“And how did it go for the Japanese?” Jonah asked, feeling kind of silly moving with all this vegetation covering him.
“They were slaughtered when the North Americans got suspicious of moving bushes,” Charley said, his tone flat.
And that just might be what happens to us, Jonah thought. They were angling away from the search, moving to the west while they closed on the cliff edge. It would take twice as long, almost three days if they pushed it. It would probably be worth it. They’d hit the edge about thirty miles horizontally from the tube they’d come down.
“Over here,” Ivan said in a hushed voice.
The Russian moved into the sloping beginning of a gully that placed them ten yards below the rolling terrain. It would take direct and close overhead observation to spot them here.
“We can move in this one for the next seven miles,” Ivan said. “We’ll take a break at the end, then figure out where we need to go next.”
That was the part of the plan that had sold it to the colonel. He couldn’t see them moving across the plains dressed as clumps of high grass for much of their journey. Fortunately, there were places of cover. Gullies like this, woods, meteor pits here and there. They’d only be out in the open for about ten percent of the walk, and that made it a risk worth taking.
“Enemy shuttle moving to the northwest at three miles altitude,” said Sandra, who was their air observer.
“Will it get a good angle?”
“It might.”
“Everyone, stop in place and close up your heat vents.”
Once those were closed, the body heat they’d been generating while moving under their thick clothing would no longer be vented into the air. They’d be almost undetectable, once the heat had completely dissipated.
“And no movement.”
If the shuttle got a good look down at them and wondered why there were twenty heat sources in a line, there could be trouble. There could be reasons for the wildlife to line up like that, but damned few of them.
Everyone was still, not moving a muscle. If they were spotted before the heat dissipated, it was hoped the observers would think they were sleeping animals and move on.
Jonah could feel the sweat begin to roll down his skin. Despite the nighttime temperature, they’d been building up considerable body heat while walking. Now that heat could only be released by diffusion through the insulating clothing, a process that trapped considerable heat within their clothing and produced a lot of sweat.
Come on, damn you, he thought. Move on.
“They’ve moved out of range,” Sandra reported.
“Open venting and prepare to move,” Jonah ordered, pulling open the flaps at armpits and thighs. Now the heat would be released, but they needed to get moving before the sweat on their bodies started to freeze.
At the end of the gully, before walking back up to the plain, they took a break. The mercenaries plopped down on the ground with groans and sighs. Charley pulled his breathing mask off and raised his canteen to his mouth, taking a couple of quick gulps. Jonah pulled his out of the heated insulated cover under his heavy weather clothing and took a couple of sips himself.
Several of the mercenaries wolfed down nutrition bars, while others simply caught their breath. The atmospheric pressure was slightly higher than Everest on Earth, so they could spend some time without the masks, though not for extended periods without oxygen supplements.
“Okay,” Ivan said, moving over to sit down next to Jonah, “next stop is a patch of woods about two miles to the northwest. That gets us about a mile and a half closer to the edge.”
“We’re in your hands, Sergeant. I think we’re good to go on your command.”
Ivan nodded and pulled out a nutrient bar of his own, taking some quick bites and finishing it off in moments. The scout pulled the vent of his outwear closed, motioning for the others to do the same.
This is going to be a bitch, Jonah thought, following the scout as he left the gulley, with the rest of the team following after. As soon as they were out in the open, they spread their formation. If anyone picked them up, they might think they were a wandering herd of beasts. The only problem with that was the natural animals were all still and sleeping for the night. Hopefully, the enemy wouldn’t realize that.
After about a mile, the buildup of body heat was almost unbearable. The colonel’s mouth felt dry as the desert, and his heart was pounding as it tried to move his blood around so it could radiate the heat out. Unfortunately, the heat buildup under the clothing prevented cooling. A couple of mercenaries cursed as they stumbled. Jonah himself was beginning to feel lightheaded.
“Keep moving,” Ivan croaked. “We need to get into the center of this stand before we vent.”
Jonah agreed, though he wished he could just fall down and open up the vents where he was. He took another dozen steps, then felt himself fall to the ground as someone pushed him.
“We’re in about as good a place are we’re going to be,” Ivan said, plopping down beside the officer and opening his heat vents.
Jonah followed suit and was soon feeling the cold air outside his clothing flowing in, while the heat moved out.
“I think we need a longer break this time,” the colonel said to Charley as the major crawled up to sit beside him.
“I agree.”
“How far to the next cover, Charley?”
“Only a couple of hundred yards this time. And it’s another gulley, running some miles to our destination.”
“In ten,” the colonel said, pulling in as much air as his lungs could handle.
* * * * *
Chapter Twelve
“We still don’t know that they’re out of the cavern system, boss,” Mmrash said, staring into the small, red eyes of the Syndicate leader of the operation.
“They can’t stay in there forever, can they?”
“They need breathing gas,” the commander said in agreement, “and they can’t have unlimited power for their extractor.”
