Extinction Fleet 1: Space Marine Ajax

by Sean Michael Argo

  Grendel’s barbed tail cut through the empty air where his chest had been, and the kneeling marine cut loose with his pulse rifle. Bolt after bolt slammed into the creature’s chest and abdomen, most of them bouncing off the creature’s body armor, though several did seem to tear away pieces of chitin and flesh. The beast continued forward despite the heavy blows it suffered from his pulse rifle. Ajax saw something pointed emerge from the beast’s thorax, just beneath its slavering and distended jaws. At this range, he could see several pairs of smaller bladed appendages, reminiscent of the ripper drones, all of which lashed out at him as the beast was upon him.

  The scything blades sheared his rifle from his grasp as a meter-long proboscis erupted from Grendel’s thorax and thrust itself at his face. The marine jerked his head to the side at the last second and the appendage missed him by mere centimeters.

  Heedless of the chitin blades that sliced deep cuts into his thighs and shoulders, the marine pushed forward. With one hand, he held the snout against his shoulder and with the other he jammed the det-putty stick into the slimy folds of the fleshy thorax from which it protruded.

  The creature thrashed wildly and the blades of its smaller limbs sliced at the marine’s armor. The creature couldn’t get much momentum considering how close together they were, but searing pain in several places on his body made it clear to Ajax that he’d been wounded.

  Ajax spit up bile and blood as he found himself face to face with the beast, its eyes once again threatening to lull him into numb inaction. Then he roared, pulling his arm from within the folds of Grendel’s thorax. As the marine’s hand came away, he twisted his body with all his might and shoved his slime-covered forearm into the base of the proboscis. The activator wire was still gripped tightly in his fist, and as he pulled it out of the stick the circuit inside the det-putty was completed, causing the incendiary substance to detonate.

  There was a wet explosion and Ajax was showered in gore as he was hurled through the air. The marine blacked out from the impact, coming to a moment later with his back against the inside of the low wall surrounding the windmills. His vision was blurred, though he thought he could see a pale serpentine shape disappearing into the gloom, taking the bone on bone sound along with it.

  Ajax couldn’t feel much of his body, and as he struggled mightily to turn his head to the side he could see that pools of dark blood were forming underneath him. As the darkness threatened to swallow his consciousness he could hear the booming sound of Hart’s rifle. He hoped that the sniper was making good on whatever opportunity Ajax had bought with his life.

  He flexed his fist and to his surprise he not only felt the movement, but realized that he held something in his hand. Ajax struggled to open his eyes, the lids feeling as if they weighed a metric ton. To his dismay, he saw that in his mangled right hand he clutched Grendel’s proboscis. He dimly recalled hearing something about thanes and monsters in Thatcher’s story, but the thought slid away before he could grasp it as his awareness faded into darkness.

  NO EASY DAY

  There were no dreams this time. Only pain.

  Ajax fluttered his eyes open, his pupils struggling to cope with the bright lights being shone in them and gradually became aware of the scent of disinfectant. The marine flexed his fingers, and when neither rifle nor enemy appendage met his grasp, he bolted upright with eyes wide and gasping breath. He was in the medic station on Heorot, not the body forge as he had expected.

  “Welcome back, brother,” said the unfamiliar voice of a skald. His name was Wallace according to the name stenciled upon his chest plate. The skald put his hand on the marine’s chest to keep him from leaping out of the med-rack. “We almost lost you.”

  Ajax groaned as the sniper helped him sit up the rest of the way. It wasn’t until the man gently moved the marine to his feet that Ajax realized he even could stand.

  “I didn’t die,” said Ajax flatly, as if he could not yet believe he’d survived his encounter.

  “Re-growing muscle tissue and a few organs are medic level basics, comrade. Jarl Mahora and myself decided your turnaround time would be faster here than a mercy slaying and a trip to the body forge, but don’t be disappointed,” assured Wallace as he helped Ajax move from the rack to a small water basin where he could wash the sleep from his face, “We have quite the mission planned, so it’s likely before this is over you’ll die again, marine.”

