The Alien Invasion

Chapter 8: The Raid On Sarney Sarittenden

Chapter 8: The Raid On Sarney Sarittenden

From the journal of Clifford Croft, ten months after the invasion of August:

Sashay, or the Paperweight, as the Silencer and the others took to calling him, was as good as his word. The next day I led an expedition to locate the materials he needed; and he got to work immediately, creating a camouflaged version of the door that would look like the wall around it. But once the task was done, and once the door looked like the wall, the Paperweight wasn't artistically satisfied; he kept wanting to dab little colors here or there to make it look more realistic. I managed to pull him away from that and get him started on a bigger project, building an artificial but real looking wall around the ground transport we had stolen.

I didn't think it was possible, but when he was done, several days later, he had colored and molded plastiform around it so it looked like a real wall. The plastiform could be easily unwrapped from the very end where it met the real wall, if you knew where to look; and if you knocked on it, you'd get a hollow sound; but under any but the closest of inspections it would look real.

The Paperweight's cooking continued to earn our appreciation. I think his culinary talents, combined with the fine job he did on the door and the wall covering the transport, muted any sentiment to get rid of him. The only problem with the Paperweight was that he was, well, a bit irritating.

He always insisted on painting portraits of us; he would sit there with an easel, when we returned from a mission and were just trying to relax, and he would paint us, without our permission. Preston or Gantry would get annoyed and turn away; and Jenkins would just ignore him, as I did. The Silencer showed less patience, however, getting him to stop painting his portrait by shooting one of Sashay's creations in progress, when Sashay was right behind it. To this day I'm not sure how he managed to get an angle where he could shoot the painting without also shooting Sashay.

Similarly Sashay stopped painting Red Sally when one of his paintings burst into flames as he painted it. Only the Clapper and Mongo actively cooperated with his efforts, posing while making exaggerated facial expressions. In fact Mongo hung up the atrocious portraits of himself all over the place and complained that Sashay wasn't painting enough of him.

I decided to take a break from all this bickering by going out on a solo recon mission. It might sound foolish to go out alone, but in my case it made sense. As one of the Eight, I could infiltrate almost any location silently, without being detected. Even Preston, who was also a Column operative (albeit a lower ranking one), couldn't move with the degree of stealth I could. And the others were only noisier.

So I went alone. It was always good to observe the latest Insect patrol patterns; it showed where they were focusing their efforts, and sometimes, what they were guarding. I followed one such patrol for an hour back to its source without being detected, the ground floor of a heavily guarded building.

What was going on there?

I saw human prisoners, with their hands over their heads, being marched into the building. Using my electrobinoculars, I noticed something especially interesting; only some of them wore control collars.

Every human who was captured by the Insects immediately had a control collar slapped on him. The fact that these didn't meant that they were new captures. Interesting.

Suddenly, I got the impression there was someone behind me. I turned, looking into the darkness, my blaster instantly raised. I waited a long moment. There was nothing. I couldn't see a thing. But something had given me the impression that someone was there. I almost felt it rather than saw it.

Unfortunately, it wasn't wise to turn away from the Insects for very long; I heard sounds of movement from behind me, and turned to see an Insect patrol, heading my way.

"Halt!" one of them said through their harsh translation devices. I turned and ran into a nearby building; but I hadn't gotten fifty feet before I almost skidded into another patrol.

"Drop your weapon," they said, blaster rifles pointed straight at me.

I'm a top-level infiltrator; how had I allowed this to happen?

I was so distraught at the failure of my abilities that I didn't even consider the consequences of capture as I was marched to the Insect outpost. How had I allowed myself to become distracted? Was it the presence of the other Insect patrol that had distracted me?

No, the other Insect patrol had been farther away. I had sensed something quite near me. Sensed, not heard or seen. Could it have been my imagination?

It was only when I was marched into the Insect outpost that I decided to focus on my current situation. I was taken to a room swarming with Bugs and brought before one Insect, presumably their group leader.

"What is your name/designation?" the leader asked.

"Mr. Nice," I said, automatically falling back into liespeak.

The leader noted it down with one of his claws on an Insect version of an electronic notepad.

"What are you doing here?" came the artificially stilted voice from its translation device.

"Looking for food," I said.

"Why do you not have a control collar?" said the leader.

"I left mine at home," I said.

"Where is home?" the leader asked.

I said nothing.

"Where is home?" the leader asked again.

"Where the heart is," I said.

One of the Insect guards reached out and casually smacked me in the head with the blunt side of one of its claws. I cried out as I fell down.

"Where is your base?" the leader asked again.

