Bill Sutherland led his small contingent along the cold dark beach, stumbling now and again over frozen clumps of seaweed. The bitter March wind howled off the Atlantic, driving the frigid evening tide at their feet.
Bill wasn't aware of his numb hands or frozen feet. With the others, his whole attention was held by Goose Hill, its summit now lit by the flash of massed energy weapons, their whining clear above wind and surf.
Even as he watched, a huge explosion tore open the night, throwing him and his men to the sand, bathing them in an ochre glow.
"Sweet Jesus." He stumbled to his feet, squinting into the glare. S'Cotar warriors swarmed unopposed past the fiercely burning shuttle.
"Someone friendly to us is up there, and in big trouble!" Bakunin's shout carried over the secondary explosions. Like the rest, he'd traded his business suit for more practical clothing from the Institute: turtleneck wool sweater, heavy twill pants and a fur-lined field jacket, the Leurre Institute dolphin crest on its left shoulder. And like the Americans, he carried an M-16, also "borrowed" from the Institute.
"Sure looks that way." Sutherland nodded, dropping his voice as the explosions died. "How do we get to them, though?" He pointed his rifle up at the carnage. "We can't fight our way through thatl"
The small pickup force from Otis-APs, mechanics, programmers-had secured the Institute. The infantry brigade, though, was still forming up at Ft. Devens. Before leaving Oystertown, Bill had changed half the airmobile brigade's destination from the Institute to Goose Hill, but it would be at least another hour before their arrival. Whoever was holding the hill didn't have an hour.
Suddenly it came to Bill. He knew how to bypass the summit.
"There's a tunnel leading from the site here to the beach," he said, sweeping his light along the embankment as they walked. "My people escaped through it and one of them left his stick as a guide. If we're lucky, it'll still be there."
Yazanaga spotted it, just as more explosions rocked the ground: a blackthorn walker leaning precariously against a great boulder. As they approached at a trot, the ground shook again and the stick fell with a clatter, rolling to a stop at their feet.
Picking up the stick, Bakunin skeptically eyed the weathered granite. "So?"
"So… this!" With the air of a conjurer, Sutherland flashed his light into a small niche above where the stick had leaned. A tiny green light winked back as a great stone slab swung noiselessly aside.
The agents stood blinking in the yellow circle of light from the tunnel. Johnson gave a low whistle of astonishment.
Another barrage rocked the hill, sending a shower of loose rock down on their heads.
"Don't you believe it." Bill clicked his M-16's safety off. "My instincts tell me this is only the end of the beginning, as the man said."
"The same instincts that got us lost for two days in the sewers under the sixteenth aggrandizement, no doubt."
If Sutherland heard the crack, delivered sotto voce, he ignored it. "After you, Tovarich Colonel," he said, gesturing toward the entrance.
The Russian shook his head. "Your tunnel, you lead."
Rifle leveled, Bill stepped warily into the passage. Marsh, Yazanaga and Johnson, veteran cold warriors all, followed, weapons poised. Bakunin, bringing up the rear, covered the doorway till the slab swung shut, then trotted after the Americans.
"Piece of junk!" K'Raoda said through clenched teeth, glaring at the console's merrily twinkling lights. It was the first time Zahava had seen him lose his composure.
"All the positions were lit before," she said, staring at the other consoles, all dark.
''I think the last time you triggered the defenses,'' speculated the K'Ronarin. "Perhaps your metabolism is a bit different from ours. Or perhaps the computer has standing orders to transport intruders to the nearest manned station. Perhaps Implacable qualified. And perhaps I don't know what the hell I'm talking about," he concluded ruefully, returning to his task.
"According to the Imperial War Archives," he added, hopefully typing a fresh sequence of numbers, "the ground defenses can be activated from a remote terminal-assuming we're faced with a Mode Two or Three system. Anything higher and all bets are off." Zahava watched the screen respond to the input with a fresh burst of figures. Figures her brain knew, through the magic of the translator, to be mathematical symbols akin to calculus.
