Gears of War: The Slab (Gears of War 5)

by Karen Traviss

  “Here he comes,” Leuchars said, holding up a finger. “Listen.”

  Marcus had a distinctive gait, the stride of a man used to moving in formation and at speed. He didn’t walk: he marched. It was thud, thud, thud on the flagstones and there he was at the doorway, looking somewhere between troubled and impatient. Reeve gave him a discreet once-over, just in case he’d guessed wrong and Campbell had taken another pop at the guy. No external marks, as far as he could tell, so maybe it was just Jarvi slipping him some more notepaper.

  Asshole. He should trust me to get that stuff to Marcus. Okay, fine.

  “So what did Jarvi want, COG?” Edouain asked.

  Marcus frowned at the mess on the floor. “Just needed to reassure somebody I wasn’t dead yet.”

  “Well, you’re alive, so you can dig.” Edouain yelled down the hole. “Vance? Out.”

  Vance was still using a small trowel. The space was tight and the power cable was buried in the sludge. Nobody wanted to put a shovel through it and get fried, so it had become more like an archaeological excavation, removing a little spoil at a time. Vance scrambled out, soaked and shivering. Marcus took the tool and the wind-up flashlight from him and eased himself halfway into the hole. He paused, taking his weight on his hands.

  “What are you going to do if you meet a grub coming the other way?” he asked.

  “What are you going to do?”

  “Yeah, I know how to fight these assholes.” Marcus grabbed the empty bucket and tugged on the knotted rope to check it. “I mean that I keep telling you we’re making an ingress point for them. And you think they can’t detect vibrations?”

  “So why are you digging, then?”

  “Because we might just beat them to it. But the next problem we hit—we better have a rethink.”

  Marcus dropped down into the hole and Reeve handed the bucket down to him. After a few moments of crunching noises it all went quiet. He was making his way down the shoulder-width pipe to the face of the excavation, which was getting further underground and more difficult to work in every day. Reeve wondered whether this was the time to simply stop him doing this and call it quits. Trying to keep him in one piece in the cell block was a waste of time if he ended up dying down there.

  “We should put a line on him too,” Reeve said. “In case we need to pull him out.”

  “We don’t have another rope long enough.” Edouain kept fetching pails of water from the boiler room. The one thing they seemed to have an abundance of was buckets. “Come on, Vance, rinse yourself. I know the warders don’t give a damn, but let’s not advertise what we’re doing.”

  Reeve stuck his head down the hole and listened anxiously to make sure Marcus was still digging. The pipe funneled the sound. He could still hear the rhythmic chuk chuk chuk of the trowel blade hacking into the silt. So far, so good. After a few minutes, Marcus tugged on the line, the signal to haul up the bucket. He’d follow behind to grab the next empty one, because there was no way to drop it down the shallow gradient of the pipe. They needed to build a pulley.

  “That’s damn fast, Marcus,” Reeve called. “Pace yourself.”

  “The mud’s getting softer.”

  “What?”

  Marcus’s voice was louder. “I said—the mud’s getting softer.” He seemed to be able to crawl up and down the pipe a hell of a lot faster than the others despite his size. “I’ll do one more.”

  “Don’t push it.”

  Reeve lowered the bucket and Marcus reached out for it. Reeve was now at the point where he wasn’t keen to go any further into the tunnel himself. He’d been more or less okay as long as he could see some dim light from behind to reassure him that there was an opening, but they were so far in now that it was almost pitch black and horribly like being buried alive. That was always a possibility, of course.

  He slid into the hole and stuck his head through the opening in the pipe. The smell of decay, a bit like rotting wood, was mixed with faintly sulfurous odors and something chemical, maybe the plastic coating on the power cables.

  “Ah—goddamn,” Marcus grunted. He was a long way down the pipe, but sounded a lot closer. “Shit.”

  “You okay?”

  “We’ve got a problem …”

  Reeve heard a silence, and then a loud glopping sound like oatmeal boiling and throwing up exploding bubbles. The rope on the bucket went taut. Marcus called out.

  “I’m coming up.”

  “Marcus?”

  “For fuck’s sake—it’s flooding.”

