Croft hoped that, after his own death, Beskaroon would not be successful with Sheba. Ah, it didn't matter. After he was dead, what would he care about what Sheba did? Looking at how the life had gone out of her formerly bright eyes, he decided that she probably wouldn't last much longer in this army anyway. And what if she and Beskaroon got together? What a cosmic joke that would be, after all, the kind of joke that justified Croft's cynicism.
Barra, who had been promoted to sergeant in place of Sarge, strode into the room. He didn't like what he was about to do. Orders had come to him that the elite squad would be sent out on one more mission. Barra had been told to make sure that the old members of the squad did not return from the mission. Obviously, the command staff had given up on the elite squad and now wanted to use it for enemy target practice in one of their complicated battle plans. Well, Barra thought, there was no need to question command decisions. He only had to carry them out. The new member of the squad, Beskaroon, would be allowed to live and then transferred elsewhere. Easy to understand that, Barra thought. That kind of soldier could be placed anywhere and still maintain the same kind of stolid utility.
Barra walked along the line of bunks, using a club to hit the footstand of each one.
"Everybody up!" he shouted. "We're going out!"
"Going out?" Beskaroon said, clearly eager for the action.
"Affirmative. A night mission."
Beskaroon glanced toward Sheba and muttered, "Just like the army. Spoil a fellow's best plans. Ah well, cutie, another night for us."
Sheba heard what he said but showed no understanding of it. Meanwhile, the squad made ready. Croft assembled his gear a little faster than usual, sure this had to be the night he would meet his death. Beskaroon, in battle readiness, came to Croft's bunk and said, "Sure you should go out, Croft? Been looking like death on a dry riverbed, you have."
"Stow it, Besky."
"Well, that's the Croft we know and love, anyway."
Beskaroon ambled away. For the first time in a long while a smile crossed Croft's face. The remark reminded him of the kind of comment Apollo would have made. He'd enjoyed it.
The squad crawled through a swamp. The musty unpleasant odor of the place seemed all around them. Everyone felt as if things were crawling on their skin, and there was a lot of quiet itching going on. Strange animal sounds that would have frightened most people did not faze them at all.
Beskaroon edged toward Sheba and whispered in her ear, "Tonight. When we get back. You and me, cutie. Send you into rapture, I will."
"Leave her alone, Besky," Xiomara said, laconically.
"Stay out of this, crudskin."
"Quiet," Barra ordered, "all of you."
Beskaroon got in one last whisper to Sheba, "Tonight."
Croft glanced toward Beskaroon and wondered if he should find a moment to polish Beskaroon off during the mission. Save Sheba some trouble. However attractive the idea was, it was not really Croft's style.
He was ready to consider it anyway when a loud explosion knocked the idea right out of his head. Looking behind him and up, he saw a figure sailing through the air. It was Sergeant Barra, his body twisted. Barra crashed to the ground. Croft crawled to him and saw that the new sergeant was dead.
Xiomara made her way to Croft and said, "What's happened?"
"I think we're in trouble."
Enemy guns opened fire on them. Squirming around in the swampy ground, they tried to shoot back. It was difficult to tell where the firing was coming from. What was sure was that they were pinned down. Laser beams lit up the night. Shots came close to the squad and made the damp ground seemed to sizzle, but so far no one but Barra had been hit.
"What should we do?" Sheba asked.
"All we can do is go the way we were going," Xiomara said.
"Where there's more of them waiting for us," Croft said. "We're trapped."
"Sounds like you've turned into a coward, Croft," Beskaroon said angrily.
"Just trying to emulate you, Besky."
"What do you mean?"
"Figure it out for yourself."
The squad kept returning fire, but it felt like shooting at ghosts. There was no indication they were hitting anything.
Suddenly there was a loud explosion and an enormous bright light. Croft shouted, "Stop firing! Look!"
When the squad stopped shooting, there was only quiet. The enemy attack had ended.
