Earth Afire (The First Formic War) (35 page)

At the top of the mountain Bingwen had been fearless. But the farther he went down the road, the more his courage failed him. The trees that covered the road were suddenly hiding places for the aliens. The thick scrub on the shoulder was suddenly the perfect place for an ambush. The thin braches that stuck out from the forest were suddenly wands waiting to spray a mist into his face. There were aircraft sounds as well, loud and fast, some close, others far away, and every time Bingwen heard one, he was convinced the aircraft was falling toward him, like a burning meteor, targeted directly to his position. The water buffalo seemed to feel the same way. The closer they got to the valley floor, the more resistant and agitated it became.

Soon the trees began to thin, and the whole of the valley plain came into view. It was the back side of the mountain, a valley Bingwen hadn’t been able to see from the farmhouse, and the sight of it stopped him cold.

There were bodies on the ground. People. Not clumped together in a big group, but spread out all over the valley in ones and twos and threes, as if a big crowd of villagers had all decided to find a spot away from the others to lie down and go to sleep.

Only, they weren’t sleeping. There was no rise and fall to their chests, no casual repositioning of their bodies as sleeping people do. No movement of any kind except for wisps of hair and corners of clothing blown back and forth in the wind.

The closest body was thirty meters away under the shade of a tree. A woman, Mother’s age, lying on her side, facing Bingwen, her shirt hanging loosely off her shoulder in a way that no modest woman would ever consciously allow. One of her shoes lay on the ground beside her. Her eyes were open, her mouth slightly ajar, as if she had been waiting for Bingwen to arrive and was just calling out his name when time had stood still and frozen her in that position.

Around her, the rice shoots were curled and black and dead.

The mist had caused this, Bingwen realized. The chemical the creatures sprayed from their wands had killed everything it had touched: the crop, the fleeing villagers, even a few animals here and there: dogs and birds and two water buffalo. There were large patches of healthy crop as well—green rice shoots that had been spared the mist, some of them as tall as Bingwen’s shoulders—but these were in the minority. Most of the valley floor was mud and death and withered shoots of rice.

On the far side of the valley, a downed Chinese aircraft billowed black smoke and ash into the air. Bingwen could hear the crackle and sizzle of the flames and the popping and breaking of components inside. He could smell it, too, an acrid stench of melting plastic and rubber and other synthetics.

It wasn’t Mazer’s aircraft, he knew. That crash had occurred elsewhere, at least another kilometer away and probably farther. Yet the sight of this one didn’t fill Bingwen with much confidence. The aircraft was barely recognizable as such. Perhaps it had been a helicopter once, but now it was nothing more than a heap of twisted, burning metal, with the entire front half of it crushed by the impact. It lay on its side like a wounded animal, burning and hissing and spewing black smoke.

Bingwen wondered how many people had been aboard. Ten? Twenty? It was certainly big enough to carry that many. Perhaps it had been loaded with supplies: fresh water and food and medical equipment, everything he and Grandfather and the others would need to survive at the farmhouse. Whatever it had held, there was no salvaging it now. Nor would there be any survivors.

Maybe Grandfather was right, he told himself. Maybe this was a fool’s errand. Why should Mazer’s crash be any different? All he would likely find there was more fire and death.

Beside him the water buffalo raised its head and sniffed at the air. It must have caught the scent of death or smoke because the next instant it pulled so hard on the lead rope that it yanked Bingwen off his feet. Bingwen landed hard on his good arm, but the jolt sent another shot of pain through his bad one. He cried out in agony despite himself. The shout spooked the animal further, and it took off back the way it had come, yanking the lead rope free of Bingwen’s grip and giving him a serious rope burn.

It took Bingwen fifteen minutes to corner the animal and catch the lead rope again. By then he had taken strips of fabric from the makeshift bandana around his face and wrapped the strips around his hand to form a sort of bandage and glove for holding the rope. The animal began to resist again, but Bingwen gave it a violent tug and reminded it who was leading whom. Then he took one of the harvesting bags from the pouch and made a sort of face mask for the animal, like a giant feed bag that covered most of its head.

The water buffalo calmed after that, smelling only the scent of the barn in the bag’s fabric.

