The Biofab War (10 page)

Bob looked out the main view screen. Where light had flared an instant before, there was a thin, colored vapor, dissipating as he watched. “There’s no wreckage,” he said to no one in particular.

“Shipbusters leave only a brief cloud of evanescent gas,” said Detrelna. “Sorry we couldn’t put on more of a show for you, but fighting it out ship to ship and beam to beam would fatal. We had to surprise them and kill them in an instant.”

“I see,” said Bob, looking at the space where three ships had been a moment before. “So, do you have planetbusters, too?”

Captain and first officer exchange glances. “We do,” said Detrelna. “Though we’ve only used one in the long history of this Confederation.”

“And your Empire?”

“Used them whenever it was having a bad day,” said Lawrona “The Empire essentially slaughtered itself out of existence.”

“And yet you keep a kindly old gentleman who’s its Heir Apparent,” noted McShane.

“We’re a complex people,” sighed Detrelna.

“How long to return to Earth?” asked McShane as the bridge sank back into routine.

“A few hours,” said Detrelna. “I’m not about to risk a jump again, assurances to Commander Natrol notwithstanding.”

Innocent of danger, the tow-headed boy bounded up the path into Zahava’s blaster sights. Communicator shrilling in her ear, she swallowed hard and pressed the trigger.

Dying, the boy-form shimmered into a Scotar warrior. “Incoming bugs!” she called over the tactical circuit.

Helmetless, the pilot she’d been guarding raced out of the shuttle, rifle in hand—and died, head exploding from a blaster bolt fired from the rocks below.

Zahava threw herself behind one of the shuttle’s thick landing struts, her helmet’s infrared scanners picking out the ochre blotches of Scotar massing along the hill’s lee. Throwing the rifle to her shoulder, she poured a series of quick bursts into the Scotar. A fusillade of blue bolts flashed back at her, lighting the night.

“Zahava! Hold on! We’re coming!” John’s voice called from her commlink.

He was there in less than a minute, Greg and one of Kiroda’s men zigzagging up behind him, through the Scotar fire bracketing Zahava.

“Can these suits take simultaneous hits?” John asked the Kronarin, ducking as a bolt exploded into the strut, showering them with sparks. He glanced uneasily at the tons of spacecraft perched above their heads as the crewman replied, “Not for long—depends on how heavy the fire is.” The man, a middle-aged commtech, sighted carefully and fired. A distant boulder flared cherry-red as a form scuttled from behind it. The Kronarin killed it with a shot from his hand blaster. A fusillade of blaster fire replied, riddling the shuttle.

“The ammunition crèches will blow!” cried the Kronarin, leading the others in a hasty low-crawl to the cover of the rocks behind them.

The shuttle went up with a ground-shaking roar, sending a pillar of blue flame shooting skyward. Molten debris rained down, sparking scores of small brush fires through which the Scotar advanced undeterred.

“Kiroda, we can’t hold here,” John called over the tactical band. “They’ve blown the shuttle and are advancing in strength. What’s your status?”

“They’re coming up our side of the hill, hundreds of them! I’ve lost two men.” The young officer’s voice mingled with the crackle and whine of blaster fire. “We’re falling back to the tunnel. Join us there.”

John laid down covering fire as the others withdrew. No matter how many insectoids he mowed down, more swarmed up from the beach, firing as they came. Soon his warsuit started taking multiple hits, forcing him to withdraw. He followed the others at a run, stopping only twice to snap off a few shots.

So intense was the return fire that for the last few yards John’s warsuit was encased in a rippling aura of raw energy. He dived behind the temporary shelter of a boulder, joining the surviving humans now huddled among the rocks ringing the site’s entrance. A stunning barrage of light and sound swept over their shelter, shattering rock and shaking the earth.

“Let’s go!” Kiroda ordered.

They charged into the tunnel, securing the door a second before another, stronger barrage rocked their previous position.

“Photon mortars!” exclaimed Kiroda. Leaning against the wall, he checked his blaster charge. “Either they’ve landed a task force or there’s a Nest on this planet.”

