Their Master's War (32 page)

"It looks good," Conchela said.

"We'll throw in with you. It may be the only chance that we ever get. I hope you can pull this off, because if you can't, we're all dead."

"We can try," Rance said.

"Well, you better make it fast. We were ordered to investigate a disturbance, but we had no details. Up on the surface they don't know what's happening. A couple of dauquoi called in a seven-twenty, but the lanteres didn't believe them. If we don't report pretty soon, the lanteres will be down to see for themselves."

"Can you stall them?"

"Not for long."

Women began to come out from all over the environment. They came with bags and bundles. Most had followed Rance's instructions, but some were hopelessly loaded down with possessions. Some were even brandishing homemade weapons. Their attitude was one of grim determination, although not without fear. More of the shore patrol came across and joined the breakout. There were even some men from the recstar's permanent complement. The crowd by the elevators grew until it threatened to become a real problem. There were close to three hundred women and further fifty men.

"Is this all of them?" Rance asked.

"All that want to come. The others are either too brainwashed or too frightened. They think we're all going to be killed."

Rance could almost sympathize with them. It was only now that he realized the enormous logistic problem that he'd set himself. Fortunately, Conchela had her own chain of command through the covens that helped to control the situation.

"We should start moving up." Rance looked for the squad leader, who seemed to have assumed the leadership of those members of the shore patrol who had come over to the mutineers' side. "How are we doing with the lanteres?"

"We're faking a communications screwup, but they're getting impatient."

"If they came down here, would they use these elevators."

"With their bulk, they'd be more likely to use the emergency chutes on the other side of the environment."

"Then we'll position a rear guard there."

"My women and a detachment of your men could hold them there for a while. They can only come out of the chutes two at a time. We could bottle them up there."

"What's the fastest way to the shuttle dock?"

"With human atmosphere all the way?"

Rance looked at the crowd of women. None of them had suits. "It'll have to be."

"Okay, you take these elevators to level
1.
That's directly under the surface. At the elevator head you take the corridor to the right for two sections. After that, you use the lat tunnel to bypass the lantere atmosphere. Most of level
1
is lantere."

"So we'd have to secure two sections of corridor and the passage."

"As well as the dock itself." "Damn."

"None of it is that well guarded. There's never been an attack from inside. One thing, though, we ought to get as many breathing masks as we can. It's possible for the lanteres to breach the tunnel. That soup they live in could kill the women as effectively as blaster fire."

"Are there masks?"

"Theoretically there should be a mask for every woman in the emergency dispensers. How good they are is another matter. They haven't been used in years."

Rance shouted to Conchela. "Have your people break out all the breathing masks they can find. We may need them."

He turned back to the squad leader.

"One more thing. I need a technician to rig the elevators so they can only be controlled from here." The squad leader beckoned to one of her women. "Hey, Jacka, get up here. Move it." With the elevators gimmicked, the great move to the surface began. The armored men went first. The others waited until the route to the shuttles was secured. As he rode up on the first elevator, Rance gave his last-minute instructions.

"While we're in here, were bottled up. If we can't break out immediately, we're dead. There may well be lanteres waiting for us at the top. I want a firing line right inside the door. Directly the doors open, start blasting and move out. The lanteres may be big, but they're slow. That's our main advantage." The men arranged themselves accordingly. The elevator seemed to be rising painfully slowly. It eased to a halt. The front line tensed. The doors started to roll back. The MEWs opened up. There were lanteres. Everyone pressed forward. Hark, who was positioned right behind Rance, found himself yet again caught up in the confusion and isolation of combat. No matter how many times he went through it, he never lost the jagged sense of fear and breathless excitement. He was in among the huge crustaceans, pumping his weapon at anything that presented itself. One of them loomed over him, bringing around a posicannon. He ripped the creature with a sustained blast. Its armor smoked as it toppled backward. The deck plates were becoming slick with colorless crustacean blood. There was a constant alien screaming in his communicator.

