combat armor fit him, but time was the thing we lacked. What he needed most was a helmet, but that big head of his was too wide to fit a standard-sized helmet.
Wondering what tortures the air inside those caves would perform on Sweetwater, I gave him the thumbs-up to show that I had heard him just fine. Then I hit the button to open the ramp, knowing I had just signed the little scientist’s death sentence.
The kettle doors slid open, revealing Breeze’s aircraft. Standing silently beside me, William Sweetwater stared at the plane that had brought his close friend to his death. He was breathing through the oxygen mask now, his breath fogging the clear plastic.
Maybe it was just my imagination, but I sensed death as I looked at the little six-seater plane. Breeze had left the hatch hanging open. Up here in the mountains, that opened door looked out of place. It reminded me of a porch light left on for a traveler who would never return.
Sergeant Thomer asked, “Lieutenant, should I have the men unpack the crates?” waking me from dour thoughts.
“I would appreciate it, Sergeant,” I said.
“Aye, aye, sir,” Thomer said.
“Major, we might as well send everybody out,” I said.
I felt a certain level of helplessness looking across the kettle. Marines in dark combat armor moved around the shadowy cabin. Across the deck, Ray Freeman slid down the ladder from the cockpit with the alacrity of a spider on a web. They were a good crew, a game crew, men ready to put up a fight.
Sweetwater opened his canvas satchel and brought out a T-shaped environmental meter much like the one Freeman had used on our last trip into the mines. As the little scientist tested the air, Thomer and his men removed the nuclear devices from their crates.
Stripped from their crates, the nukes were distinctly unimpressive—neither especially heavy nor unreasonably large—two polished metal cylinders about one yard long and two feet in diameter with two sets of handles, one at either end. With some struggle, a single Marine could have lugged each device, but we assigned four to the task. They carried the devices like pallbearers around a casket.
Freeman, carrying a case in one hand and a particle-beam cannon in the other, came to the ramp. Sweetwater naturally gravitated toward the giant mercenary. He had been the eyes and hands of the Science Lab. When they ran field experiments, Sweetwater and Breeze had relied on Freeman to carry out their wishes.
“I don’t know how long he’s going to last,” I told Freeman over a private line. “Did you check out his breathing gear? That oxygen mask isn’t going to protect him. I’ve seen masks like that before; it’s from a paramedic’s emergency kit. The seal around his mask is not airtight.”
“I know,” Freeman whispered.
“He’s going to breathe in fumes,” I said. “Most of his face is exposed. You saw what that stuff does.”
“I’ll take care of him,” Freeman said.
“We’ll carry him as long as we can, but when he falls behind …”
“I’ll take care of it,” Freeman said. I knew better than to argue.
I took one last look around the kettle. The men stood ready to fight, but I sensed something brittle in their resolve. Burton stood at the head of the company, a man ready to take any risk because he feared losing control of the situation or possibly control of himself. The men fell into lines. William Sweetwater, who now held nothing more than a small penlight in his hands, kept himself apart from the Marines. He orbited around Freeman like a child keeping an eye on a protective parent in a crowd.
“Let’s move out,” I said, giving the order in an unnaturally quiet voice.
The bright ion curtain sky shone in through the open ramp as we marched out. It had rained recently. My boots sank a quarter of an inch in the mud-covered ground.
“It’s 2100 hours,” Burton said. “Maybe we’ll see a night sky when we come back out. I’d be willing to nursemaid a nuke through a cave of gigantic alien spiders to see a real night sky.”
“Did Sweetwater mention that most of those spiders are mindless drones that are no more dangerous than a footlocker as long as you stay out of their way?” I asked.
“Yup,” Burton said.
“Did he mention that some of them are as big as jeeps?”
“The hunter spiders?” Burton asked.
“I think there are live aliens controlling the big ones,” I said.
“Yeah, that’s what Dr. Sweetwater said, that they’re avatars, just like the soldiers we’ve been fighting,” Burton said.
“Yeah, avatars,” I said, still stunned at how much more easily the men accepted the idea that they were fighting avatars than the generals had. “There aren’t very many of the big ones.”
“Good to know,” Burton said.
We stood and watched as the men filed out of the transport. Thomer led the riflemen, each of them carrying particle-beam cannons—guns with slightly better range than our standard-issue particle-beam pistols. They also had rockets. Every man in the company carried rockets.
Next came Herrington and Boll, leading the team carrying the first of the nukes.
“Harris, you’re not going to go berserk on us, are you? I mean, you’re not going to get so hopped up on that combat hormone that you start killing us off, are you?” Burton asked over a private channel.
“If you have to die, wouldn’t you rather be killed by one of your men?” I asked.
Burton turned and let the ranks walk past him until only Sweetwater, Freeman, and I remained in the ship. He raised his right hand as if preparing to salute me, then flipped me off.
Standing at the base of the ramp, Sweetwater saw Burton flip me the finger. He looked from Burton, then to me, then back to Burton. “Does that mean the same thing to Marines that it means to scientists?” he shouted through his oxygen mask.
“I’m sure it does,” I said.
“Trouble among the ranks?” he asked, then waddled off to stand nearer to Freeman.
Breeze had parked beside a different entrance than the one Freeman and I used. We would not need to scale the mountain to reach this one; it was level with the ridge.
“Get ready,” I said over the open frequency, as we neared the entrance. The men lugging the nuclear devices pulled their pistols out of their holsters. The company grenadiers unstrapped rocket launchers, and the riflemen readied their particle-beam cannons. Seeing the other men with their weapons, Sweetwater pulled out the particle beam pistol I’d given him. He held it like an old-fashioned dueler—the barrel only inches from his nose, the muzzle aimed toward the sky.
“Last chance for you to turn back,” I said to him through the speaker in my helmet. My respect for the diminutive scientist would not have changed if he’d soiled his pants and run back to the transport, but I knew he would not. Sweetwater turned toward me and pointed at the back of his hand. His skin was already turning an inflamed red as if he were having an allergic reaction. Given a little more time, blisters would form. The skin on his cheeks and forehead had a ruddy look as well.
“It’s too late to turn back now,” he yelled through the mask. He did not need to yell for me to hear him, but he did not know that.
“You took a reading before you left the ship. Did you know this was going to happen?” I asked.
He shrugged and walked away.
“Plucky little son of a bitch,” I whispered to myself. That was heartfelt praise in Marine-ese. From where I stood, with their backs to me, Freeman and Sweetwater looked like a father-and-son act. Freeman, tall and broad, Sweetwater short and stubby. Sweetwater stayed in perfect sync with the big man. When Freeman turned left, so did Sweetwater.
Noticing Sweetwater’s physical deterioration, Thomer fell back, and asked, “Is he going to be okay?”
“You mean Sweetwater?” I asked.
“Yeah, is he going to be all right?” Thomer asked.
“He’s melting. The air out here is like acid.”
Like the entrance Freeman and I used when we explored the mines, this entrance led to a foyer filled with light from the ion curtain. Burton and two of his riflemen led the way in. I entered next, followed by the teams carrying the bombs. Freeman and Sweetwater came next, with more riflemen and grenadiers bringing up the
