“Does that include estimated travel times?”
“Yes, sir. For instance, I can tell you that our riverbed camp is just over four hours hard march to the northeast.”
“Good,” Talbot mused, his brain ticking over. He wasn’t quite sure where it was heading, but something was brewing. “That’ll be all.”
The ravine opened out a little, becoming a densely-wooded valley. Tall conifers stood imperiously to either side, blocking out the late afternoon sun.
“Sir, there’s cover here,” Fielding said formally. “We could wait for the Irians to move past.”
It was a sensible notion and probably their only chance. Talbot nodded, even though Fielding’s remoteness wounded him.
“I agree,” he said. “Wilkes - take the engineers up the eastern slope. There should be enough cover to shield us. I’m going to scout the northern end of the valley with Laura’s team.”
Wilkes nodded and began marshaling the troops. Talbot advanced along the valley floor with the scouts. The valley stretched north for another mile before closing out in a very tight ravine. A small stream cascaded through the narrow space over a series of gentle rapids. The scouts clambered over the rocks with little difficulty, though the going was slow.
“I think it opens out ahead,” Porter announced.
The light was fading fast and they would need to double-back soon. At last the ravine opened out and Talbot crossed a small mud pan to join Porter, whose gaze was fixed to the north.
“It’s beautiful,” he murmured, the dying sunlight reflected in his eyes.
An undulating grassland stretched almost to the horizon, where an imposing mountain range ran east-west. The swaying grass was purple with wildflower and there was a lovely, honeyed scent to the air.
“Prairie,” Talbot said.
“Teeming with life,” Porter added, looking through his binoculars. He passed them to Talbot. No more than three miles to the north a herd of four-legged beasts roamed. They looked vaguely like zebra, though their musculature was more pronounced.
“They look dangerous,” Talbot said. “An Irian resource, not a Terran one.”
He was suddenly filled with a sense of dread. “We should double-back now.”
Looking through her own binoculars, Fielding nodded.
“Probably for the best, sir.’
Talbot’s mind raced as they headed back through the ravine. Crossing the prairie was risky for a number of reasons. First, the wildlife was unpredictable and the Terrans didn’t have the skills to control it. Second, there was no way of knowing how many beacons were out there. One? Four? Hell, there may not have been any. Third, the Irians would have a field day with the Terrans out in the open. They were faster and had more stamina.
Instinct told Talbot that heading out into the prairie was suicide. Which meant that it was exactly the kind of situation that Ashby would try to engineer. There was opportunity here somewhere, if only Talbot could grasp it. If he could somehow lure Ashby into the grassland, perhaps he could block him from returning to the jungles to the north. He slammed a fist into his palm - that was it.
“Porter,” he barked. “Did you see any other way through to the grassland?”
“Not for miles,” the scout said. “This valley is a natural bottleneck.”
“Just as I thought,” Talbot said with a grin. It must have looked a little crazy considering their desperate situation, but he didn’t care. He was seized by inspiration and all of a sudden his fear was swept aside.
“Let’s get back to the others,” he said, quickening his pace. Darkness had well and truly fallen. Thankfully the conifer-laden valley was illuminated by Avari’s large moon. Which meant that Ashby and his force would have no problem seeing the Terrans once they arrived. Hiding in the trees wasn’t gonna cut it. As soon as Talbot and the scouts rejoined the other soldiers he called an emergency meeting with his squad leaders.
“Ashby won’t let us leave this valley alive,” he said. “Our only chance is fooling him into thinking we entered the prairie to the north.”
“Our footsteps run right to the edge of the grass,” Fielding agreed.
Talbot nodded. “It might be enough to tempt him through this valley. But we need to make ourselves invisible in the meantime. Any ideas?”
“The trees are out of the question,” Quantum said. “Those conifers aren’t thick enough to conceal human bodies.”
“We need to dig plug holes,” Wilkes said grimly. “You know, ambush style.”
