Colony Down: Battlefield Mars Book 2 Read online

  “And kept that secret, too.”

  “Why this obsession with our secrecy?”

  “Because it was wrong.”

  “From your point of view. Not from ours. We had every reason to believe that if the colonists kept to themselves and didn’t disturb the Martians, the Martians would leave us alone. It was why we instituted emergency protocols that would only be put into effect in a worst-case scenario.”

  Katla jabbed a finger at him. “You son of a bitch.”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “Was one of those protocols a communications blackout?”

  Reubens looked down at his hands.

  “It was! You bastards had a plan in place to impose a communications blackout on any colony that encountered the Martians.”

  “I never said that.”

  “You didn’t have to. It explains what happened at New Meridian. Why we couldn’t get through for help. Our signals were being jammed.”

  “Don’t take it personally,” Reubens said.

  “And you expect me to keep silent about this?”Katla said in amazement.

  “Either that,” Reubens said coldly, “or we clap you in irons and return you to Earth and let them deal with you as they see fit.”

  “What do you think they’ll do to me?” Katla said. “The truth, if you don’t mind.”

  Chief Administrator Reubens slowly ran a finger across his throat.

  The minutes turned into half an hour and then an hour and the hour into two and still no one came.

  Archard simmered. He resented how he was being treated. It baffled him that no one in authority seemed to be the least bit alarmed by or interested in the debacle at New Meridian.

  He had tilted his chair back against the wall so that it leaned on two legs and was sitting with his arms folded when the door opened and in walked Lieutenant Burroughs.

  “Captain,” she said cordially.

  Archard lowered the chair and was about to rise and demand to know why he was being ignored when another person came in behind her. He was expecting Major Howard or possibly Wellsville’s Chief Administrator, Evander Reubens, whom he had met once. But it was someone else, a small civilian in his forties or so, wearing a rumpled suit. His hair was in need of combing and he hadn’t shaved in days. He also wore old-fashioned glasses, which was unusual given that implants had long become the norm. The man was carrying a portable holographic unit which he set on the table.

  “Captain Rahn,” the man said, smiling. “Don’t get up on my account. We need to talk, urgently.” He pulled out the other chair.

  “So urgent it took two hours for you to get here?” Archard said.

  The man blinked in surprise. “That long? My apologies.” He offered his hand. “I’m Kylo Carter, by the way. Named after a character in some old movie.” He smiled when Archard shook.

  “You might have heard of me. I’m the planetary scientist.”

  It was Archard’s turn to be surprised. The planetary scientist was the top brain on Mars, the head of all scientific endeavors. “Aren’t you stationed at Bradbury?”

  Carter nodded. “I am. But given the exceptional circumstances, I deemed it prudent to come here and take an active part.”

  “In what?” Archard asked. Only then did he notice that Lieutenant Burroughs had assumed a parade-rest stance by the door.

  “I’ll get to that in a moment,” Carter said, pushing his glasses up on his nose. “Again, my apologies for your being neglected. I happen to know that Chief Administrator Reubens has been busy debriefing your associate from New Meridian, Dr. Dkany. And Major Howard has been dealing with a problem that we hope doesn’t turn into a crisis of the first magnitude.”

  “What sort of problem?”

  “I’ll get to that in a moment, too.” Carter opened the holo case and turned the unit on. “You need to be brought up to speed. Since you’re in the military, you’re bound by U.N.I.C. regulations not to reveal what I’m about to disclose. To forestall your many questions, permit me to answer them in advance.”

  Archard found himself liking this odd little man. Carter cut right to the chase, a trait Archard admired. “Are you a mind reader, too?”

  The planetary scientist chuckled. “Let’s put it to the test, shall we? To begin with, we’ve been aware that Mars has indigenous life since before the first colony was established…”

  “What?” Archard exclaimed in shock.

  “…and the administrative and military branches back on Earth decided it was wise not to let that become common knowledge…”

  “What?” Archard said again.

