by B. V. Larson
We’d only brought down six by the time they hit our line. My whole unit, facing twenty of the enemy, was overrun. Graves came on the channel, giving us all direct orders in the final seconds before they hit us.
“Duck down when they step over you,” he said in a remarkably calm voice. “Lie down in the trench. That way you’ll probably avoid being crushed. When they stop the charge, do battle by squads with the nearest enemy. Fire at will.”
The battle went into slow-motion for me after that. It was like I was living at a different pace. My heart was pounding, and my lungs were burning with rapid, panting breaths.
I fell on my back when the enemy hit our front trench line. A wave of dirt splattered my faceplate, obscuring my vision, but I was able to see the foot that had landed not five feet from me.
Someone in the line hadn’t been so lucky—it was Natasha. A giant had stepped right on her, crushing her down with terrific force.
I let rip with my rifle, shooting the alien right in the crotch, but that only lasted for a split-second before it was gone. A few drops of milky fluid dribbled from the creature onto my armor, smoking white as the acid burned the metal.
Scrambling on all fours to Natasha, I was able to haul her out of the dirt. She was buried and helpless inside a huge footprint, but she was still alive. The earth and her armor had kept her from being crushed to death, but she had been pinned down. After freeing her, I turned back to the enemy.
They ended their charge as I watched. We were in the first trench not the second one, but this time we’d actually gotten the better end of the deal. The monsters that had overrun us stumbled to a halt. Some of them actually bumped into the hull of the lifter as a man might push off on a wall after a hard run. They doubled back and began going to work on the humans inside the inner circle of trenches.
Methodically, the aliens dug soldiers out of their shallow, scraped holes. All at once, I knew how gophers in a field must have felt when their homes were being stomped out of existence by a pack of grinning farm boys.
Fortunately, these “gophers” had teeth that could reach up to bite an enemy at range. I lit up a new target, the one I’d shot in the groin. Everyone who was able to fight blazed at it until it fell, thrashing. A flopping infantryman was in its hands, looking like a toy. Even though we took it down with concentrated, close-range fire, it had time to crush the man’s helmet with its massive jaws. The headless body was then cast away, twirling end over end until it crashed down onto the upper hull of the lifter and lay there motionless.
“Unit,” Graves said, still sounding like he was officiating at some kind of picnic, “I’ve been informed that the lifter crew is about to employ anti-personnel weaponry. Take cover—now.”
For a moment, my mind froze over. Then I remembered what he was talking about. Our lifters had new equipment: anti-personnel turrets. Essentially, these weapons systems were pulse-lasers on rotating mounts. The weapons had been added after our troubles on Machine World. I’d been briefed on them, but I’d never seen them in action.
Looking over the scene, I thought it might be disastrous to employ such a tool now. We had every soldier left alive in the legion out here defending the line. The automated turrets didn’t always know friend from foe, as I recalled. If they had a target, they fired, regardless of who might be behind that target or even in-between the target and the turret.
“Take cover!” I shouted to my squad, throwing myself into the trench again.
Others tried to follow me, but it wasn’t easy for all of us to fit. The soft dirt of our trenches had been greatly disrupted. Much of the trench line had been filled in by the tread of multi-ton monsters as they charged over us.
Gazing out of my thin line of cover, I realized why the lifter people were panicking. The creatures were all over the ship, tearing at it. Metal chunks had already been ripped from the hull. In their combined fury and strength, they’d managed to shift the entire lifter, and it now stood at a cant of perhaps five or ten degrees. All around the perimeter of the transport, more and more aliens were rushing up, joining their frenzied comrades. They were about to tip the ship up and over.
The turrets rolled out of protective clamshells. Visually, the effect was like that of a large animal opening eyes that had been tightly clamped shut. There were five or six turrets within my field of view—too many for my comfort.
When the turrets began to fire, things got worse. As far as I could tell, they were killing men as often as aliens. For every monster that was lit up and blown apart, at least one of our own troops died in the flashing spillover.
Scrambling on all fours, I crawled up against the body of an alien and took refuge there. As I moved, I felt something catch my foot. I pulled hard and quickly broke free.
Dragging myself, sides heaving, I fell back against the trunk of the dying alien. It was still shivering with those fronds it had on its trunk twitching and squirming like dying snakes. But it provided shelter for me with its body.
Two of my troopers joined me in short order. One was Carlos, the other was Kivi.
“You hurt, boss?” Carlos asked.
“I’m fine,” I said. “Keep down. We’ll be okay.”
Carlos gave Kivi a worried glance. We were all staying low, up against the fallen trunk of the alien. Carlos backed down the length of my body, toward my boots. He kept the body of the fallen monster against his shoulder as he moved.
“Just lie still, McGill,” he said.
I felt something then. It was a hard tug on my foot. “What the hell are you doing?” I demanded.
“I’m doing my job, Vet. Kivi, get his attention.”
Kivi’s face came into view. I was lying on my back now, and my breathing was ragged. I felt a little funny.
“James,” Kivi said, forcing a smile. “You’re going to be okay. You took a hit, that’s all. Just lie here and let Carlos do what he’s been trained to do.”
