“…damn it. It’s over, right? I mean, we crushed the bastards …”
The celebration had gone out of all of us. Everybody’s mood had changed, including mine. For no reason at all, I had come to believe we had won the war and not just a battle; and though I had no new information, I now knew that something had changed.
As I reached the Valkyrie Ballroom—the barracks my battalion called home—a young major approached me. “Lieutenant Harris?” he asked.
I saluted.
“General Glade would like a word with you.”
“Harris, glad they found you,” General Glade said. We traded salutes.
He looked tired. He was a skinny man with a weak chin, a long, hooked nose, and a round, balding head. Looking at his face and head made me think of a parakeet.
“Congratulations, General,” I said.
I did not know how to respond, so I said nothing.
“We can talk on the way, Harris. We have a briefing at the Science Lab, and they asked me to bring you along.”
I was a second lieutenant. For me to attend the same briefing with a general was beyond unusual, it was downright bizarre. Then I remembered Freeman mentioning the Science Lab and realized that he might well have mentioned my name to the scientists holding the briefing.
Two staff officers met us as we left the office. They led us through the lobby, a plush indoor palace with burgundy carpeting and crystal chandeliers. The area was abandoned. Briefings had already begun in the ballrooms; every Marine on the premises was required to attend.
Almost every Marine. Since I was traveling with a general, I was excused. The two staff officers led us out to the main entrance, where a sedan waited under the portico. Glade and I climbed into the back. The staff officers, both of whom outranked me, sat in the front.
News of the victory had already spread through Valhalla. With the Marines and Army holding mass briefings, most parts of the city lay empty; but hysteria had erupted in the areas occupied by the civilian militia. We passed neighborhoods in which rapturous mobs filled the streets—men dancing and drinking and celebrating.
Glade cleared his throat. “It’s a bit early to celebrate,” he grumbled. The officers in the front seat heard him and nodded. One sighed, and said, “Civilians.”
We drove to the University of Valhalla, a sprawling campus that reminded me of just about every other university I had ever seen. We passed a large fountain that had become the domicile of hundreds of ducks. We passed walkways lined by trees that had long since shed their leaves for the winter. Except for the military supply trucks and security stops, I might have guessed that the university had closed for the season.
The university campus sat serene. Fresh white snow had built up on the lawn areas. Melting snow covered the streets and walkways. The air was clean. The weather had washed this part of the city clean, and there were no occupants to mess it up again.
We parked near what had been the university’s School of Science and now served as the military’s scientific laboratory. The outside of the building had a glass entryway and an old gray brick facade. The benches outside the main entrance were buried in snow. The building itself went three stories up and three stories down. On this day, the debriefing took place on the bottom floor.
Apparently the four of us—General Glade, his two staff officers, and me—were the last of the elect group to arrive. We passed through a security station at the door and another, larger, station by the elevators. An MP took us down to Basement 3, where we were met by an armed escort that led us through the halls. As we entered the auditorium in which the briefing would be held, I saw a lot of brass. The meeting was for generals and their staffs, an elite circle in which I was the token clone.
Glade and his two staff officers found a row with three open seats and filled them. I sat alone on the next row. It didn’t bother me.
There was a stage at the front of the auditorium, but the scientist running the show did not use it. He stood beside a table, the objects he placed on display along the table magnified on the screen above his head.
“I understand we are all here now,” said the old scientist conducting the meeting. He was an odd-looking man—tall and skinny, built like the human version of a cotton-tipped swab, only bald. He had thick glasses, an unkempt ring of cotton-fluff hair, and a lab coat draped over his skeletal body. The guy probably stood a good six- foot-four, but if he weighed more than 140 pounds, I did not see where he packed it. He had a low, jittery voice giving the impression that his mouth had trouble keeping up with his brain.
“Um, we have made some significant discoveries over the last twenty-four hours,” the scientist began. “I’m not really sure where to begin. Under normal circumstances I would publish my results and present them in a conference. Under these circumstances, I will present our findings directly to you.”
“Can we get on with this?” someone asked from the front row. All the officers on the far end of the auditorium wore Army green. When push came to shove, the Army headed this operation.
“Yes, yes, of course,” the scientist muttered nervously. “Over the last three days, we have explored the anatomy of the aliens you refer to as the Mudders.” His mentioning the term “Mudders” brought a snicker from the officers, making the scientist all the more nervous. “We have been unable to secure a complete cadaver for examination, so we have had to work on, um, how can I put this, the various parts that have been delivered. I have brought a head and some other samples of alien anatomy with me today.” The scientist pointed a trembling finger at the table.
“Yes, yes, we see that.” The voice came from the Army section again. That kind of open disrespect would only come from the highest-ranking general.
“When …when …when we received these parts three days ago, they were solid. We cataloged their weights at that time. Depending on the damage, heads generally weighed 98 pounds and 3.2 ounces. Arms weighed 133 pounds and 2.2 ounces. Legs weighed 268 pounds, 5.1 ounces. We received portions of torsos, though these were generally badly damaged.”
“The only good alien is a dead alien,” said a member of General Glade’s staff. This brought a round of subdued applause. These old officers were behaving like a bunch of rowdy enlisted men.
“Upon examination, we …we found that the aliens had a precisely uniform body weight of 3 pounds, 6.3 ounces per cubic inch.”
“A uniform body weight per cubic inch? Is that any part of the body? Do humans have a pound-per-inch weight, too?” This question came from the Air Force section. The general asking sounded interested.
“No, no, sir,” the scientist stuttered. He looked so uncomfortable in front of these officers. “No, sir. Human bone, fat, muscle mass, organs, and hair all have unique weights and densities.
“The aliens do not have bones or muscles. They seem to be made out of a metal-clay polymer that is foreign to our understanding. We’ve tried to analyze the material. I’m afraid we could not find an equivalent material on our known periodic table of elements.” The question from the Air Force section seemed to relax the old goat.
The scientist prattled on for another five minutes, comparing the polymer to various known elements and explaining how it differed. I heard whispered conversations starting around the room. No one listened until he said, “The parts we have collected are rapidly degenerating.”
“They’re doing what?” the Army general asked.
“The material is degenerating,” the scientist repeated. “These alien sections were solid when we received them. They contained a solid mass of the new element that Dr. Sweetwater has labeled ‘MBC,’ or more properly, ‘Mudder Brown Carbon.’ When they first arrived, these alien sections were highly concentrated; we could only obtain samples for spectral and elemental analysis using a laser scalpel.
“Even so, we were able to determine that they were not composed of living tissue. Upon early examination, we, um, we found that there were no signs of entrails for analysis.”
“Entrails? You mean guts?” someone called out.
“We, uh, tried several experiments to see if we could break this material down to its most elemental form. We
