When Darkness Reigns

by Preston L. Marshall

  “Come on up!” Radcliff yelled down.

  It took Jesse and Wallace longer to climb up than it had taken Radcliff or at least it felt that way. When they got within arm's reach Radcliff hoisted them up the rest of the way. They looked exhausted when they reached the top. They'd kept all their gear on, which was smart, but added a lot of extra weight to climb with. If the life sign wasn't friendly they'd need to take care of it.

  Radcliff gave them a minute to catch their breath. They had grateful looks on their faces.

  “Let's get to work,” he ordered after their breathing slowed close to normal.

  The scanner indicated that their target was on the other side of a wall of rubble. From where they stood, it looked like the bulk of the floor above them had collapsed down into the one they were standing on. It was all pulverized concrete, shattered furniture, broken glass, splintered wood, and twisted metal. There were also three bodies. The first was strewn out on the floor about ten feet back from the pipe the rope was tied to. The other two were wedged into the debris, crushed. They were wetter and meatier than most of the bodies they'd found. The Sarsaul hadn't been here. They'd all three been killed by their home falling in on them, not an alien.

  It didn't take them long to clear off most of the smaller debris. The fist to skull sized chunks of rock were heavy, but they were able to push them aside easily enough. Radcliff did his best to keep the bodies as in tact as possible while they moved them away from the work. Two of them stayed in one piece as he gently lifted them away, but the second one that had been crushed in the collapse was cut in half at the middle. The torso came loose before the bottom half and a stream of rancid decaying organs poured out on his feet. The smell was the worst part. Even through his helmet he could smell the rot and bile as it oozed out. He grimaced and set the body aside as carefully as he could. At least nothing spilled on him when he pulled out the legs.

  They spent close to half an hour shoveling debris away with their hands until they reached a snag. A web of large I-beams had been bent around a solid oval shaped piece of concrete the size of a small car. The beams were all welded and riveted together grasping the piece of stone like a claw of jagged metal. The beams and the rock they held were the only things separating them from the room. They'd cleared nearly ten feet back through rubble. It felt like they were about to dig through to the far outer wall.

  “How are we going to get through this?” Jesse asked.

  “Do we got a cutting torch in the truck?” Wallace asked. “Maybe some sledgehammers to break up the rock?”

  Radcliff heard the whispers again. It was louder now. At first he thought he was just imagining it, but there was no denying what he was hearing now. He'd only ever heard one thing like that before. The Sarsaul sometimes whispered like that. He knew the others couldn't hear it. He thought about just calling the whole thing off and leaving, but he didn't know how he was going to explain that to the others as long as the instruments were still picking up the lifesigns.

  Jesse and Wallace grabbed hold of one of the branches of the web of beams and started trying to bend it up out of their way. They strained with all of their might before letting go, falling back and gasping for breath.

  “We can’t budge it at all,” Wallace complained.

  “Radcliff, quit spacing out,” Jesse added. “You're the one that said we needed to hurry.”

  “Here, let me help,” Radcliff said.

  Radcliff got one side of the beam and Jesse and Wallace got on the other.

  “On three,” Radcliff said. “One. Two. Three!”

  Their hands heaved upwards muscles and veins bulging inside their armor, but the beam only budged a few inches, not enough. Jesse and Wallace fell back to catch their breaths again. Radcliff just let go and rose back up to his full height breathing normally.

  “Can we just blow this up?” Jesse asked. “This is a pain in the ass. You got a grenade or two on your belt there. Let's use them.”

  “No we can’t risk it. This building isn’t in good shape as it is,” Radcliff explained. “More than likely we'd just bring the whole thing down under us.”

  “How about cutting tools?” Wallace asked. “You didn't answer me a minute ago.

  “Didn’t bring any,” Radcliff admitted.

  “Well, let’s try it again,” Wallace suggested. “Maybe we can roll it off or something.”

  “Worth a try,” Radcliff agreed.

