by Gavin Smith
In his massive hands he held a disturbingly organic-looking weapon, a tendril-like power cable connecting the weapon to his main body like an umbilical cord. The weapon had an over and under barrel. I guessed it was a shard cannon combined with a black-light projector. A chain of what looked like black bone ran from the weapon to a hump-like growth on Gregor’s lower back. This was ammunition for the shard cannon. The hump was either ammunition storage or possibly, depending on available energy, even a little biological ammunition factory, I wasn’t sure which.
By far and away the worst thing for me were the tentacles. People shouldn’t have tentacles. They were long and sinuously writhed behind him, backlit by a glow from the engine room. They were thick and powerful, and covered in small scales of chitin that didn’t seem to restrict their movement.
Morag glanced over at me, but I really didn’t have any reassurance for her. Pagan was staring at me pointedly. I ignored him. Morag let out an involuntary scream. I turned back to Gregor and let out my own involuntary cry of surprise. Gregor’s triangular head was splitting in half, pulling itself apart. There were tendrils of slime suspended between the two halves. Inside, nestled among alien gristle, was Gregor’s human head. Somehow it reminded me of a pearl in an opened oyster. The familiar face made it all the more freakish and difficult to deal with. I guessed he’d kept his human head and face to try and cling on to the last vestiges of his humanity but it just made him more alien. Maybe Balor wasn’t being such a hypocrite, I decided. The sad thing was Gregor didn’t really look all that much like one of Them either.
‘It’s still me,’ he said, but his voice sounded odd, slightly modulated.
‘The fact that you have to say that ...’ Mudge began, but a look from me silenced him. Nobody else really had anything to say. Gregor looked like he was in pain; he looked like he was going to cry. That was when I realised that his eyes were human again, the cybernetic lenses gone. I zoomed in on his eyes with my own lenses. They were brown. I wanted to ask him what he’d done to himself? Was anything worth this?
‘Let’s get this over and done with,’ I said instead. I needed to force my feelings down, beneath the training, the discipline and Mudge’s drugs.
‘We’re still going ahead with this then?’ Pagan asked, contacting me through a private channel on the tac net rather than asking out loud.
‘This changes nothing,’ I replied to him brusquely and then out loud to the rest of them. ‘Right, you know the drill, run silent, no unnecessary systems, just like the dive. Comms silence unless we’re compromised—’
‘When we’re compromised,’ Pagan corrected me.
‘Until then use sign language only. Gregor—’ I glanced over to the alien form hulking over us all ‘—is going to tow us into the Teeth, because he should be scanning as one of them.’ He nodded. ‘Once in, we use the compressed-air system on the fins to manoeuvre. Do not use your primary system unless we’re compromised.’
‘And then what?’ Pagan asked, though he knew damn well.
‘We find the pod, disable it, use it to send a signal to the other pods and extract back to the ship,’ I said. It sounded so easy.
‘You mean, if we get to the pod we hold Them off as long as possible until we’re eventually overrun,’ Pagan said.
‘That is more likely,’ Gregor said. Even through the modulation I could hear the pain in his voice.
‘Pagan, either stay behind or shut up,’ I said. I didn’t have time for this. ‘Gibby is going to hold here for twelve hours. If we’re not back by then he’s out of here. If he gets compromised he will attempt E&E, set sail to put some distance between the Spear and Them, and then meet us at our secondary or tertiary RV points.’
‘And we still don’t know what we’re looking for?’ Mudge asked. I glared at him. ‘I’m just asking.’
‘We know it’s a pod, we have coordinates for it, and we know it will be a human application of Themtech,’ Gregor said.
‘Anything else?’ I asked.
‘Morag?’ Pagan said.
I tried to force down the pain, ignore it and busy myself with other things. Tried not to think that this would be the last time I saw her. I couldn’t help but glance over at Morag as she struggled to get into the Mamluk. She looked like a pale and frightened little girl. I felt I was sending her to her death, though in reality I was doing that to everyone.
‘Morag’s going to be doing her own thing,’ I said.
