Chung Kuo - The Marriage Of The Living Dark Part 2

He slid through backwards then spun about, clicking the safety off his gun. Ju Dun was two paces out, kneeling, Johann and Benoit formed up at his shoulders, firing with a machine-like efficiency at anything that moved. The Entrance Gate was at the highest point in Eden. From where the team emerged they had a panoramic view of the terrain. To the right was the ruined village, its walls shot away over the years, the remaining brickwork heavily pocked; to the left a sharply descending slope and, just beyond it, the river. Beyond that was woodland, rising to low hills in the near distance, but the eye barely noticed them: what it saw was a flickering cloud of mechanoid hostility, a host of winged and clawed creatures - cycloids and mechanopods, scarabs and homers, a.s.sa.s.sin bugs and tinflies, screw-whips and stingers. The unheard signal drew them to the Gate like a scent, triggering the preprogrammed malevolence within them.

Daniel felt the adrenaline rush hit him as he took in the sight. The sky in front of him was dark with insect life, yet nothing was getting closer than ten metres. Shattered fragments littered the ground on every side. Twenty metres up, something small and black stopped fluttering and fell like a dropped stone, its jet-black facets glinting as it turned. Ju Dun was directly beneath it Daniel blasted it into a million pieces then turned, shooting the wing off a crab-beetle that was poised to leap from a wall just to Johann's left Leon was through now, and Slaven. They took their places in the deadly line, their guns blasting away, filling the air in front of them with splintering forms.

Daniel, his back to the wall, fired over their heads, lobbing grenades into the seething ma.s.s of dark, crawling things that covered the ground just beyond the front wave.

Here were things that hopped and chattered, things that whirred and buzzed; here were a thousand different things that crawled and jumped and clicked with menace, and all much larger than life and ten times as deadly as the originals on which they had been so carefully modelled.

And whatever moved, they blasted, not letting anything get within ten metres of where they crouched, the circle of the hatch at their backs. Christian was through and then, finally, Aidan. And as the eighth gun began to bear on the swarm, so they began to make progress, the numbers of their a.s.sailants steadily diminis.h.i.+ng.

Daniel was conscious of the movement all about him, of bodies jerking and turning, as target after target was picked out, such that the team seemed a single creature with eight deadly snouts that spat fire and steel, not a single enemy drone getting through.

And then, as suddenly as it began, it ended, the swarm withdrawing with a desultory buzz and whine.

Daniel looked about him, seeing through the visors of their combat helmets the elation on every face. But Aidan knew that such respite was brief. "Come on!" he yelled into his lip-mike, his voice resounding in their helmets, "lef s get moving!"

At once the team moved on, keeping close together, tightly organised and in perfect step, like a machine with sixteen legs and sixteen arms, heading down the slope towards the river, the black wall receding behind them as they began to make the crossing.

There had once been a war, many years before, between the Man and his enemy, Lee Wan, the King of the Han. From his bases in the south, the Man had struggled to liberate the north from the Tang's tyrannical grip. The main thrust of that lengthy War had been fought out in a great trench between the two great cities, a long, narrow zone that was known only as The Rift, a place so inimical to mankind that a new form of life had evolved, a whole host of artificial life-forms dedicated not to their own propagation and survival, but to the destruction of all other living forms.

Evolved, men said, yet in truth these forms were not a genuine part of the great evolutionary tide; they were more a breaking of the great chain, a perverse twisting to breaking point of that age-old process. A reversal. And as they became more complex and more subtle, so - though they mimicked evolution's drive to betterment and the fulfilment of some vague, far-future goal - they grew closer to the great Nullity from which they derived their being. Of this the boys knew little, other than what they had been told by the education officers back in the training camp. Only Daniel, intrigued by what he had seen in Eden, had taken the trouble to seek out Commandant Dublanc and ask why such things were and how they had come about. That query had produced no answers - only a long stay in the isolation cells. It was not, after all, the boys' place to question, only to act upon instruction. They were soldiers, not scholars. What they needed to know they would be told, and nothing more.

Looking down at the great bank of screens, Dublanc saw how Daniel turned and looked back at the Gate, a long, thoughtful stare, his dark eyes taking in everything.

"Close on his eyes."

The boy's head grew, filling the screens until, from the shadows of his face, only the eyes shone out, ma.s.sive, each sea-green eye spread out over nine screens.

It was like staring straight into his head. One could almost see what he was thinking.

"Do you think he knows?" one of them asked, turning from his desk to look up at Dublanc.

"Not yet," Dublanc answered.