He wasn’t really sure if he was telling the truth. The midlands that led into that cave wasn’t the same environment as the high plateau. It was still cold with a sparse atmosphere, just not to the level of the deadly uplands. His people would have trouble breathing in the midlands, but as long as they took in some supplemental oxygen every couple of minutes, they would survive. Wouldn’t the same hold true for the Humans? Unfortunately, he didn’t have enough data on the Humans to make a good guess as to how they would handle the thin air long term.
“By the Hells, I can’t have you cruising around up there forever. We need you down here.”
“You also want us to get them before they get to the lowlands, boss. Which is it?”
“Dammit. If you’d just made sure of finishing them the first time, we wouldn’t have this problem.”
Tell me something I don’t know, the Xlatan thought. He’d been regretting that decision ever since it happened. If he hadn’t been lazy and so sure of himself, he’d have made sure they were finished before coming back down from the uplands.
“Send your people back down here,” the boss said, stabbing a finger at him from the Tri-V picture.
The commander felt a rush of relief. He was getting tired of this incessant searching, of sitting in this damned uncomfortable seat for days on end. The luxury of his own sleeping pad, hot food, the mindlessness of an entertainment sensorium…
“But I want you and your shuttle to stay up there until they’re found. It was your mistake, and you’ll correct it if it’s the last thing you do. Understand?”
“But…”
“Your life is already forfeit to the Syndicate. You failed in your task, and that’s something we will not tolerate. So you’ll either make good on your failure, or you’ll die. Send the rest back, but you’re not to return to the compound until you have proof the Humans are dead, or they’re no longer in the midlands.”
“And my people?”
“They can rotate back and forth to get re
st and refuel the vehicles. You, however, are not to return. Until further notice, your second-in-command is in charge of the security of the canyonlands.”
The Tri-V blanked before he could get in another word. The commander sat in his chair, trembling with rage at being ordered about like some low-level servant and trembling slightly with the underlying emotion of fear. It hadn’t been an idle threat that the Syndicate would have him killed if he failed again.
“And you will be staying up here with me,” Mmrash growled, looking over at the pilot and pointing an extended claw at his face.
“What about refueling?”
“We’ll have another shuttle come up with fuel and rations, but we’re stuck up here for the duration, you and I.”
The ears of the other Xlatan twitched uncontrollably. Emotions came and went; fear, depression, rage. The commander realized it wouldn’t be safe to sleep around this warrior for the foreseeable future.
* * *
“I’ll be damned glad when we can eat some fresh, cooked food,” Joey Many Bears said as he dug into another can of concentrated rations. “I still don’t see why we can’t take down one of those antelope things and cook us some fresh meat.”
“We can’t cook anything up here, son,” Charley said, shaking his head as he replaced his mask to replenish the oxygen in his blood. “That would be too big a heat source for the Xlatan to miss.”
“Then we flash cook the meat with a laser,” the young mercenary replied.
We could do that, Jonah thought, looking out through the edge of the woods they were sheltering in. The animals were on the move now that the sun was up. The grazers, big and small, were grazing, and the predators were engaging in the behaviors that made up their lives.
A couple of the larger predators they’d come to think of as lions were crouching in the high grass, while others fanned out to surround a part of the antelope herd. They hunted with patience, moving slowly, stopping whenever they thought they were being observed.
So many planets, so many environments, the colonel thought, and the same survival behaviors on all of them.
He was thinking of ways they might be able to use the ecosystem to ambush some of their pursuers. If they stayed in the air, there was really nothing they could do to them without using one of their manpack missiles, which would draw the others to them.
Two of the lions took off, heading toward a group of antelope, who also broke into a run. The predators closed the distance, their short legs moving in a blur. They’d almost caught up to one of the antelopes when a shadow descended from the sky and a large flying beast struck the prey.
“What in the hell was that?” exclaimed Ahmed Mohammed, pointing at the flying creature that had grabbed the antelope in its talons and taken to the air.
It looked more like a bat than a bird, with thick fur covering its body. Large breathing vents opened and closed under its wings, while those appendages flapped to gain altitude, then flattened out to go into a glide.
The scene must have occurred many times in this environment, as the lions swerved away from the prey that was snatched from them and vectored in on another. Those looked like they were going to outdistance the predators until a trio of their pride rose up from the grass and hit one of the antelopes in the side, knocking it down. Before it could rise again, the pride was on it, and in moments the herbivore was reduced to quivering meat that quickly disappeared down the maws of the predators.
“Great, so now we have to look up for things other than the Xlatan,” Avgust Babich hissed. “Death from above.”
“They don’t look large enough to carry off a Human,” Ivan replied, his eyes following the creature as it glided back toward the cliff.
“Doesn’t mean they can’t kill you,” Avgust said, looking at the Russian. Babich was a Ukrainian, and there was still bad blood between their peoples, even hundreds of years since their last confrontation. “I read one time that there were eagles on Earth that could kill people, even if they couldn’t carry them off.”
