We walked, rather than using our suit propulsion systems. Flying would have been a lot faster, but we wanted to maintain as low a profile as possible. Even Marvin barely used his repellers, relying partially on his tentacles to drag himself forward. He reminded me of some kind of snake-being I’d read about in Greek mythology-a gorgon, that was it.
Overhead, the battle still raged. My squad of ships had located the big Macro with the AA missile cluster. These battles had often gone badly for my ships in the past, but this time was different. It wasn’t only the Macros who’d made technological advancements in equipment and technique. My destroyers kept their formation and kept blowing up missiles until the machine ran out of ammo. Fortunately, there was only one of the machines. Once it stopped firing, they swarmed it and used their heavy laser turrets to cut it apart. It was quickly reduced to slag.
Having destroyed the local anti-air defenses, they moved on to finding the nearest harvesting vehicles. These they destroyed with as much flash and flare as possible. The idea was to keep all enemy attention on them-so the Macros would ignore us. So far, it seemed to be working.
They didn’t get too close to the pit itself, however. I wanted them to draw out the defenders from under their shells, and I didn’t want any them to engage any serious weapons the enemy may have unless there was no choice. The ships were there to raid and harry the enemy-not to plunge into open battle.
In all likelihood, however, the Macro dome had called out for help. In these situations production centers often would summon a large number of supporting troops to its side for protection. This had me worried about my squad. The ships could withdraw in seconds, but not us ground-sloggers. I knew my team could take on a single machine-maybe even two of the big ones. But we would be wiped out if we were caught out here in the open by a dozen metal monsters.
“Let’s step it up,” I called to Kwon.
He relayed the order, shouting with incredible volume. We began trotting through the mud. Our pounding feet sunk ten inches deep with every step. Each time I ripped my armored foot loose from the sucking mud, I was glad for my exoskeletal help. These boots couldn’t come off, and my legs had the power to keep pumping even if I was buried in a wall of mud.
Things stayed only mildly interesting until we reached the edge of the big pit. It was like a crater-a wound in the earth. The land had looked bad in the surrounding region, but it looked hellish down in that dark, spiraling hole. The air was a smoky haze. I could make out the shapes of Macro workers down below, resembling metallic insects at this distance. The light rain continued, combining with the hanging vapors to obscure the bottom.
“This looks promising,” I announced cheerfully. “Who wants point?”
“I’ll do it, sir,” Kwon said.
I frowned, but after looking at the rest of my unenthusiastic team, I finally nodded. I didn’t like having my First Sergeant risk himself on point, but maybe right now it was a good idea. “Okay, move out.”
Kwon took the first step-and slid down a muddy hillside. Without having his repellers on, he was off-balance. He handled it well, sitting down and sledding through the mud.
“Looks like fun,” I said, and headed after him. I managed to stay on my feet all the way to the bottom, but just barely. The rest of the troops followed.
We’d made it down to the first spiraling roadway. A dozen more hundred-foot drops lay ahead-or maybe it was two dozen. At some point, we couldn’t see any deeper into the hole. I peered into the shadowy darkness that lay below.
“That’s funny,” I said, staring at it.
Captain Sloan stepped up next to me. I couldn’t help but notice he was one of the last men to take the plunge down into this sinkhole.
“You’ve got a strange sense of humor, Colonel,” he said, eyeing the shifting cloud of darkness ahead.
“What the hell is that?” I asked. “I don’t get it. I figured the dome was buried down here, but now I’m not so sure. From space, this black cloud looked like smoke or vapor of some kind-up close, I don’t know what I’m looking at.”
Marvin slithered near and joined us. “It’s biotic in nature,” he said.
We all looked at him, except for Kwon, who was getting ready to slide down the next cliff of mud on his butt again. He looked back in my direction. “Best to keep moving, Colonel,” he said.
“Hold on a second,” I said, raising my hand. “I’m getting a feeling here, and I don’t like it. Marvin, what kind of bullshit have you gotten us into?”
“Your reference is unclear. This is not fecal matter, but a slurry of silicon, carbon and water, mixed with a variety of other elements. The biotic content is less than one percent.”
One percent biotic? That sounded high to me, but I shook my head and approached him. When dealing with Marvin, it was important not to get distracted by random statements, interesting though they might be. He had half a dozen cameras on me, a sure sign I was worrying him.
“Let’s get back to the part about that cloud. You say it is biotic in nature, and the last time I talked to you, I found you slurping up slime in some mud hole at the LZ. What do you know about what we are facing here?”
“There are few certainties. I have suspicions, which I’m trying to verify. In time, I will make a full report.”
“In time, we’ll all be dead-even you, Marvin. Talk to me now, before this team goes another step deeper into this hellhole. You tell me what you are holding back. What is it you don’t want us to know?”
Marvin had a camera on everyone in the team now. The rain still drizzled over our suits. His electric eyes focused and zoomed independently. I knew he was taking a reading of our collective mood. Apparently, he didn’t like what he saw, because he swung most of his cameras back to me and finally answered.
“The cloud ahead is biotic in nature. It is a life form, I believe. A mass made of many small parts. In a way, it is similar to a nanite formation.”
My helmet swiveled back toward the shifting darkness. It looked like thick smoke, but I supposed it could be more of a giant, gaseous jellyfish. “You’re telling me that thing is alive? It’s huge. Is it solid, liquid or gas?”
“None of those. It is more like a living plasma, or a living gel. Part gaseous, part liquid. Very little of it could be called a solid.”
Sloan lifted a gauntlet and pointed at the robot. “I have it!” he said. “It’s a mass of those microbes, the ones we found back on the Macro cruiser. Is that it, Marvin?”
“Good question,” I said, giving Sloan a nod.
“No,” Marvin said.
We all looked at him, but he didn’t volunteer anything more.
“Well?” I demanded. “Then what is it? If you want to press ahead with this mission, you’d better keep talking.”
“It’s a single organism, not a mass made up of a trillion individual cells.”
I grunted unhappily. Far from being like robots in old movies, Marvin was a tight-lipped miser with information, rather than a mechanical blabbermouth. “Okay, what the heck is it doing squatting at the bottom of this hole?”
“It is imprisoned here.”
I nodded. “Fine. Is there a Macro dome down there with it? Or was all that talk of a production facility in this location a trick to get us to come here?”
Marvin hesitated. “I don’t know.”
Half the men in the squad groaned aloud. Marvin swung his cameras from face to face.
“All right,” I said. “I apologize, everyone. Marvin, you are fired. When I get you off this world, I’m putting you into a hold on the Centaur stations where you can’t do any more harm.”
I pulled out my com-link and activated it.
Marvin slithered closer and a cluster of his cameras studied me. “What are you doing, Colonel Riggs?”
“What does it look like? I’m calling Fleet.”
“But we were to maintain long-range radio silence.”