by R. M. Meluch
Farragut slid down the ladders to the brig, hauled open the hatch to Augustus’ cell, shrugged Augustus’ scabbard off his back and threw it at Augustus. “Augustus. Out.”
Augustus caught the sheathed sword. Didn’t rise. Sullen. “Give me a reason.”
“Gorgons. 82 Eridani III.”
Augustus was on his feet. His shock looked genuine.
Merrimack tore up the distance between Fort Ted and 82 Eridani III.
Twenty-four hours was an eternity when you felt you were standing still. Without modification, there was no sense of motion inside a ship’s inertial shell. You’re punching through space in incomprehensible measures, but you don’t know it. You only felt the ship’s sudden burbles that leaned you unexpectedly sideways or lifted you up off the deck. Otherwise you felt nothing.
In a dead calm, Navy specialists go stir crazy and Fleet Marines want to murder them. All hands needed to feel like they were getting somewhere.
So Merrimack’s environmental systems were modified to make you feel like she was flying. And Lieutenant Colonel Steele put you to work. There were drills and a lot of cleaning. Your Swift better be clean enough to lick. He made you do it, too—lick it. There were machines that could clean things quicker and better, but machines don’t mind the waiting.
And there was basketball. There was no life without basketball. Cole Darby hadn’t played much before he joined the Fleet Marines. Now it was Wing versus Battery in the maintenance hangar.
This close to threshold velocity, Mack gets moodier. Her inertial hiccups turn you sideways and leave you there. Real interesting when you’re trying to make a free throw.
Oh, bad luck, Dumbell. The ball fell up.
Lieutenant Colonel Steele kept his Fleet Marines busy when they were on duty. Worry could gnaw a hole through your guts. The Old Man don’t want you thinking about how close the gorgons are to Earth. Off duty, you snuck some bad thinking in. We’re standing on the brink of the end of everything.
Don’t think, Darb. Just make this three-pointer—
Up your nose, Shasher Wyatt!
Six hours before planetfall Taps sounded. Most of Merrimack’s personnel hit the rack. They slept if they could, and they’d better give it their best effort. In six hours they’d be back into an unholy burr ball.
TR Steele walked through the aisles of hydroponics. He was in search of light and warmth—and of those two ridiculous lizard plants Kerry Blue was so fond of. Didn’t see them. They usually made themselves known. They were the only plants that didn’t stay planted. They chortled. They climbed him like a tree. They did ridiculous things.
But he didn’t see them now. Wondered if they might have died.
He felt a sting he shouldn’t feel. Lots of things die. These two were just plants with legs. And tongues. And tails. And big eyes. And webbed feet.
And Kerry Blue loved them.
The lizard plants were as close as he could get to Kerry Blue now, in this dark hour. And they were gone.
He felt a sense of loss. And foreboding. He was going back into battle in five hours. It weighed on him. The enemy was close to home.
The hatch to the moist green compartment sucked open. Sucked shut. A Marine stepped in. Barefoot, dressed only in tank top and sweat shorts, she tiptoed up the aisle, a bushy lizard plant under either arm.
She didn’t see him. The compartment was large, and a clump of what were supposed to be banana trees stood between them. Steele was from Oklahoma. He thought the banana trees were alien.
He stayed motionless. Tried to breathe silently. Saw her between the wide green fronds, her bare arms well-toned, strong in a girly way. She placed the plants in a patch of mint. Her whispered scold carried. “Stay put, you guys!”
She poured water into bowls for them.
Her brown hair was loose on her shoulders.
The sight of her hurt. There was a painful lump in his throat, a burning in his eyes. A raging hard-on down below.
Kerry Blue retreated on tiptoe.
As soon as the hatch sucked shut behind her, the lizard plants pulled themselves out of their trough and scampered for the hatch, trying to follow her. They were the dumbest looking things. And completely useless.
Steele strode over to them. They cowered low. He scooped them up. Put them back in their trough. They hunkered down in their places, goggle eyes staring.
