Resistance (5 page)

The rock slide had stalled by then, and while the wreck hadn't slid all the way down the hill, it was at least four hundred feet closer. Nash could have taken offense to the way in which Hale had given him orders but knew the other officer was correct. “Thank you, Lieutenant,” Nash replied. “I'll get right to work.”

Hale briefed Unver, and sent both men scrambling uphill, then turned his attention to Kawecki and Alvarez. They placed some of their men in strategic positions just below the wreck, where Chimeran projectiles couldn't reach them.

“Kawecki … take First Squad, and half of Second uphill, past the wreck, and prepare a primary position plus two fallbacks. I don't expect you to kill every Chimera on the butte. Just slow the freaks down. Once you fall
back to the third position, the one immediately above the wreck, be sure to pull Nash out.” Kawecki nodded, his features set.

“As for you,” Hale said as he turned to Alvarez, “I want you to take four of your men down to secure the back door and guard the LZ. Be ready to provide covering fire for Kawecki and his people as they pull out. Questions?”

“How ′bout some command-detonated mines, sir?” Kawecki asked. “We could place them upslope from position one.”

“Good idea,” Hale said approvingly. “That'll give the Hybrids something to think about as they come down. Don't blow more than one at a time though … We don't want another landslide.

“Anything else?

“No? Then let's do this thing.”

The shuttle was roughly the size of two city buses sitting side by side, and had come to rest nose down—or was it tail down? The badly battered hull was shimmery black, boasting knifelike wing extensions and protrusions that were unlike any aircraft Private Mike Unver had ever seen before.

More important, given the nature of the assignment, the gull-wing-style main hatch was open and apparently unguarded. But Unver knew that the wreck had been home to half a dozen Chimera not an hour earlier, so he entered first, his Bullseye assault rifle at the ready.
Take care of Captain Nash
. Those were the orders Lieutenant Hale had given the Sentinel, and Unver was determined to do his best.

The main power was clearly off, but judging from some glow panels and dozens of indicator lights, some sort of backup system had kicked in. So it was dark and
gloomy, but not pitch black, as Unver turned to his right and climbed a steeply sloping deck.

The tiny control compartment was about a third of the way back from the badly crushed bow. It consisted of a control panel and two chairs—both of which were occupied by dead Hybrids. Or that's how it appeared anyway. But Unver knew better than to make assumptions, so he shot each pilot in the back of the head, just to make sure. A mixture of blood and brains splattered the instrument panel.

“Unver?” Nash inquired over the radio. “Are you okay?” He was still crouched outside.

“I'm fine, sir,” Unver replied. “Just tidying up, that's all. Let me check the stern. Then you can board.”

Two minutes later, having carried out a quick check of the small cargo area in the ship's stern, Unver returned to the main hatch.

“Everything's okay,” he said confidently, and he gestured to the captain. “Come on in.” The Chimera had recovered from the initial shock of having the ship slide out from under them by that time, and they were streaming down the butte. Fareyes cracked as Kawecki's group engaged them, and the aliens fired back.

But such was Nash's eagerness to enter the shuttle and see what lay within that he forgot his fear. He pushed the tool bag onto a scimitar-shaped section of wing, placed his foot on a support strut, and hoisted himself up. Unver was there to grab the tools and give him a hand. From there it was only a few steps to the open hatch.

The first step, according to protocol, was to carry out a quick inspection of the so-called setting before zeroing in on specific items or groups of items. That procedure was intended to make sure field investigators didn't become so enamored of a particular object that they
missed something that might be of even more importance.

In order to carry out the initial survey, Nash had to call upon carefully memorized images of the Chimeran tech that had already been captured, evaluated, and in some cases reverse-engineered. He saw several things he recognized, but the whole point of a SAR mission was to find
new
tech. As Nash made his way forward he saw very little to get excited about, and disappointment began to seep in.

The blood-drenched scene in the control compartment made his stomach lurch, and he might have thrown up had he been able to get anything down earlier that morning. But Nash forced himself to stand behind the pilots and scan the instrument panel to make sure it matched the photos he'd seen. Everything appeared to be normal. So he left the Chimeran cockpit and kept his eyes peeled as he made his way back to the stern.