  Reeve could hear exactly what was happening now. There was gurgling and bubbling, and the sound of boots scrabbling for purchase on the sides of the pipe.

  Oh shit.

  “Grab the rope!” Reeve yelled. “Go on, grab it.”

  He pulled. The rope came free in his hand, hauling nothing at all.

  The bastard thing had broken loose from the handle, or maybe it hadn’t, but Marcus hadn’t got a grip on it and he was down there in rising mud. He was still scrabbling around, still moving up the pipe as far as Reeve could tell, but the mud sounded like it was overtaking him.

  “Marcus! Marcus, talk to me! You there?”

  “Of course I’m still fucking here.” Marcus was breathless. “Goddamn it—”

  Reeve did think twice, but he hated himself for hesitating. He squeezed into the pipe head first. It wasn’t the smartest move either for him or for Marcus, but there wasn’t another damn thing in his brain and all he could do was take a chance. He was about five meters in when he suddenly found Marcus right in his face. For a second they both froze.

  “Back out,” Marcus barked. Reeve could see the mud below reflecting the faint light. “Now.”

  Reeve could only push back on the floor of the pipe with his hands as fast as he could while the mud welled up. Marcus rammed into him. He kept going until his boot hit something—the cut edge of the opening—and scrambled out up the access hole. He didn’t have a choice. The hole was only wide enough for one man at a time. All he could do was clear the way for Marcus and then reach down to try to haul him out.

  Reeve turned to Edouain and Vance. “Grab my legs. Don’t let me fall in.” He stuck his head down the hole again and slid in as far as he could. “Marcus?” He could hear the other guys clustered behind him, going nuts, but he just shut them out automatically. “Marcus? Give me your goddamn arm! Now!”

  Reeve couldn’t see him and he couldn’t hear him. The heavy, oily sound of the mud muffled everything. He could see it spilling out of the pipe, not a torrent, but fast enough to trap and kill. Silence: one, two, three, four, five seconds, way too long. And then there was a slow-motion splashing, and Marcus corkscrewed out of the cut section of pipe, almost headbutting Reeve and gasping for breath.

  Now Reeve realized just how much damage the dogs had done to his forearm. He reached for Marcus and caught his wrist, so cold it felt like a corpse’s, but he couldn’t keep a grip. Then someone jerked him backward.

  “Fuck, I haven’t got him, you hear? I can’t reach him.” He skidded on his chest, face-down on the flagstones, and for a moment he thought Marcus had slipped back down the pipe. Then he heard the coughing, and a column of misshapen mud rose slowly out of the hole.

  It was Marcus. He managed to get his elbows far enough out for Edouain and Vance to grab him and haul him clear. For a few moments he flopped onto all fours, retching and spitting. Then got his breath and stood up, completely caked in gritty, dark brown mud. Shit, it wasn’t funny at all. It would have been a god-awful way to go.

  “You got a plan B?” he wheezed.

  “Where’s the flashlight?” Edouain asked.

  Marcus had a habit of getting quieter as he got madder. Reeve knew the warning signs. “How about you go find it?”

  “Whoa, shit.” Vance was standing over the hole, hands braced on his knees. “What the hell’s that?”

  The mud had reached the top of the hole and was starting to spread across the floor, looking exactly like a blo
cked toilet discharging backed-up shit. Marcus took a few steps back. Reeve got to his feet to take a cautious look.

  “How much do you reckon is down there?” Reeve said.

  Vance stepped back as the mud spread out. “Are we just going to stand here admiring it?”

  “Unless you’ve got a frigging big cork, smartass, that’s about all we can do.”

  The pool was now a meter and a half across, as smooth and glossy as chocolate sauce. If it kept going it would flood the whole floor, then the whole wing. There had to be some limit to it. Reeve prayed for one. Nobody said a word for a long time, maybe a minute, because there was absolutely nothing to say and there was no emergency service they could call to fix it. But at some point, they’d have to hit an alarm or call the guards.

  “Maybe they’ll evacuate us,” Leuchars said quietly.

  Marcus took a step forward. The look on his face said he’d seen this before and that he’d never wanted to see it again. His whole body braced. His right hand began moving as if he was reaching for something on his back. Then he stopped dead. Reeve worked that out in a second. Marcus’s reflex was to go for a rifle that no longer existed. He felt in his pocket instead and slipped out the short blade he always kept on him these days.

