Before the Beginning. Kefiristan is about as close as you can come to
hell on Earth.
I say that with authority: I've spent the last eighteen months doing a
tour here, trying to keep the Kefiri People's Liberation Army, who call
themselves the "Scythe of Glory," from the throats of the rightist
Khorastisti, who have the backing of Azeri transplants from the south (who
want to keep their enclaves), who are fighting a "dirty war" against
Communist Cuban and Peruvian meres . . . Jeez, you get the picture. It's a
snarled skein of a million bloody threads up here on the top of the world,
in the northern extension of the Karakoram range, between Afghanistan and
Samarkand, Uzbekistan.
We'd just punched through the craggy pass pleasantly known as the "torn
hymen" in the local tongue and come across the small, Muslim city of pik
Nizganij, perched on a mountain peak of 2200 meters.
I stared in horror. Even eighteen months of picking up after the Scythe
of Glory and their Shining Path buddies didn't prepare me for what was left
of pik Nizganij.
It was a Bosch canvas, severed limbs and hollowed- out trunks--eaten
out by animals, I prayed--planted through the fields like stalks of corn,
blood painting doors and walls like the first Passover... except it was
human blood, not lamb's blood.
Corporal Flynn Taggart, Fox Company, 15th Light Drop Infantry Regiment,
United States Marine Corps; 888-23-9912. Everyone calls me Fly, except when
they're pissed.
Fox crept through the town, hell-shocked, trying with- out much success
to count body parts and make a reasonable K1A guess. Fog or an evil cloud
rolled across the mountaintop, shrouding the sprightly red decoration and
muffling our footsteps. It was like we walked along a cotton corridor,
tripping over gruesome reminders that war, especially the virulent hatred of
one tribe for another, throws men back into pre-bronze, pre-agricul- tural
savagery. I wondered how many victims were killed by the victors' bare
hands.
Something moved in the mist.
A shadow, a shape; nothing more. Gunnery Sergeant Goforth froze us with
a slight hiss... Fox is damn-well trained, even for the Light Drop.
Gates stopped next to me; he touched my arm, silently pointing to left
and right. I saw immediately; whatever the shapes were, they surrounded us
from eight o'clock to four o'clock... we might be able to retreat, but we
couldn't flank.
I watched the gunny; Arlene Sanders was whispering something in his
ear. She was our scout, the lightest of the Light Drop. PFC Sanders could
fade into the night so not even a werewolf could sniff her out. My best
buddy.
She might have been more; once, we had--no; we were buddies. We didn't
talk about that night. Anyway, she had Dodd, and I don't separate bookends.
Arlene backed away, backed past me, throwing me a wink as she vanished.
She would swing in a wide arc, ease around behind the still-moving shades,
and report back to the lieutenant and Gunny Goforth via a secured line. I'd
find out soon enough.
I hadn't moved, and neither had the rest of us; I could barely hear
Bill breathing next to me and couldn't hear Dodd or Sheill at all. If we
were lucky, maybe the dinks wouldn't even know we were here; they'd just pad
right on by.
Then Lieutenant Beelzebub came running up, de- manding, "What the hell
is going on?" in his normal speaking voice, an irritating whine.
The lieutenant's name was Weems, actually. I just call him Beelzebub
because he's a fat, sweaty heathen always surrounded by a swarm of gnats.
They like the taste of his perspiration.
The dinks froze as suddenly as we had; no longer moving, they vanished
into the swirling gray. We had just lost whatever surprise we had, lost our
best chance to get out of this encounter without a shot fired... and all
because a buffoon who had been a first lieutenant for three years now
couldn't figure out it was a Medusa drill!
One of them moved; then another. They moved singly, here and there, and
we no longer had a clue where the mass of them was.
Weems began to panic; we'd all seen it before. "Aren't we going to take
them out?" he asked Goforth, who was frantically putting his finger to his
lips. "Somebody should take them out. "
Goforth put his hand to his ear; he was listening to Arlene's report,
trying to stifle the lieutenant with his other hand.
But Weems saw a ghost to his left, a specter to his right. We were
surrounded! In Weems's mind--I use the term loosely--they were Indians, we
were the 7th Cav, and he was Custer.
"The lieutenant isn't going to stand for this!" snapped the lieutenant.
"Goforth, take out those soldiers!"
The gunny broke his own drill. "Sir, we don't even know who they are...
Sanders says they're wearing robes and hoods--"
"Scythe of Glory!" said Weems, again raising his voice.
"No sir, just robed men--"
"Gunny, I gave you an order... now take down those men!"
Arlene flashed past me again. "What the hell's going on?" she hissed.
"Weems wants us to take 'em down. "
"Fly, they're monks! You gotta stop the crazy son of a bitch!"
I was the second-ranking noncom; Goforth would listen to me, I thought.
I hunched over and jogged to the gunnery sergeant. "Gunny, Arlene says
they're monks."
"Taggart, right?" said Weems, as if bumping into me at an
oyster-shucking party.
"Sir, they're just monks. "
"Do you know that for sure? Does anyone know that for sure?"