  “Did we stop Grendel?” asked Ajax as he changed out of his sweat soaked medical scrubs and stepped into the shower tube. “Kill, capture, or otherwise?”

  “It was a valiant attempt by all involved, though sadly, Grendel remains at large,” said Wallace in a dejected tone as he leaned against the wall and patiently waited for Ajax to finish. “You, Ajax, did succeed in removing its proboscis. Initial reports from our labs on Crimson Shard reveal a match between the secretions on the appendage and those left in the wounds of Grendel’s victims, including yours. This information may prove to be a victorious discovery in the long term, and worthy of the price paid to obtain it.”

  “Grendel consumed Thatcher, didn’t it?” asked Ajax, pausing in his process as if waiting for confirmation of something he already knew was true.

  “Skald Thatcher did not survive the encounter, and it seems he suffers from the same condition as the Watchman,” stated Wallace, who let his hand stray to his belt, where he fingered absently at the trench spike that hung from it. “I was his second, so have assumed command. Which left a hole in the ranks that I have chosen Hart, your sniper, to fill.”

  “High time he got a promotion, but Thatcher, it’s hard to believe he fell. Was that rumor about the crew from Armor One true, too?” asked Ajax as he lathered up and rinsed with the swift precision that soldiers generally possessed. “It would explain how easily the Garm reached our walls.”

  “Yes, the enemy has certainly gained the upper hand, and in the process laid low two of our greatest leaders, with several dozen marines besides,” answered the skald in a dark tone. Even through the steam of the de-con shower, Ajax could pick out the tinge of shame in the warrior’s voice at being continuously bested by the invaders. “They have destroyed half of our working chain-fires, bloodied Armor One, and all but pushed us out of our trenches and behind the walls of Heorot itself. The situation is dire indeed, we are losing this war.”

  “Thatcher,” grumbled Ajax as he stepped out of the shower and began sliding into one of the standard body gloves. “That’s as bad as the Watchman, worse maybe, considering that he was special operations.”

  “With the skald’s mind in the belly of the beast, combining with that of the Watchman, there is likely no stratagem or war trick we might hope to achieve that the hive mind cannot anticipate at worst or counter at best,” nodded Wallace. “Chief Medicae Idris reports that the body forge is struggling to keep up with the casualty rates, and every available scrap of useable organic material is being funneled to the Bright Lance.

  He needs time that the swarm will not give us, so I have pressured Command to make a desperate gambit in the hopes that a wantonly reckless stratagem will give us some manner of edge against an enemy that knows us so intimately. Thatcher was never a gambling man, though I am, perhaps that nuance will yield some advantage in the battles to come.”

  “What is the mission? I assume there can’t be much time until the next swarm descend upon us,” asked Ajax while he slipped on his boots and made ready to leave the chamber. “They may have lost countless thousands of organisms, but with two hive ships pumping out broods it won’t take long for them to come back.”

  “Command has agreed to allow Jarl Mahora to lead three marine companies into the wastes alongside what’s let of Armor One, to seek out and assault the hive ships,” said Skald Wallace, his words stopping Ajax in his tracks. “The thinking being that if we attack before they are at full strength perhaps we can sufficiently forestall the next expedition against Heorot.”

  “Once we pinpoint the hive ships why doesn�
��t the Bright Lance bombard them from orbit? We should just scorch the planet and call it an acceptable loss,” said Ajax with some incredulity, “Or at the least launch starfighter sorties against them, if the atmospheric conditions are problematic for the void rounds.”

  “Ajax, this fight isn’t just about killing Grendel, if that was the only concern, then yes, Bright Lance could just turn that whole sector into molten slag. This isn’t a core urban planet like Titannicus, so the collateral damage would be minimal,” responded Wallace as he stood away from the wall. “We are studying them even as they are studying us. The siege of Heorot isn’t so much a meal for them as it is a weapons test. Imagine if we were facing down hundreds of such creatures, each one able to fight and evade as this single beast. We must learn why there is only the one, and to find that knowledge we must enter the hive ship.”

