Death World (Undying Mercenaries Series Book 5) (24 page)

-30-

Go-time.

We didn’t wait for dawn. We didn’t wait for dusk, either. We suspected a bunch of plants didn’t care much whether it was light out or not.

Less than a day after legion techs had discovered the wreck, five full units of troops marched toward the site. We wore determined expressions but carried substandard gear. After the pod-walker attack, the bio people had managed to rebuild our numbers from a few hundred up to a full cohort in strength. But we didn’t have enough guns and armor to go around.

For the most part, all the troops were from Winslade’s cohort. He’d been given overall command of the operation as well. I don’t think he was happy about that. He’d probably rather be back at the lifter sipping a cool beverage, but he played it straight enough.

“Listen up, Legion Varus,” the primus’ voice buzzed in my helmet. “I know we’re supposed to be heavy infantry but only half of you are wearing armor. Be glad I managed to get everyone a rifle at least. The units we’re leaving behind at the lifter have been stripped bare. There was talk of sending us off with every other man using force-blades alone, but I squashed that idea.”

His words were alarming. The trouble was we’d been sent down to the Death World fully equipped, but most of us had died. In many cases, we’d lost our equipment. My squad, for example, had lost everything. Many of the ill-fated troops in the drop pods had lost their weapons as well.

As a result, my squad’s load-out was definitely less than optimal. It’d been decided that anyone not specifically designated as a line-combatant was to be given a smart-cloth tunic and no armor at all. That really upset my specialists—especially Carlos. You would’ve thought they’d cut off his left nut.

“This is too much,” he said, starting up again. “First, Graves blasts me to paste after humping it over half the planet. Then as a reward for faithful service, they shaft me with a snap-rifle and a gunny sack full of med gear. What am I supposed to do if one of those pod-walkers catches my ass again?”

“Same thing you always do, Carlos,” Sargon answered. “Die squealing!”

Sargon seemed to think this was extremely funny, and he laughed long enough to get most of the squad laughing along with him. People were tired of Carlos’ complaining, and I couldn’t blame them.

“Look at you, muscle-brain,” Carlos said, talking to Sargon. “One breastplate and a pair of boots. The rest of you is wearing fancy pajamas. Half a suit of armor isn’t much good against spines and acids.”

“I’ve got a belcher,” Sargon said, “and I’m happy with that. Some weaponeers are carrying rifles like the rest of you pukes. I can’t imagine the shame.”

The chatter went on like that, but I tuned it out. I didn’t much care what they said as long as no one got mad enough to blast another squad mate. I couldn’t allow that.

“How much farther, Kivi?” I asked.

As my tech, she was watching the map displays on her tactical system. My helmet-based system only reached so far. Hers could scan the entire planet if she was hooked to the legion net—which she was now.

“I’m looking at five to seven kilometers—depending on whether we march straight through or circle around.”

We were pretty close to the tree line now. Marching over scorched ground that sent up choking clouds of ash as we passed by. The trees were like a mountain range directly ahead of us. The massive plants were daunting. Their trunks were somehow more imposing when you could visually compare them to flat, open land.

As we walked into the gloom under half-burned branches, I felt an oppressive coolness steal over my body. The blackened skeletal claws of the megaflora clutched at the skies overhead. It was the ultimate haunted woods.

“I hate this forest,” Carlos said, deciding to complain about something new. “It’s unnatural. We’re like beetles crawling among redwood giants.”

“Yeah, but bugs are quieter,” I commented, but it didn’t seem to faze him.

“Five kilometers in—that sounds like Turov missed a bet,” he continued. “She should have kept firing and destroyed everything.”

“If she had, maybe we’d be stuck on this planet forever,” Kivi pointed out.

“Are you kidding? You’ve got to be joking, right?”

Kivi gave him a disgusted look. I could tell why their short-lived relationship, which had flourished on Machine World, had quickly petered out. Carlos just couldn’t help but rub people the wrong way, even his ex-girlfriend.

“What’s your point, Ortiz?” Kivi demanded.

“My point is, buttercup, that this mission is going tits-up already. We’re not going to take over some damaged landing craft built by plants and fly it up to
Minotaur
. The whole idea is laughable. It’s got to be Turov’s dumbest plan to date. No, if we don’t die capturing it, we’ll die for sure trying to get it to fly.”