"I don't have a base," I said, grabbing my throbbing head as I slowly stood up.

One of the Insect guards raised its claw again.

"On level 30," I said.

"Section and location?" the leader asked.

"Section 1. An empty classroom. I live alone, you won't find anyone else there."

"Dispatch a patrol," said the leader, and some Insects marched off. "If you are lying, you will be punished."

"And what do I get for telling the truth?"

The leader gestured, and one of the bugs reached over for a control collar.

"Is there any chance I could take second prize instead?" I asked. I struggled, but the Insects held me in place with their sharp claws. I yelled as the claws bit into my arms. Other claws snapped the control collar in place.

"You will obey or we will do this," said the leader, pressing a button on a small pad.

I felt a staggering pain throughout my body. I fell to the ground again, yelling involuntarily.

"That was only an intermediate setting," said the leader, as the Insects pulled me back onto my feet, their claws biting into my arms again. I resisted the urge to scream.

Suddenly, the leader held up a holocam and pressed a button.

"Your image will be stored in our files and compared to known criminals. If you have lied to us about your base, you will be executed. If your record matches a known criminal, you will be executed."

The leader turned to the guards. "Hold the creature in storage for 25 hours. If the creature was telling the truth about its location, and the computer search turns up negative, have it sent to a work farm."

The leader buzzed menacingly. "And if the creature is lying, have it executed, immediately."

The Insects took me away.

I found myself in a holding cell, behind a force field with other prisoners. My head was still throbbing from the blow I had received, and I had bloody cuts in my arms where the bugs had held me. The control collar was tightly fastened around my neck.

I looked at the other prisoners in my cell. They looked even worse off than me; malnourished and exhausted. They were all probably scavengers who had been lucky enough to survive this long on their own, but unlucky enough to finally get caught.

Unlike me. I didn't know if the Insects had a holo of me, but if they did, my life expectancy wouldn't be very long. Perhaps even more immediate than that, when they didn't find my hideout on Level 30, they would probably execute me. I had no idea if there was a classroom on Level 30 Section 1, and if there was, it wouldn't be filled with supplies or signs of occupancy, unless someone else had lived there.

How long did I have, an hour, maybe two?

I thought about the possibility of rescue. But Preston and the others didn't even know where I was.

Maybe Mongo could alert them--maybe he would get a flash of my future and warn them.

But Mongo didn't always work like a dependable alarm clock; if he did, he would've warned me about being caught before I left. And even if he saw a vision of where I was, how could he translate the image in his mind to a precise location he could tell the others? Sarney was so big, so vast, so full of buildings, that one tended to look like another.

No, even if Mongo had a vision, unless it was a precise one that showed some sign of my specific location, he would be unable to tell the others where to find me.

And then there was the time factor. In a few hours the Insects would discover my deception. By the time that happened, I would have to be on the other side of this forcefield.

I looked around the cell. There were solid walls and ceiling and floor. No windows. No equipment, except for a few plastiwood benches. The forcefield in front of me flickered slightly from time to time.

I was a top infiltrator. But even I needed some kind of opportunity to take advantage of.

I sat on the ground, glumly thinking about this. One hour stretched into two and into three. I grew more and more nervous as more time passed. I stared at the solitary guard on the other side of the forcefield. The guard appeared to ignore me.

"Hey, hey guard," I said.

The Insect turned to face me.

"Lower the forcefield. I have some important information to tell you."

The guard ignored me, turning away again.

I simply didn't have any idea how to escape. I continued to sit there, feeling more and more sorry for myself.

And then, I heard the sound of buzzing.

Several Insects were approaching.

They had discovered my deception. They were coming to kill me.

I stood up and stepped back from the forcefield. I resolved not to be killed without a fight. Physically, there wasn't much I could do against seven foot tall monsters with sharp claws, and the fact they had a control collar on me didn't help, but I would try my best.

The Insects were coming. The sounds of their buzzing got closer.

And then they stood in front of the forcefield. A button was pressed.

The forcefield was lowered.

And then, a totally unexpected thing happened.

The Insects moved aside, and I saw none other than Crazy Rob standing there.

Crazy Rob. The Gamma operative with three distinct personalities, each with their own abilities. There was Crazy Rob himself, who could cause hallucinations. There was Crazy Matt, who had a form of ESP which could let him see through walls. And there was Crazy Bender, who could change his right hand into almost any object, but for some reason usually chose a wooden spoon.

At least, I think it was Crazy Rob, or at least a dirty and tattered version of him which was wearing a control collar. Crazy Rob entered the cell, and the forcefield rose behind him. The Insect escort left.

