Wetmouth was unarmed, so it appeared. Hans was an expert with all weapons and even if he missed at this distance, the intense heat of the blast would kill us both.
Something bright flashed from the eyes of Wetmouth's mask and the seemingly unstoppable giant dropped to his knees and stopped moving and screaming. It was as if he was a robot and had suddenly lost all power.
Krabbel came onto the roof right behind her, carrying four of the powerful TKU's simultaneously and he fired blast after blast into the dark sky. The thundering, sun-bright barrage illuminated a swarm of flying snakes! Each shot vaporized dozens of them.
I realized my tongue and my throat were paralyzed as well, and I could not swallow. Saliva had collected in my mouth and I wanted to get rid of it. I was gagging without the ability to cough or move my head or do much of anything. I was suffocating, black circles hovered around my eyes at the lack of oxygen, and the worst thing was the pain of not being able to cough. I had experienced pain before in many forms, but being this helpless, to be fully conscious while my lungs tried to expand, such a basic reflex hurt more than anything I could remember.
My friends were fighting the flying snakes and I was lying there almost gone. I always thought I would die in a fight and now I would drown in my own spittle. If there were a Valhalla, how would I explain to all the other warriors how I had died?
Wetmouth rushed to my side and I saw her masked face hovering over me. To my surprise, she produced a small knife and rammed it into my throat. She too was under the influence of the snakes despite her wig and it was her who killed me, these were the last thoughts I had before everything went dark.
I wasn't dead after all. I came round lying in one of the beds of the outpost and could feel no pain or other ill effects. My right hand, my eyes and, in the sweetest revelation, my tongue worked fine.
Wetmouth was sitting right next to me, putting things and instruments back into the box of a field surgery kit. She turned her head and her voice trembled with emotion. "That was close, Eric. Very close, you almost died!"
I touched my throat where she had stabbed me and felt a bandage. "Tell me about it, I was halfway to Valhalla when you stabbed me." My voice sounded like a malfunctioning robot and every word was hurting.
"I didn't stab you, Eric. I performed an emergency tracheotomy. I had to make an incision through your neck into the trachea so you could breathe because your upper airways were blocked."
She then went on explaining what the trachea was and the significance of her procedure. Explaining things was her way of calming her nerves, I knew, and I let her finish. I sat up and said with my rasping and hissing-sounding voice. "What is our situation? How are the others?"
She leaned forward and gave me a tight hug. I could smell her wonderful perfume and heard her breath. She did not say a word, and kept hugging me for a long minute. "You should not talk too much. Let your wounds heal. We only have emergency medical equipment and I am not an MD."
She did not let go as she continued. "Hans will be okay as well, no one else got hurt. Krabbel and Har-Hi are on the roof sweeping the jungle edge and the skies with the Paralysator. It appears that there is a smaller flying variety of the snake beings and they attacked in the dark, one of them managed to sweep the wig off Hans. They are more intelligent than we thought and it seems they have figured out that it is the wigs that protect us."
I got up. "How is Hans and how did you stop him?"
My mask is more than a disguise, it has sophisticated weaponry incorporated into it. There is a needler in its nose, microscopic needles dipped in a very potent Shaill nerve toxin."
She lowered her lashes behind the eye slits and added, "The toxin is deadly, but I hoped Hans was big enough to..." She stopped and then said, "I had no choice, Eric!"
"Hans is dead?"
"Oh no, he will be fine. I was able to administer the antidote in time. He will be back to normal in a few hours, but…"
I put both hands on her shoulders. "As you said, you had no choice. I hesitated too long and instead of firing at him, I threw a knife at the snake. You did what had to be done; besides, it all worked out and we can add this to our collective experience."
She just nodded, but I could feel her soft shoulders shiver underneath my hands.
I touched the tip of the mask's nose. "I bet Hans's pride is hurt more than anything else, brought down by something like that! You Sojonites sure are a devious bunch, I'd say!"
"One could say that."