Kivi hated it when he called her “buttercup” which was a nickname that he had apparently begun during their brief time together. Her weapon rose up and aimed at his back—but I was ready for that. I grabbed the barrel and tipped it toward the sky. She only had a snap-rifle, but it was equal to Carlos’ own gun. As they weren’t armored, any conflict between them was likely to turn deadly real fast.

Holding onto the barrel, I gave Kivi a grim shake of my head. She sighed in frustration and aimed her weapon away. I let go, and the march went on.

We ended up circling around to approach our target from the forest side. Soon, we were walled-in by greenery. Most alarming of all were the pods we saw hanging from the trunks.

“We should kill every one of these we encounter,” Carlos said.

“I agree,” I replied, for about the tenth time.

“Then come on, just do it.”

“Can’t. I already asked—request denied.”

Carlos came close to me. We were beyond the region of radioactive ash so we’d taken off our helmets. Breathing the local atmosphere wasn’t entirely safe, but it saved power and our air tanks.

“Don’t listen to Winslade,” he whispered loudly. “When have you ever listened to him, anyway? Where’s that old McGill magic? Come on… He won’t do anything. He’s a pussy.”

“I’m fresh out of magic at the moment.”

He pulled his head back like a turtle and peered at me. “Damn, I never thought I’d see it with my own eyes.”

I frowned at him. “What?”

“You—turning into a stiff. Since when did you decide to play Boy Scout? I’ve never seen you refuse to take action to save your squad. It’s like one of these aliens transplanted your brain or something.”

“Listen up, Specialist,” I told him. “I’m
not
refusing to take action. I’m just unsure what the right play is in this case. Attacking these pods might be a good idea, or it might needlessly set them off. Remember the spiders back at the field around the nexus? Burning them got them to wake up. If we’d walked past quietly, they might never have done a thing.”

“Maybe, but then again, they might have come after us later in a massed swarm if we hadn’t burned them first.”

I shrugged. “See? Uncertainty. We just don’t know enough about this world to go second-guessing all the techs and bio people in the legion. They’ve been studying the matter a lot longer than we have.”

Carlos steered away from me again, shaking his head. “I’m feeling a little sick, here. James McGill, a stiff. A rule-following member of the shepherd’s flock. Makes me want to puke.”

“You’re in rare form today,” I told him. “Clear off and move to the rear of the column. Maybe you can wrap up someone’s stubbed toe.”

Grumbling further, he did as I asked. It was a relief to see him go. Sometimes, I wasn’t sure how I’d managed to stay friends with a man who often irritated the living hell out of me. That was a mystery that I’d probably never figure out.

After he was out of earshot, I wondered about his words. Was I becoming dull and predictable? A rule-follower who didn’t question his betters? I didn’t like the thought of that.

Fortunately, fate didn’t give me much time to ponder. About three minutes after my talk with Carlos we came into sight of the fallen craft, and Winslade ordered us to encircle it.

The ship itself was…
strange
. It didn’t match anything I’d seen before. Empire ships were usually squared off and built with complex geometric pieces layered together. Squid ships tended to be oblong and rounded, like giant zeppelins from Earth’s past.

This craft wasn’t like either of those basic designs. The ship looked to me like an insect. There were legs on it, thick struts that tapered up from the padded feet to the body itself. The back had a fanned set of wings that appeared to have been drawn inward against the body and folded on top of the upper hull. I guessed the wings were there for atmospheric travel. The front of it—at least what I thought was the front—was a bulbous module with a tongue that seemed to spit down to the floor of the forest.

“You know what that looks like to me?” Kivi asked.

“Yeah…a fly, maybe?”

“Close. It’s a mosquito. A thickly-built mosquito.”

“You’re right. How odd. They chose a design that matches nothing on this world.”

“It’s an efficient, ancient design,” she said. “There were mosquitos eating dinosaur blood back on Earth, you know.”

Harris and his squad had been trailing us. Now that we were hunkering down along a ridgeline, they came up behind us and stared at the ship, just as we had.

“Looks like a bug,” Harris said.

“A mosquito,” I suggested.

“Yeah…you’re right,” said Harris. “That long tongue-thing that comes out of the head and touches the ground—that would make quite an impression if it stabbed into a man.” He laughed, but no one shared in his mirth.

