Gears of war, p.26
Gears of War, page 26
Marcus pointed at the rear of the lab. “That suggests otherwise.”
The back wall marked a serious departure from any normal lab. Five glass tubes—easily a yard and a half each in diameter—had stainless-steel slabs in them. Grubs—including a Boomer—lay on those slabs, strapped down with IVs running into both arms and into the femoral arteries. The Locust also had control boxes mounted on both sides of their head, starting from their temple and curving back around behind where ears would have been on a human. The Locust appeared healthy to Marcus’ eye, and if they weren’t quite as large as some of those he’d fought, he had little doubt they’d grow to that size soon enough.
Damon came running into the lab and stopped a yard past the doorway.
“Whoa.”
“Yeah, that.” Marcus shifted around to cover the scientists and tossed a spare clip to Cole. “Go back to the door, buy us some time.”
“You got it, Marcus.”
“What is this, Baird?”
Damon approached the tubes. “Well, if I was to guess—”
The female scientist’s eyes widened. “Don’t touch anything.”
“Looks like they are sedating the grubs to move them.” Damon picked up a notebook. “Also looks like they are using a compound to chelate the toxins the ICM left in the grubs’ system. How many of these things did you go through before you found the right formula?”
All three looked down and remained silent.
Marcus pressed the muzzle of his Lancer to the neck of the nearest man. Skin sizzled. “Hasterwith isn’t going to be able to save you. I might. Answer the question.”
The man shied away from the pressure on his neck. “In the mine here, we found two dozen. A handful escaped, these five are all we have left.”
“So you went through thirteen, fine-tuning this.”
“Chelation and then training. Some had to be destroyed. Some escaped.” The man looked up at Marcus. “That’s the truth, I swear it.”
“Baird?”
“That sounds like the truth, but not all of it.” Damon crossed to the computers and began poking around. “Tons of data here, but I can’t find a sat phone or encrypted radio for sending reports out.”
The woman looked over at him. “There was an air gap between the lab and the outside world. The radio is in the office. That’s where they keep the guns and the armor, too.”
“Damn it.” The soldiers had been expecting physical duty in getting the cylinders out, so they hadn’t pulled on their armor. But all of them, coming to the fight now…
Cole’s voice crackled over comms. “Marcus, you get your furry ass out here now.”
“Baird, any of them move, kill them.”
“Got it.”
Marcus ran back to the mouth of the mine, hunkering down with Cole as bullets pinged off metal and whined through the air.
“How bad?”
“Worse than bad.” Cole pointed north toward the barracks. “They’ve brought up that truck and have it across the train tracks. It’s giving them cover from Sam and Clay. Soldiers are wearing armor now, and there’s a lot of them. They had to be hot bunking.”
A squad of men poured out of the administration building, spreading out, covering one another. They sent a withering hail of bullets that forced Marcus and Cole to keep their heads down. Marcus keyed his radio.
“Sam, what do you see?”
“Men in black, moving through darkness. Couple dozen minimum. Muzzle flashes only.” Her voice hesitated. “If we move up, we might be able to flank them.”
“Negative. You two get into that village and get people out to the south. We’ll hold them for you.” Marcus checked his Lancer’s load. For a little while, anyway.
“How long is Sam going to need?” Cole fed a new clip into his Lancer.
“Too long. Same for Baird to set charges and blow those Locust to hell.”
Cole nodded. “So, nothing Delta can’t handle, right?”
Sam’s voice crackled into their ears. “They’re sending a squad after us, Marcus, and they’ve got a couple more massing in your direction. If you have a miracle, let it rip now.”
“Hear that, brother?” Marcus’ hand found that lucky stone in his pocket. “Time for us to be a miracle.”
Cole’s reply died unvoiced, his eyes widening. He looked up, past Marcus, as the mercenaries’ withering fire gnawed into the mine door. With a metallic shriek, the corrupted metal tore away from its hinges and crashed down in an avalanche of heavy rusted metal.