Yes, but he tviH, he thought, remembering Daniel's persistence. That spell in isolation hadn't cured him - he had still wanted to know. And finally - faced with the choice of indulging Daniel's curiosity or doing away with the boy altogether - he had given him access to the camp library, such as it was. Yet if the boy thought he'd find all the answers there, he must have been disappointed, because these days no one knew the answers, least of all the scribes who had tampered with the ancient books.

The past was one huge fiction. And the future?

Dublanc turned in his seat, looking across at the map of Eden that glowed in the shadows to his left Inside the gates of Eden there was no future, only the endless present "Leon, go left and come out behind the wall! Benoit, cover his back!" Aidan spoke urgently into his lip-mike, his voice sounding clearly inside their helmets as they crouched in the narrow road that ran through the ruined village. As he spoke, his instructions were punctuated by concussive thuds and bright laser flashes as one or other of the team fired off a gun, responding to the buzzing whine of some flickering, flas.h.i.+ng attack. "Joh, Christian, take anchor. Slaven, you go in first Ju Dun and Daniel will back you up. Now go!"

At once the team moved into action, Benoif s flamer opening up on a coppice just to Leon's left as he ran, toasting a group of three metamoths even as they launched themselves, their tiny egg-like bombs sparking explosively. Slaven had the worst job. At the centre of the village was a well, at the foot of which was an energy-tap. There were hundreds of them, scattered throughout the Garden, and the team could use the taps to recharge their weapons, but each taphad to be fought for, for they were also the main source of energy for the countless mechanoids that populated Eden.

There were three types of taps. The simplest and most numerous were the platform taps, that were situated at the centre of big bowl-shaped platforms. Then there were well taps and - rarest of all - dome taps, of which there were no more than six in the whole of Eden.

The taps themselves were energy spigots - small, studded posts onto which one might clip one's weapon, or, in the case of insects, one might squat and "feed". Normally Aidan would have ignored this particular tap and pressed on, recharging further in, but the sheer intensity of the attack at the Gate had left several of the boys' weapons on low charge. They had to take this tap. But it would not be easy. Well-taps were never easy.

As Slaven ran towards the well, Daniel saw what looked like a billow of dark smoke lift from the well's mouth. But it wasn't smoke. Smoke didn't make that whining, drone-like noise. He saw Slaven hesitate, then open up with his automatic. At the same time, Daniel went down onto one knee and, flicking his visor to longsight, opened up with his laser, firing past Slaven's shoulder, squeezing short bursts that seemed to cut tiny holes in the drifting swarm. The tiny insectile machines popped and cracked and, splintering, fell from the air like shattered crystal, but there were hundreds of them. Thousands. Both Ju Dun and Aidan were firing now - Aidan lobbing mortars into the air from his big gun, the circular sh.e.l.ls fragmenting in the midst of that chittering, droning cloud of metallic bugs - yet more and more seemed to come up out of the well to replace those which had been destroyed.

Slaven was slowly moving to his right now, drawing the swarm with him. That was his job. Leon, meanwhile, had come out on the far side of the well and was stealthily approaching it At the same time, Johann and Christian were moving into the gap Slaven had created. If all went well, the three boys - and Benoit, who was hurrying to move into position - would get to the lip of the well at roughly the same time.

The swarm was almost on Slaven now. You could barely see him. At any moment they would cease holding back and fall on him as one. A muscle in Daniel's cheek twitched. Timing was everything.

"Okay, Slaven, seal!"

Yet even as Aidan gave that crucial order, Daniel saw one of the bugs - a tiger-wasp, its bright orange and black markings distinctive - fall directly towards Slaven's back. He twitched his gun upward to fire, but the back of Slaven's helmet was directly in his line of fire. Seal d.a.m.n you!

The material of Slaven's uniform s.h.i.+mmered and changed colour, becoming a simple metallic black. At the same time it changed shape, hardening into a kind of chrysalis. The tiger-wasp shattered against it Instinctively, Daniel turned his head away. Even so, the flash left him half-blind, while the concussion rattled his teeth and set up a ringing in his ears.

When he looked again the sky around Slaven was clear. At the well, Leon and Johann were climbing in, harnessed to their partners, their guns picking off anything that came up out of the darkness at them. Not that there was much left down there.

Daniel looked back at Slavea The black pupa-like sh.e.l.l of Slaven's uniform lay at the centre of a small depression in the earth. All about it, forming a perfect circle roughly fifteen metres in diameter, the earth was charred black Faint wisps of steam rose up out of that blackness, drifting to the north. The wind had changed.

Daniel turned, looking about him. Ju Dun was up, and Aidan. There was a shout from the well. The tap was secured.

He allowed himself a smile. They'd done it, and without a single man lost.

