Total Conflict

by Neal Asher

  “That was surprisingly accurate,” said Coney, looking at Kyril with obvious dislike. Typically for a Heliothane woman she was tall, beautiful, and perfectly capable of tearing the head off anyone from the earlier weaker ages of the Earth. “This place is a long way down the probability slope.”

  Hoisting the strap of his assault rifle over his shoulder, Kyril gazed up at the sky where birdlike creatures could be seen circling. He nodded to himself then pointed towards the back of the floor the mantisal had come down on, where a large generator, red lights winking over its surface, rested canted amidst the girders, a perfectly spherical hole cut all about it. “That’s because we were supplied with energy from this end. We threw over fifty generators at this parallel before we got the right location.”

  “So what’s the story?” asked Thrax, a massive man who was the only one of them capable of easily wielding the huge portable cannon he held.

  “Quite simple,” Kyril replied. “An Umbrathane sabotage unit occupied this place, but their mere presence here pushed this past Earth down the probability slope and they abandoned it.”

  “And we are here why?” Thrax was contemplating the bird-things in the sky, whose raucous cawing had grown loud now they were much lower.

  “Their fusion reactor is still here, still connected to their time-snatcher.” Kyril held up a detector, studying its screen, then nodded across the city. “Over there. It’s still causing disruptions on mainline time and we have to knock it out.”

  “But why are we here?” asked Jelada, standing with the butt of her assault rifle resting on her hip.

  Kyril stepped outside of the mantisal. “Come on.” He began heading for the tangle of girders amidst which stairs could be seen leading down into the building. As the others followed him, shadows fell across them and a webbed and clawed foot slammed against Thrax’s shoulder sending him sprawling. Coney swung her assault rifle up and fired, and with a shriek a massive pterosaur crashed into the girder tangle. Then more of the monsters were attacking. Jelada hauled Thrax to his feet, while firing up into a great flock of creatures. They ran for the cover of the girders, but as they reached the near edge one of the pterosaurs landed and lumbered straight at Coney.

  “Fucker,” said Coney, going down on one knee, her squat assault rifle up against her shoulder. The pterosaur reared, shrieking and spreading its wings. Coney pumped her weapon like a shotgun and fired. The explosive bullet detonated in the creature’s chest, opening out its keel bone and ribs and blowing it backwards towards the building edge. It tottered there for a moment then fell out of sight.

  Passing under where the first pterosaur had fallen, its ugly head dangling through the girders and dripping blood, they finally reached the stairs.

  “They were nothing,” said Kyril gesturing back to the dead pterosaur. “The Umbrathane were collecting here some of the deadliest predators from Earth’s prehistory, which they intended to transport into our cities. Those creatures are still here and the mechanisms used to feed them broke down some time ago.”

  “You could have warned us,” Coney spat.

  “I shouldn’t need to warn you,” Kyril replied. “You are Heliothane, not some weakling from the old ages of Earth.”

  As he descended into the darkness of the stairwell, Thrax turned to Coney. “Y’know, one day I’m gonna have a friendly fire incident with that shit.”

  Coney nodded, obviously still annoyed. Jelada slapped Thrax on the shoulder.

  “Not a problem,” she said. “He believes the only cause of violent death is stupidity.”

  The pterosaur fell down the face of the building and crashed onto the roof of a rusting car, its blood trickling down the metal. From the nearby entrance to an underground garage came an excited chittering, then out sped a small dinosaur, to stop between the entrance and the car like a pointer dog. After a moment it scanned about itself before stalking forwards. It leapt up onto the car bonnet and began tugging at a chunk of gory intestine hanging from the pterosaur’s body cavity. Suddenly a whole flock of these dinosaurs rushed out after it and began feasting.

  The first one continued tugging at its prize, growling like a dog with a bone. The others began to tear the pterosaur apart, squabbling amongst themselves as they did so. Then, except for the gut tugger, they ceased all movement and turned to look in one direction, before abruptly fleeing. The first little dinosaur continued tugging at its prize and growling until a shadow fell across it. It paused and looked up, then cringed. A troodon, a dinosaur three times its size, slammed its jaws closed on the creature, wrenched it up and shook it like a dog with a rat, then proceeded to try and swallow it whole. Another troodon appeared and attempted to pull the snack from its mouth. A tug-of-war ensued, resulting in the little dinosaur being torn in half. Gobbling down their bloody prizes, the two troodon then turned to the dead pterosaur.