Della came up next, and she threw herself down beside me, hiding among the ferns.

“I don’t like that thing,” she said. “Is it true such monsters exist on Earth?”

“Mosquitos? They’re real enough. This ship
does
look like one, if you magnified it about ten thousand times.”

“A terrifying image of evil,” she breathed.

I chuckled. “Plenty of people in Georgia would agree with you.”

“What’s wrong with the ship?” Della asked.

“What?”

“They said at the briefing that this ship was disabled. That it had survived the broadsides—but I don’t see any damage.”

She was right. I contacted Kivi, who answered back quickly.

“We’re working on that,” Kivi said. “We don’t know the answer. The initial images showed damage—but the vessel looks perfectly operational now.”

“Well, I like mysteries,” I lied. “How long until we run up that thing’s tongue and take a look inside?”

“Tongue?” she asked. “If this craft’s design is based upon real insects, the correct term would be proboscis.”

I rolled my eyes. “Whatever. How long?”

Soon. The techs are all chatting about it. They’re recommending caution, but Winslade has overruled them.”

“Uh-huh,” I said. “I figured that was coming.”

“There’s something else, James,” Kivi said in concern. “Did you know that we’ve been designated to take the point on this attack?”

“I’d been meaning to bring that up,” I said apologetically.

“You really are a bastard. You know that don’t you?”

“So I’ve been told…”

-31-

The assault began about thirty minutes after we first reached the mosquito-ship. The more I got used to it, the more the insectile vessel looked like it belonged here. Where else would a giant mosquito fit in, after all, than in the midst of a forest full of trees that were over a kilometer tall on average?

Graves marched in the lead of our lonely unit as we approached the ship. I had to give the man credit—sure, he was a heartless bastard with soul of a stone, but he had guts, too. He often led from the front without any concern for his personal safety.

Winslade, by comparison, was way back in a headquarters bunker he’d had the techs dig for him using drones. The bunker was behind the trunk of the tree nearest to our position. I imagined him hiding back there, using a bunch of specialists as an excuse and as protection.

He’d ordered the rest of us to capture the ship on foot. All around me were people from my unit. Della, Harris, Johnson and Leeson—we were all marching in a widespread formation. We kept our distance from one another, hoping we’d be harder to take out if the ship suddenly lit us up.

I was of the mind that we should up and charge the thing, but that hadn’t been the consensus. A heavy infantry group in exo-armor can move very quickly across a field like the one we were in, but the trouble was not all of us were in armor now. If we tried a quick assault, we’d be strung out depending on who had working legs that could auto-run and who didn’t. To keep the line coherent, we’d been ordered to march together.

So far, the ship had just lain there quietly.

It really
did
look as if a giant bug with gossamer wings of titanium had just landed on the forest floor to take a break.

We reached the ship without incident. Walking up the tongue-like ramp made everyone uneasy—except possibly for Graves himself. He walked up that uneven slanted surface as if he was mounting the steps outside the Mustering Hall back home.

“One at a time,” he said. “I’m wondering if we’re looking at a vehicle manned by a smaller variety of alien. This ramp is pretty narrow for beings as large as these aliens tend to be. Input, Natasha?”

“What, Centurion?” she answered as if startled.

“Weren’t you listening? What kind of being would use this type of ramp?”

I glanced over toward her, and I felt a surge of sympathy. She wasn’t enjoying this adventure. Not at all. Her face was white, and I could see her eyes rolling around in her helmet as the dark maw of the ship yawned wide up ahead.

“Uh…I don’t know, sir.”

Centurion Graves laughed. “Don’t tell me this thing has you spooked? I can tell you haven’t seen enough alien craft yet. Some of the designs are downright weird. You should see a Mogwa’s personal pinnace, for example. They look like rifles, and you enter through the muzzle. The first time I did that, I thought it was going to blast me to kingdom-come.”

Natasha and I exchanged glances among ourselves. We had no idea what he was talking about, but we were impressed he’d been on a real Mogwa ship at some point in his long career.

Graves stepped over the final lip at the top of the tongue and into the strange mouth of the craft beyond. He vanished like a swallowed morsel. Only his suit-lights gleamed faintly to show where he was.

“Hmm,” he said. “There are no internal light sources. No windows, either. Turn on your lamps, people. And make sure your faceplates are closed and locked.”