When he arrived in the small cargo area aft of the main hatch, he spotted a case that was secured to ring bolts set into the deck. Not recognizing the design of the case, he was curious as to what might be inside. Leaning his carbine against the bulkhead, Nash knelt next to the box, undid a series of latches, and lifted the lid.

Light splashed the officer's face. His eyes went round, and his heart began to beat faster. It was the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen.

The Chimera had taken casualties,
heavy
casualties, but they'd still managed to push what remained of First Squad into position two. And Hale was worried. Not just because of the snarling Hybrids—who fought as if possessed—but due to the fact that something even more dangerous was prowling the battlefield. Something
so stealthy that two of his Sentinels had been decapitated without anyone seeing what had killed them.

Sergeant Kawecki had made the gruesome discoveries. But rather than broadcast the news to the entire team, he'd made it his business to tell Hale face-to-face, mikes off. Based on the evidence, it appeared as though a Chameleon was stalking the Sentinels.

And that was bad news indeed. Hale glanced around involuntarily.

Chameleons were ugly brutes with heads set low between their massive shoulders, and long claw-tipped arms. That was bad enough, but what made the creatures worse were the high-tech field generators they wore on their backs. Machines capable of rendering the Chameleons invisible. This capability was dangerous in and of itself, and it had a profound psychological impact as well. Because soldiers who worried about what might be standing immediately behind them had a tendency to fire at shadows.

So as Kawecki went about keeping the level of outgoing fire up, Hale readied the Rossmore and followed a set of large footprints that led away from the blood-splattered boulder where Laraby had been decapitated. Even though the Chameleon could make itself invisible, it still had mass, and couldn't hide its tracks.

The trail led downhill, past the point where Laraby's head had come to rest, toward the shuttle. It would have been nice to have a couple of Sentinels with him, but they were needed on the hillside, which left Hale to track the Chameleon alone.

He felt something heavy land in the bottom of his stomach as he rounded the shuttle's badly crushed bow, and spotted the body that lay on top of a blood-splattered wing. Bullets
pinged
off the ship's hull as he climbed up onto the flat surface and knelt next to Unver. Judging
from appearances, the private had been standing with his back to the hatch, sucking the aerosolized serum commonly referred to as I-Gas through his mouth piece, when the Chameleon ripped his abdomen open. At least a yard of purplish intestine had spilled out through the wicked gash, yet judging from the vapor that issued from his nostrils, the Sentinel was still alive.

Hale switched his radio from the team freq to the command channel.

“Alvarez! I'm on the shuttle. Unver is down by the main hatch. Send two men to bring him out, and alert the medic. Tell them to keep their eyes peeled … We have a Chameleon on the loose.”

Nash was on his knees with his back to the main hatch when he heard what sounded like a scraping footstep. “Unver? Come here … There's something I want to show you.”

After a couple of seconds without a response, Nash swiveled toward the hatch, wondering if he had imagined the footfall. The sounds of fighting were coming closer—so close that the Chimeran projectiles sounded like hail as they rattled against the hull. He had been distracted up until then, fascinated by the object in the box, and oblivious to the situation around him.

Now the hairs on the back of his neck rose and a bad smell invaded his nostrils.

There
had
been a footstep, he was certain of it. So where was Unver?

He realized that his earpiece had come loose, and he hurried to fumble it back into place. That was when he heard Hale.

“Captain Nash? Can you hear me? If so, listen carefully … I have reason to believe that a Chameleon is on board the ship. Put your back to something solid, keep
your weapon ready, and slide along the bulkhead toward the hatch. I'll be there to cover you. Please confirm.”

Nash attempted to reply, but produced a croak instead. So he swallowed, cleared his throat, and managed a “Roger, that.” Then he came to his feet.

By that time he was aware of a shallow rasping noise that seemed to originate from a few feet away, though it was impossible to pinpoint the exact source. Was it the sound of breathing? Or just his own fear-fed imagination?

