the street. The mud and rain had swallowed almost all the immediate signs of the explosion. There was no smoke, no dust cloud. Just a pancake of rubble where the house had stood moments before. The tide of mud was already frothing round it, bubbling eagerly into cracks.
Choma pointed his machine gun along the street, radiating satisfaction that the squad had merged with the scenery. He knew where they were, but they weren’t easily visible. Where are they? Did anyone see where the white fire came from?
He was answered with a chorus of: No’s.
I don’t think it was white fire,sinon said. he ordered his block to replay the memory. The gouts of flame spearing out of each corner were orange, and they came from inside the house.
Sabotage?choma said.
Could be. They were perfectly placed for demolition.
They were on their way down the stairs when the second house exploded. It was on the far side of town, being examined by one of the other squads. One serjeant was killed, another two were injured beyond any field medic’s ability to patch up; they needed immediate evacuation. The rest of Sinon’s squad stood back as he clambered up over the mound of stone and girders which had been the house. When he was clear of the mud he ran a sensor pad over the exposed rubble close to one of the corners. The rain was washing the mess clean, but the chemical analysis still had enough residual molecules to work with.
Not good,he announced. This wasn’t white fire. There’s a definite trace of trinitrotoluene here.
Sod it!choma exclaimed. The bastards have booby trapped the whole town.
Parts of it. I doubt they’ve got the resources to rig every building.
But you can bet they’ve done the critical ones, as well as picking on houses at random,he said grudgingly. It’s what I would’ve done.
If you’re right, we’re going to have to treat each building as potentially hazardous. And we don’t even know what the trigger is.
I doubt it’ll be electronic. Our sensors would spot active processors, and the possessed wouldn’t be able to set them up in the first place. We’ll have to get some of the marine engineers in here to find out what kind of mechanism they’re employing.
Sinon’s response was lost amid a burst of anguish within the communal affinity band. Both of them instinctively turned to the west. The death of another two serjeants was all too clear. A warehouse in a town called Holywell had just exploded.
It’s not just here,choma said. Ekelund’s people have been busy.
Confirmation that most major towns around the periphery of Mortonridge were booby trapped came in to the Ops Room throughout the afternoon. Ralph sat in his office assessing the reports in a state of weary disbelief. Progress schematics were being revised on a fifteen minute basis by the AI. Their original timetable was constantly rearranged, targets being pushed further and further back.
“Truly amazing,” he told Princess Kirsten during the evening’s briefing. “We’re fifteen hours in, and already twenty behind schedule.”
“Conditions are pretty foul under there,” Admiral Farquar said. “I don’t see Ekelund’s people having a better time of it.”
“How would we know? Fifteen hours, and we haven’t had a single encounter with a live possessed. Christ, I mean I know no battle plan survives contact with the enemy, but no one ever said anything about it disintegrating before we even catch sight of them.”
“General Hiltch,” the Princess said sharply. “I’d like you to give me some positive factors, please. Have all the possessed simply vanished into this other realm they long for?”
“We don’t think so, no, ma’am. Pulling back from the coast and the firebreak is a logical move. They obviously worked it out in advance, hence the booby traps.”
“There’s circumstantial evidence that they’re still in the centre of Mortonridge,” Diana said. “Our satellite sensor scans are at their worst there. Radar and UV laser is beginning to break through the fringes, but when we try to probe the centre we get the same kind of hazing effect the possessed have always generated. QED, they’re still there.”
“That’s something, I suppose.”
“I also think the worst of the rain should be over by midday tomorrow. Results from the sensors we can rely on show us the cloud is thinning out. A lot of it is simply blowing out to sea now they’re no longer containing it. And of course, it’s falling, bigtime.”
“It certainly is,” Acacia said. She shuddered at the on-the-ground impressions affinity had delivered to her. “You’re going to have real problems with Mortonridge’s vegetation when this is all over. I doubt there’s a tree standing on the whole peninsula. I didn’t know rain like that could exist.”
“It can’t, normally,” Diana said. “This whole meteorology situation is highly artificial. The dispersal will influence the planet’s weather patterns for the rest of the year. However, it certainly isn’t sustainable; as I said, the heaviest falls will be over by midday tomorrow. After that, the serjeants will be able to make decent progress.”
“Over open country, possibly,” Ralph said. “But we’re going to have to vector in these booby traps.”
“Do we know what they are, yet?” the Princess asked.
“The majority so far are good old fashioned TNT,” Ralph told her. “Easily produced from the kind of chemicals available in most of our urban zones. We managed to get some marine engineers in to the afflicted towns to examine what they could. There’s no standard trigger mechanism, naturally enough. The possessed are using everything from trip wires to wired up door knobs. There’s just no quick way to deal with them. The whole point of the front line serjeants is to clear every metre of ground as they advance. Knowing you’re in danger just by walking in to a building is going to be very stressful for the entire army, I’m afraid. Doing the job properly is going to slow us down considerably.”
“So will the mud,” Janne said. “We know where the roads are, but no one’s actually seen a solid surface yet.”
“Progress down the M6 is slow,” Cathal confirmed. “The major bridges are out. We expected that, of course. But the mechanoids are having a lot of trouble erecting the replacements the convoys are carrying, they’re just not designed to operate in this kind of environment.”
“That situation should ease off tomorrow as well,” Diana said.
“The rain, yes; but the mud will still be there.”
“We’re going to have to learn to live with that, I’m afraid. It’s here for the duration.”
Did you know, the original ethnic Eskimos on Earth had several dozen words for snow,sinon said.