Hurrying across, he knelt beside Slaven. A moment later Ju Dun was at his side. Without needing to be told, the young boy put his hands beneath the sh.e.l.l and, with Daniel's help, turned it over.

Daniel studied the suit a moment. Good. There were no cracks. The seal had held. Looking to Ju Dun, he nodded.Lifting the suit between them, they carried it across and laid it beside the curved wall of the well, Aidan covering them all the while Slaven would be out of it for some while, but he was fine. The worst he'd have was a blinding headache.

But it had been close.

Johann and Christian were busy lowering weapons down the well to Leon at the tap. At once Ju Dun and Daniel joined Benoit and Aidan, taking their positions about the well, picking off anything that came in sight, whether it was a threat or not Some teams, he knew, did little else. They took a tap then held it, knowing that at the very least they had a constant energy supply. But it was a no-win situation. You couldn't live on energy alone. There was water in the suits - enough for two days - but you had to get across and out before you could eat again. Yes, and at some point you also had to sleep. And that's when they got you.

Inside the hardened sh.e.l.l of his uniform, Slaven groaned. "Go help him, Daniel," Aidan said quietly, using a discreet channel to speak to Daniel alone. "I may be wrong, but I think he sealed late." Daniel s.h.i.+vered. He'd not wanted to admit it before that moment, but he knew Aidan was right The groan deepened to a low moan of pain.

Even as he knelt over it, the sh.e.l.l s.h.i.+mmered again and, softening, changed colour once again. As the helmet visor cleared, Slaven's face was revealed, his eyes screwed tight in pain.

"What is it, Slaven?"

There was a sharp intake of breath, then, "My back."

Daniel stepped over him, and, gently easing Slaven up, looked. The suif s sealing had concealed it, but there, just below the protective s.h.i.+elding of the neck-plates, there was a tiny rip in the softer back-plate Protruding from it - broken off, no doubt, in the instant the suit had sealed - was the needle-fine sting of a tiger-wasp.

"Oh, s.h.i.+t..."

Slaven stiffened, hearing the words. "What is it?" Daniel took a breath, knowing Aidan was listening. "A sting," he said. "We'll take it out and drug you up. I'll carry you."

He looked up as he said this last and met Aidan's eyes. Both boys knew what this meant. You couldn't carry pa.s.sengers in Eden, not without paying the price But there was the morale of the team to consider. To abandon Slaven at this early stage would destroy team morale It wasn't that the others didn't know how ruthless things were in here - they knew - it was just that to see one of their own simply left for the mechanoids to pick over would be too much, especially this early.

Aidan came over and, crouching, smiled at Slaven. "You'll be okay," he said, speaking on the open channel. "We'll get you through." But when his eyes met Daniel's they conveyed a different message entirely. We have to deal with this, Aidan's eyes said, as clearly as if he had spoken the words. And sooner rather than later, right?

Right, Daniel answered silently. He undipped the medic's kit at his side and snapped it open.

"Okay," he said, speaking to Slaven once more "Let s give you something to numb that pain."

CHAPTER-2.

crossing the river.

It was not immediately discernible, but Eden was a place of subtle currents and pressures. Some paths were easy to follow, others fraught with difficulty and if one persevered, that difficulty tended to intensify so that it felt almost as if the air itself were thickening with danger. Most teams tended to gravitate towards the easier paths; to circ.u.mvent those places where the danger was most intense and look for trails where progress could be made quickly and at little cost So it was that they found themselves, at midday of the first day, crouched by the river bank on the outskirts of an ancient town, a long way further south than they'd intended.

While Leon, Christian and Ju Dun formed a perimeter guard, Aidan and Daniel took a moment to discuss tactics.

"They're pus.h.i.+ng us out," Aidan mouthed, his visor pressed to Daniel's so that the watching bugs could not see what they were saying to each other. "You think we're heading into a trap?" Daniel mouthed back.

"If s possible."

"Then maybe we should cross the river."

Aidan frowned. Here it was relatively easy to get across, but further east the land fell away between rocks and the current was much stronger. It would be much harder to cross back. And they would have to cross back if they were going to get to the Exit Gate."I'd rather not." "Then we go north." "Into danger, you mean?"

Daniel smiled. "I feel I've been pushed far enough, don't you?"

Aidan grinned. "Yes." "Then lef s go."

Dublanc was in the back room, lying on his bunk, half-dozing, when one of his a.s.sistants came in. He yawned, then opened one eye. "What1 s up?"

"They're on the move again, sir."

"Across the river?"

"No, sir. They're heading north."

Dublanc sat up, suddenly alert. "North?"

