Europa Strike(130)

The People’s Mobile Strike Force had just suffered an incalculable setback.

But not a defeat. Not a final defeat. The last communiqué from Major Huang indicated that the defenses left in place at Cadmus base were very weak. Huang’s first assault had overrun the crater, and now had the enemy penned up inside the CWS base.

It was now only a matter of time, as Huang’s assault troops worked their way down the length of the CWS structure, one level at a time—dirty, deadly, agonizing work, but sooner or later successful.

In a way, perhaps, the defeat here at the LZ could be justified as the diversion that had made the victory at Cadmus possible. At least, that would be a good way to present it when he made his report to General Lin.

Lin Shankun was one of the old guard of the PRC’s senior military line. He’d fought as a child in the Great Civil War that had divided China between north and south and grown up to become one of the leaders who’d overseen the Reunification. The man did not like failure, could not accept it for any reason. During the Chengchou Campaign, he’d made a name for himself by shooting five subordinates who’d failed in their orders.

By his own hand, with his own pistol.

Xiang closed his eyes. The prickling, itching sensation at the back of his skull was worse now. He could hear voices—unintelligible voices, the meaning of their words just beyond the grasp of his comprehension. It was maddening, and terrifying.

He wondered again if he was going insane.

Or did it have something to do with the alien artifact? Dr. Zhao complained of the same headaches, the same voices. So did several of the other officers. Too many to be coincidence.

It almost suggested an attempt at communication.



Connector Tunnel,

E-DARES Facility

Ice Station Zebra, Europa

0811 hours Zulu



“Maybe…maybe we could talk to ’em,” Lucky suggested. He continued to hold his 580 steady, keeping the HUD cursor centered on the dogged-shut hatch. “Maybe try negotiating.”

“Negotiating what?” Kelly Owenson said, sneering. “Surrender terms?”

The hatch overhead gave a loud clang, and they heard the thump and shuffle of booted feet on the deck above, inside the corridor airlock. “I don’t think they want to surrender,” Pope said, tightening his grip on his 580.

The hatch banged back and gunfire thundered, impossibly loud in the metal-walled compartment. Bullets shrieked their ricochets from the deck and bulkheads.

Lucky pressed his 580’s firing button, unsure of a clear target but trying to spray fire through the open hatch.

A grenade dropped through.

It fell slowly in Europa’s meager gravity, but time seemed to stretch, to slow, making the drop of the green baseball seem to take forever.

But Doc McCall was already on his feet, reaching out, grabbing the grenade and pulling it to his chest, falling forward, full length, smothering the thing with his body. The others were on their feet or on their backs, pouring laser fire up through the gaping hatchway, firing at movement, at IR shapes painted on their visor HUDs, at vaguely seen shapes and at shapes they thought they saw.

Doc hit the deck, and then the grenade exploded, a terrifying eruption of sound that stabbed at the ears like daggers. The concussion slammed Doc against the bulkhead, and staggered the others. A second explosion roared, this one from the airlock at the top of the ladder. Someone up there must have had a second grenade, been hit by the Marines’ fire, and dropped it.

Doc screamed.



Manta One, Europan Ocean

0912 hours Zulu



The Manta was steering a course that should take it well to the north of the blockading line of black smokers, staying at a relatively shallow depth. The hope was to avoid the Singer artifact entirely by passing a couple of hundred kilometers to the north of it. The new course took them out of the way, but all in the Manta’s aft compartment agreed that a couple of extra hours suited up and in sardine mode was a small enough price to pay to avoid further injury to Sergeant Major Kaminski.

The siren’s song continued as they drove onward through the depths, remaining, this time, just beneath the densely tangled forest of marine growth hanging from the ice ceiling. The added distance didn’t seem to be helping Kaminski. He sat motionless on his seat, hands clasped so tightly before him that the knuckles showed white. When Jeff asked how he was, he replied only, “Headache. And I’m damned scared.”



Kaminski

Manta One, Europan Ocean

1020 hours Zulu



The pain in his head was growing worse, a pounding, throbbing assault on his senses that left him numb. He considered trying to drug himself with some of the morphanadyne in his suit’s first aid kit, but decided against it. When he’d passed out before, he’d had the damnedest, weirdest dreams, mental ramblings with the clarity of a prophet’s vision of onrushing doom. Most had been memories, scenes from childhood, from school, from his career in the Marines, and most had been unpleasant. A few had been so alien he still couldn’t grasp their content.