“Stay,” he ordered them.
He left hydroponics and went back to his own cabin. He had private quarters in officer’s country. He lay in his rack, cursing the desk-commando eunuch who ever thought that putting women in combat was a good idea.
Thoughts churned in the dark. Would it be any better keeping a woman safe at home? No. The enemy just now proved that there was no safe home. The Hive was erupting in quick striking distance of Earth.
He had to face it: He needed Kerry Blue here, with him. Armed and trained in twenty-one scenarios.
17 September 2443
U.S. Space Battleship Merrimack
82 Eridani III
Near Space
An emergency evacuation of the domed settlements on the third planet of the 82 Eridani system was underway as Merrimack arrived.
The space battlecruiser Rio Grande was already there, her Swifts deployed. The fighter craft fired beam shots on the masses of gorgons as they broke out of the ground and spidered toward the inhabited domes.
“Just why are there so many people on 82 Eridani III?” Calli said, appalled.
John Farragut supposed he was wearing the same stunned expression as his XO.
Merrimack descended low enough to physically see the settlement through her portholes.
There were acres of newly constructed domes on the dark planet. They were physical domes, not energy domes, housing a scientific expedition that made no sense. The domes shone bright white from their interior lights.
Someone with galactic amounts of currency had flushed a lot of it into this world sometimes known as Xi.
A dome flickered to darkness as it broke open.
The domes were equipped with no defenses. They had no stable of spacecraft. The research scientists had been ferried here and left without a means of quick exit.
Swifts strafed the open airless ground. You heard a holy lot of barking on the Marine harmonic. The space battlecruiser Rio Grande carried the other half of the 89th battalion—the Bull Mastiffs.
Captain Farragut tried to contact Rio’s captain, but Dallas McDaniels was not on board Rio at the moment. Captain McDaniels had commandeered a Swift. He was outside shooting gorgons.
Captain Farragut spoke over the Fleet Marine com without identifying himself: “What do you call a Navy Captain at the controls of a Swift?”
A chorus of Fleet Marines answered at once: “Flight risk.”
The voice of Captain Dallas McDaniels: “Is that you, John, old son?”
“Ahoy and howdy, Dallas. You started without me. What’s your tally?”
“Lost count,” Captain McDaniels sent back. “Don’t reckon these things died this easy in the Deep End. You have any idea what’s causing them to be so amenable to the notion here?”
“No, sir. I do not. And I’m getting unkind looks from my Flight Controller. Pick up channel G.”
Captain McDaniels came back on the G harmonic, leaving the Marine harmonic to the Marines: “It’s like these gorgons never seen a Swift before.”
Which wasn’t possible. They both knew it. It was a well-known fact by now that you don’t keep secrets from separate members of the Hive. You teach one gorgon, you’ve taught them all, everywhere, instantly.
“Are these even real gorgons?” Captain McDaniels asked.
“Not sure. Keep it simple. Make ’em die.”
“Roger that.”
McDaniels signed off, yelling.
John Farragut
was getting harsh looks from his XO now. The commander of his Fleet Marines was also frowning.
Calli spoke very very low. “Captain, you’re not.”
“No.” He was not going outside to play with a Swift. “I’ve got the big guns right here. TR, release the hounds.”
“Sir.”
Lieutenant Colonel TR Steele left the command platform, roaring for his pilots and gunners to kit up in bunny suits and bubble helmets. And everyone take a sword.
Kerry Blue squawked. “Not flight suits?”
Bunny suits were standard issue spacesuits for ground duty. And swords? No one took a sword on board a Swift.
Reg Monroe: “He’s talking to the battery, right?”
Carly Delgado: “No, chicas. He’s talking to all of us.”
Steele: “No one is flying. You’re going in on the ground. Merrimack will descend to the surface. You will debark best speed. Proceed to the domes with swords at the ready. Escort the civilians to the evacuation vehicles. Secure all displacement equipment behind them.”
Kerry saw Lieutenant Hazard Sewell open his mouth, an objection in there. Never got it out.