  One of them began worrying at an overhanging wing whilst the other leapt onto the car to feed on the contents of the body cavity. With its head down it wasn’t watching its surroundings too closely, so did not see the massive pterosaur that simply snatched it, while in flight, from the car roof. Seeing this, the other troodon released its hold on the wing, turned and ran, straight into the underground car park. After much shrieking racket it then shot out again with the whole horde of little dinosaurs in pursuit, straight into the jaws of an allosaurus which slammed it to the ground with one claw and proceeded to eat it alive

  Meanwhile, another allosaurus had arrived at the car and was disputing ownership of the dead pterosaur with a pack of utahraptors, and from the surrounding streets even more carnivorous dinosaurs from disparate ages of Earth were heading in. Soon the street was filled with brawling dinosaurs, scattered body parts and pools of blood.

  Thrax thrust his shoulder against the heavy metal door and it crashed open, admitting bright sunlight and the sight of a rearing troodon. He raised his weapon, but even before he could fire an allosaurus crunched its jaws closed on the troodon’s neck. The troodon scrabbled at its attacker with its back legs, like a cat, but the allosaurus shook it, cracking bones, then carted it off.

  The other three Heliothane moved up beside Thrax and peered out the door at the carnage.

  “Fuck,” said Thrax. “Aren’t there any vegetarians here?”

  Kyril pointed down the street at two advancing triceratops. One of them, confronted by an allosaurus just turning from its latest victim, swung its huge armored head and gored the creature, swung its head again sending the allosaurus crashing through a plate glass window.

  “I don’t understand,” said Coney. “Why are they here? There’s nothing they’d want to eat.” She gestured at the street which was now beginning to look like the interior of an abattoir.

  “Of course you don’t understand,” said Kyril snootily. “Look behind their head shields.”

  As they tramped on in, one of the triceratopses swung its head to one side. Some sort of device was surgically affixed to the back of its head behind its head shield.

  “What is that?” Coney asked.

  “The Umbrathane wanted aggressive killers and, let’s face it, some herbivorous dinosaurs are bigger and more dangerous than some of the predators,” Kyril explained. “Those little machines alter the brain chemistry, so even the vegetarians here are looking for a fight rather than being intent on defending themselves.”

  “Sweet,” Thrax observed.

  Kyril glanced at him with a moue of annoyance then started inspecting his screen.

  “Is there any way round this?” Coney asked.

  Kyril pointed to his right. “Down there, but we still have to cross the street.”

  Thrax swung the door shut and they moved through the gloomy interior of the building until reaching another door. Opening this, they stepped out onto the street. To their right the triceratopses were roaring and beginning to charge and to their left lay the main carnage.

  “Let’s go.” Kyril led the way.

  Even though the mayhem was n
ot so intense where they were crossing, it was impossible for them to avoid the notice of hungry predators. An allosaurus bore down on Thrax, who raised his portable cannon and fired. The creature’s head disappeared in an explosion of brains and blood yet, like a headless chicken, it ran on past him, then, tilting over, began running round in circles. One of the triceratopses reached the hapless beast, gored it, then began stamping it to slurry. Kyril and Coney faced up and down the street, hitting with automatic fire anything that drew too close. And grinning all the while, Jelada calmly took down anything else with short bursts of deadly accurate fire into their heads.

  “Keep moving,” Kyril instructed coldly.

  Jelada shot a dwarf allosaurus in the head, but that seemed to stop it not at all. She shot it twice more, still to no effect, but then Thrax stepped in, blowing out its side with one cannon shot.

  “Hey, thanks!”

  “Jelada!” Thrax shouted, just as a triceratops horn punched through her back and out between her breasts. It lifted her struggling form high, tossed her to one side. Where she landed, troodon and other mid-size dinosaurs sped in and, before any of the other three could react, tore her apart as they fought over her.

