Ripping off two final shots, Darcy ducked for cover and snapped the rifle into two sections, slamming them into their backpack compartments. In a sudden burst she vaulted the railing and dropped to a lower catwalk. "Inboun--"

Through the ComLink, Ridgeway could hear the erratic percussion of metal on metal that played sharply over the wet gush of air driven from human lungs. A sudden hail of sparks appeared across the sniper's form as she was knocked off her feet.

Ridgeway tracked left; a fire team of at least eight Rimmers ma.s.sed at the near end of her catwalk, pouring fire on Darcy's position. The sniper rolled frantically, scrabbling for cover as Ridgeway's CAR fired a five-round burst into the lead Rimmer. One squad automatic dropped out of the fight, but seven remaining weapons chattered ceaselessly.

Staggering to his feet, Monster took the wholesale approach. The beefy Marine swung the Gatling straight up, vectoring in on the Rimmer team some fifteen meters overhead. The multi-barreled gun howled.

The first two hundred rounds tore the Rimmer stack to h.e.l.l. But the Gatling continued, attacking the catwalk itself. Eroding metal burned with the electric fire of covalence gone awry and the hanging sidewalk parted with a metallic shriek. With the growing crash of chain-reaction failure, the length of catwalk succ.u.mbed to gravity amidst the whip-like crack of snapping guy wires. The end of the walk pitched down to form a long ramp with Darcy at the top.

Her flailing body skated down the sudden slope. A trail of sparks framed her descent as armor sc.r.a.ped along grated metal. With tremendous speed she plowed into twisted wreckage at the bottom.

Ridgeway struggled to maintain cover fire as Monster grabbed the sniper with his left hand and hefted her from the wreckage like a rag doll. Shielding her with his own body, Monster staggered straight for the gaping hole. He hit the edge without slowing and dove over the rim amid a flurry of red streaks.

A rapid series of powerful thuds echoed from the far side of the cavern. Ridgeway didn't need to see the bright 0:00:00 flashing on the chrono to know the source.

St.i.tch screamed "Fire in the hole" and dove into the crater.

Ridgeway jumped. Somewhere in the distance, a huge gong reverberated. The sound was beyond all proportion to the noise of battle. Some eight hundred meters away, the south wall of the Cathedral bulged, shattering into a billion pieces.

Dan Ridgeway had a brief impression of sunrise shining through the cracks before the crater's darkness engulfed him.

CHAPTER 7.

Muted ba.s.s ebbed and flowed in the darkness, the absence of treble oddly soothing. Only a persistent buzz disrupted the womblike environment, a gnawing, synthetic drone that refused to go away. Dan Ridgeway forced one eye open as his mind groped to find the source of the noise and kill it.

Explosion, big one. Fragmented impressions strobed in a fitful rush; freight train roar, yellow-orange brilliance, countless impacts fused into a single formless brutality. Then freedom, slow rotation, the sound of rushing air. A pane of blue iridescence hurtling closer, closer.

The Marine lay quiet as the memories congealed in his brain. His tongue slid across parched lips, the familiar taste of stale blood in his mouth. He was relieved to find teeth.

Ridgeway fumbled to form a mental link with the armor. The effort was like pawing through a wall of cotton to find a light switch. Somewhere in the back of his mind a synaptic contact meshed. His sight returned in a snowstorm of digital imaging, the harsh brilliance a.s.sailing neurons that had grown accustomed to darkness. He fought a wave of nausea as the envelope of augmented reality spooled up. With a bright flash, the digital static was replaced by an undulating blue glow.

"Dammit," Ridgeway cursed as he scanned the soft-focus haze. If visual was offline he would be in a world of s.h.i.t. He pushed his perspective through several of the sensors that dotted the Carbonite sh.e.l.l. Nothing changed, even the TAC elements were dead. No targeting brackets, no maps; just the digital clock ticking silently in the lower center of his vision.

1224 hours. s.h.i.t, been out for a while.

Nearly twelve hours had elapsed since a carefully-placed string of Detonex charges had transformed the Vostok reactor into a nuclear bomb.

Power cells gotta be sucking fumes by now, Ridgeway thought with a start. If they hit zero, the armor would shut down and life support would fail altogether. Point one of concern.

Reluctant to see the answer, he queried the damage-control system. To his surprise, the DCS was operational and painted a vivid picture.

Dents and gouges covered the armor's exterior. Although several plates had stressed to the point of cracking, Ridgeway could see no catastrophic failures.

"Gotta live with it," he grumbled as he dismissed any thought of mnemonic reconstruction. Invoking the armor's slow regeneration capacity would burn through his remaining power in short order. He tabled the option, having neither the juice nor the time to dedicate to the effort.

