"Nice to see we could kill them," Psycho replied.
"Move it, gang—we're gone." Snow Leopard wasn't wasting any time. He began sloshing vigorously through the scummy water. We followed, quickly. We passed a downed probe, a large wing jutting out of the water, riddled with xmax and laser, glowing pale green in my darksight.
"Look at that—nobody's ever seen anything like that before," Snow Leopard remarked. One was a student of history, and he always felt he was a direct participant in momentous events.
"I'd just as soon have passed on the honor, thanks," I responded.
"They're not unbeatable, Thinker—we shot down their probes!" Psycho insisted. "I'll bet some O probe jockey is catching hell right now from his One."
"Look at this." Snow Leopard paused before an open doorway. It was a very odd doorway, narrow and high—about twice the height of a man. A corridor, flooded with filthy water, the walls glistening with slime. One had one hand out, almost as if he was feeling the air.
"We go in." No explanation. Never an explanation, from Beta One. Just an order, and we move. In, we go in. He was just as crazy as Psycho.
Into the unknown, again. A cold sweating corridor as black as death, sloshing through chest-deep water, our shoulders almost touching the walls. Into the Camp of the O's. I knew we were crazy—all of us, totally insane.
We were so far gone there was simply no reason left.
A terrible grinding noise shook the walls, and the starport trembled. We stopped as the walls moved around us and the water shivered. Vibrations, in our bones. The base was tearing itself apart.
###
Nobody said a word. I think we were all stunned into silence by the sight. We were in a tall, lightless, ice-cold room, the walls covered with slime. The room was full of corpses, pale blue naked human corpses lying on slabs, rubbery plastic tubing glistening with black blood running from cold pale arms up to an overhead rack.
"Life, life, life!" Sweety's reaction was more human than our own. "They are alive, Thinker. All of them—still alive!"
We followed the tubing to an auto device where the tubing spit the blood into a mechanism which eventually squirted it into an endless line of pale plastic bottles.
Bottles of blood, for the O's. Strange. I picked up one of the bottles and slipped it into a pouch on my U-belt.
Snow Leopard turned back to the living dead. It was pitch black to the Systies. They glowed green in our darksight. Sightless open eyes, glazed dead eyes. One of them blinked. A female, hovering before the gates of death, cold and skeletal and wasted. She could see nothing. Perhaps she sensed movement. Her mouth opened, a silent scream before the gates. She could feel the cold. She thought we were the O.
I gently pulled the tubing from her arm—it was attached with a regulator of some sort. I slapped on a patch. She began trembling violently. What could we do? They were only alive because the air in this section of the base was still breathable. How could we take them with us? It would be a procession of the dead and the doomed, sleepwalking through the Realm of the Ghouls. I did not even dare to voice my questions.
"Come on you, slimy subs! Mommy's ready!" Psycho was going berserk. "I'll roast you alive! Crawl out of your holes, subs! Try Legion blood, you worms! I'll stick this link right up your ass!" Psycho was whirling his Manlink around wildly, ready to fire, his eyes flashing behind his faceplate.
"Calm down, Five!" Snow Leopard ordered. "I have some news for you."
"News? News? Scut! I got news for you—we're not leaving here until every last, stinking O is dead!"
"Warhound is here," Snow Leopard said calmly.
"What? Where?"
"Close. He's close. He's getting closer. Follow me."
We were shocked into silence by Snow Leopard's statement. And now he was moving again, into another open, dark doorway.
Follow me. No explanations, from our One. How could he know where Warhound was, when even Sweety did not know? What would happen to the Systies? We followed. What the hell else could we do?
We followed.
###
"Six on scope," Sweety announced calmly. A chill shot through my veins. This was not a good place. It was a seemingly endless series of tall cubicles, cloaked in total darkness, strange grilled glassy walls, a mushroom-shaped column rising from the center of each cubicle, as tall as a man. Alien devices hung from the ceiling, and many of them had fallen to the floor, blocking the cubicles. Each cubicle was open where the walls would have met, four separate exits leading to eight adjoining cubicles. It was a twisted maze, and it was buckling and breaking up.
The dying starport shuddered and groaned. Tortured metal shrieked and moaned. Vibrations rattled our bones.
The floor shifted under me. A dull boom echoed in my ears.
The roof cracked and rippled. The lava was getting closer. I checked out the tacmap. Snow Leopard was in an adjoining cubicle just ahead of me. Psycho was in a cubicle just behind me.
Warhound was up ahead—clearly marked on my scope, a glowing point of light: B6. There was no doubt about it. One had been right all along—it was Warhound!
"Six, One. Report." Silence, only the hissing of the tacnet in our ears.
"Six, One. Report." Silence. Silence, silence. Warhound was moving.
"Six approaching," Sweety informed me.
"Warhound, it's Snow Leopard. Report! Have you got us on scope?" Snow Leopard was moving forward, toward Warhound. I followed, threading my way past massive, downed instruments, in and out of cubicles. This was not good. I did not like this at all.
"Warhound, we're approaching you. Is your commo out?"
Silence. Only silence, from Beta Six. Snow Leopard was almost on him.
"Six on xmax, safety off!" A warning, from Sweety.
"Six, it's One. Don't…"
A shattering explosion, brilliant white-hot shrapnel ricocheting everywhere, burning white tracks on my darksight. Again, again! Warhound was firing auto xmax at Snow Leopard!
"Cease fire! Cease fire! It's One!" I shouted.
"Warhound, it's Snow Leopard! Cease fire!" One ordered. I charged forward, dodging around massive chunks of metal, in and out of cubicles, snatching glances at Warhound and Snow Leopard on the tacmap. Warhound was only a few cubicles away now.
"Warhound, it's Thinker! Cease fire!" The wall exploded, glowing with laser tracks.
"Six firing at you with laser!" Sweety informed me briskly.
"Psycho, Warhound is firing at us!"
"Scut!"
"Beta, retreat! Six is firing at us!" Xmax auto, ripping away, a long, wild burst, flashes of lightning dancing on my faceplate. A tremendous explosion split the darkness. My tacmap flickered and faded. A deceptor was banging away, scrambling everything.
"I've fired deceptor," I heard Psycho in a wave of crackling static. "Get out…"
"Six advancing on you!" Sweety was still with me!
"Don't shoot him, Thinker!" Snow Leopard ordered—I could barely hear him. I was scrambling to get away, darting in and out of cubicles at random, heading away from Warhound, a glowing dot on my tacmap.
"Six pursuing!" Xmax, supersonic slivers of steel whistling all around me, my suit suddenly ringing with hits, rocking me off my feet.
"Multiple hits!" I landed up against one of the metal mushrooms, my ears ringing, my faceplate a flashing mass of red lights, alarms ringing in my ears. Warhound stepped into the cubicle.
Warhound, armored and armed, black armor smoking, red faceplate dark and dead, raising his E calmly, the stock sliding easily into his shoulder, the barrel pointed right at me, brilliant laser sight flooding my faceplate, as cold as death. I snapped my E to V-max auto and fired. The world exploded in my face. I winked out in a flash of atoms.