Earthfall (33 page)

“Mike—those are the things we need to get back to Harmony!”

“They’ll be fine,” Rachel said. “Even if the rig is destroyed, they’ll survive. You already know how heavy they are, and the weight is because they’re extremely dense. Fire won’t harm them, and only shaped charges would be likely to make them unusable. It’s safe to leave them here, Captain.”

Laird shrugged. “Well, you’re the SME,” he said. “All right, crew. Let’s suit up.”

Andrews looked at Rachel and smiled at her as the others started prepping to leave the overturned rig. “I’ll bet you’re glad you came, huh?”

She took his hand. “I wouldn’t have missed this for the world. Besides, for better or worse, right?”

“Yeah, well, I hadn’t thought things could get much worse, but here we are,” Andrews said, turning to the suit locker and pulling open its heavy door.

T
he airlock was
inoperable, and they discovered the SCEV’s tailgate was also not available for use—the big loading door had been jammed shut in its frame when the rig rolled onto its back. That meant everyone would have to disembark via one of the side viewports in the cockpit, which could be used as an emergency exit. Loaded down with respiration gear and weapons—as well as one immobile crewmember and one walking wounded, exiting via the cockpit was no small chore. It took Andrews almost a minute to clear the vehicle and emerge into the wind-torn day. He conducted a brief security scan—there wasn’t much to see, especially with all the loose dust blowing around—then turned back and assisted Leona in exiting the dead SCEV. Rachel and Choi came next, then Mulligan, and they all helped him pull Kelly Jordello’s still form through the opening, handling her as gently as they could. Andrews saw her eyes were open but glassy behind her visor. Either she had slipped deep into shock, or the codeine was strong enough to dope her up. Laird was the last to emerge, and it took him quite some time to fumble his way out of the vehicle. Once he did, the crew looked toward the eastern horizon.

Through the blowing dust, Andrews saw the brewing storm squatting on the horizon, a dark mound illuminated by brief bursts of internal pyrotechnics. A malignant mass, pregnant with the promise of death.

“Look at the size of that front,” Leona said, awe clear in her voice when she spoke over her mask’s transceiver.

“I see it,” Andrews said. He turned in a half-circle, trying to get an idea of the terrain. He recognized the general area, but it wasn’t until the wind ebbed for a moment and the dust began to settle that he saw a low-lying ridge several hundred meters to their left. He pointed it out to Laird. “Jim, get everyone to that ridge over there. Hide in the rocks. Choi and I will hang back and give you some cover for as long as we can.” He turned to Mulligan. “Sarmajor, you go on ahead. Try to make it to Harmony’s perimeter. Someone’s got to be watching for us.”

Mulligan scowled behind his visor. “What? I can’t leave now.”

“The odds are what they are, Sergeant Major.” Andrews felt suddenly weary, and he wished he could rub his burning eyes, but the full facemask of his respirator prevented it. “They won’t change very much if you stay. And you’ve got the skills—if anyone can survive in this shit, it’s you.”

Mulligan stood where he was, looking directly at Andrews. His scowl was gone now, replaced by an odd look Andrews hadn’t seen before. Was it respect, or something else?

“Hit the road, Sergeant Major,” he said finally, when Mulligan made no move to obey. “That’s what we call an order, just in case that flew over your head the first time.”

The two men looked at each other for another moment, then Mulligan shifted his rifle and reached into the knapsack that hung from his side. He pulled out three forty-millimeter grenades and handed them to Andrews.

“Here, take these. They’re old, but they’ll still work. Standard M441 rounds, nothing fancy and nothing that’ll be likely to take out an SCEV. But if you can get a shot at the radome, take it. Otherwise, they’ll be about as effective as a frying pan.”

“Hey, better than nothing,” Andrews said. He had two of the SCEV’s original loadout of forty-millimeter grenades, and Choi had the last one. He handed two to Choi and kept one for himself.