The medical diagnosis proved a greater concern. Despite the armor's dense gelpack lining, the Marine had lost over a pint of blood from blunt-trauma injury. His major muscle groups suffered from deep-tissue bruises and torn fibers. A stress fracture ran across his left collarbone, adding to a list that included cracked ribs, strained tendons, and one h.e.l.l of a concussion.

Ridgeway grunted through clenched teeth, "Today's menu, pain."

The DCS had already dumped a jolt of neuro-inhibitors into his bloodstream, enough to dull the debilitating edge and allow him to carry on until he could get formal medical attention. Infrared-a.s.sisted healing could help but that, along with repairs to the armor, would have to wait.

Ridgeway took a deep, slow breath. Given the holocaust he had just come through, things could have been a h.e.l.luva lot worse. He hoped the rest of the team had fared as well as he ordered the TAC to run a perimeter scan.

The world remained an azure field, but familiar icons appeared one by one against the haze. With no reference map, the TAC simply generated concentric rings around Ridgeway's position, graduated in meters. Heading vectors radiated from the center point to each glowing symbol. Not as good as sight, but distance and heading were enough to get from one point to the next.

Sweeping the display, Ridgeway counted off the pulsing icons.

Merlin was twenty meters off, moving at a crawl. His icon flickered in and out like an old neon sign. Taz looked to be some twelve meters beyond, moving toward Ridgeway. St.i.tch and Darcy were off to the right, both motionless. The sniper's icon alternated between red and black. He could see no sign of Monster.

Gritting his teeth, Ridgeway forced himself to sit up. Pinwheels of light flared across his vision, driving another punishing wave of nausea. Ridgeway's equilibrium rolled like a ship in high seas.

He braced himself and breathed slowly, willing the pain to pa.s.s. The DCS cycled a second dose of painkillers but Ridgeway cancelled the action. "Gotta keep my head straight," he muttered, "gotta stay clear." Swallowing back the taste of vomit in his throat, the words held little conviction.

Elbows planted on armored thighs, Ridgeway allowed his vision to clear. As the optical fireworks coalesced, he realized with a start that it was the environment, not his imaging system, that was awry. A hazy sapphire fluid swirled around him with a ghostly slowness, thick with sparkling particles.

A pool?

Thoughts of Hex flashed to Ridgeway's mind, but he discarded them just as quickly. Hex was sludge-brown, the color of burned motor oil. This stuff was like liquefied blue crystal. Thick and viscous, it radiated a gentle luminescence. He was d.a.m.n sure it wasn't Hex.

His teeth grinding, Ridgeway stood, surprised when his head and upper torso broke through the surface of the lake. He wobbled, forced to rely on the armor's stabilization to keep him upright.

As he weaved in the unearthly glow that rose from the surface of the pool, Ridgeway gazed at a natural cavern of immense size. The radiant lake stretched on for at least a couple hundred meters in all directions. A dense white fog spread across its surface like a blanket of gauzy cotton.

Wicked spikes of black rock jutted up through the haze, many extending into the darkness above the glow. Each dark spire was coated with ice. Ridgeway struggled to focus on the bladelike tip of the nearest stalagmite. The conical spike reached lethally towards a sky it had never seen.

That would have left a mark, Ridgeway thought dully, imagining what would have happened is he'd fallen onto the spike instead of the pool.

Even with light-amplification, Ridgeway could find no hard measure of the cavern's actual size. The TAC estimated it at two to three times larger than Cathedral, but even that was a guess. They'd need a h.e.l.l of a lot of light to see into the distant corners.

Ridgeway gave a brief thought to the powerful searchlights mounted in his shoulderplates, but forestalled that action. The TAC could a.s.semble a decent composite based on pa.s.sive sensors, enough for the moment at least. A spotlight would not only burn precious power, it could draw unwanted attention.

Lights point in both directions, one of Grissom's many axioms. Far better to quietly find out who might be in the neighborhood before appearing at one end of a sixteen million candlepower beam.

Turning in a slow circle, Ridgeway came to face a mangled metal frame lying dead in the mist. It took him a long moment to recognize the remnants of the truck.

The vehicle looked to have fallen a.s.s-end first, its crumpled nose pointed skyward. The cab gaped open and Hex-eaten metal framed a gaping wound where the pa.s.senger seat would have been. Aft, the heavy chemical tank was a tangle of steel. Parts of the upper sh.e.l.l were recognizable, but even these were bent and corroded. The blue light of the pool rippled silently across the decimated vehicle, casting eerie shadows through the gutted carca.s.s.

Ridgeway turned from the truck and waded through the thick fluid toward the cl.u.s.ter of blips on the TAC. He could see Taz climb unsteadily onto a flat island of rock. The Aussie knelt stiffly and scanned the perimeter with his CAR shouldered. By the looks of him, Taz had come away reasonably intact. Most of the obvious armor damage was concentrated along his right side, from hip to shoulder. The young Marine picked his way over the rock to a crumpled form obscured in the fog. It took Ridgeway a long moment to recognize the shape.