"Sanders said--"
"Sanders said! Sanders said! Does Sanders have to deal with Colonel
Brinkle every week?"
"Sir," began the gunny, "I think we should recon the group before we
open fire."
Weems looked him in the face, shaking in fury. "As long as I'm giving
the orders here, Marine, you'll obey them. Now take down those men!"
Monks. Freakin' monks!
I snapped. Maybe it was the bodies, or the body parts. The mountain
air, thin oxygen. A gutful of Weems, Arlene's frightened, incredulous stare,
the way Goforth's jaw set and he turned to give the order--a twenty-year
man, he wasn't going to throw it away over a bunch of lousy religious dinks.
But suddenly, it occurred to me that if Weems were lying facedown in
the deep muddy, he wouldn't be giving no orders. Then we could let the
damned monks disap- pear, and nobody would be the loser.
"Scuse me, sir," I said, tapping the looie on the shoulder.
He turned, and I Georged him. Full-body swing; came out of Orlando,
where I grew up. Picked up speed over Parris Island, hooked in at
Kefiristan, and turned off the lights of Mr. Lieutenant Weems in pik
Nizganij.
Alas, they only flickered. Power was restored. The dork didn't have a
glass jaw; have to give him that.
Weems sprawled messily in the mud, and a couple of the boys were on me
like monkeys on a tree. Weems flopped for a bit like a giant spider, then he
found his hands and knees. He glared at me for a moment, an evil smile
cracking his face. "Later," he said. Then he turned back to Goforth. "That
don't mean crap, gunnery ser- geant; now take down those men--or are you
going to frag me, instead?"
Goforth looked at me, looked at Weems, looked at the ground. Then he
clicked his M-92 to rock'n'roll and quietly said, "Fox--take down those
men."
I closed my eyes, listening to powder hiss, bullets crack, the metal
clang of receivers slamming back and home. The screams of the dying. The
shouts of the victors. I smelled the smoke from the smokeless power, the
primer, fresh blood.
I'm in hell, I remember thinking; I'm in hell.
We mopped up the enemy troops in record time. Strange thing; none of
them shot back. Fact, no weapons were found... just fifty-three men ranging
from pre- teen to seventy or eighty, wearing brown robes and hoods, shaved
heads, a couple carrying prayer sticks.
The boys wouldn't get off my back. Weems wouldn't even walk around
where I could see him, the murdering bastard, while he formally charged me
and I opted for a formal court-martial instead of Captain's Mast.
Jesus and Mary, somebody should put a bullet in his brain. I could
taste the trigger. I didn't know how I was ever going to be shriven if I
couldn't feel remorse.
1
I didn't miss Earth, but I sure as hell hated Mars. Sitting in a dingy
mess hall on Phobos, one of the two, tiny Martian moons, seemed like a nice
compro- mise.
Ordinarily, the C.O., Major Boyd, would have handed me over to the
jaggies for trial; but the day after Weems gave the fateful order that
bought him a mouthful of fist from Yours Truly, the 15th received orders to
answer a distress call from Phobos. Fox Company was due to rotate back to
the world anyway; Boyd decided to mail us to Mars.
They poured me onto the transport along with the rest of Fox; plenty of
time to fry my butt after we figured out what the hell the UAC miners were
squawking about this time.
The Corps, the Corps, all glory to the Corps! I don't think you know
what the Marine Corps truly means to me. It has a bit to do with my father;
no, he was not a Marine, God no. Maybe something to do with growing up in
Orlando, Florida, and Los Angeles, seeing first the ersatz "Hollywood
Boulevard" of Universal Studios East, then the even phonier real thing out
west. Glitter and tinsel. . . but what was real?
Everything in my life rang as hollow as the boulevard until I found my
core in the Corps.
Honor wasn't just something you did to credit cards. A lie wasn't
called spin control, and spin was something you only put on a cue ball.
Yeah, right, you think you know more about it than I? I know it was all BS,
even in the Corps. I know the service was riddled up and down with lying
sacks of dung, like everything else. "There is no cause so noble it will not
attract fuggheads;" one of those sci-fi writers Arlene is always shoving at
me, David Niven or something.
But God damn it, at least we say the word honor without laughing. At
least we have a code--"I will not lie, cheat, or steal, nor tolerate those
among us who do"--even if individuals don't always live up to it. At least
it's there to reach for, even if our grasp falls far short. At least decency
has a legal definition, right there in the Universal Code of Military
Justice! At least respect means more than leaving the other guy's graffiti
alone. At least we do more crap by six A.M. than most of you civilians do
all day. At least the Corps is the Corps, semper fidelis--damn it, we know
who we are and why we are! Do you?
Arlene never saw it the way I did; hell, no one did. I was a majority
of one.
But you can't understand me unless you understand this much: there is a
place in the world where decent men walk the streets, where water flows
uphill, where miracles happen behind enemy lines and without air support,
and where a guy (boy or girl) will stand on the wall that divides you people
from the barbarians at the gate, take a bullet, and shoot back at the son of
a bitch what fired it.
Unless you've been there, you'll never know. I want to take you there.
