Barto felt as if he and his point man were on display, specimens for a zoo . . . or humiliated members of a captured Enemy force, dragged before the public as trophies. Shrouded in silence, Arviq seemed to be doing a slow burn as he sat staring at his food, glaring at the other people.
Barto tried to calm himself. His own emotions seemed so much flatter since he’d been brought underground, his mind dulled—as if the adrenaline pump, endorphin enhancers, even his root survival instincts had been neutralized. Listening to the muted drone of conversation and music around them, he thought back longingly to the cacophony in the mess hall at his old barracks.
He remembered the clatter of metal trays, the crash of armorplates as soldiers jostled each other. With wordless comaraderie, the squad members sat on hard benches, grabbed their utensils, and gobbled their tasteless food. Together, they recharged their batteries and stoked the fires that they would need for combat in their next mission.
While none of the soldiers knew each other very well, each knew his place in life, his purpose . . . and his Enemy. These underground civilians had nothing to compare with that.
Juliette sauntered up to them, her elfin features positively glowing, as if Barto’s presence had increased her own standing among her people. She walked with her tall friend, Gunnar, who had spent days escorting Arviq. She looked down at the food on Barto’s plate, and clucked in a mock scolding tone that he should eat more.
Barto felt a strange sensation in his stomach and heart, as if he were basking in the sunlight of her presence. How could Juliette make him feel proud that she had chosen him for her special attentions? He had never been singled out for anything before.
On the days when Juliette brought him to the breakfast hall, Barto was glad to see her, eager to hear her voice, just to look upon her face. As his senses had become accustomed to his environment, his tongue relished the taste of fresh fruits and breads. The flower scents in the air smelled sweet, and he didn’t flinch when Juliette touched him this time, taking him by the elbow. He liked the softness of her fingertips, the way they moved up and down his arm. He felt that he wanted to be even closer to her, to allow her into the walled fortress of himself.
“Do you like it with us here?” Juliette said with a hopeful, even plaintive, lilt to her voice. Ignoring Arviq, she touched the lumpy intaglio of scars on his forearm, tracing patterns and imagining his terrible wounds, as if she had never seen such marks before. “I’d like for you to stay with us, Barto . . . with me.” She reached across the table to clasp his hand, and he felt the urge to withdraw. What was she doing?
Gunnar’s narrow face seemed drawn and concerned. He shook his head gravely. “You know how he’s been trained. You know what this man has been through. He’s not a toy for you, Juliette.”
“I know exactly what he is,” she answered. They both talked as if Barto wasn’t even there. “And that doesn’t change my wishes one bit.”
With intent, flicking eyes, Barto followed the conversation, the conflict. If Juliette wanted him to stay here—and he vehemently wished that she did
—then he would stay.
He’d seen the control chambers, the computer screens. He knew that these were the ultimate commanders of the war, the people who issued the instructions through his helmet speakers. His job had been to defend these civilians, to protect them . . . and if Juliette should happen to give him leave to stop the fighting and stay here, with her, then he would follow orders.
Moving around behind him at the dining table, Juliette held out a large purple flower, its petals like a soft starburst. With particular care, she slid it into the close-cropped dark hair behind his right ear. Then she clapped at her audacity and at the spectacle she had made. He flushed.
Barto did not remove the flower, knowing it was somehow special to Juliette. The other civilians in the dining hall spoke to each other, pleased and entertained. Then Juliette danced away with tall Gunnar beside her, leaving the two soldiers to continue eating under the scrutiny of the curious observers.
Arviq looked across the table at him, scowling at his comrade’s behavior. He narrowed his flinty eyes at the flower in Barto’s hair. “You look like a fool,” he growled, and snatched it away.
#
Back in his too-peaceful quarters with the door sealed and locked from the outside, he lay on his too-comfortable bed and then finally curled up on the hard floor. He would sleep better that way. . . .
He dreamed of other times, when there hadn’t been so much peace, when he had felt alive and useful and necessary. Where he had known his place in the world.
