Recon Marines III: The Marine's Doctor (24 page)

They returned to the rear wall and
continued along it to the far end from where they’d entered. A
little square room filled the corner. The control room for flights?
It seemed too small. Mak went to it, gliding quickly across the
open area between the ship and the room. He pulled open the solid
metal door to reveal a set of steps.

“
They built everything but
the hangar underground,” Mak said quietly.

“
How many do you think are
down there?” Molly teetered on to the top step, ready to start
down.

Mak took her arm and pulled her back.
The door closed and hid the steps. “Doesn’t matter.” He started
back along the rear wall.

She dragged her feet. “Mak, they could
be destroying evidence right now.”

He took her hand and picked up the
pace. The door banged open behind them but Mak kept moving along
the back wall. The shadow of the cargo ship enveloped them. Mak
paused and wrapped his arms around Molly, pulling her in front of
him. As nice as it was to be held in his embrace she knew that he
did it to cover her with his camouflaged body. They stayed in place
for what felt like an hour but might have been only two
minutes.

Molly could hear the voices of men,
stern military men, behind them. They relayed orders to search the
plains and start moving the wreckage.

Mak took her hand and started off
again, heading toward the tangled mess of destroyed cruisers. He
stayed close to the rear wall but Molly saw men all along the open
area in front. All of the enemy dressed like soldiers and carried
all manner of armaments. A few tugged at pieces of metal and
dragged them away from the vicinity of the intact cargo
ship.

Near the corner opposite the one that
held the stairwell a particular large chuck of junk leaned against
the wall. Mak ducked under a jagged side of it and pulled Molly in
behind him. He urged her to climb past him to the corner. “Face the
wall and cover your head.”

Remembering the little disc he’d
jumped up and put on the bottom of the cargo ship, she obeyed. He
wrapped himself around her and a second later an explosion rocked
the ground beneath their feet. The sound smashed around the walls.
Tortured metal screeched and more booms joined the cacophony.
Instinct urged her to turn and watch but the sound of falling
debris kept her huddled tight to the wall. Silence followed, sudden
and complete.

Curses and shouts erupted. Mak did
too. He pulled her up and dragged her along the wall toward the
front. She didn’t dare look around as they leaped over more junk
and the furrows dug by the explosion. The corner and escape looked
so far away.

Mak stopped only once and pressed her
back against the wall. Molly saw men running toward the other end
though they moved with the caution borne of expecting an enemy
encounter. Before the last one was out of sight Mak led Molly into
a jog again. He let go of her hand and unslung his rifle as they
finally reached the corner.

Molly’s tension eased as soon as they
put the hangar opening out of sight but Mak didn’t stop running. He
angled out into the plains and set a pace that soon had Molly’s
legs burning.

“
Mak, I have to rest.” She
set her hands on her knees when he stopped. Her breath tore at her
throat as she sucked in huge gulps. When she lifted her gaze to him
she found him watching their back trail. She turned and noticed the
hangar still hunkered like an ugly beast not so very far away. A
smoking beast.

“
Can you walk?” Mak’s
breathing seemed completely normal.

“
I’m sorry.”

“
About what?” Mak still
watched the hangar, not a stare but an alert scanning of the
enemy.

“
I’m slowing you down.”
She started to walk, forcing her trembling muscles to obey her.
“You would be two miles from here if not for me.”

“
Probably four by
now.”

“
How far until we’re out
of their sensor range?” Molly picked up the pace as her legs
recovered a little. She couldn’t run yet but she no longer worried
she would collapse.

“
Depends on how much the
explosions damaged their external equipment and what kind they
have. They might have seen us leave and know our
direction.”

“
But we’re far enough
ahead of them, aren’t we? They don’t have ships now to search for
us.”

“
We don’t know what they
have below ground. They might have smaller hover craft stored
there.”

“
Damn.” Molly walked
faster. “Was this your plan before I ruined it?”

“
I wanted to disable any
ship they could escape on and trap them here until your father sent
reinforcements.”

“
So much for his big plan
to keep this all secret. What are we going to do now?”

“
We’re going to hide and
wait for the real army to arrive.”

Molly looked around the plains, not so
much a tree in sight. The land rolled gently but not enough to
define even a shallow draw let alone a valley. “Hide?
How?”

Mak slung his rifle back over his
shoulder and pulled a long knife from the back of his belt. He
knelt on the ground and drove the blade into the sod. With a sawing
motion he dug a long strip. Then he made perpendicular cuts to the
first one. With a few sharp jerks on handfuls of the thick grass
and more cuts with his knife, he rolled up a layer of sod. “They’ll
have to step on us to find us.”

“
How clever.” Molly helped
him pull the turf back further. “Let’s make this
bigger.”

“
It’s only for you. I’m
sorry it’s so dirty.”

“
What do you mean, it’s
only for me?”

“
I have my camouflage.
They won’t see me.”

Molly knew Mak’s gear was high tech
but could it hide him in the short grass? Mak helped her stretch
out on top of the dark, exposed dirt. “How long will we have to
hide?”

“
Three days. Five or six
at the most.”

Molly sat up and put her arm out when
Mak started to lift the heavy blanket of dirt and sod over her.
“Six days buried under the grass?”

Mak put his hand on her shoulder and
pressed her into a lying position. “You only need to hide until
they stop searching for us. There’s a water source less than two
miles from here.” He unhooked a water bag from a strap of his pack
and handed it to her. “You should hydrate now after all that
running.”

“
I’m the doctor.” But she
took the bag and enjoyed a long drink. When she tried to hand it
back he shook his head.