  The three of them got on one side of the beam and shoved as hard as they could. The result didn’t change. Jesse and Wallace fell back again.

  “It's no use,” Wallace said. “I give up. Could we just go around somehow?”

  “What you wanna try digging in another way while hanging from the side of the building?” Jesse asked.

  “Shit, not really,” Wallace said.

  Radcliff was getting impatient. Without the right tools there was no way the three of them were going to be able to do this, at least without doing things the other way. Jesse and Wallace knew and Ford knew. Nate wouldn't be able to see what they were doing up here. Lumar was out. The only thing that made him hesitate were the whispers. He was starting to doubt it was even a human inside there.

  “What's wrong?” Jesse asked.

  “Nothing,” Radcliff replied. “Step back. We don't have time for this. There's a life on the line.”

  Radcliff took hold of the beam the three of them had been struggling with. He felt the muscles in his arms and legs strain against the weight. He tensed up and started growling with the effort. He finally put all of his might into it and bent the beam up over his head like tremendous barbell. Jesse and Wallace leaned forward to help, but Radcliff raised his hand and waved them back.

  “I don't want you to get hurt,” Radcliff explained. He could feel the sweat starting to drip down between his shoulder blades. “Just a couple more.”

  He repeated the process until all the beams were out of their way peeling back the fingers of the metal hand until they released the stone blocking their way. Radcliff found a ridge he could use for a handle and pulled the stone back a few feet.

  He could feel the heat pouring out of him. From head to toe his muscles were sweating giving a tiny chill to his skin as it pressed up against the cold metallic fabric of his skinsuit. Radcliff let out a sigh. It had been a while since he'd done anything like that. It felt good to have the strength flowing through him again. He held it back far too often.

  With the chunk of concrete out of the way, there was a small tunnel over the top big enough for them to crawl through one at a time. The whispers stopped, but the life sign didn't vanish from the scanner.

  Jesse and Wallace exchanged glances and looked over at Radcliff.

  “You don’t think the new guy saw that do you?” Jesse asked.

  “It doesn’t matter.” Radcliff replied. “We've got work to do. I'll go in first.”

  “You sure?” Wallace asked. “That looked like it must have taken a lot out of you.”

  Radcliff shook his head and crawled over the last obstacle. Wallace and Jesse crawled up after him. The room was nearly intact. The walls stood. Most of the room seemed to be the way the owners had designed it. It was the living room of this little apartment. Radcliff sighed when he saw the blood.

  Jesse and Wallace landed behind him as he slowly walked into the room. The Sarsaul had been here. He turned over his shoulder to glance back at Jesse and Wallace. Where Radcliff had dragged the huge stone was a smear of gray blood and a hornet’s head and arm.

  Radcliff stopped. There were splashes of red blood on the furniture and on one of the walls. There were body parts on the floor, small parts, a child’s parts. Radcliff closed his eyes. There was no sight more horrible a dead child. The child was too young to determine the body's age or sex without defiling the corpse more than the Sarsaul had already done when they ripped the child to pieces.

  There was another body in the room with the child too. It was the mother. Why the Sarsaul had torn the c
hild apart while they left the mother mostly intact Radcliff cared not to guess. For her all they had done was cut her off above the shoulders. It was likely a quick and painless death. Her body lay chest down, but the head was staring up at the ceiling with pretty blue eyes. She'd had a beautiful face. Even locked in her last terrified expression Radcliff could tell she had been lovely.

  He frowned while Jesse and Wallace took in the scene at their own pace.

  “Damn,” Wallace breathed.

  Radcliff never got used to seeing these kinds of scenes. Seeing families murdered in their homes made him remember why he couldn’t stop fighting this war. They filled him with righteous anger. He found his lips soundlessly tracing a prayer, an old habit.

  “Here!” the whisper called much louder now than ever.

