Earth Unaware (First Formic War) (44 page)

A door opened on the side of the Formic ship, and a large mechanism extended. Mono couldn’t begin to guess what it was for or how it operated. Vico would probably know. Vico could look at anything and know exactly how to fix it or what it was good for.

The mechanism rotated and pointed its many shafts at El Cavador. There was a flash of light, and then a wall of hot glowing globules of radiant plasma shot forth from the shafts, rocketing toward Mono like ten thousand balls of light.

*   *   *

Segundo tumbled through space, struggling desperately, fighting off the last two Formics clinging to his body. One of them crawled onto his back, opened its maw, and reared back its head, ready to bite and tear and puncture his suit. Segundo thumbed the propulsion trigger and hit the Formic with a blast of compressed air, startling it and knocking it away.

The last Formic was kicking at him, swatting, biting. Segundo spun it around, grabbed it below the jaw, and twisted its head until he heard things break inside. The Formic thrashed and kicked and then went still. Segundo released it and hit his thumb trigger, shooting away from it. His breathing was labored. He had little air. He was bleeding. There were holes in his suit. Several alarms were going off on his HUD. One showed a silhouette of his suit dotted with flashing lights, indicating where there was a rip or tear. The worst was on his leg where the Formic had bitten through. The emergency system had cinched his leg’s strap tight, sealing off the escape of air in the tear, but it wouldn’t hold for long. He fumbled for the emergency tape in his pouch. He pulled a strip free and placed it across a hissing puncture on his arm. He tapped the tape mechanism to release another strip. Then another. His gloved fingers were big and cumbersome and kept sticking to the corners of the tape strips before he could apply them. Twice he had to throw bent, twisted strips to the side, which was maddening since he knew he would need every strip. He covered as many holes as he could, but then the tape ran out. There were still a few torn seams, nothing big, tiny holes, but his HUD continued to sound its alarm.

Segundo blinked a command to shut off the alarm. The computer asked if he was sure since life-threatening damage to his suit was still unrepaired. He blinked the affirmative, and the alarm went silent.

His oxygen tank was nearly empty. He was desperate for air. He had a spare tank in his pouch with fifteen more minutes of oxygen, but he knew it probably wouldn’t last him five. He ditched the spent tank and screwed in the spare. Cool oxygen came into his helmet. He’d enjoy it while it lasted.

He turned back toward the direction of the ships and saw nothing but empty space. He knew he was still moving incredibly fast in that direction, but he would never see the ships again. The WU-HU ship would have passed him a long time ago, trailing behind the Formic ship, recording everything. They wouldn’t see him. He was a speck in a sea of black.

Rena.

She was safe at least. She would take this hard, but she was with others. They would comfort each other, strengthen each other. They would survive. He wanted her to know that she was the last thing on his mind, and that he hadn’t died in agony. Well, not total agony; the wound in his leg had settled to a burning numbness. Some of the others had suffered much worse. He focused on the spot in space where he assumed the WU-HU ship would be and told his HUD to give the remaining power to the radio transmitter to boost the signal.

“Rena. I don’t know if you’ll receive this, but my suit is punctured and leaking air. Even if the WU-HU ship decelerated now and you knew exactly where I was, you’d still never reach me in time. So don’t stop. Keep going. I don’t know if El Cavador got out, but I don’t think so. Tell Abbi that Mono was sorry for lying to her. Tell her he loves her. Tell her we couldn’t have done this without him. It’s the truth.

“The women will be looking for a leader, Rena, someone to help them navigate all this. Don’t be modest. We both know they’d appreciate you guiding them. Work with the captain. He strikes me as a good man. Don’t rush to Earth. I don’t know what will come of this, but I’d prefer you stay away from it and survive. Do that for me, mi amor. I’m sorry we won’t share a hammock when you read my letter, but know that I mean every word. Te amo, Rena. Para siempre jamás, te amo.”

The air in his helmet was getting thin, and he didn’t want her hearing him gasping for breath. He shut off the transmitter. He turned off his HUD. All was silent except for the weak rasp of the regulator, pumping in the last of the air. Segundo let his body go loose. He was cold and tired, but he ignored the cold. Around him stars shone. Some bright, some dim, the most constant things in life. Segundo smiled up at them, happy at least to be dying among friends.

