“They’ll let you keep playing with the boat, I’m sure,” Dom said.
“Hey, I rebuilt their comms and towed array. They’d peel grapes for me if I wanted. If we had grapes.”
Gettner interrupted. “Serious moment, guys. Is he fit enough for me to hang around here? Because I can see something. Look at the water. Follow the line from the main stalk.”
Dom couldn’t see what she meant until the Raven gained altitude. A streak of shadow grew under the surface as the growth was continued underwater, heading southeast. While Dom watched, another stalk erupted from the sea a few hundred meters ahead of the last one.
“Wow, is that part of this one, or what?”
“If it isn’t,” Marcus said, “maybe they’re erupting all over the region.”
Barber marked it on the folded chart resting on his thigh. “Better put out a shipping warning.”
“Hey, Nat, we’ve got one ahead,” Gettner said. “Look.”
She turned the Raven so Barber could see from the crew bay. Dom watched his expression behind his goggles as he refolded the chart and looked at the next grid. His frown got deeper, he started licking his lips a lot, and then he sat back with his hands flat on the chart, staring into the mid-distance for a moment.
“If I draw the proverbial line through these points, you know what it intersects with?” he said at last.
Baird unstrapped his boot and nursed his injured ankle. “This isn’t going to be a fun quiz, is it?”
“No, it’s not,” Barber said. “The damn things are on course for the Emerald Spar field.”
Marcus pressed his earpiece. “Control? This is Fenix. We might need a hand at the imulsion rig.”
Dom had reached his crisis overload for the day. Whatever came down the pike next, however bad, however crazy—it wasn’t going to shift that needle beyond the end-stop.
The harder they fought, the worse things got.
IMULSION PLATFORM EMERALD SPAR, 350 KILOMETERS NORTHWEST OF VECTES.
Gettner touched down on the rig’s helipad, muttering to Barber about loads and return trips.
Baird could hear her. She was already planning for the worst—the evacuation of the platform. Judging by the welcoming committee that met the Raven, though, the rig crew weren’t planning on going without a serious fight. They were, as Bernie would have said, seriously tooled up.
“Is that hardware for the stalks, or us?” Baird asked.
Marcus shrugged. “It’s their home. How far would you go to defend yours?”
“Mine was demolished by grubs. Like yours.”
“Yeah. So it was.”
Gradin and six of his crew waited at the edge of the pad, armed with an array of weapons that Baird had to admire. It included a grenade launcher, a flamethrower, a harpoon gun, and a Locust Hammerburst.
Grubs. Baird almost felt nostalgic about them. Nice big targets, predictable things that he knew how to fight. Things that relied on dry land, just like he did. After fifteen years, he had the measure of them. Now he was dealing with glowing monster eels, ship-killing giant stalks, and dog-sized exploding polyps, all of which sounded like interesting novelty acts until he started adding up the casualty list.
His ankle was giving him hell. He was parked somewhere between angry lashing-out aggression and the shaky aftermath of being too scared to think straight. When he jumped out of the Raven after Dom, he realized—again—that his armor was still on board Clement.
Gradin shook Marcus’s hand. “So is it our excellent cuisine or witty conversation that brings these stalks to our door?”
“We’re still working that out. You can evacuate. Gettner can take you off the rig.”
“And leave you to defend the platform?” Gradin took a step forward and did a theatrical count of heads. “I make that four, unless your Raven flies itself. We stay. Everyone here can use a weapon, including our wives.”
Marcus didn’t even try to argue with him. “Fair enough. We’ve got extra squads inbound, but until the cavalry shows—better get started.”
“So tell us how to fight these things.”
Baird was the world expert on stalks and polyps by default. Everyone looked at him expectantly.
“It’s an emerging field of research,” he said. “As in—we met the assholes for the first time a couple of hours ago. They blow up when you hit them. Or when they hit you.”
Gradin sighted up on an imaginary target somewhere past Baird, then lowered his rifle. “Good. That is all I need to know.”
“About knee-high. Six legs.”
“Walking mines.”
