might well have panicked after Kim’s death and stumbled into the carnivorous plant’s jaws. The sergeant searched for some trace of him for a few more minutes but without success. He had to go back and help the rest of his men—those definitely still alive—get the hell back home.
As he turned to rejoin them, he heard the sound of a large group of men who advanced toward his position. Boots stomped and sloshed, low voices conversed, and most disturbingly, engines buzzed and revved, the noises faint but unmistakable through the patter of the still-falling rain. It didn’t sound like anything too large, he reasoned. They were probably scouting with those motorbike things and he wasn’t sure how well they’d handle in this mud. Hopefully, they’d handle like shit.
Wallace broke into a full run. His suit whirred, but the sounds of the rain masked it and the downpour would also hopefully obscure his tracks. For now, his only concern was to return to his men.
It took only a few minutes before he heard their progress a short way ahead. He moved toward them and noted the subtle signs of their passage through the foliage and over a patch of firmer earth.
“It’s Wallace,” he said and slowed as he listened for a response before he proceeded once again in a fast walk.
Four men facing him with rifles sighed with relief.
“All is well, sir,” Black said. He frowned. “I take you didn’t find—”
“Kim is gone, and I’m almost certain Jozwiak is as well,” Wallace replied and shook his head. “I couldn’t justify leaving the rest of you much longer.” He waved his hand. “Keep moving. You don’t need to stand still to hear me talk.”
The troops nodded and continued as he sloshed toward the center of their formation. “The mercs are still behind us. They’re using their bikes, I think, or trying to. I’m not familiar with that class of vehicle but if we’re lucky, they’ll get bogged down in this mud. It sounds like they’re still almost a full klick behind us, though. They probably don’t know where we are exactly and are gradually sweeping the whole damn jungle. If we keep moving, we can make it to Wall One. Even if we emerge a mile from the nearest gate, there should still be enough sentries on the wall itself for us to signal for aid.”
“Finally, some good news,” said Falstaff.
His enthusiasm seemed to encourage the weather to lend a hand as well. The rain suddenly slackened and became little more than a faint drizzle. Light poked through the clouds above and a few rays reached the ground even through the dense canopy of the Zoo.
“Hah!” Falstaff added to his previous comment. “It looks like we might actually make it out of this damp, slimy, muddy, tree-infested, vine-infested, cat-infested, mercenary-infested, shit-infested shithole of shitty-ass fuckery.”
“Don’t speak too soon, Private,” Wallace replied, “but yes, we might. Keep up the pace. And keep your eyes and ears open.”
They pressed on for another five or ten minutes. They couldn’t be too far from the edge of the Zoo by now. The creatures were less likely to attack nearer the perimeter of the jungle, and their human foes seemed to still be far behind.
They reached a small basin of sorts, a lower-lying area that had begun to fill up with rainwater although by now, the rain had finally stopped. The ground around it was higher on all sides. Wallace studied it and considered whether to go through or around.
“Head right into that water,” he told his men. “There’s no sign of any hostiles around, and it will help disguise our tracks.”
They descended into the basin. The water was only about ankle-high, so it didn’t impede their movement much.
“Sergeant, do you want me to scout ahead again?” asked Corporal Black, “We should be close by now, so the last thing we want is to get detoured back the way we came.”
“Yes, do it,” Wallace commanded.
Black nodded. He sloshed ahead, emerged from the shallow pool ahead and slightly to the side of them, and clambered up the low incline to the flat area beyond. Once he reached it and stood, he seemed to freeze in place. He spun toward them as a shotgun boomed into the silence.
“No!” Wallace gasped.
Black catapulted down the incline, a gaping hole in the side of his chest. The wound leaked blood in a long trail behind him as his limbs flailed and his body splashed loudly into the water.
All around them, engines roared to life.
“Back!” Wallace barked. “Back the way we—”
“Yeeeeehaaaa!” someone beyond the ridge screamed as loudly as possible.
They were surrounded. The roar of revving engines filled the air and the jungle erupted into life with fast-moving forms—men mounted on camouflaged, military-grade motorbikes, two per vehicle, and at least twenty of them. Each of the forty or so men on the bikes held a rifle, machine pistol, or shotgun. A couple even had RPGs. Behind them were even more armed men on foot. A quick glance confirmed that no significant gaps could be found in their lines on any side. Wallace realized, with a horrible sinking sensation, that he’d led the remains of his platoon directly into the center of a noose.