The carbine was right where he had left it, leaning against a bulkhead, but would the Chameleon allow him to touch it? Or would it take his head off the moment he moved?

There was only one way to find out.

Nash turned as if to orient himself to the hatch, and found the assault weapon with his right hand. Slowly, working by touch, he flicked the safety to the off position, as his eyes scanned the cargo area. Then, having pressed his back to the bulkhead, he brought the rifle up and pointed it toward the spot where he thought the Chameleon might be.

There was a scritching noise, and being too afraid to do anything else, Nash opened fire. One of his bullets must have hit the Chameleon's field generator, for where there had been nothing, suddenly a hideous creature appeared, and it was only four feet away. Its right arm was poised to slash at him when one of Nash's bullets passed through the Chimera's open mouth and blew the back of its skull out.

The Chimera staggered as more bullets hit it, but stubbornly refused to fall, and even managed to lurch forward. That was when Hale arrived and opened fire. Two blasts from the shotgun were sufficient to blow a
hole in the Chimera's barrel chest and bring the monster down.

Nash was out of ammo by that time, but still pulling the trigger, as Hale slowly pushed the carbine down. “Good work, sir … You nailed the bastard.”

Nash stared in astonishment at the body on the floor.

“I did?”

“Yes, you sure as hell did,” Hale confirmed. “And that's saying something, because Chameleons are damned hard to kill. Now let's get out of here.”

“Not without this!” Nash said triumphantly, and turned to retrieve the box. “I think we stumbled across something extremely valuable. We can't be sure, of course, not until experts examine it, but I'm pretty sure it's what we've been looking for. That's why the Chimera fought so hard to protect the wreck.”

“Good,” Hale responded, but the tone of his voice indicated that his mind was elsewhere. “Follow me.”

Thirty seconds later Hale was through the hatch, and immediately he hit the ground, bullets whipping around him, as Nash made his way out onto the blood-slicked wing. There was no sign of Unver.

Nash had both arms wrapped around the metal box and there was still a look of triumph on his face when the energy bolt hit him between the eyes. His head jerked back, and the box tumbled free as he fell backward, landing with a meaty
thump
as his body struck metal. The cube bounced off the wing, and Hale rushed to catch it.

He wanted to climb up to get Nash's dog tags, but there wasn't enough time.

“Come on!” Kawecki yelled, “the
Boop
is two minutes out!”

Hale, with the cube clutched in his arms, turned to
make sure that the rest of the team had begun to withdraw.

The Chimera were streaming down the hill at that point, intent on overrunning them. But at the last moment one of the Sentinels—Private Budry, Hale thought—stepped out from his cover. He was a big man, and very muscular, which was a good thing because it took a lot of strength to hold the Wraith minigun and fire it.

Budry's lips were pulled back into a snarl, and his white teeth made a stark contrast to his dark skin, as the machine gun growled and sent 1,200 slugs per minute racing upslope.

The hail of lead caught half a dozen Hybrids in mid-stride, cut them down, and sent the survivors scuttling for cover as Hale took advantage of the momentary lull and threw an air-fuel grenade into the shuttle. There was a loud
whump
as the bomb detonated, and a gout of flame shot out through the hatch.

Budry was out of ammo by then, but it would take the Chimera a few minutes to regroup as the Sentinels withdrew to the LZ.

Ten minutes later all the surviving soldiers, Unver included, were aboard the VTOL as it lifted off and Hybrids streamed into the LZ. Machine guns rattled and empty casings arced through the air as the door gunners swept the area below with a hail of bullets.

Finally, as the
Betty Boop
leveled out, the men had time to suck I-Gas out of their packs, and wonder why they were still alive while others were dead.

Meanwhile, Hale stared at the box positioned between his boots, and thought about Nash.

“So what's in it?” Kawecki inquired, as he toed the box.

Hale didn't have an answer. So he opened the latches,
flipped the lid back, and was surprised to watch the sides fall away.

There, sitting on the deck, was a roughly twelve-by-twelve-inch cube made of a translucent material. Deep within the gelatinous mass thousands of sparkling lights could be seen. They looked like stars in a miniature galaxy and were beautiful to behold.