  “….so a policy of containment was implemented whereby should a colony make contact with the Martians, a communications blackout would be imposed…”

  “Son of a bitch!” Archard started to rise but sat back down again.

  “That is why, sadly, you were left on your own at New Meridian,” Carter said. “It wasn’t my doing. Or, for that matter, Chief Administrator Reubens’ or even Governor Blanchard’s at Bradbury. They were simply following a policy I don’t necessarily agree with. As a scientist, I would much rather have contacted the Martians directly long ago.”

  “Dear God,” Archard said quietly. He was thinking of all the dead colonists at New Meridian. “They abandoned us. Left us to die.”

  “I understand how you must feel. I would feel the same were I in your boots. But you must overcome any emotional issues you might have and do your best to assist me. When I said this is urgent, I meant it.”

  Archard contained his anger enough to ask, “Urgent how?”

  “Just like at New Meridian and Bradbury, Wellsville has a number of outlying farms. Agripodists who supply much needed produce.”

  “Yes. So?” Archard remembered that at New Meridian, the Zabinski farm had been the first place the Martians struck.

  “At my suggestion, Chief Administrator Reubens had the Communication Center radio word to each of the local farm families to report to the colony under the medical pretext of being given a required booster shot.”

  “And?” Archard said when Carter didn’t go on.

  The planetary scientist pushed on his glasses again, and frowned. “Not one of them has answered.”

  CHAPTER 11

  To Levlin Winslow, the very idea of copulating with a Martian---he couldn’t bring himself to even think the other word---was loathsome. I am an Earthman, he thought, hoping he could explain to the creature that called herself Nilista without angering her. I am what you call a Blue Worlder. We do not become…… intimate…..with alien crustaceans.

  “You are one of us now,” Nilista inserted into his head. “You are….what did you just call us? A crustacean yourself.”

  Don’t remind me, Winslow bitterly thought, adding, It doesn’t change anything.

  “To the contrary,” Nilista responded. “It changes everything. You will never be as you were. You are no longer of the Blue World. You are of the Unity. Embrace the gift we have bestowed. Open your sentience to the fullness we offer.”

  To do what you want, I would have to be sick, Winslow thought.

  “Blue Worlders only have sex when they are ill? Is that how you cure yourselves?”

  No, no, Winslow thought, and mentally laughed at the absurdity of it all.

  “Then when do you bind?”

  All the time, Winslow admitted.

  Nilista moved closer, her multifaceted eyes almost touching his. “If that is so, why balk at binding with me?”

  It goes against everything I believe, everything I have ever been taught. To bind with you would be like binding with an animal.

  “I do not comprehend. Elucidate, if you would.”

  An animal. A lower lifeform. Do you have them here as we do on my world?

  Nilista’s eye stalks rose up and down as if she were studying him. “You are confused. I am not a lower lifeform. You are. Or you were, before we made you one of us. Now you are of the Unity.”

  That still wouldn�
�t make it right, Winslow thought.

  “Right how?”

  You know. Acceptable.

  “You refuse to bind with me because you find it aesthetically displeasing?”

  On a whole lot of levels, Winslow thought. He was afraid to come right out with the fact that he regarded her as hideous, and any binding as repulsive in the extreme.

  “I think I perceive the truth of it,” Nilista said. “You regard your previous form as the standard by which you judge all forms.”

  Of course, Winslow thought.

  “You must learn to be more accepting. Forms are fluid. Look at your own. The form your now possess is not the form you once were.”

  Stop reminding me, Winslow thought, and went on with, The important thing is that I don’t want to bind.

  “I am sorry.”

  Not wanting to offend her and make an enemy, Winslow thought, You have no need to apologize. It is me, not you.

  “No. I am sorry because you have no choice.”

  Excuse me?

  “For us, binding is a biological imperative. The same as ingesting sustenance. We do it because we have to.”

  Now I’m the one who doesn’t comprehend, Winslow thought. You can’t force someone to bind, as you call it, against their will.

