Suddenly it didn’t feel merely cool any longer. It had gotten downright cold. Being stark naked presented other problems; with all the disgusting ways to die I had recently discovered, I’d be damned if I wanted to catch my death of cold.
Adrenaline pumping madly—my drug of choice—I ran in the most promising direction. A red light pulsed dimly in the shadows directly ahead; and the flat, slapping sound of bare feet against the metal floor seemed almost as loud as my boots had earlier.
If this setup were anything like the one I’d left, I actually wanted to find a zombie! “Alive” or dead, they were armed with what I needed, and a lot easier to deal with than the spinys or ghosts.
I found the source of the red light: an entire wall emitted crimson illumination; at the bottom was an inverted-cross cutout, just big enough to serve as a doorway. It was directly in line with a square platform on the ground. The platform was red, too. The symbolism was blasphemy—anyone walking through the “doorway” would have the privilege of being crucified. The religious imagery was starting to piss me off; whoever or whatever was behind this had learned things about human psychology that I preferred it not know. I slipped through, feeling dirty and corrupted.
I felt an unholy chill as I walked through the inverted cross in the red wall, the color of communion wine, the color of blood from fallen comrades.
How right I was to think of buddies lost in battle. Directly on the other side of the opening was the dead body of a UAC technician locked in mortal embrace with a soldier I recognized from Fox Company. I wasn’t likely to forget Ordover.
The youngest kid in the outfit, we’d bagged on him something fierce. He was patriotic to the “Corps” and easy to rag. As I looked at the remains of this friendly private, the boyish face that hadn’t been altered even in death, I regretted the times I’d helped get him drunk.
Finding out that Johnny enjoyed singing old ballads, badly off-key, when he was honed and capped was too much temptation. I thought that was as funny as everyone else did.
“Sorry, kid,” I muttered to his corpse, relieved that at least he’d received the gift of a clean death. He hadn’t been reworked. Now it was Johnny’s turn to provide Fly Taggart with a piece of serious artillery. He was lying on top of a Sig-Cow with a fifty-round magazine. Thanks to him, I might still be a naked savage, but I was back in the game. I was a Marine once more.
As I examined my surroundings, I had the feeling I’d been dropped into a giant warehouse. There were huge boxes, or crates, all over the place with UAC stenciled on them. I began to explore and noticed a red, glowing square that emitted a curious heat. I avoided it for the moment, welcome though the heat would be.
Having gotten in the habit of following Arlene’s arrows, I started hunting. And looking for more weapons, as well as food, water, and an unbroken radio. I was so intent on all this that I barely noticed it when I turned a corner and was back in zombie country.
I shouldered the rifle and fired while they wasted time roaring. The shot was good; the nearest head exploded like a ripe melon. That startled me; it was a single bullet, not a grenade! This zombie had to be especially ripe.
The next one reacted more typically; the bullet made a normal hole and the creature fell to the floor, twitching. But I was already pounding a round into the head of number three, scutting sideways, firing two or three shots at a time. I lost count of how many zombies went down. A few had weapons, but none had taken a shot at me yet.
It was all too easy; then something on the other side returned fire—actual fire. The damned, brown spinys were back, complete with their bizarre ability to toss flaming snotballs like warm-up pitchers for the devil.
The easy zombie pickin’s had made me careless. The first fireball was too close, far too close, to my face and neck. The stuff stuck to my skin like napalm, burning like hell and reminding me that I had no protection over any part of my skin or vulnerable parts.
But I was pumped. With a roar to match a hell-prince, I charged the nearest spiny and let my bayonet do the talking. The blade split thick neck like a cantaloupe, and the demon dropped, bleeding a deep, ruby red.
But even with a bayonet stuck in its windpipe and blood pumping out in buckets, it stretched a clawed hand up toward me. With a thrust and a yank, I tore the neck so badly that the head was hanging lopsided. It would take a lot more work than that to actually decapitate the mother, but at least it wouldn’t bother me anymore. I needed the bayonet back. I had other fields to plow.
