Infinite Day (109 page)

At the Circle, things were much as they had been. DC was sitting in her chair eating a sandwich, operating the screens and buttons with one hand.

“That quiet, eh?” Merral said, trying to smile.

DC wiped her mouth and smiled back. “Chief, I took five minutes to freshen up, change my T-shirt, and get some food.”

“I'll waive the court-martial. What's happening?”

She shrugged. “Same old stuff. You guys look like you've had some action.” Merral saw that his and Lloyd's armor were stained with mud and silver Krallen fluid and was inclined to agree.

Merral described what they had seen. “I have the very strongest feeling that something is brewing. But what? I have no idea.” He looked at Betafor. “Do you?

“A battlefield is always complex, Commander. Always full of strange signals. But I detect no . . . evidence of an impending attack.” Behind her, he saw Lloyd and noted his face bore an unmistakable look of skepticism.

Merral, aware that everyone in the Circle was watching, raised his voice. “Everyone: I want you to look out for oddities. We think we face a trap!”

Over the next hour little of significance happened. There was the steady press of Krallen against the perimeter of the defenses, and the line was penetrated briefly at several points. But that was all.

In the end, Merral grew so uneasy that around half past eight he ordered a pair of drones with night vision to overfly the site. He was waiting for the first images when he heard a quiet, hesitant voice behind him. “Commander . . . if I could have a moment . . .”

He turned to see a petite, auburn-haired woman who held a diary in her hand. “What is it?”

“Sir, I'm from the artillery team. I'm a glaciologist. Or was. But here I look at the seismic . . .”

“To help us check where the shells are landing.”
That much I do know.

“The thing is, sir, there have been some odd signals. On the seismic.”

“What sort of
odd
?”

“Like small, gentle explosions, only . . . only when you trace the signals there's nothing at the epicenter.”

“No crater?”

“None. And when you play back the imagery to the time of apparent impact, no explosions.”

“So you have what? Ghost explosions?”

She puckered up her face. “Sir, in my glacier studies, I worked on deep events. The cracking at the base of the ice. And I plugged these odd signals into my programs.”

“And?”

“The signals make sense if you assume they have a focus at around fifty meters' depth.” She held out the diary and Merral took it and overlaid the data on a main screen. Two red stars appeared on the map of the battleground.

“You see the trend, sir.”

He saw that if you joined up the points, you had a line that—if both ends were extended—linked the northeastern landing site and command bunker.

“I do, indeed.” He checked the times. As he expected, the more recent explosion was the nearer. “Any other signals?”

“There's a lot of continuous background noise.”

“Your guess?”

“I think, sir . . .” Her face showed caution. “I think . . . they may be tunneling toward us. Most of the time they do it without very much noise, but sometimes they have a roof fall or use explosives. That's the bigger events.”

“Thanks. Thanks a lot! Now, as fast as you can, get me an estimated time of arrival underneath us.”

“Certainly, sir.”

As she left, Merral strode over to the Allenix. “Betafor, is it possible that the Dominion forces could be trying to tunnel toward us?”

“It is . . . possible. They possess sophisticated mining machines.”

Of course, they would have to. Their worlds are so hostile at the surface
.

“Just machines?”

“Operated by things like Krallen.”

Five minutes later, the glaciologist was coming back, a look of urgency on her face. “Checked the readings. Best estimate: two and a half hours.”

He looked at a clock. “Eleven,” he said aloud and caught the flicker of dismay on Lloyd's face.
He and I know we need another half hour. I could use Vero now. Where is he and what is he doing?

Merral took Lloyd aside. “Sergeant, if you were the enemy, how would you run things?”

Lloyd scratched his nose. “We're gonna hear or feel this burrowing thing when it gets nearer. So . . . they'll attack to mask it. Perhaps half past ten?”

“I agree.” Merral paused. “I think we need to be ready to evacuate here and get the key personnel over the bridge to the core center.”

“Sir, what about having a welcome ready for them here? Hundred kilos of that new hi-blast explosive ought to be a nice welcome.”

“Good idea. Get it arranged.”

He saw Lloyd was staring beyond him at Betafor. “And, sir,” he whispered, “I reckon she knew. Didn't warn us.”

Merral glanced at the Allenix. “Perhaps.”

Merral consulted with the team leaders, and plans were drawn up for a phased evacuation and the transfer of the key personnel to the core center. It was felt that the sharp focus of the attack meant that, with covering fire, those not needed at the core center ought to be able to flee to the southwest. Merral ordered the team leaders to have evacuation drills ready.

For the next ninety minutes, the ceaseless assaults of the Krallen continued. In concrete terms they achieved little other than the gaining of a few tens of meters of trench and the deaths of a few score soldiers. Yet Merral knew they had gained a less obvious but important benefit in the wearing down and tiring of his troops.

As the battles raged outside, the teams in the Circle were divided into those few who, should the decision to evacuate be made, would move over to the core center and the larger number who would try to leave the mountain to the southwest. Ominous gray canisters with yellow symbols were stacked around the sides of the Circle. Seismic monitors were set up and linked, and on a screen a shadowy cross section of the hill showed a long horizontal red line beginning to curve upward toward the summit.