  Without any forewarning of what she was about to do, Nilista raised her carapace onto her rear pair of legs with her other legs and her grippers spread wide.

  What are you doing? Winslow demanded.

  “Releasing my pheromones.”

  What good will that do? It’s not as if… Winslow began, and got no further. Suddenly, his mind seemed to freeze up. He was aware of his surroundings but couldn’t form a cohesive thought. Then, to his utter horror, his Martian body moved of its own accord.

  Toward Nilista.

  The Thunderbolt hangar wasn’t under the domes. The aircraft was too large to fit through any of the airlocks so it was housed in a separate structure linked to the south dome, or Dome Two, by a short enclosed walkway.

  Archard was surprised that neither the walkway nor the hangar were constructed of the same nigh-indestructible alloy as the domes. Nor were they covered by the protective nanosheath that made the domes gleam like gold in ambient light.

  Planetary Scientist Kylo Carter must have noticed the look of puzzlement on Archard’s face because he commented, “The Thunderbolt was brought to Mars in pieces and assembled only a short while ago. There hasn’t been time to build a proper facility. We will once the current situation stabilizes.”

  “I would admire your optimism,” Archard said, “if I hadn’t been at New Meridian.”

  “Which is exactly why I’ve asked you to tag along on our check of the agrifarms. You know what to look for. We don’t.”

  “Evidence of the Martians, you mean?” Archard said.

  “Exactly.”

  “The fact you’ve lost contact with the farmers is enough. The Martians are doing the same thing they did at New Meridian. First, they attacked the outlying farms, then the colony.”

  “We need to be absolutely certain,” Carter said.

  “I already am.”

  A metal door permitted entry into the hanger. Archard was amazed that an airlock, which would be an added safeguard against accidental or intentional decompression and was required by regulations, hadn’t been installed. Nor were there any EVA suits hanging on the wall. He pointed that out.

  Carter gestured at the Thunderbolt, which sat on an elevated pad. “Our suits, should we need them, or in the aircraft. As for the lack of an airlock, we saved time and money by installing an air cycling system that feeds in air from the dome and expels it as required. Besides,” and he pointed again, at an open airlock on the rear of the Thunderbolt itself, “the aircraft is our haven in case of an emergency.”

  Archard still didn’t like it. Heightened risk for expediency’s sake was never wise, in his opinion.

  “Shall we?” Carter said, and led the way into the airlock. They had to wait for it to cycle to enter the aircraft.

  Archard had imagined an interior design as futuristic and imposing as the exterior. But no. The cockpit and the passenger seating were similar to those in a conventional craft. The big difference was the large housing for the propulsion system.

  In the pilot seat, a stocky, balding man with bronze clusters on his lapels was going through a preflight checklist. A trooper with sergeant’s chevrons on his sleeves was wiping the viewscreen.

  “I believe you’ve already met Major Howard,” Carter said, nodding at the officer.

  “We haven’t been formally introduced, no,” Archard said.

  “This other trooper is Sergeant Kline. Gentlemen, Captain Archard Rahn.”

  The pair stopped what they were doing, and turned.

  Archard nodded at the noncom, then snapped to attention and gave the major a salute. “Sir.”

  “Mr. Carter has filled you in?” Major Howard said.

  “Yes, sir,” Archard replied. The man’s tone was exactly the same as it had been over the radio when the Thunderbolt came to the tank’s rescue.

  “Good. Then we can get underway. We’re making a sweep of the farms to find out why they’ve all gone silent.”

  “It should be obvious, sir,” Archard said. “The Martians are on the move.”

  “Or it could be a communications glitch. Sunspot activity, maybe,” Major Howard said.

  Wishful thinking, Archard almost said.

  “We’ll know soon enough,” Kylo Carter interjected. “If it is the Martians, we’ll have time to warn the colony and prepare an adequate defense.”

  Archard doubted it. The attack on New Meridian had been unbelievably swift. He couldn’t help but think that he was about to witness history repeat itself.

