Frozen Sky- Battlefront

by Jeff Carlson

10.

  Vonnie and Jan suited up. As they walked through decon and the air lock on the surface, Ben sent two doppelgängers to join them in the catacombs.

  At the same time, he used their other doppelgängers -- the two that had accompanied Tom -- to relay Vonnie's commands to Tom's group at the chimney. Get away. Far away. Very soon, we may smash open the ice.

  Tom's scouts raced toward camp, leaving the two 'gängers at the sunken chimney. One stayed near the surface, prowling the area, gauging its solid masses and its fissures. The other went into the shaft. It plummeted down through the chimney's open spaces and squirmed through a congested place where the chimney was blocked.

  Vonnie's nerves jangled in her stomach, her fingers, her feet. She moved too fast, sprinting through the catacombs. She tripped over a bump that she should have seen and banged her helmet against the ice.

  The flashback that rose inside her was tainted with darkness and pain. She ran with her eyes shut, chasing the sound of her own boot steps--

  "Easy." Jan caught her arm. "Hey. Easy. Why don't you let me go in front? Stay on my tail."

  "We don't have much time."

  "Bullshit. The proxies can throw as many orders at us as they want. Pete and I are in charge. We'll go on my mark, not a deadline set by a recording of a man who isn't even here."

  Vonnie shook her head. She tried to move away, but Jan increased her grip.

  "Slow down, Vonnie. I mean it."

  Jan took the lead and purposefully lagged behind their doppelgängers. Twice, Vonnie pushed at Jan's back, trying to hurry her. Jan paid no attention.

  Vonnie fidgeted. She worried. She kept one eye on her datastreams as they hiked.

  Leaping and falling, the doppelgänger in the chimney had gone four kilometers below the surface. So far down, the chimney was a warm, dripping echo chamber. Streams formed on its sides. Ben, Meiko and Mississippi were directing the incursion. He predicted that within three more klicks, the chimney would fill with water and slush.

  "Hold up," Ben said as Mississippi added, "I see it."

  The 'gänger paused on the lip of a slumping crack. Stuck in the wall above it were nine fragments of basaltic lava. Their sims identified a pattern carved into eight of the nine pieces, which had originally been a single rock.

  They'd found a faded hieroglyphic.

  Peering beyond the chimney with radar and neutrino pulse, their doppelgänger identified the ruins of rock walls and dams strewn throughout a diagonal, standing wave in the ice where tunnels had lifted and flooded.

  The doppelgänger recorded hollow pockets in the ice and drifts of frozen bugs. It found the living clots of bacterial mats alongside a stream of liquid water.

  It also found the corpse of what appeared to be an oblong, six-armed creature with two round protuberances where sunfish had two more arms. The six arms had short claws. The other two were blunt, round, calloused nubs.

  "Holy crap!" Ben said happily as Harmeet joined the group feed. "Can we retrieve it?" she asked.

  "I don't see how," Mississippi said. "The ice in there is wedged in sideways. Check our radar. That whole section's packed too tight. It's ready to slide."

  "This is a new species," Harmeet said, and Vonnie added, "We can't leave it!"

  "Sorry, Von," Mississippi said. "If we start digging, we could spill fifty tons of ice into the chimney. A hundred. We gotta leave that critter alone."

  "She's right." Ben's voice was reluctant now. "The chimney's too warm. The whole region could let go."

  "I want tissue samples," Meiko said.

  "It's in too deep," Ben said. "One doppelgänger can't handle the job. We'd need a group of mecha."

  "Listen to me," Jan said. "We'll have to go back for it later. I want you to scan it, then keep moving. Remember the mission."

  "Roger that," Ben said.

  Vonnie shared his disappointment and she wanted to console Harmeet, but she kept quiet as Mississippi led the 'gänger through a full spectrum of X-rays, radar and pulse.

  The distended corpse had fur and a long, recessed nose with two vertical slits for nostrils. It was albino, although its claws and its short fur were tinged red. The fur covered everything except its nose, its claws, and its two weird, round, nubby arms. Of course it had no eyes.

  Most likely it was from the same evolutionary branch as the ferrets. Had its species been completely wiped out, their existence lost in the churning ice, or were there living populations somewhere else in the frozen sky?

  What if it was a member of the Low Clans?