Zahava was about to ask what a Nest was when Greg asked, “Can they get through this door?”

“With some work,” said
Implacable’s
Tactics Officer. “It only looks like rock—it’s a derivative of Imperial battlesteel.” He tapped the door with his gun butt. “Nothing tougher.”

“So I discovered,” said the geologist.

“Why don’t they just teleport in here, Mr. Kiroda?” asked John.

“My friends call me Tolei. Either they don’t have the coordinates or are afraid we’ve laid some nasty surprises for them.”

“My God! Where’d they all come from?” The Israeli slumped wearily against the wall. “We littered the ground with them, but still they kept coming.”

“From what you told us,” said Kiroda, “the nearby oceanographic institute must be their Nest. They probably quietly killed off the staff and were using it to search for this site.”

“Cindy!” Greg’s eyes widened in alarm. “She’s at the Institute.”

“Who’s ‘Cindy’?” Kiroda demanded sharply.

John explained.

The Kronarin officer grasped Greg by the shoulders. “Answer carefully,” he said intently. “How long did you know her?”

Blinking, the Terran met his gaze. “Three months.”

“Lived with her?”

“Yes.”

“How long?”

“About a month.”

Kiroda nodded, then pressed on. “Did you ever notice anything unusual about Cindy? Inappropriate mannerisms, dress, speech?”

Greg shook his head, mute.

“I only saw her once,” John said. “She was dressed very lightly for a raw, rainy day. She looked comfortable.”

“Just as Langston bounded up Goose Hill with no sign of exertion!” exclaimed Zahava.

The Kronarin turned back to Greg. “Do you have any vivid memories of sex with her,” he asked bluntly, “or just an indistinct recollection of a wonderful, glowing experience?”

“Why do you think we had sex?”

“Oh, please.”

Greg sighed. “I . . . I can’t recall anything.” He shook his head, bemused. “I remember clearly every other woman I’ve ever been with, but not her.”

Kiroda released the geologist. “There was no ‘her.’ ‘Cindy’ was a Scotar. The real Cindy’s long dead.”

“That would explain how Langston—how the Scotar—knew we were on the hill,” said Zahava. “And that nice, freckle-faced girl I slept under the same roof with—”

“Was a transmute that could have ripped your throat out,” said Kiroda.

“But why?” Greg’s voice was anguished. “Why lure me back to Massachusetts? Why ask to marry me?”

“You were the last human who knew where this site was,” John guessed. “To kill you outright would have drawn even more unwelcome attention to the Institute. Better a wedding in Louisiana followed by a tragic accident.”

Greg looked sick. “Now what?”

“We hold until relieved, or until I can awaken this installation’s slumbering guardian,” said Kiroda. He turned to Zahava. “Show me the control room you were taken from. I’ll try to activate the defenses. Unless
Implacable
returns soon, it’s our only chance. We’ll make our stand at the control room, then destroy it.”

“Hold here as long as you can,” he called over his shoulder, following Zahava down the stairs. “Then fall back to the control room.”

“We’ll redo the floors in vulture-vomit green,” John promised, turning to face the door. It’d begun to glow just a bit under the hellish energies clawing at it out of the night.

B
ill Sutherland led his small contingent along the cold dark beach, stumbling now and again over frozen clumps of seaweed. The bitter March wind howled off the Atlantic, driving the frigid evening tide at their feet. He wasn’t aware of his numb hands or frozen feet. With the others, his whole attention was held by Goose Hill, its summit now lit by the flash of massed energy weapons, their shrill whine clear above wind and surf.

As they watched, a great explosion tore open the night, throwing him and his men to the sand, bathing them in an ochre glow. “Sweet Jesus.” He stumbled to his feet, squinting into the glare. Scotar warriors swarmed unopposed past the fiercely burning shuttle.

“Someone friendly is up there and in trouble!” Bakunin’s shout carried over the secondary explosions. Like the rest, he’d traded his business suit for more practical clothing from the Institute: wool turtleneck sweater, heavy twill pants and a fur-lined field jacket, the Leurre Institute dolphin crest on its left shoulder. And like the Americans, he carried an M-16 taken from the Institute.

