Semper Mars (16 page)

At night it was really bad. The sky was so dark. Kaminski had grown up in a suburb of Chicago, and the nights there—between the city sprawl and the monster ultraplex at Woodfield—pretty much washed everything out of the sky except the Moon. Here, the blacknesses below and above the horizon were the same; you could tell the difference only by knowing that the horizon was where the dusting of diamond-hard, blue-white stars stopped. He’d never even seen the Milky Way before, but it arched across the sky like a long, fuzzy cloud. It made him feel… lonely.

Worse though, was the cold. Marine Class-One armor was designed to serve as a space suit, but it wasn’t as well insulated as an EVA or Marsuit; it couldn’t be, not and stay as relatively light and manageable as it was. The arsenic-gallenide batteries and the micro fuel cells provided power enough to keep him warm in the day—as well as processing the air he breathed and the water he drank—but at night, when the temperature plunged to 150 below, the ground got so cold it seemed to suck the heat right out through the soles of the boots. All of the Marines wore thermal socks inside their suits, but it wasn’t enough, not on a long, four-hour watch in the icy darkness. Marines on outside watch kept warm by moving… and by spelling one another every twenty minutes or so inside the main hab’s airlock.

His watch requirements were to patrol the general area around the main hab and the C
³
facility, with at least one stop per hour at the automated methane-cracking plant east of the base perimeter, the makeshift shuttle pad, and the well and freshwater storage tank to the south. It wasn’t, he thought ruefully, as though Martians were going to attack… though the black hill they called the Fortress and the empty shell of the Ship, bulking huge against the stars to the north of the base, were eerie enough to have you believing in anything after more than ten minutes or so.

He’d just completed this hour’s rounds, walking out to the fuel farm first, then swinging past the shuttle pad. Now he was trudging north through the sand, with the external lights of the base a welcome sight indeed. In their glare, he saw Groller, moving out from the shelter of the main lock. He waved, and Groller waved back.

He touched a control in the arm of his suit, switching on his armor’s comm system. You were supposed to leave it on all the time, but on low-alert status, most of the Marines kept theirs switched off when they weren’t using them to save the batteries.

As soon as he switched on, though, a blast of static crashed from his helmet speakers. Hastily, he tapped on the key that lowered the volume; the channel was completely blocked. He tried the backup… with the same result.

Damn. He saw Groller tapping the side of his hehnet and knew that he was having trouble, too. That meant it wasn’t a fault in the suit, then—for which Kaminski was grateful—but a screwup with the comm center. No matter. One of them could go inside and report it.

As he walked closer, he noticed another armored figure standing in the main lock. That was strange. No one else was supposed to be—

The figure in the lock was aiming an assault rifle at Groller. It took Kaminski a frozen instant to realize that the guy was firing the rifle; he could see the rapid flicker of the muzzle flash, could see him struggle with the weapon’s climb as he loosed a burst at Groller’s back on full auto.

Kaminski broke into a clumsy run, unslinging his ATAR as he surged forward through loose sand. In the cold, the upper layers of the sand tended to freeze, the grains sticking together in a brittle crust, and each step was an unsteady stride-lurch as the crust broke beneath his boots.

Amazingly, the gunman appeared to have missed his target; Kaminski didn’t know where that stream of rapid-fire lead had gone, but it had apparently sailed past the unsuspecting Groller without coming near enough to hit him. He remembered the problems the Marines had had on the firing range; maybe the gunman was having difficulty with the local gravity as well. Kaminski came to a clumsy halt, raised his ATAR, and sighted in on the gunman.

Directly aiming a rifle in a space suit is next to impossible, if for no other reason than that you can’t get your eye close to the rear sight. The M-29, however, used a video low-light scan system that picked up the target picture through a camera lens mounted on the rifle’s back and fed the magnified image to the rifleman’s helmet electronics. In the green glow of his HUD’s image feed, he could see only that the target was wearing UN armor and seemed to be trying to brace himself against the open airlock’s seal for another shot. The laser rangefinder gave him a range of 243.6 meters. He dragged the crosshairs over the target… then cursed as the man ducked back out of sight.

Groller had seen him aim and obviously wondered what was going on. The Marine turned to look back at the main hab, saw nothing, turned again, his hands spreading in a what-the-hell-are-you-playing at? gesture.

Kaminski tried the comm channel again. Still blocked, and now he knew that somebody was jamming him. He started running again, signaling to Groller to get down, cursing wildly inside the ringing confmes of his hehnet.

The figure appeared at the airlock again… no, two figures, and one of them was cradling something long and vicious and deadly-looking, a rifle at least twice as long as an ATAR, and obviously much heavier and more clumsy. There was a green flash…

… and an answering flash against Groller’s backpack. A puff of white silently burst from the PLSS unit, propelling Groller forward and down.