“We’ll make sure we have a couple of people checking the skies above while we’re moving,” Jonah said. They didn’t know if the things hunted at night, when they’d be moving, but it wasn’t worth taking the chance that they did.
“You really think we can still accomplish this mission?” Charley asked as he sat with the colonel a little distance from the others. “We’ve already wasted a week we hadn’t planned for.”
Jonah thought about it for a moment. They’d planned to leave from the edge of the high plateau, cross the midlands in a couple of days, and then down to the canyonlands. They’d built in a couple of extra days for unforeseen circumstances. They’d pretty much used up all that time, and more.
“We were going to scout out the region around the compound for a week,” Jonah said, looking at his partner. “If we can keep up our pace, we can still get there. We’ll just have to use what we have left and not worry about it.”
“And if the Ravagers don’t show?”
They’d already talked about how they might have been set up, and the Ravagers called off. They might not be coming.
“What else do we have to do?” he asked Charley, closing his eyes. “If we do nothing, we’ll still be stuck on this planet. There’s no way the Syndicate is going to haul our asses off this rock. So we either do something while we have the ammo and equipment to do so, or we fade into the jungle and survive. And never leave here.”
They weren’t the only members of the company in the Universe. There were two other teams, both out on contracts, and the support staff on Earth, including legal. Would any of them come looking for their missing boss and the people he had taken with him to oblivion? Maybe. They might send some inquiries out, but they damned sure wouldn’t invade this planet.
Charley shook his head. “Not what I want. I don’t want to die for no good reason, but I also don’t want to be stuck in what amounts to a jungle prison for the rest of my life. If I’m going to go out, I want to take some of those bastards with me. And I think the rest of the troops will agree with me.”
Jonah reached over and offered his hand to his friend. “Then let’s get down there and kick those bastards in the teeth. Live or die, they’ll remember the names of the Fierce Eagles.”
* * *
The company made good time the second night, having gotten into the rhythm of traveling in this manner. They had to backtrack a couple of times, which added miles to the trip. Jonah wasn’t willing to take any chances while everything was going so well. Just a superstition of his, but one he was unwilling to discount.
“Are you doing okay, Asuka?” he asked.
The slight man had been walking with a limp through the entire walk, grunting in pain at times. Like all of them, he was carrying almost his body weight in equipment and clothing. Some of the others were carrying quite a bit more, and everyone on the team was in fantastic physical shape, but the rest of them weren’t injured, and even though Asuka’s forearm was in worse shape than the superficial wound to his calf, it was still bad enough to slow him down.
“He’ll make it,” said Hotaru, who was carrying some of her husband’s load.
“Of course I’ll make it, wife,” the male ninja said, a grimace in his voice. “If I don’t make it, who will there be to make sure you do as you’re told.”
“Perhaps you would like to carry your own ration bag and water,” Hotaru said after a snorting laugh.
“Dotty said you should be as good as new in another couple of days,” Jonah said, patting the man’s shoulder.
“That might be true if I was resting,” the ninja growled, shrugging off the colonel’s hand. “Don’t try to humor me. When we get to the lowlands, and I can get rid of some of this stuff, I’ll be able to move like a man, and not a cripple.”
Jonah looked over at Hotaru, who shook her head and kept walking beside her husband. He’d trust her to keep him going. With a nod he moved past them to the front of the line, having taken care of his c
ommander’s duties and raised morale. He hoped.
“How much further before we’re back out in the open?” he asked Ivan, who’d stopped in his tracks.
“Quiet,” the scout hissed, holding up a hand. “There’s something ahead.”
“What?”
“I’m not sure. But I don’t think it’s something we want to mess with.”
Something coughed ahead, a sound that reminded the colonel of lions on Earth. He thought they must be some of the lion-like things, and he turned up the light gathering function of his HUD. Sure enough, there were a half dozen of the creatures laying on the ground and sleeping. They could try to move past them, but he wasn’t sure they’d remain asleep when they heard creatures moving through the night.
“What do you want to do, Sergeant?” he asked his scout.
“We could shoot them,” the Russian said in a low voice, “but then we’d have to move the bodies under some kind of cover.”
Jonah nodded. Leaving the bodies of six or more of the four-hundred-pound predators lying in the open was sure to catch someone’s attention during the day. They wouldn’t know exactly where the Humans were, but they’d know they were out here and getting close to the edge.
“I think we should head west for half an hour, then circle around them. That would be the cautious way to do it. Of course, we’ll be out in the open for a longer time, with more heat buildup.”
And add more distance to our journey, thought the colonel, who’d been hoping to get to the edge tonight. We’ll have to deal with more heat, but no more than some of our past marches through the open. Not the easiest way to do this, but it’s the smart play.
“We’ll do it that way then,” he agreed. “Lead the way.”
They continued on, moving around the lions, everyone looking over at them with their night vision systems. Several times the beasts coughed, and once there was a hissing roar, like it had detected something it didn’t like, but none moved from their positions. The team was soon past them and moving back around, heading for another small patch of woods.
When Eagles Dare Page 12
