Forging Zero (50 page)

That
very same question was running through the back of Joe’s mind, nagging at him. 
“Nebil said you capture the flag, you win.  That’s it.”

“What
if a whole side has to be dead before they’ll let us go?” Libby said.

“Then
we’ll get some sleep,” Joe said.  “I’m tired of walking in circles.”

Scott
and Carl looked away and he felt instantly bad.

“Hey,
guys, it’s not your fault,” he told them.  “It was dark and you couldn’t see.”

“He can
see now and he still doesn’t know where he is,” Scott muttered.

“Everybody
relax,” Joe insisted.  “Take a break, catch a nap, whatever you want to do.  We’ll
just wait for the hunt to end.”  He sat down against a tunnel wall and brought
out his PPU again in desperation.  He stared at the screen, trying to make
sense of the blocky Congressional squiggles.  He could read some of the
numbers, but numbers by themselves meant nothing to him.

“You
already tried that,” Sasha sneered.  “Didn’t work last time either, remember?”

Joe
scowled at Sasha and stuffed his PPU back into his vest and went back to
waiting.

But the
hunt didn’t end.  Eventually, Joe had to admit that they weren’t coming. 
“Okay, everybody.  Let’s get moving.  Carl, just make your best guess.  We can
have as much light as you want this time.  Just get us back to the surface.” 
Before
I lose my mind down here.
  He’d managed to control himself so far, avoiding
a serious attack, but he knew if he was down here much longer, he was going to
come totally unglued in front of an entire platoon of kids.

Libby
started moving around the camp, kicking everyone awake like Nebil liked to do. 
Joe nudged Maggie with a toe to spare her the rougher treatment, and she
started, blinking up at him like an owl.  “Hunt’s over, Joe?”

“We’re
still trying to figure out where we are,” he admitted.  “Listen up!  Everyone
keep a good eye out for X’s or any other markings that look out of place.  I
want as much light as possible, so uncover your cartridges.  Maggie, take the safety
off your rifle.  Let’s move!  Everybody follow Carl.”

“Like
that’s gonna help,” Sasha sneered.  “He’s been walking us in circles.”

“Go,
Carl,” Joe said, glaring at her.  “You’re doing great.”

Reluctantly,
Carl obeyed.  Four intersections later, they were staring down at a
well-defined arrow in the entrance to one of the tunnels, pointing down it.

“Does
an arrow mean In or Out?” Libby wondered aloud.

“Let’s
say it means Out,” Joe suggested.  “Come on, everybody.  If it’s the wrong way,
we can always turn around and go back.”

They
followed the tunnel until they abruptly came to a dead-end with a tight,
one-person passage leading into the darkness.  Joe got on his knees and shone
the light of a spare cartridge into the hole.  It was so small he’d have to
crawl on his hands and knees to get through it…and a fetid breeze hit his face
the moment he got close to it.  Immediately, he stepped back, his heart rate
climbing.

“Looks
like Out meant the other way,” he said.  “Let’s turn around.”

“Wait a
minute,” Libby said, squatting near the entrance.  “Can’t you smell that?”

“Smell
what? I don’t smell anything,” Joe lied.  He swallowed, hard.  His hands were
shaking all over again.

“The
air,”
Libby said, frowning at him.  “I can smell ferlii.  This is a way
out
,
Joe.”

“It’s
too narrow,” Joe blurted.  “We gotta backtrack.  He immediately turned to go.

Libby
grabbed his wrist as he turned.  Her eyes were hard as she looked up at him. 
She was only a few inches shorter than him, now, and she hadn’t stopped growing
yet.  “Joe.”  The word was as much a command as anything.  “This is the way
out,” she said, low enough that only he could hear.  “Do you want to get out of
here or do you want to stay trapped?”

Joe
swallowed convulsively and the word ‘trapped.’  “It’s
tiny
Lib.  We
don’t know if anybody can even
fit
through there.”

“I
can!” Maggie cried, stepping forward.  Joe winced.  He’d already made Maggie
run across the battlefield.  He couldn’t bear to see her pinned in a tunnel in
his place, suffocating, unable to wiggle free.  “Not you.  You’ve gotta carry
the flag.  You’ll go last.  Scott?”

