Beast

by Patrick McClafferty

  “Understood, Brigit,” Solomon said evenly. “Draxx to ground team.”

  A rough voice of a marine sergeant replied, “Ground team. Go ahead, Captain Draxx.”

  “How are things going?”

  “Surprisingly quiet, sir. I expected some resistance from the Bleeth forces.”

  Solomon frowned. “So did I. I’m coming down with the pinnace and a few observers before we start downloading the colonists.”

  “It’s quiet enough right now, sir. We’ll be waiting.”

  “Draxx out.” Solomon turned to his staff. “I have to go to the surface. Hepzibah, Tristan, and Brigit will be in the landing team.”

  Elora’s face began to redden, and Solomon sighed. He’d really intended to leave Elora safely on the ship, but he knew in his heart that it would never happen. She was just too damned stubborn. “Yes, Elora, against my better judgement, you will be coming, too.” He shook his head.

  Mila, who was too young, would remain on the ship. Still sitting at her station, she wouldn’t even look at him. Jax, sitting beside her, was biting his lip, his face stricken. Solomon sighed to himself, but he knew leaving them behind was the right decision.

  “Gibbs, you might think of calling in the second shift to backfill behind us, and you have the con.”

  “I have the con, aye,” Gibbs replied solemnly. “And the second-shift personnel are on the way.”

  Solomon stared at the planet spinning slowly in the view screen. “Gibbs, is the pinnace ready for flight?”

  “Yes, Captain, but I really think that I should do the flying this time.”

  Solomon sighed at Gibbs’s mother-hen attitude. “I’ve taken the pinnace out three times already, Gibbs, and I’ve landed it in the hangar without the use of automatics. That’s over and above the dozen times I’ve had it out in the simulator. It’s not so different from a marine shuttle, after all, and I’ve had hundreds of hours in one of those.”

  “Fine.” Gibbs sighed. “Have it your way.”

  Solomon made a quick motion to his bridge team, who were already on their feet.

  “I’ll have your hand weapons waiting in the hangar,” Gibbs added.

  Solomon watched in bemusement as the gleaming white pinnace appeared to slide down the hangar wall on almost-invisible rails, and out onto the deck, where it pivoted slowly until it faced the open hangar door. It was an incredibly efficient way to store small auxiliary craft and equipment, but to Solomon, it looked… odd. An ogival delta-winged craft, the pinnace was designed to look impressive, fight her way out of tough situations, and outrun enemies. In the case of the Lost Horizon, the pinnace was at least partially armed with energy weapons, but like the mother ship, it lacked functional missiles. As Solomon slid into the comfortable pilot’s seat, he hoped that it wouldn’t be an issue. A quick glance at the inside camera showed him the other half dozen crewmembers belting in. Then he raised the small ship on its antigravity field, edging it slowly out of the hangar as below him the blue-green world spread out in jewel-toned beauty.

  Shangri-La was a stunning planet, slightly smaller and younger than Earth, with two shining moons. Dense forests covered its continent, and dark icy seas made up eighty percent of the world’s surface. Solomon eased the control yoke back as he remembered Gibbs’s briefing on the planetary ecology and history. Jagged mountains touched the clouds, and winters were long and bitter except on one belt of moderately sized islands that circled the equator. Settled first by Adaari colonists in the distant past, the world was fought over again and again for its resources and for its strategic position along the galactic trade routes. Since the last long-ago battle, the forests had regrown, and the deep scars of kinetic strike weapons had finally smoothed over and disappeared. Mountains rose where lush plains had once been, and not one person would remember that Shangri-La—it was known by a different name then—had once supported a population of just over a billion souls. Now the world supported a plethora of creatures well adapted to the cold, along with a few struggling human beings. The night sky was empty of everything but the stars.