  “Better check that out,” he said.

  Reeve watched the mud shiver for a moment. Something terrible was going to burst out. He could see what was coming written on Marcus’s face. Small bubbles were forming and popping on the surface of the mud, and then a dull rumbling began like a train some way off.

  “Get clear,” Marcus said quietly. He didn’t move. Reeve had no idea what he thought he could do to stop a grub with half a knife. “You heard me. Go.”

  But they didn’t have time to do more than duck. A fountain of water jetted out of the hole, showering them with debris. The plume of muddy liquid crashed back down on the floor, followed by a loud sucking noise and then a long gurgle like someone pulling a plug in a bathtub. The mud vanished. Reeve stared, arm still half-raised to shield himself.

  “Wow.” Vance peered into the hole. “That did the trick. Some asshole’s used a damn big sink plunger somewhere down the line. Hey—look.”

  They gathered around the hole and looked down. It had now cleared completely and was almost clean. The toilet comparison seemed spot-on now. Surprisingly, the power was still on; the boilers were chuntering away. Either the utility company had managed to make the cables watertight, or the power supply in the conduit fed somewhere else.

  “At least we know where the water in the solitary wing’s coming from,” Edouain said.

  Marcus stared at him, coated in gritty mud. “No shit.”

  “So what now?” Reeve asked.

  Edouain shrugged. He looked shaken, but so did Marcus. “There’s got to be another way out.”

  “Call me when it’s done,” Marcus said, and stalked off.

  Reeve went after him. “Hey, Marcus, okay, it could have been grubs, I know—”

  “You don’t know,” Marcus growled, not looking around. He was heading for the showers, leaving a trail of muddy prints. “You haven’t been outside since before E-Day. You’ve got no damn idea at all.”

  Marcus strode straight into the showers and turned the hand-wheel. The first shower made strangled noises but no water came out. The next showerhead rattled before spewing a torrent, and Marcus stepped under it, boots and all. The showerheads were clogged with all kinds of shit from the deteriorating pipes and the perforated plates were breaking up, so it was more like a jet of water from a garden hose than a decent shower. He stood there, jaw clenched, staring at the mud spiraling down the drain. The grit settled in the ridges of the shower tray. He gulped a mouthful of water from the jet and swirled it around his mouth like he was cleaning his teeth, then spat a few times. He didn’t look at Reeve once.

  Reeve leaned against the wall, feeling like he’d almost let him die. Chunky and a couple of other guys appeared in the doorway, probably wondering what the noise was.

  “Shit, I thought you were gone,” Reeve said. “Look, I did my best, buddy. I tried to pull you out.”

  “I know.” Marcus spat and wiped his mouth on the back of his hand again, then looked past Reeve toward the door. “Beat it, Chunky. Show’s over.”

  Reeve didn’t look to see if they’d left. He didn’t need to. For a moment he thought Marcus was shaking, but he was just shivering. There was never hot water in the washrooms; even in the summer, it was cold enough to stop your goddamn heart. “You okay now?”

  “Lost a guy a while ago,” Marcus said. “Drowned in cement.”

  Shit. It was an explanation of sorts. Maybe he was shaking after all. Reeve didn’t ask for details. “Look, why didn’t you run if you thought it was grubs? What the hell did you think you could do without a rifle?”

  Marcus took off his boots to rinse them. Reeve was only just starting to understand just how much the guy ran on hard-wired reflexes. He’d never had time to think things through. He just had to rely on stuff he’d been drilled to do so often that he did it without thinking, and got it right first time because if he hesitated he’d be dead. That wasn’t the kind of killing Reeve had been used to. He’d always had time to plan, to perfect his shot.

  “I don’t like confined spaces,” Marcus said at last. “I don’t like the dark. And I don’t get on with dogs. So I make myself face it.”

  That was some admission. “Yeah, but grubs …”

  “It’s what I’m for. I kill grubs.”

  “You’ve never chickened out of anything in your life, have you? Never lost your bottle.”