11: IRON HILLS RIPARIAN PRESERVE
IRON HILLS, SERA
12 FROST 18 A.E.
The corroded metal curtain peeled down from the wall, the upper edge descending like a guillotine blade. Marcus tried to leap clear, but his left foot slipped. His left arm came up in a futile attempt to ward off the mass of metal.
Oh, Anya.
Augustus Cole tackled Marcus, twisting him out of the way. Marcus jackknifed forward, his midsection wrapped around Cole’s shoulder. They landed hard and bounced, with Marcus rolling through the dust. Cole skidded to a halt on his knees, then got up, but a bullet caught him square over his heart, dropping him.
Bullets spanged off the mine wall and folded metal door where it sagged at the cave’s mouth. Marcus came up on one knee and triggered three short bursts, catching advancing targets as they broke from cover. One man twisted around, his Lancer lipping fire into a spiral in the sky. Another dove back and the third just wilted, straddling some rubble.
“Thanks for the save, Cole, but we ain’t out of this yet.”
Cole quick-crawled over to his Lancer, then sprinted back under cover. More bullets struck sparks from the mine walls and pinged off the door that was providing him cover. He popped up and sent a stream of bullets into the darkness.
“They’re getting a little bold, brother.”
Marcus ducked down behind the wilted door’s wreckage.
“They’re getting a lot bold.” Half the Seradyne mercs laid down heavy covering fire, while more emerged from behind their cover and advanced in good order. This is not going to end well.
“Cole, it’s been nice to know ya.”
“Same, Marcus.” Cole jammed a new clip home. “Might as well burn all we got. We can’t take it with us.”
To have it end here like this. “Here they come.”
Before the mercenaries could cross that last twenty yards, something bizarre happened. A crunching clatter arose to the north. Marcus looked toward the noise and caught movement far in the darkness. Then, roaring forward and picking up speed, a compact yellow engine emerged from the darkness. Racing along on the rails, it accelerated to a solid forty miles per hour, then plowed into the truck Seradyne troops had been using for cover. The engine nailed the vehicle behind the left front wheel, bouncing it up and pushing it further along the rails. Another wheel caught. The truck tipped and rolled.
Mercenaries shifted their fire and opened up on the engine. Bullets pounded the windscreen into an opaque spiderweb of safety glass. They dented the metal and spalled paint off, stippling the machine with leopard-spots. The engine pushed past the mangled truck, but lost speed and slowed to a halt before it came to a curve in the track.
The momentary distraction bought the Gears some valuable time. Marcus darted across the opening, with only a bullet or two chasing him. He threw himself on his belly and brought the Lancer up. He aimed and fired, spinning a soldier into the dust.
The man he’d hit rolled, then got his feet under him. He got back up, his armor dented but unbreached. His rifle came up and he drew a bead on Marcus.
Before he could pull the trigger, the soldier’s head exploded. The man next to him flew to the side as a second bullet struck him in the left hip and exited through the right. And then, far to Marcus’ left, a merc running to commandeer one of the loaders pitched forward into a somersault. A bullet had entered high on his back, blew straight through his armor, and exited through the chest plate.
That’s not Lancer fire.
From over to the right Clay and Sam opened up on the Seradyne formation. With the truck battered out of the way, the two of them had clean lines of fire into the enemy’s flank. If mercs moved to use the truck as cover again, they exposed their backs to Cole and Marcus. The snipers busied themselves with dropping all those who decided to do anything but make themselves very tiny behind the least little scrap of cover they could find.
Baird’s voice burst through the camp’s loudspeakers. “Now hear this. We have secured the lab. We have your attack dogs. We have their control units. We know how to use them. Are you getting paid enough to want us to run a field test on this equipment?”
“Baird’s enjoying this way too much.” Marcus and Cole exchanged grins.
“True, brother, but it’s good for a man to have hobbies.”
