Colony Down: Battlefield Mars Book 2 Page 3

  Struggling to regain his senses, Archard made it to his hands and knees. The RAM’s servos seemed to still be functioning. He wanted to check for leaks but that would have to wait.

  The Martian wasn’t dead. It lay on its side five meters away, its grippers and legs thrashing. Its carapace was cracked, but the thing didn’t appear to be severely hurt.

  Archard gulped a breath, and rose. Simultaneously, so did the Martian. For all of ten seconds, they stared at one another.

  Archard raised a gauntlet but before he could fire, the creature came at him like a living express train. He raised his arms protectively a split moment before the Martian plowed into him with enough force to lift the RAM off its metallic feet.

  The strength of the thing! Archard hit hard and slid a good four meters. He lumbered erect as the Martian rushed him with its grippers spread to seize and tear.

  Archard resorted to a dart, firing when the warrior was almost on him. That close, he didn’t need to rely on the suit’s targeting system.

  The dart struck the Martian in the equivalent of its face, and by design, instantly broke into a hundred tiny razor-sharp flechettes that sliced through the creature from its eye stalks to its segmented tail. That would be enough to kill most anything. But not the blue warrior. It slowed, and shuddered, and came on again, its will as indomitable as its body.

  Grabbing both forelimbs, Archard wrenched with all the power the RAM possessed and tore one of the appendages off. Still gripping the other, he drove his fist into the carapace below the eyes, again and again and again. He struck so many times, he lost count. He punched until he felt something give and heard a squishing sound. The forelimb he was holding went limp.

  Breathing deep from his exertion, Archard stepped back.

  The front of the blue carapace was a ruin. Broken sections lay on the ground, and a greenish ochre dripped from the ruptures.

  “Take that,” Archard said, and wearily grinned.

  “Captain! Captain!” Private Pasco shouted. “Behind you!”

  Archard turned. He’d forgotten about the other Martians, the smaller ones. In large numbers, they were as deadly as the blue warrior. And a very large number were streaming across the plain toward them.

  Chief Administrator Levlin Winslow wanted to scream but had no mouth to scream with. He saw the Martian soldier or worker or whatever it was freeze, and instinctively sought to back away. To his amazement, the creature scuttled back a few steps, and stopped.

  Winslow waited for the thing to attack but it only squatted there, staring with those damnable eyes at the ends of stalks that never stayed still. What do you want? he mentally shouted. Without thinking, he reflexively thrust the hands he didn’t have out at the thing as if to hold it at bay.

  To his astonishment, the creature thrust both of its forelimbs at him, its grippers spread wide.

  Winslow recoiled.

  The crab-like Martian backed up another step.

  Winslow shuddered.

  The Martian shuddered.

  Winslow realized he was facing a basalt wall. A wall so smooth, it was a virtual mirror.

  The insight rocked him. No, no, no, he thought. It couldn’t be. He imagined backing away, and the creature took a couple of steps back. He imagined blinking, and the thing’s compound eyes dipped and rose. He imagined he could scream, imagined it with all his mental might, and a slit widened near the bottom of the creature’s carapace.

  Oh, God, Winslow thought. His mind reeled. He felt as if he were perched on the brink of an unfathomable precipice, and was about to plunge over. He grew dizzy, and nauseous, and was gripped by a violent seizure.

  Reflected in the basalt mirror, the creature shook and trembled.

  I’ve gone insane! Winslow thought. That was the answer. His mind had slipped into madness. Having their head ripped off would do that to anyone. But then, if his head had been separated from his body, how was he still conscious? How could he imagine something so bizarre as that reflection?

  Terror seized him as he pitched into a bottomless black well. He fell and fell and fell. The next sensation he had was of a voice in his head.

  “Assimilation matrix complete.”

  Winslow snapped alert, the words seeming to echo. But they weren’t really words. They were more of a conscious impingement on his own.

  “Welcome to the Unity.”