  In the back left corner of the room a loveseat had been overturned. Half a dozen broken ceiling tiles had fallen down into a roughly spherical heap. It was where the voice was calling from and the where scanner was pinging. He took a deep breath. With one hand he lifted the chunks of stiff foam from the ceiling tiles. The other went to the pistol on his hip. Jesse and Wallace sensed his tension and moved closer. Wallace drew his knife up to his chin, Jesse dropped into the fighting stance he'd taught her.

  They all relaxed and let out a breath when they saw the man's sandy blonde hair and the faint stirring of the dust from his breathing. The man's hair was matted into a mess of crusty blood and dust, but he was alive. He'd just been knocked unconscious and left there. Radcliff might have said the man was lucky if not for the two other bodies in the room. Radcliff imagined this man might not be that grateful that they saved him once they told him what had happened to his family. At least he wasn't going to have to see it.

  Jesse and Wallace helped move the loveseat off the man while Radcliff moved the last of the ceiling tiles aside. As Radcliff lifted the man into his arms he saw how badly the man's head had swollen up from the wound that had knocked him out. The knot was almost as big as the man's fist. There was a trail of blood down the wall were the man had been lying. It had dripped down the back of his neck and halfway down his back too before it dried. Even without much medical training Radcliff knew his condition was bad. If nothing else this man had gone way too long without water and that could be fatal when combined with that much blood loss. Leaving someone unconscious that long made them hard to wake up too.

  “We found him,” Jesse said. “Let's get out of here.”

  “Agreed,” Radcliff said. “You two go up first. I'll hand him up to you. Then you two go ahead down and I'll lower him on the rope down to you.”

  “Yes sir,” they replied.

  Jesse and Wallace scrambled up the chunk of rock, throwing themselves over the top. After a moment they offered their hands at the opening and Radcliff carefully lifted the man up over his head doing everything in his power to keep the man's back as straight as he could. Once they had the survivor out of the way of the opening Radcliff lifted himself up into the gap and wriggled through to the other side. Jesse and Wallace offered the man back to Radcliff once he was through.

  “Alright, see you at the bottom,” Wallace said.

  Jesse and Wallace rappelled down the rope as fast as they could. Jesse went down first then Wallace followed right behind. Radcliff set the man down as gently as possible and pulled up the length of rope. He tied an 'X' shaped harness together at the end of the rope under the man's armpits so he could lower him down without putting strain on his back. Radcliff pulled his helmet off and slid it over the man's head. With the lump on the back of his head the helmet almost fit snugly on the man's head. Radcliff hoped that would be enough to keep him from further injury on the way down.

  Radcliff lowered the man over the side slowly. He tried to hold him out as far as he could from the side. Even with his best efforts, the man still swung back against the wall a few times. He couldn't tell how hard the man hit, but he cringed each time he saw the survivor's limp form bang into the rough surface of the building. Jesse and Wallace held their arms up to receive the survivor. Once their arms were around him Radcliff let go of his end of the rope. Once they had him untied, Radcliff rappelled down after him.

  “Alright let's move out,” Radcliff said taking the survivor back. “Nate, you too. Load up. We're moving as soon as Ford has a look at this guy.”

  “Yes sir,” the three of them replied and started moving back to their seats in the truck.

  Radcliff climbed up into the top floor of the truck with the injured man held against his chest. Radcliff set him down in the unoccupied bed beside Lumar. It was the one Radcliff was supposedly going to use, but he figured he could do without for the sake of the poor man they had just rescued.

  “Got another one for you,” Radcliff said.

  “Good,” Ford replied. “I'm just about done with Lumar.”

  Radcliff glanced over at Lumar. Ford had put a patch over the right eye and covered most of the rest of his face with smaller bandages and a gauze wrap. Radcliff noticed there was a splatter of gray blood on Lumar's breastplate. That answered what had happened to him well enough for Radcliff. Clearly he'd taken one of them with him. Some scars on the face were a small price to pay to keep living. He was still unhappy that the kid had fallen behind, but a touch of pride softened it knowing he'd at least taken out a Sarsaul while he was at it.

