Chapter Twenty-Three

 

Colonel Mirsky gripped the edge of the hatch leading to the ship's cockpit. There was no direct view of the bore hole; the laser shield and armored outer hull covered the forward windows. He couldn't understand the displays before the two pilots; they were a confusion of vague lines, spinning circles, things like Easter eggs rolling and precessing in a grid pattern. "Get your men ready," the ship's commander said, glancing over his shoulder. "Tell them to stay close to the bore-hole walls until they exit into the first chamber. They have men with lasers waiting. Sting like bees."

Heavy fists seemed to slam on the outside of the hull in a rapid tattoo. Alarms went off. "Naughty fellows; that was a Gatling gun," the copilot said. "Laser shields penetrated. Minor outer hull breach."

Mirsky backed out and closed the hatch behind him, the commander's comment about bees still echoing in his mind. Mirsky had once tended bees on a city co-op in Leningrad as a student project. We invade the hive, he thought. Naturally, they try to sting.

He floated across the first compartment, picked up his helmet and issued terse instructions. The sergeants—squad leaders for the second and third compartments—pulled themselves through the hatches to alert their men. Minutes and it would begin.

"Why so glum, Alexei?" he chided a soldier inspecting his helmet. "Friends, are your weapons charged?"

They pulled their rifles out of a charging rack and checked the glowing LEDs.

"Line up," Mirsky said. In the second and third compartments, he heard orders being barked. The first company commander, stationed in the first compartment, Major Konstantin Ulopov, was already in his helmet, with the cannon-bearer Zhadov tugging experimentally at the connections and seals on his suit. When he was given the okay, Ulopov would in turn assist Mirsky.

None of them had much protection against laser or projectile hits. In this sort of warfare, an AKV or even a pistol—prepared for the vacuum, but with standard-issue bullets—was as effective against a soldier as antipersonnel lasers.

Mirsky approached the small group surrounding "Zev," Major General Sosnitsky. "Our battalion is prepared, Comrade General," he reported.

Sosnitsky's staff of three officers—with the Zampolit, Major Belozersky, standing nearby—were checking and re-checking the general's suit, like chicks around a hen. Sosnitsky lifted a gloved hand over the commotion and offered it to Mirsky. Mirsky grasped it firmly. "The Marshall would be proud of you and your men," Sosnitsky said. "Today—or tonight or whatever it is—will be glorious."

"Yes, sir," Mirsky said. Even though his thoughts about the command structure bordered on the cynical, Sosnitsky had the power to make him feel emotion.

"We will give them something back for Kiev, won't we, Comrade?"

"That we will, Comrade General."

He glanced up at Belozersky. The political officer's expression was a mix of exaltation and borderline panic. His eyes were wide and his upper lip was damp.

Mirsky wiped his own upper lip. Moist. His whole face was moist. Then he backed away from the group and resumed his position.

The queuing lights near the three circular exit hatches came on and the craft began its erratic tumbling, designed to offer unpredictable targets for marksman as the soldiers leaped forth. It would also scatter them like chaff inside the bore hole; the partners would grip each other's harnesses and jump as a group to stay together until they had their bearings.

They would not fire randomly; there was more chance of hitting one another than an antagonist. Only in direct combat with clearly seen opponents would they fire, and they were not to waste their time even with that if it could be avoided.

Everyone was suited and lined up. The emergency airlock surrounding number two exit hatch had been dismantled and stowed against the bulkhead. The pumps began to evacuate the compartments with throaty grumbles and a high pud-pud. The connecting hatches between the compartments slid shut. The lights were extinguished. The only thing Mirsky's soldiers could see now were the queuing lights above the exit hatches and the luminous glows of their guide ropes.

"Check radios and locators," he said. Each soldier performed a quick diagnostic on his communications gear and the all-important beacon locator.

The queuing lights flashed at half-second intervals. Everyone made sure they were connected to the trolley which would guide and tug them around the compartments until it brought them to their exit hatch.

Ten seconds until hatch opening. The motion of the ship—jerking, pitching and rolling as its maneuvering jets fired unevenly—was beginning to affect even Mirsky.

He could no longer hear the pumps. They were in vacuum.

The hatches slid open abruptly and the queues began to spill out into darkness and silence.

Two squads destined for the first chamber—twenty men in all—went out in the first queue.

Mirsky was third in his queue. Ulopov went ahead and Mirsky held him by a strap attached to his thigh. Mirsky in turn was held by Zhadov, who kept the laser cannon strapped to his side. The trio gripped the hatch edge and kicked away in unison, as they had been trained, flying from the craft like a precision skydiving team, a little star of six legs in the vast darkness.

His eyes adjusted quickly and he switched on his locator. For a heart-stopping moment he thought all was lost; he could not hear even a whisper of signal. Then came the steady high-frequency CHUFF-chuff-chuff of the beacon, placed by some unknown compatriot—perhaps dead already, murdered by the Americans—in the bore hole leading into the second chamber.

And he could make out the tiny spot of light that was the opening to the first chamber.

Stuff floating around. Bumping, smearing. Dark drops fuzzing out. Large chunks of metal in his helmet beam, sections of torn bulkhead and rippling sheets of steel. . . a ship!

