By Other Means Page 7

  “Deal with it; we’ll have a Vettech give you a bath when we get home.” At the moment the girl was distracted by the sounds of Ke’Se extracting himself from his armor. Ra’Ewl leapt for the couch; there, built into the padded arm rest, was the controller. With a stubbly digit he pressed the window-screen button. In an instant, the stars no long shown through the panels, as the dark became black. The girl gasped in horror and started sobbing.

  “The batteries still work,” he mused as he turned to face the scene. Ke’Se was out of his suit and standing in front of the child. “Ready?” Ra’Ewl asked, before realizing his mistake. The Pacscomp could only communicate with the user’s Synaptic Interface within the confines of the helmet.

  “Suit, external,” he instructed. “Hi there.” sounded the male-neutral voice from the Parr’s external speakers. The girl turned toward the voice, her eyes wide; her mouth hung open as she panted to breathe.

  “It’s okay, we’re here to help. Don’t be scared.” It sounded cliché. “Suit hold, lights, thirty-percent, maximum diffusion, engage.” The helmet’s side lamp came on. Even at its low setting it still came on like a blazing sun. Ra’Ewl’s night vision switched off.

  The girl squealed and raised her arms to cover her eyes against the light, the blue plush animal she had been holding dangled precariously by its long ears; a trail of white stuffing lead to its midsection.

  Ke’Se had guessed his comrade’s intentions and was prepared. Slowly, he opened his eyes, allowing his pupils time to constrict. The girl’s boots stood like a grime-splattered wall in front of him. Not wanting a repeat of her earlier reaction, he decided not to reach for her, instead he purred.

  Timidly the girl peered around her arms in search of the sound. Her blue eyes locked onto Ke’Se’s, who then squinted his eyes in greetings and then tipped his head slightly to one side to be cute.

  For the first time something less then terror shown from the girl’s face; slowly she unfolded herself, and tentatively reached out toward the black and white cat. Ke’Se stepped forward, thrusting his head under the girl’s hand and pressed into her palm.

  To Ke’Se surprise, the girl giggled nervously and rocked forward onto her knees to throw her arms around him in an effort to pick him up. Of course, at fifteen pounds he was easily over a third of her weight, so he just stood there, as she hugged him and buried her face into his soft fur.

  “Raul from Owens, status!” came in over the comm. “What’s happened to Kizzy?”

  Ra’Ewl paused for a moment to figure out what to say; no doubt Ke’Se’s icon fell of the grid once he was out of range of his Pacscomp. “Ah, we have a domestic situation here,” he answered.

  “Be more specific.”

  “We found a child in the house near the tree strike,” he replied, wondering what would happen next. Looking up, he could see Owens’ icon in the distance.

  “Standby. I’ll be with you shortly,” he instructed.

  Sighting in on the scouts’ icons, Owens entered the building, closing the damaged door behind him as best he could. The Parr’s small helmet lamps lit up the house as if it were high noon. Owens went down on one knee, using the counters for cover from the windows; his weapon was at the ready. “Raul, turn them off.” The house went black; the intensity of his night vision display rose to compensate. The false safety of the darkness returned.

  Staying low, Owens moved over to the body. Next to it, the girl had reared back trying to take Ke’Se with her. The Parr—now standing up on his back legs—was held tight as if he was the girl’s only hope. Lowering his weapon, Owens allowed it to hang across his chest by its strap.

  “Raul?” he commed, as he reached for the body. Firmly he grabbed it by the shoulder and moved it; it was cold and sluggish, but not stiff. Whoever she was, she’s been dead for more than a day, he surmised.

  “Raul…” he repeated, when he realized that the Parr was sitting next to him. “Did you check their RF tags?” he asked, looking over at the girl. A knot now gripped his stomach. He’d seen that look of terror before, and not on the faces of a stranger, but of a friend, long ago, when her own parents had met a similar fate.

  “Negative, I don’t have a reader,” communed Ra’Ewl, as his suit’s synthetic voice joined in.

