Subterrene War 03: Chimera (23 page)

“But the Royal Army is at least supplying you, right?”

“If you call it that.” Major Remorro leaned back in his chair and waved at the space where the holo map used to float. “That map is misleading. The supplies they give us are enough to keep us running, but not enough if we want to push into Burma. It’s the one way they can keep some kind of leash on these girls. Outposts not manned by the
Gra Jaai
are manned by Karen mountain people, rebels against the Burmese government, and although they’re ruthless as hell, it took us nearly a year to teach them armor and Maxwell carbine fundamentals. They’re not cowards. They’re just a little overwhelmed at the moment.”

Captain Orcola nodded. “We’re barely holding on. It’s like the Stone Age out here, and something is up because last week a sato patrol came back with combatant prisoners.”

“So?” asked Jihoon. “Why’s that so odd?”

“Because the
Gra Jaai
don’t
take
prisoners,” he said, “unless they’re civilians. If these satos weren’t on the line, Bangkok would have been speaking Burmese years ago, and holding them back has taken a level of violence that
you guys haven’t even begun to imagine. Hell. These chicks and their human units are so badass that their atrocities have atrocities.”

My helmet had been off for a few minutes, and already the hair on my head had soaked through with the damp but it felt good in the bunker’s heat, which had been born from radiation and a geothermal gradient that made everything warmer with each meter downward you went. Drops ran the length of my neck. They slid into my undersuit and along my back so that I fought the urge to peel the ceramic off and scratch at them, the sensation of water making me want a shower more than anything. But at least in our bunker, the jungle had lost its hold. The kilometer of overhead rock separated me from the banyans and strangle vines, from the snakes and insects—spies and sappers the bush used to wage constant psyops on my brain, making it crawl with uncertainty. It took all my strength to keep my thoughts on target and on the conversation because they just wanted to turn back to Phillip or to Wheezer. To anything except this place.

“What’s the
good
news?” I asked.

The major shook his head. “We thought
you
were bringing some. You want to tell us why you’re here?”

“The US is putting the Germline program back online—pulling production ateliers out of mothball and starting construction of new ones. They’re going to try and get back onto a war footing so they can stop the Chinese advance into Thailand using new genetic units.”

Both men stared at me. The air in the room had become still, and I sucked on my cigarette, hoping it would prevent the onset of a bad headache, then drank a mouthful of water while I waited for them to respond.

“There isn’t time,” Remorro said. “That’ll take years, and there’s no way they’d get here in time.”

“I know. That’s why we’re here. We need to talk with Margaret because SOCOM needs her help, and they want her to ally with us—stop the Chinese invasion if she can.”

“Jesus Christ.” Remorro stood and leaned against the wall, pressing his forehead against it. “They don’t understand shit.”

“What’s the problem?” Jihoon asked.

“The
Gra Jaai
aren’t just here for a tour or rotation, and this isn’t some military op for them. It’s a home. Nu Poe is holy ground, the headquarters for their freakin’ religion, and they have everything here—families, children, underground schools for the kids, and training tanks for potential converts. Everything. So of course they’re going to try and stop the Chinese. But it doesn’t matter how well they fight or how dedicated they are, and the last thing they’ll do is negotiate some kind of deal to work with us or US forces. There isn’t any way to stop the freakin’ Chinese whether you talk to Margaret or not;
don’t they get that?
”

Orcola nodded and pointed at me with his pipe. “And you better not tell these chicks about production ateliers. I have no idea how that will sit with them because they’re
all
freakin’ crazy.”

“I still need to talk with her,” I said. “Can you arrange it?”

Major Remorro sat back down and relit his pipe. “They think you’re here to kill Margaret.”

“I’m not here to kill her; I just want to talk. I mean, what the hell are you guys doing up here anyway? The
Gra Jaai
are in charge, and there’s no Thai Army, and from what you say it sounds like the satos won’t accept
US help anyway. So who the hell are you
advising
in this place?”