They were in the right-hand corridor, and for the moment, there was no more opposition. The half dozen lanteres that had been guarding the elevator head had been overcome with no human losses. More men were coming from the elevator cages. Rance moved them forward, leaving detachments at each crucial point along the way. Hark noticed that among the men from the
Anah 5
there were also shore patroL

and even civilian women wearing facemasks and carrying improvised weapons. Two were lugging one of the heavy posicannons that had been dropped by the dead lanteres.

Hark, along with Renchett and Dyrkin, was in the advance party. They reached the first corridor intersection without incident. There was the sound of firing from behind them. Something was happening back at the elevators. Dyrkin waved the party to a halt.

"If we get too far ahead, we'll be cut off." He spoke into his communicator. "Rance, can you hear me?"

"I hear you."

"What's happening back there?"

"More lanteres, but we're holding the bastards. I'm going to start bringing up the women."

"We're at the first intersection, but we need more men to hold it before we can go on."

"They're on their way."

At that moment, a number of human figures appeared in one of the side corridors. They wore the tabards of field police and carried MEWs.

"Hurry it up, Rance. We got company."

A headhunter voice was in their helmets on the general frequency. "Drop your weapons or we open fire!"

The men of the
Anah 5
didn't need an order. Their response was instant and deadly. The burned down the field police with something close to relish. The e-vac fields on. JD4, and the scars that went with them, were still fresh in their memories. Troopers were coining up from behind to reinforce the corridor. The two women with the posicannon were among them. They seemed to be determined to use the thing as makeshift artillery.

"Let's move up."

Again they made the intersection without incident, and once again they had to wait as more troops came up to hold the position. Now there was just the bypass tunnel in front of them. That, too, seemed at first to be unguarded. It was halfway along that all hell broke loose. The lights suddenly went out, and the bolts of red fire were flashing at them and ricocheting off the walls of the tunnel. There were screams and curses.

"Get your redscopes on!"

A heavyweight energy weapon had been set up at the far end of the tunnel behind an improvised barricade. Finally someone was ready for them. Leaving four dead, the advance party quickly retreated to a point where a curve in the tunnel would give them cover.

"What the hell do we do?"

"We can't rush that thing."

Rance was on the communicator. "I'm moving the women up into the corridor."

"You can't do that! We're pinned down in the tunnel by a heavyweight."

"Can you do anything about it?"

"Not a damn thing. We'd have to rush down a straight tunnel. We'd be cut down before we got halfway."

Rance sounded desperate. "I've got to start moving these people up into the corridors. We're being pressed too hard here at the elevators. We're stretched too thin."

"You got any ideas?"

"What's manning the EW?"

"Hold on... Renchett, take a look at what's firing that thing."

"Stick your own goddamn head out." "Don't screw around, man!" "Okay." Renchett craned forward. Fire burst above his head, and he jerked back. "Dauquoi."

"At least they won't be rushing us in a hurry. They squirm too slow."

"So what's the story, Rance?"

"Wait a minute, we might have something back here." More fire hit the wall. Molten rock spattered their armor.

"You better make it fast."

"I've got six shores here with their servo suits. They figure they could rush this gun nest. They might pull it off. They've got the speed and they've got the armor. They'll be coming at a power-assist run, so don't get in their way."

"We'll be here."

There was a lull in the firing. The dauquoi seemed willing to wait out the humans. After a couple of minutes, the men in the tunnel heard the first metallic crash of power-stepping coming down the tunnel behind them. The servos had their lights flashing and panning from side to side to confuse the dauquoi. They were coming fast, faster, in fact, than most of the men thought a servo suit was capable. Two extra shore patrol clung to the back of each one, firing under its huge arms. The troopers flattened against the wall as the machines thundered past.

"Get in behind them."

The servos' armor seemed to be withstanding all of the dauquoi fire. Then a cascade of sparks fountamed from the leg of the lead machine. It reeled like a drunken man as the operator lost control, staggered a few paces, then fell headlong. The others didn't hesitate, however. They kept on going. A second servo was hit. Smoke streamed from the upper half of its torso. It lurched off course and smashed into the tunnel wall. The remaining three steered around it. They were in among the dauquoi, pumping fire and even stomping down on them with crushing steel feet. Purple slime sprayed the tunnel wall and dripped from the ceiling as the wormlike aliens literally burst apart.

