March of the Legion

when the field went down, briefly. Now all we had to do was do it again.

The ship shook, banging around wildly. Somebody laughed. You have to be in the Legion awhile before you can appreciate that type of humor. I wasn't quite there.

'Thinker, Warhound. You know what I think about that O we met?'

'No. What do you think?'

'I think it was unarmed.'

'Yeah—it was.'

'It was probably somebody's aged grandmother.'

'Yeah, or a pregnant lady,' Psycho cut in. 'Or a little kid, pissing in its pants.'

'Thanks, guys,' I said. 'I needed that.'

'It's a ten, Thinker,' Psycho assured me. 'When we meet a real O, fully armed, we'll be able to give all this hardware a good field test. Otherwise we're wasting our time.'

'Wouldn't want to do that.'

The ship was shaking itself apart, a falling star, a meteor, hurling itself at Mongera's tortured surface.

'We die today,' Valkyrie said dreamily.

'We die together,' Boudicca replied quietly.

Outstanding leadership, I thought glumly.

'That O is going to die too, guys,' Sassin announced. He was armed with a massive plasma manlink, another horrendous new toy for our O to ponder.

'I'm staying right next to you, Sassin,' Scrapper said. 'I've got no plans to die.'

'Nobody's going to die,' Snow Leopard cut in, 'except the O. Listen to me and follow orders, gang. We came back from Coldmark, we came back from Andrion 3, and we're coming back from Mongera. Nobody dies!'

That was the difference between Beta One and Gamma One. I'd walk into Hell for Beta One, but I wouldn't cross the street for Gamma One.

'Drop successful. Levelling out.'

'Got the port.'

'Watch out for those O's.'

'Get down on the deck.'

'Highroad, it is cleared for softdock in Mongera Port. Please note the zero.'

'Acknowledging landing instructions.'

'Priestess,' I said, 'You stay close. Don't stray.' My mind was a whirl of wild emotions; my heart was thumping.

'I'll be right there, Thinker,' she replied immediately. 'It's going to take more than an O to split us up.'

'Thinker.' Warhound was on private.

'Yes, Warhound.'

'I know for a fact that Scrapper hates me.'

Oh no, I thought. Not now. Poor old Warhound.

'Well, I know for a fact that she doesn't hate you, Warhound,' I said. 'Don't be silly. Look, we can talk about this later. Sometimes things just don't work out. It doesn't mean she hates you.'

'She hates me. I know it.'

'Come on, Warhound. We need you, right now. You've got to concentrate on the mission; we need that psybloc!'

'Don't you worry about that, Thinker. I'll be right there!'

'Good!' The awful thing was, Warhound was right. Scrapper had told me herself that she hated Warhound and was sick of his bumbling efforts to romance her. I felt so sorry for him. I'd talk to him after the mission.

'Get right down on the deck,' somebody said.

'Badboy, prepare for aircar launch.'

Adrenalin kicked in. The Highroad was almost at zero altitude now, flashing at blinding speed over a cold grey forest, bouncing lightly over forested hills, flattening out again, hugging the contours.

'Hang on to your stomachs, gals!' Redhawk shouted.

'Launch aircar!' The warning bell bleated.

A sudden chill to my flesh. Then a sharp explosion shattered my ears and the gravs smashed at my chest and my vision blurred and I was paralyzed and helpless and praying for survival.

Redhawk shrieked for joy as my vision slowly returned. Weak sunlight dazzled my eyes. The grav eased off. The aircar was free, flashing over a forest of bleak wintry trees under cold grey skies. I craned my neck and I saw the Highroad, a blunt white wedge, fading into the distance. We were on our own now— down to business! The aircar was crammed full of troopers and everyone was suddenly having second thoughts about the readiness of their weapons and equipment, checking it all once again.

'Weapons check—mark!'

'Weapons all—hold it. What's the story, Gamma Seven?'

'Yeah, just a frac…'

'Tenners, all weapons ready.'

'Look at the horizon.'

It was past dawn, but the sky was dark. Up ahead, the horizon was aglow under smoky black clouds.

'That's Century City. We'll find our O there.'

'Badboy, Big Kid. We've got you on scope.' Big Kid was Two Three Delta, back on the P.S. Maiden. Delta's mission was to watch us die, or maybe even live, and report it all back to the Legion. We didn't answer.

'Look at all those O's—Deadman!'

The Maiden had flashed us a view of Century City, and each individual O glowed red. The suburbs were spotted with hundreds of little red dots, like an infectious disease. A scattering of dots were in the city. There did not seem to be any order behind it—the O were wandering around by themselves, all over the place.

'What do you think?' Snow Leopard, to Coolhand.

'The East—there's hardly anybody there. Look at that one.'

'Yeah. Yeah. Target selection. You see him, Merlin?'

'Right. That's the one!'

Mountains flashed past, taking my breath away. We were between two great mountain ridges, hurtling to our deaths. The sky was dark with smoke. I caught a glimpse of the city up ahead, burning brightly. We had our O zeroed. Introductions would be made, shortly. And one of the two parties was going to die. Either the O, or Badboy. We burst free of the mountains and Redhawk took us down as low as he could get. The aircar was a fat black bullet splitting the air apart, a supersonic knife, now over darkened meadowlands, now flashing through black smoke, the land below all on fire, a dirt road snapping past, a glimpse of a moving groundcar.

All the power of the Legion was with us. I could feel it glowing inside me. And I knew that O was in trouble. I didn't know if we were going to kill it, or it was going to kill us, but I knew, for certain, this was not going to be one of its better days.

'See it?'

'Right, Badboy. Let's get our O. By the numbers! Prep for decar!' Snow Leopard was out of his seat and ready to go, death in an A suit. He would be the first one out the door and the closest to the O.

The ZA came flashing at us on the screens, and the gravs were again pulling at us, and then we softly glided, weightless, floating like a dream, an armored bat, hovering over the ground.

'Badboy—decar! Death.' Snow Leopard added the last part almost as an afterthought.

'Death!' We echoed him, in unison.

The assault door snapped open and we threw ourselves out at once, into swirling smoke, an entire reinforced squad dancing in air for just an instant, dull black armor and winking red faceplates and exotic weaponry, all on display, all together, charged and hyper, coiled to strike. Then we hit the ground and I ran, following the track etched onto my faceplate. We were going starburst, immediately. The O was going to have to kill thirteen of us, and then he'd still have to deal with Redhawk in the aircar.