The long trip to Mars was dull, and the little voice in the back of my
head had plenty of time to ask whether I would do anything different if
given the chance. I had to honestly answer no.
Funny thing is, I always hoped I'd go to space one day . . . but not
like this. My idea was to be on a deep-space exploratory ship, pushing out
beyond the bounds of the known solar system. But when I scored only a 60 on
the MilSpaceAp test, the chances of me receiving a deep-space assignment
ranged somewhere between infinitesimal and "forget it." The big surprise was
that one right upper cut to the concrete jaw of Lieutenant Weems opened my
pathway to the stars.
Not only would I do it over again, I'd still enjoy it!
I stared at the two men whose job was to guard me, and had a strange
feeling of unreality. "Want some coffee?" one of them asked with something
that sounded like actual concern. His thin face reminded me of one of the
monks.
"Yeah," I said. "Black, if you don't mind." He smiled. We'd run out of
cream back in Kefiristan, and when he hopped up to Phobos, the supply
situation was no improvement.
The guard's name was Ron. The other guard's name was Ron, too--I called
him "Ron Two," but they didn't see the humor in it.
We didn't talk much. It seemed a little insulting only having two
Marines protecting such a dangerous type as Yours Truly; but the other men
were busy figuring out what had gone wrong on Phobos.
After we up-shipped to Mars Base, we sat for a solid day, trying to
find out why the UAC miners on Phobos had sent a distress call--and why they
didn't answer now. In the Marines, you spend eternity so bored you'd look
forward to your own court-martial as a break in the tedium. Then an
unexpected danger with huge, jagged edges comes rolling over all the set
routines, a reminder that the universe is a dangerous place.
The last message we received from Phobos was: "Things coming through
the Gate." When something that serious hits the fan, boredom is returned to
its proper place as a luxury. The court-martial of a corporal was deemed
less important than a potential threat to Mars--and not important at all
compared to an imme- diate threat to the profits of the Union Aerospace
Corpo- ration.
With a ringing cry of "sounds like they're smoking something up there,"
Lieutenant Weems boldly led his men into the transport. At first I thought
I'd be left behind on Mars Base; but either Weems thought I might prove
useful to have along, or else he just didn't want a loose end. I volunteered
to go along. Sometimes I'm not very bright.
Major Boyd did his best to brief us by video feed, under the obvious
handicap of complete ignorance. He made the best of it. We were issued
pressure suits, in case we had to leave the immediate vicinity of the Gate.
You couldn't stay very long outside the pressure zone, and you'd get mighty
cold, mighty fast. But at least the suits gave you a fighting chance to get
to a ship or a zone before you were sucking vacuum. I was pleased to be
issued a suit; I was less pleased that Weems didn't issue me a weapon.
While I contemplated the lethal uses of common household articles, PFC
Ron Two brought the promised cup of coffee. It tasted bad enough to be a
strategic weapon of deterrence. The expression on the guard suggested that
he might have sampled it before passing it on to me; but maybe he was just
plain scared of the situation. I couldn't really blame him.
A word about these Gates on Phobos and Deimos, the two tiny moons of
Mars; you've probably heard about the Gates, even though officially it's a
secret.
They were here when we first landed on Mars. It was a hell of a shock,
discovering that someone or some thing had beaten us by a million years to
our own closest neighbor! It was long before I joined up, of course, but I
can only imagine the panic at the Pentagon when we found ancient and wholly
artificial structures on Phobos, despite the complete lack of any form of
life on Mars.
It was pretty clear they'd been placed there by some alien
intelligence. But what? All my adult life, I'd heard speculation: all the
usual UFO culprits . . . Reticulans, Men-in-Black, ancient Martians--that
was the most popular theory, despite not working at all: there was no native
life on Mars; but try to tell that to generations raised on Martian
Walkabout, Ratgash of Mars, and Mars, Arise!
Me, I figured it was a race of alien anthropologists; they got here,
said, "Hm, not quite ready yet," and left a "helipad" in case they decided
to return . . . which they might do tomorrow or a hundred thousand years
from now.
Somebody decided to call them "Gates," even though they just sat there
doing nothing for as long as we've known about them. But surrounding them
was a zone of about half Earth-normal gravitation ... on a moon whose normal
gravity is just this side of zero! In addition to the big, inert Gates,
there were also small pads scattered here and there that instantly
transported a person from point A to point B within the area, evidently
without harm . . . teleports, if you will. I had heard about them but never
seen one; damned if you'd ever get me into one, either.
When the United Aerospace Corporation bribed enough congressmen for the
exclusive contract to mine Phobos and Deimos, they built their facilities
around the Gates, taking advantage of the artificial gravity . . . except
for those parts of the operation that wanted low gravity, which they built
outside the "pressure zones." After the big reorganization, the Corps got
the task of guarding the Gates.
Well--it looked as though the big Gates weren't quite so inert as we
all thought.
Once we landed on Phobos, the gunny dropped me and my two guards at the
abandoned Air Base depot (in the "western" pressure zone--antispinwards) and
took the rest of Fox Company on to the UAC facilities, Weems in tow, to
reestablish contact and "secure the situation." All my friends went with
Weems, leaving me with the two Rons for company.