  Winslow became aware he could see. Like before, the world was broken into scores of fragments. He concentrated, and like before, they resolved into a single view. Under him was a basalt floor. High above, a basalt roof.

  Directly in front of him towered one of the yellow Martians. Three meters tall and a meter long, it possessed two sets of three legs instead of the usual four to a side. It also had a large bowl-shaped carapace, unlike any of the other Martians he’d seen. Halfway down its carapace were a pair of long arms with grippers.

  “We greet you, new brother.”

  What? Winslow thought.

  “You are now of us. You and many of your kindred from the golden egg.”

  Winslow felt himself growing dizzy again.

  “We could not salvage all of you. We tried, but some were irreparably harmed. They strenuously resisted being collected.”

  What? Winslow thought once more.

  “You must calm your inner being, new brother. You are too agitated. Look at yourself. Perceive the magnificence of the gift we have bestowed.”

  Winslow willed his eyes to turn toward himself. He saw the same crab-like pinkish-red Martian he had seen in the basalt mirror.

  “Look behind you and the full truth will dawn.”

  Winslow raised his eyes to behold a large chamber filled with creatures exactly like him.

  “They are your brothers and sisters from the golden egg.”

  No! Winslow thought. Or, rather, silently shrieked.

  “Yes,” the alien consciousness said. “We have made all of you as we are. As you would express it in your former stream of mentation, you are now a Martian.”

  CHAPTER 6

  Kicking in the RAM’s thrusters, Archard rose above the tank. The counter on his helmet display informed him that two hundred and forty-seven Martians were in the onrushing swarm. He had enough missiles, darts and grenades to take out about a third. After that, he would rely on the ion cannons for as long as their charge lasted. Then it would be hand to hand, or hand to grippers. If he was overwhelmed, so be it. He would defend those in the tank with his dying breath if need be.

  “Captain Rahn!” Private Pasco bellowed. “Above you!”

  Thinking that Flyers were about to attack, Archard tilted his helmet skyward and raised his arms, prepared to unleash raw havoc. Only it wasn’t the Martians.

  A gleaming silver aircraft was descending swiftly toward them. A large saucer with a delta wing attached at the rear, it was twenty meters round and gave off a hum.

  “Is that one of ours, sir?” Private Everett said.

  The question jogged Archard’s memory. A year or so before leaving Earth for Mars, he’d attended a briefing at which several prototypes for possible use on the Red Planet were presented. One was for the very aircraft now swooping out of the pale sky. Its operational designation, as he recalled, was the

  Thunderbolt.

  “This is Major Dwight Howard, Wellsville U.N.I.C,” a hard voice crackled over the commlink. “Captain Rahn? Is that you in the RAM?”

  Archard replied in elation, “It is! I read you, sir.”

  “We have been monitoring your situation en route. You may stand down. We’ll take care of those things for you.”

  “Sir!” Archard said gladly.

  The Thunderbolt dropped until it was between the tank and the swarm. Hovering, it began to glow, becoming brighter by the moment. So bright, unshielded eyes would not be able to look at it.

  The Martians came on in a living wave of eyes, limbs and carapaces, their grippers opening and closing in anticipation.

  Archard remembered more of tha
t briefing back on Earth. The Thunderbolt’s main weapon was to be a newly developed device that emitted electromagnetic pulses. The effect was to completely disrupt any organism---and induce immediate death.

  The Thunderbolt flared like a sun going nova. There was a tremendous crackling and sizzling. A spider’s-web of writhing energy lines became briefly visible, spreading outward from the aircraft toward the Martians.

  Archard didn’t know what to expect. He thought maybe the creatures would be fried or react as if they were being electrocuted. But all they did was drop in their tracks. Every last one. No twitching. No writhing. No last bursts of savagery. They simply fell over and lay still.

  “Madre de Dios!” Private Pasco exclaimed.

  Private Everett whistled.

  “Archard,” Katla gasped. “Dear heaven. Wasn’t that amazing?”

  Archard went to reply but someone beat him to it.