"Rance, we're into the shuttle dock. You can move everyone up." The troopers practically had to wade through the debris of the dauquoi. The purple slime seemed to be everywhere. Renchett looked genuinely amazed. He scooped up some of it with his fingertips and held it up to his visor. For one horrible moment, it looked as if he were going to taste the stuff.

"Never thought they looked like that on the inside."

"Shut the hell up, Renchett, you're making me sick."

"Somebody bring along that EW. We may need it."

They were in a brightly lit, transparent gallery that ran along the rear of the large shuttle dock, overlooking the individual reaction pads. There were five of the hemispherical craft parked in the dock, and umbilical walkways ran out to their pressure locks. Each one could lift 150 human passengers. There didn't seem to be any further guards of any species.

The surviving shore patrol dismounted from their servos. The advance party walked slowly down the gallery with the same dazed look that always followed combat. Both the men and the women were gazing up through the curved canopy that covered the gallery. The stars were visible where the dock was open to space; it was the first time most of the women had seen the stars since they had been taken from their own worlds. Then the
Anah 5
came around on its orbit and blotted out everything else. One of the shore patrol looked at Hark. "Is that your ship?"

"That's her."

"Then it looks like we really made it."

"When the pilots get up here."

Dyrkin broke the spell. "Some of you secure that far entrance. Take the EW. I don't want anything coming through there."

"We still have to knock out the main fire control. It's just above here." Renchett scowled at Hark. "And guess who'll do the knocking."

"We'll wait until Rance gets up here and see what he wants." Rance wasn't long in coming. There was the sound of firing and the sight of flashing in the dark of the tunnel. Women started to pour into the gallery. Dyrkin remained in control. He started to direct the women down the um-bilicals.

"Keep on going! Down into the ships. You'll be safer there." The troopers were now backing out of the tunnel, firing as they retreated. A large force of lanteres was pressing them hard.

"You men! Get back there and help them out! We've

got to keep those suckers back... Rance? Where are you?"

"Over here!"

Dyrkin spotted the topman backing out of the middle of the fighting. There were four men with him in blue flight suits and helmets.

"Are those the pilots?"

"That's them," Rance said. "I've been watching over them like a mother."

"Better get them down into the ships. It'll take time to get those shuttles powered up."

"They're on their way."

Firing started at the far end of the gallery. The EW opened up. A second force of lanteres was attacking from that direction. Rance looked quickly around. The situation could actually have been a lot worse. For the moment, the humans were holding both entrances. In the tunnel, the lanteres were pinned down in the same way that Dyrkin and his men had been just minutes earlier. At the other entrance, they had yet to mass in sufficient force to be able to overrun the EW. Rance, having taken stock of the situation, moved up next to Dyrkin.

"I think we got them stopped. We should start pulling back into the umbilicals."

"What about fire control?"

"Can you take some men and handle it?"'

"You're getting predictable."

Abruptly the firing ceased.

"Wha—"

The lanteres had stopped firing, and at the same time, men were also lowering their weapons. They were backing away from the mouth of the tunnel.

"What the hell is going on?"

A light appeared in the tunnel, white and brilliant, and murmuring among the humans. Hark was one of the last to feel it, and Renchett the first to realize what it was.

"A Therem. A goddamn Therem. Right here."

Hark's MEW was very heavy in his hands. He wanted to put it down. His legs felt weak, and a warm languor was spreading all through his body. He knew that he should be angry, that he should do something, but he couldn't force his mind to focus. He was staring through his visor at the weapon in his gloved hands. Even reality was wavering. What the hell was this thing that he was holding? He wanted to lie down and sleep. All around him, men and women stood and stared as if they were in a trance. Even the attacking aliens were rooted to the spot.