‘I’ll split with you when we reach the Teeth.’ She sounded both scared and strangely sure of herself.
I looked over at Rannu, expecting an objection from him, insistence that he accompanied her, but he said nothing. I think I was jealous of his confidence in her, his faith? Enough thinking. I finally managed to wriggle into the control slippers and gloves. I was lying down on the padding as the four interface plugs slipped into the ports on the back of my neck. Information from the Mamluk’s systems appeared on my internal visual display. The front panel slid shut over me as the head lowered and clicked into place. I didn’t get the rush and feeling of power I had in the Wraith over the Atlantic. This time I felt like I’d been locked into a cell only slightly bigger than my own body. Still I’d decided to take Mudge’s advice. A mournful-sounding saxophone started up, music piped directly into my ears, as I shut down all nonessential systems on my mech.
The bomb bay was effectively a large airlock. The internal door closed and locked and the bomb bay depressurised before the two enormous external doors opened. Craning the Mamluk’s neck, I could see blackness punctuated with pinpricks of starlight below me. We seemed to tumble out. We had to get out quickly because the Spear was zipped up, everything retracted to present the smallest possible scanner signature, and the open doors disrupted that.
I was free-floating now just beneath - or above, depending on your perspective - the Spear. Gregor was last out. A tentacle snaked out of the darkness of the bomb bay and gripped the edge of the hatch, then another joined it and another. Others whipped out, reaching for us as Gregor pulled himself out of the spacecraft. We all knew he was going to be towing us but even so I flinched as a tentacle wrapped around the midriff of my mech. The pale-blue light of his propulsion system seemed to burn slightly brighter as we moved away from the relative safety of the ship towards the Teeth. Even though I knew both the mech and my inertial undersuit were heated, I felt cold. I tried to tell myself it was just the psychology of EVA.
First it seemed to take for ever - the Teeth never seemed to be getting closer - and then all of a sudden we were there and they filled our vision. Much of the Teeth was uninhabited but the coordinates we were heading for were densely populated by Them. Fear and awe warred within me. The larger asteroids were in pretty static orbits, despite the binary nature of the star system. However the aliens had joined many of them together, strands and structures of what I guess were the aliens themselves ran between the huge rocks. It wasn’t like human construction - no inelegant metal or concrete scarring the rocks. They weren’t even structures; there were no delineated roles for the growths. They were habitats and production centres and defences all in one. They were alive, growing, taking raw materials from the rock and energy from their pale stars. If anything these growths were Them; what we saw on Dog 4 and on the other battlefields in the colonies were just Their weapons. I tried to think of a comparison, something to help me understand Them as we approached the Teeth. They were like a latticework of coral suspended between huge floating mountains.
Because of our relative spatial perceptions, although we were approaching it seemed like we were staying still and the Teeth were getting bigger and bigger. The closer we got the easier it was to make out the cordon of ships from Their fleet. We could even see new ones growing out of the alien matter. In the alien coral I began to make out the energy matrices and cancerous-looking growths of various weapon systems. Closer still and I could make out smaller craft, Their equivalent of long-range raiders and fighters, then EVA-equipped Walkers and
finally what we’d always thought of as Them, the Berserks, though they were really just another weapon system.
There were other humanoid Them-forms here. Ones we’d never seen before, which presumably performed some niche task in their space-going ecology.
This was insane. There were so many of Them crawling like termites over Their complex structures. Why couldn’t They see us? Of course we were tiny little specks against a backdrop of infinity, using some very sophisticated stealth technology and prayers not to get noticed. Also if humanity had never tried a penetration this foolish before, and I wasn’t aware we had, then They wouldn’t have learnt to look for something like this.
Several of the manoeuvring mechanisms on Gregor’s battle form glowed brighter as he changed position. He angled towards a sparsely populated gap between several of the rocks, though I could see lattice growths on them that suggested sensors. We trailed behind him, a tentacle wrapped around each of us, two around Balor’s Dog Soldier mech. It reminded me of a spider’s web with multiple flies caught in it.