A number of zombies had gathered around as I was busy taking care of the demon that I hoped had been the one who burned my face. More spinys loitered by the weirdest piece of wall I’d seen yet, with human skulls stuck all over it like raisins in a cake.
A thin female zombie went first, a fat male second, an ex-PFC third. I used the bayonet on all of them because there wasn’t room to shoot.
Pivoting, slashing and stabbing, shouting gleeful curses—this was the way to kill! The feel, the smell, the blood pouring out of them beating through my veins, all linked. A world of blood. Some had to be mine; but this was no time to worry over details.
Then there was one zombie left. I recognized its face. Recognition slowed me down . . . this was a good face, honest and stern, like the men who’d settled the frontier.
Corporal Ryan. Dead eyes in a face I once respected were an invitation to do more than kill. I had to erase him from the universe.
I pinned him with the bayonet; but he was made of stern stuff, even as a zombie. Squirming forward, he clawed my face with long, dirty nails. Damned rifle was stuck in him! He was far stronger than the others, stronger than me.
Thank God I knew Ryan better than his reanimated corpse did. The corporal always carried a 10mm pistol in a back-draw holster. I reached behind him. The gun was there! I drew the piece, stuck the business end in Ryan’s mouth, and squeezed the trigger.
His death grip combined with the pool of blood underfoot pulled me to the floor. It was too slippery to get up easily. While I freed myself, I tried real hard to assimilate the latest data. If zombies were holding a weapon when they died, they still used it. But the intelligence required to remember a hidden weapon was beyond their reach.
Slipping and sliding on the blood was distracting . . . and then I realized that I was sobbing. Having given myself strict orders to keep emotions under control, I felt betrayed. At least I held onto the pistol.
Standing up, I realized with disgust that the real reason I was weeping was because I had temporarily run out of enemy. All the zombies were dead-dead, and the monsters who had been watching over by the wall of skulls had run off. This was worse than being interrupted in the middle of making love. I really felt that. I had good reason to be crying like a baby.
“Pull yourself together,” I ordered Yours Truly. “I mean it. Cut the crap, right now!” I wasn’t going to put up with any insubordination.
“Damn you all!” I screamed at the universe. “How long am I supposed to take this, over and over?” It was a good question, but nobody had any answers. I kicked a zombie’s head, angry that he wasn’t contributing his part to the conversation.
Zombies weren’t the only inanimate objects around; I found a metal cabinet that I tore off and flung at a console. Great sound effect. I would have moved on in search of glass to break—an even better sound—but I noticed my little tantrum had actually led to something useful. As the forest fire raging in my brain toned down to a mild fever-delirium, I vowed never to say anything bad about dumb luck again.
A hidden drawer in the console sprang open. I investigated, hoping to find a weapon. Instead, I found another of those computer key cards, the very same cards I had sworn not to use again while I had my trusty rockets . . . the very same rockets I no longer had. Buck Rogers, back to square one. I picked up the translucent, blue computer disk. Waste not, want not.
A rifle in one hand, pistol in the other, and a key card clenched in my teeth. Not having pockets was becoming a major pain in
the butt.
Why didn’t I simply field-strip a corpse? I don’t know; I guess my brain wasn’t rolling on all tank treads.
One direction seemed as good or bad as any other, so I went back the way I had come. As the frenzy of the battle wore off, I was starting to feel cold again. The red platform was appealing as the only source of heat I knew about around here, the next best thing to a roaring fireplace. It felt great as the heat warmed my cold, naked skin.
Then, as idiots have asked themselves throughout history, I asked the magic words “Why not?”—and rubbed my hands over the thing.
A million flashbulbs exploded in my face.
By the time I finished blinking the world back into focus, I realized I was not in the room I just had been.
My mouth dropped open. Fly, you gorm, I thought, I think you’ve just discovered your first teleporter!
That square, red platform just had to be the “teleport” pads I had heard about when they posted Fox Company to Mars. They were just big enough for a man to stand on . . . assuming he felt adventurous.