  “Jelada,” said Thrax, his voice dead.

  “Thrax, keep moving!” Kyril ordered.

  Ignoring him, Thrax turned on the triceratops and began firing, blowing massive holes in its body and bringing it down to its knees. He circled round and fired once more, the shot hitting behind its head, tearing the boney shield forward. The beast collapsed completely.

  “Fucker,” said Thrax, staring at the creature.

  “Thrax! Move it!”

  Kyril and Coney had reached the kerb and were heading along to the corner. Thrax abruptly snapped out of it, looked around to see the other triceratops charging towards him, then turned and ran after his companions.

  There were fewer dinosaurs along the new street Kyril and Coney headed down, but still, every so often something threw itself at them. They passed a couple of alleyways and, reaching another street corner, Kyril went down on one knee to inspect his screen while Coney covered him.

  “Get a move on!” she shouted to Thrax, who was struggling to catch up with them.

  Thrax raised a hand in acknowledgement, paused to hoist his cannon onto his shoulder, then picked up his pace. The tyrannosaurus had obviously been lurking in the alleyway. It snapped Thrax up like a gharial taking up a fish. As it crunched him to position him just right in its mouth, body parts slopped to the ground and his cannon clattered into the alleyway, useless, then it swallowed him whole.

  “Oh hell.” Coney raised her assault rifle as the tyrannosaurus swung its head here and there, tracking the progress of other dinosaurs in the street. Kyril rested a hand on the rifle barrel and pushed it down.

  “Don’t waste ammunition,” he said. “Let’s go.”

  She turned on him, and spoke through gritted teeth. “You’re a cold bastard aren’t you?”

  “Thrax and Jelada forgot they are Heliothane, and that’s why they are dead,” he said. “I haven’t forgotten, and I hope you haven’t either.”

  She lowered her weapon and nodded, then followed as he led off, staring at his back with concentrated hatred.

  “They just keep coming,” said Coney, eyeing a couple of allosauruses that had a stegosaurus backed into a space between two buildings on the far side of the street. She glanced up the street and observed the triceratops charging into view, making plaintive noises and swinging its head from side to side as if in search of something

  “The smell of blood will be drifting out of this city like a fog,” said Kyril. He was standing at double steel doors rigging explosives. “Five seconds.”

  They quickly moved away from the doors, crouching in adjacent doorways. The explosives detonated, the sound stunningly loud and stilling all the calls and shrieks of the dinosaurs in the surrounding city. They ducked back towards the doors.

  “Damnation,” said Kyril.

  The doors, though badly dented, were still in place.

  “I think you need to get that rigged again, and quickly,” said Coney, noting the two allosauruses swinging away from the stegosaur and now stalking towards them. She glanced towards the triceratops and saw it had now turned and was gazing directly towards them. “Shit, I think we’ve attracted a bit too much attention.” When there was no response from Kyril she glanced round and saw he was just standing, hands on hips, gazing at the door. “Problem?”

  “The door…” He gestured towards it, seemingly at a loss.

  “Fuckit! Rig it again!” shrieked Coney. She aimed at the nearest allosaurus as it broke into a loping run, and opened fire. The creature went down head first, somersaulting and crashing on its back. The second allosaurus now noticed the stegosaurus escaping from confinement between the two buildings. It turned towards the creature, but the stegosaurus was an entirely different matter now with freedom to move its tail. As the predator attacked it turned, honking noisily, and swung the mace of its tail straight up underneath the allosaurus’s head, tearing off the lower jaw. The predator crashed to the ground and, still honking, the stegosaurus sped away, came face to face with the triceratops, then abruptly turned into a side street and disappeared.

  “We must try a different approach,” said Kyril.

  Coney whirled on him and studied him for a long moment.

  “You piece of shit,” she said. “Thrax and Jelada dead because, according to you, they weren’t Heliothane enough, and all for nothing?”

  Kyril just gazed at her.

  “You didn’t bring enough explosive,” she spat. “Did you?”

