Earthfall (35 page)

“E
klund, you current
on the M416?” Laird asked as he made a quick system check of his own rifle. As he had no grenades, he had no grenade launcher attached, only a forward hand grip to give him better control. The weapon was loaded, charged, and ready. He flicked off the safety.

“I am,” Leona said.

“Then you’re with me. Andrews, stay here with Jordello. Keep down, don’t move a fucking muscle until someone tells you otherwise. You get me?” Laird looked over at Rachel, taking note of her wide eyes. She nodded fractionally, not looking at him, but at the SCEV moving across the darkening plain below. The harbinger of death, slowly stalking her husband. Laird was sure she was torn up inside, so he grabbed her arm and forced her to look at him.

“Andrews, do you read me?” he asked, his voice brusque and full of iron, even though he didn’t feel it in his heart.

“Yes,” she said finally. “I heard you the first time.”

“Then listen to this: if we don’t make it back, you need to bury yourself and Jordello with as much earth as you can. You’ll run out of canned air in an hour, so make sure this,” he pointed at the filter can in the flexible composite hose that connected his air tank to his respirator face mask, “is exposed to the environment. Don’t bury it. It’ll filter out all the particles that you could inhale. It’s got a threaded connection. Just unscrew it when your tank runs dry, then do the same for Jordello. Bury yourselves and leave the filters on the surface. Can you get to your entrenching tool?”

She reached around and pulled it from the magnetized hook it hung from on her back and held it up for him to see. “Yes.”

“Know how to use it?”

“What is this, a job interview?” Her voice sounded shrill over the radio.

“Rachel, do what Jim tells you.” Andrews’s voice was calm and rational over the radio net. “Just answer his questions. We’ve got stuff to do, and arguing with Jim is only slowing us down.”

“Yes, I know how to dig a fucking hole!” she snapped. “I know it needs to be big enough for both of us, we need to be covered by at least twenty-four inches of dirt, and it has to be packed as hard as it can be so the wind won’t scour it away.”

Laird grunted. “Okay, sounds good to me.” He raised his head slowly and looked down at the plain. He had gotten sloppy before, exposing himself when Law was clearly surveying the ridge and causing the group to be on the receiving end of a withering fusillade of 7.62 millimeter minigun fire. Thankfully, the rock had been dense enough to prevent anyone from getting killed. A missile strike, though … That would be a different matter altogether.

“Let’s roll, Eklund.” He pushed himself into a crouch. “I want to move at least a hundred meters downrange. Keep up as best as you can.”

“Roger,” Leona said. She got to her feet and hobbled after him as he set off down the ridge.

***

Law was bathed in sweat, despite the cool, conditioned air that whispered across him. His hands trembled, and he felt vaguely nauseous. Extending his senses over such a vast distance and at such amplitude to take over one of his enemies had taken a remarkable toll on him. He had no idea who it was he had found; such knowledge was available to him only at close ranges, and it had been a miracle he had been able to interact with the target’s mind at all. It would have been easier to induce a fatal cardiac infarction, as he had been trained to do, but he had no idea of the team’s medical capabilities. So he had merely compelled the mark to commit suicide, something he had done numerous times in the past while keeping the family in line—it prevented any blowback among the family, because it could never be proven that he had forced the individual to hang himself, or slash her wrists on a piece of rusted metal. But overpowering a man’s sense of self-preservation over such a vast distance and forcing him to shoot himself had been enormously taxing, leaving Law shaken and weak, as well as ravenously hungry and thirsty. He would need to replenish his body’s energy stores as soon as possible.

Was it Andrews?
he wondered dimly as he lay gasping in the pilot’s seat.
Was he the one I killed?
He tried to recall the more intimate aspects of the connection, but there was nothing much to pick over. It had been as empty and impersonal as a simplex radio connection where the caller could speak, but could hear nothing back.

Through blurry eyes, he looked out at the terrain beyond the viewports. The skies were growing ever darker as the massive storm loomed closer, radiating bursts of lightning that flickered and flashed across the landscape. Still struggling for breath, Law hunted around the instrument panel until he found the switches for the rig’s floodlight arrays, located on the overhead panel. He flipped them on and was rewarded with a substantially brighter view of the bleak environment outside. He noticed that the radar display was reading more and more clutter, garbage through which it could not see. That worried Law. He would have to try to get a hold on himself and finish the task at hand. There were still others outside to hunt down, and he would be best served by starting with the grenadiers first. He knew he had killed one; now, he had to do the same to the others.