I knew it was good advice the second I heard it. But as my mama could have told you, I wasn’t much for following good advice.
Heaving myself into a sitting position, I grunted and strained. I pushed Kivi away and stared down at my legs.
One of them was missing, just below the knee.
“Damn,” I said. “Those frigging turrets. That was Winslade, I’d bet you a dollar to a donut. He ordered them to let loose with the turrets.”
“I’ve almost got this,” Carlos said. “But you’ve lost a lot of blood, Vet. You need to lie flat. Sitting up is sending more blood right out of your body.”
“What good am I with one leg missing anyway?” I demanded. I tried to get up, but they both worked to stop me.
If I’m one thing, I’m a large, strong man. I bowled Kivi backward and pushed Carlos’ face out of mine.
Lifting my rifle, I unloaded it into the nearest creature. The monster went down with a crash, but it wasn’t just my doing. It was one of the last ones standing. Lots of people were firing at it. It felt good to see it fall anyway. In each of its alien claws, it clutched an armored corpse, as if it didn’t want to let them go.
I looked around the battlefield, sweating and panting. I grinned.
“Looks like we wiped them out,” I said. “Maybe Winslade made the right call after all.”
Carlos came back to my side and gently tried to push me down. I felt myself sinking. I didn’t remember him being that strong.
I kept on sinking after I was lying on my back. Spinning, too. I wanted to vomit, but I couldn’t get anything to come up.
Carlos and Kivi were saying something, but I didn’t catch their words.
Then, looking up at plants so tall that hazy clouds drifted between my eyes and their glorious crowns…I died.
-21-
While I was dead, a thought occurred to me.
No, it didn’t really happen that way…but it felt as if it did.
Sometimes, when a man is revived, it seems like his mind has been dreaming while floating in a hazy half-existence between li
fe and death. This was just one of those times.
The thought that was fixed in my mind as I breathed with fresh lungs, coughing and hacking, was that I’d been wronged. I shouldn’t have had my leg blown off. It was the fault of my officers, and I wasn’t happy about that.
My mouth worked the moment I came back, but my limbs were sluggish. I squinted as I opened my eyes. All I could see was bright white lights and shadows moving nearby.
I knew they were bio people. For some reason they seemed like ghouls to me today, and I wanted nothing to do with them.
“You can all go to Hell,” I said in raspy voice.
“What’s that?” asked a voice. I recognized it was Anne after a moment, but I didn’t care. I was in a bad mood this time around.
“I said you’re all assholes, and Winslade’s the worst of your kind.”
“You’re not making any sense, James,” she said patiently. “I can barely understand your slurred words.”
Sitting up with a grunt and a deep breath, I found an orderly was poking at my neck with something.
“What’s his Apgar score?” Anne asked.
“Nine, I’d say. He’s a good grow by all the numbers—but his mind seems fuzzy.”
“Give him a minute.”
The orderly poked at me again. His face was too close to mine. He was looking into my ear for some shitty reason. I found him and his instruments to be intolerable.
I put my hand on his face and pushed. The man went over and back onto his ass with a satisfying crash.
Another face appeared in my limited field of view after that. It was Anne, and she looked pissed. Her arms were crossed under her small breasts, pushing them up a little.
“That’s not an appropriate attitude, Veteran,” she said.
I looked at her. More specifically, I looked at her breasts. They were plumped up by her arms, and I focused on them blearily.
“You’ve got nice ones,” I said. “They look perfectly round, like apples.”
She made an odd sound of disgust then. “Are you making a pass at me, James? The moment you come back? Are you serious?”
“Suppose I am?”
“Well, that has to be the worst pick-up line I’ve ever heard.”
Despite myself, a smile flickered over my face. “I’m a little off my game,” I mumbled.
“You sure are. Now, is there a reason why you’re abusing my staff?”
I looked at the orderly. He was standing well clear of me, looking wary and irritated.
“Hey guy,” I said. “You look like you’re going to cry. Why don’t you go pout somewhere else?”
Anne moved between me and the orderly as I began to climb off the table. Maybe she took my move as threatening.
“James,” she said. “You’re exhibiting aggressive behavior without cause. That’s not good. Try to get a grip on yourself right now.”
I finally grasped what she was saying. She had the right and the duty to recycle me if my brain wasn’t working correctly. If I’d come back physically crippled, I’d have been killed for that as well.
“I’m fine,” I said.
“Sometimes,” Anne said, eyeing me in concern, “a bad grow doesn’t have a twisted limb or an organ failure that’s easy to measure with a blood test. Sometimes, they come back with a twist in the mind. I’m hoping that’s not your story, James.”
“It’s not. I’m fine.”
“Can you tell me why you’re angry?” she asked gently.
The truth was that her questioning was pissing me off. But that wouldn’t have been a good thing to admit. Instead, I tried to remember why I’d come off the table so sure that I’d been mistreated.
The thoughts I’d awakened with were hard to grasp. They were already like dreams that faded the second you woke up. Often, a minute or two after re-birth, I couldn’t recall what I’d been thinking about as I woke up.
But then, I finally remembered.
“I’ve got it now,” I said. “The turrets—the officers screwed up.”