CHAPTER 19

Interference

Rena listened to the transmission on the helm of the WU-HU ship. Static crackled throughout much of the message, and for several seconds Segundo’s words were lost entirely. Rena got the gist of it, though. She knew Segundo well enough to fill in the blanks.

Captain Doashang apologized that they didn’t get the complete transmission, explaining that the alien emissions interfered with the signal quality. He assured Rena, however, that the ship had decelerated as quickly as it could upon receiving the transmission, but that, sadly, they were unable to locate Segundo or any of the other men. “Thank you for trying,” said Rena. “I appreciate you being considerate enough to play the transmission for me. It means more than you know.”

“We took the liberty of making you a copy,” said Doashang, offering her a small memory disc. “We thought you would want it for your personal records.”

It was that act of kindness that pushed her over the edge. She broke down briefly and cried silent tears, covering her face with her hands. A female member of the crew consoled her with a gentle arm around her shoulders, and it was that touch that steeled Rena again. She stood erect and wiped at her eyes. “Forgive me,” she said to the captain.

“There is nothing to forgive, Mrs. Delgado. You have my most sincere condolences. I will provide grief counselors from my crew for you and those from your ship.”

“That is very kind. Thank you.”

“I have prepared a few statements for your people to explain the events of the battle. I think it necessary to give the families an account of the bravery demonstrated by their husbands and fathers.”

Doashang had politely asked the women and children to stay in their rooms for the duration of the attack so that he and his crew could perform their duties without interruption. Rena, pulled from her room moments ago, was the only person from El Cavador who knew it had been destroyed.

“Everyone is eager to hear news,” said Rena. “Thank you.”

Captain Doashang looked at her with compassion. “I want to be as sensitive as I can with the families, Mrs. Delgado. Now that I’ve met you and heard your husband’s transmission, I wonder if the report of the battle would be better delivered by you.”

“Me?”

“I will accompany you, if you agree. But you know these families best, and I wonder if such news is better delivered by a friend instead of a stranger.”

It took Rena a moment to find her voice. “With all due respect, Captain, I don’t know if I’m in the right emotional state to do that.”

He nodded, blushing. “Of course. It was inconsiderate of me to ask, particularly in your own time of grief. Forgive me.”

But before Rena excused herself, she reconsidered. If she could choose someone to tell her such devastating news, she would want it to be someone she loved, a friend, a fellow sufferer even, someone who could take her in her arms and weep with her.

“On second thought, Captain, I think you may be right. I will meet with the families individually. But first, I must hear the full account myself.”

He showed her everything. She watched the vids and listened to the transmissions. She seethed when Lem Jukes’s ship pulled away and fled. Her heart broke when El Cavador disintegrated before her eyes. Her home, the only world she knew, was gone.

Why hadn’t Concepción come with her? Rena had insisted that she join them on the WU-HU ship, arguing that by Concepción’s own orders, all women and children were to leave El Cavador. But Concepción had laughed this off. “Old, stubborn women are the exception,” she had said.

Now she was gone. They were all gone. Bahzím, Chepe, Pitoso, Mono: cousins, brothers, nephews, uncles. Half of everyone she knew and loved in the world. As well as the man she loved more than them all.

The vids ended. She knew everything she needed to know. Her back was straight. Her eyes were dry. “Come, Captain. You and I have work to do.”

*   *   *

Captain Doashang stayed at Rena’s side as she met with every woman from El Cavador. Doashang promised each of them protection and safe passage to the Asteroid Belt. The ship would have to ration its food supply—corporate hadn’t planned for this many passengers—but neither Doashang nor his crew would get an ounce more food than anyone else. The children would not go hungry. The women wept in sorrow and gratitude, and one even kissed his hand as she cried.

In the corridor afterward, he faced Rena. “My senior officers and I will vacate our quarters for those families who do not yet have a room.”

“That’s not necessary, Captain.”

“I have children of my own, Mrs. Delgado. We have quite a trip to the Asteroid Belt ahead of us. The more comfortable the children are, the more pleasant the flight will be for all of us.”