He had expected them to cross the river, then try to re-cross further up, at Ebnet, maybe, or Brand, but north ...

"They're going through the town?"

"It looks like it, sir."

Dublanc frowned, genuinely surprised. He stood, then walked out onto the gallery, seeing the team at once, there on the big screen, their backs to the remote as they moved in tight formation into the ancient, ruined town of Freiburg.

"Where's the nearest tap?"

At once a map was superimposed upon the right of the screen, a flas.h.i.+ng light indicating an energy-tap a kilometre north of where the team were. "Do you think they'll head for that, sir?"

"No." But even as he said it, he knew that if they were to survive at all, they would have to expend a great deal of their energy, so they'd need a tap.

He narrowed his eyes. If he could nudge them slightly east

"Let them get in deep," he said, conscious of how his own team were watching him. "Hold back until they hit the high ground, then push them towards Breisgau."

The air was filled with an angry buzzing sound. Daniel turned, seeing at once a great swarm of hornet-like creatures with long gla.s.s bodies approaching from the direction of the Square below.

"s.h.i.+t!" Daniel said, recognising the creatures. They were small but those long gla.s.s bodies were full of burning acid that could rot a suit in seconds. If only one or two got through the results could be disastrous. But the rest of the team were already distracted, fighting off a nest of beetles that were threatening to overwhelm them.

Snapping a grenade from his belt, Daniel tossed it up onto the root where the beetles were coming from, even as Aidan did the same. The twin explosions threw dozens of the fist-sized mechanoids into the air and blew a hole in the tiled roof. But still they came, hundreds and hundreds of the black, scuttering things.

Daniel turned back. The others would have to cope now; the hornets were almost on them.

"Clench your teeth, Daniel," Aidan said, unclipping a big shovel-mouthed gun from his back and taking off the safety.

Daniel did as he was told. A moment later he felt the huge concussion in the air as the stun sh.e.l.l went off in the midst of the swarm, dropping instinctively as the wave of sharp gla.s.s shards swept over him.

There was laughter in his helmet - Aidan's laughter.

"Hey, Daniel!" he shouted. "Do you think someone's got it in for us?"

Dublanc slumped back in the chair, letting the tension ease from him. It was his job to distance himself from his charges, to test them as one might test machines, but sometimes - just sometimes - one found oneself getting involved. Linked somehow.

It didn't happen often, but when it did he found himself, as now, pus.h.i.+ng harder to compensate, as if to prove to himself that he didn't really care. He stood, pacing the gallery slowly, considering what he should do next It was within his power to crush them - to make good and certain that they didn't stand a chance - but what was the point of that?

Unseen, he made a face into the darkness. Some days he wondered what the point was anyway? He selected these boys and trained them, and then ... nothing. Those that came out alive were sent back to the camps, where they'd be trained yet more before being sent back here. Until, finally, they did not emerge from Eden. There was a point. Of course there was. He'd been a.s.sured by Horacek many a time that DeVore had a good reason for all of this, even if that reason was not spelled out, but some days Dublanc"s faith in the Man wavered. One did not train one's shock troops only to expend them in these endless exercises. So what did DeVore want? The perfect killer? A machine to outgun the machines? Or was he just a s.a.d.i.s.t?.

That answer did not satisfy. If DeVore was a s.a.d.i.s.t, why did he not ask for copies of the tapes? Why did he express no interest whatsoever in the fate of his charges?

Or was that true? Horacek, for certain, had expressed an interest in Daniel. And Horacek had the Man's ear.

Dublanc sat once more, looking across at the bank of screens, watching as the team regrouped.

The trouble was, it was hard to know precisely what DeVore did want On the three occasions on which he'd actually met the man, he'd had the distinct feeling that - all rea.s.surances to the contrary - DeVore didn't give a f.u.c.k what he did, nor how he went about it And yet...

Dublanc paused, coming, as he always did in this internal debate, to the nub of it.

And yet he's given over att of this time and effort to creating the camps and running them. And to building Eden, and the mechanoids, and... He huffed irritably. There had to be a reason for it It made no sense unless there was a reason. But even he, who was in charge of it all, could not say what that reason was.

"The Man has a plan," Horacek had said to him once, grinning that horrible feral grin of his, "and it is not our place to question it. We do as he asks when and where he asks it and no more. You understand?"

At times like this Dublanc wished he did understand. He sighed. Maybe Daniel understood. If anyone had an inkling of what was going on, it was the boy. Those eyes of his were so knowing, so full of seeing and understanding.

None of the other boys had that "Commandant?"

He went to the rail and looked down onto the floor of the operations room. His Duty Captain stood there, at attention, looking up at him. "Yes, Captain York?"