“You motherfuckers,” Wallace hissed under his breath. He knew for a fact that the bikes he’d heard e
arlier had been far back. The mercs must have had a separate force that had detoured and raced ahead of them, or other men lying in ambush. Everything Wallace’s unit had done had only taken them deeper into the jaws of this trap.
The mercs did not, however, open fire. They stopped, aimed, and waited.
“Hold your fire,” Wallace said to his own men. All of them were tense, shaking, furious, and scared. “Do not squeeze off a shot accidentally. Fingers off triggers. It looks like we have to negotiate.”
The squad of mercenaries on foot directly ahead where Black had tried to scout walked forward slowly and spread out to stand between the motorbikes. At the front stood a tall, broad-shouldered, muscular white man, idiotically dressed in a camo tank-top which showed off the black flame-decal tattoo that ran all the way up his right arm and shoulder from wrist to neck. He sported a buzzcut not unlike Wallace’s and smirked broadly at the cornered soldiers. In his hands, he carried a combat shotgun from which a thin wisp of smoke still curled faintly.
“I say,” he began, “lower your weapons.” His voice was much higher-pitched than one would have expected for such a brutish-looking guy, and he had a piping, almost lilting accent—probably Scandinavian or thereabouts. Wallace pegged him as a middle-echelon enforcer type, obviously in charge of this particular group at the moment but probably not the overall commander of the mercenary force. He looked too dumb for that.
“They’re lowered,” Wallace replied. “We’re willing to cooperate for now. What do you people want?”
“You are not in any position to ask questions,” the big man said. Which, sadly, was all too true. “We demand your unconditional surrender. Order your men to throw their guns away, Sergeant, and you will live.”
Wallace had lived to middle age in a very difficult and dangerous profession. And he had, over the years, dealt with a wide variety of people. One could not have accumulated that much experience without developing certain skills. Like, for example, how to tell when someone was lying through their teeth, lying without shame or guilt, and lying without even seeming to care if their lies were believed. The undercurrent of apprehension, under a false mask of calm; the oily and unctuous tone of voice; the calculation in what to do next if their mark saw through the deception. It was all there, plain as day, alongside the fact that these people had indiscriminately fired rockets and heavy machine guns at them not too long before.
One of the men next to the burly leader, a scrawny Mediterranean- or Persian-looking fellow, cracked up and had to turn away so they wouldn’t see him snicker. A few of the other mercs smiled.
Morale in Wallace’s unit had been, unsurprisingly, very low. Now, the bottom dropped out and they were in free-fall.
Falstaff turned to his commander. “What do we do, Sergeant?” he asked in a soft voice.
Wallace took a deep breath. “A slim chance, Private, is better than none whatsoever,” he said and gritted his teeth. “Attack.”
Chapter Eight
Wallace himself fired the first shot. His suit acted almost before his brain could demand it. He flicked the switch on his rifle to single-shot, aimed the weapon, and pulled the trigger. He’d selected not the tattooed commander but the driver of the motorbike beside him. His aim was good, and the man’s forehead collapsed in on itself in a spray of red and pinkish-grey.
The commander’s jaw dropped. “Kill them!” he shrieked and brandished his shotgun in the air.
The bikes’ engines roared to life and every firearm erupted in a cacophony of deadly sound. The frenzied barrage continued relentlessly and drowned out the voices and commands of men. A heated exchange swallowed the jungle silence in the seemingly endless crackle of gunfire.
And yet, for all the lead sprayed, little of it seemed to find its mark. The battle had started too suddenly for the mercs’ liking. They had actually expected Wallace and his men to surrender and allow themselves to be executed and the element of surprise robbed them of their apparent superiority.
Wallace pivoted to the side and leaned so that his plasteel-armored hip and leg shielded Private Falstaff from a volley of machine-pistol fire that rained down on them from the nearest motorbike duo. His muscles shuddered in pain from the impact, but the bullets nevertheless deflected harmlessly and left only shallow dents. The sergeant raised his rifle, now set on burst fire, and returned the favor. Nine rounds struck the bike and its two riders, and both men toppled with the vehicle in a spray of blood and sparks.
Falstaff, meanwhile, had flipped his own rifle to full auto and bellowed a war cry in desperation before he sprayed an entire magazine at the thick cluster of men and motorcycles behind them, where they’d entered the flooded basin. Two of the mercs screamed and fell as bleeding holes opened in their chests, limbs, and faces. Another, on foot, cursed and clutched his arm before he ducked behind the nearest bike.