“Good luck, sir. I’ll be back,” Mulligan said. Without further ado, he ran off, keeping to a crouch and heading due east.

“Jim, get the others to the ridge,” Andrews said.

Rachel took one of his gloved hands in her own. “Mike, I’d really like to stay with you.”

Andrews shook his head. “No way, hon. There’s nothing more you can do down here. Get to the ridge and hunker down. Help will come, believe me.” He smiled at her, even though she couldn’t see the lower half of his face. “No heroics here, I promise.”

She looked at him keenly for a long moment. “I hope not.” She reached out and touched his mask. “I can’t even kiss you good-bye.”

“Then kiss me hello later,” he said.

“Andrews, I’m going to need help with Lieutenant Jordello,” Laird said to Rachel.

“Get going,” Andrews told Rachel. He nodded to where Laird and Leona stood over Kelly’s supine form. She wore a vacuum splint on her injured leg, which had in turn been bound to her uninjured limb by several cravats.

“On it, Captain,” she said to Laird, slowly turning away from Andrews. She helped Laird haul Kelly into a fireman’s carry, despite the fact the splinted leg made the action awkward. Laird didn’t seem to notice, and he set off toward the rock-strewn ridge hovering in the distance. Leona followed, hobbling on her injured leg, an assault rifle in her hands. Rachel looked back at Andrews for a moment, then turned to join them. The wind began to blow again, and the billowing dust swallowed them from view.

“Choi, ready?” Andrews asked.

“You know it, sir,” Choi responded immediately.

“All right. About three hundred meters to the south, there’s that region of rocky outcrops. You know which one I’m talking about?”

“Yes, sir.”

“That’s where we’re headed. Follow me, and keep low.” Andrews headed off in the opposite direction from Laird and the others, keeping low and moving as quickly as he could through the flying dust. He glanced back occasionally to ensure Choi was still with him, but he kept moving. They were out in the open and, for the life of him, he couldn’t understand why they weren’t already dead.

***

Law had laughed aloud when he saw his second missile strike the ground near the SCEV and the resulting explosion that lifted its right tires high into the air. The rig seemed to hang there for a moment, like a stunt driver doing a trick in one of the mindless adventure films he had watched as a youth, and for an instant he thought it would slam back to the ground and continue on. But slowly, inexorably, the rig leaned further to the left until the chance of recovery died. The SCEV grounded on its left side, tearing a huge gash in the dry earth as it slid along for several meters before turning turtle, crashing onto its back in an explosion of dust. Bits and pieces of the vehicle flew through the air as panels and antennae and even the forward-looking infrared scanner and one tire were shorn off by the force of the impact. The vehicle ground to an abrupt halt, and columns of steam and smoke erupted from its undercarriage.

Law had to confess, it had been quite some time since he’d seen anything so beautiful.

He moved to fire a final missile, which would surely strike true and blast the vehicle into flaming wreckage. Right before his fingertip touched the button on the LED display, he stopped, pulling his hand back to his side.

I want to see them. I want to see them die with my own eyes, if I can.

In order to do that, he would have to reverse course and navigate around the ridges. The upthrust he was parked on had far too sheer a face to safely maneuver the vehicle across, and he had no intention of dying out here with Andrews and the others. So, he cautiously reversed the rig in the direction he had come.

***

Andrews and Choi set up in the rocky abutments several hundred meters from the overturned SCEV. The wind continued to mount, and dust swirled through the air. Andrews made sure the dust cover on his assault rifle was closed, then checked to ensure the grenade launcher was ready to go. He hadn’t heard anything from Laird or the others, nor did he expect to; they were to observe radio silence unless something untoward occurred. Even though their channels were encrypted, Law had military experience, and it was conceivable he could use the signal-hopping radios in SCEV Four to find the channels reserved for their use. Not very likely, of course—while Leona had been very informative in describing to Law how to use the vehicle, he had only had access to her for a few hours, and something such as spoofing an encrypted communications channel likely hadn’t been one of his priorities.