After one particularly furious foray, he, Arviq, and five other squad members crept ahead, continuing to approach the blasted Enemy territory even after the main conflict was over. They followed trails of blood and footprints, drag marks left by the bloodhounds that had come to retrieve the bodies of Enemy soldiers.
In the dream Barto increased his visor’s sensitivity to search for infrared traces of organic waste or warm blood droplets. The enhanced bloodhounds were not trained to cover their trails, and with their heavy, mangled burdens, they left a path that was easy to follow, even across the blistered landscape.
The squad followed the trail back to a shielded Enemy encampment. Barto and his comrades prided themselves in their bravery (or foolhardiness), and they charged into the bunkers with their weapons drawn, their adrenaline packs tuned to full output. Their laser-lances blasted the hinges off the doors and made short work of the plasrock bricks that shored up the damaged buildings.
Within moments, Barto’s squad had breached the outer defenses and came in firing. No mercy. Many Enemy soldiers were still in their armor, but their weapons were locked in recharging racks. Others fought hand-to-hand, never giving up.
Barto’s team suffered heavy losses, but during the fight he was dizzy with exhilaration. By himself, he vanquished fifteen of the Enemy soldiers; altogether, his squad destroyed the entire outpost. Total victory.
Throughout the combat exercise, during the screams and explosions, the violence and death, Barto had felt a sure camaraderie between his fellow soldiers. He never let doubt enter his mind, never a question. He knew exactly what he was doing here.
The Enemy bloodhounds, locked in their small home-kennels, bayed until Arviq cut them all down. The dogs seemed to know they had been responsible for betraying their masters’ location.
With a resounding cheer of triumph, the survivors of Barto’s team gave a shout to celebrate the defeat of the Enemy. Then, as part of a ritual for such infrequent but absolute victories, the men reached down to tear the helmets off the Enemy corpses, taking them for souvenirs.
Barto removed the helmet from the soldier he had just killed, then looked down to see the visage of the Enemy.
In his dream, the face belonged to Juliette.
#
As days of contained rage and frustration built within him, Arviq found that he didn’t even need the supplemental adrenaline pump from his dismantled armor. This was all wrong! His blood boiled, his anger rose into a thunderstorm of fury—and he unleashed it upon the walls, the bed, anything in his room. His cell.
Arviq didn’t want to be a prisoner of war. He wanted to fight, to kill the Enemy. He had been bred and trained for nothing else.
The quiet stillness of this underground civilian world, the soft fabrics, the perfumes, and the too-tasteful food . . . all pushed him into a frenzy. He tore the coverings off his bed and thrashed about, ripping the sheets to shreds. He howled and screamed without words, a bestial cry of damnation. He pounded on the door, but it only rattled in its grooves. Then he threw himself upon the bedframe itself, yanking and pulling, until finally he uprooted it from the walls.
He didn’t know if anyone was watching him, nor did he care.
Arviq hurled himself against the metal wall, battering his shoulders, bruising his muscles, but feeling no pain. His body was accustomed to running on the ragged edge of energy, and he had been resting h
ere for days, storing up power in his muscles. Now he released it all in his frenzy.
His attack made marks on the wall, left some smears of his own blood. His fists caused dents. The sealed door rattled again in its tracks; it seemed looser now. He pounded and pounded, receiving no answer.
Finally, Arviq returned to the ruined bedframe, wrenching free a strip of metal that he could use as a crowbar. He had to escape. He had to get back. He didn’t belong here.
He wedged the ragged end of torn metal into the door track and pushed, prying . . . bending. The door began to buckle, and Arviq worked even harder.
#
After his nightmares had left him like exorcised demons, Barto fell into a deep slumber and awoke incredibly refreshed. Sometime in the middle of the night he had crawled back into his bed and rested peacefully.
A soldier had to be flexible, had to adapt to new circumstances. At last, he had begun to do just that.