Monster lay face down on the stone island. Ridgeway sloshed to his side, concern pushing back the pain wrought by every step. He reached the flat stretch of rock just as Taz rolled Monster onto his back. The sergeant flopped over and Ridgeway's concern doubled.

A huge, charred dent had cratered the left side of Monster's breastplate, cracks radiating out from the center like an erratic spider web. He tried to count the number of scorched starbursts that pocked the carbonite plating but was forced to give up by the sheer volume of damage.

Ridgeway fumbled for the release mechanism that would open the armor sh.e.l.l. Absent from the TAC, Ridgeway was left with nothing but a physical inspection to determine the big man's injuries.

A grave-deep groan resonated from the prostrate form, broken into syllables but beyond comprehension. Ridgeway ignored the sound and his right glove settled against a set of contacts that ran along Monster's ribcage.

The sound repeated as a clubbing forearm slammed into Ridgeway's chest. He toppled back and plopped squarely on his b.u.t.t. The sergeant rolled to his side and growled angrily as he pushed himself into a seated position, "I said, I'm all right!"

Even Taz took a full step back at the bear-like sound, but Ridgeway moved forward once more. The visible evidence impeached any statements Monster could make as to his condition. Before he could reach the battered figure, Monster's head snapped up, his hand raised once more though this time with a barring palm extended. With an agonized groan, he wobbled to his feet.

Stubborn sonofab.i.t.c.h, Ridgeway grumbled. The world might fall apart but it wouldn't see Monster ask for help along the way.

He keyed Monster's private channel, unsure if the sergeant's comm was working any more than his TAC Link. "Sometimes this superman s.h.i.t gets a little old," Ridgeway muttered.

Before Monster could respond, the medic's voice cut across the open comm channel. "Major, we've got a problem."

Ridgeway turned toward St.i.tch, who hauled the fallen sniper onto the island that had by default become their logical LZ.

"What is it?"

St.i.tch reeled off the situation report, none of it good. "It's the Lieutenant sir. She's bad. Real bad. She took a ton of point-blank fire, punched one lung at least. Lots of internal bleeding, maybe some bile leakage. Between slugs and spalled carbonite she's got a s.h.i.tload of frag floating inside her. I've gotta crack the suit to get a better handle on it but I can't risk the environmentals."

"Atmosphere?" Ridgeway asked as he helped set Darcy onto the island. Environment remained the first consideration in any off-world engagement. Deep underground, things only got worse; toxic gases could abound, while good stuff like oxygen could be in very short supply.

"Negative on that," St.i.tch muttered, his voice ragged, "air down here is better than it is topside, and that ain't right. I dunno, maybe they've got some kind of terraforming op running down here. Might mean a way out."

Ridgeway waved dismissively. "File it for follow-up. What's our immediate problem?"

"Hex decon."

Looking down at his own armor, Ridgeway recognized the unexpectedly enduring hazard in the Trojan Horse tactic. His mind scanned back across the operation.

The chemical plant, separate from the underground facility, had been identified as a weak spot in the Rimmer's security, likely because n.o.body in their right mind would ever choose to play near gallons of Hex. Seizing control of a poorly guarded factory on the edge of town had been an easy matter for the advance teams. With the factory secured, sealing the RAT squad inside a replacement Hex tank, was a simple matter of mechanics. Ridgeway had to give it to Grissom; who would look for intruders in a bottle of acid?

Therein lay the rub; the plan also called for the Marines to be on the surface by now, where a dropship rigged for decontamination would be waiting. Carbonite was impervious to hydrogen hexafluoride, but the people inside were not. Contact with even a lingering smear of the material could still prove catastrophic.

"We caught a break with the lake," St.i.tch noted as he jerked a thumb toward the expanse of luminous fog. "It's not water, but it's at least ph-neutral. If anything, it oughta dilute the corrosive."

Ridgeway pointed at the blackened pits in Darcy's armor. "What about those?"

"I think we're OK here," St.i.tch tapped Darcy's armor with a grey finger. "Given the amount of energy it takes to chew a hole in carbonite, any Hex around the impact area should have boiled off before the armor gave out. But it'll be a c.r.a.pshoot to pop the whole suit without some kind of formal decon." The timber of his voice dropped an octave. "On the other hand, we're gonna have a dead Marine for sure if I don't pop it."

"And that ain't gonna happen." The voice on the ComLink was ragged but forceful.

Ridgeway turned to see Merlin slogging through the iridescent pool. The Marine hauled a rack of damaged cylinders and a tangle of braided steel hose. Fog swirled in his wake, clinging to the trailing strands of equipment.