She nodded. “True. I’ll see to it. Thank you. Also, with your permission, I would like to organize a work detail. Those of us from El Cavador don’t want to be a burden. We would appreciate being allowed to help maintain the ship however we can.”

“Permission granted. Work out the particulars with one of my officers.” His wrist pad vibrated. “Now if you’ll excuse me.”

Doashang hurried to the helm. His first officer, Wenchin, was waiting for him at the monitors. “We found a Formic drifting in space,” said Wenchin. “It’s dead. Or at least we think so. It wasn’t wearing a suit. It must have fallen from the ship. I have a team outside checking it now.”

On the monitors, five spacewalkers in WU-HU suits surrounded the Formic. They had attached various instruments to its body, but the men were keeping their distance.

“It couldn’t have survived in a vacuum this long,” said Doashang. “Restrain its limbs and bag it. Use every precaution. Treat it as if it were the most lethal of biohazards. Have the men outside decontaminate their suits. Then get the Formic to Dr. Ji to examine. The more information we can send to Earth about these creatures the better.”

“Yes, sir.”

Captain Doashang moved to the communications officer. “Any luck contacting Lem Jukes?”

“No, sir. The Formic ship is putting off all kinds of interference. It’s causing a perturbation that randomizes the digital information. I’m getting transmissions, but at a much slower rate. A bit per second instead of a trillion bits per second. Which means what I am getting is basically nothing. It’s not enough information to decipher anything. We can’t send or receive long-range messages at all. Not as focused laserlines or as blanket spreads.”

“That’s unacceptable. I need to send a warning to the Asteroid Belt.”

“I don’t know what to tell you, sir. The only radio communication that works is short-range. And we’ve deviated from the main thoroughfare to follow the Formic ship, so no other ship is going to come even remotely close to this position. We could accelerate back to the major flight paths and wait until a ship comes close enough to hear our transmission. But that could be a long wait, sir. And there’s no way to determine if the interference is still affecting that quadrant. If it is, whomever we contact won’t be able to send long transmissions either. The most reliable way to get word to the Belt, sir, may be to go there ourselves.”

“That’s several months away.”

The officer looked helpless. “It’s not ideal, sir. But we’re short on options.”

“Is the Formic ship sending radio? How are
their
messages getting through?”

“Near as we can tell, the Formics are silent, sir. Even when we were close, I didn’t pick up so much as a squawk.”

Captain Doashang turned to Wenchin. “Set a course to the nearest station in the Asteroid Belt, moving as fast as our fuel supply will allow.”

“What about Lem Jukes?” asked Wenchin.

“He’s out of range, and I doubt he cares what happened to us anyway. He abandoned his own men. He won’t concern himself with us. He’s probably heading for the Belt as well.”

Wenchin relayed the order, and the ship quickly accelerated.

Doashang stayed on the helm until Dr. Ji called him to the medical offices several hours later. Ji appeared pale and shaken when Doashang arrived.

“Not the most pleasant postmortem examination you’ve performed, I’m guessing,” said Doashang.

“That’s putting it lightly,” said Ji.

The two stood at a large window outside a room where a team of technicians was examining and videoing the dissected Formic.

“What are they?” asked Doashang.

“They’re semivertebrate,” said Ji, “in that they have a single neural column, but clearly they evolved from exoskeletal hexiforms.”

“What does that mean?”

“They evolved from creatures very much like ants, but they left ant-hood far behind.”

“So they’re not insects?”

“
Descended
from insectlike creatures. Certain evolutionary changes have occurred. They’re warm blooded, for instance. They insulate and perspire to regulate body temperature in much the same way we do. They have an endoskeleton covered with muscles and skin and fur. Most of their organs are a mystery to me, although we’ve documented everything. They have six legs obviously. The middle pair has musculature that suggests they can bear weight, though perhaps not as much as hips or thighs. The joint socket is extraordinarily flexible, even more so than human shoulders. Plus they have highly developed back muscles, which suggests they have enormous strength.”

“We’ve already seen evidence of that. What I want to know is how do we kill them.”