time.
“These will get us into the site,” Sweetwater said. “We don’t expect to come back.”
“Lieutenant Harris, is there a problem?” Newcastle asked. He and the other generals stood a few feet back from the jeep, waiting for Burton and me.
“Someone get this man a particle-beam pistol,” I said.
“You’ll take us?” Sweetwater looked near tears. Small, pudgy, and severely uncoordinated, this man had probably grown up being picked last for every group activity that did not involve science.
“You just keep up with us,” I said, handing him a particle-beam pistol. “If you fall behind, you’re on your own.”
Sweetwater stowed that pistol in his bag so gently you would have thought I’d given him a faulty grenade. “Freeman is in that transport; go tell him you’re coming along for the ride,” I said, pointing to the only transport with an open ramp. He thanked me, picked up his bag, and waddled off.
“You sure you don’t need more men?” Newcastle asked.
I had a quick vision of him foisting an entire platoon of muscle-headed Neanderthals like Captain Baxter on me. “I just picked up another new recruit,” I said, pointing at Sweetwater. “That gets us to forty-nine.” We had forty-seven men in the company, plus Freeman, and now William Sweetwater.
“You’re going to need an entire regiment at the very least,” Newcastle said. “I can have more men—”
“I’ve been in those caves,” I said. “The entrance is a bottleneck, and the route to our target area is a narrow path. The plan is to place the bomb by the gas and beat a hasty retreat. The last thing I need is a regiment of men clogging the works once that nuke is armed,” I said. It was a lie. I didn’t expect any of us to make it out alive, but that didn’t matter, not much.
There was just a brief moment when I stopped and questioned why I was doing this. I wasn’t doing it for love of humanity, and I sure as hell was not going into that mountain again because I wanted to save a bunch of crusty old bastards like these generals. Mostly I was going because I was programmed to go, I supposed I never had much of a choice.
Thomer jogged over to join us. “The gear’s loaded, sir. The rest of the company is on board.”
I knew why Sergeant Kelly Thomer was going on this mission—neural programming. William Sweetwater was going because he had something to prove, even if it would cost him his life. I suppose he felt he had to prove it to himself more than to anyone else. Surely he didn’t care what Newcastle and these generals thought about him.
So the soulless clones and the misfit scientist would die carrying out a mission while these privileged jackass generals waved us good-bye. Maybe that was all they were made to do, these high-powered officers. They were the human equivalent of S.C.O.O.TE.R. robots, practicing the self-preservation programming that was genetically hardwired into their brains. Newcastle’s version of self-preservation involved sending men to their deaths.
And the programming in my brain made me fight. I wasn’t fighting for humanity. Hell, I wasn’t even fighting for myself, I was fighting simply because that was what I did. I fought.
“I have a flight to catch,” I told Newcastle.
“Good luck, Lieutenant,” General Glade said with a salute. He turned to Burton and saluted him as well.
“I don’t need to tell you just how much is riding on your shoulders,” General Newcastle said. He also saluted.
In the background, I heard the thunderous roar of a Tomcat formation. The jets passed over us seconds before the noise of their engines could catch up. They flew a few hundred yards above the ground, remaining well below cloud level. We all watched the five-jet formation bank and circle back over us.
One way or another, this would be the final battle. Flying too low over the city, the jets would be easy targets; but they’d have been even easier marks sitting on a runway. The troops protecting the city would fire every bullet, missile, and rocket they had; why spare the jets?
I returned the salute. “General, good luck to you,” I said, knowing that every man who remained in Valhalla might well be dead by the time I returned …if I returned.
“We’d better go,” I said to Burton. We walked past the generals, who held their salutes as we passed.
“Still feeling sick?” I asked in a whisper.
“More embarrassed than sick,” Burton admitted. “Seeing that little twerp scientist begging to go, I wanted to shoot myself.”
“I know what you mean; the little bastard’s got guts,” I said, as we walked up the steel ramp and entered the transport. The major bobbed his head enthusiastically, then ran to the head, a hand over his mouth to keep the bile from spewing out of his mouth.
Watching Major Burton dash into the can, I hit the button that closed the big doors. Somewhere below my feet, gears whined as they drew the six-inch-thick doors together.
The transport was made to carry two platoons—a hundred men. It was half-full. Some of the men stood near the ladder at the far end of the cabin; most sat on the benches along the walls. The sound of the iron doors closing served as a call to attention. The men stood, turned to face me, and saluted.
I returned the salute and told them to sit. The transport’s powerful engines flared to life outside. Inside the kettle, the sound of the engines was no more than a rumble, but outside those thick walls, they made a deafening roar.
Our nukes—we actually had two of them—sat in a couple of large crates near the rear of the cargo hold. As we took off, I sat on one of the crates with the nukes, a combination of bravado and Marine Corps humor. Across the cabin I saw William Sweetwater, a short, stout man with mangy long black hair, thick glasses, and a second chin that hung from his neck like a hammock. He sat alone in a corner staring at the floor, his hands clasped between his knees.
“Dr. Sweetwater!” I yelled louder than was necessary for him to hear me over the engines. Hearing his name, he looked up with an alert, startled expression. “Why don’t we head up to the cockpit?” I called out.
Sweetwater hopped off the bench and shuffled across the deck. His head was just about even with the heads of the Marines sitting on the bench. Just as he reached me, the door to the can opened and Major Burton came out wiping his mouth.
“Major,” I called out. “The doctor and I were just about to visit the pilot. Would you care to join us?”
Burton looked at the ladder leading up to the cockpit and shook his head. “I’m still getting my sea legs.”
“Aye, sir,” I said. I was in charge. The generals had put me in charge, and Major Burton accepted my authority, but I wanted to show respect to an officer who had come out to die with his men.
I let Sweetwater climb the ladder first. With his chubby body and short limbs, he looked like a koala bear climbing a tree. I waited until he reached the top, then I went up after him.
As we reached the cockpit door, Sweetwater paused. He forced himself to look me in the eye, like a kid caught stealing cookies, and said, “Um, we might have neglected to mention to Raymond that we were coming on this mission.”
“I thought I told you to report to Freeman.” It occurred to me that I was scolding one of the brightest men in the galaxy the way a mother scolds a misbehaving child.
Even more ironic, he answered in kind. “We’re sorry, Lieutenant. It’s just …What if Raymond said we couldn’t come?” Somewhere in that stubby body still beat the heart of the schoolboy.
Fighting back the urge to laugh, I tried to sound angry as I said, “Well, we’re stuck with you now, whether he likes it or not.”
Sweetwater brightened, led the way into the cockpit, and called out, “Good afternoon, Raymond.” Then he said, “Good Lord, Raymond, that can’t be comfortable.”
Freeman sat cramped behind the controls of the ship. The engineers who designed the cockpit did not have a seven-foot, 350-pound man in mind when they placed the pilot’s chair a mere twenty-four inches away from the yoke. Freeman’s knees did not fit into the cavity under the HUD, so he had to sit with his legs straddling the yoke, a comical sight.
Freeman looked back, nodded at me, then said, “Good afternoon, Doctor.”
“How is our flight time looking?” Sweetwater asked. He really did behave like a nervous adolescent. He stood there nervously fidgeting, swinging his arms back and forth while rocking on his heels.
“We have a few hours ahead of us,” Freeman said in a velvet rumble. “Are you going in with us, Dr. Sweetwater, or just coming along for the ride?”