I was dubious about the whole thing from day one, and so was Gunny Goforth. If I were surrounded by trolls and out of ammo, I’d decided, I might try one; nothing short of that would tempt me.
The teleport pads were already there when humans first arrived, presumably built the same time as the Gates and gravity generators. Practical folk that we are, we incorporated them into the design of the base; UAC used them to transport heavy ingots and equipment. I don’t think many people used them; most of us worried about things like souls and continuity of consciousness and all that crap.
Trust Corporal Fly Taggart to render the whole philosophical discussion moot by tripping over his own feet into it!
As I stared stupidly at my new surroundings, a swarm of zombies poured around the corner. As the first one fired a round that took me in the shoulder, several thoughts whizzed through my mind. First, as I fell to the floor, I thought of writing up the careless dolt who’d triggered a teleporter by sticking his paws where they weren’t supposed to be. The second thought, as I rolled onto my back, was more ironic: moments before, I’d been unhappy over running out of zombies. My third thought, as I sat up, stunned, was: I’m shot!
My Sig-Cow was out of reach. I’d let go of it, along with the key card. I opened fire with the 10mm.
A nearby stone platform provided me cover; the zombies were too stupid to do the same. They reminded me of Army privates.
Taking my time about it, I aimed and fired, aimed and fired. The bullets went in, the blood came out. I took them one by one, killing the very last at point-blank range.
This time I wasn’t sorry I’d run out of zombies. The bullet in my shoulder made me groggy. There was nothing I’d rather do at that moment than lie down in a nice, warm pool of blood and sleep forever.
Nothing suicidal; sleep was good. Rest was a sacrament.
Willing my reluctant body to move, I got up.
16
By now I must have looked like a zombie myself. I felt like one. Being honest about it, I had to admit that I didn’t know how a human being crossed over into the zombie state. I hadn’t seen the process. The talkative monster implied that he could control zombies, but he never said a word about how they were made—he simply lied about not reworking me if I surrendered.
I wondered . . . was this how the others became what they were, fighting a never-ending war that finally drove them mad? Wasn’t a sign of insanity the conviction that everyone and everything is the enemy? That was the way I’d been living since I left the cafeteria and the two Rons and began my assault on Phobos Base and . . . and wherever the hell I was now.
Turning a corner, I was greeted by a sight not calculated to reassure a man doubting his sanity. A gigantic skull, half the length of a full-grown man, glared at me through empty sockets. It seemed to be made of brass. I stared into its eyeless sockets before allowing my gaze to lower. The giant, metal skull had a tongue; a curving, snaky, metal tongue.
There was no way this was standard-issue in a UAC refinery!
Of course, the skull’s tongue had to be a lever.
“I can’t help it,” I said, “I’m a born lever-puller.”
If I were already dead and in hell, it hardly mattered what would happen if I pulled the lever. I still had my curiosity. And if I were still alive, trying to save humanity from an alien invasion, then I had even more curiosity.
I pulled the lever. It was ice cold against my already chilled flesh. A metallic, grinding noise riveted my attention. It sounded like all the old, abandoned automobile plants in Detroit had started up at once. And with all that sound, one stupid box rose from the ground containing another pair of skull-tongue switches! I pulled the next one in line and heard a click from the wall directly in front of me.
Moving to investigate, I saw a crack of light in the wall, then another and another until the yellow lines had formed a perfect square. Secret doors were losing their appeal for me. If this one were going to improve my opinion, then it had better offer something better than the usual collection of monsters. I shoved open the door with one mighty heave.
A bloody, naked figure held a gun pointed directly at my face. By reflex, I shoved my own piece right between its eyes.
“DROP THE GUN!”
“DROP THE FREAKIN’ GUN!”
“PUT IT DOWN, I SWEAR TO GOD I’LL BLOW YOUR FOOL HEAD—”
“—WHERE I CAN SEE THEM, PUT YOUR HANDS UP—”
“—AND DON’T MOVE OR—”
“—GROUND! ON THE GROUND, MOVE!”