Steele: “You are not flying. They need fishers inside the domes.”
To “fish” was to Fight Inside Someone’s House. The Fleet Marines who served on Merrimack were masters of wielding sharp metal in tight corridors packed with equal parts gorgons and your very best friendlies.
“You are the experts,” Steele told his Bull Mastiffs.
“None better,” Lieutenant Hazard Sewell said, and gave an eighty-ninth battalion bark.
Hoo Ra.
When the Marines assembled in full gear at the sail, Lieutenant Colonel Steele spat on Kerry Blue’s bubble helmet.
The glob slid off quick and clean. The Old Man looked disappointed.
He could’ve benched her if she hadn’t passed that test. She didn’t know why Steele never wanted to send her forward. She was as good as anyone else. Couldn’t understand why he hated her.
Steele was kitted up for ground duty too. He was going down with his dogs. He and Farragut were alike that way. Both of ’em led from the front.
Kerry glanced out a portal. The planet was getting real big. Merrimack was descending fast.
And we got orders to proceed down the lower sail. Why do they call it a sail? It’s a one-hundred-fifty-foot tower slanted back like a shark fin, mostly filled with equipment. And it has a ladder for deploying us lot.
The Fleet Marines filed down in units, Kerry Blue down front with Alpha Team. Waiting on the ladder for the hatch to open. Twitch Fuentes below her, Cole Darby positioned to come down on her head if she didn’t move it when it came time to jump.
Hatch open. Everybody out. Kerry Blue jumped.
She landed easy. The gravity wasn’t too fierce. She ran to make way for everybody else.
She could see now where Merrimack let the Bull Mastiffs out—in the center of a ring of widely spaced domes that housed the settlements.
Kerry looked for Dome E. Couldn’t see for the bright white flashes that split the perfect black. She blinked. She had to find Dome E. Or, better yet, just follow Lieutenant Hazard Sewell.
Ran with her team through a rain of sparks.
Whipping gorgon legs sniped at her flank. She hadn’t even seen them. A downstroke with her sword made the biting mouths fall away. More mouths moved in. She sliced those off too.
Heard the hiss of a suit leak. One of the mouths got her. Then came that little fwip sound as her suit sealed itself.
She stabbed a landing disk as she ran past it. It stuck to her sword point and came with her. She had to kick it off. The Marines had orders to secure all displacement gear.
Steele motioned with his sword for Red Squad to split right, and Hazard Sewell led the charge into Dome E. Everybody get inside as fast as you can pack yourselves through the air lock and make way for the evacuees to get out.
Kerry Blue, first thing, pulled the D collar off a civilian, who fought her for it. Kerry won. Told the woman to suit up for dust off.
The woman said she’d rather displace.
“Suit or die. Those are the choices.” Kerry slashed the legs off a gorgon that fell from the overhead.
The ground shook. Not good. Makes the civilians scream, and that don’t help.
The floor tiles moved, breaking underfoot. Kerry stumbled over the uneven ground, hacking at the tentacles that bloomed up between the broken edges of foundation tiles.
The dome lights failed.
Headlamps on. Made for jarring shadows.
Kerry Blue tried to count her dead. Couldn’t verify half her kills. The gorgons disintegrated, and she was left arguing over pools of ooze that really were her kills, not yours, Cole Darby, go get your own. No time to argue. Lots more opportunities. Priority targets were the gorgons that got between the civilians and the exits.
Not feeling as scared as she oughtta be. Reminded herself: Do not under-respect the enemy.
Most of the resident scientists had already suited up for evacuation. Kerry’s crew had to clear the gorgons from the exit and then shove refugees out the air lock. Keep ’em moving.
Until you had to stop.
Civilians were whiny and unpredictable and really hard not to cut. Even the smart ones. Especially the smart ones. It was like dressing children, making sure they were ready to go outside in the snow. This geek woman tried to go out the air lock with a big ol’ gash in her pressure suit. Told Kerry Blue, “It’ll be fine. I don’t mind the cold.”