Talbot knew all about plug-holes. He’d been on missions where Terran soldiers were forced to dig themselves into the earth as a last-ditch effort to ambush pursuing enemies. The last hope of outnumbered soldiers, plug-holes usually ended in death. A soldier could only hope to take an enemy life before he himself died.
“Plug-holes it’ll have to be,” Talbot conceded. “Except no one will be ambushing the enemy.”
“The soil is deeper and softer near the eastern ridge line,” Wilkes reported. “Let’s dig there.”
17
The Terran host worked frantically in the darkness. Without proper tools their task was onerous, but Quantum used the local timber to build a workbench and fashion crude shovels. Talbot worked up a sweat as he helped dig several holes in the rich, loamy soil. One by one the engineers and scouts occupied their plug-holes while Talbot and the squad leaders piled soil and pine needles over the top. Suffocation was a very real danger, but Talbot far preferred to run that remote risk than expose the entire army to discovery.
Once his people were in place, Talbot squeezed into his own plug-hole and drew as much dirt and debris over the top as he could. Locked in position with a mouth full of grit, he remembered how he’d once sworn never to do it again.
For several minutes he listened to the chirp of night insects, glad to have their company. Ashby would smell a rat if there was unnatural silence in this part of the forest. He was dying to hear from the riverbed base, as they would almost certainly have been attacked by now. He was proud of the structure and wondered how many Irians had been killed in the assault.
The night wore on interminably. Talbot became hot in the soil and wished he could drink from his canteen. On the plus side, none of his comrades had made a sound, which showed wonderful discipline. His mind drifted, and he found himself thinking of Laura, Harris, all the women he’d known.
As the hours slowly ticked by, Talbot pondered the notion that he was a scoundrel who was routinely given more chances than he deserved. The damning self-analysis fueled anxieties about Avari, and the fact that the fate of the Terran Republic effectively rested on his shoulders. If he couldn’t take the opportunities offered right here, right now, he would forever be a second rate individual.
At length, probably just after midnight, the shimmering, throbbing insect chirp died down. The Irians were approaching. Sweat trickled down Talbot’s forehead as he waited, every sinew in his body screaming at him to climb out and run. The seconds passed so slowly that Talbot was sure time itself was mocking him. He told himself that no matter how stealthy Irians could be, he would hear them before they got within striking range.
A breeze rustled the foliage high above them, bringing snatches of whispered commands and rhythmic footfall. That last sound filled Talbot with hope - it was the sound of marching, the sound of an army intent on covering as much ground as possible in the shortest period of time. It was easy to forget that these Irians had expended an enormous amount of energy in overtaking the humans earlier in the day.
For all they knew, Talbot’s people were now firmly entrenched on the prairie. His heart pounding, Talbot waited until he was absolutely certain that the Irians had passed through. Ashby was simply too crafty to be taking any chances.
Finally, his body tensed for action, Talbot clawed his way free of the plug-hole. The valley, lined with silvery moonlight, gave no hint of enemy presence. Talbot’s soldiering instinct told him it was safe to proceed.
“Where are you go
ing, sir?” Wilkes asked as he pulled himself free of his plug-hole. “Shouldn’t we be heading back to the riverbed camp?”
“I figure we have at least an hour before the Irians work out they’ve been fooled,” Talbot said. “Plenty of time to set up.”
“What do you have in mind, Major?” Wilkes asked doubtfully.
“We need to cut down as many trees as we can.”
By this stage several soldiers had gathered round. Talbot was struck by how small his group was now.
“We don’t have much time,” he said for their benefit. “I want twenty trees felled and stripped by the time the Irians return.”
“We blocking the ravine somehow?” Quantum asked.
“Spot on,” Talbot said. “But not in the way you might be thinking. I want the trunks fashioned into two separate gates.”
“Their sentinels could knock over a wooden gate in seconds flat,” Wilkes said incredulously.