Kaminski reached Groller an instant later. The other Marine was down on his hands and knees, wildly trying to reach behind him. It looked like his Number Two O
₂
reserve tank had been breached; oxygen was spilling into the thin, cold atmosphere, the moisture in the tank freezing as it emerged in an icy fog.

Damn! He could exchange fire with the unknown attackers, or he could try to save Jim Groller. That was no choice at all. Dropping his rifle, he skidded in on his knees, one hand steadying his friend while the other groped for the emergency cutoff valve that would close the system before it bled Jim’s precious air into near vacuum. Shit! The suit was breached too… the active camo surface was scorched away beside the burst O
₂
tank, and frost was forming rapidly around a hole a little narrower than the width of a pencil.

“Damn it, Jim, hold still! Hold still!” The man was thrashing about so hard that Kaminski had to drive his shoulder into the man’s side and knock him down, pinning him against the cold sand while he jammed the thumb of his glove against the breach. The armor was solid, if a bit slick with ice, and the pressure inside the suit was less than eight psi; he was able to stop the leak. One-handed, then, he began fumbling in his repair kit pouch for a self-seal patch.

When he looked up, several minutes later, he saw the two gunmen standing a few meters away, covering him with their weapons. The man with the assault rifle came forward and picked up the Marines’ ATARs; the other kept them covered with his bulky weapon—which Kaminski now recognized as an H&K Laserkarabiner LK-36, a deadly and powerful man-portable laser weapon powered off of a backpack power unit.

Lasers were unaffected by gravity… which meant they usually hit what they were aimed at. Carefully, bitterly, Kaminski raised his hands, but only after he checked to make certain that the patch he’d just slapped over the puncture in Groller’s armor was going to hold. The two UN troops closed in, then, urging both men to their feet.

It occurred to Kaminski as they were led back toward the habs that he and Groller had just become POWs.

And he’d not even known that they were at war.

E
LEVEN

Sunday, 27 May: 1220 Hours GMT

Marine Barracks

Cydonia Base, Mars

Sol 5636: soltime +34 minutes MMT

Most of the Marines in the barracks area were asleep. The sole exception was Sergeant Randolph Gardner, First Squad, Second Section, who had the ten-to-two fire and security watch that night. He heard footsteps in the passageway, heard the hiss and thump of the pressure door opening, and centered himself on the hatch to give the challenge. He assumed, of course, that it would be Staff Sergeant Ostrowsky making the late rounds… or even Colonel Lloyd, checking to make certain that all of the watch standers were on their toes. He was not prepared for what he saw when the hatch swung open—the business end of an H&K pointed straight at his face.

“Do not give the alarm,” the man at the far end of the rifle told him in thick, German-accented English. “Do not speak. Give me your weapon.”

Gardner complied. His ATAR wouldn’t have done him any good in any case; it was unloaded, as specified by regulations. The platoon’s alert status was still green, which meant full weapons-safety protocols were in effect. He wasn’t even wearing armor, save for the kinevlar vest he had on over his greens.

“Down on the floor!” the man said, speaking quietly but with a deadly will behind the words. “Hands behind your head!”

Gardner hit the deck, fingers interlaced behind his head as one of the intruders stood above him, well clear of any attempted heroics, a leg-sweep or a scissors. Other UN troops filed quietly into the barracks, moving almost silently, with only the occasional click of plastic on armor to warn of their coming. They fanned out through the barracks, taking key positions. Then, when all were in position, the man who’d first addressed him hit the light control panel.

The barracks lights came on, harsh and uncompromising. “Hey, what is this?” a male voice called. “What the freakin’—”

A tall, severe-looking man in UN blues entered the barracks. “Fall in!” the man snapped. “All of you! At attention!”

Habit dragged a half dozen Marines out of their racks and up to the red tape line marked out on the deck… but others, realizing that what was happening was way outside of standard procedures, protested. “Who the fuck are you?” Sergeant Jacob demanded, standing in green T-shirt and white boxer shorts, hands on his hips. “And what the fuck are you doing in here?”

“Shut up and move!” the German barked. One of the UN soldiers rammed the muzzle of his short-barreled bullpup rifle against Jacob’s side, propelling him toward Gardner’s position. More soldiers emerged from the hab section partitioned off for the women Marines, grinning as they led them to join the other Marines. Ostrowsky, barefoot and wearing only a T-shirt and panties, was furious. “What the fucking hell is this all about?”

“I am Sergeant Ernst Stenke, of the Second Demibrigade, First Regiment of the Legion Étranger,” he announced, “currently in the service of the United Nations Enforcement Arm. And for the moment, at least, you are all my prisoners.”