  “What’s the damage on this one?” Ford asked.

  “Looks mostly like head trauma maybe a few minor bruises and scrapes other than that. Dehydration,” Radcliff replied.

  “You know at this rate I’m going to have to go back to med school and actually finish.”

  “I’m sorry. I know you don’t like this part of the job.”

  “At least I don’t have to amputate anything. I still don’t have the stomach for that.”

  “I’ll try to keep a better eye on the others and keep them out of trouble.”

  “It’s not your fault Lumar got hurt. Besides his injury wasn’t as bad as it looked. He’ll keep the eye. There was just a little glass in it. Most of the bleeding came from the side of his face. It’ll just leave a scar.”

  “I know, but he’s my responsibility. I’m glad it wasn’t too serious though. You're better at this than you let on,” Radcliff replied.

  “Robot did most of the work,” Ford admitted.

  “I'm going to get us moving. Gonna try and pick up the trail. The easiest part of the mission's over.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  Ford felt the engine come back to life as Radcliff got them moving again. He knew he had to work fast. As soon as Radcliff found the trail the enemy left behind Ford knew he'd want him to take over the driving again. Radcliff didn't much care for driving. He always complained that he could never get the seat back far enough or low enough. It took him close to five minutes to get the seat and everything just the way he liked it last time. He sighed thinking about having to adjust all the settings again. He hated it when other people messed with his settings just to drive around for a few minutes. Half the time Ford had to spend hours in those chairs. His comfort was paramount. Everyone else just didn't matter enough to cause so much inconvenience.

  He laughed at himself for thinking about that. He had more pressing concerns. It was tricky to work on someone's injuries in a moving vehicle. He'd already strapped in his John Doe so he wouldn't go rolling off in the middle of the work. Radcliff's basic diagnosis had been pretty accurate. A little head trauma was about all that was wrong with him and of course he was dehydrated from the blood loss and the lack of drinking anything in over a day. A concussion seemed pretty likely and there was a good chance the guy would stay unconscious until they could get him to a hospital and a real doctor could work on him. Ford was actually thankful for that. That made working on him that much easier and he wouldn't have to waste any of his painkillers or anesthesia on him.

  He carefully shaved the man’s head with an electric razor out of his medical kit to find the full extent of the head
wound. It wasn't pretty. With the hair out of the way, he could see that the back half of his head was covered in dried blood from his ears up. He started by cleaning off as much of the excess dried blood as he could be using up the rest of the package of alcohol wipes. The goose egg on the John Doe's head was at the center of a spiderweb of smaller cuts. It looked like the skin ripped and oozed around the swelling. There were little bits of concrete buried into the central wound at the crown of the knot. Ford pulled them out with tweezers to be greeted with new bleeding.

  Ford put some gauze over it to catch the excess flow while he got the robot ready to put some stitches in. Doing anything less would just be wasting bandaging. He put the little robot down on the man's back just above the shoulder blades and entered the required commands into the console. He knew he'd never be able to do such a delicate thing in a moving vehicle. Somehow the medical robot didn't flinch a hair the whole time it was sewing even when Radcliff took them over a bump. Ford wondered why anyone even bothered with human doctors anymore when robots could pull something like that off without botching it.

  All that was left for a human to do was put an IV drip in to get the patient hydrated and get a few nutrients in him to promote the healing. Ford hated watching the needle create a little bump in someone's arm. For some reason he didn't mind being poked with needles too much, but he wasn't crazy about putting in IVs. It was like he assumed others hated having needles in them and the empathy of forcing someone to deal with that discomfort made him uncomfortable.

  Every time he did something like this he realized that joining the army was a better course of action than finishing up medical school. He would have hated it. Fixing up and operating machines was much more his speed.

  “Hey, how’s he doing?” Nate asked as he climbed up the ladder. Ford heard the tremor of concern in his voice.