Rubbing his eyes until his vision cleared, Law sat up in the seat and pushed the control column forward. The SCEV slowly rumbled forward, swaying slightly in the wind. The hunt was once again afoot.

Slowly, the rig drew closer to a brief line of rocky outcroppings. Law peered through the viewports. The floodlights revealed more detail as the vehicle approached the formation in the landscape. He decided this would have made an excellent position to attack from; not only did upthrusts of stone provide more than conceal-only cover, he got the distinct impression the plain rolled away gently on the other side. The decline would provide additional protection, from both weapons and radar.

Something winked in the darkness to the left and above the SCEV. He heard several objects slam into the SCEV’s nose. The floodlights suddenly went dark as glass exploded. Sparks played along the SCEV’s nose as several pockmarks appeared in the viewport right before his eyes. Law made a strangled, enraged sound as the floodlight array was destroyed. He reached for the radar display and tapped the screen, highlighting the area on the ridge from where he believed the weapon fire had originated. He heard a distant whine as the missile pod automatically spun and locked in on the site, and one of the Hellfire missiles homed in on the spot. Law pressed the fire button on the display, and was rewarded with a brief hissing sound as the missile leapt from the rail and blasted across the darkening sky. A quick second later, a bright flash of fire and smoke signaled the weapon’s impact as it powered into the ridgeline and exploded, sending great chunks of rock flying through the air. Debris rained down from the sky, peppering the SCEV as a column of smoke-filled dust rose into the air from the impact site. Law stared at the ridgeline for a long moment, looking for any movement, any sign that a follow-on attack was underway from that side. He saw nothing, but he held his position for a moment, watching and waiting, knowing the idling rig made an attractive target. He briefly considered expanding his consciousness again, allowing his mind to brush against the ridgeline, but that part of him was reluctant to function. He had severely overstressed himself, and to reach out with his phantom hand and explore the landscape would leave him incapacitated and unable to proceed any further with his plan. At least, until his attackers drew nearer.

Come on, Andrews. Show yourself, you coward …

A chime sounded, followed by a male voice:
“Incoming. Incoming. Incoming.”
Shocked, Law turned to the radar display and saw a pipper rapidly approaching the SCEV, arcing toward it from the sky above. There was a vague rumble as one of the anti-missile warheads erupted from its niche and curved upward to meet the incoming object, but the angle was wrong; the defensive system fired up and out from the SCEV, whereas the incoming round was coming almost straight down. It slammed into the top of the rig as the AMW projectile curved away, climbing uselessly into the sky where it detonated benignly fifty meters overhead. At the same time, another explosion rocked the SCEV, and the rig trembled on its suspension as the radar display went dark, replaced by a flashing legend that told him the array had been destroyed, no doubt by a grenade. With a shout, Law pulled the control column backward, backing away from the ragged line of rocky outcroppings, cursing himself over the loss of his last remaining targeting system. Now, the remaining Hellfire missiles were of no use, and he would have to fire the miniguns the old-fashioned point-and-shoot way.

Still enough to kill them all.

Another chime sounded, and Law swept his eyes across the displays, looking for the source of the notification. When he saw what it was, he slammed on the SCEV’s brakes and reached for his harness release before the big rig had come to a full halt. The assault rifle propped up in the copilot’s seat went clattering to the floor as he reached for it, and he groped for it while staring at the engineering display in the center of the instrument panel.

The outer airlock door had opened.

Someone was aboard the SCEV.

***

Andrews whooped when he saw SCEV Four’s floodlights disappear into explosions of shattered glass that sprinkled across the rig’s top and nose like a sudden snowfall, leaving the rig bathed in darkness save for where its LED position lights still gleamed. The rig ground to a halt less than twenty meters to his right, and Andrews could see the FLIR was knocked askew, its flat pane of mirrored glass turned away from him, pointing more or less at the ridgeline where Laird and Leona hammered the vehicle with aimed bursts of 5.56 millimeter rounds. He saw a vague outline behind the rig’s viewports, a small, slender figure craning its head around, looking for his attackers. It was Law.