Bingwen guided it back down into the valley. He wasn’t turning around, he had decided. He had come this far; he would see it through. He wouldn’t give up as quickly as the water buffalo had.

They moved toward the nearest patch of healthy crop. If they crossed the valley by sticking to the green shoots, maybe they could pass through without contaminating themselves.

Bingwen took the first few tentative steps into the tall shoots and waited to see if he felt sick or light-headed.

Nothing happened.

He pushed on, pulling the water buffalo behind him.

The healthy green shoots crumpled and broke under their feet. Damaging the crop like that went against everything both of them had ever been taught, but they walked on nonetheless.

They passed dozens of bodies. The first few faces were strangers: men and women from other villages. Then Bingwen began to see people he knew: neighbors and friends of Grandfather. Yi Yi Guangon, one of the elders from the village council. Shashoo, the only woman in the village who owned a washing machine. Bexi, the nurse who made herbal remedies for Bingwen whenever he got sick. All of them were lifeless and lying in unnatural positions, their skin red and blistered, as if they had worked for days in the sun without a hat.

A suffocating fear gripped at Bingwen’s chest whenever he saw someone new: What if the next person’s face was Mother’s or Father’s? What would he do then?

Once he was sure he
had
found Mother. The dead woman lay in the mud with her back to him and her face turned away. She had hair like Mother’s and a shape like Mother’s and the same plain, faded clothes like Mother’s.

But when Bingwen walked around her and saw her face, he realized it wasn’t Mother. The relief was so sudden and overwhelming that Bingwen broke down and sobbed. His chest heaved, and his body shook, and it took several minutes to compose himself again. By then the water buffalo was growing restless and pulling on the lead rope again. Bingwen wiped at his eyes and nose with the sleeve of his good arm. He had been crying for everything: his arm, Hopper, Meilin, the dead woman who looked like Mother, Mazer’s ship. Everything. When he finished, he felt better, braver even. I’ve had my cry, he thought. My final one.

He kept walking.

There were dead children as well, though Bingwen couldn’t force himself to look at them. He made his eyes defocus whenever one came into view, always looking above the body, never directly at it … until a bright shirt caught his attention. A shirt he recognized. A shirt he had seen up close when the person wearing it had put him in a headlock once.

Zihao.

Alive, Zihao had always worn a bullish, condescending sneer. But here, lying on his back in the mud, he looked afraid: wide eyes, rigid body, a dirty face streaked with tears. He seemed younger, too. Like a child. Bingwen looked away.

A faint hiss from behind caused Bingwen to turn around suddenly. Back at the end of the access road, a few hundred meters behind him, four aliens were spraying the healthy grass and moving in his direction. They seemed unaware of Bingwen, but he knew that wouldn’t last.

Bingwen yanked on the lead rope and got the water buffalo moving. He didn’t stop to look at faces. He didn’t step carefully. He ran.

The water buffalo sensed his urgency and ran as well, big lumbering strides that weren’t fast enough for Bingwen, who kept yanking and pulling on the rope. The animal stumbled once, but quickly regained its footing. They ran for fifteen minutes, never slowing until the valley turned south and the aliens were long out of view. They stopped, both of them wheezing and breathing heavily, the water buffalo moaning and mooing. Bingwen’s broken arm felt as if it were on fire; all the jostling and running had aggravated the break. A stitch in his side burned so hot Bingwen was convinced he had torn something inside.

The water buffalo wavered, and for a moment Bingwen thought it might keel over. Then it shook its head and gathered itself.

Bingwen looked to his left and saw that they had arrived. There was wreckage a hundred meters away. Mazer’s aircraft. Bingwen was sure of it. A fire had consumed it and burned it black, but the flames had long since died out, and the familiar shape of the aircraft was still intact. The only new feature was the four rotor blades on the top of the aircraft, which must have snapped open as the aircraft fell.

Bingwen’s heart sank at the sight. There couldn’t possibly be any survivors. The aircraft had exploded, sending shrapnel and debris in every direction. Even if someone had survived the impact, they couldn’t have gotten clear of the explosion in time. Nor could they have ejected before impact, not with the rotor blades, not in a dead drop.