“Running mines. Lots of running mines, and they use the stalks like siege ladders.”
Gradin shrugged. “We keep them clear of the vapor venting system, then. Or else we all end up orbiting with your Hammer satellites.” He looked out to sea. “So this is all Lambent.”
“Probably. They were the ones the grubs were fighting a war with.” Baird had a feeling that he’d overplayed his expert card. “We can’t keep up with the different shapes they come in, so here’s the rule—if it looks weird or glows, blow the shit out of it. We can worry about accidentally plugging endangered bioluminescent species later.”
Gradin gave him a look that could have been amusement. “We take your advice.”
Gettner and Barber stayed with the Raven while the others climbed down to the drill deck. The platform was a lot of real estate to cover with just fifty people; Baird suspected that wasn’t even enough personnel to run the drilling operation safely. In the canteen, a team of surprisingly cheerful men and women were laying out ammunition and medical supplies in what looked like a well-practiced drill. They seemed to have a plan for sieges.
“You’ve played this game before,” Dom said.
Gradin shrugged. “We’re a fat target marooned in the middle of nowhere. Yes, we’re ready. Stranded, exploding monsters, marauding COG—we repel all boarders. That was a joke, by the way. We joke.”
“Yeah, I knew you didn’t mean it about the Stranded.”
“Where is your big thrashball star?” Gradin asked.
“Probably still throwing up all over a submarine,” Baird said. He’d kept trying to raise Cole on the radio, but Clement was obviously still below mast depth. “You’ll have to make do with us puny guys.”
“You want someone to take a look at that leg?”
“Not until it falls off.” Baird paused. He could go through the motions, he supposed. Diplomacy. Yeah. How hard can it be? “Thanks.”
The ankle injury worried Baird. He kept unfastening his boot to take a look, and it wasn’t so much the pain as not knowing a damn thing about those polyps. He was checking to see if it was glowing. He felt stupid for even thinking it, but after the weird shit he’d seen in the Locust tunnels—the luminous mucus on the floor that he’d stopped Dom from handling, and the grubs that looked a bit shiny, too—he was half-expecting to morph into some grotesque mountain of exploding meat like that Brumak did.
Shit.
“You want some pain control?” Marcus said.
Baird had to come clean. Marcus had seen all the Lambent variations too. “Just checking I’m not glowing in the dark.”
“You’re the one who was always bitching about having no flashlights.”
“Just saying.”
“Don’t worry. I’ll shoot you if you light up.”
Marcus could say shit like that and not sound remotely callous or glib. Baird couldn’t. He knew it. He fastened his boots again and then began worrying about what to use for body armor instead.
Gradin stepped up onto a bench at the front of the canteen and let out one of those piercing forefinger-and-thumb whistles that Baird couldn’t do. That got everyone’s attention.
“People, Eugen is filling the standby tanker to capacity so we can ship out as much fuel as possible. A precaution.” Gradin pointed to the northwest quadrant of the platform. “The landfall—if it happens—is likely to be on the helipad side, but these
stalks can shoot up anywhere. So two lookouts per flank, and one depth-charge launcher. Keep the polyps from exploding near flammable vapor.”
“Do we begin shutting down the whole platform or not?” asked one of the men.
“No time. Drilling is suspended. That is all we can do.”
One of the women was loading spare ammo clips with rounds and didn’t look up. “Are these things quick?”
“Yeah,” Baird said. “They are.”
“Can they swim?”
“No, but they don’t drown fast, either.”
The name tab on the woman’s overalls said DERSAU A. “So. I treat them same way as cockroaches. Flamethrower, maybe. Works really good.”
“At a distance, yes …”
Marcus looked up as if this had rung a bell with him. “What’s the lowest flashpoint imulsion you’ve got here?”
“Flashpoint, or fire point?” Gradin asked.
“You read my mind.”
“We prerefine some grades that will burn. Two-edged sword, of course.”
“Do it to them before they do it us.”
“This is how Gorasnaya waged war in the Silver Era.” Gradin looked amused. “Stand on the castle battlements and rain fire on the unwary. We enjoy this.”