The Phobos facility is built like a gigantic, under- ground cone
extending many hundreds of meters into the rock. There are a bunch of
levels, I'm not even sure how many. Eight? Nine? The whole thing is built in
the center of the solar system's largest strip mine, which would be terrible
for the Phobos ecology--except that Phobos doesn't have an ecology, of
course; it's an airless moon of ice and rock.
The facility was on the opposite hemisphere from the base. Big deal. .
. the entire moon is only about twenty- five kilometers in diameter. You can
walk from one pole to the other, except most of it is disturbingly close to
zero-g, outside the pressure zones.
We had the radio on in the mess hall and were periodically picking up
messages from Weems's Weasels. We'd about given up hope of hearing anything
from the UAC guys who used to be on Phobos. As I sipped the scalding
wake--up--call, wondering who I could sue if I burned my tongue, I couldn't
help but scrutinize the two Rons. Neither gave the impression of being on
top of the situation. They kept glancing at the closed cafeteria doors, at
the radio, at each other . . . They weren't paying much attention to their
prisoner.
They were also having the same conversation every twenty minutes or so.
It generally started like this: "What do you think's happening?" one would
ask the other.
I was tired of listening to variations on I-don't-know, so I
volunteered a theory: "Somehow the Gates turned on, and whoever built them
decided the UAC was trespassing. Maybe they were wiped out."
"But who attacked us?" asked Ron One. Funny; I never thought of Union
Aerospace as part of "us."
"They said monsters were coming through the Gate," said Ron Two with
the same sense of surprise he'd displayed the other half-dozen times.
"They said 'things,'" I corrected. Neither heard me. Things or
monsters, I had faith in Arlene and the rest of the guys.
The guards didn't strike me as being overly interested in the subject
of high order physics. They had reached firm conclusions in the realm of the
biological sciences, however. They didn't believe in monsters.
The truth is that neither did I.
In one respect I was as bad as the PFCs. There were questions that
couldn't be answered yet, but they wouldn't stay out of my mind. Who was the
enemy? How had they reached Phobos through the gateways? And most troubling
of all, why hadn't Fox found any bodies yet? Major Boyd and even Colonel
Brinkle back on Earth would want answers to these questions and a lot more.
Suddenly, the radio sputtered to life, grabbing our attention, an
invisible hand reaching out to choke the breath from us. It was PFC Grayson,
out front on recon, reporting to Weems, who was elsewhere in the facility.
The young Marine had found a corpse. Weems radioed back the obvious
instructions.
"ID impossible, sir," reported Grayson, his voice tense. "It's in too
many pieces. I can positively say that it was a white male. It looks
like--Jesus, sir, it looks like claw marks. And this body's been chewed."
Wild beasts on airless Phobos? Judging by the sickened expressions from
Ron and Ron, it was all too evident that neither of these specimens had ever
seen combat. I've seen my share . . . and all at once, the idea of living
long enough to attend my own court-martial seemed very appealing. Even five
years at Leavenworth looked good. The fact that I didn't have a gun crawled
around deep inside my gut like a tapeworm. Right then I decided to remedy
the situation.
The masticated body parts had been found in the processing plant. We
heard Weems over the radio issuing orders to converge on that point when a
burst of static interfered with the reception.
When Grayson's voice came in again, it was loud and clear. Up until
that moment, the universe still made some kind of sense to me. Of all the
military scenarios running through my mind, none prepared me for what
happened next: "Jesus Christ! It's not human," shouted Grayson. "Too big . .
. shaped all wrong . . . humanoid . . . red eyes . .."
While Grayson was providing this fragmentary report, he punctuated his
description with bursts from his rifle. Before he could become more
coherent, we heard an inarticulate roar of animal pain from whatever he was
shooting, and then he shouted, "I can't put it down!" The next scream we
heard was fully human.
My whole body went cold. Jesus--Arlene was down there.
Keep cool, keep your head--she's a Marine, damn it!
One of the Rons looked like he was about to throw up. "Okay," I said,
"this has gone on long enough. We know we're in this together. Give me a gun
and let's make some plans." If Arlene were being shot at, God damn it, I
intended to shoot back! The honor of the Corps was at stake, not to mention
my best buddy's life.
The radio was reduced to background noise for the moment as Weems the
Weasel tried to control the situation. The nervous looks exchanged between
the dynamic duo in the mess hall made me wonder about training that
completely destroys initiative. On the brink of death, all the Rons cared
about was going by the book--even if that book printed their own obituaries
in flaming letters.
One finally generated the initiative to say, "We can't give you a
weapon!"
I tried again. "Staying alive is the objective here. We've all got
buddies down there. They don't court-martial the dead! You can't help anyone
or defend anything if you're dead. Now give me a piece!"
If either of them had shown a glimmer of intelligence or guts, I
wouldn't have taken the next step. But they insisted on being idiots.
Jesus Christ! As the Godfather said, there are men who go through life
begging to be killed.
2
Shut up," said the first Ron.