In the distance, through the billowing clouds of dust, Andrews caught a glimpse of movement.

SCEV Four appeared, bouncing out of the ridgeline. Once it made it down to the flat plain, it accelerated toward the overturned hulk of SCEV Five. Andrews looked to his left, where Choi was positioned about fifty meters downrange. Choi met his gaze and he nodded, pointing at his grenade launcher. Andrews motioned for him to hold his fire. There was no sense in alerting Law to their presence if he already thought they might be dead.

He turned his attention back to the SCEV as it advanced through the dimming light of the day. It stopped two hundred meters from the wrecked vehicle and sat there, its turbine engines whining, missile pod extended, miniguns oriented toward SCEV Five. The FLIR turret on the rig’s nose slewed left and right, as Law used the optics to surveil the area. After thirty seconds or so, the rig began to trundle forward, slowly bumping its way across the plain, drawing closer to SCEV Five’s shattered form. It circled the dead rig, slowing every now and then, the FLIR turret turned toward it, as if Law thought he could use the device to peer through the armored hulk and see what lay inside. The rig circled around the wreckage twice before it accelerated back toward the ridge. Two hundred meters away, it turned back until its snout was pointing more or less at the destroyed SCEV.

Come on, guy … Get it over with.

Andrews didn’t have to wait for long. Seconds later, another Hellfire missile leapt out of the extended pod on SCEV Four’s back and roared across the darkening plain on a pillar of fire. Andrews had only an instant to crouch down behind the rocks he was using as cover before the projectile climbed up, gained altitude, and nosed down. It slammed into the overturned rig’s belly and exploded. Even several hundred meters away, Andrews was shocked by the ferocity of the explosion. One moment, the wrecked SCEV was there, the next, most of it vanished in a gout of flame and smoke and thunder that sent a shockwave racing across the wasteland. The missile managed to decimate the rig’s self-sealing fuel tanks and ignite the propellant that remained inside. The remains of the SCEV began to burn, bright and furious, the flames dancing in the gale that carried the black smoke to the west. A moment later, pieces of debris began raining down on him. Something clanged against one of the rocks beside him, and Andrews saw it was an access plate to one of the MEP electronics racks, twisted and burned. Just like the remainder of SCEV Five.

Andrews peeked around the rock, exposing half of his face. He knew the suits the team wore would help mask their thermal image, but the FLIR on SCEV Four was extremely sensitive; if Law knew what to look for, he might see a small sliver of heat through the gloom. That would be bad news for all of them. He watched as the SCEV sat unmoving, while SCEV Five continued to burn. A sudden series of pops erupted from the flaming vehicle as the 7.62 millimeter rounds in its magazines cooked off in firecracker-like detonations, which were made tinny and insignificant by the howling wind. Andrews studied the idling rig for a full minute, watching the vehicle’s FLIR slew from side to side.

What the hell is he waiting for?

***

Law sat in the cool, climate-controlled environment of SCEV Four’s cockpit, his right hand on the FLIR control yoke. The immense heat given off by the burning rig distorted a good portion of the infrared picture, and the mounting wind began to drive flying dust even harder, which made visual inspection of the conflagration even more problematic. The vehicle’s millimeter-wave radar returned nothing suspicious; there was no sudden movement in the wasteland other than that driven by the winds, and the only sizeable metallic signature was on its back before him, burning away.

Still, Law wasn’t convinced. Andrews and the others had had ample time to evacuate the overturned SCEV, unless they had a procedure in place to sit tight and wait for rescue. But would they do such a thing when they were under attack? Would they follow the usual SOP when they knew an armed aggressor was closing on them? Had they all been killed, or so severely injured during the rollover that they had been unable to exit the vehicle?

Judging by the sturdy straps that kept him anchored to the pilot’s seat of SCEV Four, and the numerous straps and handholds spread throughout the rig, he rather thought death and injury, while possible, was unlikely. At least for the entire crew.