One mercenary stood and pitched his Lancer aside. He raised both hands, then dropped to his knees with his hands over the back of his head. A man groaned, feebly raising one hand, but unable to sit up without help. Another soldier threw his gun down and knelt, and then two more. The sixth took off his helmet, then looked toward the mine.
“Can we get a medic here? I got two guys bleeding.”
Marcus stood, his Lancer leveled. “The faster the rest of you see reason, the sooner the dying stops.”
Cole emerged, moving right. “Ain’t like Seradyne’s gonna be paying anybody bonuses for dying here, baby.”
“Hell, ain’t like Seradyne is going to remember this place, or your sacrifice.” Marcus pointed his rifle at the chest of explosives. “There’s a reason you were ordered to blow it to hell. You know you’d have been next.”
The mercenaries all knew, deep down inside, he was speaking the truth. Sam and Clay, coming across the river with Lancers at the ready, smothered all remaining resistance. The hired guns threw their weapons down and knelt with their hands behind their heads.
“Cole, get them sorted. I’ll get a medic.”
“You got it, boss.” Cole placed fingers in his mouth and whistled loudly. “Over there, into your LZ, let’s just all sit down in a big friendly circle. Shuck your helmets and your armor as you enter.”
Marcus returned to the lab. He looked at the three scientists. “One of you has to be a doctor. Grab a first-aid kit, and save some lives. Outside. Move it.” The woman got up, pulled a first-aid kit from a wall bracket, and ran out.
“Baird, did you mean what you said about being able to control the grubs?”
“Of course not.” Damon shook his head, then indicated the two remaining prisoners. “They said they could show me how, but those things are drugged up good. But I figured the soldiers had seen the grubs in action so, one way or another, they wouldn’t want them on their asses.”
“It wasn’t what you think.” The balding scientist shuffled around on his knees.
“Really?” Marcus towered over him. “You tell me what it was, because I saw what one of your grubs did at the Watson farm. I know exactly how it is.”
“No, listen, you have to understand. When we found them, they were dying. We wanted to know what was killing them, because it was a sure-fire way to defeat them. Once we determined the cause, we figured out how to counteract it. If we’re going to create a poison, it might also kill humans, so we had to create the antidote.
“In their weakened state, we noticed a few had significant intelligence. They learned things. We created the control interface to train them and to destroy them if they rebelled—but they didn’t. The soldiers referred to them as attack dogs because they were loyal, and responded to verbal commands. They didn’t need the pain–pleasure stimulus from the control circuitry.”
“So, what, you were going to sell them as pets?”
“No, we… we wanted to learn how they lived, how they thought, how they could be trained to undo the damage, and maybe fight their own kind. We weren’t making them for any commercial applications.”
The other man nodded in agreement. “When the soldiers took one out for ‘training exercise’ we didn’t know what… we thought it was just another hunting trip. They used to take them out and let them hunt some of the big-horn sheep and antelope. They’re quite fast when you…”
“I know how fucking fast they are, asswipe.” Marcus grabbed the lapels of the man’s lab coat in one hand and hauled him off the ground. “You want to know how many people I’ve seen hunted down by them? You want to know how many people I’ve seen your grubs tear apart? In. The. Last. Week?”
The researcher grabbed Marcus’ wrist. “No, sir, please. We didn’t mean any harm.”
“He’s right. When we figured out what they had done, we were horrified. We were composing a report to alert management to what was going on when the orders came in to shut things down.”
Marcus released the smaller man. “A report. Well, then, you should have said that in the first place.” He brought his Lancer around and used the muzzle to lever the man’s chin up. “What about their wiring up the little village? Why do that except to kill everyone there—the witnesses there? You would have been next, or didn’t you think that far?”
“No, they would never…” The man’s eyes just went dead.
“Understand what was going on here. You gave grubs to people who intended to use them to create a crisis. People would be afraid that there were more out there in the wild, and that no one was safe. And the tiny villages, grouping people ‘for protection.’” Marcus shook his head. “They’d be Seradyne settlements, with Seradyne mercs guarding them, while everyone watched Seradyne programming and listened to Seradyne news. You’d buy everything through the Seradyne Market Exchange, and if you got out of line, the grub infestation would claim another victim. So sorry.”