“A sentinel could,” Talbot said cryptically. “But I’m hoping they don’t make it that far.”
“These trees are mature hardwoods,” Wilkes pointed out. “We don’t have the tools to fell them in under an hour. We’d need a day at least.”
“Sir,” Fielding said. “Three of my scouts are leveled in woodcraft. Anwar ran an assessment on our first run through the valley.”
Talbot looked at the young man expectantly.
“Most of these trunks are infected with boreworms,” the scout said. “Critters usually attack the base of the tree. We might find soft wood at cutting level, but the rest of the trunk would be fine.”
“Promising,” Talbot said, turning to Quantum. “Can you manufacture fifteen axes, Gary?”
“Already moving,” came the reply.
“Once you receive an axe, move straight to a tree identified by Anwar,” Talbot shouted. “When you have fallen timber, call Quantum for stripping and processing. Get to work.”
Talbot stood back to watch the operation unfold. Anwar turned out to be correct - many of the outwardly strong, healthy conifers were riven with squirming black worms. Their axes ate through the rotten wood with ease, though Quantum had to produce more axes as they themselves were worn down.
The various sharp sounds of tree felling echoes across the valley. Talbot’s company made good time, felling the required quota of trees in under twenty minutes. In many cases the boreworms had only infected less than ten feet of wood, leaving plenty of good, hard timber to work with. In restricting the work to the upper valley, hopefully it wouldn’t be obvious that work had been done there.
The next task involved lashing the wood together with twine and using a burning technique to ‘solder’ the beams into each other. The Terran engineers had soon produced three solid wooden lattices that could span the ravine if required. Of course, they were rather crude. Anyone with a plasma blaster would eat through them with ease. But only sentinels had plasma blasters on the Irian side. And after Talbot was finished with the ravine, it was unlikely that sentinels would get that far.
“Hide them well,” Talbot barked. The wooden frames were stowed under a bed of pine needles near the top of the ridge. They wouldn’t be discovered unless the enemy was specifically looking for them.
By this stage the Irians had been gone for over fifty minutes. Ashby was probably making sure the humans weren’t out on the prairie.
“Wilkes, form the column,” Talbot said urgently. “Hard march to the riverbed camp.”
The journey through the darkness was fraught for many reasons. First, the Avari darkness was a particularly ominous darkness, particularly when they reached the jungle and the moonlight died. All kinds of chittering, unseen creatures scuttled and darted in the undergrowth, content to lay seeds of doubt in the intrepid travelers.
Second, Talbot’s host was dog tired after their long second day, a day in which they had been expected to build a base, flee, endure a deadly ambush, then flee again. As such it was difficult to get them to move at full speed.
Third, no one knew if Ashby had left any nasty surprises behind. For that reason Talbot instructed Porter to stay off the animal tracks he occasionally used for navigation. It made the going slower, especially when the machetes had to come out, but it eased Talbot’s mind a great deal. He also thanked the gods that one of the Terran skill trees was pathfinding. Without Porter, he would’ve been flying blind through the dense, low-visibility jungle.
Better still, many of the scouts and engineers had leveled up at the northern ravine and were now well on the way to taking up specialized positions in the team. For example, Quantum was now so proficient in construction that to build things all he needed to do was access a range of options in an action HUD that had appeared in the bottom left of his view. Provided, of course, the raw materials were at hand.
The game was all about manual interaction with the environment until one could level up in a chosen discipline. Over time, performing actions related to that discipline required less effort until they became completely automated.
The troops’ successful advancement within the game’s mechanics was the one scrap of hope that Talbot could hold onto. Being able to manipulate the environment to advantage was like recruiting a powerful ally. And allies were like gold now that the Terran host had been diminished to a quarter of its size.
If Talbot got through this jungle experience with no more losses he would count that as a win, though he very much doubted that was going to happen. Ashby was too adept at hunting. As Talbot followed his troops in the rear of the column, he contented himself with the mental image of smashing Ashby’s head in like a watermelon. Now that was a comforting thought.