“It’ll be a party,” said Baird.
They really need me here. I can rig stuff fast. This is what I was born for.
The platform had plenty of spare pipe sections and conduit. It took Baird, Eugen, and the drill crew half an hour to divert the outflow from one of the storage tanks to a network of hoses around the platform. Wherever those stalks came up—if they came up—their little polyp buddies would get sprayed with flammable fuel and torched.
It might not get here, of course.
Who was he kidding? He’d seen enough of the Locust to know that if shit was feasible, then it was a dead-cert fucking guarantee to end up in his lap. The glowies wouldn’t be any different.
He looked up at the crane arm that jutted from the side of the platform. The remains of the Stranded pirate still hung there, a keep-clear warning in any language, but it wouldn’t make one damn bit of difference to those dumb stalks.
Now it was a matter of waiting. Baird wasn’t good at that. He walked around the topside gantries, checking for missed angles and vulnerable pipe runs. The platform would go up like a bomb if too much vapor escaped into a closed space and ignited. He was standing on the helipad trying to devise ways to use the flare-off as a giant flamethrower when Dom wandered up to him, Lancer clutched across his chest.
“Just as well we’re quick learners,” Dom said.
“Humans. Great at inventing things to fry each other. Shit at being harmless.”
“Always good to hear an outsider’s view on us.” Dom seemed to be waiting for a retort. “Don’t worry, I bet Cole’s fine.”
Baird still didn’t take the bait. He didn’t feel he had to now. He watched Gettner jump down from her Raven, walk around checking its skin, and then sit behind the door gun facing out to sea. He wondered if she’d ever been a deck chief and missed letting rip with that gun. Everyone needed a weapon in their hands. Gettner struck him as the kind who missed hers.
Marcus joined the staring-out-to-sea committee. “Listen,” he said.
The chatter of Raven rotors drifted in and out of Baird’s hearing on the wind. That definitely boosted everyone’s spirits, although the Gorasni had seemed up for a good fight anyway. A cheer went around the platform.
“Now they earn their fuel!” someone yelled.
“Yeah, it must look that way to them,” Marcus said.
Dom glanced at him. “You going soft on Indies?”
“They’re not Indies now.” Marcus turned to face the direction of the sound. “And none of them ever shot at you or me.”
Three Ravens appeared as black blurs on the horizon to the southwest, instantly reassuring. Ravens were air support, replenishment, and a ticket home. It was going to be a tight fit on that landing pad. As the first bird came into land, everyone took refuge from the downdraft and rotors by withdrawing to the deck below. Baird waited for the engines to cut, but the Gorasni guys went straight back up top. He could hear their loud cheers.
“Must be the mail drop,” Dom said.
But when Baird climbed up to take a look, he could see what had prompted the cheering. Miran Trescu had stepped out of one Raven followed by a squad of Gears. With body armor and a custom assault rifle, he looked like a seriously hard bastard.
“No Prescott, then?” Baird said. “Surprise.”
The Gorasni rig men were slapping Trescu’s shoulder and pumping his hand. He’d made their day. This guy wasn’t a desk jockey. He looked like he loved his job.
“See,” Eugen said to Baird, grinning from ear to ear, “this is why we follow Trescu anywhere. No figurehead. No manager. A leader.”
Baird looked anxiously for squad mates. Sam was swapping ammo with Jace. Even Drew Rossi had shown up, and that told Baird something; this wasn’t just a case of throwing the best guys at the job in hand. It was a training acquaint for the future. Hoffman had sent the guys who would lead squads the next time the stalks appeared after this.
Baird couldn’t see Bernie. But he did hear a loud, bellowing laugh.
Cole stepped out of a Raven with a navy kitbag over his shoulder, walked up to Baird, and dropped the bag at his feet with a clatter of metal.
“Baby, I turn my back for one minute and you’re gone,” he said. “Put your damn plates on. You look like a civilian.”