  Marcus shook out both boots and tossed them onto the dry floor. He frowned like he was genuinely trying to remember something. “Never heard that one before,” he said, rubbing his fingers through his hair. “Yeah, I’ve lost my bottle. Lost it today, in fact.”

  He didn’t elaborate. Reeve decided not to press it. Marcus switched off the water and shook himself, then went to go back to the boiler room.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Got to check out that pipe again.”

  “Marcus, there’s a fine line between facing down fear and being a total fucking idiot,” Reeve said. “You’re well across it.”

  “You got a better idea?”

  “Not yet.”

  “How do we get hold of a geological survey map?”

  “Why?”

  “We need to know where that water’s coming from.”

  “We need to find another way out. We’ve just blown a year’s work.”

  “Well, I’ve got another thirty-odd left. And my diary’s clear.”

  The dogs were still barking somewhere. They just didn’t stop now. Marcus didn’t seem bothered that he was putting on wet boots, but maybe he was used to a lot worse in the field. Reeve had only seen the war on the news and then tried to follow it on the radio when the television broke down for good, but it didn’t tell him a damn thing. Marcus hadn’t exactly spent his time telling tales from the front line, but just watching how he behaved told Reeve everything he needed to know.

  “You’ve beaten the odds,” Reeve said.

  Marcus checked in his pocket for his blade. “What?”

  “Two years.” It was journo bullshit, Reeve was sure, but everyone quoted it. “That’s what they always say is the average life expectancy of a guy in here.”

  For a moment, he thought Marcus was going to smile. No, that wasn’t going to happen now, and maybe the wound to his face meant it never would. But he nodded.

  “Imagine that,” he said.

  CHAPTER 11

  This isn’t like the Pendulum Wars. This isn’t a case of whether we’ll be occupied and whether we’ll all end up speaking Pellesian or Ostrian. It isn’t a case of how we’ll handle being swallowed up by an enemy empire. This is a war of survival. We win or we die. There’s no middle ground. No surrender. No terms. This is a war for survival of the human species, and that changes all the rules, people.
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  (Colonel Victor Hoffman, reminding his junior staff of the stakes post E-Day.)

  BASTION ROW, CENTRAL JACINTO: BLOOM, 12 A.E.

  “Hey, Dom. You missed Pad again.”

  Sorotki’s voice boomed in Dom’s earpiece, complete with loud engine noise in the background. He flinched and turned the volume down. That was the problem with wearing a radio off-duty: the background noise wasn’t there and it was easy to leave the earpiece on max. Damn, he was going to be deaf by the time he was forty.

  And he’d missed Pad Salton yet again. The guy had become a ghost. Dom was beginning to wonder if he’d just gone UA a step at a time over the years and Hoffman didn’t have the heart to have him arrested. He’d never been quite right after the Hammer strikes, those god-awful patrols just after the fires died down and the entire landscape was shrouded in thick, dark gray ash like filthy snow.

  “Goddamn, you know when I last saw him?” It wasn’t Sorotki’s fault. The guy was just passing it on. Dom carried on walking along Bastion Row, picking his way between piles of brick rubble. “Eight years ago. Maybe more.”

  “Look, if we run into him again, you want me to pass on a message?”

  “Just tell him to get his ass back into HQ more often and have a beer with his buddies.”

  “Will do. Two-Three-Nine out.”

  Dom had no idea where Sorotki was. He could have been flying recon or just standing next to his Raven in the maintenance bay while the ground crew were running engine tests. Not knowing precisely where people were was starting to trouble Dom at a level he knew wasn’t healthy. He knew what caused it. He just couldn’t stop himself doing it, that was all.

  Bastion Row had been one of the most expensive pieces of real estate in Jacinto before E-Day. It was the sort of place Dom would take Bennie and Sylvie for walks when Maria needed a bit of peace and quiet to get on with the chores, playing tourist in his own city by staring at the homes of the wealthy. The properties were a couple of hundred years old, four-story ashlar-fronted town houses or office conversions with tall windows and ornate black iron railings in front of a small forecourt basement. Sylvie was always fascinated by that. On dark winter afternoons, the basement rooms were always lit up and Sylvie loved to peer down into them. She called them dolls houses. Dom could see the resemblance if he tried hard enough.