The host reached the riverside camp around three in the morning. Thankfully, the small Terran garrison remained. That was five heads Talbot could add to his paltry army. Even better, Mannet looked to be over the worst of his tic infection. He reported that the Irian host had passed by in a great hurry earlier in the day. The Terrans had fired a couple of pot shots but failed to score any kills.
“You did well,” Talbot said. “The main objective was to hold this base.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“Scouts on patrol,” Talbot called out. “I want a team of engineers ready to relieve in three hours.”
Wilkes and Fielding organized the troops. It was important that the bulk of the Terran force slept, but the southern approach needed to be watched closely. Only a diligent early warning system could alert the slumbering soldiers of imminent danger. Designed to hold a small patrol, the base interior rapidly filled with soldiers lying top to toe on the sandy soil.
Talbot surveyed the southern approach for several minutes, but he couldn’t see much in the dark. One thing was certain - Ashby and his troops knew exactly where they were and would be coming soon, probably at dawn.
Judging from the sky, there was probably only four hours of darkness left. Talbot padded tiredly around the back of the base and collapsed on a bed of flat leaves. He was so exhausted he figured he’d get a couple of hours of shut-eye before battle preparations would begin. The soft footfall of an approaching figure made his body tense.
“Laura …?”
“No - Harris, sir. Courtney Harris.”
Ignoring the twinge of pain in his heart, Talbot beckoned Harris over. Her body felt good. It was warm and supple. As the sounds of the jungle sank its teeth into him, he submitted to the fever dreams swirling in the back of his mind.
18
The first thing Talbot checked when he woke from his tormented slumber was the beacon map on his wrist pad. 5-2 in favor of the Irians. They must’ve picked up a few beacons during the night. His expression must’ve been grim, because Harris gently extricated herself from his arms and mumbled something about battle preparations.
Talbot went and drank some water from the camp tub and went to find Wilkes.
“All quiet,” he said, eyes locked on the still-dark southern approach.
“Won’t be long now,” Talbot said, and if i
t sounded like reassurance, it was. Any soldier knew it was the waiting that was the worst. Talbot went to look for Fielding and found her standing with Corbin and Quantum under a stand of purple-flowered trees.
“We should be taking up positions,” Talbot warned as he approached.
“We have something,” Fielding said excitedly.
Corbin was holding what looked like regular insect larvae, except for the electric blue streaks along the side of the cocoon.
“Never seen anything like it,” Corbin enthused. “According to the holo-tag, the gel inside is a critical ingredient for the construction of bore grenades.”
“Bore grenades?” Talbot asked.
“My reaction exactly, sir. According to the tag, they can cause both acid and incendiary damage.”
Talbot looked at Fielding. “That could be a game-changer against Irian sentinels,” he said.
“What’s the bet Ashby will lead with his sentinels in the coming attack?” Fielding returned.
“We don’t have much time,” Talbot said. “Can we produce these grenades at the workbench, Quantum?”
“That’s the best bit, sir,” the head engineer said, his eyes glittering. “The bore grenade recipe is entirely organic. The material combusts on impact, releasing the acid inside. The perfect hand-crafted weapon on Avari.”
“Collect as many larvae as you can,” Talbot said, his hopes rising. “I assume they like these particular trees?”
“They do, sir,” Corbin said. “I’m calling them salvation trees. I hope you don’t mind.”
“Couldn’t think of a more appropriate name,” Talbot said with a smile. “Well done, Corbin. Who said ecology didn’t pay, eh?”
Talbot marched back to the riverside fortification to oversee the preparation of the workbench. Quantum’s first task was a few final modifications to the standard engineer’s plasma blaster. Using local materials he’d been able to craft a slightly longer barrel and a cooling chamber that greatly reduced the chance of over heating.
Virtual War: Alpha Centauri (A LitRPG Novel) Page 11
