Star Corps(117)
They couldn’t trigger the nuke from here. It had been reset to detonate only with the proper authorization code, a set of alphanumerics transmitted either from Dragon One or from orbit. And without the relay…
“I think we have to act as a new relay, Lieutenant,” she said, “if we can get a clear signal through to the captain.”
“Roger that,” Lieutenant Kerns said. “I’m afraid I don’t see any other way….”
Lander Dragon One
In flight, Ishtar
0011 hours ST
Success! Warhurst felt the familiar tingle of the net going online, the flow of data unfolding itself within his mind. The noumenon opened…narrow and poorly defined, but with resolution enough for him to begin directing his efforts toward establishing a stronger radio link with Task Force Kerns. The Lander One AI had done the trick. It might not have the high-powered processing thrust of a CS-1289, Series G-4, Model 8 like Cassius, but it knew how to set up network protocols.
He could see outside now. The Dragon carrying Lander One was racing low across a purple-red forest, skimming the canopy at treetop level. Behind, ten kilometers distant, now, An-Kur rose above the jungle, a vast, black, flat-topped cone.
He was still getting a faint radio signal from within the mountain, transmitted and magnified by a relay left on the ground at the LZ.
“Enhance signal, Channel Five,” he ordered over the net. “Boost it!”
Damn, but this pocket version of the MIEU Net was ragged! His internal cerebralink hardware was so much faster than this cobbled-together monstrosity, he felt himself waiting with dragging impatience after each set of commands.
“…Kerns! Dragon One, this…Force Kerns. Come in!”
“This is Warhurst. I copy!” He shot a coded mindclick up the link. Clean this freaking signal up!
“This is Kerns. We’re surrounded and can’t reach the nuke. Suggest using me as a relay for detonation. Over!”
Warhurst stared in sick horror at An-Kur. “Roger that, Lieutenant. I…copy…”
Task Force Kerns
Depths of An-Kur, Ishtar
0012 hours ST
Again the enemy was falling back, but four more Marines—Knowles, Luttrell, Muhib, and Couture—were dead, brought down by heavy gauss-gun fire. Rounds continued to crack and snap around them, as hidden snipers fired from behind the surrounding rocks.
“This is Kerns. We’re surrounded and can’t reach the nuke. Suggest using me as a relay for detonation. Over!”
Valdez looked at the lieutenant. She didn’t know him that well, but she knew he’d seen action in Colombia. She caught his eye through his visor and nodded.
“Roger that, Lieutenant,” Warhurst’s voice replied after a pause. “I…copy…”
They couldn’t reach the nuke in time. Warhurst had the trigger code. He couldn’t detonate the nuke directly, but he could send the signal through Kerns’s comm gear.
“I’m sorry, people,” Kerns told the listening Marines. “There’s no other way.”
“Hell, Lieutenant,” Ostergaard said cheerfully. “No way we were gonna get out of here anyway!”
“Yeah,” Staff Sergeant Feltes added. “Let’s take a few of the bastards with us, straight to Hell!”
The Ahannu were surging into the cavern again. Lieutenant Kerns jerked and fell, half his helmet ripped away. No matter. Any of them could provide the necessary relay.
For an instant the cavern grew extraordinarily bright, as though the rock ahead had dissolved to admit the bright white sunlight of a summer’s noon at home….
Lander Dragon One
In flight, Ishtar
0012 hours ST
The mountain seemed to heave higher, its slopes trembling, a gentle fog of dust rising from its flanks. Warhurst watched, in horror mingled with awe, as the mountain shuddered in an uncertain equilibrium between gravity and the titanic forces loosed within its depths.
Then, after a seeming eternity, gravity won and the mountain began to settle back upon and into itself, the crest slumping, the base of the mountain spreading out, a pall of gray-white smoke spewing from the peak.
He could see the shock wave racing out from the crumbling mountain’s base.
“All Dragons!” he called over the newly established net. “Up! Go up!” When that shock wave overtook them, it might slam the landers into the ground. They would be safer at higher altitudes. The view in his mind tilted sharply as the Dragon clawed at the sky.
The shock wave, racing at the speed of sound, thundered past, grabbing the lander and shaking it hard, as the strangely shaped and colored Ishtaran trees were uprooted below and tumbled along in a surging sea of devastation. The Dragon trembled and bucked, the bulkheads of the LM ringing with the concussion.