"They might be sneaking up on us," Xiomara said.
"Or trying to surround us," Beskaroon said.
"I'm not sure," Croft said warily. "Maybe we should—"
"Look!" cried Sheba.
There was movement ahead of them, dark shapes in the darkness. The squad gripped their weapons tighter and watched the apparitions come closer. The first ghost came into the light, and it was Apollo, waving to them. Behind him, the second phantom became Sarge.
Sheba shouted their names and ran to them. The others quickly followed. Sarge stood off to the side as Sheba, and then Xiomara, hugged Apollo. For his greeting, Croft tapped Apollo on the shoulder, then he asked, "What happened?"
"We've been tracking you since you left camp. When you were ambushed, we were practically standing next to your attackers. They were easy to wipe out. Only four guys with too many weapons."
In response to the questions of the squad, Apollo hastily explained what had happened to him and Sarge, and how they had come looking for the squad.
"We're all on the same side now," Apollo remarked.
"No, we ain't," Beskaroon said angrily. "Deserters, the both of you. Taking you in." He raised his pistol.
"No, listen," Apollo pleaded. "It's all because of the belt. The belt controls you."
"Nobody controls me," Beskaroon said. "I'm—"
"Show him, Sarge."
Heedless of Beskaroon's weapon, Sarge approached him. Some of Sarge's former authority was still felt by Beskaroon, who backed away, shouting, "Sarge, I'll kill you. I'm not kidding."
He pointed the gun at Sarge's chest. Before he could fire, Xiomara shot the gun out of his hand. It flew a short distance, then landed with a splash in a puddle of swampy water. Before Beskaroon could do anything else, Sarge reached around him and manipulated the control stud, then he jerked the belt off Beskaroon. Reaching up to his forehead, he was able to remove the sweatband also.
Apollo worked the belt and sweatbands off Croft and Sheba while Sarge removed the control garments from Xiomara. When the quartet were freed of their belts and sweatbands, they felt dizzy for a while.
"You can actually feel it go, the grip on your mind," Xiomara said, awed. "I didn't realize I felt it."
"God," Croft said, fright in his voice, "a moment ago all I wanted was to get myself killed. I might have done it."
"Apollo," Sheba said, her voice trembling, "I tried to kill you!"
"I know," Apollo answered softly. "But not you really. The belt did it to you, turned you into a killer."
"But, if I had, it wouldn't've mattered about the belt. I would have—"
"Don't dwell on it. Anyway, we've got to get out of here. All the action might have alerted other units. What say, Sarge? Where should we go?"
"Back to the river. For now, anyway."
"My thinking exactly." He turned to address the others. "You'll like it there. It's peaceful, quiet.
"I could use a little peace and quiet right now," Sheba remarked.
"Well, it'll only be for a little while," Apollo said. "We've got work to do."
"You're kidding," Croft said. "Aren't you?"
"Not at all."
"No, I see you're not."
"Beskaroon?" Apollo said. "Staying? Or coming with us?"
Beskaroon seemed genuinely in doubt for a moment, then he said, "With you, Cap'n."
While the squad assembled its gear, Sarge walked slowly over to Barra's corpse and looked down at him. Apollo came to his side. Sarge addressed Apollo without looking at him.
"He was a good soldier. He shoul
dn't have died like this."
"No. None of 'em should."
"This war should end."
"Funny thing for you to say."
"I guess, in a way, the belt that controlled me is gone."
"Well, I did want to talk to you about the war and what to do about it."
"Oh?"
"I have a plan."
"People like you always have plans. That's your curse, I expect."
"I expect."
Apollo turned around, called to the squad, "Everyone ready?"
They all said yes and came to a kind of lazy attention. Apollo turned back to Sarge and said, "Sarge, you lead the way. Your job."
Sarge accepted the command easily. He was so used to taking commands. This time, however, at least his officer wasn't hiding behind the thick walls of a command bastion.