Har-Hi had organized the defenses while Wetmouth was patching me up. Hans was sitting with a forlorn expression on his face in the common room and as he saw me he turned his gaze to the ground, kneading his big hands.
I sat next to him and said, "Don't be too hard on yourself. I am sure 10 000 men as strong as you fell for one of those Sojonit weapons. She only did it to save herself."
He looked up. "Oh, I am not mad about that. Wetty did what she had to do and I am glad she did."
"Then what is bugging you? I don't know when exactly but I promise you, we'll get off this planet eventually."
"Eric, I am not worried about that either, but I almost killed you! Har-Hi seems to be a better friend to you than I am; he managed to aim to the side. I did not. I hit you! I always considered you my best friend, but it looks like inside I am not strong enough."
I put my hand on his truly immense forearm. "It was Psionics and not you, I hate these invisible powers. Hans, do you trust me?"
"With my life, you know that, Eric!"
"Do you believe what I say?"
"I have never doubted a word you have said."
"Hans, I know you are my friend. I trust you with my life. I have no doubt you are as good a friend as Har-Hi. Besides, I think you managed to pull that darn Paralysator away too. I was only partially affected, if I had been caught inside that ray at that distance, we would not be having this conversation."
His eyes lit up. "You know, maybe that is true! You should be dead!"
"Well, I am glad I am not. So get up and let us get out there and assess the situation."
On the next day, one of our satellites identified an energy source almost 5000km from our campsite. It was located in a mountainous area with less vegetation than everywhere else. The energy signature did not match any known configuration, but then without having access to GalNet, we could not compare it to more than what Wetty had stored on her PDD.
We fitted a robot with telemetric equipment and sent the machine in remote control mode to investigate.
As the robot closed in on the source, the machine was attacked by a large number of the snake beings. The beings relied on simple clubs and their Psionic powers; neither form of attack was effective against the heavy construction robot. The snakes retreated into a cave and pelted the robot with rocks and boulders.
The robot was unarmed but we used its strong arms to throw rocks back and, with machine precision and great speed, the robot unleashed a deadly hailstorm of rocks, killing several snakes right away and making the rest retreat further into the cave.
In order to get to the bottom of this mystery, I decided to assault the cave ourselves, so we attacked from the air, soaking the area with Paralysator rays.
There was no movement at all, but Har-Hi was not sure how deep the Paralysator rays would penetrate the rock. For all we knew, there could be millions of those snakes hiding in sub-surface caves.
Har-Hi said, "I think we should simply go in there with TKUs blazing and roast anything that moves."
"I don't think that would be wise," objected Hans holding the P4. "We don't have battle armor and those TKUs produce an awful amount of heat, in a confined space like a cave the superheated air could hurt us too! There is a reason why these TKUs are no longer issued, they were too powerful and did cause casualties among our own troops."
I said, "Lt. Aurellius at Camp idyllic had us study the cave wars of Winston Planet and I think I know what we can do. We suck all the air out and make them suffocate. Al
l we need is a strong explosion inside the cave entrance. We've got lots of explosives and detonators too!"
Wetmouth said, "Do you think we should do that? This is still a potential first contact situation, you know."
"After what they have done to that planet's population, the survey teams and what they have done last night, heck yes! Besides we need to be able to work in safety. Whatever is left after I am done can ask for surrender!"
Three hours later one of our robots carried a 1000 kilo thermo-charge into the mouth of the cave and as soon as the machine was clear, I sent the detonation signal.
The explosion was tremendous, fire and smoke belched out of several previously hidden holes and openings all around the area.
Hans let out a silent whistle. "I am sure they got the message. Don't mess with Eric."
I looked at him. "Who knows exactly how much longer we are going to be here, on this world. I personally prefer not to have to look over my shoulder every five minutes and hope nothing messes with my brain."
"No argument from me. I just liked the big explosion and wish we had another one to set off."
"Let us check out what damage the first one did, if anything is still alive we can always do it again."
