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

by Karen Traviss

  Okay. I can always shoot it if it’s a grub. Got to check it out.

  “Rip the door, Jack.”

  Jack burned his way through the lock and the door swung open. A squadron of flies buzzed out, skimming Dom’s face, and for a moment he wondered if he was rescuing a corpse. He couldn’t see a thing inside except a shaft of dim light filtering through from the gantry above. Then he heard movement—creaking bedsprings, the shuffle of boots, those fucking Wretches still moving around on the overhead gantries—and Marcus loomed out of the darkness.

  Dom had imagined the worst, but not this.

  Even in this light, Marcus looked pretty much the same as he went in, just thinner, but not the emaciated shell of a man Dom was expecting. Dom wanted to hug him because that was what regular guys did when they hadn’t seen their brother for years and didn’t know if they’d ever see him alive again, but this was Marcus, and some things about him never changed. His body language said don’t touch me. His shoulders were squared and his arms were held stiffly at his sides.

  But I’ve come for you, Marcus. I swore I would. I’ll never let you down. Come on, man. React.

  Marcus just stood there, his outline picked up by the faint light, holding a scrap of paper in his hand. He folded it with surprising care for a man with Wretches scuttling about on the gantry above and puking drool over him, then slipped it into his pants and stared past Dom for a moment at Jack. The overhead light suddenly caught his face and Dom almost flinched. Shit, something had ripped up his right cheek. Dom steeled himself not to ask, at least not yet.

  “What are you doing here?” Marcus demanded.

  It was like a slap in the face. “Getting you out.” Damn, I should know better by now. Marcus had gone straight back to his default setting, pretending nothing had happened. Cut him some slack. God knows what he’s been through in here. And you know what he’s like. Dom dropped the kitbag on the floor. “Here. Put this on. You’ll need it.”

  Marcus was still staring suspiciously through the open door like someone had called trying to sell him brushes. He seemed to have worked out that Dom didn’t have anyone’s orders to stroll off with Jack. Then he opened the kitbag and started putting on his armor.

  “You could get into a lot of trouble for doing this,” he muttered.

  “Not anymore.” Dom had heard that embarrassed false annoyance before. It was a lot like Hoffman’s. “Things have changed. We better go.”

  “What about the other prisoners? We can’t just leave them here.”

  “They’re gone. Hoffman pardoned everybody.”

  Marcus jerked his head back a fraction like he didn’t believe what he’d heard. Then his face fell into that familiar grim resignation. “Is that right,” he rasped.

  Oh shit. Here we go. Shouldn’t have said it. It wasn’t quite like that, was it? But Dom was in a hurry, scared shitless, and none of that crap mattered right now. “Yeah. Welcome back to the army, soldier.”

  “Shit.” Marcus seemed to have erased four years from his memory instantly. It was like he’d never been shut away, never missed anybody, never thought he’d die in here.

  And he didn’t ask about Anya.

  But that was Marcus. The worse things got, the more he locked into that stiff-upper-lip, Fenix-men-don’t-feel-pain bullshit. Dom got the feeling that any Fenix caught losing his intestines on the battlefield would be told to get a grip and snap out of it.

  “What’s the paper for?” he asked.

  “Sanity.” Marcus gave his Lancer a fond look like this was the reunion he’d longed for the most. “Let’s go.”

  Dom decided to let Marcus say what he wanted to say in his own good time. He was safe, he was getting out of the Slab before the place killed him, and that was all that mattered. Dom didn’t know if he was now facing a a court-martial of his own, but it was way too late to worry about that and he needed to unload Jack.

  “Go on, Jack, thin out,” Dom said. “Get out of here. Some other squad needs you now.”

  Jack paused for a moment like he didn’t trust Dom to complete the mission on his own, but he might just have been checking the radio net for instructions. Come on, he’s not a guy. He doesn’t react like that. Jack cloaked himself and Dom felt the wash of warm air as the bot moved off.

  He turned to Marcus. “Which way out?”

  “Cut through D Wing,” Marcus said. “Have you seen anyone else in here?”

  “No. The place is deserted. I told you.”

  Marcus pressed his lips into a thin, angry line. Dom wondered if the realization that Hoffman had left him there had now sunk in and was starting to fester, which wasn’t like Marcus at all. He’d always said he deserved his sentence.