“
Keep it. I have another
one.” Mak pulled his backpack around to his front and dug into it.
He found a square of lightweight cloth. “To cover your face and
keep the dirt out.”

She wrapped it around her head a few
times, covering her hair and most of her face except her eyes and
nose. Surely she looked ridiculous but Mak didn’t smile or even
raise his eyebrow.

Mak pushed his pack under the sod near
her feet and then rolled the heavy natural carpet overtop of her. A
gap remained between the edge and the ground so she could easily
breathe and see a good slice of prairie. She expected Mak to lay
down beside her but she watched his boots walk a few steps back
toward the hangar.

Perhaps because of the layering of
dirt on top of her, Molly didn’t hear the whine of the hover craft
until she saw four of them flying low and right at their position.
She lifted the sod a wee bit more so she could see Mak.

He stood in their path, his rifle at
his shoulder. The supersonic round drowned out the sound of hovers
and her cry of alarm. One of the men tumbled from his ride. He
rolled over and over as the small craft plowed into the
ground.

Molly prepared herself to leap from
her hiding place and be ready to run. Why hadn’t Mak told her he
intended to make a stand?

Because he wasn’t making a stand. Her
Recon Marine sprinted away from her hiding spot. He moved at a
speed she thought physically impossible for a human. She knew he
could have probably shot the other hovers out of the air, but the
vessels would have location monitors installed and perhaps real
time cameras. The people back at the underground lair would see Mak
as he led them away from her. They wouldn’t even know she was there
in her perfect little hiding place.

Mak’s pack pressed against her legs.
He’d hidden her and left her with his supplies. He’d told her where
a water source was and that she had to hide for up to six days. All
the while planning to lead the enemy away from her position. If not
for her presence he could have escaped or hidden. And for the first
time in their acquaintance, her marine had lied to her.

Another shot whistled across the
plains and echoed off the hangar wall. Molly couldn’t see what was
happening, only sure that Mak would lead them as far from her as
possible.

She wept into the cloth he’d thought
to provide her for comfort. How many times had Mak reminded her
what he’d been created for? She’d never thought of his belief
coming to this. And she’d never told the man sacrificing himself
for her that she loved him. And now it was too late.

Chapter Fifteen

They shot him but only with small
rounds. Mak had taken out the first four hovers but half dozen more
followed after them. His armor prevented the shots from killing
him, but they knocked him off balance. He took down two more before
the other four swooped in close enough to use stunners on
him.

Mak’s rifle dropped from his hands as
he fell to his knees. The stunner’s shock rippled through his body,
numbing his fingers and leaving them unresponsive to his needs. He
fumbled at his second pistol with hands working like blocks of
wood. The enemy landed and ran toward him. Four massive men. Mak
struggled to his feet on wobbly legs. They tackled him and landed a
few blows to his head.

Someone tore open Mak’s armor at the
shoulder where it fastened. They pulled it down so nothing covered
that side of his body except the tightly fitted shirt he wore
beneath the protective layer. A heavy object pressed into Mak’s
ribs while the large bodies held him in place. As a Recon Marine
Mak he had expected to die in battle. Though he wouldn’t be taking
all the enemy with him when he died, he’d led them nearly two miles
from Molly’s hiding place. He hadn’t obeyed the general’s order
about staying away from his daughter, but he’d followed the other
more important command. Molly was safe.

“
Do it,” someone
ordered.

A jolt shot through Mak that took his
hearing, his sight and for a short while his breath. He sensed more
than felt his body being moved. His sluggish brain figured out he’d
been stunned again, not shot. They’d taken him alive. He must have
given away his returning consciousness. Another vicious jolt
stabbed through him and sent him into a dark oblivion.

When he next woke, Mak couldn’t move
his arms or legs. Cold metal pressed against his bare back. Thick
loops of something strapped his wrists and ankles to immobility.
Instruments buzzed and beeped around him in a brightly lit room.
Sticky-backed sensors dotted his body and head.

Flexing his muscles to test his
restraints reminded him of the bruises he’d received through his
body armor. The excellent suit stopped bullets but it couldn’t
totally prevent painful bruising. None of his ribs seemed broken
and his mind cleared with each breath. As his senses sharpened he
realized he wasn’t alone in the room. A room he suspected made up
part of the lab lurking beneath the plains of Mossy.

Mak turned his head to the left. The
room spun a bit before his vision settled. Two men and a woman,
dressed in the simple clothing Molly and her colleagues usually
wore, worked at the computers lining the wall. All had their backs
to him. He turned his head the other direction, almost no dizziness
this time, and looked through a wall of windows to a sprawling
training room. It looked similar though more modern, to the other
facilities they’d discovered on this damned mission.

“
Good, you’re
awake.”

The familiar voice confused Mak. How
could the doctor be here? Pender and Box had flown them away. Mak
didn’t know how long he’d been unconscious, but their ship should
have been miles and miles away. They should be sending help. If
they didn’t make it out Molly would be alone out in the plains with
only a few days of food.

Dr. Shear strode to the side of the
table Mak was strapped to. She tugged a blanket over his nakedness.
“No sense in making you uncomfortable. Of all the creations I’ve
worked with you’re the closest to human. There were times when I
wouldn’t have guessed what you are if I hadn’t already
known.”

“
How are you here?” Mak’s
mouth and throat felt dry.

The doctor smiled and adjusted one of
the sticky leads attached to his chest. “I slipped off the ship
while you gave orders to those incompetent boys on the bridge. I
held cover until you flew that lovely science vessel away. Then I
waited for the pickup I’ll called earlier. Arrived back here just
in time to make sure my squad captured you rather than kill
you.”

“
Why?”