Merlin wrestled with the snarl of loose lines. "Chem-rigs have suppression systems," the engineer explained wearily, "I figured a Hex-hauler to have a pretty good one." He held up the cylinders. "Two of the pressure tanks got sc.r.a.pped, but one survived. Guess we caught a break."

With a heavy bang, Merlin set the ma.s.s of equipment on the rocks and began to untangle the silver-colored hoses, popping off the clamp-style brackets that had affixed the braided steel lines to the top of the truck. He paused once more, breathing heavily for a minute before he purged the lines and charged the power nozzle.

The decon rig had not been designed for manual use. Charged to several thousand psi, the high pressure jet would have broken the arm of anyone foolish enough to try. In powered armor, Merlin merely braced himself and threw the lever, directing the stream of white foam across Darcy's p.r.o.ne figure. He took care to focus on joints and seams where bits of the deadly fluid could lodge. He repeated the procedure on St.i.tch and Ridgeway before clanking off toward Taz and Monster.

St.i.tch had already turned back to Darcy, placing his grey armored palm into a recess along the sniper's ribs. Contacts met and a high-security code fired across the gap. With a burst of compressed gas, the entire torso of the suit gull-winged open and slid down along the sniper's sides, revealing the inert form of Lieutenant Darcy Lonigan.

Ridgeway peered over the medic's shoulder and grimaced. Darcy was beat all to h.e.l.l. A dark, mottled bruise swept up her entire neck and jawline. Blood stained the left side of her olive drab T-shirt. Darcy's breathing was labored and the sniper's shallow breath fogged in the frigid air.

Scanning layers of injury, St.i.tch fired off a series of corrective measures. A wave of drugs pulsed into Darcy's bloodstream. Her heartbeat quickened, but barely.

St.i.tch gave Ridgeway a quick synopsis. "I can plug some of the leaks, but we're gonna need heat and shelter. She'll freeze if the suit stays open, but we don't have a lot of choice. If I'm gonna get some of this frag out, I'll need to peel the armor completely."

"In your dreamssss..." The voice was slurred and heavy, but the glint in her good eye was all Darcy.

St.i.tch let out an unexpected chuckle, muttering under his breath as he quickly resumed his ministrations. Ridgeway knelt at the sniper's side, his faceless helmet gazing down impa.s.sively.

"Gave us a bit of a scare there, Lieutenant."

"Yessir," she wheezed through bloodstained teeth, "...wasn't part of the plan. How's Monster?"

"Stubborn as s.h.i.t."

Darcy snorted and closed her eyes, nodding slowly. "So what's new?" A long moment pa.s.sed before she looked up once more, this time gazing directly at Ridgeway. "He saved my a.s.s."

"Yeah, well, you can be his Morale Officer while he heals up."

Darcy coughed and speckles of bright blood stained on her lips. She flashed a wry smile in spite of the pain. "Aw s.h.i.t Major, the guy saved my life and all, but that's askin' too much."

Behind his mask Ridgeway allowed himself a tired smile at her sarcastic wit, but the signs didn't look good. Darcy needed medical attention, and more than they could give her on a frozen island of rock. Ridgeway leaned down and spoke softly. "Rest up Marine, we're going to need to be mobile soon. You up for it?"

"Roger that," she replied, her tone suddenly stripped of humor. The eyes that gazed up were hard as sapphire gla.s.s.

Ridgeway nodded once, then stood, his armored fist thumping a gentle rap on the medic's shoulder as he turned away.

Taz and Merlin were on their feet, checking each other's gear. Monster knelt at the island's edge where he re-armed the Gatling.

As Ridgeway approached, he could fully appreciate the beating Monster had absorbed. Aside from the grapefruit-sized dent sprawled across his chest plate, a mult.i.tude of lesser dents and furrows criss-crossed the armor in a haphazard array.

The TAC package at the base of Monster's skull had been blown to bits. Ridgeway could only imagine the pounding the skull inside had taken.

Ridgeway stood at Monster's side while both men scanned the distance. "How we doing, Gunny?"

"Merlin, Taz and St.i.tch are operational," Monster replied mechanically, adding with a dry note, "you look like s.h.i.t, but you're moving." Then his deep voice grew somber, "You already know about the Lieutenant."

The Major nodded in silent agreement. Ridgeway couldn't see the big man's eyes, but he knew they were full of concern. Although Darcy was quick to point out Monster's heroics, both men knew full well the role the sniper played in the entire team surviving Cathedral. Courage cut both ways.

"So what have we got?"

Monster paused a moment before answering, his head making a slow sweep of the dark horizon where lake light faded into blackness. When he spoke, his reply was insightful and succinct. "We've got some weird s.h.i.t here, Major."

Of all the technical answers he might have gotten from a hundred other Sergeants, Monster to cut to the chase.