Those who had forgotten to button-up adjusted their suits in a hurry. Visors were slapped down, and they clicked as they locked into place.

We advanced into the craft, shining our suit-lights into the bowels ahead. The ship was simplistic in design. There were only three decks, and the bottom deck was the biggest of the three. That space was filled with egg-shaped nodules that lined the floor, walls and ceiling. The eggs were in what looked like a honeycomb of hexagons built with secreted resins. There were fleshy leaves surrounding each egg, and what looked like roots or veins growing between them. Graves ordered us to stay out of there. The eggs were clearly some kind of alien life-form.

The middle deck was full of equipment. Strange-looking devices that seemed to produce carbon dioxide and generate power.

The top deck was the control system. Fortunately, it was unoccupied. The accommodations were very large, however. Whoever was expected to pilot this ship was clearly a giant.

“Has anyone ever seen a being that might operate this kind of control system?” Graves demanded.

I looked at the controls, baffled. Paddle-like devices lined the floor. They looked rubbery and almost organic. Two or three meters above the paddles was an uneven surface—call it a table or a board—encrusted with strange growths. The techs analyzed the paddles and determined they gave the pilots feedback as they were hooked to external sensors. Instead of visual gauges or read outs, the feedback systems consisted of tactile nubs and tips. These things squirmed when you made contact with them.

Out of all of us, only Natasha seemed more fascinated than disgusted. She became increasingly excited as she examined the alien technology.

“This is unbelievable,” she said. “So different from Imperial standard. I can only guess at the details, but this thing that looks like a seashell has to provide a reading of speed—or maybe navigational data. The pilot sits here, next to this pineapple thing, and he must have to remain in contact with the mobile data readouts. Then, using these paddles way down here—”

“Are you serious?” Graves asked in disgust. “Nothing Imperial standard at all? There’s no way we’ll ever figure this out.”

“Well, it’s not a familiar interface, naturally. But given enough time, Centurion—”

“We don’t have time. I’m going outside to report back to Winslade. This mission is a bust.”

Graves strode out of the ship to stand on the tongue. Those of us left inside looked at one another, relieved and worried all at once. After all, nothing had attacked us yet. But on the downside, we weren’t going to be getting home inside this strange ship.

Graves contacted us moments later on the unit-wide channel.

“We’ve got a problem,” he announced. “We’ve been out of communication while we’ve been in here exploring. Those pods hanging from the trees we passed on the way to this ship have begun tearing themselves open. Walkers are massing up between our position and the lifter. This whole thing might have been a trap all along. In any case, Winslade has ordered us to stay here and defend our captured prize at all costs.”

“I don’t believe this,” Leeson said to me. Then keyed his mic and talked to everyone. “Centurion, did you tell the primus this ship is impossible to figure out and full of alien eggs, sir?”

“We have our orders,” Graves said. “Take up defensive positions and remove those eggs in the main hold. I want them all tossed overboard.”

Leeson and I looked at one another. Neither one of us wore a happy expression.

“Leeson,” Graves continued as if he could see our faces. “Stop crying and get your platoon on it. Clear out that hold.”

Closing his eyes and shaking his head, Leeson let out a long sigh. “All right, you heard the man. Let’s move out!”

Trotting down the nearest ramp, he vanished in the direction of the hold. I followed, with Harris and his squad behind me. Profanity echoed from every wall all the way to the bottom.

We soon stood in a knot among the alien eggs nestled in their honeycombs. There had to be a thousand of them—maybe more.

“I say we burn them,” Carlos said. “That worked last time.”

“That’s a solid idea, Ortiz,” Leeson said, “but we can’t do that. We might damage the ship. The whole point is to take this ship for ourselves, not to burn it up.”

“Graves himself already said we can’t fly this thing. Maybe we should have an accident to speed things along.”

Leeson eyed him for a moment. I couldn’t tell if he was considering doing it or shooting Carlos for being mouthy. It might have been a toss-up.

“You’ve been following McGill too long,” Leeson said at last. “I’m going to recommend an assignment change after this mission. You can be Harris’ medic next time we deploy.”

“No reassignment is necessary, Adjunct,” Carlos said.

“I say it is. You two have been rubbing on each other in the same squad for years. Don’t you want to get away from McGill?”