  With a practiced hand, Owens reached into his side pack and retrieved a wallet-sized device. He then held it near the body. “Suit, RF scan.” With that command, an ID photo and data line appeared with an arrow pointing at the body. Her name is—was—Sherilyn Carter; it went on to list that she was married and had a daughter.

  Owens then aimed the reader at the girl. “Christine ‘Crissy’ Carter,” he read aloud over the comm; “Year of birth, 2059. She’s only three.” Owens fought to keep his emotions in check.

  “Did you find anyone else?” he asked, wondering about the father.

  “Nope.”

  Owens gently reached over and put his hand on Mrs. Carter. Silently he prayed. He then took a deep breath; it cleared his mind and helped steadied his emotion.

  He then reach into his pack and pulled out a disposable chemlight. Removing the safety cap, he depressed the igniter, which popped. As the chemicals mixed, the room became awash in a soft white glow.

  “Sheeet.” meowed Ke’Se in purrsing, the closest thing the Parr had to a spoken language, as Crissy clutched him in a death grip when Owens was revealed by the light. Clad in his AS’Is carapace armor, the soldier must have appearance like some form of unimaginably large insect, suddenly materializing out of the darkness. Crissy was frozen with fear.

  “It’s okay, he’s not going to hurt you, he’s a friend.” said Ra’Ewl in an effort to comfort the girl.

  “Easy, easy…” Owens commed before realizing she could not hear him. “Suit, external.” “Easy there, Sweetie,” he said, calmly leaning forward, and motioning with his hand. Clearly it wasn’t working. Owens was still some faceless monster in her eyes.

  “Suit, unlock.” he said as he reached up and pulled the mandible portion of his helmet free. In response, the visor raised, leaving his face framed by his comhood. “It’s okay, Sweetie, please don’t squish the cat. They’re expensive,” he said gently.

  Ke’Se’s tail swished with annoyance at the remark, but at least the girl calmed down.

  “Raul, you get Kizzy back into armor,” Owens said as he stood up and walked toward the kitchen, then up the stairs.

  There was no sign that the girl was going to give him up. Ke’Se knew he could fight his way free, but that was not even going to be his last option. Longingly, he turned to see what his comrade was up to.

  Ra’Ewl was now next to them reaching for the girl’s discarded plushy; his glove’s prosthetic grippers were deployed and acting as a set of opposable thumbs. With the toy in paw, he moved off in a three-legged hop, to sit down with his back toward the two.

  Owens had returned; his helmet was closed with the visor still up. He was carrying a small blanket adorned with wide-eyed blue bunnies. “What’s the hold up?”

  “Working on it,” Ra’Ewl said. Turning he held up the plushy as he closed his medpack; the rabbit’s torn abdomen was now covered by a gray contact bandage. He gently shook it, making its long ears flop about.

  “It’s okay, Sweetie, you can take your rabbit,” Owens assured her.

  Reluctantly, she let go of Ke’Se and grabbed for the toy. She clutched it even tighter than she had the cat, all the while giving Owens and Ra’Ewl a pouting frown, as if their handling of her toy was more of an offense than their presence. Ke’Se backed away the moment she took possession of the plushy.

  “Right,” Owens said in a firm tone. “We’re going to EVAC her to the recover site.”

  “What about the mission?” asked Ra’Ewl, as he helping Ke’Se back into his armor. “Couldn’t we just leave her here, and pick her up on the way out?”

  Owens knelt in front of her; setting the blanket aside he reached over and placed his hands on her upper arms. “Can’t take the ch
ance. If something happened…” he trailed off. “Besides, we’ve accomplished the primary objective, so everything else is ‘up to the discretion of the team’,” he quoted.

  “What if we leave Ke’Se here to keep and eye on her?”

  Ke’Se was mostly back into his suit, with only his head still sticking out. “Feek que,” he meowed, and pushed his head down through the neck coupling. Ra’Ewl then flipped his backpack closed, and like a man doing CPR, he pressed down onto his comrade’s back with both paws, throwing his weight into the effort.

  “On line,” communed Ke’Se, as he flipped his head around while trying to get his paw up to his faceplate as if trying to groom. “Damn, I stink.”

  Owens angled his head, both Parrs’ icons shown on his display. “You two, outside, check for Echos,” he ordered.