  Probably not, she decided. It didn't look like something that the Top and Mid Clans would revere. It looked clumsy. It had a fatty hump where it stored calories and yet its body, when intact, would have massed less than a Top Clan male.

  "I wish O'Neal could see this," Harmeet said. "Imagine what he would think."

  Vonnie might have been upset if anyone else had cited his absence. Harmeet's tone was melancholy yet positive, recalling their friend's best qualities: his innocence and his sense of wonder. Far beneath the ice, Vonnie smiled in agreement. O'Neal would have been ecstatic.

  "Let's name it after him," Harmeet said. "Peter? Can we name it after him?"

  "What is it?" Peter asked.

  "The real question is why haven't we found more of them," Meiko said. "We need to determine how long it's been dead. How old is the ice? Was this creature pushed up by a geyser or did it live in the area?"

  "I don't want to call it an O'Neal," Ben said. "We could use his name in its classification, but day-to-day I suggest we call it a beaver. Look at it. Those are rodent-like incisors in front. They're made to cut and grind at the ice, not to attack. It's not a predator."

  "Can you focus on its stomach?" Harmeet asked. "What did it eat?"

  "It looks like it had two small stomachs," Meiko said. "It must have digested its food over and over again. That's how it gleaned enough spare energy for that fatty hump."

  "She's right," Ben said. "The first stomach is packed with fungi, which it was eating when it died. The second stomach contains a few segments of vertebrae from an eel. Who knows how long it needed to dissolve bone, but it did. Except for those incisors, the rest of its teeth are an omnivore's. That suggests it's adaptive to multiple environments. It probably grazed on fungi and bacterial mats, and it ate carrion when it could."

  "I concur," Meiko said.

  "Those stubby flippers where a sunfish would have another pair of arms are made to shovel at the ice. Neutrino pulse says the flippers consist of brute muscle and cartilage. The skin on them is desensitized. All I see is scar tissue. Those flippers aren't tool-using appendages. Also, its brain is too small. This thing is a burrower like the ferrets. It's an animal."

  Vonnie would have given anything to listen to O'Neal tell Ben why he was wrong. Her smiled widened at the thought. The two of them could have had a colossal debate.

  In the chimney, Mississippi tagged the beaver's location. Then she sent their 'gänger hurrying downward again.

  Minutes later in the catacombs beneath Zone Two, four savage males found Jan and Vonnie, then eight scouts. They'd traveled less than three klicks from camp when they met sixteen matriarchs and twenty-four more males.

  Some of them appeared very sick now. Others might have been improving.

  Among the healthy sunfish were Brigit and Michelle. They submitted to Jan, greeting her in the fashion of lesser females. Vonnie knelt, too, expecting this conversation to go well... but Jan shrieked, needlessly demonstrating her willingness to clash with Michelle again.

  In confusion, Michelle coiled her arms. --Attack? Attack? she screeched.

  "Jan, stop," Vonnie said.

  Too late. The thirty-six males included older, mature scouts named Wolfi and Dieter, but their most fundamental response was to defend their matriarchs. They screamed.

  The savage males leapt. Vonnie leapt, too, covering Jan's side. She swatted three of the savage males away. Jan hit the fourth one.

  --Wai
t! Listen! Vonnie cried, but Jan waded into the sunfish like a flame among dry wood.

  --We need your aggression! Jan shrieked, embracing her persona of Low Matriarch. She was a daredevil at heart. She stamped and roared, swinging her pike as the males clacked and screeched with her. --Our enemies may strike above the ice! They may invade our catacombs!

  --Danger! Attack! the males screeched.

  --We need your arms and beaks! Defend our ice! Jan cried as Vonnie knelt again with her arms out like a sunfish.

  In body and in tone, Vonnie tried to settle them all, including Jan. --We want most of you to stay here and protect Low Matriarch and Shy Foot and Mature Male! Vonnie sang, using the sunfish names for Jan, Claudia and Peter. --Only a few of us will enter the chimney with our machines. I will go. So will Biting Male, she added, using their name for Ben.

  --Who goes with you? Who goes? Michelle shrieked.

  --Attack! the males screeched, capering at Jan's feet as she brandished her pike.

  Jan had more style and flair than Vonnie. She also lacked experience with how volatile the males could be. She was dancing with a devil she barely knew.