  Shangri-La Base Camp consisted of a large fifty-meter white dome surrounded by two dozen smaller white domes of various sizes. Sitting in the middle of a wide meadow, Solomon could see where trees had been felled to give the colonists a better field of fire, and a high three-meter chain-link fence surrounded the camp. Tall covered watchtowers built of rough wood sat at the four corners of the compound, and for a second, it looked like a medieval village under siege. Grinning to himself, Solomon could see where the ground team had moved the armored combat drop shuttle to allow the pinnace room to land between the protection of the shuttle and the security of the compound, with the nose of the drop shuttle and its weapons facing the woods a kilometer off. He caressed the controls, and the pinnace drifted down as gently as a feather, bumping softly as it settled on its landing skids. The whine of the engines descended into silence.

  Solomon unbuckled, stood, and stretched. “All ashore,” he announced as he exited the flight deck to make his way through the luxurious passenger compartment. The pinnace, he noted dryly, was never intended to actually be flown by the captain of the warship.

  Elora, Hepzibah, and Tristan were already up and checking their weapons, while Brigit was already armed and standing by the door. Solomon gave her a thin smile and a nod. With a hiss of chilly air, the door swung open, and the short ramp unfolded to the ground.

  Jean-Philippe Lémery, the head of the international team exploring Shangri-La, was a tall lean man, with dark curly hair and intense hazel eyes. As he walked from the compound toward the grounded pinnace, he looked deathly tired. He nodded briefly as he studied the group. “I’m Jean-Philippe, the team chief,” he announced in a low, lightly accented voice.

  Solomon stepped forward, holding out his hand. “I am Solomon Draxx, Captain of the Lost Horizon, and the leader of this merry band.” He glanced at the others.

  The marines from the drop shuttle had unobtrusively surrounded the party as they faced the potentially hostile woods.

  Jean-Philippe frowned. “I was led to believe that Bassam Shamoon was the captain of the Lost Horizon.”

  Solomon sighed. He had hoped to wait until later to explain the circumstances surrounding the Lost Horizon. “There was a problem onboard the Lost Horizon, Jean-Philippe, and we had to make several adjustments very quickly.”

  The Frenchman’s frown deepened. “I hope that no one was killed.”

  “Actually, the entire crew was killed when the command module and the landing shuttle were destroyed.” Solomon kept his voice flat and devoid of emotion.

  Jean-Philippe’s eyes swung to the pinnace and the drop shuttle. “You mean that those aren’t…”

  “Movement!” a marine hissed, followed a second later by another call of “Movement!” by the marine at Solomon’s side.

  Solomon turned to the marine sergeant. “Get everyone back into the compound, Sergeant, and get that drop shuttle airborne to give us support.” He touched his com link. “Gibbs, we’re under attack. Get the pinnace out of here. The ground party can take the drop shuttle back, if necessary.”

  “Yes, Captain.”

  The engines of the pinnace whined into life even as the ramp withdrew into the sleek hull. What had moments before been chilly pine-scented air was filled with the overpowering reek of fear.

  Jean-Philippe had gone white as the marines pushed the group toward the open gate. Solomon flinched at the hiss-crack of an energy weapon discharging. Something silver that had been streaking from the woods suddenly disappeared in a ball of coruscating fire and flying parts. The team chief blinked.

  “What are those weapons?” he asked, turning to Solomon. “Who are you? Your name was not on the colonist manifest.”

  “My name and the names of six others were added to the list just before takeoff.” He pushed the man toward the gate. “We can discuss this later, if we survive.”

  More marines were firing, picking their targ
ets carefully to conserve energy. Solomon raised his weapon, sighted, and squeezed the trigger. Jean-Philippe flinched at the sharp hiss-crack, and fifty meters away, something that looked like a stainless-steel cat exploded in a shattering boom. The pinnace was arching into the sky as the drop shuttle lifted, the heavy energy weapons making a deeper hiss-crump. Along the tree line, meter-thick trunks exploded. The wave of robotic attackers wavered for a moment under the withering fire of both the ground and airborne forces, then turned and disappeared back into the trees.

  “Follow them and wipe them out!” the sergeant barked into his com link. The shuttle swooped, belching fire and destruction, then rapidly disappeared around the curve of a low mountain. The thud of the weapons was still clearly audible, and fingers of smoke darkened the horizon as the shuttle moved farther and farther away.