When Gunnar and Juliette came to fetch him, he sensed their straing. The other civilians continued to stare at him, as they had done for days, but now they held a greater glint of fear in their eyes, a more uncertain look on their faces. Barto couldn’t understand it, because for the first time since he’d come to this place of sanctuary, he felt more relaxed, more at ease, as if his life had indeed changed.
Seeing how the underground people had changed, how their attitude toward him had shifted, Barto knew something must have occurred. He could sense it. “What has happened?” he said.
Gunnar looked at him and answered crisply, “Your friend Arviq has gone on a rampage. He broke out of his room, and he’s escaped.”
Barto bolted to his feet. He understood Arviq’s impulses. He had felt them himself, and now alarm bells rang out in his head. “What has he done?”
Juliette took a deep breath and blinked her deep brown eyes, as if the subject itself made her uncomfortable. “He broke his way out of the room. He smashed some windows in the corridors, destroyed one of our greenhouses. That was an hour or so ago. No one has seen him since.”
Barto pushed his half-finished breakfast away and stood tall and strong. Called back to active duty. He didn’t need any more sustenance, no more food to distract him. His mind became focused again, delving into the old hunter/survival mentality.
“I know how he thinks, and I know what he’s doing,” Barto said. “You cannot let him get away.”
“We can’t stop him,” Gunnar said. “He’d kill all of us if we tried.”
Barto shook his head. “You don’t understand what Arviq can do, or what will happen if he gets away from this place. You can’t just ignore him.” Then he looked over at Juliette again. He finally admitted to himself that she was beautiful.
“Can you stop him?” Juliette said. “It would be to protect us.”
“I will need my armor and my helmet if I’m going to do this right.”
#
At first the armor felt rough and strange, but rapidly Barto adopted it as a second skin. The protective covering belonged, as much a part of him as his bones and muscles.
Looking at her soldier, Juliette wore a concerned expression, as if he had too easily stepped over the brink. Barto saw something unreadable deep within her brown eyes, a flush on her elfin face, as he picked up the helmet. He looked at her uncertainly one last time, then seated it firmly on his head. He pressed the side speakers against his ears, lowering the visor in place so that he looked at her through filters and scanning devices instead of his own eyes.
Barto drew a deep breath, stretching his chest against the breastplate armor plate. He flexed his arms against the hard bicep plates, the forearm protections, the gauntlets. His torso was solid and impenetrable. His legs and back, shoulders, hips, everything could withstand the worst that Arviq threw against him.
Barto was invincible.
“I must stop him before he leaves,” he said. “He’ll report the location of this place to HQ.”
Juliette hesitated, moved forward and then stopped, as if she wanted to embrace him but was afraid to. Barto was glad she didn’t. He didn’t want to get close to her, like this.
The tall chaperone Gunnar stood beside her, his face grim, and he drew her back. “Let him go now, Juliette. He has a mission.”
Barto turned and marched out of the room, summoning up his mental map of the underground civilian sanctuary. He would begin in Arviq’s quarters, where the point man had smashed his own room and broken loose. It would not be too difficult to pick up his former comrade’s trail. Barto knew how to track down a quarry.
Leaving the other inhabitants behind, he followed the tunnels. Most of the civilians reacted with fear when they saw him now. They hid within their own quarters or clustered together in the communal halls, though only one unarmed soldier had gone on a rampage. It was all beyond their experience.
All of these people cowered down here, helpless. And Barto was the only one who could protect them.
Though Arviq had not been able to retrieve his armor or his weapons, Barto did not underestimate him. A properly trained soldier could fashion defensive materials out of just about anything.
At the pried-open door, he stood motionless, assessing Arviq’s damaged room, saw how his comrade had wrenched open the barricade using a piece of the bedframe as a lever, how he had battered the walls with his bare hands. Barto saw blood, but knew that Arviq would pay no attention to such minor cuts and bruises. Not Arviq.
Barto had seen him through much worse.