Carlos gave him a funny look. By funny, I mean stressed and uncertain, not like he was about to laugh or anything. I realized right then that Carlos didn’t want to be separated from me. He’d been by my side for years, just as Leeson had said. Despite all our adventures, mishaps and downright disasters, he wanted to keep it that way.

“I was just talking big, sir,” he said. “No changes in the rosters are necessary.”

Leeson snorted. “All right then. How about you shut your mouth, get down there into that hexagon of bug-spit, and carry the first egg out?”

Carlos set his teeth. He glanced at me, but I didn’t say anything. I knew what Leeson was thinking: if Ortiz didn’t want to get transferred, he could damned well start doing more work and less complaining. Leeson was testing him, and I couldn’t honestly fault his methods.

Resignedly, Carlos moved to the nearest of the hexagons and stepped inside. There were hundreds of these large indented regions on the floor of the hold and more on the walls and ceiling. About a meter deep, these hexagons didn’t have water in them, they had eggs instead.

The eggs were kind of kiwi-shaped. They were roughly scaled on the outside and they had vein-like roots running in between them.

I was immediately reminded of the cocoons we’d found back in the forest with the nexus plant. Could these eggs be like those things? Pods, full of some kind of new life-form? 

As Carlos approached the nearest egg, moving slowly so as not to step on any of the hose-thick roots that ran between them, I looked all over the hold. Where were these roots going?

“Get on with it!” Leeson shouted.

Carlos hesitated. Harris and his team had gathered up behind us. They were all grins, nudging one another and pointing at Carlos with glee. They were enjoying the scene.

Carlos had always had a big mouth. Over time, that tended to irritate a lot of folks, and in our unit he’d pretty much irritated us all.

But still, I felt an urge to defend him.

“Adjunct, sir?” I said.

“What now, McGill?”

“That’s my one and only medic you’re endangering out there. He hasn’t got a strip of armor on, either.”

“You want to take his place?”

“Yes sir, if I may.”

Leeson stared at me with narrow eyes. “Request denied! Carry on, Ortiz, and hurry up or I’ll start kicking those eggs over one at a time myself.”

“Maybe he should carry two at once, sir,” Harris suggested.

“Shut up. One man, one egg. If Ortiz lives, you’ll all get your chance to carry plenty of them.”

Harris retreated hastily.

Carlos took in a deep breath, knelt, and put his hands around the lower, fatter end of an egg. He then straightened, using his legs to do the lifting. Even so, he struggled with the weight of it.

“Heavy, sir!” he managed to grunt out.

“That’s cuz they’re all attached with those hoses. Put it down, fool, and cut it loose first.”

Blinking with the strain and fear, Carlos put his egg down. He then produced a knife and slashed the vein-like roots that interconnected the eggs. He was sweating, despite the fact it wasn’t all that hot in here.

A hissing sound erupted as he cut the hoses. Liquid gushed out and pooled around his boots. A vapor arose, like white smoke.

“That looks like the stuff we met up with on
Minotaur
,” I commented. “Is that acid?”

“By the look of it,” Natasha said, “it must have a highly unstable pH.”

“Pick the damned thing up, Ortiz!” shouted Adjunct Leeson. “Time’s wasting! If your boots melt, well, we’ll find you new ones.”

Everyone knew what that meant. The only supply of fresh boots was back at the lifter in the lockers near the revival rooms.

Carlos knelt again, gripped the bulbous egg and lifted. It came clear, but it sloshed and dribbled more liquids.

“Natasha said these plants use stinks and liquids to talk,” Harris said. “Maybe it’s trying to talk to you. What’s it saying, Ortiz?”

“It says you smell like your mama’s purse, Harris,” Ortiz called back.

Harris growled something I didn’t catch. I had to hand it to Carlos, there he was carrying an alien egg dripping acid all over his shoes, and he was still smarting off to his superiors. I had to admire his dedication.

Carlos almost made it out of the hold. The trouble came when he reached the edge of the honeycomb he was in. I reached down along with Sargon, and we hauled him out—at least we tried to.

Unfortunately, the egg-thing, or pod, or whatever you want to call it, tipped too far and spilled liquid all over his pants.

That white smoke billowed and hissed like hot rocks hit with cold water. I could hardly see for a second, and although I tried to haul Carlos up onto the higher deck with us, he stayed down there as if glued to the deck.