“Yes, Mom.” Baird could rely completely on Cole, maybe the first and only person in his life who was always there for him with no questions asked or conditions set. He opened the bag and took out his armor. Clement probably hadn’t even reached port yet, which meant Cole had been airlifted off the casing. “Bernie sent you to nag my ass off, did she?”
“She says she always knew you were human, deep down.”
“I just didn’t want to lose our last sub on my watch, okay?”
Cole wasn’t letting up. “Well, the sub thanks you, and so do the crew that was shittin’ themselves when that dose of crabs showed up.”
Yeah, I did something that Marcus would do. Does that make me a different person? I don’t even know why the fuck I did it. I don’t like losing. I knew Cole was relying on me. Does it make me an asshole because I wasn’t thinking of the other guys first?
“Yeah, whatever. Where’s Bernie, then?”
Cole shook his head. “Hoffman grounded her. Says she’s gotta take desk duties until she tests fit again.”
“I bet that went down well.”
“It’s gonna take him more than flowers to smooth over Boomer Lady, that’s for sure.”
There were eighteen extra Gears on the rig now, plus Trescu. Yeah, Bernie wasn’t essential, and she wasn’t a lucky charm. Everything she touched lately detonated under her. Baird still felt bad for her. He didn’t like being left behind when he could do something useful, so he could imagine how she felt about it.
“She can take her killer puppy for nice long walks,” he said. “Savage a few Stranded. It’ll do her good.”
Two of the Ravens took off again to monitor the progress of the stalks. There was nothing to do but stand here and wait for the things to hit or miss the rig. Baird switched his radio to the pilots’ channel and listened.
It was half an hour before he heard the words he’d been expecting.
“Shit … that’s fast. Four-Seven-One, you see that?”
“Confirmed. I’d say that’s multiple stalks, not one with branches.”
“Everyone’s an expert,” Baird muttered.
Marcus shook his head slowly. He must have been listening in on the comms net too, but then he always did. Trescu walked up to him, looked him in the eye in total silence, and nodded once. Then the Gorasni leader strode into the center of the helipad and proved he’d once been a drill sergeant.
“Emerald Spar!” Trescu roared. “Stand by to
repel invaders! This rig is Gorasnayan soil!”
CHAPTER 10
Individually reliable, collectively disciplined.
(CHAIRMAN RICHARD PRESCOTT, DESCRIBING THE COG’S VISION OF THE IDEAL ARMY)
IMULSION PLATFORM EMERALD SPAR, 350 KILOMETERS NORTHWEST OF VECTES.
“You think these things put out runners, like plants?” Kevan Mitchell stayed on the radio, giving a running sitrep from the Raven as it kept an eye on the stalks’ progress. “It sticks up a branch every so often like it’s checking its bearings. No polyps. Maybe it’s looking for somewhere dry to off-load them.”
Dom could follow the progress by sight. The helicopter moved in odd lurches, hovering for a moment and then darting forward. Its searchlight played on the water below. Even in the afternoon sun, Dom could see it.
The Raven was coming at the imulsion platform head-on. The Lambent stalk—or stalks, however the thing propagated—was making straight for the rig.
“I’m going to give it another rattle with the gun the next time it pokes its nose above water,” Mitchell said. “But that’s made sweet fuck-all difference to it so far.”
Sorotki cut in, probably aware that everyone was listening to the radio chatter. “Heads up, people—Clement and Zephyr are both back on task. Falconer is steaming in our direction, ETA four hours. Centennial is about thirty minutes behind her.”
Four hours sounded as good as never to Dom, but he put it out of his mind. All the Gears were at their action stations, lined up on the stalk-facing side of the rig on both main decks. Between them, some of the platform crew stood at the safety rails with an assortment of heavy weapons. The woman with the flamethrower—her name was Aurelie like her grandmother, she told Dom—had a good clear space to herself. Nobody fancied being panfried if things got out of hand.
But they were all sitting on a powder keg anyway. And the incoming trouble was an enemy that self-detonated. If there was a worse place to fight these things, Dom couldn’t think of one.
“This is going to be like a mycelium,” Baird said.