"You're going back to detention," said the other. This was a truly
pathetic spectacle. Suddenly, I had become the threat in their eyes, simply
because I was forcing them to face an unpleasant situation head-on.
A number of things happened at once: more screams and gunfire came over
the radio, and I thought I heard a woman scream. The nearest Ron unholstered
his 10mm pistol and pointed it at me--then the poor jerk gestured the
direction he wanted me to walk. He gestured with the hand holding the
pistol. With an invitation like that what could I do?
I caught his arm, moved the gun aside, and rabbit- punched him in the
kidneys; the gun slid across the floor. The other Ron was still fumbling
with his holster, so I turned and jabbed him in the throat. . . not hard
enough to kill, but with enough impact to keep him busy trying to breathe.
Sorry, Rons; Arlene PFC Sanders means more than the both of you rolled
together!
I turned back to the first one, who surprised me by regaining his feet
and making a grab with his good arm. Too bad for him, he was off balance and
fell toward me, providing another irresistible target. I flat-palmed the
back of his head, and he was out like a light. The other Ron was still
doubled over, trying to breathe as I collected their weapons.
"You guys aren't exactly cut out for Light Drop Infantry," I said in as
kindly a voice as I could muster.
Now I had a problem. They weren't bad guys, but I couldn't trust their
goodwill not to come after me. Their fear might be enough to keep them out
of my hair, but I couldn't count on that, either. Nor did I want to leave
them sitting ducks for the hostile forces that were loose in this station.
So I helped the one who was still conscious to his feet and waited for his
glazed eyes to clear a bit.
"Listen, Ron; we've got a situation here. So far as I can tell, we only
have these two sidearms between the three of us. This is not good. The
lieutenant should have left us with some weapons, don't you think?" It was a
rhetorical question, so I kept on. "I'm leaving one of these guns with you,
unloaded." I let him sink back on the floor and slid the ammo clip across
the floor. "When you feel well enough to reload, I suggest you barricade the
door better than I can lock it from the outside, and wait for orders."
He looked sick as a dog but nodded, and I left him to his own devices.
I pocketed the remaining ammo clips. I wanted all the edge a few extra
rounds could provide until I could find an armory and lay my hands on some
real firepower, if the factory had any.
As I locked the mess hall doors behind me, I heard the radio sending
out useless static crackle; no Weems, no Goforth--no Arlene. Well, last I
heard, we were all going to have a party, with Grayson's remains as the
Guest of Honor. I didn't like that particular train of thought so I derailed
it. Time to get serious.
After ten minutes of humping around the compound, I found a
landcart--the last one. That was thoughtful of them. Phobos is so small, a
diameter of only twenty-two kilometers, that I almost could hoof it to the
factory . . . particularly in the ultra-low gravity. But I might need to
evac the survivors; and in any case, speed counts.
Although I'm not claustrophobic, I'd lately had my fill of blank walls.
The spaceship was the worst. Traveling through a million miles of nothing in
a little cubicle just so you can reach another cubicle at the end is not my
idea of the conquest of space.
At least for the one day we spent on Mars, we had a view. The domes
were made of super-thick, insulated plastic, but were cleverly designed to
give the illusion of being thin as a soap bubble. The only trouble was that
the view wasn't very impressive--a blank expanse of empty desert broken by
an equally barren, dark purple sky. I was only so thrilled with looking at
stars. I liked some- thing bigger up there. Although we could see Phobos
from Mars base camp, it was so tiny it almost looked like a bright star
trucking across the sky. Not enough moon for a melancholy mood.
But now as I crawled the land-cart out under the black, airless sky of
Phobos, I enjoyed my first genuine feeling of freedom since I left Earth.
Mars loomed in the sky, three-quarters full, larger than any moon and
burning red as all the blood of all the armies ever spilled in uncountable
battles across the stupid, drooling face of eternity--the face of a monster.
By contrast, the gray, dull surface of Phobos looked like brittle,
laundry soap or dried oatmeal; the only variation was Stickney, the huge
crater that covered a quarter of the moon's surface and filled the rest with
impact striations.
At that moment I thought that Mars might be the last beautiful sight I
would ever experience. Ahead lay noth- ing good. The thought that I might
shortly die didn't bother me nearly so much as the dread of letting down my
loved ones . . . again.
There weren't that many back on Earth, but there was one here on Phobos
that meant everything to me.
Maybe I did love her; I couldn't say. I mean that literally ... I
couldn't say it with her hooked up with Wilhelm Dodd, the dirty bastard. But
that didn't mean crap; if Arlene were in trouble, then putting my life on
the line was the easiest choice I'd ever made. Doing my duty didn't mean I
had a death wish; it meant that I would have to stay alive as long as
possible to find her and hump her out. All right, and the rest of Fox, too.
So with Mars looming gigantic and our sun a shrunk- en, distant ball of
flame, quickly setting as I crawled toward the factory, I sped through
Phobos daylight, across the terminator, and into the black night.