We assaulted the main cave entrance with heavy Paralysator fire and with our TKUs dialed down to a minimum and at the ready.
The thermo-kinetic explosion had blackened the walls and incinerated anything flammable and turned it to ashes.
Har-Hi pointed at a section of cave wall and said, "I guess there was one of them." He pointed at the shadowy outline of a snake being burned into the rock wall.
We moved very slowly, expecting an attack at any time. Hans carried the Paralysator like a big bazooka on his shoulders and was ready to activate the weapon at the slightest sign.
Elfi, who walked right behind me, had her eyes half-closed and insisted that she could not sense anything.
The heat damage of the fire cloud rushing through the chambers lessened the further we penetrated into the cave. Now the floor was littered with the bodies of charred snake beings, both the big and the smaller, winged kind.
Finally we reached a larger chamber. Alien machinery lined the walls; transparent cylinders, hoses, pipes, glass tanks with greenish liquids and banks of control machinery. Some of it had been destroyed and smashed by the explosion.
Wetmouth examined the consoles and said, "This is a DNA matrix hatchery. The purpose is quite straightforward, but I cannot identify the civilization that made it."
Har-Hi scratched his chin. "You call this tumbled nightmare of goo and techno-bits straightforward? I would not want to see what you call a mess then!"
I knew she was smiling under her mask, like a Viking boy who found his way into the armory. She said, "The principle behind the science of Xeno technology is to realize that a machine designed to cook water, may look very impressive or really alien but it still functions by the same principles and does the same thing." She made a gesture around the cave. "This is all very old equipment and most of it has not been functional for many millennia. I am sure this is where the snakes multiplied but it does not appear that they had the technological know-how to maintain and keep all this running."
Hans looked over the many bodies lying around between some of the smashed machinery. "I think we should pull the plug on whatever is still working. This place gives me the creeps. Let us blow it up."
We did not blow it up. Cirruit and Wetmouth did, however, disconnect the alien power source from all the equipment. We did not see any more of the snakes over the next days, but I was convinced there could be more out there. They had an entire planet to hide in and we were only nine individuals, however if there were survivors to the explosion I hoped they carried the message around, not to mess with us.
The fourth week of our stay on Quagmire was almost over; at 13:00 hrs today it was 28 days since we had arrived. Since then we had repaired the GalCom terminal, manufactured a second unit and launched two probes with pre-recorded messages in case we were jammed. The possibility that there was a war going on seemed more and more likely and since we did not hear anything, things might not be going as well for the Union as we hoped. Maybe the Nul were a more serious adversary than anyone thought they would be. Perhaps the Kermac saw their opportunity and had joined the ferocious Annelid life forms of the Nul Empire.
The floating makeshift base we had found on our arrival was gone; its materials had been recycled and incorporated into the new medium size planetary base that stood in its place. Of course it was far from done, and the robots kept on working day and night. They had to roam much further and use large all-terrain wheelbarrows to gather the necessary raw materials. We had moved into the second tier of the base complex, 20m above the ground with a good view all around. We all had spacious new quarters now and there was a regular conference room, laboratories and plenty of empty, not yet completed or furnished rooms and halls. Cirruit devised a life form sensor combined with a radar system that kept watch and would warn us of any airborn attack and he was working on a shield generator to put the whole base under a forcefield if necessary. The nanite factory was a marvelous machine but it was limited in what it could create, Multi Dim Shields and modern weaponry were among the things it could not create. To obtain metals and certain minerals, the robots could not rely on dirt and plant material for raw material alone but needed to start mining and that slowed down the entire process.
We all knew of the weekly anniversary coming up, we had our daily meeting right after breakfast. It was there we discussed our daily tasks and the progress of our plans.
Elfi glanced over to the GalNet terminal. "I think it is fair to say no one has heard us." She didn't sound depressed but I could sense she saw herself stuck on this planet.