“Nobody. And other than radioing in occasional sit-reps and being the eyes and ears of the Royal Thai Army and SOCOM, I have no idea why we’re here,” the major said. “No fucking clue. So yeah, smart guy. We’ll take you to see Margaret, and you can see for yourself how crazy this place is. And then maybe
you
can give these chicks some goddamned
advice.
” He and Captain Orcola stood, slipping into their vision hoods and helmets. “Do exactly what we do, and don’t say a damn word until I tell you to. Follow us.”

Orcola knocked his pipe clean and slipped it into a loop of webbing on his chest. “
This
oughta be fun.”

We squirmed through the entrance tunnel and back into the main one, which took us farther into the complex, and it wasn’t long before I got lost; the place was like a small city. Remorro led us through underground villages where children of the
Gra Jaai
squealed at seeing four Americans and then ran to hide. Nobody trusted us. The kids, even the girls, were bald and all dressed in white pajamas, and at first something bothered me, but it took a few minutes to figure out what was wrong, and when I did it chilled me to think what the
Gra Jaai
might be doing; the kids all looked under the age of ten. None of them was even close to their teens, and there were even fewer old people—a gap that underscored the sensation something was off. The two or three aging men and women we
did
see sat in front of automated looms and sewing machines, putting together uniforms or repairing ripped undersuits, and none of them paid us any attention. So there was just one conclusion to
draw: everyone between ten and fifty was either dead, on the line to fight, or in the training tanks.

The major led us to a bank of mining elevators where three men stood guard, their hair clipped into short Mohawks and faces scarred from more wounds than I could count. One of them pointed his carbine at us.

“Go back.”

The major pointed at the elevators and bowed his head while speaking in Japanese. “With respect. We need to see the sisters.”

“Access to the command bunker is sealed.
Go back.
”

“It’s an emergency,” Remorro insisted, “and it can’t wait. Please contact them and ask; the new ones”—he then pointed to me and Jihoon—“have important information about Chinese and American forces.”

The man looked at us and took forever to make a decision, finally slinging his carbine over a shoulder and disappearing into one of the mining elevators—small steel cages that ran on cables into a narrow shaft overhead. I looked at Remorro while we waited. Even through the armor you saw him shiver, the plates of his carapace vibrating against the ceramic carbine, and he stooped over so that at first I thought he was continuing to show respect to the remaining
Gra Jaai,
until Remorro burst into a fit of coughing and almost fell over. Orcola wasn’t much better off.

“Are you two OK?” I asked.

Remorro tried to straighten but amazingly wound up more stooped than before. “Dysentery.”

“Or,” said Orcola, “malaria. Or dengue. Pretty much any cruddy tropical disease you can imagine is on the list.”

Even over the helmet speakers, Jihoon sounded scared. “Biological warfare?”

“Yeah,” said Remorro, “if you call Mother Nature biological warfare. That’s the thing. You don’t need the man-made stuff to have a real good disease out here because in reality the bush is already one big stinking petri dish, with all the warmth and nutrients you need to get a good epidemic going. The smoking helps, though. And we have some drugs.”

“Christ,” said Ji, “all you’d need are the right antibiotics and antivirals, and haven’t you been vaccinated anyway?”

Orcola shook his head. “Kid, you don’t get it. We’ve been vaccinated. But there are things up here that nobody’s heard of, and all our medical supplies get intercepted anyway for the
Gra Jaai
and their war effort.”

The thought of it made me cringe. Both men seemed so weakened with disease that I wondered if it would be a good idea to stay suited for our entire trip to the front, to keep at bay an entire universe of invisible biothreats that hovered all around us. Nobody said anything, and what was there to say? In Bangkok, whatever the two had contracted was probably treatable, but out here you managed on your own, and in our silence the remaining
Gra Jaai
guard watched us, grinning. I hated the guy; I stared back at him, fingering the stock of my carbine, and figured he knew what we were saying and that his grin resulted from hatred returned, a wish that disease would take all four of his non–
Gra Jaai
visitors sooner rather than later. If we’d had to wait much longer it wasn’t clear what would have happened, but a moment later the elevator returned.

