Portal Wars 1: Gehenna Dawn Read online

  “You will take full control? What does that mean? You will eradicate the rebellion on Erastus? Will you do so as effectively as you did with your first effort? Because all that served to do was swell the size of the rebel army.” He glared at Kazan. “No, we must assume that Taylor has taken full control of UNFE by now. There is no reason to suspect that the other lifers would be any less susceptible to his manipulations than Major Simms and his people.”

  Keita sighed loudly. “We do not have sufficient trained troops available in the Military Affairs Department to handle this situation, not while maintaining force levels on the other worlds.” His voice was raw. “I will have to go to Secretary Samovich now, and request internal security forces to invade and retake Erastus.” Keita was glaring across the desk with murder in his eyes. “Do you know what an embarrassment that is for me?” He let out a deep, angry breath. “Do you have any idea how costly it will be…especially since it must be rushed? There are no more warring armies on Earth, you stupid fool, no easy place to pull the soldiers we need. By losing control of the situation on Erastus, you have created a problem beyond the scope your infantile mind can grasp. Samovich will have to strip every internal security unit of its heavy forces in order to field the expedition we need.” Keita paused again. “He will take it out of my hide.” His eyes zeroed in on Kazan’s again. “And I will take it out of yours.”

  Keita sat quietly, respectfully. He was on the other side of the desk now, about to face the same kind of tongue-lashing he’d given Kazan. Keita was more than willing to sacrifice his terrified under-secretary as a scapegoat…and he was well aware that Anton Samovich would do the same to him if it was expedient. Keita was smarter than Kazan, and he figured he had a good chance to survive the storm if he was careful. Very careful.

  The room was dark, one side of Samovich’s face dimly lit by a small lamp in the corner. It was late outside, a dark cloudy night, threatening of rain. “Secretary Keita, as you are well aware, I sponsored and actively supported your candidacy to the Secretariat.” A half-smoked cigar sat neglected in a silver ashtray, small wisps of smoke rising slowly into the gray darkness.

  “You and I had not been close allies before your candidacy; I made my choice to support you based predominantly on my perception of your competence. Indeed, you had essentially been doing the job for several years, as Raj Patel sat in a hospital bed and drooled on himself.” Patel and Samovich had not been fond of each other, but Keita hadn’t realized how strong their rivalry had been until he’d become a member of the Secretariat and started hearing stories.

  “You can imagine, Mr. Keita…” His use of mister instead of Secretary was deliberately disrespectful. Everything Anton Samovich did was deliberate. “…my dismay to have a full-blown disaster exploding on my desk just weeks after your confirmation.”

  Keita sat perfectly still, trying to decide if he should respond or stay silent. He was just about to open his mouth when Samovich beat him to it.

  “I would ask you to explain yourself, but I really don’t care about whatever imbecilic argument you have fabricated in an attempt to obfuscate your own guilt. I am not one to waste time with excuses. They are meaningless, insincere, and a waste of time.”

  Samovich remained almost unmoving, sitting in the shadows, hands clasped in front of him on the desk. He hadn’t raised his voice nor spoken a phrase in apparent anger…yet Keita had never felt more exposed or vulnerable. This is a dangerous man, he thought.

  “Unfortunately, I have just gone on record supporting your candidacy, and your unanimous appointment was the result of my efforts.” He angled his head slightly, staring even more intently at Keita. “Unfortunate for me, at least. For you it is, perhaps, a bit of luck you do not deserve. Were I not covered in your stink already, I can assure you we would not be having this discussion.”

  Keita had been fearing the worst, but now he felt a spark of hope. Perhaps he’d wiggle his way out of this after all. “Mr. Secretary…”

  “Silence, Keita.” The tone was still neutral…no shouting, no anger. But the menace was unmistakable. “You are here to listen, not to offer your insights. I will tell you when I am finished.”

  Keita felt his body sink back into the chair. He tried to hold himself steady, but his head nodded slightly in acknowledgement.