“Ma’am? You’ll mind the vacuum.” Kerry Blue slapped a piece of sealer on the gashed sleeve before the woman could get out there and pop her lungs.
Keep ’em moving.
Green Team was out there on the other side of the lock, clearing a path for the civilians to get to the landers.
They heard something over the com: “We’re down here stabbing bilge balloons and babysitting tourists while Rio’s Wing is flying and shooting. Is that fair?”
Hazard Sewell, right beside her: “We are known for no friendly hacking. You should be flattered, Marine.”
Fishing was a real art form. Kerry’s company was hard-practiced at fighting in narrow corridors alongside brothers she loved more than her own life.
“I’m flattered, Mister Lieutenant Hazard Sewell, sir,” Kerry Blue said as a Swift executed a barrel roll over the dome. “I’d rather be flying!”
She saw Hazard’s white face through his crystal-clean bubble helmet, mouthing words for only her to see: Me too.
Swarms of gorgons scaled the dome, trying to get in through the top. Kerry could see them moving up there on the translucent panels.
She heard a deep structural groan. Dome E was cracking. Air hissed out. Kerry Blue’s suit fluttered in the current.
A glut of gorgons briefly plugged the crack. Then the crack widened, and the whole wad of them fell in, down, and splattered onto the buildings and the running people.
More of them tumbled down in giant clumps.
“Oough!” A gorgon fell through the ceiling, right onto Kerry Blue. Would’ve killed her in normal gravity. This one dropped her to the broken floor, knocking the breath out of her. She felt the tentacle hits; the thing was biting at her suit.
Suddenly the gorgon sack was melting all over her.
“GRETAAAAAA!” There was Dak with a sword. Master crazy. Severed tentacles and gorgon bits flying this way and the other way. Dark ooze slid down Dak’s sleeves.
Kerry jumped to her feet and cut open the next gorgon that came at them. “Tango Yankee, Dak!”
Dak was already away, flailing and yelling like a berserker, “Greta Greta Greta Greta!”
Kerry’s team guided the civilians through the dome’s air lock. Another squad waited outside to shepherd the people into the waiting life craft.
>
And Rio’s Wing was upstairs, flying cover. Lucky them. Their Swifts became dragons in the dark. They scorched bright paths across the black rock.
Many, many whippy legs fled before them.
From way upstairs, Merrimack advised that there was no more human life inside Dome E.
Kerry looked up at the dying dome. Air hissed out. Freezing steam glittered in the emergency lights.
There were more gorgons out here. Lots and lots, harassing the landers and trying to get into the other domes.
The gorgons out here were the bloated kind. Under atmospheric pressure gorgon bodies got smaller, compressed to about a meter wide not counting all those snaky tentacles. These gorgons were balloons. Their fanged tentacles were all the same.
A squadron of Swifts from Rio Grande approached for another strafing run to burn the refugees’ escape route clear of gorgons. The fighters came in real low on the deck.
Kerry would’ve been moving a lot faster than that if she were flying that close to the ground.
Suddenly a whole mass of gorgons rose up from the rock surface, tentacles clasped to form a living net of themselves. Five of the Swifts pulled up and clear. The last one flew right into the net, and crashed down into the rock. Kerry watched it auger in. A scream. Hers. “No!”
There was no explosion.
A mass of dark thrashing bodies piled on top of the Swift.
The pilot could be alive. You could bury a Swift and live if you had the fat part of your energy field—your cowcatcher—deployed right. Kerry Blue knew that real well. The pilot could be alive.
The other Swifts came in screaming, flaming. Gorgons leaped and clutched and burned.
The downed Swift was moving, coming out of the ground, rising in a drunken motion.
Kerry Blue squinted. Didn’t look right. The crate wasn’t flying. And it didn’t have its cowcatcher deployed. It didn’t have a force field at all.
The gorgons had it. A mass of tentacles pried the Swift out of the rock. More were pulling at its canopy.