The squad trudged away, leaving behind them the swamp and Barra's body.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Adama and Starbuck were maneuvering their Vipers in precise formation, following a dictated search pattern. Starbuck was impressed at the Commander's skills. It must have been true, what they said. He must have been one real hotshot pilot.
They had just begun flying over Yevra, although they didn't know the planet by name. Starbuck activated his commline and spoke into it: "Just looks like another barren one, a copy of all the other planets in this system. And most of the other systems we've seen."
"I agree, Starbuck. This sub-sector seems totally devoid of any kind of life-forms. I can't detect—"
The way the Commander broke off made Starbuck look toward his Viper to make sure nothing had happened to it.
"What is it, sir?"
"I don't know, Starbuck. For a moment there, the scanner did a strange flip-flop, changed its readings almost entirely, then it returned to the same readings."
"A malfunction?"
"I suppose so. I'm going to descend a ways, take a closer look at this one."
"All right with me. I'll be right on your tail."
"Going down . . ."
Starbuck followed Adama's Viper. He was staring at it intently when it vanished from sight.
"What the—"
It made no sense. One moment the Commander's Viper was there, the next moment it was gone. He had to find him. He headed for the point where Adama's Viper had been.
"Commander A—"
The landscape below him seemed to magically transform itself, from barrenness to a lush richness.
The former Sweeper elite squad, including Beskaroon, crouched on a hilltop overlooking a strangely shaped fortification. It seemed built of odd-shaped blocks, with the sections shoved together randomly. It was made of thick stone and towered high in the sky.
The air was cool. It had recently rained and the stones and rocks they leaned against were still damp.
Apollo studied the fortification. There seemed to be no clear approaches to it, except for a heavily guarded roadway. He turned to Sarge, who was conducting the same surveillance right next to him.
"That it?" Apollo asked.
"That is the Sweeper's command bastion. The bastion for the Pelters is located some distance from here, nearly on the other side of Yevra."
Croft, sitting on the other side of Sarge, whistled and said, "And we're supposed to get in there?"
"I didn't promise easy work," Sarge said. "But, after all, we are ingeniously trained, all of us."
"And where would our Vipers be?" Apollo asked.
"I can't say. On the roof, I would suspect, if they could get them there. Even if they couldn't fly them, they could use cargo aircraft to lift them up there. Their own less efficient planes take off and land on the roof. But they may have been taken elsewhere for research and examination."
"Well," Apollo remarked, "whatever we do, we should at least get a clue to where they are. Best we can do."
"Many victories have been based on such anomalous factors," Sarge said, aware he was sounding again like a training noncom.
"And many more defeats," Croft added.
Sheba, on the other side of Apollo, commented, "Good to see that Croft has regained his cantankerous spirit, don't you think?"
"I'll show you cantankerous, Sheba," Croft said.
"Look forward to it," Sheba said.
Apollo was pleased by the good-natured feeling that Croft and Sheba exhibited in their bantering. It was a significant contrast to their recent behavior. He turned again to Sarge, asking, "We should wait? Wait and observe?"
"Yes. There'll be an opportunity. I suspect their security is less than effective. Nobody's tried to attack a bastion in so long they won't be expecting anything, especially a small force like ours."
"Our advantage."
They kept watch on the fortress for a long while. Not much happened. A vehicle like the one Apollo had traveled in with Tren landed on the roof. Some soldiers marched in file along the roadway and into the bastion.
Apollo crawled over to Xiomara, who was doing her surveillance from a different angle.
"See anything?" he asked.
"Nothing useful."
He touched the back of her tunic. His hand caressed in a slow circle, feeling a certain tactile familiarity with what was beneath the cloth.
"You don't have to do that," Xiomara said without looking at him.
"I want to."
"Apollo, I'm quite happy with last night. I enjoyed it. But you have no obligations to me."
"I know that. I just—"
"Want to take me home and introduce me to your father, the Commander?"
"Yes. Yes, I would."