Tangled in something invisible ahead, the wreckage of one of the heavy-lifters vibrated ponderously, fly caught in a web, surrounded by drifting bodies, most without helmets. Pieces of limbs and trunks drifted past.

A blinding nimbus surrounded them all. High-intensity spotlights played around the ships and their disgorged soldiers, dead and alive. Zhadov let go of Mirsky's strap, and Mirsky instinctively reached for the man's weapon but caught his arm instead. The suit squirmed in his grip and the body twisted fiercely, almost dragging Mirsky away from Ulopov. Zhadov's suit had been holed and the venting gas whirled him about like a released balloon. Mirsky reached out as far as he could and gripped the cannon. He handed it to Ulopov.

(As clear as reality—clearer, at the moment—he stood in a grassy field and contemplated this nightmare. He gathered his chute up from the yellow grass and shook his head, grinning at his imagination.)

Soldiers filled the bore hole, hundreds of them, and all around he could instinctively feel the invisible laser needles and projectiles searching, piercing, picking away.

Mirsky pulled Ulopov to him and swung his helmet beam around, looking for the wall they should be approaching. It was not visible. Zhadov's death had knocked them off course.

"Use your rocket pack," he told the major. "We break up now."

"Spshhome potato," the Major commented dryly, the voice-activated microphone cutting off the first sound of each phrase. "Sphshhotter than an oven. Spshhust be baked. Shhpood luck, Colonel!"

Mirsky let go of the strap and fired his thruster. He swung outward, away from the entangled wreckage and awful corpses. He cut the thruster and switched on his helmet display. Before his eyes, the beacon and his relation to it appeared on a small luminous stage. He adjusted with another thrust, as did hundreds of his comrades—how many hundreds he could not say.

He suddenly remembered the number of the entangled wreckage, now far behind. That had been the lunar ship—filled with those most recently and thoroughly trained for low-gravity combat. Their best.

Mirsky, alone now with his signal and his thruster—unconcerned for the moment about how many of his men were behind or ahead—flew down the bore hole toward the tiny circle of light.

 

"They've broken through," Kirchner said, slamming the side of his palm against the chair arm. "There's nothing in the bore hole but bodies and wreckage. About three heavy-lifters have backed out; we must have disabled the rest. Nobody's getting away, though—they can't go home."

"The pilots will wait until we're taken," Gerhardt said wearily on the comlink. He was now overseeing evacuation of the civilian teams to the forth chamber.

"You don't sound in the best of spirits, Oliver," Kirchner said. "Your turn now."

"We have some transmissions from the Persian Gulf," Pickney said. "We can unscramble them. Captain, would you like to listen in?"

"Let's hear them," Kirchner said.

A man's voice, sounding almost mechanical after the processing of the signal, said, "One K that is Kill Seven, One K that is Kill Seven, have smoked the circle; repeat, have smoked the circle. Vampires, fourteen count, range fifty klicks, source Turgenev small platform. Repeat, fourteen vampires. Six down. Sweep two commencing. Smoking circle, up with directed fry, nine down; up with knives, eleven down. Three vampires, twenty-klicks. Priests out. Priests and vampires engage. Advising salamander crews. Starfish launched. Sea Dragons alerted. Two vampires, six klicks. Sweep three commencing. Foaming now. Short eyes out, blades out, Guardians out, knives inboard." A pause. "Two vampires, three klicks." Another pause, then, softly, "Good-bye, Shirley."

"That's the cruiser House," Kirchner said quietly, rubbing his eyes with his hands. "She's gone."

"Another," Pickney said. "Coast of Oman."

"Let's have it," Kirchner said, glancing at Lanier.

"—CVN ninety-six, group Hairball," the signal commenced, "second launch Feather Two, repeat, Feather Two, commencing Chigger, repeat, Chigger. Special fourth class nuke, postal authorities will advise."

"The carrier Fletcher is sending in strategic aircraft for a midrange coast sortie," Kirchner translated.

"CVN eighty-five, code Zorro Doctor Betty, Postal authorities withdraw your permit. Claws will scratch Chiggers. Sea Dragons alerted. Slow wall up and Turkey Feathers down. Repeat, slow wall up and—"

"Group Hairball, Leading Man, Groom, and Alpha Delta Victor. . . Best Man, Chambermaid, luncheon postponed—"

"CVN ninety-six, I count thirty-eight vampires, source deep-blue Turgenev-class platform, range ten klicks, knives up, short eyes, Sea Dragons alerted. Priests and vampires engage angels two, Jesus Christ"—an obvious expletive, not code—"they're at two klicks—"

Kirchner flinched as the message was cut off. "I should be down there," he said. "Right in the middle of the barbecue."

"How many OTVs did Station Sixteen get off?" Lanier asked.

"Besides OTV 45, five. Three are coming for us. Two for the Moon."

"Warn the three we are under attack and may not be able to receive them. Suggest they divert to the Moon."

"If they can make it," Pickney said.

The evacuation of the low Earth orbit platforms and other stations had already begun. The war was expanding now; not just beam defense platforms, but research and industrial stations were becoming targets.

"Some diversion," Pickney said bitterly. "Looks like it's getting out of control."

"Of course it is," Gerhardt said on the comlink. "Only an idiot or somebody very desperate would have thought otherwise. Garry, you done all you can there. I'll need you in the first chamber in a few minutes. I'm on my way back now."