  INTERLUDE IN MARTIAN MINOR

  CHAPTER 12

  To Dr. Katla Dkany, it smacked of the unreal to walk the streets of Wellsville and see the colonists going about their daily routines as if all was well. Ignorance was indeed bliss. They were oblivious to the fact that the Red Planet harbored creatures every bit as intelligent as they were, and that those creatures resented their presence and would wipe them out if they could.

  Katla would dearly love to talk to Archard, but Chief Administrator Reubens assured her that was quite impossible for the time being.

  “Captain Rahn is involved in a security matter,” was all Reubens would tell her.

  A private named Heinlein had ushered her from the Security Center. As he held the exit door, she’d asked if he knew where she might find Private Everett and Private Pasco. They should be able to get word to Archard, she reasoned.

  Private Heinlein had smiled politely and said he had no idea where the pair were.

  Now, Katla watched people chatting and laughing and behaving as if they didn’t have a care in the world, and prayed it would stay that way.

  Taking the vouchers Reubens had given her from her pocket, Katla examined them. She was entitled to a room at the Visitor Center, free of charge, until further notice. She was also entitled to free meals. It was the least the government could do, given that she’d lost everything except for the clothes on her back. Perhaps to partly mollify her, Reubens had also given her a credit slip useable at any store in the colony.

  His generosity didn’t do a thing to improve Katla’s mood. She was furious that those in authority had allowed the assault on New Meridian to take place. They might argue it wasn’t their fault, that the Martians had left the colonies alone for well over a century, and how were they to know the creatures would suddenly rise up in violent wrath? A lame excuse, if ever there was one.

  Thinking about it made Katla so mad, she clenched her fists and swore. Coming to a stop, she willed herself to calm down. It wouldn’t do any good to lose her temper, especially since she had no one to vent it on.

  “Dr. Dkany? They let you go, too?”

  Katla glanced up. Not three meters away stood Trisna Sahir, her daughter Behula in her arms. Beside t
hem, holding Trisna’s other hand, was Piotr Zabinski, his eyes brimming with tears.

  “Katla!” the boy shouted, and threw himself at her. Wrapping his arms around her legs, he pressed his face against her and gave a little sob.

  “Piotr?” Katla said, putting her hand on his head.

  “He has hardly stopped crying since we were separated,” Trisna said. “I tried to comfort him but all he does is say your name over and over.”

  “Oh, Piotr,” Katla said softly. She sought to pry him loose but he clung to her as if for dear life. “Why wasn’t he turned over to Social Services?”

  “I do not know. The woman who spoke to us at the Security Center, an assistant to Chief Administrator Reubens, would only say that the government will look after us in due course.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Again, I do not know,” Trisna said. “Her name was Hinds. She told us that the C.A. desires to speak with us in person, but he is too busy at the moment. In the meantime, she gave me a voucher for the Visitor Center.”

  Katla stroked Piotr’s hair and he sniffled. “They gave me vouchers, too.”

  “Why do they treat us this way?” Trisna said. She didn’t wait for Katla to reply. “I tried to tell them about New Meridian. About the horrors I saw. About the people who died. But this Hinds woman said they would take my official report later. It is most strange.”

  Katla gazed up at the high arch of the dome and then out across the streets and buildings designed to simulate those on Earth. “What counts is we don’t need to worry about the Martians.”

  “Do you really and truly believe that?” Trisna anxiously asked.

  “No,” Katla admitted. “I don’t.”

  When Archard had enlisted in the United Nations Interplanetary Corps, he’d had a decision to make. Should he join the Air Wing or the Infantry? He loved to fly. From the time he was twelve until he was seventeen, he’d spent every spare minute on his hoverboard. But he chose the Infantry.

  Mars was the reason. Above all else, Archard craved to be assigned to a colony. Each had a contingent of U.N.I.C. troopers, and nearly all were Infantry. There wasn’t a need for Air Wing personnel because the colonies didn’t have aircraft.