  “This is Major Howard to you in the tank. Radio silence will be maintained from this moment on unless I say otherwise. Is that understood?”

  Archard answered for all of them. “Yes, sir.”

  “Good. We will escort you to Wellsville and provide cover the entire way.”

  “Thank you, sir,” Archard said.

  “Once we arrive, none of you are to talk to anyone. You’re not to speak unless I grant permission. Is that understood?”

  “Is something the matter, sir?” Archard asked, puzzled by the command.

  “Didn’t you hear me, Captain?” Major Howard barked. “Not another word.”

  As graceful as a swan in motion, the Thunderbolt rose and banked to gain altitude.

  Archard opened his mouth to ask another question, then shut it. He was under orders, and he was nothing if not a good soldier. But he was troubled.

  To coin a phrase from that famous playwright of long ago, Archard sensed that something was rotten on the planet Mars. And he did not like it one bit.

  REVELATIONS

  CHAPTER 7

  Levlin Winslow didn’t know how long he was in shock. He wasn’t even aware his mind had shut down until he slowly became aware of sounds and movement, and by gradual degrees returned to the world of the living.

  If you could call it that.

  Raising his stalk eyes, Winslow gazed about the chamber at the dozens of other victims of the most ghastly fate imaginable. Many were completely still, probably numb with horror as he had been. Revulsion rippled through him, and he dearly wished he could cry.

  “You are conscious again. Good. We have much to communicate.”

  Winslow shifted on his eight legs and looked up at the towering yellow Martian. Go away, he thought. Leave me alone.

  “You are of the Unity. You will never be alone again.”

  I want to die, Winslow thought. Although he really didn’t. He loved life too much. What he wanted was to be back in his own body and back in New Meridian wielding the authority and prestige that came from being important.

  “We appreciate the exchange can be traumatic. You will recover once you have been taught to embrace your sentience.”

  Exchange? Winslow thought. Sentience?

  “Yours has been transferred from the body you wore on the Blue World to a body that is part of the Unity.”

  Blue World? Winslow thought.

  “When we peer at it through our long-range viewers, your world appears blue. As do those who hail from it. Our scientists surmise it is because your world is mostly liquid.”

  God, Winslow thought, and would have laughed if he knew how.

  “The Source of All is fundamental to our beliefs.”

  Winslow’s interest perked, and he straightened slightly on his eight legs. Wait, he thought. You things have a religion?

  “You disparage us. We are sentients, as you were and are. Forms are irrelevant. It is the sentience which inhabits the form that is paramount.” The yellow Martian seemed to pause. “As for our relationship with and in the Source, it is intrinsic to our natures. It is why we do not kill except in extreme situations. It is why we did not merely dispose of you and your fellow Blue Worlders. It is why your heads were brought back and preserved until your sentience was transferred.”

  Winslow remembered all the dead colonists whose heads were missing. Now he knew why. He remembered, too, how their arms and legs had been torn off and placed next to their torsos. Why did you rip us apart and leave our bodies like you did? he mentally asked.

  “We destroyed your bodies quickly to spare the sentience within from pain. The placement was done out of the respect that we of the Unity hold for all life.”

  A spike of anger caused Winslow to rail, I didn’t want this! I didn’t ask you to save me! I want my own body back! I want to be as I was!

  “That is not possible,” the yellow Martian said in Winslow’s head, almost kindly. “You are now and forever of the Unity. Over the cycle to come, we will teach you how to alter your consciousness so that you become fully as we are.”

  I don’t want to be as you are, Winslow forlornly thought.

  “You will change your attitude once the fullness of our bliss is yours to share.”

  Winslow sagged in despair.

  “Already you have shown remarkable aptitude. You attuned to your receptors much faster than many of the others, enabling us to interchange our consciousness streams.”

  You had no right, Winslow lamented.

  “You came to our world. We did not come to yours. Here, all sentients are required to be of the Unity. When we learned of your colony, we absorbed it. In doing so, we learned of the other two. Plans are now in motion to absorb those, as well.”