A crash sounded from the far end of the barracks. It was taking three UN soldiers to subdue Colonel Lloyd, who’d been sleeping in the partitioned cubicle reserved for the Marine officers. No, four. Lloyd had left another one on the deck, clutching his left knee in what Gardner sincerely hoped was excruciating pain. Two of the UN troops had just slammed Lloyd facedown against a garbage can—the cause of all of the racket—while the third came up behind him, rifle raised above his head.

Gardner winced as the rifle descended sharply, butt down, connecting with a sickening crack against the back of Lloyd’s skull.

“Anyone who resists,” the sergeant continued, as they dragged Lloyd up the center aisle of the barracks, “or who does not carry out my orders precisely, will be subdued, then dragged. We do not wish to harm any of you, but you will do as we say!”

Gardner was finally allowed to sit up as the Marines were carefully counted and checked for weapons. There were twenty-three Marines in the barracks in all, counting Gardner and the unconscious Lloyd. Swiftly, efficiently, they were allowed to dress in twos or threes, with a guard standing by to check their greens and boots for hidden weapons, and then herded through the airtight hatches to the recreation area. There, they were deposited in the middle of the floor, seated with their hands up and their fingers locked behind their heads, all save Doc Casey, who was allowed to look after Lloyd.

Within a few minutes more, Bergerac, the UN commanding officer, led three more men into the room from the comm shack—Hayes and the major, along with one of the scientists who’d been at Cydonia when the Marines had arrived. During the next ten minutes, more UN troops brought in the rest of the American and Russian personnel from the station, most looking groggy and sleep-disheveled as they continued to pull on their clothing. There was confusion enough in their noisy entrance that several of the Marines took the chance to talk among themselves in quiet murmurs.

“What’dya think, Randy?” Corporal Theodore Miller, a young kid from Ohio in Gardner’s squad sitting to his left, whispered. “Looks like some kinda military coup.”

“Shut your trap,” Sergeant Ostrowsky growled, her voice just loud enough to reach the two Marines. She was sitting to Gardner’s right, and she was still furious. “We’ve got a war on our hands, here.”

“Shit, Sarge. What makes you say that?”

“Stands to reason, doesn’t it? You don’t think they’d pull a dumb-ass stunt like this unless they had the full backing of the UN, do you? Oh, shit! They got Kaminski.”

A pair of armored Foreign Legion troops were bringing Frank Kaminski into the room at gunpoint. That wasn’t good. If the guys on duty outside had escaped the UN net, maybe they could’ve helped somehow. Groller’s absence was worrying and a little hopeful. Was the other EVA security watch dead, or had he managed to get away?

And if he’d escaped, what could he do?

“Be quiet, all of you, if you please,” Bergerac said, addressing the entire room. “By order of the United Nations Military Command and the UN World Cultural Bureau, I am assuming direct military control of this facility—”

There was an explosion of noise from the Marines, and from the scientists as well, people shouting, people starting to rise to their feet despite the threatening guards stationed close by.

“Quiet! Quiet!” He turned and rasped something to the troops near him, and a dozen rifle muzzles raised in unison, pointed at the Marines. For a panic-ragged moment, Gardner thought that one or another of the other troops was going to fire warning shots into the overhead… not a good idea with the next best thing to hard vacuum outside.

“You UNdies don’t have any jurisdiction here!” Donatelli shouted above the commotion, using the popular Corps slang for UN troops or bureaucrats.

“I beg to differ. Now, all of you, sit down, and I will explain your position!”

“I’ll show you some positions,” Sergeant Jacob growled nearby, but, slowly, order was restored in the room.

“Now then,” Bergerac continued, speaking as though nothing had happened, and despite the UN troops who still held their rifles aimed at the Marines like a firing squad. “As I said, we are assuming military control of this facility. The politics of this decision do not really concern any of you… except insofar as this obviously changes the nature of your mission here. We do not have enough personnel to watch over you all the time, and so we are taking you to another… place, where—”

He had to stop again as shouts, curses, and questions broke once more from the Americans before him. “We will take you to a place where it will be easier to guard you. You will be our guests at this place for another three months, when the cycler Champlain arrives to take you all back to Earth.”

Gardner let out the breath he’d been holding then. For a moment, he’d thought the Americans were all to be killed. Then he decided that it was premature to relax. The SS guards had told their prisoners in the death camps that they were being taken to the showers.

“We sincerely regret the necessity of this action, but be assured that we will carry out our program here, and you will not be allowed to stand in our way.

“You will be led in groups of three back to the common room,” Bergerac continued, “where you will find your EVA armor already laid out. I assure you, all suits will have been carefully checked for weapons or other contraband. You will find your suits and you will put them on. There will be no talking. Any attempt at escape will be dealt with severely. Am I understood?”