My stomach started roiling the moment I left the zone and entered the
correct gravitational field of Phobos-- not quite zero-g, but close enough
for a queasy stomach. I had to watch my speed carefully here; I wasn't sure
what the escape velocity from Phobos was . . . probably a lot more than a
crawling land-cart could make. But I sure as hell didn't want to end up in
orbit--the tractor treads didn't work too well out there!
I wished I could drive the land-cart right inside the refinery, but I
had to leave it in the garage on the surface. It sure felt good to get back
under even the half-normal gravity in the refinery zone. The silent station
lurked below the surface, containing what was left of Fox Company.
As I began the long descent, I promised to keep very, very quiet. Early
in a career in the Light Drop Infantry, you learn the absolute essential of
lying to yourself. Sure enough, there was noise, and I was the source of it.
Even in the low-g, my boots squeaked slightly. Each squeak was magnified in
my imagination as if giant rodents nibbled at my heels. The rectangle of
light beneath me grew in size as there was no turning back.
I thought about using the lift, but there was no telling who I'd find
inside. The access-tube ladder looked a safer bet.
A popular feature of these permanent stations is how there's always
light and air so long as the small reactor is working. Imagine my
disappointment on climbing down the ladder into the hangar when I noticed
the first signs that something was seriously wrong: the lights were
flickering, and I didn't hear the whine of the air recirculators.
The light was adequate to show empty corridor stretching in front and
behind me. This section didn't seem to show any signs of recent conflict. .
. and no sooner did a small part of me make the mistake of relaxing than I
heard a sharp hissing sound. Before I had time to think, the 10mm was in my
hand and I had spun around into a defensive crouch. I'm sure I scared the
leaky pipe real bad. At times like this, nothing is more welcome than an
anti-climax.
As I examined the damaged pipe, mindful not to be scalded by the
escaping steam, I realized that I might have found something interesting
after all. The pipe had been dented by a blunt metal object of some kind,
and there was a rusty stain on the floor underneath it.
There was really only one direction to go, so I went. That direction
would also take me toward the hangar control room, where I could swear I
heard low, growling noises. Somehow I didn't feel like reholstering my gun.
I didn't like the way my palm was sweating, either.
Taking it nice and easy, I proceeded down the corri- dor. I had a good,
long view ahead of me. No room for surprises. I didn't hear the animalistic
noises again, but that didn't make me feel any better. Finally, I reached
the control room. Right before I pushed the door open I felt a sudden shiver
on the back of my neck and spun around, trying to look down both directions
at once, like one of those crazy cartoon drawings of a double take. But
there was nothing. At least nothing I could see. No casualties yet, thank
God.
The control room was empty, but it had a peculiar odor like sour
lemons. After months in a barracks, whether in Kefiristan, on Mars, or in
space, you get used to the smell of paint and gallons of disinfectant. But
this was nothing like that. I didn't like it one bit.
It took only a few minutes to establish that all the equipment was in
working order--except for the com- munications system, which was smashed
into nonexis- tence. Then I had a brainstorm. There might be a gun locker
here, something left over from when Phobos was an Air Force outpost;
something a bit heavier than a 10mm pistol would greatly improve the
adjustment to my new environment.
I found the locker and jimmied open the door fairly quietly; but there
were no weapons. Bare cupboard. Not even a slingshot. But so it shouldn't be
a total waste, there was a nice selection of last year's flak jackets; not
combat armor, but better than skin and a pressure suit. One looked like it
fit me, so I put it on.
There seemed nothing else to do but resume my journey along the
corridor that must ultimately take me into the rest of the station. I was
reaching that dangerous psychological state when you feel that you are the
only living person in what had been a battlefield situation. Another word
for it is carelessness.
Reconnoiter, you bastard! My little voice was telling me to get back
with the program. And not a moment too soon. A human figure came striding
purposefully in my direction from just around the curve of the corridor.
I almost shot first, and asked questions at some undetermined future
date. Reminding myself that Arlene and my buddies were here, as well as UAC
civilians, I relaxed the old trigger finger that crucial centimeter. But I
kept the gun on the human shape and experienced a sickening moment, not of
empathy, but of reluctant understanding of Lieutenant Weems and the monks.
When the fearsnake slithers around inside your gut, it's pretty damned
easy to just start squeezing off at anything that moves.
Then I recognized the shape as one Corporal William Gates.
"Bill!" I shouted, relief flooding me at contact with a fellow Light
Drop. "What the hell's going on? Are you all right? Where's Arlene--the rest
of Fox?"
At no moment was there any doubt that this person approaching was the
corporal with whom I'd played poker, drank, and told nasty jokes. We'd been
through enough together that I didn't even mind that he was one of the
monkeys who jumped on my back when I popped Weems. Bill had a very
distinctive face with eyes spaced wide apart and a scar that ran from his
prominent chin into his lower lip.
He was walking in an erratic manner; fatigue, I as- sumed. Men in
combat situations can get very weird, and I'd seen plenty worse than this.
Battle fatigue might even have explained the strange words coming out
of his mouth, stuff that sounded like an old horror movie. Bill was staring
straight ahead; but he didn't seem to recognize me as he chanted, "The
Gate--the Gate is the key--the key is the Gate." I didn't like the spittle
on his chin, either.