"We complete the base and then we have the facilities to strip that Saran planet lander and make it a working ship. We've got robots and a nanite factory and a hell of a crew. We are far from out of options! Today we start cutting a way to the Saran ship and then we devise a way to drag it here." I smiled at her. "However we do have some work cut out for us!"
She simply hugged me. "How could I be lost with the best friends a girl could ask for?"
We then started to make plans how to move the Saran ship and what needed to be done to get it spaceborne.
Cutting a 2km-long road into the jungle, wide enough to drag the 800-ton Saran ship back to the base was, even with the robots, backbreaking work. We found out that the jungles of Quagmire had many other nasty inhabitants, besides the Psionic snakes. There were all kinds of biting and stinging insects, small and very poisonous snakes, a beetle spitting acid that was strong enough to eat holes in the tough fabric of our uniforms and, of course, strong enough to burn and blister the skin. Twenty robots and a nanite factory were simply not enough. Sadly it was beyond the nanite factory's capability to reproduce or to make more robots; this is why we worked alongside the robots.
For the nanite factory to produce metals and high-grade materials it needed metals and minerals and could not rely on mud, animal and plant material alone. The gathering robots began several mines to gather the needed raw materials in more concentrated amounts but it took longer to get a finished product since the bots had to march further using large all terrain wheelbarrows.
Our plan was to dig the ship out, attach newly manufactured arti-grav lifters to its side and neutralize much of its weight, then drag it back to the base. Getting the ship repaired and spaceworthy was another story.
After Cirruit took a closer look at the old ship and had delivered his technical report, combined with his assessment of the nanite factory's limitations we were certain we would be able to repair the ship, but at best it would take us more than a year to complete. Building something from scratch that could go faster than light would have taken much longer.
Most of us had already written off the idea that anyone would come and were sure there was a war going on that prevented that. Mao speculated
that Clusen had deleted any traces of our whereabouts and the war troubles had made everyone completely forget about us.
Har-Hi was angry that he was missing a chance to fight and was certain the war would be over by the time we got off this world, but overall they were all in good spirits. We did have a plan and a way off this world and everyone agreed a year would pass soon enough.
There was plenty for everyone to do and I made sure we all had a busy schedule.
***
Six weeks had passed now and things became routine. The base construction progress had slowed down to a crawl as only two robots continued that task. The rest gathered raw materials for Cirruit and the nanite factory churned out replacement parts for the old ship. It was slow going, as he had to give the machine exact instructions for every part since none of the things he needed were pre-loaded in the factory's memory.
It was late afternoon and I was sitting in the base command office, adding notes to my daily report log as I did every day. Earlier this morning Wetty and Mao had discovered a treasure chamber underneath the temple ruins they were excavating. The shallow rock chamber was filled with golden trinkets and jewelry, speaking of the high level of craftsmanship of the vanished, original inhabitants of this world.
I was about to finish and go relieve Hans on the watch post when the GalNet terminal beeped and, since it was on auto-receive, it came on right away. "USS Devastator calling Olafson's Gang. Are you able to answer?"
I believe I made the distance from my chair to the terminal in one jump and said, "Planetary Base Quagmire 1, Midshipman Olafson here, and yes we are able to answer. I am switching to visuals."
Captain Harris became visible and I saw Stahl standing behind him. It was the Captain himself and not a Communications officer and he said, "Can you give me a short situation report? Where are you exactly? Any casualties?"
"No casualties Captain, Sir. We are on Planet Quagmire Bog as per our orders and I think we have completed our mission. Contact to the previous team as ordered was impossible due to the fact they are dead. We identified and most likely neutralized the danger that caused the death of previous survey teams. Base construction, as per orders, is progressing and we are at 67% completion of Phase One of the base construction program. We are attempting to repair an old Saresii shipwreck, but we could postpone that if you have different orders or maybe give us a lift from this planet. We are ready to return if that is okay with you."
Eric Olafson Series Boxed Set: Books 1 - 7 Page 42