Time to pay the piper, pal.

Andrews pushed himself away from the clump of rock he was hiding behind and hurried toward the SCEV, keeping to a low crouch. “Good job, guys,” he said over the radio. “I’m on the move now, closing on the vehicle—you should relocate.”

“On it,” Laird said.

Andrews was only five meters from the rig’s nose when he saw the missile pod slewing to the left. “Look out, he’s going to use a Hellfire!” He dropped down and knelt, raising his rifle. As he did, one of the missiles erupted from the launcher, riding a plume of flaming exhaust that was incredibly bright against the darkening sky. He heard a microphone key open, perhaps as Laird started to reply, but the transmission was cut off as the Hellfire slammed into the ridgeline and exploded. A small mushroom cloud of spark-filled black smoke erupted into the air, its shape a short-lived affair as the wind tore at it, breaking it apart and pushing the cloud downrange. Pieces of rock—some small as pebbles, others as large as a grapefruit—rained down around Andrews as he estimated the range to the SCEV. He would have to fire the grenade on a very short but high arc, one that was certain to be detected by the rig’s millimeter wave radar. He had no idea if the anti-missile defense system would be able to intercept an object as small as a forty-millimeter grenade, but he had no choice. Rachel was up there, and if Law got off another shot, she would likely be killed. He pulled the trigger on the M320, and the grenade fired with a brief thumping noise. Almost immediately, one of the AMWs in the rig’s side exploded away from the vehicle, curving up into the air. Andrews didn’t wait to see what happened next. He pushed himself to his feet and made a mad dash toward the vehicle, more or less certain he was inside the radar’s small blind spot. If not, he would find out the hard way.

Two explosions tore through the darkness, the first coming from directly atop the SCEV, the second from much higher as the AMW warhead detonated. The SCEV bounced on its suspension as Andrews ran toward it and flattened himself against its metal hide. Payload from the expended AMW pinged off the rig, and small eruptions of dust exploded all around Andrews as a portion of the weapon’s load of ball bearings hit the ground. None of them struck him, and he knew just how lucky he was—the projectiles were moving almost as fast as bullets, and were quite capable of killing him. More material rained down from above, and he saw it was pieces of shattered fiberglass. He didn’t know if he had destroyed the rig’s radar, but he had definitely destroyed the radome that encased it. He popped open the keypad access panel next to the airlock door, but before he could type in the entry code, he heard the rig’s turboshaft engines begin to spool up. Next to the airlock was a series of maintenance access steps, hidden behind hinged dust covers. Andrews pushed his right foot into the lowermost step and boosted himself up, reaching for the next handhold. He grabbed it just as the SCEV’s tires began spinning, and the rig rocketed backward. Andrews hung on for dear life as the vehicle roared away in reverse. He reached for the open keypad, but the vehicle was bumping so much that he would never be able to type in the code. Instead, he reached for the yellow and black handle next to the keypad, marked with the word RESCUE in red letters. He yanked on it, but it refused to move. He pulled harder—and almost succeeded in losing his grip on the maintenance ladder. Swearing and fighting to maintain his tenuous grasp on the SCEV, he pulled again. This time, the handle pulled outward with a pop, and Andrews felt the airlock’s drive motors engage. The airlock door popped open, and he flung himself inside. He bounced off the hard wall inside the cubicle, and he grunted as he opened another panel, revealing the secondary emergency access. He yanked on it, and it pulled out from the recess easily. The inner door slid open into its pocket just as the SCEV slammed to a shuddering halt, throwing Andrews across the small aisle, where he crashed headlong into the science station. His helmet smashed into one of the displays there, fracturing the durable, coated plastic screen. An alarm blared, indicating the rig’s pressure seal had been compromised, and that it was exposed to the hostile environment. Both pressure doors at either side of the second compartment began to slide closed automatically. Andrews reached across the science station and pressed down on the command override there, and both doors withdrew into their pockets. He whirled toward the cockpit, and there was Law. Their eyes met for an instant as the smaller man pulled an assault rifle off the cockpit floor and pointed it at him.