"Hmmm." K'Raoda stared hard at the new figures.
"Maybe?" asked the Israeli, peering eagerly over his shoulder.
"Maybe. I don't know." He rubbed his eyes. "What's worrying me is that the Planetary Operations Command series had a reputation for chattiness that's endured over fifty centuries. If this one were functioning, we shouldn't be able to shut it up."
They looked up, startled, as the shrill of blaster fire echoed down the tunnel.
"Cover the hall," ordered the officer, tapping again on the trilevel keyboard.
Rifle at high-port, Zahava ran from the room.
The outer door flared white, atomizing. Aiming carefully, the handful of humans fired into the packed S'Cotar, dimly visible through the haze and smoke. Harmless-looking, a small black ball rolled in.
The K'Ronarin commtech moved first.
"Grenade!" he cried, hurling himself atop the ball.
Even though his body absorbed much of the fearsome heat that vaporized it, his retreating comrades would have been broiled without their warsuits.
The commando Sergeant, D'Nir, leading, the survivors charged into the altar chamber and down the ladder into the lower tunnel. John, in the rear, secured the altar stone with a blast to the wall sensor. "That should hold 'em," he growled.
"Not for long," said the commando, running ahead of him. The small troop halted where Zahava waited, just outside the control room.
"Commander, I need a blastpack," D'Nir said, bursting in on K'Raoda.
"Over there." Not taking his eyes from the screen, the officer gestured toward their neat, small stack of equipment.
The Sergeant, no older than K'Raoda, ran to the pile. Tumbling it in his haste, he yanked out a flat gray packet, then charged back down the corridor.
K'Raoda typed in another sequence. "How long?" he asked over the commnet.
"Assuming maximum delay at the ladder-twenty minutes," D'Nir reported.
The NCO reappeared a moment later, sans blastpack. "It'll detonate when the first warrior reaches the bottom rung," he reported. "I set it only for that life form."
John poked his head through the doorway. "If you don't get that thing working soon," he said, "we're going to experience fatal overcrowding."
"If I do," replied K'Raoda, "the defenses may be inoperative. And if I don't-well, be grateful that we won't have to spend much longer in these dreary tunnels.
"Sergeant, plant nuclear demolition charges on this equipment. Set timers for command detonation and detonation within three feet of any nonhumanoid life form."
A dull krump punctuated his order. The floor shook as dust billowed in from the ruined altar well. Gagging and wheezing, the humans switched their warsuits to internal atmosphere.
It took only a moment, though, for the installation's scrubbers to sweep the air clean, affording a clear view of the first wave of S'Cotar as they rounded the tunnel, firing.
Crouching low, the defenders blasted back.
One crewman lost an arm to concentrated fire. His suit sealed the blood-gushing stump, clamping off the wound-but not before his agonized shrieks had filled the commnet.
The first wave of warriors, cut down, were followed by another. And another. And another, charging unwavering into the human blaster fire. The corridor became a charnel house, heaped high with dead S'Cotar.
John's blaster quit without warning. A quick look showed over half a charge left. Hearing curses, he looked up. All of their weapons had failed.
"Damper field!" spat D'Nir. "This is it." He drew a wicked-looking knife from his boot sheath.
"Their blasters won't work, will they?" asked Greg. He peered down the tunnel's curve, around which the S'Cotar had withdrawn.
"No." Leaning his useless rifle against the wall, the NCO took up position midtunnel. "It'll be small consolation, though. Form on me. Skirmish order."
The other commando and the three Terrans fell in beside him. "Commander!" he called. "Now or never."
"Never," said a resigned voice. Knife in hand, K'Raoda came to stand with his men.
John felt a hand squeeze his arm. Zahava stood next to him. "The French have a saying," she said with a sad smile. "'Tout passe, tout casse, tout lasse.' You know it?"