Bingwen felt ashamed. He should have listened to Grandfather. He was foolish to have come out here.

Something near the wreckage caught his eye. A rifle perhaps? That would be useful. And where there was one, there might be others; and if not other weapons, then perhaps other tools. He pulled on the rope. The water buffalo didn’t want to move; it still wheezed and whined from their run. Bingwen pulled anyway with his good arm, and eventually the animal walked.

The wreck smelled like ashes and burning things and what might be the scent of charred human remains. Smoke still hung thick in the air and stung Bingwen’s eyes. He didn’t want to look inside the cabin or cockpit. He knew what he would find there.

The ground was littered with shrapnel and debris, some pieces as big as Bingwen, all folded up and bent in odd shapes with torn edges that looked dangerously sharp.

Bingwen’s eyes were locked on the rifle ahead of him, but as he approached it, moving through the smoke, something else near the weapon caught his eye. A body.

Bingwen ran forward, frantic, the lead rope dropping from his hand.

It was Mazer. There was blood and mud all over him. His arms, his head, his side. His side was the worst. A bloody bandage lay draped across his abdomen, soaked through and deep red. The contents of a med kit lay scattered around him. Someone had administered first aid. Someone was alive and helping. Bingwen looked around.

“Hello?”

No one answered.

To his left was another body. The female soldier. Bingwen instantly knew she was dead, even without seeing her face, which was turned away from him. She had too many wounds. Her skin was white and lifeless. Her clothes were burned. Her arm was twisted behind her.

In the fields, the corpses had looked asleep, peaceful even in some instances. Not so here. This had been a hard death. Quick most likely, instantaneous even, but it terrified Bingwen more than anything he had seen thus far.

There were lines in the dirt from the aircraft to the woman’s body where her boots had dragged across the soil. Mazer had pulled her from the fire, Bingwen realized. Wounded as he was, Mazer had pulled her from the flames. Bingwen could think of no other explanation. And then somehow Mazer had tried to treat his own wounds. Bingwen knelt beside him. Yes, one of the packets from the kit was still in Mazer’s hand. Bingwen should have noticed that instantly.

“Mazer.”

No answer.

Should he try shaking him awake? No, that might tear something inside him. Instead, Bingwen reached out a tentative finger and poked Mazer in the arm. The skin was warm. The tip of Bingwen’s finger came back bloody. Mazer didn’t respond.

Then Mazer’s chest rose, just slightly, almost imperceptibly. A shallow intake of breath. Then an exhale. He was alive. Barely maybe, but he was breathing.

Bingwen had to get him back to the farmhouse, back to Grandfather. But how? He had hoped to find the soldiers awake and able to walk. And if they couldn’t walk, Bingwen would build a travois for the water buffalo to pull and then ask the wounded soldier to climb up onto it. But Mazer couldn’t even do that; he couldn’t move at all. Bingwen would have to lift him somehow onto the stretcher.

Bingwen ran back to the water buffalo, tied it to a tree, and came back with all the supplies from the tool pouches. He found a grove of bamboo nearby and chopped down three large stalks with the hatchet. It took him forever because he had to do it one-handed, using only his good arm. He then chopped one of the three stalks into shorter lengths and built the travois, lashing the bamboo together with the rope. The shorter pieces went between the longer two, making a ladderlike surface for Mazer to lie on. Bingwen then cut out the bottoms of a few of the harvesting bags and pulled those up over the two shafts, creating a flat surface like the bed of a cot.

The travois was heavy when Bingwen finished, almost too heavy for him to drag with one hand, but he heaved and strained and pulled it across the dirt until he had it on the ground beside Mazer. He had hoped to pull Mazer’s body up onto it, but after a few tentative tugs it became obvious that wouldn’t work. There was too much dead weight, and he couldn’t pull with his broken arm. He’d have to lift the body, suspend it in the air, slide the travois underneath, and then lower Mazer carefully onto it.

By now Bingwen was sweating and thirsty and tired. He hadn’t brought any water; he hadn’t wanted to take any from the little supply the group at the farmhouse had. Now he wished he had. There wasn’t any drinkable water nearby, and even if there had been, he wouldn’t have drunk it, not with the mist in the air and the threat of contamination.