  More sunfish were gathering. They slithered from the catacombs. Angelica was among the new arrivals. Vonnie saw Hans, too, who ranked among their very oldest scouts. Hans was spotted with fungal infections, although he moved well. He did not appear to suffer from the hemorrhagic bruising, which indicated a strong immune system and perhaps more food and rest than the matriarchs allowed other, lesser males.

  Most of the sunfish were young males or savage males. They were ravenous and feral despite their sickness or even because of it. They wanted to kill and kill and kill before they were too weak. They needed an enemy. They needed to provide food for the tribe. Jan had pushed them too far. They writhed in shapes that depicted avalanches and eruptions.

  --No! Vonnie cried. --Our clan may be attacked but your job is to save Low Matriarch and yourselves. Retreat if you must. Stay alive. Our clan cannot withstand more death.

  --Listen to Young Matriarch! Brigit screeched at the males. --Listen! Obey!

  --Who goes? Who goes? Michelle shrieked.

  Jan didn't seem to recognize how Vonnie and Brigit had defused the males' blood thirst. Concentrating on Michelle, Jan let her body radiate her emotions. Her posture was a domineering shout. --Your four greatest females will come to the surface with us, then enter the chimney! she roared.

  The matriarchs wrapped their arms around each other, communicating in their secret language.

  --No! Jan roared. --No consensus! No rituals! She stabbed her powerful gloved hand at Brigit and Michelle and two others. --You, you, you and you! Let's go!

  "Stop," Vonnie said. "For Christ's sake, now you're the one who's moving too fast. Let me describe the Lewis to them. I want to ask about the beaver, too."

  "Absolutely not," Jan said, aiming the tip of her pike at Vonnie. Bewildered, the males clacked their beaks. "We don't need another distraction," Jan said. "Let's get four matriarchs and get out. We can chitchat with them later."

  "Fine." Vonnie deferred to her as the sunfish rasped and shrieked. The matriarchs accepted Jan's authority, but they had a well-developed bond with Vonnie.

  --What do you hide? What do you hide? Brigit screeched.

  --Young Matriarch's journey to the Great Ocean will exceed your greatest legends! Jan roared. --She needs more than scouts. She needs sacrifice and wisdom. Do any of you have the same fortitude as your males?

  Jan wanted to provoke them like Vonnie and Cornet had provoked Ribeiro, but the sunfish were far more perceptive than the FNEE colonel. They'd sensed the warring emotions of anticipation and dread that Vonnie felt about the Great Ocean.

  They factored Jan's hard-nosed ambitions into Vonnie's dreams. They weighed their own abilities with the needs of the clan after so many tragedies.

  --Angelica and I will join you! Brigit screeched. --We will bring two males!

  --No! Jan roared. --No males, only matriarchs!

  --We will bring two males! Brigit shrieked, forming shapes to demonstrate how two males and two matriarchs fit as a balanced sum.

  Brigit wanted Tom and Hans. She nakedly explained why. Tom was a clever, loyal pawn yet a pawn nonetheless, willing to die to protect his females, and Hans was a proven stud, albeit one who was near the end of his usefulness.

  If the Lewis did not return to the surface, if the four sunfish were separated from the clan, they could repopulate. They could also stay in the depths of the ice if they found viable territory that was unclaimed by other lifeforms. In this regard, the sunfish were much like the ships that left Earth with ova, sperm and artificial wombs. Sunfish sought any chance to divide and colonize.

  --Give me four matriarchs! Jan roared.

  --Two and two! Two and two! the sunfish shrieked.

  Cornet was patched into Jan and Vonnie's heads-up displays. The proxy said, "Commander, this was a simple assignment. I sent our expert with you. Let her sort it out."

  "Sir, I don't think we should resist," Vonnie said. "They'll be more cooperative if we accept two males... and like you said, if we can't keep a few sunfish in a locked room, we're not worth our paychecks."

  Thinking at lightspeed, the proxy must have made its decision before she finished speaking. Without pause, it said, "All right. Get moving."

  --We accept! Two and two! We accept! Jan cried, letting the sunfish hear the irritation in her voice. On her display, she could see that Tom's group had covered most of the distance from the chimney. --We will meet Tom near the surface! she cried, pointing up into the catacombs.

