Stephen Berry - The Battle for Terra Two

"Sardon's being forced back, Erich. Most of our choppers are down. It'sDer Tag, my friend. Let's roll."

Grim faced, zur Linde ran for his own tank as Aldridge headed for the lead M80, scrambling spryly up its side and down into the turret. Thick, toxic smoke was pouring through the ceiling vents into the motorpool.

Over a hundred armored vehicles coughed to life as the great blast doors atop the ramp swung open. Burning debris showered the column as it gunned up and out, thundering over the dead mines.

Behind them, the roof and upper stories crashed down in slow, booming majesty, a story at a time. The prisoners heard the fiery avalanche coming an eternal moment before it struck. Some screamed, some prayed, some wet themselves-all died. The column snaked down the hill and into the morning.

Heather looked up from the microviewer. "They're mad. Stark, raving mad." She shook her head, still not believing.

"Know anything about quantum mechanics?"

"Black holes, alternate universes, stuff like that?" She nodded.

John shook his head. "Just a dumb spook."

"Yeah, with a Ph. D. in history. Listen, Professor Spook, there's no law of physics mandating the singularity of time or space. And there's some evidence, for those who care to see it, of an infinite series of alternate universes, some alien beyond our comprehension, others possibly different from our own only by my not having said 'possibly.' And if these alternate realities exist, they can be reached, given the right technology."

John nodded. "Based on this," he tapped the viewer, "you think Maximus is a gateway from an alternate reality?"

"Maybe. It's not a natural manifestation. It just appeared, two years ago. A research facility was promptly constructed around it. And judging from the file reports, the crew up there still have no idea what it is-this despite early use of human subjects to probe the phenomenon.

"I mean, really, look at these reports. Much initial excitement, everyone wanting a crack at it, then nothing."

"More. The reports are almost the same after the first year. Verbatim."

Checking, she saw he was right. Maximus's staff kept sending the same negative reports, with only superficial changes in text. "Something's very wrong up there," she said. "It's almost as though the phenomenon's manipulating the experiment."

Their eyes met. "Then the Viperswill support my mission, Dr. MacKenzie?"

"Yes, Major Harrison. Once the situation in the city becomes clear."

The UC battalion's route of march took it through the heart of Lord's turf. Bull watched from a tenement roof as the column wound through Roxbury's broken streets.

Midmorning usually found kids playing in the rusting junk cars, women trudging to and from water and food points. Not today. The delapidated three-decker houses were hushed, the streets empty. Nothing moved, no dogs barked. Even the rats were still, hiding from the rising throb of powerful engines, the crunch of broken glass under clanking treads.

"Shee-it. Only fifty tanks, rest APCs," said Bull's lieutenant, called Chop for his karate-calloused hands. "We can wipe those mothers." Hundreds of gangers paralleled the convoy, well-ordered platoons skillfully leapfrogging through alleys and over rubble.

Bull shook his head. A big man, rippling with muscle, he'd come to Roxbury from Chicago's South Side three years before. His finely honed street smarts and instinctive grasp of infantry tactics had soon put him at the head of the Lords. Over the top of his flak vest, gold chains glinted against rich ebony skin.

"They got trouble." He nodded at the column, nearing their camouflaged bunker. "Hit 'em," his voice rumbled, "then two, maybe three days, gonna be a sweep-wipe a few more miles an' couple thousand niggers to make an ex-sam-ple.

"Pass 'em," he ordered.

Zur Linde radioed to Aldridge, "Ground sensors show hostiles all around us, Colonel. About five hundred, armed with TOWs and automatic weapons."

"If they haven't opened up yet, Erich, they probably won't," said Aldridge. "But we can't take that chance. All strategy's predicated on enemy capability, not perceived intent. Kill them."

"Acknowledged."

Zur Linde switched to the command channel. "Manatee Leader to Manatee Pack. Execute Golf Alpha Sierra."

"What they doin'?" asked Chop, suspiciously eyeing the tanks as they slowed, turrets swinging, cannon cranking too high to hit the gangers.

Bull grabbed the radio. "The tanks! Hit 'em!"

The first shells burst overhead with a dullwhump, vomiting greasy, grayish-yellow clouds that drifted gently down.

Rocket volleys answered from all sides, some hitting just so, where turret met body. Twelve of the M80s went up, volatile chemical munitions flaming blue, melting metal and turning men to ash. There was no second volley.

Shrouded in the oily, yellow pall, the column rolled slowly through Roxbury, firing methodically, cloaking itself in the slimy mist.

Seeping into cellars, attics, rough-hewn bunkers, the gas brought ethereal calm to young and old, male and female, animal and human. There'd be no rat problem for a while.

Bull carried Chop well away from the death zone, blood from the smaller man's orifices trickling unnoticed down his flak jacket and clothes. "Hey, man," he said, gently lowering his friend to the floor of the old elementary school, now an impromptu mortuary-hospital. Chop tried to speak, but managed only a rasping, wet gurgle. Shouting for a medic, Bull stood, speaking into the radio. "This Bull. What's it like?"

It was bad. At least three hundred gangers dead, no one yet knew how many civilians. "Old folks, kids, dogs," reported a woman dully. "We're goin' in as it clears, doin' what we can.

"You gonna let 'em get 'way with this, Bull?" she demanded, tone suddenly vibrant with hate.

"No way," he said softly. "Put out a call on the Viper channel. Get me Heather Mac."

Moving at the same careful pace, the convoy reached a deserted Copley Square at twilight, halting before the Ital-ianate masterpiece that was the Boston Public Library. The cobblestone square should have been aflow with the early evening theater crowd, the cafes crowded.

Not tonight. The rattle of machine-gun fire had sent many of the urban pioneers scurrying north over the expressway, until mortars atop Bunker Hill had mangled the evacuation, sealing the technos into their enclaves. Now they huddled in their town homes and condos, as much afraid of UC's shoot-to-kill curfew as of the approaching rage.

Aldridge mounted the worn granite steps of the library, turning to face the troopers forming up between the fountain and stairs. Homo fascis, he thought, watching the black-uniformed, starhelmed troopers dressdown, each indistinguishable from the next save by position. You were wrong, Plato. The best guardians of the State aren't like obedient watchdogs; they're automatons, as much a machine as the needs of the psyche allow.

"At ease." His dry voice cracked over them like a whip. "You've done well," he said, a wireless microphone carrying his voice into every helmet. "But it's not over yet. With the red line breached and the Army hours away, it's going to be a long night. You'll be assigned to this and the Harbor subgarrison, maintaining zonal integrity. I know you'll acquit yourselves as honorably as you did today. Good luck."

Returning Grady's salute, he and zur Linde entered the library, heading down into the basement command post. The distant gunfire faded as the elevator's blastdoors closed.

"Hardly Pompey's battle oration, was it, Erich?" the colonel said as the elevator sank.

"Adequate, sir, if not enduring," said the German. The doors opened. Stepping into the CP, his became a gray uniform in a sea of black. Colors shifted, swirled and reformed on the big situation board as reports came. Alarms competed for attention.