She laughed.
"Maybe you would. Don't worry, I won't go. But it's nice to know you would take me. Face like this, I don't go seeking anyone's society."
"We have medical facilities, amazing ones. We could do something for you, perhaps."
"For this? This doesn't come off with surgery. It is bound to me and can't be altered. Not by medical treatment, anyway. I don't even mind it anymore. There are bigger matters to consider. How to restore my home, my planet. How to end this stupid war."
Apollo gazed across at the bastion. It seemed so impenetrable. He wondered how they'd ever find their way into its interior. They might crouch on this hilltop forever.
After Adama had flown through the force field, he was astonished by the drastic changes in the surfaces below him. The new beautiful landscape stretched almost from horizon to horizon. In the distance the horizon seemed to stop much sooner than it should. That was a sign, he figured, of the presence of a force field, one that camouflaged the loveliness of the planet by projecting above it the contours of a barren land. Making a loop, he saw the smoke and flame of a battle far away.
"Lieutenant Starbuck!" he shouted and got no answer. "Starbuck, answer me, where are you?"
He scanned the skies for Starbuck's Viper. Suddenly it materialized quite close to him and he heard Starbuck's anxious voice: "—dama, Commander . . . I see you, Commander. What's going on? What happened down there?"
"We've just flown through a wall of some kind of force field used to camouflage the real planet. It's not designed to keep us out, but merely disguise the landscape so that no one will try to land under ordinary conditions."
"Do you think Apollo might have come here then?"
"It's a possibility. Remember Omega saying that the ships seemed to vanish from the scanner screen? That could be because they went through this force field. Our telemetry might have been able to record only what is transmitted from here."
"Transmitted? By whom?"
"That's what we'll try to find out. Set your telemetry to locate Vipers."
"Aye, aye, sir."
"We'll fly circle patterns, staying close but covering as much area as we can."
"Yes, sir."
Starbuck was impressed by the energy in Adama's voice. He sounded like a young pilot. It was a pleasure to be flying as his wingmate.
The flat vehicle with the canopy was rising again from
the roof. It hovered above the roof for a moment and Apollo could see two soldiers inside the transparent canopy.
"I wonder . . ." he mused.
"What?" Sarge asked.
"Do you think we could all fit on one of those? More important, would it carry our combined weight? And could we figure out how to fly it? Tren used a control, I can just remember. Look, it's coming our way. How convenient."
"You going to jump up and snag it, Apollo?" Croft said. "Not exactly."
He left the shelter of his rock and waved at the vehicle, which began to descend toward Apollo.
"That's a ship?" Croft whispered. "It looks more like a rug. Why are you waving to it?"
"Keep still, Croft."
The two soldiers inside the canopy stared at Apollo quizzically. One was reptilian, the other humanoid. Puzzled or not, they were nevertheless landing the ship. As the canopy went up and tipped back, the two soldiers stepped forward, brandishing weapons.
"Take it easy, guys," Apollo said. "We need help. A wounded sergeant. Sarge?"
Improvising, Sarge limped into sight and said in a croaking voice: "We were ambushed, we—"
Apollo made his move, jumping the reptilian soldier and wrenching the weapon out of his hand. Sarge took care of the other, knocking him unconscious with one smooth punch. Croft stood up, saying, "Now what?"
"We take a trip to the castle there."
"In that," Beskaroon said, pointing to the ship.
"There isn't enough room for all of us," Croft said.
"Well, that is a logistics problem," Apollo said. "But it's almost nightfall, and I think we can pull it off. Meantime, let's get these two characters trussed up."
Confused, Croft and Beskaroon nevertheless began tying up their two captives.
In a large control room inside the bastion, two officers crouched in front of a large scanner console. Both were reptiles and looked amazingly like Sarge. They had just detected the presence in their skies of the Vipers of Adama and Starbuck, and were tracking them.
Battlestar Galactica 13 - Apollo's War Page 18