One time on a reconnaissance and destruction mission, Barto and his point man had ventured into the crumbling ruins of what must have been an impossibly large building, now scarred, empty, and blasted. The structure had fallen into rubble with haphazard girders and broken glass protruding from poured stone walls.
They had chased several Enemies into the wreckage. Their senses screamed that it was probably an ambush, but still the two soldiers had followed, weapons drawn, confident that they could defeat their opponents. He and Arviq separated and traveled along different passageways, using their scanners to pick up infrared footprint traces.
Barto had proceeded cautiously, but Arviq, incensed and determined, charged through the darkened halls, knocking wreckage aside. Finally he had crashed down a rickety iron staircase that shattered into rust as he stepped on it. And he dropped through to the underlevels. . . .
When Barto had found him later, he saw that Arviq had broken his left leg in two places and had sprained his right ankle. His helmet visor was cracked and damaged—yet still Arviq had pulled himself along to find the Enemy. He certainly had.
Though severely injured and at an extreme disadvantage, Arviq had slaughtered both of the Enemy soldiers. . . .
From their missions together, Barto knew that his comrade was utterly relentless, feeling no pain and no fatigue. Nothing would stop him from escaping the underground enclave. He would never give up.
And neither would Barto give up. He was the only thing that could keep this civilian paradise protected and intact.
He strode out and moved briskly along the corridors. His bootsteps ricocheted off the metal walls. Arviq had smashed windows and thrown loose objects from side to side, leaving a painfully clear trail—until he had learned better and sensibly stopped his rampage.
Then tracking him became more of a challenge. Barto called up a detailed implanted map of all the underground corridors, which Juliette had added to the information systems in his helmet.
Arviq was running blind, by instinct, just trying to escape, but his movements displayed a pattern. On the map gleaming inside his visor, Barto could see the best paths, learn where to go . . . where to intercede.
Arviq didn’t have a chance against a fully armed, fully outfitted soldier, like Barto.
He marched along, his senses tuned to a high pitch. He moved carefully in case the other soldier had set up some kind of booby-trap or ambush. That was to be expected. Arviq must know Barto would come after him.
Becaus
e the other soldier was without his armor, his bare feet left a trail of infrared images on the clean floorplates. The marks were old and fading, but still identifiable with Arviq’s genetic signature: droplets of sweat, skin particles, even stride length gave evidence of his passage. The other man was still bleeding from one of the cuts he’d inflicted upon himself in escaping from the room; occasionally a telltale crimson droplet reinforced Barto’s tracking.
The control voice returned, insistent and self-confident. It comforted Barto, who had lived his conscious life hearing the words: “KILL THE ENEMY! KILL THE ENEMY! KILL THE ENEMY!” He no longer felt so alone.
According to the map display, Arviq had made it to within several hundred meters of the long access ladder that led up a shaft to the outside—the battleground where their squad had been killed.
But Barto also knew he had cornered his quarry.
At an intersection of the dimly lit corridors, a framework of girders and support beams held up the ceiling. The place had been long-abandoned by the underground civilians.
Barto’s visor-sensors detected a large smear of blood at floor level in a corner, as if Arviq had rested there . . . or as if he had encountered an Enemy, and they had struggled, hand-to-hand. The blood was fresh, wet, warm in IR
—like a sign emblazoned there to draw his attention.
Too late, he realized the ambush. From the shadowed support girders above, Arviq let out a loud cry and dropped on top of him. Though he had no armor and no weapons, the other soldier crashed down upon him with brute force. Barto might have found the conflict absurd if Arviq hadn’t been so determined, so passionate—if the other man hadn’t been his own comrade for so long.
Arviq wrapped his left arm in a vice-lock around Barto’s neck, trying to wrench the helmet off his head. With his other hand he tried to grab one of the ID-locked weapons sealed in armored holsters on Barto’s hips.
Barto rose up like a tank, as if his armor gave him stimulus and energy, though Juliette had told him his artificial adrenaline pumps were disconnected from the suit.
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