  A chilly breeze seemed to blow down Solomon’s neck, and he glanced at the small group of people moving through the open gate and into the compound. “Check your charges,” he said, loudly enough to be heard by all. “And stay alert. It’s not over yet.” He didn’t know why he’d added that last part, but it seemed appropriate.

  Elora shot him a worried look. The heavy gate of chain-link steel and razor wire clanged shut, and Solomon saw a local technician chain the gates together and fasten the chain with a heavy padlock.

  Solomon turned to Jean-Philippe, who appeared to be directing his personnel to the watchtowers. “Does that happen very often?” he asked, nodding to the woods.

  The Frenchman shrugged. “Who can say? The attacks have been more frequent in the last twelve months; however, the creatures never attack in a regular pattern.”

  Solomon stared at the lean man, wondering just how much the colony leader’s credulity could take. “There was a huge battle about three astronomical units from here, some time ago. The Adaari and the Bleeth forces virtually wiped each other out in the conflict. This world was a colony of the Adaari at the time, supporting a population of close to a billion souls.”

  Jean-Philippe blinked, his face registering astonishment. He opened his mouth to speak, but Solomon interrupted.

  “Just let me finish first, Jean-Philippe.” He took a breath. “This all happened in the neighborhood of a half million years ago. Apparently, a Bleeth warship was left in orbit around this world to guard against intruders. After a half million years, the ship survived, but not the crew, and the ship continued its assignment in the only way it could… by using robots. Of course it didn’t even start building robots until after humans set down on Shangri-La.”

  Jean-Philippe had turned white and nodded. “Initial surveys indicate that this world was populated at one time,” he admitted, looking around the fertile valley. “This, we think, was the site of one of the cities.”

  Solomon gave the man a sad look. “The Bleeth used kinetic energy weapons to destroy the Adaari cities. They leave no radiation, while the blast damage is similar to nuclear.”

  “How do you know all this?” There was a touch of fear in Jean-Philippe’s voice.

  “It’s a long story, Jean-Philippe, and—”

  A flurry of gunfire erupted from the towers.

  “They’re coming again!” someone shouted from the closest tower.

  “Get your people back inside, Jean-Philippe,” Solomon snapped at the colony leader, but the man simply stood his ground.

  “This is our world, Captain Draxx,” the Frenchman said in a level voice. “The women and children are inside, and what you see here are the local defense forces. We, too, will fight.”

  Solomon shook his head. “It’s your funeral,” he growled before turning to Elora.

  She simply put her hands on her hips and glared at him.

  He laughed. “I wasn’t going to ask you to go and hide with the other women,” he said, in direct contradiction to what he had intended. “You, the marines, all the others have received Kiniseri Constructs before we arrived at Shangri-La. Tell your brothers and sisters that it may come down to that.”

  The flat crack of chemical-powered rifles was nearly steady as the men in the towers picked off the advanced elements moving out of the woods.

  “I will tell the marines—and for God’s sake,” he added in a softer voice, “be careful.”

  She smiled as she reached out to touch his cheek. “You, too, Solomon,” she said, moving away. A moment later she turned back, and Solomon noted that her cheeks were red. “I just thought you should know that I love you.” She swirled away before he could say a thing.

  Jean-Philippe was giving him an odd look. “I thought you said that she was your sister.” A hint of a smile touched his lips.

  Solomon snorted. “Yeah, well, it started out that way. Somewhere along the way, we found out that Elora really isn’t biologically related to me at all, while I’m a true son of Giuseppe Fontaine, but under a different name… it’s complicated.” He shrugged, giving the Frenchman a rueful smile.

  Jean-Philippe’s hazel eyes widened at the mention of Giuseppe’s name. “You are all children of Giuseppe Fontaine, the Beast of Mars?” the man gasped.

  “Oh, fuck!” someone in a tower shouted.

  Solomon glanced to the tree line to see a wall of silver robotic shapes burst out, all streaking toward the camp.

  The marine staff sergeant’s eyes narrowed as he drew his two energy pistols. “Marines!” he bellowed. “Defensive positions.” He glanced down at the grim-faced Fontaine “children” and made a motion for his line of marines to make room for the civilian defenders. The marines to Elora’s right and left dwarfed her, but although her face was pale, the hand holding her gun was steady as a rock. The dozen local Shangri-La defenders, all wielding ancient chemical-propellant weapons, stood clustered in the center of the ring of defending energy weapons.