  “This entire sorry episode will be disruptive enough. I do not intend to compound matters by affording Chang Li a greater opportunity to embarrass me for my misplaced faith in you.” Keita had begun to realize that the struggle between Chang Li and Samovich was more than the usual political rivalry. They both saw themselves as the next Secretary General, and neither intended to let the other interfere. It was a battle to the death between the two…the ascension of one would almost certainly encompass the destruction of the other.

  Keita wondered, for a fleeting moment, if it might be worth his reaching out for Chang. Perhaps Samovich’s rival would offer him a better deal to humiliate his rival. No, he thought, almost immediately…he was too closely aligned with Samovich already. Chang would never risk it. Especially not now. Chang and Samovich hated each other, but neither one wanted to allow a rebellion to get out of control. They disagreed on most things, but neither one of them wanted the masses forgetting their place, and especially not when they were armed, trained killers.

  Samovich slid his chair and stood up, turning his back to Keita and looking out the window. “Here is what we are going to do.” He stared out at the swirling, gray night. It was just beginning to rain lightly, droplets finding their way slowly down the heavy glass of the floor-to-ceiling windows. “I will provide you with sufficient forces to crush this rebellion.” He paused. “The current strength of the armed forces on Erastus is, what, 12,000?”

  “Planetary regulars were at 11,987 as of our last reliable report approximately eleven days ago. Of course, we cannot know that all of these forces have rallied to the rebel side.” He hesitated. “There are also approximately 1,743 auxiliaries deployed…engineers, antigrav crews, and similar forces…as well as 872 headquarters staffers. These are rotational troops who would be unlikely to sympathize strongly with the lifers. Whether they are still holding out...or whether they have been killed or captured…we cannot know.”

  “You are certain they would not join the rebels?” There was doubt in Samovich’s voice. “Admittedly, they enjoy a higher social standing and superior benefits, but I fear you fail to fully comprehend the power of a charismatic leader.” He paused and turned to face Keita. “Do not underestimate this Jake Taylor. He is precisely the kind of leader who is capable of rallying disparate forces to his side.” Another pause. “He is a serious danger, and we must eliminate him now. Indeed, I am surprised his behavioral traits weren’t identified at a younger age. We are typically quite effective at targeting problem personality patterns in youth. This Taylor should have been sent to a reeducation facility a long time ago, probably in childhood. I can only assume his own particular latent abilities failed to surface until he was subjected to the crucible of war on Erastus. It is regretful that we will not have the opportunity to study him in detail. It could prove useful in developing methods for more effectively culling out such problem individuals from the societal pool.”

  Keita found it hard to be overly scared about some lifer on Erastus, though he played along with Samovich’s concerns. It was the cost and the embarrassment of the whole thing that troubled him, not some fear that Taylor’s band of flag-wavers could actually win.

  “Such musings are immaterial at this point, however.” Samovich turned back toward the window. “I would indeed be interested in studying this rebel leader, but it is too risky to even try. This cancer must be eradicated immediately.” He paused, thinking quietly for a few seconds. “I will provide you will 50,000 internal security troops from the paramilitary teams. You will send them through the Portal to reclaim Erastus. They will have orders to terminate everyone on the planet.”

  “Yes, Secretary, but the headquarters s
taff is certainly not…”

  “Everyone, Secretary. Is that understood? Erastus is to be swept clean. No trace of the infection must remain.”

  Keita hesitated for an instant. “Yes, Secretary Samovich. Understood.”

  “Good.” Samovich clasped his hands behind his back. “The forces will be assembled in two weeks. You will be ready when they arrive.” A statement, not a question. “I would tell you to go through the Portal yourself, but that would be highly unusual for a Secretary, drawing far too much attention.”

  “What about Gregor Kazan?” Keita just blurted it out, wishing almost instantly he’d kept his mouth shut.