  “You speak as Thatcher did, sir, all plots and feints and countermoves,” observed Ajax, folding his arms across his chest and looking at the skald intensely. “Tell me, other than legions of marines stumbling around in the dark begging for an ambush, how are we to find the hive ships on this trackless waste of a planet?”

  “The secretions on the proboscis you tore from Grendel’s body contain powerful neurotoxins, presumably to help the beast immobilize the target and remove the brain matter,” answered Wallace, “However there are cells within the secretion that emit electrical pulses which read just like brainwaves. They match up with what Command already has on file for the WarGarm, and it’s thought that this ‘transmitter cell’ is what allows the WarGarm to, in essence, control the other broods, all of whom are filled with ‘receiver cells’. What sets Grendel’s apart is the power of the pulses and the density of those types of cells.”

  “I have a feeling you’re going to tell me why this relates to us finding the hive ships. Cut to it skald, sir” snapped Ajax, the terrible knot in his stomach tightening as his mind raced with guesses as to what Wallace would say next. Each scenario was more grim than the next, and all of them seemed centered around him, otherwise why would such a high ranking operative spend so much time explaining the complexities of war and alien biology with a common rifle grunt. “The suspense is killing me faster than the Garm.”

  “Each time we resurrect the men who have been slain by Grendel’s proboscis they die again moments later of severe brain hemorrhaging,” said the skald as he continued to finger his trench knife, the burden of command perhaps resting uncomfortably upon his shoulders. “Command thinks those transmitter cells, when combined with the neurotoxin, are able to re-program something in the men’s DNA. Upon resurrection, their brains generate receiver cells despite the fact that our body forge doesn’t have the ability to create them. How exactly this is happening we don’t know yet, but effectively, Grendel is altering the genetics of its victims, making them impossible to resurrect. Once it harvests the brain, it seems, for lack of a better way to describe it, the victim’s mind belongs to the swarm. Each time they’re brought back the men’s brains are overloaded with information coming from the swarm and they die.”

  “Those cells are inside me, aren’t they?” asked Ajax. “They’re in my brain right now, receiving.” He had to struggle not to let his knees buckle and collapse into a nearby chair.

  “Yes,” nodded Wallace reluctantly, before adding, “And they are also transmitting. You and Grendel are, in effect, engaging in subconscious communication with each other all the time. The beast was unable to harvest your brain. Whatever process of DNA transmogrification occurs never fully happened to you. As it stands, you are the only marine to be pierced by the appendage and not be harvested, but the poison and the cells got into you all the same, and both kinds of cells come back with you each time you are resurrected.”

  “The dreams, yes, the dreams,” Ajax interjected. “You know I dreamt about the windmills, and then something similar happened in District 10,” he added hurriedly, his mind racing over the events of the last few weeks. “We keep fighting in my dreams, hunting each other, and my wife, gods, my wife.”

  “I’ve read all the debriefings, Ajax, no need to re-live them now,” said the skald, placing a hand on the marine’s shoulder. “The point is, we have a theory about what’s going on here, and how to put an end to it. Whatever they’re developing can’t be allowed to progress past its current stage of evolution. Biology is a messy business, and no doubt the Garm will, in time, correct this oversight. Soon, victims of Grendel will not share this connection with the beast. A simple tweak of the chemistry and the advantage you provide us will be gone, so we must use it while there is still time.”

  “I’ve seen the Grendel’s hive ship, in my resurrection dream, the same one with the windmills,” realized Ajax suddenly, coming out of his fugue once he understood what Wallace meant about turning his misfortune into an advantage. “Get me a topographical map and I know I could spot it, faster even if you had any municipal agri-maps for the windmill installations.”