  God help us, Winslow thought.

  “Yes. Soon we will all be joined in the Unity of the Source.”

  Dr. Katla Dkany had seen a lot of beautiful sights in her time. A Norwegian fjord early in the morning. Jotunheimen National Park. The Lofoten Islands. But none were ever so beautiful as the twin golden domes of Wellsville rising in the distance. To know that sanctuary was at long last theirs brought a deep joy.

  Katla sat back in her seat and smiled. Their ordeal was over. They would be taken care of, and protected. She would ask to be assigned to the Wellsville hospital and once again be able to do what she liked best: Help people.

  Katla wondered how Archard was doing. She hadn’t heard a peep out of him since Major Howard ordered them to maintain radio silence. Nor from either of the privates in the tank with her. She glanced over at the Kentuckian and saw his face set in hard lines. “Why do you look as if you want to punch someone?”

  “Something isn’t right,” Private Everett said. “You heard him.”

  “Who? Major Howard?”

  “Who else?”

  “You’re imagining, things.”

  “Am I?” Everett said. “He should have been glad to see us, glad we’re alive. Did he sound glad to you?”

  “Well, no,” Katla admitted. She had been surprised by the officer’s gruff tone. But then, military types weren’t known for their gentle natures. Look at Archard. He had a tough-as-nails-exterior. Yes, he had a soft side, but he only ever showed it to her.

  The boy sleeping in her lap roused and lifted his head.

  “Are we there yet?” Piotr Zabinski said, and yawned.

  “Soon,” Katla said. She pointed at the far-off domes. Marvels of Earth science, they were composed of an alloy that was virtually indestructible. As a further safeguard, the alloy was covered by a transparent nanosheath that blocked harmful radiations. It was the nanosheaths that lent the domes their golden hue.

  Piotr sat up, and grinned. “We’ll be safe there, won’t we, Dr. Dkany?”

  “How many times must I tell you to call me Katla?” she reminded him. “And yes, we will.” Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Private Everett give her a sharp glance.

  Up in the turret, Private Pasco remarked, “I won’t ever feel safe again until I’m back on Earth.”

  Katla could have kicked him. Comments like that would
upset Piotr. Probably Trisna Sahir, too. Twisting around, Katla smiled at the black-haired mother and her daughter. “How are you two holding up back there? You must be happy the worst is over.”

  “Are you insane?” Trisna said.

  Katla had forgotten how blunt the woman from India could be. “I beg your pardon?”

  “What is there to be happy about?” Trisna said. “New Meridian has been overrun by those vile creatures. Over a hundred colonists, people we knew and worked with, friends and loved ones, are gone. Mars is not the uninhabited planet we were told it was. And the Martians are out to remove us from their world. There is nothing to be happy about that I can see. We are in as much danger as ever.”

  “Got that right, lady,” Private Everett said.

  “I just meant…” Katla said, and fell silent. They had a point, after all.

  The worst might not be over.

  The worst might be yet to come.

  CHAPTER 8

  Captain Archard Rahn wearily plodded into the largest of the airlocks that permitted entry into Wellsville. He waited as the outer door closed and the artificial atmosphere was cycled so the inner door could open without risk of decompression. The tank had already gone through.

  Archard still didn’t know what to make of Major Howard’s cold treatment. The major had ordered him to go with the escort that would be waiting. When he’d made bold to suggest that given the circumstances, they should take him straight to Wellsville’s Chief Administrator, Major Howard had replied that any meeting with the C.A. could wait, and to do as he was told.

  As the inner lock began to open, Archard’s helmet display flickered. That made the sixth time since his clash with the blue warrior at the tank. The RAM had sustained more damage. Exactly how much remained to be determined. He’d like to run a full diagnostic but that would have to wait, too.

  The airlock finally spread wide, and Archard stepped out. Before him were the busy streets and building modules of the second colony, constructed to resemble those on Earth. After the destruction visited on New Meridian, it was jarring.