  “Perhaps.” Samovich thought for a few seconds. “Mr. Kazan has every incentive to attempt to save himself. There may be some use in that.”

  “With your permission, I will order him to assume overall command of the expedition.” Keita paused. “He is of no use militarily, but his interests are aligned with ours, and his motivation is beyond question.”

  “Indeed, Mr. Kazan finds himself in a very undesirable position. I can think of no one with greater incentive to swiftly destroy the rebels.” He paused for a few seconds, thinking. “Very well…Gregor Kazan shall accompany the expedition, and he shall have full vice regal authority on Erastus.” Samovich turned again from the window and sat back in his chair. “Perhaps if he is thorough enough in eradicating all trace of this rebellion, he can even save himself.”

  Chapter 22

  From the Journal of Jake Taylor:

  Fourteen years. I’ve been in this miserable hellhole fourteen years. Some days it seems like an eternity, others I wonder where it all went. Home seems like a distant dream to me now. I don’t even miss it anymore, not really. It’s just sort of a dull ache, a numb spot in the back of my mind. Something that was part of me once, but isn’t anymore.

  I guess time passes the same way for most of us. If you don’t get wasted as a rookie, which most do, you go through a sweet spot. You’ve learned how to survive, but you still have something left of who you were before you were sent here. You cling to ceremonies and traditions, still mimicking the ways of life you left behind, but you also adapt to your new reality; you get used to the routine. The pain of losing home isn’t as keen as it was, but the memories are still clear.

  It usually starts when you’ve been about two years onplanet, and it goes on for a few good years, before exhaustion and hopelessness really start wearing down your soul. Sooner or later we all become too tired, too grim, too used up to do anything but move through every day like a zombie. We start off remembering exactly when we came through the Portal, and most of us commemorate it for a while, sort of like a birthday. But eventually it gets too hard to care about anything, and another year on the calendar doesn’t seem like such a big fucking deal anymore.

  Back when I first got here, the idea of being on planet fourteen years would have been unthinkable. Men just didn’t live that long on Erastus. Five Year Men were iron veterans, admired and respected. Ten Year Men were more legend than reality. I think there were two onplanet when I got here. And neither one of them made fifteen.

  Things have changed, though, and the last five or six years have been different. The rooks still died like flies…the same as always. No matter how hard we tried to teach them, it just took time…more time than most of them had. But the ones who survived long enough to get their mods lived longer, much longer. Five Year Men became less of a rarity. A lot of the troops even knew a Ten Year Man or two, perhaps one of their officers.

  Longbow was the only one of my close companions to die after we got the Supersoldier mods. Blackie, Bear, and the others…and me too…we’ve all been wounded, mortally by the standards of normal men. But the mods saved us. It turns out cyborgs are a lot harder to kill than men.

  There’s a price to pay for everything, and survival is no exception. With longevity, I discovered a new kind of fatigue…a bone-deep weariness that grows with each passing year. It becomes harder and harder to care about anything…at least until the lust for vengeance filled the empty place in my soul.

  It’s been years since I did anything to celebrate my Portal day, but I still remembered it every year…and gave a silent nod to my resilience. Every year until this last one. For the first time, I completely forgot. It was days later when I realized, and it was Blackie who remembered, not me. I’m not sure what to make of it. For better or worse, I am newly embarked on a road vastly different from any I have traveled. I am still on Erastus, but my mind has moved on to a new chapter. The road ahead promises no less suffering or bloodshed…but now, at least, I will be fighting the right enemy.

  “Not many people surprise me, Major.” Taylor stared across the table at MacArthur. “But you have.” For perhaps the first time, Taylor looked at the antigrav pilot with something approximating admiration. “Are you sure?”

  Jake Taylor was about to embark on a fight to the death. He wasn’t going to defeat his enemies; he was going to exterminate them like vermin. Or they were going to do it to him. This conflict would have no prisoners, no rules of war, no blathering diplomats arguing over etiquette while men died in the front lines. Taylor had no pity, no mercy to offer his enemies.