Her eyes. Her eyes were alive. And she spoke . . . words. By now we both stood, each pistol pressed against the other’s face, eyes wide with fear, wonder, and hope—Was it? Could it be? Could she be?—shouting at the top of our voices in pain, rage, and desperate need.
My hammer was cocked, but my finger outside the trigger guard; I had just begun to suspect, just begun . . .
Something clicked in my brain. The penny dropped. I recognized the bloody, disheveled, pallid creature.
A dream come true—if true—in a world that specialized in nightmares. Panting before my face, watching warily, ready to fire off half the magazine if necessary, stood the reason I had come this far and hadn’t yet given up.
I wanted to say her name, but I couldn’t. We were each locked in a perimeter of silence, holding a gun against each other’s face, doubts and paranoia having the only voice. One of us would have to say something.
She went first. “Drop the friggin’ gun!” The command came from a lifetime of giving not an inch or trusting without two forms of picture ID . . . and that had been back on Earth! She’d worked hard, her every friendship based on a sense of honor. She’d kicked her way onto the Mars mission. And this is what she’d found.
But she’d survived. And I’d survived. She’d kept me alive with every A.S. and arrow; and maybe her fantasy that I’d come after her kept her alive—why else use oui private code, a link between just the two of us?
But now there was no room for sentiment, only for certainty.
“You are a dead man if you do not drop the freaking gun now.”
Oops. My arm and hand had been through too much to even consider it. My body was wired for instant responses. The same as her body if she were still the old Arlene. The only reason I hadn’t blown her away automatically was the time spent praying she was alive, and a willingness to take a risk right now that she wasn’t really a zombie. No zombie had ever spoken before. And somehow, covered with mud and gore, she looked too damned bad to be a zombie. Only the living could look that fried!
“Arlene, your ass is mine,” I replied. “I’ve had the drop on you since I opened the damned door.”
Zombies didn’t talk that way, either. They didn’t tease or smile a moment later when awareness crept across a human face. She returned that smile, and I knew everything would be all right.
“Your finger wasn’t even on the trigger, big guy. I’d
have blown you away before you fumbled around and found it.” She was wounded, disheveled, filthy, terrified, naked . . . and totally, totally alive.
“You’re alive!” I shouted.
“No, really?” she shouted back.
We slowly lowered our weapons simultaneously, mirror images of each other. Grinning.
Staring me up and down, she commented, “Nice fashion statement.” I’d forgotten I was buck naked. My damned reflexes insisted on embarrassing me, and I reflexively covered myself.
Well, I guess it was one more proof I was still fully human. I doubt that zombies are modest. “Turn your back, for Christ’s sake,” I implored.
“I will not,” she answered, eyes roving where they shouldn’t. “You’re the first decent thing I’ve seen since this creep show began.”
If we kept this up, maybe things would get so bloody normal that the monsters would simply pack their suitcases and leave.
Arlene could dish out a hard time when she wanted. I decided to get dressed, and finally I noticed the corpses and stripped one. She reached out a hand. “No, Fly; don’t put those on yet. Please?”
My right foot was halfway into a boot far too small to fit. It stretched, conforming to the size of my foot: one size truly fits all. Arlene turned as red as the crimson wall. “Jesus, I’m sorry, Fly. You’re my buddy; I shouldn’t have made you uncomfortable. Forgive me?”
I finished dressing. It didn’t take long. Now it was my turn to look her over, which I did with a lot more subtlety than she did with me. I kept my eyes moving where she’d let hers stop in embarrassing places. God, she looked good. All the dirt and blood almost gave her the appearance of being dressed in a weirdly hip-punk outfit. Her slender waist, tight, firm thighs, medium bust, and long arms made me think of more than the undeniable fact that she had the body of the ideal orbital pilot—her ultimate goal when she’d earned enough in service to take a hiatus, get a degree, and take a commission. Space travel needed the occasional boost in morale.
Knee-Deep in the Dead Page 11