  Solomon glanced at Jean-Philippe and blinked at the weapon in the man’s hands. “Is that a Colt 1911, 45 ACP?” he asked, a touch of awe in his voice. He’d had the chance to qualify with one of the ancient weapons while he was in the marines, and he’d fallen in love with the gun. Unfortunately, his own Colt 1911 was locked safely in a gun vault back on Earth. He sincerely hoped that Addy had resisted the impulse to sell the gun when he didn’t return from Mars.

  Jean-Philippe grinned. “Oui. It was the only weapon I could bring with me that I could still get ammunition for.” He flushed. “I used to be a collector of ancient weapons.”

  “Nice.” Solomon turned back to the fence in time to see a catlike robot bound over the three-meter fence to take out one of the armed tower sentries with a swipe to his throat. The man’s thirty-thirty rounds from his lever-action rifle had simply sparked off the thing’s metal skin. Jean-Philippe’s Colt bellowed, and Solomon watched the heavy forty-five-caliber round punch a hole in the side of the metal cat’s head. The creature fell from the tower to lay on the ground twitching, smoke trickling from its ears. Solomon’s energy weapon caught the next robotic cat in midair as it leapt to take out the tower’s other sentry. There was a flash and a crashing boom that made Solomon’s ears ring, then pieces of robot were suddenly raining down all about them. The air smelled of scorched metal and burned plastic.

  “Merde!” Jean-Philippe cursed, shaking his head.

  “Get your folks out of the towers, Jean-Philippe!” Solomon shouted. “Those rifles won’t stop these critters.” He paused to vaporize another steel cat that was leaping for another tower.

  “Oh, mon Dieu!” Jean-Philippe gasped. “Get out of the towers—all of you!”

  The men had no more than hit the ground running, when all four towers burst into flame as heavier robots shaped somewhat like great apes, but carrying explosives in crude backpacks, scrambled up and into the towers.

  “Where is the drop shuttle?” Solomon shouted to the marine sergeant over the cacophony of noise and incessant fire.

  The man paused to blow the head off a doglike robot that was worrying the lock on the main gate before he turned a sour look in Solomon’s direction. “I shou
ld have known the first attack was a feint. The drop shuttle went off to chase the first attacking force, and it will take the shuttle thirty minutes to get back here. In thirty minutes, our survival will have been decided. The robots are probably throwing everything they have into this last push.”

  “Peachy,” Solomon replied.

  “Breach in the fence!” someone behind Solomon shouted, and he turned to see five of the robotic creatures chew a hole through the tough fence and charge the embattled group of humans. Tristan, Hepzibah, and three of the marines fired almost as one, and the robots were suddenly reduced to smoking scrap. In a glance, Solomon saw that they had reduced the number of attacking forces by fifty percent, but the number still charging their position was staggering.

  “Low ammo!” a marine shouted out, and the sergeant tossed him one of the few spare charge packs. Snagging the charge pack out of the air with one hand, the corporal slapped it into his waiting pistol, checked the green telltale light, and turned to destroy one of the apelike robots that had made it to the top of the fence and was struggling with the razor wire strung on the top.

  “Make your shots count!” the marine sergeant yelled then turned to Solomon. “What do we do when we run out of charges?” he asked in a surprisingly reasonable voice.

  Solomon looked down at the energy weapon in his own hand. The yellow low-charge lamp was blinking ominously. “You all recall how I’ve turned into the Beast on occasion?”

  The sergeant nodded slowly.

  “You’ve all received the Kiniseri Constructs while aboard the Lost Horizon. As beasts, we’ll be at least as fast as those things out there.” He nodded to the fence. “And our claws and enhanced strength will tear them apart. Try to keep some order in your marines after the change. It’s hard, but try,” Solomon warned. “You’d better pass the word… and keep an eye out.” He glanced pointedly at the Fontaine children. Brigit, he noticed, was in the center of the group, trying unsuccessfully to cover them all. “All of us will be in this upcoming fight, I believe.”