Without warning, shortly after ten, a ferocious bombardment began. The hill seemed to shake like a beaten drum as explosion after explosion struck it. Screens flickered off and on. Lights swayed, and a snow of dust fell from the ceiling.

DC, leaning and swinging this way and that on her seat, shouted out over the explosion's din a long, breathless string of alerts: K-boys attacking, incoming shells and missiles, pressure on many different segments of defenses.

As the minutes passed, reports filtered in of new and terrible elements to the battle: winged creatures that swooped in the darkness with dreadful screams and ripped at faces and hands, eerily gleaming columns of whirling dust that plowed into lines of soldiers and blinded and panicked them, and strange crackling and hissing lights that moved along the ground like snakes, stinging and shocking.

With these reports came the first firm news of men among the enemy ranks, soldiers protected by armor and seen only momentarily at the rear of the Krallen packs. Merral was sent an image clip from a sniper of a tall man in gray armor stalking through the lines with an unassailable authority, ordering others to follow him and then moving on before snipers could target him.

“Lezaroth,” he said, and Lloyd just nodded.

We will meet before the end.

Slowly, the defenses began to yield before the new attack, and the enemy started advancing up the slopes. Some of the sensory inputs to the Circle began to fail and several screens went blank. Aware that he had some hard decisions to make but reluctant to call a retreat yet, Merral decided to make one more foray outside
.

As soon as he emerged from beyond the bunker door, he stopped as he had before to survey the scene. But however bad things had been before, they were now far worse. The scene before him was hellish. Lit by the rising full moon, flames from a dozen fires, and the flickering metallic gleam of flares, he could see columns of glowing dust and flame twisting about; and in between them, silvery Krallen dodged and dived, apparently unhindered. Not far below him, soldiers were edging back up the slope or clambering in disarray up the ladders that allowed access up the walls of mirror ice. There was the smell of burning and death and, overlaying it all, the constant, deafening thuds and whistles of artillery, the hiss of bullets, the screams of humans, and the unstoppable howl of the Krallen. And in the sky, now just a dozen degrees away from the moon, the garish, ruddy streak of the Blade seemed to mock all their efforts.

Merral's attention was drawn to a cluster of soldiers backed up around a tottering banner and surrounded by Krallen lashing out with claws.

“Sergeant, ready to follow me?”

“Daft question that, sir.”

“Volunteers!” Merral called and ran to the ladder above the defensive wall. A dozen soldiers ran after him, and together they clambered and leaped down the ladder.

“At my word, charge; let's get them back,” he ordered.

“The Lamb!” he cried and ran. “The Lamb!” they echoed and followed him. They ran and slipped down the muddy slope with such force that they almost collided with the outermost Krallen, their eyes like fires, who parted before them as they were chopped and slashed with heavy, breathless sword strokes.

Merral cut down four of the things, while Lloyd stood by his side, firing and recharging in an almost continuous blur of motion. They walked forward, supported by other soldiers, until they had reached the beleaguered unit. As Merral lifted up a fallen soldier, something flapped through the air at him. His helmet protected him, but a claw caught his cheek and it slid away before he could strike at it.

He glanced around, deciding that they had done all they could and were so far down the hill that they were in imminent danger of being utterly surrounded.

“Withdraw!” he yelled.

Merral and the others formed a tight defensive arc and, as soldiers retreated up the hill bearing wounded, backed their way slowly up. Just out of reach of their extended swords, a wall of Krallen paced after them. Merral was the last man up the ladder, and he felt a claw lash at his heels.

“Okay, Sergeant,” Merral said, dabbing at his cheek, as the ladder was withdrawn. “I've seen all I need to see.”

When Merral returned to the Circle, more screens had gone blank. It was ten forty-five, and as he assembled the team leaders, he checked the latest casualty figures. The numbers were imprecise, but it seemed that of the ten thousand soldiers he started with, barely half were able to fight. At least two thousand were dead. Trying—and failing—to grapple with these figures, Merral turned to the seismic and saw that whatever was mining toward them was barely twenty minutes away from breaking through. Indeed, he felt if he could shut out all the other sounds, he could feel the vibration underfoot.

He considered deploying the reserves but now felt certain that they wouldn't be able to save the situation.
No matter what we do, Tahuma-A will fall in under an hour. Our only hope now is that Amethyst will work.

Merral gave orders for the withdrawal plans to be put into operation. The frontline units would try to hold the current defensive perimeter as long as they could while the evacuation took place to the rear.

With resigned nods of agreement, the team leaders dispersed and began issuing orders.

Merral called Lloyd to him. “Sergeant, I have a task for you that you will probably not enjoy.”

“Go on.”

“I want you to take Betafor over to the core center now. Then I'll join you.”

“Sir, is that an order?”

“Yes.”

There was a sigh. “Yes, sir.”

Merral called the Allenix over. “Betafor, I'm going to get Lloyd to take you over to the core.”

“Is that safe?” she asked, looking at Lloyd, who was clipping ammunition into his gun.

“Sergeant, is she safe with you?”