  The auxiliary services on Erastus weren’t in the same situation as the footsoldiers. They had been better treated than Taylor’s people, and many of them had behaved poorly toward the lifers, displaying an arrogance born of their different status. But they’d fought alongside Taylor’s men, and they’d suffered their own losses in battle. Taylor had some resentment against this privileged group, but they weren’t the enemy, and he knew it. He’d gone to MacArthur to offer safe passage through the Portal for his survivors and the other auxiliaries.

  “I know we’ve had our differences, Colonel.” MacArthur’s voice had an odd tone to it, like the pilot was still trying to figure out exactly how he felt. “But what UN Central has done transcends any of that. We may have argued, but we were always on the same side…and we have all been used in the most horrendous manner.” There was heavy emotion just below the surface…MacArthur was barely restraining his anger. “I believed I was here defending Earth, just as you did. Do you know how many thousands of Machines my gunships have slaughtered?” He was staring plaintively, desperately looking to Taylor to make some sense of what he was feeling. Jake’s retelling of T’arza’s description of the Machines had hit MacArthur hard. He’d always considered them almost as robots, created solely to fight. Now he realized they were much closer to sentient beings than he could comfortably accept, that they’d been created to live something like a normal life and only turned into soldiers when mankind attacked their welcoming parties and started a war. “I was a soldier, Jake…” Taylor blinked in surprise as MacArthur used his first name. “…at least I thought I was. But I’m nothing but a mass murderer, am I? That’s what we all are.”

  Taylor took a deep breath. He didn’t know what to say. He found himself wanting to reassure MacArthur, but he wasn’t sure his own opinion was all that different. It was easy to tell yourself you were misled, that you didn’t know what you were doing…but the blood on your hands was still there, and the thousands you massacred were still dead.

  “John…” Taylor hesitated, still not sure what to say. “I don’t have any wisdom for you. We’re all going to have to learn to live with what we’ve done. One way or another.” Taylor looked down at his feet for a few seconds before meeting MacArthur’s gaze again. “But now isn’t the time to sink into remorse and self-pity. We can’t undo what we’ve done, and some crimes are beyond atonement.” Taylor’s gaze narrowed, and a firmness returned to his voice. “But we can avenge the dead…and punish the guilty. We can put a stop to this insanity before it drags on for decades on the other Portal Worlds. We can cleanse Earth. We were unwitting parties to this great crime, but not those back at UN Central. They knew…they did this intentionally. They are truly those who bear the monstrous guilt. If we allow them to escape judgment, we will compou
nd what we have done. This is our mess to clean up.”

  The anger was rising again in Taylor’s voice. It was never far below the surface anymore, a bubbling rage ready to escape at the slightest instigation. “That is my purpose now, John. Nothing else matters to me, and there is nothing I will not do to achieve what must be done.” His expression softened slightly as he gazed into MacArthur’s eyes. “And if you and your people are truly willing to join us, I for one, will be very grateful.”

  MacArthur nodded his head slowly. He was silent for a moment, but his face looked calm, settled. “Like I said, Jake, I’m with you.” He paused briefly. “But it’s not just me. We’re all with you. My aircrews, the engineers, the transport teams. Everybody.” He extended his hand toward Taylor, even managing a thin smile. “Now let’s make the bastards pay.”

  “Jake, you’re wrong this time.” There weren’t many people with the balls to tell Taylor to his face he was wrong, but Tony Black was one of them. “We’re better off spreading out, manning all the strong points. Make the bastards run all over, sweating their balls off trying to dig us out.” Black’s voice had a vindictive edge to it. Clearly, he relished the thought of unacclimated UN enforcers trying to assault strongholds under the burning Erastus suns. “The troops they send through are probably going to be inferior on a man for man basis, but you know they’re going to outnumber us. Probably by a lot. Why not let the planet wear them down as much as possible?”