  All of the sunfish swarmed in that direction, chirping and screaming at Brigit, Angelica and Hans. Their howls sounded like laughter. They knew they'd outfoxed Low Matriarch, an indelible victory.

  As the two women ran with them, Jan said, "Thank you."

  Vonnie answered with a nod.

  For a moment, Jan was quiet, too. Behind her faceplate, her eyes were uncharacteristically pensive. Then: "What did I do wrong?"

  "Nothing," Vonnie lied. "They want to be dominated by their leaders... but in the ice, down is up, two is one, and one is zero. Understand?"

  "Nope."

  "Sometimes it looks like there's a single female in charge, but the group mind always guides her. You pushed them farther than I thought you should. We were never going to convince them to send matriarchs without males, not on a long-distance journey. They'll leave eggs in the ocean if they can. They'll try to stay."

  Jan's eyes turned thoughtful again. "Maybe we should let them," she said.

  "Maybe," Vonnie agreed, expecting Cornet to intervene. He didn't.

  She and Jan climbed after the sunfish.

  Near the surface, Tom’s scouts intercepted them. Brigit and Angelica told him to join them. They instructed the others to return to the catacombs.

  Vonnie watched the larger group scuttle off into the ice. Then she looked at Tom. Even a month ago, they wouldn't have depended on him, she thought. His missing arm meant he was worthless. Now they see the ingenuity and the independence he's been forced to learn.

  The matriarchs have grown, too. Their worldview is evolving, but there are things they won't change.

  Females rule. Up is down. Two is one.

  I wonder if bringing them with us to the Great Ocean is really a good idea?

  11.

  At the airlock near Submodule 07, Vonnie opened one of her chest kits. Angelica screeched, thinking she had food. Instead she removed a flat fabric packet attached to two short, narrow cylinders of compressed air.

  The device was an ERIC, an Emergency Rescue / Intensive Containment unit, better known as a rescue ball. Vonnie showed the four sunfish where to sit and described how the ball would expand with a bang and envelop them.

  First she aimed its infrared targeting beam at them. Then she inflated it. Dotted with IR and tactile sensors, the bright yellow fabric enfolded them before stiffening into a sphere. Tom screamed -- but in an
instant, he was cut off. The ball absorbed all noise. She felt him thrashing. The matriarchs brought him under control. The ball was still.

  An ERIC could provide a human being with at least ten minutes of oxygen, more if she clipped on additional cylinders or an air hose. Plenty of time.

  From experience, Vonnie knew the inside was muffled and black unless someone on the outside attached a radio or data/comm relay. For her, the sensory deprivation had been absolute. She'd felt disembodied. Angelica, Brigit, Tom and Hans probably were comfortable inside the cramped dark sphere. Vonnie rapped on it, assuring them of her presence. They drummed against the inside. She lifted it and followed Jan through the airlock. They climbed to the surface, where they passed mecha and several astronauts in suits.

  One of them was Matthew Wester, who stopped to watch. "You're actually gonna bring 'em onboard?" he asked. "Why not just dump 'em?"

  Vonnie's stomach clenched. Dump them? Out here? she thought, but Jan wasn't flustered.

  "We need 'em," Jan said.

  "They're sick and they could rip someone's throat out," Wester said. "Just get rid of 'em. Pop the ball. The rest of the tribe won't know, and the people in the Lewis will have one less threat to worry about."

  "Get back to work," Jan said. She led Vonnie toward the sub. Vonnie tried to look over her shoulder but she couldn't see past the rescue ball.

  I can't believe he said that, she thought, finding Wester's transponder on her display. He hadn't followed them. He'd returned to his job. But she held a little tighter to the ball.

  An ERIC was designed to save people in disabled suits or hab modules. It would also prevent the sunfish from measuring the sub's layout via sonar. Ribeiro and Cornet had insisted. She didn't disagree. In the beginning, she might have believed she could tame the sunfish. Today she viewed them as a moderate risk... but Wester had suggested cold-blooded murder.

  How many of the Americans feel the same?

  "Jan, should I worry about him?" she asked. "What about Popson?"

  "They'll do what they're told."

  And if they don't? she thought, following Jan onto a loading platform set against the Lewis.

  Airlock one had been rigged for dual use. It was covered by a plastic tent with two temporary seals. One allowed them to enter the sub directly from the ice. The other was connected to a pedestrian tube from Module C.