  Ke’Se tromped off in compliance; Ra’Ewl sat down next to Owens. “You know she’s going to shine like a marker beacon in the infrared.”

  “No shite,” Owens agreed. “All we can do is dampen her down, and break up her silhouette.”

  “What about telling…someone she’s here?” said Ra’Ewl reluctantly; he’d expected Owens to spaz out on him for even suggesting turning her over to the bad guys; the Legion.

  “That’s not happening, cat,” stated Owens, a determined edge to his voice. “Now get outside and do your job.”

  “Acknowledged.” Ra’Ewl ran from the living room.

  Owens turned to look at Crissy; she was so very small, his armored gloves were massive by comparison. It would be so easy to unintentionally hurt her. “Sweetie, I need you to stand up, can you do that for me?” he said while nodding his head in the affirmative.

  On shaky legs she stood. Owens helped to steadied her, but in the back of his mind the fear that he might accidentally break her fought for his attention. Carefully he retrieved the blanket and placed it around her so that it could be pulled up over her head.

  “Mommy!” Crissy cried in a hoarse voice; tears welling up in her eyes as she uselessly flung herself hard toward the body on the ground.

  Owens held on to her, knowing too well that if she didn’t calm down, this was not going to work. All he could think to do was fall back on what had comforted him. “Crissy, Sweetie, please look at me.”

  Her tear filled eye met his. “Sweetie, we have to go. Mommy is with God now, and I promise you, that after you have had a long and happy life, you’ll be with her again.” Owens’ faith had always been strong, but in this day and age, God was often something other people talked about, not something they believed in.

  It could have just been the look in Owens’ eyes, or his sincere tone of voice, but Crissy stopped crying and fighting him. She closed her eyes and clung to him as if what he’d said had changed everything.

  Relieved, Owens swung his weapon so that it rode under his right arm within easy reach of his hand. Snapping closed his visor he gently picked up the girl and carried her on his left arm, the thumb of that hand tucked into the webbing of his load-carrying gear. “Raul, Kizzy, status?”

  “All clear,” they replied.

  “On the move.”

  The team moved through the darkness as if it held no domain over them. Once again they were operating on active night vision, as their infrared lamps punched small arcs of scenery out of the surrounding void. The Parrs were scouting ahead. Owens followed, trying to minimize bouncing the girl around as he negotiated the uneven, root-covered ground.

  “Hold up!” instructed Ke’Se, excitement flavoring his words as he went to ground.

  Ra’Ewl went down onto his stomach.

  Turning off his helmet lamps, Ke’Se sat up. Ra’Ewl looked off into the same general direction to see what had attracted his comrade’s attention. With his lights out, Ra’Ewl crept up on Ke’Se and then slowly sat up next to him. “Where?”

  “At about thirty-degrees, something moved against the ambience of the clearing.”

  Through Ra’Ewl’s scopes, the break in the trees shone like sunlight as seen at the far end of a dark tunnel. “Suit, nine-power.” His display transitioned into a magnified view; now the slightest movement of his head was exaggerated. Looking down at his compass display, he aimed his head to thirty-degrees.

  Intently he scanned the area. There it was; a rounded, smooth shape, black against the background glow. It was moving to its left, toward another of its kind standing next to a tree. The silhouette was all too familiar.

  “Owens, we have bad guys!” Ra’Ewl communed, not waiting for Owens to confirm he was listening.

  “Raul, say again!”

  “We have ECHOS between us and the recovery site!” repeated Ra’Ewl, making sure to emphasize the term Owens used for the bad guys.

  Owens darted for cover behind a bank of surface roots. Like gigantic snakes they twisted around and over each other, covering the ground between the two massive trees. Bracing the girl with his free hand, Owens came to an abrupt halt behind the roots; going down onto one knee, he leaned forward so that only his head was above the edge.

  Startled, Crissy cried out.

  In the still air of the forest, the sound carried; bouncing off into the distance.

  The Parrs turned in response; Owens icon was at the epicenter.

  Ra’Ewl swung back to reacquire the bad guys, things had changed. “Owens, the Echoes are on the move.”