“What do you mean, James?”
“They put the troops out in the forest instead of using our new defenses. They should have kept us back, under the hull of the lifter. They should have deployed the turrets before the giants even showed up. If they’d done that, only a few of us would have died. Maybe none of us would have. That’s why I’m pissed off. Hundreds died for nothing.”
Anne looked at me thoughtfully. After a moment, she nodded. “You have a point. We lost about half the force we had out there. I’m no tactician, but I can see why you aren’t happy.”
I sucked in another breath, and I felt better. I took a second to glance at the orderly.
“Sorry,” I said.
“No problem,” he responded. But I could see in his eyes that it was a problem.
I ignored him and moved to the lockers. I pulled on a uniform and left the revival chamber. As I did so, I could hear the orderly talking to Anne quietly.
“Are you sure he’s okay?” the man asked.
“It’s my call, and I’ve made it.”
“Yeah, sure. Your call.”
Feeling another mild surge of anger toward the nosy, whining orderly, I left the chamber before I could act on it.
Was something wrong with me? What part of the brain controlled anger? I had no idea. Could it be true they’d brought me back to life with new emotional problems that I didn’t already have? Wonderful.
Usually, when troops were revived outside of battle, they headed for their bunks or maybe got a light meal. I did neither. I almost didn’t know where I was headed until I got there.
The guards at the ladder that led up to the officer’s deck let me pass after a cursory glance. After all, I’d blown past them with Winslade’s blessing just a few hours earlier. They had no idea what I was intending to do.
Winslade was in his office, but he wasn’t alone. The primus had a guest.
Claver was strapped to a chair in front of Winslade’s desk. I barged in and stared. Claver’s head was lolling strangely.
“What the…?” Winslade demanded. “Oh, it’s you McGill. I thought you were still dead. Well, no matter. Did they send you to collect the body? That’s what I requested. I thought you were an orderly. Such an inconvenience having them all so busy down there.”
I was still staring at Claver. His head rested on his chest. His tongue protruded, and his eyes were open a fraction.
“You killed him?” I asked.
Winslade laughed. “Slow today, are we? Claver chose not to give me the information I wanted. I decided to reroll, as it were. Next time, we’ll get more from him. I’ve learned a few things from this experience.”
There was blood on the floor. Claver’s blood. My eyes crawled over it silently.
Now, don’t get me wrong—Claver has always been a card-carrying fucker of the first order. I’d once watched him cause thousands of Tau to die just because they inconvenienced him.
But that didn’t mean the man should be tortured to death. What made it worse was knowing I’d suggested we revive him for questioning.
This same cruel cycle of life, torture and death, had been visited upon my person in the past, and I took a dim view of the practice.
“If there really is a Hell and there’s any justice in this universe,” I said, “someday Claver will be the devil’s favorite.”
Winslade cocked his head and narrowed his eyes. “You’re in an odd, poetic mood today.”
“But that doesn’t mean,” I continued as if he hadn’t spoken, “that we should torture and kill even such a wretch as he!”
I looked up, meeting Winslade’s gaze.
He knew then what I intended. He saw the emotions surging behind my eyes. A murderous lust burned in my twisted mind. An anger I couldn’t hide any longer.
“What’s wrong with you, McGill?” he asked. “Has something gone wrong with your revive?”
“I don’t think so, sir,” I said. “I think it’s gone very right. I think
I can see more clearly now than ever before.”
Winslade nodded and sat on his desk nonchalantly as if he didn’t have a care in the world. I didn’t have a weapon—but we both knew that didn’t matter.
“Your head is tilting to one side, and your left eye is blinking on its own,” Winslade said. “Are you even aware of that?”
“What I’m aware of is your shortcomings as an officer,” I said. “You ordered us to set up a defensive position too far out from the lifter. We should’ve been tightly circled under the vehicle’s struts. Then anti-personnel turrets could have been deployed safely with us in reserve—instead of the other way around.”
Winslade shrugged. “Tactical hindsight? Really? That’s what this is all about? You think you know better than I do how to run a cohort?”
“Yes,” I said flatly.
He frowned at me. “I shall have you arrested for this,” he said. “But I want to hear more first. Let’s hear what you really think.”
“I think you’re a sadist who sat up here toying with Claver instead of doing your job,” I began, and it got worse from there. I told him everything I thought—hell, everything the whole legion thought about Primus Winslade.
He shot me before I even finished my tirade. I never saw it coming. Whatever else he was, he was a sneaky bastard. He’d had a small, concealed needler in his palm the whole time. I figured that out later.
When I was on my back, trying to breathe and staring up at him, he dared to loom close.
“You want to know what I think?” he asked me conversationally. “I think you’re a big baby who didn’t like dying in a fight. Worse, you’re a bad grow. A mental case. That’s lucky for you because I’m going to give you another chance, just like Claver, here. Now, when you wake up, I want you to come upstairs again and give me the best apology you’re capable of. One that money can’t buy. Do you understand?”
Growling and spitting blood, I reached for his throat. I caught hold of his neck for a moment, squeezing, but I lost my grip. I was gratified to see the shock on his face as my big fingers tore at his shirt and pulled him off-balance.
