“Listen,” Maria said, making her voice as loud as possible without yelling, without sounding as if she had edged just a bit closer to losing it. “You know that sooner or later they will give us some orders. But if they hear we’ve been standing around as if we were waiting for a bus, well”—she looked at the soldier who had emerged as her most vocal opponent—“you try explaining that. And if people die because we were all here hiding, cowering—”
Fighting words, she knew, to any marine, whether a space marine or the more earthly variety.
“—you can be sure that, as bad as this is, for some of us it could get a lot worse.”
“At least we’d still be alive.”
Another voice. Perhaps the ringleader’s side-kick. Might be a good pressure point to hit, Maria thought. And if she knew anything from her years as a marine, and before that her years in a ring trading blows with some other woman equally eager to take her down, it was to look for the pressure points, places where the right move could expose a weakness.
“Really? Is that what we are all about now? Staying alive? Well, I got a news flash for you, Private, that’s what I want to do, too. Except I don’t think hiding here is the way to do it. I think that we should set up a perimeter. I think we need to know if anything might still be out there, closing in on us. You see, I think we stand”—another step toward the soldier, whose height had him eyeball-to-eyeball with her—“a damn sight better chance if we act like goddamn soldiers rather than a bunch of old ladies…”
She added a bit of a sneer for effect.
“…or old men.” Now she looked around at the others. She felt Kim’s eyes on her, waiting to see how this was going to go down. Otherwise, it would be the two of them, alone. About as bad odds as there could be.
“What do you say?” She directed the question to the group, but no one answered her.
“Okay, good. I’m no officer but I can get us organized to—I dunno—what do you call it?” She smiled now, the tension easing. “‘Secure’ the area.”
Kim came and stood by her.
“Okay, we’re going to need three groups. One to head back to Alpha—” She brought the toughest one up first, and quickly added, “Which I will lead. One to start a patrol of this intersection, down the hallways, back. Constant radio contact. Every five minutes we check in. And then a few grunts to stay here, but weapons at the ready in case whatever the hell happened starts happening again. Any questions?”
Suddenly, the scared and rebellious group were soldiers again. And Maria thought, If I hadn’t screwed up my career by trying to save the UAC boss from a crazy grunt’s bullet six months ago, I might have made a damn good officer.
“Good. Well, I have one. Can we check ammo? Everyone. Let me know what you got. Because if we’re low…” She let the words trail off. They might need a fourth group to solve the ammo supply problem. And everyone there knew how far away that section was.
10
MARS CITY—VENT AREA 21 45 MINUTES AFTER THE FIRST OUTBREAK
THEO PULLED HIS KNEES UP TO HIS CHEST AS tight as he could, the hard bone of his jaw against his kneecap. For some reason—he didn’t know why—he banged his chin against his knee once, twice, a third time, and—
What was that? A noise, somewhere down there. He felt himself start to breathe again in that funny way, taking the air in fast, as if he were in some kind of race. He tried to listen to the sound of his breathing—could it be heard?
Could they hear it?
And then what? If they knew he was up here, would they stop and somehow find a way to climb up here, just as he did, and crawl into this small opening, just barely big enough for him. But then he thought: Could it be other people, like that soldier who saved him…saved him…saved him—
From his own mother.
What if soldiers came, and he sat so still that they passed right by him? And he’d be left alone again, in this dark space, the only light coming from the room below and farther down this metal tunnel?
He forced himself to pay attention to any sounds down there, and not worry about his breathing. He wished there was some way to make his ears work better. Could they be aimed if he tilted and turned? And what sounds should he listen for? The sound of steps, soldiers’ boots, and the clanking of their guns? Or…the sound of something taking strange steps, and the horrible sound of claws, and—
He felt himself start to cry again. But he knew he couldn’t do that. They’d hear him for sure, and come for him.
And whenever he thought about how he couldn’t do this, that he had to come out and try to get some help, he remembered what happened. How the strange wind filled that hallway, how he hid behind a wall while something happened to his mother. And when he came out, and she slowly turned (and he was so glad to see her), he didn’t know for the longest time that there was anything wrong.
Not until he could see her face, and then he knew that what was once his mother…had become something else. He had tried not to look at the rows of teeth from such a large mouth, the same mouth that once sang to him and asked him how he felt when he was sick. Now the jaw working up and down, his mother (no, it’s not my mother, not my mother, no—) looking at him with eyes that were big and empty, but kept looking at Theo.
And from the fairy tales she had read to Theo, he knew what such eyes wanted, what they were for…
And then that soldier telling Theo to run, get out of here, now, fast, hurry—run! And Theo did, knowing that the soldier would then stop the thing that used to be his mother.
On the way out of that place, Theo saw other things. More soldiers, dead ones this time—at least, he thought they were dead. And then other monstrosities that he made himself not look at. Because he knew he’d just stand there, shivering, crying, shaking, and waiting for them.
So he ran.
And when he crawled into this place, and started to scurry away, it felt safe. A secret place. But he also knew that he couldn’t stay here forever. Sooner or later, he’d have to move, have to come down.