Vertigo threatened to overtake me, breaking through the narcotic haze of Mudge’s drugs, as we flew silently into the gap between three of the huge asteroids. I was having problems coping with the sheer scale of the landscape. Above and beneath us I could see Them moving through space, Their propulsion systems glowing pale blue as well. Many of Their forms were unrecognisable to me, serving purposes I could only guess at. To my left I saw something that looked insectile crawl across Them-growth, picking at it with mandibles and manipulators, presumably some kind of maintenance creature. It ignored us as we floated past, the music going a long way towards helping keep me calm.
As we rounded one of the bigger asteroids that formed the outer perimeter, the light that emanated from deeper within the Teeth almost acted like a sunrise effect. In the distance I could make out spires reminiscent of the vision that Ambassador had given me as I’d slept next to Morag. Except these spires weren’t multi-hued, they were black, pale bioluminescence providing illumination. The spires grew out of four huge planetoid-sized asteroids, all of them pointing inwards like a jagged maw. Thick strands of the coral material formed a web connecting the four asteroids. Between the spires huge tentacles moved, performing tasks I could only guess at. It was beautiful and sinister, and the more I thought about it the more I was sure that it was so far removed from me that I didn’t belong here.
Gregor took us in close to a smaller asteroid with no visible growth on it. Tiny molecular hooks mounted on pads adhered to the Mamluks’ fingers and feet attached us to the rock as Gregor’s tentacles slid off us. We formed a quick and impromptu defensive perimeter. I superimposed the coordinates that Gregor had provided over the view in front of me. The pod was hopefully just on the outskirts of the maw-like city. The area was crawling with Them.
Without doing an active scan that would have given away our position I reckoned that our destination was about twelve miles way. I plotted the course I would have chosen, the path of least resistance, as a matter of course, my training kicking in. As it was, it was Gregor’s call. Using hand signals the huge hybrid pointed out the course he wanted to take, which initially seemed to agree with mine, and then indicated that he wanted to head off. We all signalled the affirmative and Gregor pushed himself off the rock.
We flew in an arrowhead formation, tight as possible to keep within the biometric pattern that Gregor was transmitting. Gregor was point, Morag and Rannu flanked him, Pagan and Mudge flanked them and I flanked Pagan. Balor flew in the centre of the V providing our rearguard. We stayed as close to the rocks as we could and tried to avoid any of Their growth.
Moving was a matter of firing a blast of compressed air from the propulsion fin to send you in the direction you wanted to go, and then making any adjustments to your course with smaller blasts of compressed air. We, or rather I, and I’m assuming it was the same for the other members of the team, experienced more than one moment of pant-shitting terror as we came round a blind corner to find Them-growth or worse some Them-form only to have it seemingly ignore us. This was either because of the biometric pattern that Gregor was transmitting or because we were superfluous to its duties. Despite this and the general constant high stress level, the main problem was a struggle to stay alert because of the slowness of our movement. Going from one piece of cover to the next was boring, except when we had to cross large areas of open space. That got exciting largely because you didn’t know if you were going to get seared open by black light at any given moment. We were really penetrating Themspace; I couldn’t believe we were really doing this. I needed a cigarette and a drink.
We formed a rough circle in an indent on a smallish, tethered asteroid close enough to Maw City, as I’d come to think of the nearby habitat, to be bathed in its ambient light. I felt a thrill of success at getting this close. We truly were sneaky bastards! We were looking up at another rock face about a hundred and fifty feet away from us. I felt one of the other mechs touch my Mamluk’s arm. I moved my mech’s head to take in the image of Morag signalling that she was leaving. I signalled a negative for no good reason. I didn’t want her to leave. It was too soon and I was still alive, but she signalled an affirmative. I signalled her to wait and reached out. Signals from the Mamluk’s armoured skin told me my mech had touched hers. Gas escaped from her propulsion fin and I watched as her mech gracefully, or so it seemed to me, took off into the void.
