Steven Kent - The Clone Betrayal

The explosion was a classic example of Marine Corps overkill. The blast caved in the stairwell and the surrounding walls. The door I had just slammed closed came flying out of its jamb like a cork from a champagne bottle.

Doctorow and his men had enough weapons on the second level of the garage to launch a minor world war. Racks of M27s and particle beam cannons lined two of the walls. Crates of grenades stood in stacks that reached the ceiling. Preparing to fight the Avatari, the Unified Authority had sent three million men with enough munitions to wage a prolonged war. Now, only their surplus gear survived.

Hollingsworth’s men rigged charges around the tops of the pillars. Using my night-for-day lenses to look into the shadows, I spotted the wires, but the emergency lights were bright enough to keep my visor switched to tactical lenses. Without night-for-day vision illuminating the shadows, the charges were invisible.

The garage rang with the echoes of gunfire and explosions. One floor above me, war had gone full scale. Glare and shadows flashed on the wall along the ramp out. I picked up battle chatter on every frequency as I scanned the interLink.

I contacted Hollingsworth and told him to begin evacuating the garage. I contacted Thomer and told him to retreat.

Marines started backing down the ramp in a trickle. These were the men at the back of the battle, men who might not have fired a single shot. They ran down quickly, hid as best they could, and turned to cover the ramp. They hid behind pillars and corners. A few fools hid behind crates of grenades; the wooden sides of the crates would offer little protection against fléchettes.

I ran to the side of the ramp and pulled out my particle beam pistol. The little gun would probably have no more effect against shielded armor than an M27, but I had to try.

More of my men retreated down the ramp, now in a steady stream. Some men backpedaled, firing up at the enemy as they came. Some ran and dived for cover. From my hiding place, I watched as swarms of fléchettes turned men into mist. Men hit while running for cover fell and slid along the floor. Men hit while returning fire collapsed where they stood. A few toppled over the side of the ramp.

One man fell in front of me. He was gut-shot, but not dead. He landed on his back on the concrete, his hand over the lower part of his stomach. He squirmed, his movements getting slower and weaker. I wanted to save him, but I couldn’t. I wanted to kill him and put him out of his misery, but I could not bring myself to do that, either. A few moments passed and his squirming stopped. Blood trickled from holes in his armor.

My men continued their retreat. The ramp was wide and open, offering no chance of cover or concealment. When I peered over the edge, I saw more of my men falling than reaching the bottom. The screams and sounds of panic I heard over the interLink left me numb.

I opened up a channel to Thomer and yelled, “Get them moving, Thomer. Get them down to the third floor! Get them into the tunnels. They’re dying up here!”

The combat reflex was in such full flow in my veins, it was almost joyous. I watched men retreating past me. They no longer stopped to fight. Sprinting across the concrete, they hit the bottom of the ramp, rounded the corner, and continued deeper into the garage.

One man came limping past me. He had streams of blood pouring out of three holes in his leg, but he kept going. In another minute, poisons from the fléchettes would kill him, but the man kept going.

Time had become as transparent as glass to me now. Seconds had no meaning as I prepared to fight and kill.

More of my men backed down the ramp, firing particle beams up as they went. As they walked past me, three men hiding along the base of ramp opened launched grenades.

“Get them out of here!” I called to Thomer.

“Fall back,” Thomer gave the order even before I finished. The glow of shielded armor spilled over the ramp as Mooreland’s men started down. I waited, holding my particle beam pistol ready.

Fléchettes flitted through the air, scratching chips from the concrete walls and pillars, drilling through crates and racks of weapons, forcing men from positions they had already been ordered to abandon. The tiny metal darts drilled into walls. Some banked off the concrete, making the tinkling noise of breaking glass as they dropped on to the ground. Over my head, an exposed pipe burst and light bulbs shattered. More of my men fell as they retreated.

Wanting to see what a particle beam would do at close range, I shot out of my hiding place, stood along the side of the ramp, pressed my pistol right up against the knee of an advancing U.A. Marine, and fired. The sparkling green beam struck his shielded armor and disappeared. The man did not even flinch.

And then I felt pain, a sharp and brilliant jolt. My fingers flew open. My hand went numb and I dropped my pistol. There was a moment of dead silence in my head. Then, I felt the fire in my skin. When I drew back my hand, I saw holes in my armor. Blood trickled out over my forearm and palm. I had been shot twice.

First, I felt dizzy and then confused. The warmth of my combat reflex comforted me for a moment and then it faded.

The shielded Marines reached the bottom of the ramp. Having seen the rest of my Marines in retreat, they must have expected to find the level empty. In the moment it took them to spot me, I dived behind a stack of crates and tried to roll to safety. Fléchettes ripped through the air around me. Crates shattered in a storm of dust, darts, and splinters.

“Harris, where are you?” Thomer asked.

“I’m coming,” I said, the words slow as they rolled from my lips. “I’m on the second …”

The blood from my hand and arm did not stain my armor; it beaded and rolled across the slick, dark plating the way raindrops roll down a well-waxed car. My forearm burned, my hand was numb. My injured arm dragged as if it had fallen asleep. I tried to make a fist with my right hand as I used my left to crawl toward the next ramp down. I could not even make a fist, my fingers would not cooperate.

So many fléchettes hit the box beside me that the wood disintegrated and grenades rolled to the floor. I tried to pick one up with my right hand and could not close my fingers around it. I picked it up with my left and realized I would need my injured right hand to pull the pin.

“Are you hit?” Thomer asked.

“My arm,” I said. The slurred voice in my helmet did not sound familiar to me. It sounded as if it came from a drunk man.

Bringing myself up in a sitting position, I slumped across the ledge overlooking the ramp to the next floor down. There was a ten-foot drop. I managed to thread my right pointer finger through the loop of the grenade pin, and held my right arm steady as I pulled the grenade away with my left hand. As the pin broke free, I saw men in glowing, shielded armor coming around the corner. The bastards looked like angels in the darkness. My head filled with mist and cobwebs, I bowled the grenade in their direction.

The bastards fired back at me. Fléchettes hit the rail around me, glancing off the metal in a dance of sparks and chips. One dart struck me in the leg as I swung it under the rail and rolled over the ledge. The grenade exploded. I did not see what it did to the bastards. I dropped ten feet to the concrete below, landing on my back.

I felt pain. My thoughts were disjointed. The fall must have knocked the air out of my lungs. I had to fight to breathe. My chest felt crushed.

“You’re not the toughest man in the Marines, just the luckiest,” Ava had told me the last time that I saw her. I did not feel so lucky now. When I tried to get up, my body ignored me.