Scott
wrinkled his nose and peered into the hole.  “I can see claw marks in there. 
Do I have to?”

“I’ll
go!” Maggie cried again.  “Here, Libby.  You take the flag.”  She shoved it enthusiastically
into her groundmate’s hands.

Libby
took the flag from Maggie and stuffed it under her belt.  “Come back whenever
you figure out what’s on the other side.”

Excitedly,
Maggie crawled into the dark burrow.  Ten minutes later, she was back, dirty
and excited.

“I
found it!  The tunnel comes out on the inside of one of those broken
buildings.  There’s a couple narrow spots, but I think even you can get
through, Joe.”

“You
think
,
Mag?” he asked, more harshly than he wanted.

“Well,
yeah,” Maggie said, “it was easy for me, but you’re a little bigger than me, so
you might have to crawl a little.”

He sure
as hell wasn’t about to stake his life on a five-year-old’s estimate.  Just how
good
was
Maggie at determining proportions?  He remembered stuff being a
lot bigger as a kid.  What if she was wrong?

Then he
realized everyone was staring at him, waiting for some sort of signal. 

Joe
cleared his throat nervously.  He had to do it.  He couldn’t just stand here. 
He couldn’t let them down.

Still,
he couldn’t bring himself to lead them into the tunnel.  He’d rather sit there
and starve to death.  Joe bit his lip and glanced at the tunnel entrance.  He
could feel Libby watching him, gauging his reaction.  Reluctantly, he said, “Maybe
you guys should go first.”

“Maybe
you
should go first, Joe,” Libby said, watching him way too carefully.

Joe
could feel his entire body trembling.  Libby was right, as much as he hated her
for it.  He couldn’t wait for the others to go.  If he did, and was last, he
knew he would never find the willpower to crawl into the tunnel by himself.  “Guess
maybe I should, huh?”  A nervous laugh built in his throat and he choked it
back down.
  You’re acting like a baby.  Not even Sam acted like this when
the aliens caught him, you big pussy.

Feeling
his groundmates’ eyes fixed on him, Joe reluctantly pulled off his pack and
dropped it into the entrance.  He hesitated, taking a deep breath.  He caught
Maggie giving him a strange look and he forced a smile.  “Never been a fan of
tight spaces,” he said.  “Keep getting this idea I’m gonna die.” 
Say it,
you coward.  You’re afraid you’re gonna bleed to death.  In a tunnel.  Where
the sharpest things are little bits of stone.  You fire-loving furg.

“We’ll
be right behind you,” Libby assured him.  Her face had softened a little, and
she almost looked like she sympathized with him now.  Joe quickly looked away. 
Someone else’s sympathy would give him the excuse he needed to back down.

“Don’t
follow me too close,” Joe said, eyes fixed on the dark maw of the tunnel.  “If
I get stuck, I’ll have to back out.”

“Ten
minutes enough?” Libby asked.

Joe
swallowed, hard.  Ten minutes.  Alone.  In a body-fitting tunnel.  “Yeah.  I
can do that.”  He got down and started crawling, pushing his gun and his pack
through the tunnel in front of him.  Almost immediately, feeling that cold,
lifeless stone swallowing him, he felt as if the world had suddenly shrunk to a
pinpoint above and behind the back of his head.  His breathing grew more rapid
and sweat sprang out on his brow, worsening the already hot conditions of the
tunnel, making it almost impossible to breathe.  He had a sudden urge to stand
up and run, but crammed into the narrow passage as he was, he could barely even
crawl.  Up ahead, he even saw a place where he would have to get down on his
belly.

Suddenly,
an overpowering image of blood on the floor of the tunnel made him jerk away,
slamming his back against a rough spot in the roof above him.  The pain only
panicked him further, making him
convinced
something had punctured his
skin.  All the way down here, they had no way of getting him to a medic.  He lost
it, then, and thrashed, his legs churning up the tunnel floor, the ceiling
raining down more sandy blackness from where he was trying desperately to stand
up.

I’m
gonna die.  That’s blood and I’m gonna die.
 