  “It is Thrax’s fault. If he hadn’t lost the cannon…”

  “Screw you.” Coney turned away and fired down the street, her shots zinging and raising dust around the triceratops, which reared on its hind legs and roared.

  “You shouldn’t waste ammunition,” Kyril berated her.

  “What about the reactor?”

  “Shutting that down is not a problem – we just need to set it to maximum and hole the cooling jacket.”

  Coney fired again, raising more dust around the triceratops. It roared again, came down on all fours and charged towards them.

  “I will not tell you again,” said Kyril, trying to reassert himself.

  Coney turned and hit him with her rifle butt and he went down. She stooped and dragged him to one side before moving back out to the middle of the doors.

  “Come on baby,” she said, firing again at the approaching monster.

  The triceratops lowered its head, bearing down on her fast. With a yell she ran forwards to meet it, jumping high at the last moment. Her right foot came down on the top of its head, her left on its back, where she slipped and tumbled off the side of it, hitting the ground and rolling, her rifle gripped across her stomach. The triceratops, unable to halt its charge very quickly, slammed straight into the doors. It backed up, tearing both doors out of their frame, one of them crashing to one side, one of them still impaled on its horns. It tried shaking the door free, eventually hurling it clattering down the street.

  Up on one knee, Coney took careful aim at the mechanism attached to the back of its head. She fired and the thing exploded, miniature lightnings spreading from the point of impact. The monster convulsed and collapsed in a cloud of dust. She stood and walked past the triceratops, glanced once at Kyril, who now seemed to be recovering, and stepped inside the building.

  The fusion reactor lay to one side beside a dais: a sphere from which spread a jungle of pipes and ducts. On the dais stood the time sampler, its cylindrical field flickering to reveal a dinosaur skeleton lying within. Shouldering the strap of her weapon, Coney advanced to a pedestal-mounted control panel and inspected it. After a moment she tapped two or three icons on a reactive screen then slid her fingers up a virtual slide switch. Immediately the hum of power in the room rose and the snatch field grew steadily brighter. Stepping past the console, Coney unshouldere
d her rifle, and released bursts of fire at the pipes leading into either side of the reactor. Steam and coolant began to scream out. Swinging her aim to one side, she targeted a device covered with cooling fins, loaded an explosive shell and fired at the mechanism, blowing a hole in its side. Smoke and wisps of fire began pouring from the hole and the hum in the room became intermittent. The main lights dimmed and numerous emergency lights began to flash. A warning klaxon began to sound, then a voice spoke calmly: “Reactor overheat. Emergency shutdown required. Estimated time to containment breach is eighteen minutes.”

  Coney turned and headed for the door.

  Kyril was leaning against the door frame.

  “Well done,” he said.

  She ignored him and stepped past, moving on down the street.

  “You see,” said Kyril, hurrying to catch up with her. “If you are Heliothane, there is always a way.”

  Almost casually Coney shot a dwarf allosaurus and moved on. Others came to feed on the body and ignored the two Heliothane. Ahead of Kyril, she reached a corner and paused to peer around it.

  “Unfortunately,” said Kyril from behind her, “there will be no way for you – no way back home that is.”

  Coney froze, then slowly nodded her head, a sneer twisting her features. “No witnesses to how you fucked up this mission?”

  “I’m sorry,” said Kyril flatly.

  “Yeah, sure you are.”

  Coney tried to get around the corner but a shot slammed into her shoulder, twisting her and flinging the rifle from her hands. Further shots whipped past her, but she managed to dive from view. Rolling, she came up onto her feet and staggered for a little way then paused, recognizing Thrax’s helmet lying on the ground, and nearby the man’s hand.

  “I can always just leave you here,” said Kyril, rounding the corner. “I’ve no problem with that.”

  He raised his rifle and Coney threw herself into the alleyway the tyrannosaurus had attacked from, then slumped against the wall clutching her shoulder. Only after a moment did she become aware of a noisy digestive bubbling and a rumbling sound and then see the massive clawed foot just inches away from her. She tracked the leg up to see the tyrannosaurus standing over her, asleep – it was snoring. Then lowering her gaze she saw Thrax’s cannon lying on the other side of the alley.