As much as I wanted to run over to him, I held back. There was
something really wrong here, nothing I could put my finger on yet, but it
was like that smell in the control room--little hints that something was
FUBARed on Phobos.
"Bill," I tried again. "Bill, it's your cuz, Fly."
This time he noticed me. I could tell because he grinned the most evil
grin I've ever seen in my life.
Then he raised his rifle and opened fire!
Even then, I didn't want to believe what was happen- ing. Fortunately,
my bodily reflexes were more realistic. Diving behind a pillar, I was
already preparing to return fire.
I had to try one more time. "Stop firing, Bill! It's Fly, goddamn it.
Stop shooting!"
3
Bill didn't stop; he came closer. Desperate, feeling like Cain, I
returned fire. Given the half-dead condition Bill was in, killing him all
the way should have been easy. The first bullet took him in the throat,
above his kevlar armor. That should have done the job, but he kept on
coming. I pumped more rounds at Bill, and finally one connected with his
head. That dropped him.
But even as brains and blood oozed onto the corridor floor, his body
continued to flop around the way a chicken does when its head has been
removed. Humans don't do that . . . and they don't have a sour-lemon smell
either, which was suddenly so overpowering that I could barely breathe.
I stared, shaking like a California earthquake.
I was looking--at--a zombie.
That was all that kept racing through my head, scream- ing the word
over and over again between my ears . . . zombie, zombie, zombie! What utter
shit. Maybe Arlene could believe in all that crap and bullroar; she watched
those damned, damned horror movies all the--I wasn't never going to watch
anything like ... a freakin' zombie? I was crazy, buggin', freaked like some
hippie punk snot flying on belladonna.
There are no goddamned zombies! This is the real world, this is--"
Gates flopped some more, then stiffened up so quick, it was like he'd
been dead for hours. Scared, but drawn toward him like iron filings to a
magnet, I crept forward and touched his corpse.
Billy Boy was ice-cold. This meat was decidedly not fresh.
I gagged, then turned aside and vomited. He was blue. His skin was
tough, like leather.
Private Gates was a freaking zombie. Walking dead. They'd killed him,
then sucked the life out of his body, so that in just half an hour, he was
many days dead.
Arlene . . . !
I knew what I had to do next. I was crying while I did it. I hoped I'd
find some magazines to go with my new acquisition, a 10mm, M-211
Semiautomatic Gas-Op- erated Infantry Combat Weapon (Sig-Cow, we called it).
Bitch of a way to get one.
Gates only had a single spare mag, and the one in the rifle was dead.
Still shaking, I reloaded the rifle, dropping rounds left and right, and
crept on, wondering who would come running at the sound of me murdering my
dead chum.
Leaving Gates's body, I started walking fast, then a little faster.
Suddenly I was running . . . not in fear, but sick rage. The little voice in
my head that usually keeps me on track was screaming about discipline and
strategy and keeping my cool. The voice wanted me to make a nice, practical
analysis of the evidence.
I had every intention of listening to reason, but my feet and brain
stem had other ideas. They were running from the face of a man who used to
be a human being; running toward the bastards who reworked him.
I've always had good survival instincts. They'd never abandoned me
before, not even in the worst firefights in a career that had seen its fair
share of combat. But here and now, in a dull, gray cavern under the craggy
surface of Phobos, my body was betraying me. If I could just stop seeing the
slack jaw, the dead eyes, I could get control again. But the face wouldn't
go away; even the character- istic twitch of the right eye that used to
annoy me when Gates was alive unnerved the hell out of me now. I couldn't
stand to be winked at by a zombie.
Yeah. Zombie. Putting the word to it helped. At least I was running a
little slower and started paying attention to my surroundings. I saw the
walls of the corridor instead of a phantom mask of death; and I heard the
loud echoing of my footsteps, my labored breathing . . . and the shuffling
noises of other feet.
Four of them were waiting for me around the bend-- four zombies. They
stared at me with dead, dry eyes . . . and one of the zombies was a woman.
I didn't know her; UAC worker. Thank God it wasn't Arlene. I didn't
even want to think about Arlene with gray flesh and a sour-lemon smell,
sneering and pumping bullets at me without any recognition.
I felt a rage I'd never felt before; my blood was on fire and my skin
couldn't contain the boiling, liquid anger. I shook from hate so deep that
military training could never reach it.
I didn't want to shoot these travesties of human life. I wanted to rip
them apart with my bare hands! They shuffled toward me, fumbling their
weapons and pump- ing shots like their rifles would never run dry. What did
I do? I staggered directly toward them, raising my own M-211 and taking one
of the walking dead in its shoulder ... a useless shot.
It was the girl that broke the spell. Some little piece of who she once
was must have been left in her brain, a faint echo or resonance of human
thought. She didn't charge blindly like the other three; she turned and fell
behind cover to plink at me.
My higher brain functions kicked in. I shook my head, then strafed
while sidestepping to a pillar; once behind cover, I aimed a shot into
Zombie One's head. It roared, then danced like a headless chicken and
collapsed. I got the message: only head shots got me any points. Just like
in the movies.