We stayed where we were, giving Morag time to get clear. Now beads of sweat were beginning to appear on my skin as each second passed without my mech’s passive scanner picking up weapons fire. Each second that Morag didn’t transmit to say she was in trouble meant that I knew she was still alive.
There was another tap on my arm. I turned to see Mudge’s mech gesturing towards the lip of the small crater in which we were hiding. I could just make out the irregular silhouette of a Walker beyond the lip on the surface of the asteroid. I turned back to Mudge. Beyond his mech I could see the Dog Soldier disappearing into a cavern entrance in the asteroid. I couldn’t see Gregor so presumably he was in the cave as well. The rest of them were crawling in what looked like slow motion towards the cave entrance. Mudge was doing the same and I followed.
Last into the cave, I ended up acting as picket. It was huge. I looked past the rest of them as they moved deeper into the cathedral-sized cavern. I could see another exit about a kilometre away from my position. Between here and there huge pillars of rock joined the ceiling to the floor. I was lying on a smooth slope next to a wall about twenty yards away from the cave entrance and was trying to make myself as small a target as possible, hoping that the stealth and camouflage systems of the Mamluk would protect me. About fifty yards behind me Balor was acting as fire support, covering my position, crouched down near to one of the pillars.
Although facing the cavern mouth, the Mamluk’s systems were providing me with a full three-sixty view on my internal visual display. I saw Gregor organising the others by hand signal to patrol into the cavern. He signalled to Pagan to join them, but Pagan signalled negative. Gregor signalled for Pagan to join him again, and again received a refusal. This was pissing me off. As if we weren’t in a tight enough situation, Pagan was choosing now to be insubordinate. Pagan moved behind the pillar next to Balor and out of my view. Even in his alien form I could tell Gregor was annoyed. Shaking his triangular head in an oddly human gesture, Gregor led Rannu and Mudge deeper into the cavern, walking in a staggered line.
There was nothing at the cave entrance. I was hoping that the Walker hadn’t seen us. There was certainly nothing to suggest we’d been caught in an active scan. That didn’t, however, mean we hadn’t been picked up on a passive scan. The bioluminescence of Maw City and the other Them-growth nearby lit up the cave mouth but threw the area where I was lying into shadow. I wished we’d brought vacuum-capable crawler cams or mites with us so I could check out what was going on on the surface of the asteroid, but any transmissions from devices like that would’ve b
een picked up.
Behind me, Gregor, Rannu and Mudge had stopped their advance towards the other entrance. Gregor and Rannu were providing security while Mudge looked at something. I split-screened my visual display and had the Mamluk zoom in on Mudge’s area. All through the rear part of the cavern alien growth coated the rock walls.
‘Shit,’ I muttered quietly. The soft jazz wasn’t doing quite such a good job of keeping me calm now. I watched as the growth began to move, crawl together and form the sort of lattice pattern I’d come to connect with Them sensor systems. That was it. We were compromised. It was all over bar the shooting now. I signalled to Balor that we were compromised and pointed to Mudge’s position. The hive-mind nature of Them meant that if a cell in here knew, then all of them in the Dog’s Teeth knew.
I barely had time to register the silhouette of the Walker backlit by the bioluminescence of Maw City before it exploded, its flesh floating away in the vacuum. It had been hit by one of the massive 105-millimetre shells from Balor’s mass driver. Its legs were still stuck to the cave-mouth rock by their tiny molecular hooks.
Then of course there were more of Them. My acquisition software promised me a target-rich environment as Berserks swarmed into the cave mouth. We activated the rest of our Mamluk systems, my internal visual display now receiving feed from all the other mechs bar Gregor’s organic one. I fired, shifted target, fired another burst and moved to the next target as 20-millimetre rounds from my railgun tore Them apart.
Rounds from Balor’s 30-millimetre railgun flew over my head as he provided longer bursts, trying to deny the Berserks the cave entrance, but there were too many of Them. Every time a Walker stalked into view Balor would fire his mass driver and the alien mech would silently explode. Despite our firepower They were creeping towards us. Their returning fire was light but getting heavier as black light scarred the rocks near me and shards rained down on my armour.