He thought again of that soldier who saved his life. Theo wished he’d hear his voice again. But for now, he just listened very carefully. Waiting.
Now it was quiet…but there had been something before. Theo looked down the metal tunnel. Maybe it would be okay if he made a run for it? Keep moving, keep hiding, keep listening? And—he told himself, when he felt as if he couldn’t take it anymore—let himself remember what it was like down there.
He uncurled his legs, stretching out, and then, as though he were playing soldier in his old backyard on Earth, he started crawling forward.
11
UAC WORLDWIDE HEADQUARTERS—PALO ALTO 49 MINUTES AFTER THE FIRST OUTBREAK
IAN KELLIHER RAISED A HAND TO GENERAL Hayden. He didn’t want to hear any more explanations of how “secure” Mars City was right now, how every goddamn thing was now well under control. “General, can you stop for a second—”
“I just wanted to review the situation in all—”
“I know. But I want to do something else. You see, General, I don’t believe we have a lot of time to get up to speed.”
“I assure you, Ian, that everything is under control. I certainly hope you haven’t given orders to the Armada.”
Kelliher winced at Hayden’s use of his first name. “Mr. Kelliher” would be much more preferable. But then, Hayden was a bona fide hero of many of the shitty little wars of the past decades—or so his CV seemed to indicate. And having started with the precedent that Hayden was “General” and Kelliher was “Ian,” it would be a bit hard to change it now.
And Hayden had just raised an interesting point in this aftermath. On Mars, it was clear who was running the operation—the UAC. Funded largely with UAC money, Mars City was mostly a corporate operation with the support, tactical and financial, of the American people. Whether they wanted it or not.
But the Armada? That was a different story. The brass in the New Pentagon would never have turned over the operation of th
eir primary defensive and offensive space shield to a private enterprise. Sure, there was a good deal of cooperation back and forth: shared technology, resources, even money. And the Armada was at the beck and call of Kelliher and Mars City—within limits. But the bottom line was that the Armada, now on routine patrol in Jupiter space in support of the Europa expedition, remained under military control.
So what would be the implications of summoning it to Mars, to calling on it for help? Could they consider that the operation had been under civilian control for too long, with obviously disastrous effects? No matter that Kelliher’s father had made the entire concept of interplanetary travel feasible. The military could do what they’d done for millennia. Just march in and take over the fleet. History was filled with such lessons.
So Hayden raised a very important point. And the fact that the bastard was military even made the point almost more of a threat. But Kelliher had to admit, it was a good move. Maybe Hayden had more going on in his brain than Kelliher gave him credit for.
“Okay, General. Not to worry. The Armada has been thoroughly briefed that whatever happened is now under control. I believe they are making their way from Jupiter, but that was the mission plan all along.” Kelliher took a breath. “No alert to them has gone out from this office.”
Hayden’s eyes twitched a bit. The fat-ass general was probably pleased that his little game of chess had played so well. “And none from here either, Ian. I’ve made sure of that.” A small smile. “No need, really.”
“Yes. Good. No need. Now.”
“Now?”
Kelliher reached to the floating keyboard. “Time to review what happened, General. Time to look at some of the pictures we have here.” Now it was Kelliher’s turn to look Hayden right in the eyes. “Let’s look at exactly what happened, hm? And then—well, maybe you can explain it.”
“Ian, there are a lot of things here that need my—”
“Exhibit 1, General. Let’s just watch the vid, okay?”
A tap in the air, then Hayden’s face shrank to a box in the corner of the screen, and suddenly they had a crystal clear, breathtaking view of a section of Mars City near the lower Hydrocon units. Two space marines stood close to a wall, weapons slung over their shoulders. Kelliher brought up the audio.
“So—get this—she sent me another one. Last night. Even a hotter pic, man. I got to tell you—she’s driving me crazy.”
The other marine laughed. “You are one lucky son of a—”
The sound of steps, and the two marines in the vid straightened up. One looked at his PDA as if an urgent message had just come through. But when the third person entered the area, they both relaxed again.
“Carpenter? What the hell you doing here? Lost again?”
The third marine stopped. Kelliher noticed that this new entry, Carpenter, stood in the hallway. The other two were in a recessed area, so that if someone—a lieutenant or sergeant—was looking for their sorry asses, he wouldn’t see them just standing there.
“Kelly gave me an order to check power levels—in person. God, can’t they just—you know—look at their meters or something? Waste of my time.”
One of the other marines chuckled. “And your time is so valuable, right, Carpy? That’s one thing we don’t want to waste.”
And all three of them laughed at that. The sound was warm, human. In another second, the sound of that laughter became swamped with something else.
Instinctively, Kelliher leaned back. Hayden preemptively cleared his throat. “Ian, I’ve seen this. And—”
“Hold on, General. Indulge me.”
The sound of the shock wave blew out whatever was picking up audio. Good thing, Kelliher thought, considering what was coming. The two marines curled up close to the wall, their instincts quickly taking them out of the blast of whatever the hell just roared down that hallway.
But the third marine—
He disappeared in a smoky orange-red glow. For a moment he was completely invisible, but then Kelliher could make out the outline of a shape in the haze. At the same time, the two soldiers stood up, first looking at each other, then—it seemed—as if one of them looked down at his body to make sure it was all there.
