No response. He really was out. Terrific.
That there are many large areas where the infestation appears to be minimal or nonexistent should not be construed as evidence of either weakness or failure on the part of the agencies of infestation, nor should it be interpreted as evidence of the effectiveness of control measures of human agencies. Such misperceptions can lead to dangerous miscalculations of resources and energy.
What has become apparent with time is that the member species of the Chtorran infestation need to clump. They seek each other out for mutual benefit. Beyond the relationship of predator and prey, there is partnership; these plants and animals depend upon each other for immediate survival and ultimate success.
Where the density of infection is thickest, there you will find the healthiest, the most vigorous, and the most confuient of Chtorran organisms; there you will also find the most rapid growth and expansion.
Where the density of infection is at its thinnest, you will find that the individual specimens of the invading ecology are weaker and smaller than their more successfully integrated counterparts.
The assumption here is that the Chtorran ecology prefers to feed on itself first, and on Terran species only when the preferred foods are not available. Further investigation of this behavior is still required and is strongly recommended as it may have considerable impact on long-term strategy for Terran survival.
This leads to one immediate recommendation: that any military energy applied to a target area be specifically designed for the circumstances of the infestation prevalent in that area, instead of following the usual blanket-fire approach that is currently in practice.
Implementing this recommendation will mandate a considerable increase in both skillage and manpower, particularly at a time when both are increasingly scarce. Nevertheless, the recommendation stands.
For the application of our energies to be effective, it is imperative that individual cases receive critically tailored attention. What may be appropriate in one situation may prove to be fatally inappropriate in another. (The reader is directed to Appendix III, Case 121, for a particularly dramatic justification for this caution: the disastrous results of attempting to flame a grove of hunting shamblers as opposed to flaming a single torpid individual.)
—The Red Book,
(Release 22.19A)
Chapter 3
Residuals
"I enjoy watching amateurs make fools of themselves. Most of the time, it's the other way around. "
-SOLOMON SHORT
It was my fault, really. I'd pushed him too hard. I picked him up and hoisted him over my shoulder. As if the job hadn't been impossible enough before, this was all I needed, a passenger.
My headset beeped. "Captain?"
"Yeah?"
"Is the major okay?"
"He fainted."
"Oh."
"You okay?"
"I'm fine. It's a nice day. I wish I'd brought some sunscreen though. You want to bring me some?"
"Uh, that's a joke, right?"
"Right."
Silence for a moment. I took a step. The major was heavy.
"Captain?"
"Yeah?"
"Uh, Siegel's been going through the briefing book, and-"
"Forget it." I cut him off quickly.
"But, sir-"
"I know the page you're looking at. It's not applicable here."
"Are you sure?"
"Trust me. I know what I'm doing."
"Well, okay… "
I shook the major gently. "Come on, asshole, wake up." I had to think about this. What kind of physical reactions did acute panic cause? Could he be in some kind of hypoglycemic shock? Or worse? Maybe he'd had a heart attack. I shifted the asshole to my other shoulder
He moaned.
I recognized the sound. He was fine. He was faking. The son of a bitch. I shook him harder. No reaction.
An uneven flotilla of bright pink puffballs bounced across the scarlet hills. They were already starting to break up, leaving a trail of luminous powder hanging in the air behind them. It gave me an idea. I clicked my headset on. "Which way is the wind blowing?"
"We were just thinkin' about that, Cap'n. We can lay down some smoke, if you think it'd do any good."
"I don't know. Nobody's ever tried it on shamblers-if they did, they didn't come back to talk about it."
"Bees, sir. Bees slow down when they're smoked. They don't attack."
"Tenants aren't bees. What if the smoke triggers them?"
"Oh." He sounded crestfallen. "You're right. Sorry." Still…
I poked the major. "You awake yet?" He moaned again.
Not only an asshole, a coward too. He was conscious, but he was paralyzed with fear. He was going to let me do it all. Well, we'd see about that.
I clicked back on. "Let's think about this. I might have been too quick. The smoke will cover us, won't it?"
"Yessir."
"Maybe it'll make it a little harder for the bugs to find us."
"You're the expert, Captain."
"Nobody's an expert on smoke," I said. "It's too new. It looked good in the lab."
Sort of. Some of the Chtorran species curled up and withdrew. Some got really pissed. I hadn't seen any reports about shamblers or their tenants. This was a real gamble. Damn. I hated this business of quality control in the field. I took another step. The major was too heavy. I made a decision.
"Okay," I said. "Let's try it. Tell you what-" I stopped talking while I shifted the major back to my left shoulder. "Turn the lead tank so it's pointed toward us. If anything'happens, start driving toward me as fast as you can. If I have to, I'm going to drop the major. Leave the hatch open till the last possible moment; but if it's obvious I'm not going to make it, close it. Two dead officers will be hard enough to explain; but losing the vehicle could ruin your career. They'd certainly dock your pay."
"It's okay, Captain. I'm not a lifer. I'm only in it for the duration."
Shortly, two of the tanks began belching blue and purple smoke. It wasn't actually smoke-it was a powdery mix that exploded into the air in thick peppery clouds. Its scientific name had seventeen syllables, but we called it smoke. It only looked like its namesake, it smelled like eau de skunk. We were going to reek with it by the time this was over. I'd heard it was hard to wash off too.
The smoke was supposed to be strictly organic and nontoxic to humans. It had something to do with diatomaceous earth. Diatoms were tiny one-cell creatures that lived in the sea. When they died, their bodies floated down to the floor of the ocean. It was a continual process, and it had been going on for hundreds of millions of years. It was still going on today. After a while, the remains of the diatoms piled up in thick beds. After a longer while, they compressed into a kind of powdery clay. You could find diatomaceous earth almost everywhere the seabed had been raised above water level. The particles were small and hard and were terrific at jamming up insect mouths and legs and wings. It was purely a physical reaction, and it worked just as well on Chtorran insects-well, insect-like creatures really-as it did on Terran ones.
There were other things in the smoke too, hormones and bacteria and spices to confuse the Chtorran ecology. The idea was to use Earth's natural defenses in concentrated doses. Sometimes it worked. Sometimes it didn't. Life was full of surprises, most of them nasty.
The plume of blue smoke drifted silently across the rolling red ivy. When it reached us, I buried my nose in the major's side and suppressed the urge to cough; then I turned so that Major Bellus was facing into the worst of it. My eyes were already watering badly. The damn stuff stank worse then I remembered; it was a thick, cloying smell, disagreeable and unpleasant. Combined with the rank soup of assaulting Chtonan fragrances, it was enough to raise the dead and send them off looking for a less odoriferous place to rest.