  “The maps are waiting for you in the briefing room,” nodded Wallace, who then turned to leave, gesturing for Ajax to follow him. “Our plan is a good one, but hinges upon you pinpointing the location of Grendel’s hive ship. The others matter only in that they will be lending swarm support to our true enemy.”

  “What happens once we are in the hive ship?” questioned Ajax as he followed the skald through the medic station and, presumably, towards the briefing chamber.

  “Who can say?” asked Wallace, who had seen more of the universe than Ajax. “We must lay eyes upon the birthplace of the beast, stare into the womb of Grendel’s mothership, and learn what we can before we purge it from existence.”

  “And with the swarm working to recover and replenish the ranks after such a costly fight against the walls, now is the best time to press an attack,” observed Ajax, feeling slightly sharper and more aware than he had upon waking, the painkillers finally wearing off and his limbs crackling to life. “Especially with Grendel wounded so badly, it may have retreated to the hive ship for healing or to have the appendage regenerated.”

  “Now you are catching on,” nodded Wallace, “There is a natural revulsion felt in humans when faced with the Garm, a raw and primal reaction that reduces our critical thinking and pushes us into a siege mentality. Would you believe me if I told you that Command is beginning to suspect that this reaction in humanity is, in some way, intentionally exacerbated by the psychic force of the hive mind?”

  “Like it wants us to dig in?” asked Ajax as they continued towards the briefing chamber. “Seems like we are rather skilled at siege war from my perspective.”

  “We very much are, and yes, it is the most effective way of combating the Garm in the main,” agreed Wallace conversationally, giving Ajax the impression that the skald was happy to have a sounding board for his musings. “Yet we fight from our ditches and rarely think to counter. We tell ourselves that we are re-building, re-arming, and preparing for the next wave, and that the strategy of breaking the enemy’s strength upon our walls is the best and only way to conduct our war. It seems like an acceptable stratagem, and has allowed us to all but halt their advance into human space.

  However, with the new tactics and monsters we have seen here, there is indication that the hive mind is moving towards a shift in the balance of power. We must prevail, Ajax.”

  “We will, sir,” affirmed Ajax with a certainty that felt false, though he did his best to master his fear and growing sense of unease. He was still silently reeling from learning that he carried within him parts of Grendel’s cellular structure. Having such an immediate physical link with the beast made him sick, knotting his stomach even tighter, and he wanted nothing more than to take the fight back into the enemy’s teeth.

  “Fighting fit, marine?” asked Jarl Mahora in his gravelly voice as the skald and Ajax entered the briefing chamber. Mahora and two other jarls waited in the chamber alongside a group of seven skalds, with Hart numbered among them. The sniper gave Ajax a curt nod and th
e marine took his place near the projection table. Wallace keyed in his access code and several three-dimensional maps sprang to life in the air above the table.

  Ajax ran his eyes across the maps, then at the schematics of a mobile fortress construct, and finally, at the task force breakdowns. His eyes went wide when he finally grasped the full scope of the skald’s plan.

  “Ah, you see it now, marine?” growled Mahora with a wicked smile, “It’ll be bloody business indeed.”

  INTO THE NIGHT

  Ajax fingered the torc that encircled his neck, both the symbol and the power of the Einherjar Corps, and closed his eyes. He allowed the clamor of readying for battle around him to dim in his awareness, removing himself from the hustle and bustle of the armor bay as hundreds of crew scurried about. They had good reason for it, for today it was humanity that was on the attack. It was always the Garm on the offensive, and Ajax found himself nearly overcome with bloodlust at the thought that today it would be the Einherjar who came first for the fight. Ajax caught himself then, noticing the aggression in his thoughts, the barely contained frenzy that felt so potent it could burst from his chest at any moment.

  “We are both a step closer to the Blackout my friend,” said Yao, who stood next to Ajax. The marine absently rubbed his throat as if recalling the sensation of the trench spike driving through him. “I can feel it beginning to encroach upon my awareness, influencing my thoughts.”