"Today's not our day to perish, my friend." He gave an answering squeeze, then let her hand fall away. "My bad knee doesn't hurt."
The warriors came at them six abreast, leaping toadlike over their dead, sweeping down on the humans, a great green flood. At twenty paces, John gamely fell into a fighting crouch. His left knee was throbbing.
"Drop!" roared a voice from behind. "Hit the deck!" The humans dropped, faces to the rock floor, as a hail of gunfire tore into the S'Cotar. The victorious charge became a rout.
Firing from the hip, Sutherland led his men after the retreating warriors. A final burst of fire killed the last of them just as they reached their blasters, stacked beside the altar well. The five men walked slowly back to where John and Zahava stood, helmets under their arms.
"Long night, Mr. Director?" John smiled weakly.
"Long night, Mr. Harrison." Bill nodded, smiling back. "In fact, I keep hoping I'll wake up soon."
"No chance. Thanks, Bill." He clapped his friend on the shoulder.
Zahava, ever direct, kissed Sutherland soundly on the lips.
"More. More." He grinned, tired but appreciative. She kissed him again.
"Something out of an opium dream," said Sutherland, nudging a torn S'Cotar corpse with his rifle butt.
"And who those people are, I'm afraid to ask," he said, nodding toward the K'Ronarin survivors. "I gather they supplied your galactic opera costumes?"
"They're from a nearby starship," said Greg nonchalantly, helping carry the unconscious crewman into the transport room. Sutherland merely nodded, eyes distant. Bakunin, standing nearby examining a blast rifle, didn't even look up.
"I can see you're overwhelmed by the news," drawled John.
"I was overwhelmed hours ago." The CIA officer sighed. "Now I'm just trying to cope, moment to moment. What are they called?"
"They're K'Ronarins," said Zahava. "Their ancestors built this installation, centuries ago."
"And the big green bugs?"
"S'Cotar. The two are fighting a war of extermination," John said.
"Who's winning?"
"The S'Cotar."
Sutherland grunted. "This gets cheerier by the minute."
K'Raoda had vanished into the transport room just after the warriors' destruction. Now he reappeared, intent on the small biosensor he was holding. After a moment he looked up, relieved. "All enemy forces have left the area." He gave a crooked grin. "We did it-we held.
"And it's because of you that we did," he said to Sutherland. "Thank you." He held out his hand.
"I can't understand you," said Bill, shaking hands, "but I can guess. You're welcome."
"By a clever oversight, I neglected to bring translators with us." K'Raoda led them into the transport room. Bakunin, exploring, looked up as they trooped in.
"May I present Colonel Andreyev Ivanovich Bakunin, Union of Soviet Socialist Republics," said Sutherland. "These two people"-he indicated John and Zahava-"work with me."
Bakunin nodded pleasantly. "May I know their names?"
"No." Bill looked at Greg. "You, I don't know," he said.
"If you're Joe Antonucchi's boss, you might recognize my fingerprints from a piece of granite I gave him."
"Implacable to ground force." D'Trelna's voice boomed from the commset and over all the communicators. "What is your situation?" A ragged cheer preceded K'Raoda's report.
"I'm coming down with reinforcements," the Captain said, an anxious McShane hovering at his elbow. "By the way, fifty Terran rotoplanes are closing on you-ETA two minutes. I assume they're friendly." (He assumed nothing. Four batteries were locked on the unsuspecting airborne troops.)
John relayed the information to Sutherland.
"RDF troops from Devens." He nodded. "I'd better get up there. Where's the front door?"
His men hadn't been idle. A rope ladder now dangled down the altar well. He made a face, then swung up the ladder, K'Raoda following close behind.
"I don't know about anyone else," said Bakunin, "but I need rest." The Russian lay down on the floor and was instantly asleep.
"Food for those who want it," said D'Nir, passing out handfuls of tasteless protein wafers.
Tired but hungry, the remaining allies ate.
Stephen Ames Berry
The Biofab War