Remorro bowed his head again to the guard who stepped out. “Will they see us?” When the man didn’t answer, he motioned us forward. “OK, this is it. We’ll go up
first. Leave your carbines here, and after our car goes, you two get in the second one and wait a few seconds before hitting the button. When you get there, bow to the girl speaking to us and don’t say a word until I give a signal.”

I nodded, and they disappeared. A few seconds later Jihoon and I had dropped our carbines to the floor and stepped into a metal cage that rattled into the darkness overhead, and I closed my eyes, not wanting to see rock a few feet from my face, the streamers of water looking like white strings that would encase us in a spiderweb of heat. The cage screeched. In places it scraped against the rock and promised to become stuck, trapping us there forever, but I consoled myself that even if the
Gra Jaai
wouldn’t want to waste time to rescue
us,
they’d have to if they wanted to recover their
elevator
. Finally, it dumped us into another bunker somewhere above, where monitor screens covered every wall, and holo stations blinked and shifted to portray different aspects of the defensive line.

There was one sato; she spoke with Remorro while about thirty
Gra Jaai
women jabbered into radios or worked at their computers in a dance of strategy that neither Jihoon nor I had time to grasp.

“Drugs and therapeutics are reserved for those who have seen the tanks,” she said, “and aren’t for the nonbred who killed so many of my sisters. Catherine’s blood is on your hands. And don’t forget that there’s another way to get drugs, Major.”

Remorro had removed his helmet and shook his head. “I’m in no shape for joining the
Gra Jaai.
”

“The Karen don’t require medicine for disease,” she said, sounding disgusted. “Why should you?”

“Because the Karen are natives. They have their own
remedies and immunity to the local stuff. If you can’t spare any medicine, then tell the Thai Army to relieve me, have them send a replacement.”

She laughed, and the sound sent a chill up my spine; it was empty of joy, and hearing it reminded me they were pseudohuman things—almost people, but not quite.

“We can’t do that either,” she said.

“But
why
? You know the agreement, that I can’t be relieved without your or Margaret’s endorsement. And your people are stealing the medicine that’s supposed to be reserved for us.”

“Why keep you here? Because we like you and think you can be so much more, if only given the right motivation.” The girl looked at me, and I froze, embarrassed for having almost stepped back. “You are the two from Bangkok,” she said, “the ones with news from America.”

“Take your helmet off,” said Remorro. “This is Lucy, Margaret’s second-in-command.”

I did, then peeled my vision hood away, staring at the girl without blinking and annoyed with the thought of having to show respect. “What’s your serial number?” I asked.

The entire room went silent. Other women stopped talking into their radios and looked up, and if anyone had asked me why I’d done it—why I’d said something that was sure to piss her off—there wasn’t any answer other than it
felt
right. This was a sato. I was goddamned if I’d treat one with deference after I’d hunted them for so long and seen them rotting in terror, and the way she’d treated Remorro and the way he’d just taken it… I’d never thought a Special Forces operator could sink so far. But what really got me was that I couldn’t stop seeing
Wheezer as she spoke, couldn’t get the image of him out of my head.

“It’s OK,” Lucy said, smiling as she waved the
Gra Jaai
women back to work. “I like this one, Remorro. Maybe I’ll let
him
replace you.”

“Where’s Margaret?” I asked.

“Jesus, Lieutenant,” Remorro pleaded, “shut your damn mouth.”

“I said it was OK!”
The girl moved so quickly that her hand disappeared one second, then reappeared the next to hold a knife against Remorro’s neck. “And to answer the lieutenant’s question, I can’t remember my serial number. Before I let you see Margaret, I’ll have to know why you want her.”