He backed up until the back of his shirt caught on the tunnel
ceiling and held him in place. In a panic, Joe lunged forward and wedged
himself into a tight spot, and between the shirt and the narrow passage, he was
suddenly unable to move.  He choked back a scream, his lungs sucking in ragged,
panting breaths of stale tunnel air.

After
several minutes of futile, mindless struggling, a voice of sanity broke through
the terror. 
Calm down!  That’s not blood.  That’s just a darker layer of
dirt.  Maggie must’ve brushed it off the ceiling when she crawled through here
earlier.  Stop freaking out!

Joe
blinked repeatedly, trying to cement in his mind that the stain on the floor
wasn’t blood.  It was difficult.  He actually had to reach out and press his
hand into it, brushing his fingers through the dry sandy layer in order to
dispel the image of red wetness.  He gave a desperate laugh and lowered his
head to the dirt, his entire body shaking.

Just
sand.  It’s just sand, Joe.  Get a grip, man.  Come on and get moving.  They’re
gonna be behind you any minute now.

That
was the wrong thing to think.  Joe started breathing harder, thinking about how
he was going to get stuck in here, trapped by a line of kids behind him.  He
swallowed several times, staring at the two-foot-tall space up ahead.  Cavers
wouldn’t have any problem at all getting through that.  He’d seen documentaries
where they crawled miles through spaces much smaller than the one in front of
him.

And
they never freak out like a burning pussy, either.

Joe
closed his eyes and pushed one shaking limb forward.  Once that was in place,
he forced his leg to follow it.  Soon afterwards, he was on his belly, staring
at a narrower spot in the passage ahead.  His every joint and muscle was
tingling and felt like gelatin and his fingers wouldn’t stop shaking.

He took
several deep, ragged breaths, then lifted his head to once more eye the path
ahead of him.  What if it got too tight?  What if he couldn’t squeeze through? 
What if he got
stuck
?  Somehow, Joe found the will to push himself
forward on shaking limbs.  When he reached the tight spot in the tunnel, he
reluctantly lowered himself to his belly.

You
can do this.  Maggie did it
twice. 
How’s that
feel, furg?  You’ve got less balls than a five-year-old girl.  That’s something
to write home about.  Hey, Dad, I’m a soldier that pissed himself in front of
ninety little kids.  What an accomplishment, huh?  Just close your eyes and get
it over with, you damn pussy.

Taking
a deep, unhappy breath, Joe forced his shaky body to move forward.  His back
brushed the ceiling and Joe gasped, trembling all over.

Closing
his eyes, he pushed his rifle deeper into the tunnel and pulled himself forward
again.  He did it again and again, his eyes squeezed shut, forcing himself to
just keep inching along.  Ten minutes later, he stumbled out of the black
honeycombed tower and fell to his hands and knees, gasping.  The ferlii-tainted
air had never smelled so good to him, and he couldn’t get enough of it, sucking
in deeper and deeper lungfuls into his chest.  Panting, he lowered his forehead
to the ground and tried to force himself to stop hyperventilating.

One by
one, the members of his platoon piled out of the honeycomb behind him.  Distantly,
he knew they were giving him odd looks, but he couldn’t bring himself to get
up, so relieved was he to be in open air again. 

“Joe?”
Maggie said, coming up to him.  She squatted and touched his shoulder where it
touched the ground.  “Are you okay?”

“Yeah,”
Joe lied into the dirt.  His whole body, however, betrayed him.  He was shaking
all over, his limbs weak and lifeless.  He knew his actions baffled the other
kids, but he didn’t care.  He was so glad to be out of the tunnel that nothing
mattered to him anymore.  A Dhasha prince could have walked up to him in that
moment and Joe wouldn’t have noticed.

After taking
a long moment to steady himself, Joe reluctantly sat up to survey their
surroundings.  All of his platoon had made it safely out of the tunnel and were
clustered around him expectantly.  They were on the far side of the clearing,
almost touching the enormous, twisted rootstalks of first row of cream-colored
ferlii.  Towards the middle of the clearing, he could see a group of Lagrah’s white-clad
defenders sitting along the edges of a pit, talking.  They had their backs to
them, but Joe urged his platoon back behind the rocks, out of sight, should Second
Battalion happen to glance their way.