“Sure looks that way.” Sutherland nodded, dropping his voice as the explosions died. “How do we get to them?” He pointed his rifle up at the carnage. “We can’t fight our way through that!”

The small pickup force from Otis—APs, mechanics, techies—had secured the Institute, meeting no resistance—the buildings and grounds were deserted. The infantry brigade was still forming up at Ft. Devens. Before leaving Oystertown, Bill had changed half the airmobile brigade’s destination from the Institute to Goose Hill, but it would be at least another hour before their arrival. Whoever was holding the hill didn’t have an hour. Suddenly it came to Bill—a way to bypass the summit.

“There’s a tunnel leading from the site here to the beach,” he said, sweeping his light along the embankment as they walked. “My people escaped through it and one of them left his stick as a guide. If we’re lucky, it’ll still be there.”

Yazanaga spotted it, just as more explosions rocked the ground: a blackthorn walker leaning precariously against a great boulder. As they approached at a trot, the ground shook again and Bob’s stick fell with a clatter, rolling to a stop at their feet.

Picking up the stick, Bakunin skeptically eyed the weathered granite. “So?”

“So . . . this!” With the air of a conjurer, Sutherland flashed his light into a small niche above where the stick had leaned. A tiny green light winked back as a great stone slab swung noiselessly aside.

The agents stood blinking in the yellow circle of light from the tunnel. Johnson gave a low whistle of astonishment. Another barrage rocked the hill, sending a shower of loose rock down on their heads.

“After you, Colonel,” Bill said, gesturing toward the entrance.

The Russian shook his head. “Your tunnel, you lead, mine host.”

M-16 leveled, Bill slipped into the passage. Marsh, Yazanaga and Johnson followed, weapons poised. Bakunin, bringing up the rear, covered the doorway until the slab swung shut, then trotted after the Americans.

“Junk! Junk!” Kiroda said through clenched teeth, glaring at the console’s merrily twinkling lights. It was the first time Zahava had seen him lose his composure.

“All the positions were lit before,” she said, staring at the other consoles, now gone dark.

“I think the last time you triggered the defenses,” speculated the Kronarin. “Perhaps your metabolism is a bit different from ours. Or perhaps the computer has standing orders to transport intruders to the nearest manned station. Perhaps
Implacable
qualified. And perhaps I don’t know what I’m talking about,” he concluded ruefully, returning to his task. “According to the Imperial Archives,” he added, hopefully typing a fresh sequence of numbers, “the ground defenses can be activated from a remote terminal—assuming we’re faced with a Mode Two or Three system. Anything higher and who knows?”

Zahava watched the screen respond to the input with a fresh burst of figures. Figures her brain knew, through the magic of the translator, to be mathematical symbols akin to calculus.

“Hmmm.” Kiroda stared hard at the new figures.

“Maybe?” asked the Israeli, peering eagerly over his shoulder.

“Maybe. He rubbed his eyes. “The Planetary Operations Command series—the POCSYMs—had a reputation for chattiness that’s endured over fifty centuries. If Terra’s POCSYM was functioning, we wouldn’t be able to shut it up.”

They looked up, startled, as the shrill of blaster fire echoed down the tunnel. “Cover the corridor,” said the officer, tapping again on the trilevel keyboard.

Rifle at high-port, Zahava ran from the room.

The outer door flared white and was gone. Aiming carefully, the handful of humans fired into the packed Scotar, dimly visible through the haze and smoke. Much like a child’s toy, a small blue ball rolled in.

The Kronarin commtech moved first. “Grenade!” he cried, hurling himself atop the ball. His body absorbed much of the energy that vaporized him, saving the others.

Commando Sergeant Danir leading, the survivors charged into the altar chamber and down the ladder into the lower tunnel. John, in the rear, secured the altar stone with a blast to the wall sensor. “That should slow them.”

“Not for long,” said the commando, running ahead of him. The small troop halted where Zahava waited, just outside the control room. “Commander, I need a blastpak,” Danir said, bursting in on Kiroda.