"…brace for crash landing, recommended, emergency navcom still functioning, pilot is unconscious, flight controls are partially responding. Hit! Hit! Hit! Major damage, land and abandon vehicle to…"
We were dropping fast! My seat was right behind Redhawk and he was slumped down in his seat. I activated the emergency release on my restraints and vaulted over Redhawk's bloody armor to seize the controls. I managed to veer the car away from a sheer cliff—just in time! Warhound and Priestess frantically hauled Redhawk out of the cockpit as I forced my way into the pilot's seat. The controls vibrated harshly and I could barely hold them steady even with Sweety's help.
"…EMERGENCY LANDING SYSTEM FAILING!" the car announced. I struggled to gain lift as the aircar fell like a brick towards the surface. It was all dark out there except for a wide river of glittering golden lava—we were headed right for it!
"Look out, Thinker!" Snow Leopard warned. A slice of velvet suddenly split the river and I pointed the car's nose right at it—we were going down and I didn't want to land in the lava. I prayed our target was flat land and not a pile of slag floating on top of the lava river.
We hit with a bone-jarring impact and skidded out of control through a stony surface as I struggled to stay conscious. Dead! We were dead!
###
"It's an island—just as Sweety said," I told Psycho. "And there's no way off." Psycho and I lay motionless in a field of pumice, under a smoky night sky full of burning ash. Our recon was over—and the result was not good. Our aircar had crashed onto a long island of volcanic rubble set in the middle of a wide, relentless, white-hot river of lava that ground past us with elemental force. The rock around us steamed, poisonous yellow gases hissing. A phosphorescent red glow lit up the lava river. Pumice glittered like glassy diamonds on the shore. The ground shook like jelly as we watched, and an awful shrieking, grinding noise set my teeth on edge. A hot breeze blew against our faceplates—a dull roaring and crackling. The temperature kept rising—our armor glowed.
"They'll spot us out here," I observed.
"You're a real strategist," Psycho replied. "Nice work on picking this spot to land. How come you're not an officer?"
"It's because I don't want to have to deal with people like you! Shut down, will ya?" I snapped. I was getting sick of his jibes.
"Let's get closer!" he said, snaking forward.
The lava river rumbled past us, a fiery torrent of glittering, molten lava. Massive chunks of golden goo bobbed and churned in eerie slow motion, hissing and sparkling. A mighty, magical river of liquid stone, flowing into the unknown. Hot volcanic winds roared all around us. Sparks filled the air. Fire and brimstone, a glittering, luminous river from the heart of Hell. We watched the molten rock grind past, flickering and spitting, and listened to the roaring of the wind.
"This is the most beautiful thing I've ever seen." Psycho sounded completely content.
"Psycho, look at the tacmap," I said. "This river flows down towards the Omni base. It empties into the lake."
"Who cares?" Psycho asked. "We're trapped like rats. We're going to have to go back to Snow Leopard, confirm there's no way out, and then all we can do is wait for somebody to show up—and if it's the O's, we're cooked. So say your prayers."
He was right. If we called for help, or signaled a nova, the O's would have us.
A double blast echoed above us. Golden laser tracks flickered high above through the smoke. The fighting was going on without us and the flames from our aircar wreck would be an effective homing beacon. Sooner or later, someone would come down and investigate. I feared it wouldn't be the Legion. Every extra instant we spent on this island brought us closer to death.
"I suppose so," I responded. "I suppose you're right."
"You can bet your next watch on it. We're all going to die, just like the Second said, but I promise you, we're going to take some O's with us. You can bet on that, too." Psycho's boyish features twisted, behind his faceplate—an evil grin.
I looked again at the river of lava. Surely this was the River of Doom, where the souls of the dead board the ferryboat to the Underworld, leaving the shores of life behind them forever. I had no coins for the boatman. A shiver ran over my body. My armor glowed from the heat, but my blood ran icy cold. Then, the idea hit me. I knew what we would have to do, and it was terrifying.
###
"You're completely out of your mind." A river of molten gold reflected off Snow Leopard's faceplate. His pink eyes burnt with emotion. We were all gathered together. We'd carefully dragged Redhawk all the way from the aircar to the shore of the glowing river. His armor was riddled with holes, but we had sealed it. He was badly wounded, but Priestess was taking good care of him. I had no doubt Snow Leopard had already made his decision about my idea, one way or the other, but we would have to go over it again. Snow Leopard wanted to be sure he was right.
"We can do it, Snow Leopard—we can do it!" I insisted. "It's not that wide. All we have to do is reach the far shore! It'll get us there!"
"It'll kill us. You're crazy. There's no guarantee it'll work!"
"There's no guarantee in your Legion contract either," I quietly reminded him. "You always told me that."
"We'll sink! Like a stone!"
"No, we won't, we'll float! Sweety's done the calculations. We laser the parts from the fuselage of the aircar. Then we weld it together with the plasma, fill in the gaps, and we've got a cenite boat—a raft. We can even rig up a tiller! We can build it in no time, and then we can move off this rock! We can reach the other side and hide or continue the mission, whatever you want! Redhawk can just lie there in the boat, and we'll be off! Otherwise, we're dead!"
More Legion fighters and Omni tracers streaked overhead. I pointed at the burning hulk behind us. "Sooner or later someone's going to have time to check that out."
"This is the craziest idea I've ever heard." Snow Leopard stared at that awful river, hypnotized. The mountain trembled. An explosion of yellow sparks glittered over the lava. A deep rumble shuddered in our bones.
"It's a great idea," Psycho said dreamily. "It's the best idea Thinker has ever had. We ride—we ride the fire, right into Hell."
"It's insane," Priestess said quietly. "But everything we do here is insane—I'm for it, because it means easy transport for Redhawk. We can't carry him much further. We just can't. And it doesn't matter if we die, does it? We die anyway."
"You're all nuts," Warhound declared. "This must be a psycho ward. Why don't we just jump off the cliff into the lava and swim there? Huh? Maybe that will work, too. How long do you think our armor will hold out?"
"We should name the river," Psycho said, ignoring Warhound. "Beta River. How's that? Beta River—our very own river. I never had a river before."
The lava groaned past us, great glowing chunks of semi-liquid rock, bobbing along in slow motion in a glittering red-gold river of liquid sunshine, volcano blood. Snow Leopard silently gazed into the river. Finally he stirred.
"It's insane," he said. "We do it. Let's get started on the boat."
###
Adrenalin flooded my system as we launched the boat. I was certain we would all die, but I didn't care—I was proud of that crude, ugly boat. A beautiful boat, I thought, perfect for our needs and fitting for a Legion squad. We installed some railing for handholds and a tiller. We had several long cenite poles, which we hoped would be useful for steering and to avoid floating boulders of semi-solidified lava. It was a primitive, functional metal boat, scarred and burnt white by our plasma welding, watertight and lavatight. Priestess had traced a giant Legion cross onto the deck, and Psycho had named our boat, bold white letters lasered onto the side: BEYOND. It was an altogether fitting and proper boat for our last ride.