  “Goddamn,” Marcus said. “Okay, I’ve got some catching up to do with the grubs.”

  Dom now had to risk using the radio. They’d need a Raven to extract them, however pumped up Marcus was to fight his way out. Ah, shit, Hoffman knew he was here anyway. Dom would take what was coming to him. He took a deep breath and pressed his earpiece.

  “All KR callsigns, this is Delta-Two,” he said. “We’re at the Slab. We need extraction.”

  “Six-Four here, Delta. Copy that. We’re beginning our run.”

  “Run?” Marcus said. They moved out onto the main floor of D Wing, on the alert for grubs. “What’s his target? Did he understand that?”

  Dom heard the Raven coming but as it swept overhead, a single burst of fire spat through the shattered glass of the roof and blew chunks out of masonry. Dom dived for cover and Marcus dropped down beside him.

  “Six-Four, this is Delta-Two, hold your goddamn fire.” Shit, that was all they needed, getting hit by friendly fire after making it this far. “We’re inside the Slab. Repeat, inside.”

  “Six-Four to Delta, roger that. Holding fire. Advise you relocate. The place is crawling with grubs.”

  Marcus scrambled to his feet. “So who else doesn’t know you’re here?”

  This wasn’t the time to try to explain a messy situation, least of all one with the word Hoffman in it. Dom just wanted to get Marcus out of here without being creamed. A half-lie would shut him up for a while. “If Command knew I was here to get you, I’d be in some deep shit.”

  “Yeah? So how are you going to explain me to them? You said things have changed.”

  “Hey, just worry about getting out of here first, okay?”

  Marcus went up to a side door and kicked it open. The place was a cesspit. Dom could see blood and bullet marks on the walls, some recent, some not.

  “What the hell went on in here, Marcus?”

  “You don’t want to know. Come on. This way.”

  Dom followed him outside into a big courtyard scattered with more fallen masonry. He could hear the radio traffic between two Ravens and the ground, calling in grub positions. Marcus was still looking around like he was checking for snipers or something.

  “There was a guy,” Marcus said impatiently. He held his hand at chin height, fingers squared. “Black guy, this tall, thin. So you didn’t see him or his body. You’re sure.”

  “No, nothing, and we’ve got to keep moving.” Dom could hear the Ravens moving back in. “The grubs took the Andius highway. It’s pretty hairy out there.”

  Right on cue, a shell hit a tower on the far side of the prison, sending chunks of granite down on the yard. The top of the tower shattered and then the whole thing started tipping over, falling, before crashing down on a colonnade about twenty meters ahead of them. The next thing Dom saw was the muzzle flash right in front of him as grubs came charging out of an alley. He took cover behind a low granite wall with Marcus, bobbing up every few seconds to fire. Movement on the top of the walls caught his eye, More grubs were making their way along a bridge connecting two buildings at roof height.

  “Either we put those assholes down, or we have to cross back through D Wing and get out that way.” Marcus took a breath and knelt upright to lay down a long burst before dropping down again to rel
oad. “Get ready to run.”

  The grubs were still coming out of the alley, and the ammo wasn’t going to last forever. Dom decided it was time to get back on the radio. “Delta-Two to KR units, requesting some support here. Grubs up on that bridge.”

  “Six-Four here, we see them.” Raven fire raked the walkway, sending chunks of it spinning into the air along with the grubs. “We’re clearing the area for extraction. Stand by.”

  “Okay,” Marcus said. He checked his grenades. “Run.”

  They sprinted to the door they’d come out of, back into D Wing. The grubs were waiting for them. Dom ran straight into a hail of fire from the floor level while more grubs came running along the gallery above. So much for using the debris for cover: for a moment Dom thought they’d both be picked off in seconds from the upper floor, but the dumb gray assholes rushed down to fight on the ground. Dom didn’t understand that and he didn’t need to. He just grabbed their stupidity with both grateful hands and blew the shit out of them, moving from cover to cover.