One of Wallace’s men collapsed with an agonized groan, his body perforated with a dozen bullet holes.
Another followed him almost immediately and a jet of blood spurted from the back of his skull as two or three rounds entered the front of his head.
Some of the mercs stopped to reload.
“Spread out,” Wallace said, “and follow me!” He used his suit to power himself into a jump that lifted him almost over the heads of two mercs who stood above them on the slope. Both were in the process of reloading and looked at him with eyes that bulged in shock. They likely had no idea who or what they were dealing with.
In midair, Wallace lashed out with fist and foot. His gauntleted left hand crunched against the face of the man to the left. The force of impact snapped the merc’s head back fast and hard enough that his neck could well have broken. He slumped and rolled down the slope into the shallow water below.
The sergeant’s armored foot struck the man on the right in the side of the knee. The enemy screamed as his leg collapsed and folded, and as Wallace landed beside him, he heaved the merc directly at a fat, sweaty teammate who’d begun to fire a machine pistol. The airborne body absorbed most of the small-caliber bullets before it crashed into the gunman, knocked him on his ass, and successfully smacked the weapon out of his hand.
Wallace’s rifle was still in his right hand and without pause, he fired two more three-round bursts to his left. The volley wounded at least one of the enemy and the others shrank back in hesitation. Before they could react, he vaulted forward again and took cover behind a large tree. An entire cluster of the bastards still hovered in front of him, however. This was where Falstaff had directed his first magazine and the private had been right to do so. The sergeant realized instantly that this group had to be removed in order for the soldiers—however few of them might remain—to escape.
It was undoubtedly time for full auto. As the mercs on the other side of the tree sprayed lead at him and tried in vain to force him out of cover so they would have a clear shot, he removed his mostly-empty magazine, inserted a fresh one, and flipped the switch. With slow, measured calm, he aimed carefully at his target. The cluster registered what the hell was happening and turned their guns toward him mere seconds after he fired.
Forty bullets were expelled, and all struck flesh, bone, or the tires of the motorbikes. In one case, finally, one found a gas tank. The bike exploded in an orange-black fireball accompanied by greasy black smoke and a hail of shrapnel.
“Fire!” Wallace shouted.
His men directed their weapons toward what was left of the cluster—two dazed men, and two who were on fire. The blazing mercs screamed until multiple bursts of rifle fire put them out of their misery. The others had all died in the explosion.
As the soldiers raced toward the now-undefended southern slope where they’d first entered this death-trap, Wallace made another jump into the basin to cover their retreat. He saw, with a sudden pang of anguish and regret, that only six were left, including Falstaff. The others had all been slaughtered while he’d tried to break through their encirclement. Still, those six might have a chance. Just maybe.
/>
“Aim for his head!” the mercenaries’ captain screamed.
The sergeant landed in the water with a loud splash. He had already loaded the mostly spent magazine he’d previously used into his rifle. Now, he set it to single-shot and exhaled a slow breath to relax himself. Two bullets whistled past him within about an inch or two of his face, but he ignored them as he aimed and fired.
There were too many of them for him to individually snipe each one, but he killed two more of them, blew a few toes off the foot of another poor schmuck, and sent the rest scurrying for cover. They were now afraid of him. Good.
Behind him, his men were out of the basin, past the wreckage of the destroyed bikes and the mercs around them, and had begun the retreat into the jungle. Wallace turned and raced after them. He ejected the magazine from his rifle and let it fall. He had one left, and the gun had begun to overheat. He reloaded it but put it over his back on its strap, ignored the heat of it against one of the plates of his exoskeleton, and instead, drew his pistol.
“Sergeant! Come on!” Falstaff yelled and motioned toward him. The half-dozen survivors were thinly strung in a wavering line as they ran into the woods. That was good insofar as it made them less obvious targets than a densely-packed formation, but Wallace couldn’t be sure that they hadn’t simply charged away in a blind panic. He hoped the men in front had the sense to make for the wall. They hadn’t exactly had time to formulate a new plan of retreat.
He broke into a full sprint and his suit hummed almost as loudly as the revving engines of the motorbikes behind them. The mercs would pursue on wheels, of course. His men would be hunted down and shot like wild dogs. He gritted his teeth. Ahead, he could see three of them too close together when they slowed down and waited for the others to catch up.
“No,” Wallace yelled toward them. “Scatter. Head for—”
“Oooops!” someone sneered, deliberately loud, up ahead. A merc appeared from behind a tree and fired a rocket-propelled grenade at the trio.
