He had every reason he could wish for to cancel this operation. No one would blame him in the least if he pulled the plug right now. Not General Drakon, not President Iceni, not the Kommodor, not Honore Bradamont whose worry had been ill concealed when they parted, and certainly not his own soldiers, who knew enough about combat operations to know how ugly this one was.
But he couldn’t do it. He couldn’t give up without trying. It wasn’t pride, he told himself. Partly it was the knowledge that more than once seemingly impregnable enemy positions had proven to be surprisingly vulnerable. There was no way to be certain until you actually tested the defenses, especially in a case like this where practically everything they knew about the enigma base was pure speculation.
Partly it was knowing that his soldiers, relieved or not at the cancellation, would wonder if he had lacked confidence in them.
Partly it was knowing how many enemy warships were already in this star system, and how many more the enigmas might have concealed if the Kommodor’s guess was right, and what those warships would do to these transports if they got a shot at them.
Partly it was thinking of those poor bastards already on the surface. Not just Syndicate ground forces but also who knew how many civilians who had been dragged into this mess by the Syndicate. Rogero didn’t care whether or not the snakes who were holding guns on everyone were themselves massacred by the enigmas. He actually liked the idea. But there didn’t seem to be any way to make that happen without the civilians also being wiped out.
The civilians. That was mainly it, wasn’t it? He and so many others had kept fighting for the Syndicate because they wanted to protect their families from both an Alliance that didn’t care who died in their bombardments, and from the Syndicate that would retaliate against anyone who failed to follow orders. But now the Syndicate had brought the families into the war zone. Hostages to keep the mobile forces and the ground forces in line.
He didn’t know how many snakes the Syndicate still had. But if word of this got around, it wouldn’t be enough. Not anywhere.
Rogero donned his battle armor, then clumped glumly through passageways large enough to accommodate him in that heavy outfit. He passed parts of his brigade, the soldiers all suiting up with the careful efficiency of those who had done this plenty of times already. That was an odd thing to think about. They had taken losses since revolting against the Syndicate, but not nearly as many as had been the norm during the war. He had a growing proportion of veterans in his unit, men and women who had accumulated experience in the grim art of war.
He reached the bridge, where the transport’s commander awaited him.
Leytenant Mack saluted with rigid precision. “My ship and HTTU 643 are ready to land your ground forces upon your command, Colonel.”
“What are the Syndicate transports doing?” Rogero asked.
“They took off when we reached the planet. Them and the Syndicate freighters.” Mack pointed off in a direction that meant nothing to Rogero. “Running. I don’t know where. They’re heading along the track their flotilla took, which means they’re running toward the enigmas. I don’t know what’s up with that.”
“They’re staying together?”
“No, sir.” Mack shook his head, looking uncomfortable. “The transports have been pulling steadily away from the freighters. Leaving them behind.”
Rogero looked at Mack, knowing even with his helmet visor up he still appeared very menacing in combat armor. “Why does that bother you, Leytenant?”
Mack glared back at Rogero. “Because it’s not right. I understand running to try to live. But those Syndicate transports haven’t a chance in hell anyway. Somebody or other is going to blow them apart before they can jump out of this star system. They should have at least put on a good show and stood by the others.”
“At least,” Rogero agreed. “Now, what about the planet? I’ve got the data from your sensors showing what they can see of the Syndicate position, but not anything on the enigma base.”
“Yeah,” Mack said reluctantly. “That Syndicate ground position is a mess, huh? Looks like they just dropped people and stuff any which where. Panic, seems to me. I bet those freighters still have some critical stuff on board that anyone on a rock like that will need to live long-term.”
“Long-term living requirements are the least of their worries,” Rogero said. “Why don’t we have anything from our ground-penetrating sensors on that buried base?”
Mack brought up an image that floated before them, a segment of the planet below lit up in various colors to enhance the information. “You have everything that we can see,” Leytenant Mack advised, waving at the display. “We’ve tried every trick, every sensor for remotely seeing what’s on the surface and what’s beneath the surface, and that’s all we get.”
Colonel Rogero scowled at the image. One of the advantages of real assault transports was that they came equipped with active sensor systems that could penetrate objects like the surface of a planet to map underground installations. When aboard warships he had asked for that kind of support and been met with blank stares. The warships depended so heavily on passive sensors that collected everything that could be seen across every band of the spectrum that they were shocked at the idea of sending out energy using active systems like the advanced radars on a troop transport.
But this time the transports’ sensors weren’t helping much. “It’s just a blob covering a huge area,” Rogero complained.
Leytenant Mack nodded. “That’s all we can see,” he repeated. “There’s something in the surface soil blocking our scans across every frequency and wavelength. At least we know whatever the enigmas are hiding is somewhere under that.”
“What could they seed across hundreds of square kilometers that blocked everything?” Rogero wondered. “They must have a way to vent heat, at the very least.”
“You could do it underground,” Mack said. “My sister’s a geologist. Did I ever tell you that? We were talking once and she said you could either dump the heat into an underground river or into a really big underground reservoir. That would get rid of the heat and disperse it so much that the source couldn’t be pinpointed.”
“We should have brought a geologist,” Rogero said. “Despite knowing these are aliens, I keep expecting them to do things like we do. To have the same capabilities that we do. But they are obviously a lot better at camouflage.”
“Where do you want to drop?”
Rogero gazed at the display. To one side of the underground blob that marked the enigma’s masking efforts were a cluster of symbols that marked the Syndicate personnel and equipment that had been hastily landed. They might be directly over part of the alien installation. Or not. “I might have to fight those Syndicate ground forces as well as the aliens, but I am supposed to protect the citizens with those ground forces from the aliens.”
“I wouldn’t come down too close to them,” Mack cautioned. “Keep a few kilometers off, at least outside the range of their hand weapons. Odds are they’ve already been targeted.”
“Odds are so has this transport.” Rogero took a slight, perverse pleasure from seeing Leytenant Mack’s anxiety when that was pointed out. “I think the enigmas are going to wait and see if we and the Syndicate ground forces start fighting before they attack either of us.”
“Why would they do that?”
Rogero sat back, folding his arms and frowning as he spoke. “That’s been their usual tactic. From what Captain Bradamont told me, the enigmas might have tricked the Syndicate into starting the war with the Alliance, and once it was going the enigmas apparently leaked to both sides the hypernet technology that ensured we would keep fighting longer. The Alliance thinks the enigmas expected humans to eventually figure out that the hypernet gates could be used as nova-scale bombs to destroy the star systems where they were placed, and then to use the hypernet gates against each other until both the Syndicate and the Alliance had been totally gutted by the mutual destruction.”