  He hadn’t fought alongside Marcus for years, but they snapped back together as if they’d never been apart, staggering their reloads, overlapping their arcs of fire, both knowing exactly what the other would do next. For a moment Dom could kid himself that the Slab had never happened and that it was just another ruined building they happened to be clearing. The incoming fire died away a grub at a time and Dom and Marcus just stood there, panting in the sudden silence. All Dom could hear was the faint click of shattered stonework that was starting to crumble and fall from the walls.

  “I think we’re done,” he said. Then he heard scrapes against the steel door and a searing point of white light punched through the metal. “Shit, they’re cutting their way through.”

  Marcus lined up with the door and started swinging a grenade on its chain. “Fine. Saves us the trouble.”

  Dom took up position behind a granite block and covered the door, now fringed by a red-hot line as the cutting tool crept around the edges. It was all a matter of timing. If Marcus let the grenade go before the door was down, it would just bounce off and detonate in front of the door. He had to wait for it to fall in. He stood there, eyes fixed on the glowing metal, swinging the frag like it was some kind of exercise and nothing urgent at all.

  No, he hadn’t lost it. Whatever this shithole had done to him—and Dom knew he’d changed—Marcus was back on top of his game.

  The hiss of the cutting tool stopped. “Here they come,” Dom said.

  Boom. The door panel blew out from behind and crashed to the ground, and Marcus let go of the grenade. It was perfect timing. It caught the first rank of grubs starting to pour in.

  “Okay, go!”

  Marcus headed straight into the smoke. Dom could see more grubs behind but Marcus just plowed ahead, emptying clips into them like he’d been saving up for this all those years. Dom pushed through the mangled doorway beside him and now they were in what was left of the lobby, back in the sunlight, listening for Ravens above the noise of the shelling. A gaping hole yawned in one of the shattered perimeter walls. At least the way out was obvious now.

  But the grubs weren’t dumb, and they’d worked that out. They rose up from the rubble like range targets and opened fire. Ricochets sprayed everywhere. Marcus dropped behind a low wall with Dom on his heels.

  “All we’ve got to do is get through that gap,” he said. “Thirty meters. Come on. One last push. On three … two … go.”

  They darted for the next cover, hosing whatever raised its head or ran at them. Dom had reached the blind instinct stage. At one point he wasn’t even aware of where Marcus was. It was only when the grubs stopped popping up that his body handed the reins back to his brain and he was acutely aware of the deafening noise of Ravens coming in low.

  The pilots had to be able to see what was going on. They wouldn’t leave them here, not now. Dom hit the radio.

  “Delta-Two here, ready for extraction,” he said, finger pressed so hard to his earpiece that it hurt. He could hear the chatter between the pilots but he wasn’t sure who else was up there. “Six-Two? Any KR unit?”

  “I’m hit. I’m hit.”

  Dom heard the impact before he saw the black smoke. Then he heard the worst: someone saying he’d lost control, the signal breaking up, and then the whoomp of something crashing and exploding.

  “Six-One is down. Repeat, Six-One is down.”

  “KR-Zero-Eight-Zero here—Kim to Santiago, we’re seeing ground deformation outside the walls. There’s something emerging. We’re pulling you out.”

  Goddamn. It had to be Kim, didn’t it? Mr. Sovereign’s Regs. By the book. Now everybody knew. Was it Hoffman or Prescott who sent him? Dom looked up and saw the Raven loop around.

  “Santiago receiving, sir. We’re on our way.”

  “Move it before that e-hole opens, Private. We can’t hang around.”

  “Understood, sir.”

  Kim wasn’t joking. The Raven was waiting on the pavement a long way from the hole in the wall, engine whining, and as soon as Dom put his boot on the concrete slabs he felt the ground shiver.

  Marcus broke into a jog. He gave Dom his dubious look, eyes slightly narrowed. “So Kim’s going to be fine when you tell him you happened to be passing and found me here. With armor and a Lancer.”

  “Look, gift horses, mouths—just do it.”

  The jog turned into a run and then a sprint. Dom was ready for whatever was about to burst out in front of them, prepared to jink left or right, but it didn’t happen. The concrete started cracking and then almost tipped him forward like the rolling deck of a ship as the pavement reared and broke open behind them. He didn’t really need to look, but he did. It was a fucking huge Corpser, tank-sized, so vast and dangerous that it didn’t need a load of grubs coming up behind it to take out everyone plus the Raven. Concrete and debris rained off it as Dom and Marcus scrambled for the open door. It was so close when they skidded across the deck that Dom felt the hail of grit and gravel fly off its legs.