This time, there were no protests, and Bergerac seemed to accept this as assent. “Very good,” he said. He pointed. “You three! Let’s go!”

Soldiers led Donatelli, Marchewka, and Hauser from the room, and at that moment, Gardner wondered if he would ever see any of them again.

1828 Hours GMT

Mars Transport Shuttle

Cydonia Base, Mars

0605 hours MMT

The flight out of Cydonia was brutal, but mercifully short. The transport was so crowded with Marines—all of them encumbered in their Class-One armor—that there was no room to move or even shift to get into a more comfortable position. “Y’know,” somebody said over the general comm channel, “if they wanted to get rid of all of us in a convenient accident—”

“Ruhe!” another voice barked. “Be quiet, all of you! No talking!”

The pilot—Garroway didn’t know if it was one of the UN troops or a NASA pilot working at gunpoint—piled on the Gs for the liftoff from Cydonia… and the acceleration continued for a long time, long enough to convince Garroway that they were making a high-speed run to someplace rather than the usual slower, fuel-conserving suborbital hop.

He was sitting close enough to one of the shuttle’s small observation ports that he could see a blur of ocher landscape below as they hurtled past. It had taken most of the rest of the night to secure the American prisoners, get them suited up, and to lead them three at a time out to the shuttle on its launchpad. The sun was just coming up, the light casting long fingers of black shadow from each rock or boulder or irregular fold of the chaotic terrain, but they were moving too quickly, and at too low an altitude, for him to tell where they were. At a guess, judging from the direction the shadows were pointing, they were heading more or less southwest, which made a certain amount of sense. There were only two major bases on Mars, Cydonia and Candor Chasma at the equator; they must be heading back for Candor Station.

The question, of course, was what was going to happen to them when they arrived.

He felt a growing discomfort in the small of his back, where the wrist-top he’d hidden there was trapped, pinched between him and the inside of his armor. They’d searched him again before he’d suited up, but he’d palmed the microcomputer when they frisked him, hiding it under hands clasped behind his head as they patted him down. By pretending to adjust his trousers before climbing into his armor, he’d managed to hide it again in his waistband. He wondered just how much stress the device could take, though, as several Gs slammed him back into the thinly padded seat.

Acceleration cut off, and for a long time after that they were in free fall, save for occasional violent thumps and kicks when the pilot fired steering jets to maintain attitude or to adjust their course. Their captors had made certain that all of the Marines were strapped down, and two of them sat now at the forward end of the compartment, as uncomfortable as any of the Americans as they kept an eye on their prisoners.

Garroway was wedged in between two Marines, with a third sitting half on top of him and half on the Marine to his right. In their armor, they were anonymous… but he could still recognize voices occasionally over the comm channel… mingled occasionally with the harsh, retching sounds of people being sick in their helmets.

The shuttle’s cargo hold was designed to hold thirty passengers in something like relative comfort, and it could manage another ten, perhaps, with some crowding. That, however, assumed that the passengers weren’t wearing bulky Class-Ones… or EVA suits. Most of the scientists, Garroway noticed, had been kept at Cydonia, but five had been packed into Mars surface suits and loaded aboard the shuttle with the Marines… the ones who’d discovered those Homo erectus corpses two days before. They’d nearly had to drag Alexander physically from the hab and chuck him into the lobber.

There were twenty-five Marines on board—Colonel Lloyd and Private Groller, both wounded, had been left at Cydonia under the care of Dr. Penkov, the Russian doctor at the base. That put a total of thirty prisoners aboard the shuttle, and the crowding was nightmarish with them all wearing armor or surface EVA suits.

After a small eternity of free fall, they were jarred by a sharp, dizzying swoop as the shuttle flipped end for end, and then acceleration hammered at them again when the main drive fired. The world tilted sickeningly, and then was obscured by swirling ocher dust as the craft settled in for a cushioned landing on its four hydraulic jacks.

They were down.

“Gentlemen, and ladies, we have arrived at your new home,” Bergerac told them, climbing down the narrow ladder from the pilot’s compartment. Had he flown the ship himself, Garroway wondered? No, he could see a NASA pilot behind him, seated at the console. The UN colonel must have been riding strapped to the bridge jumpseat.

With two UN guards urging them to move, the Marines and scientists clambered awkwardly down the center passageway ladder and into the shuttle’s airlock bay. Since everyone had been suited up for the flight, the shuttle was already open to the Martian atmosphere. The loading ramp was down; in moments, Garroway stood with the others on the cold, still, and nearly airless desert.

This was not Candor Chasma.

That fact was beginning to register with the others as well. He heard several low-murmured comments, and several Marines exchanged words by touching their helmets together for a quick, sound-inducted comment or two.