“Marcus, come here.” Baird hunched over a computer. “I found their report. It looks like they had their suspicions, but there’s nothing here about Seradyne’s final disposition for the grubs.”
“They had to know what they were being used for.”
“Feared, maybe, but know? Maybe they just didn’t allow themselves to know.” Baird tapped a finger against the screen. “This is important, though. The chelation process, it doesn’t cure the damage the ICM did, just slows it down. If they don’t have constant therapy, they’ll just get sick again and die.”
Marcus’ eyes tightened. “Did that part of the research go out to Seradyne yet?”
“Not that I can see.” Damon turned around. “How ’bout it, Curly? That info known to anyone outside of this room?”
The balding man shook his head. “We held it back because, you know, of what they did. We didn’t want to tell them, so the Locust would just die.”
Marcus took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. He tipped the Lancer’s muzzle toward the ceiling. “Okay. I need all the data, two copies, ready for transport. Then we wire this place and those grubs with enough explosives to put them into orbit.”
“On it.”
Marcus looked at the two scientists. “Here’s a question. Right answer, you win big. Who was giving the orders here? Did Raul Hasterwith ever visit?”
The scientists looked at each other, then at Marcus, and shook their heads. “We got our orders through the camp commandant, Eric Hernandez. No files, no paper, he’d just tell us what to do.”
“You gave him reports?”
“Yes, but we don’t know what he did with them.”
Damon glanced back over his shoulder. “Not enough radio traffic going in and out of this place to move files this size. Likely sent them out by courier, via supply transport, and they sent them on from another location.”
The smaller scientist nodded emphatically. “We got supplies monthly, and we’d be asked to write reports the week before. I never connected the dots.”
“There were a lot of dots you didn’t connect.” Marcus jerked his thumb toward the door. “Move it. You, too. Join the others outside.” He let them walk in front of him. They stepped around a pile of body armor and helmets to join the circle of soldiers. Marcus stopped outside the square.
“Hernandez, Eric, make yourself known.”
The mercenaries looked around the circle, then one of them pointed toward one of the loaders.
“That’s him there.”
Marcus jogged over and crouched. The sniper’s shot had hit the man center mass, clean entry in the back, a bit bigger and messier coming out. Somewhere in the man’s body the bullet had begun to cartwheel. It blew a ragged hole out of the armored breastplate. Everything between entry and exit would have been churned into hamburger, putting the man well beyond ever being able to answer Marcus’ questions.
He started toward the administration building and two people came into the light emanating from the railhead. Karima carried a Lancer as if she’d be using one as long as Marcus had. Brandon had Clay’s Longshot sniper rifle cradled in his arms.
Marcus pointed. “I’m a little pissed with you.”
Karima smiled. “Barracks is clear.”
“That’s what you were supposed to be. Clear.”
“It’s your fault, Marcus.” Brandon gave him a lopsided grin. “You said if I was of a mind to repay your saving my life, you wouldn’t say no.”
“Me and my big mouth.” Marcus mounted the steps to the administration building and shrugged. “I guess I’m the last person who should complain about someone disobeying orders. I’m still pissed, though.”
“Good to see you, too, Marcus.” Karima slung the Lancer over her shoulder and pulled open the door. “What are we looking for?”
“Anything that ties Raul Hasterwith to this place. Orders. A signed photograph. Company directory?”
Brandon entered the main office, sat down at a workstation, and his fingers started dancing over the keyboard. Karima joined Marcus in going through Hernandez’s private office, and then personal quarters. The man had been fastidious in life. Marcus couldn’t find so much as a speck of dust, much less incriminating evidence linking him to the Seradyne CEO. It even appeared as if Hernandez had folded the shirt he’d removed before he pulled on his armor.
He was the sort of soldier who would have stood out on parade, and been great in meetings.