It is for now, Kelliher thought. Another few seconds, and the third soldier could be seen. Or more appropriately, what had once been a soldier. With each passing second, his image became clearer. Kelliher felt his stomach tighten. Hard to repress the gag reflex, even though he had seen this a few times.
The face was the first thing that became visible. Except, with one eye nearly bulging out of its socket, and the other recessed and floating in a pool of bloody mucous, it was hard not to look away. But the jaw truly commanded one’s attention. Twice as large as a normal jaw, it snapped open and shut, its owner getting a handle on using this massive instrument. Teeth somehow jutted out sharply at all sorts of different angles.
Kelliher thought, How the hell did that happen so fast? Or did it? Is there something involving time going on here? Could what appears to be a few seconds actually be something else?
Only a few moments to take the rest of the creature in: hands turned into elongated claws, chunks of his uniform hanging off like some parchment blown away, exposing flesh—Kelliher imagined—below. But what flesh? The color of it now bronze and red, gashes and red lines scuttling across it. He swore he saw a new opening, oozing, just…appearing.
No audio. So no chance to hear what the two soldiers, now standing, looking at their friend, had to say. Probably “Holy shit.” Or “Goddamn.” Did they think it was really still their comrade, another space marine who happened to be standing in the wrong place at the wrong time?
“Ian, you can stop it.”
But Kelliher didn’t. He let it run as the creature moved with terrifying speed and precision. One would have guessed it would have—what?—lumbered, staggered, wounded, sliding toward the other soldiers. But no, it moved with the speed of a trained predator. The two clawed hands flew up, each landing on the neck of one of the other two soldiers. Kelliher looked away, just for a moment, then back to see the claws close. Then the men began gagging, their jaws open, trying to make a sound. But it was easy to see that the creature’s claws had closed tight around their throats, almost enough to sever the heads from the bodies.
But not quite.
The once human thing brought one soldier to its mouth and, with that same speed, bit down on his head as if eating a candy apple. Thank God there was no sound, as it cracked right through the skull with one great bite. The creature didn’t spit out the chunk.
But it did bring the other soldier, who Kelliher hoped (really, really hoped) was already dead, and did the same thing to him. And after several more bites, whatever the once-marine held in its claw-hands no longer looked like humans at all.
Kelliher reached up to the floating keyboard and killed the vid.
“Christ, Ian. Why did we have to watch that again?”
“Okay, General—can you tell me what we just saw? What the hell was that?”
“We—we’re not sure. Some of the men have started to call them zombies.” A nervous laugh from Hayden. He started to say something else, but again some fluctuation in the signal allowed a few seconds’ delay to kick in. In a moment, the audio caught up again: “I have teams looking at it now, Ian. A disease, a virus—”
Kelliher shook his head, then said, “Hope I don’t catch it.”
The sick joke sat in the room for a minute. Hayden took a breath and tried to continue. “Thing is, we don’t know what happened, except that it came from Delta. The good thing is—”
“Oh, there’s a good thing about all this?”
“Delta has been secured. Dr. Betruger has Delta completely secure and has begun an investigation of the incident.”
“Incident. I do hope you have the area sealed off.”
“Of course. In fact, Betruger did that internally. But we also dispatched Sergeant Kelly and a full squad to position themselves at all
the points of egress from Delta. Nothing in, nothing out, until we know what’s going on.”
Somehow the words didn’t give Kelliher any sense of security. “So not many theories, eh? Disease? Radiation of some kind from the teleportation process? Something—whatever it is—that works fast….”
Hayden said nothing.
“Any idea of how many of them there are? Your zombies.”
“Not yet. We haven’t begun full patrols of all of Mars City. Still securing—”
“Begin them.”
“Yes, we will.” Hayden looked as if he thought that their chat was done.
“Hold on, General. I know you have a lot to deal with up there, but there’s one more thing I want to show you.”
Hayden settled back in his chair, looking like a twelve-year-old about to see how badly he had screwed up.
“Take a look at this. If you would. As long as we’re talking theories, ideas. Okay?”
Hayden nodded, and Kelliher began the second vid.
12
MARS CITY 53 MINUTES AFTER THE FIRST OUTBREAK
KANE WALKED OVER TO THE CURVED RECEPTION desk. The woman at the desk was still curled up, still heaving, sobbing, a clenched fist muffling her tears, and didn’t even look up at him.
Behind her, Kane looked at the massive 3-D panorama of Mars City, a vision of the future when the labs and tunnels here would have given way to towers filled with people living here as this Red Planet supposedly—and miraculously—became terraformed back to life.
That dream seemed dead now. Going to be mighty hard getting pioneers to come live here. Not until they get all the bodies out of the way.
Only twenty minutes ago, Kane had gone to look for this woman’s friend, the other receptionist, who found out that even a woman’s restroom could suddenly turn into a trap out of her worst nightmares. He leaned down. “Anything I can do?” He glanced at her name tag. “Molly? Can I get you anything?”
Doom 3™: Maelstrom Page 5