  The Raven lifted and banked like it was spring-loaded. Dom struggled to sit up on the tilting deck and found himself staring right into the Corpser’s open maw, so close that he could see the line of pale tissue down the center of its tongue. He wasn’t going to forget that image in a hurry. For a second he was sure he was going to slide down its gullet.

  The crew chief stepped in and pulled Dom to his feet. “So we’ve got an extra passenger,” he said. It was Nat Barber. Dom didn’t know him that well, but Barber seemed to know Marcus a lot better. “Now there’s a familiar face. Good to see you back, Fenix.”

  And wherever there was Barber, there was his pilot, Gill Gettner. Her voice came over the radio, an oddly reassuring blend of seen-it-all and pure acid. “And they say women keep guys waiting. You two okay?”

  “Yes ma’am.” Dom slid into a seat. “Sorry about Six-One.”

  “Yeah.” She paused. The woman never reacted, at least not in public. “I’m losing them all today. Nobody else left down there?”

  “Nobody,” Marcus said, like it really pissed him off.

  He settled into the seat next to Dom, facing Kim like a man on a train trying not to get into a conversation with a stranger. The lieutenant handed him his water bottle in silence and Marcus took a pull at it. Nobody seemed to know what to say to a disgraced hero. History had been put on hold, probably forever. The Gear on the door—CARMINE A., it said on his armor—fired sporadically at something on the ground that Dom couldn’t see.

  “Welcome to Delta Squad,” Kim said at last.

  Marcus seemed to have forgotten “sir” and salutes. “Where are we going?”

  “Embry Square.” Kim either didn’t know that Dom had defied the Chief of Defense Staff and hijacked a bot, or he’d been ordered not to care about it. “Colonel Hoffman’s waiting for us.”

  “Hoffman.” Marcus leaned back, looked up to the deck-head, and visibly gritted his teeth. “Shit.”

  Dom tried to jolly
him along. The old firm was back together, Santiago and Fenix. Marcus should have been happy. “This is going to be awesome.”

  Carmine, kneeling at the open door, glanced back into the crew bay for a moment. Marcus couldn’t have looked more badass if he’d taken lessons in it. He was simmering with some fresh anger and the new scar on his face just doubled the effect. Dom couldn’t see Carmine’s expression underneath the full-face helmet, but it was clear from the way he tilted his head to look up at Marcus that he was starstruck by machismo.

  “Hey, are you the Marcus Fenix?” He sounded really, really young. “The one who fought at Aspho Fields?”

  Marcus’s shoulders sagged. Carmine couldn’t have known what a painful subject the battle was. “Yeah.”

  “Wow! Cool!”

  Marcus turned away and looked down out of the door on his side. “Not really.”

  Gettner circled over a patch of waste ground in the center of the city. Dom could see Sorotki’s Raven on the ground with its rotors turning. Hoffman was pacing around just outside the range of the rotor wash, probably rehearsing a rant. Gettner brought the Raven in to land.

  “Marcus, don’t start it with the old man,” Dom whispered. “Okay?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I mean it.”

  “Yeah. Reality doesn’t change. I still did it.”

  Marcus jumped down and ambled toward Hoffman, leaving Dom some way behind. It was a clash of stubborn bastards. Hoffman was a nice guy, a decent man for all his snarling and cussing, and he’d just turned an awful lot of blind eyes toward Dom’s insubordination. He could have had him shot. But Hoffman had his bullshit barrier to keep up just like Marcus did, and his clenched jaw said he was digging in. What else could he do, burst into tears and say how sorry he was? No, Hoffman just stepped into Marcus’s path—shoulders squared, boots apart, fists on hips—and looked him up and down like a piece of unwelcome shit.

  “You traitor,” he growled. “You’re not fit to wear the uniform.”

  Marcus made a visible effort to resist a fight. He turned his head away for a moment, then just rolled right over the insult in that I-didn’t-hear-you kind of way that he had. “Looks to me like you can use all the help you can get.”