The citrus stench almost overwhelmed me. I snuck a quick glance at the
zombie I'd just smoked . . . some- thing squirmed inside its brain.
Swallowing nausea, I took a bead on Zombie Two.
The zombie-girl chittered, and the other two headed jerkily toward the
console behind which she crouched. I caught Zombie Two before it made it
halfway; but the other one took a position behind cover, and both it and
Zombie Girl returned fire.
A standoff. I was trapped behind the pillar, two zombies behind an
instrument console marked UAC and covered with sticky-pad notes, the three
of us separated by no more than twenty meters. Swiveling my head, I stared
wildly around, trying to spot something useful.
Five minutes deep into the Phobos facility, and I was pinned down
inside a mortuary in hell. A dozen bodies sprawled on the floor from the
open control room in which I stood all the way to a curve in the corridor
beyond which I could see no farther. Recognizing a few of them didn't do my
stomach any good. The others were probably UAC workers.
I thought I'd seen war in Kefiristan.
The undead and I played a game of tag around the pillar; I popped out
to fire off a shot, and they sprayed my position a moment after I abandoned
it.
There wasn't much time to appreciate the fine details; the third time I
popped around for a shot, I slipped on fresh blood. Even as a kid, I was
good at turning mishaps into advantages; special training merely augmented
my natural instinct for survival.
I hit the floor on my knees, then dropped to my belly to aim a shot
while braced against the floor. The third male zombie rose to fire down on
me, and I caught it in the throat, knocking it backward; before it could
reacquire its target, Yours Truly, my next shot took Zombie Three in the
right eye.
The female wasn't wearing a uniform or armor; I realized she must have
once been a UAC worker, not a soldier . . . which might account for her bad
aim. She fired off a couple of rounds that missed by a wide margin.
I can fight this war forever, I thought, rage starting to creep back.
Then it struck me: I could fight this war forever, at least until I was
finally blown away, and never even come close to figuring out what had
happened here at Phobos Base.
I had to take one of bastards "alive," if that was the right word.
The plan flickered through my head between one shot and the next; and
now that I finally had a plan, I was Light Drop Infantry again!
Quickly, before she could adjust and acquire me, I bolted around the
pillar, head-faked to the left, then cut right and hopped over the console.
Zombie Girl swiveled the wrong direction, and before she could turn back, I
swung the butt of my Sig-Cow into her temple.
She dropped like bricks on Jupiter. The rifle sailed from her hands
across the floor. I slung my own M-211 across my back, flipped her over and
shoved my pistol in her mouth.
"What the hell's going on?" I demanded.
"Mmph hmmpb rmmph," she said. I pulled the gun out of her mouth, but
she kept talking as if she had not even noticed it. "--is the key. Gate is
the key. Key is the gate. Coming. Kill you all."
Zombie Girl's eyes shifted left and right; she was preternaturally
strong . . . but not as strong as big Fly Taggart. My hand drooped as I
stared at her, and she snapped at it like a rabid dog, trying to bite me.
Abruptly, I realized why the zombies' eyes were so dry and their vision
so bad: they never blinked.
I pushed the pistol against her forehead. "If there's any piece alive
inside of you, you know what this thing will do to your shriveled, little
brains. What the hell is coming through the gate?"
"Great. Ones. Gate ones." She focused her eyes on me, seeming to see me
for the first time. She didn't answer, but for a moment her face was filled
with such torment that I could no longer stand the interrogation.
I cocked the hammer; her eyes rolled up, looking over my head. "You
want this?" I asked.
Zombie Girl closed her eyes. It was the only kind of prayer left to her
by the reworking that made her what she was.
I closed my own eyes when I squeezed the trigger. The gunshot snapped
me awake again; I jumped up, slid the Sig-Cow into ready position, and
backed away from the undead dead.
What the hell was going on? I started to think I had an answer . . .
part of an answer.
"Who built the Gates?" The question endlessly on everyone's lips might
be about to be answered. Maybe. But were the "Great Ones" coming through the
Gates the ones who had built them? Or had the builders already been overrun
by some even more powerful, horrific critter, who was now joyfully following
Gate after Gate, finding and overpowering all the colonies of the builders'
"empire"?
Neither thought was pleasant: humans were either trespassers who were
about to be run off the property or dessert after a main course of Gate
builders.
I got the shakes, real bad. I backed into a dark corner, M-211 pointed
toward the corridor, the unknown, the way I hadn't been yet. I had not seen
a particular body I'd half dreaded, half hoped to find. Christ. Arlene was
still Somewhere Out There, one way or the other.
I prayed she was lying dead on the deck, not stumbling toward me with
dry, unblinking eyes and a sour-lemon smell.
I might soon be the only living human on Phobos, I realized. I had
little faith in the guards I'd left back in the mess hall. First contact
with zombies, and they'd role over and, to coin a phrase, play dead. I could
imagine a rotting corpse that used to be Lieutenant Weems telling them to
get with the zombie program; the Rons would salute and "Yes sir!" themselves
straigh