  “Roger that,” replied Owens. He turned to the little girl.

  “Sweetie, please quiet down,” he pleaded, his helmet just inches away from her. No good. “Kizzy, get back here. Raul, maintain contact, and make damn sure you don’t get between us and the Echoes,” he ordered.

  Pulling the blanket up around her head, Owens carefully placed the girl down into a gap among the roots. “Crissy, you need to stay here,” he told her. She was already trying to work her way free. Owens used careful force to keep her in place.

  Ke’Se landed with a soft thump, his IR lamps on low barely lit up the scene; Owens was always astonished at just how fast a Parr could run. “Suit, external, disengage.” He was now back on comm traffic only. “You keep her here anyway you can.” He gestured for Ke’Se to take over. “Knock her down and sit on her if you have to, just keep her under cover.”

  The Parr moved around Owens’ legs, and up under his arms; with outstretched paws he took over. “How do I keep her quiet?”

  Owens moved back and reached for his weapon. With one smooth motion he brought his square-framed rifle up and placed it at the ready. On his visor’s display the weapon’s semicircular targeting reticle appeared, its PIP (Projected Impact Point) dot resting at its center. “You don’t.” He then moved off.

  “Ra’Ewl, what do we have?” Owens was moving quickly to gain distance from the girl.

  “Two, possible three Echoes, moving toward your…” Ra’Ewl looked back, Owens’ icon was moving up off to his right. He corrected his response, “Ke’Se’s position. They’re just over a hundred yards ahead of me.”

  “Stay left and close to fifty. Then bunker down.”

  “Acknowledged.” Ra’Ewl sped off.

  Owens was still covering ground, all the time looking for an advantageous place to set up his ambush. “On station,” came over the comm from Ra’Ewl. The time is now, thought Owens. Just ahead was another ancient tree. Its trunk was easily six yards across, with massive surface roots splayed out from its buttress.

  He moved into position behind the tree. Looking around, he tried to memorize the position of the potentially foot-tripping roots. With his left hand against the tree, he turned off his IR lamps and maneuvered around the trunk.

  Now in relative darkness, he could see the distant glow from the far-off clearing; Ra’Ewl’s green icon shown off to his left. Intently, he scanned the arc between himself, the Parr, and the clearing. His eyes locked onto two sets of small lights. A sudden feeling of intense anticipation washed over him, not unlike a child forced to wait to open a present.

  Bracing himself against the tree, he rais
ed his weapon. With a squeeze of his right hand, he depressed the leading edge of the rifle’s handgrip; Click. The safeties were off and power made available. A pull of the two-fingered trigger would now launch a salvo of electromagnetically accelerated, armor-piercing darts.

  Owens settled his sight’s PIP onto the further of the two. “Firing!” he warned his comrades over the comm, as his darts cracked through the air, breaking the sound barrier. The first target bounced from the hits, but without waiting for it to drop he swung onto the second. He couldn’t hear the concluding thump of his projectiles as they punched through mesh body armor to render flesh and smash bone, but he knew with satisfaction they had hit.

  He released the trigger and the world went quiet, nothing moved. Owens took in a breath; he had been holding it while he fired. Although it had only been a few seconds, his body demanded air.

  “On the move,” called Owens as he stepped forward over the root. He’d heard the thump and caught sight of the flash; in that moment, his training took over as muscle memory tried to drive him to safety.

  Everything was a blur of motion as the world flew past at strange angles; memories of being in the heart of a blazing fire raced in his mind. He could hear breathing, it was becoming louder and labored, his eyes snapped open; it was him.

  “Status,” he choked. Coughing, he spat up something; it had a strong metallic taste.

  “Corporal Owens, you are critically injured,” stated the Pascomp in its emotionally neutral female voice.

  Owens fought to reorient himself; he was prone and lying on his left side. As he kicked out with his right leg, a wave of pain slashed through him. The momentum rolled him onto his back, the pain forcing his eyes shut, trapping him in hell. “Combat!” he screamed pasted the pain.

  “Corporal Owens, the administering of Comburodorphin in your current state could result in exsanguination,” it said calmly.