Crazy Rob looked at me and straight past me. Maybe it wasn't him. Maybe it was just wishful thinking on my part.

If it were Crazy Rob, wouldn't he have said something by now?

I had to know.

"Hello," I said.

Crazy Rob, or the person who looked like Crazy Rob, ignored me.

"Excuse me, but is your name Rob?"

Crazy Rob just looked into space.

"Excuse me," I said loudly. "Is your name Rob?"

Crazy Rob looked at me oddly. "No. You should know that, Croft."

He knew who I was. And he wasn't Rob. That left two possibilities. I looked at his right hand. It wasn't a wooden spoon.

By process of elimination, it must be the Matt personality.

"Matt?" I said.

"Yes," said Crazy Matt, as if it had been obvious all along.

"What are you doing here?"

Matt smiled. "Indeed, what are any of us doing here?"

I groaned. That was Crazy Matt, all right. He was the least aggressive of the three personalities, but he tended to be so philosophical that it was difficult to get him to focus on reality.

"What are you doingin this cell," I said, emphasizing the key words in my sentence.

Matt looked around. "I don't know."

"What do you mean-" I stopped, in midsentence. I suddenly realized that it was very possible that Matt was telling the truth.

If Matt had been captured while in another personality, such as Rob or Bender, he might not remember what had happened. Each personality's memory of what happened when the other personality was in control was tenuous at best.

Still, it had to be more than a coincidence that Matt (and Rob and Bender) were in a cell with me in the same time and place. Had he seen me get captured and had then decided, in one of his personalities, to come and rescue me?

That seemed unlikely. The Matt personality claimed to know nothing about it. If the Rob personality had been in charge, he would've suspected that my capture was an elaborate trap designed to trick him. If the Bender personality had been in charge, he probably would have been too depressed to do anything about it.

So how had Matt ended up here? Could it be a trap, set by the bugs, to allow me to escape? That sounded unlikely. Almost unlikely enough for one of Rob's conspiracy theories. Why would the bugs want me to escape? Perhaps they had found out who I was, and had decided to let me use to Matt & Co. to escape and to lead them back to the others.

Unlikely. But possible.

Or it could really be a coincidence that he was here. But I didn't believe in coincidences.

But not believing in coincidences didn't mean that I wasn't going to take advantage of them. If the Insects were trying to manipulate me into revealing the others, and had hidden a tracking device on either of us, I could deal with that later.

I had to assume I was still on a time deadline, and if I didn't get out of here soon, the Insects would discover my deception and kill me.

"Listen, Matt, we have to escape," I whispered to him, not wanting the guard outside to hear.

"With an active mind, we can go anywhere," he said smugly. He closed his eyes. "I'm thinking of Mohonk now-"

"No, Matt," I said, shaking him so that he opened his eyes. "We have to escape for real."

"Oh," he said. Then, "How?"

I thought quickly. "We have to convince that guard that the forcefield is down."

"How?" Matt asked again.

"Create an illusion which will lure the guard over here."

"An illusion?" said Matt. "How do I do that?"

I forgot. I was talking to Crazy Matt. I needed to talk to Crazy Rob.

"Matt, I need to talk to Rob," I said. This was the part of the process I hated.

"What? No, I don't like Rob," said Matt.

"Unless you can create an illusion, I need Rob," I said, knowing how it worked.

"But I don't like Rob," Matt repeated.

"We need Rob," I said. I whispered in his ear. "There's a conspiracy. They're trying to kill you."

"What?" said Crazy Matt.

"A conspiracy. They're all against you. You have to wake up! This is all a plot, a plan against you! Can't you see it?"

"What are you talking about?" said Matt, speaking in a more rapid, sharper tone of voice. I had gotten through. I was now speaking to Rob.

"Rob, we're trapped in an Insect cell-"

"How did that happen?" Rob asked. "Did you trick me?"

By process of elimination, again, I concluded that he had been Bender when he had been captured. I wondered if he had had the spoon hand then. That would have been kind of conspicuous.

"In case you hadn't noticed, I'm in the same cell with you-"

"The perfect cover," Rob snapped.

"Rob, we have to get out of here. Can we agree on that?" I said.

Rob paused, then nodded. "But once we're free I'm not going to let you manipulate me!"

"I wouldn't dream of it," I said. I quickly explained what I needed. Then I turned to the other prisoners. "You have to be quiet now."

"Why?" one of them asked.

"Because I told you to," I said. "Be absolutely silent!"

When we were ready, I turned to the guard.

"Ah, Mr. Insect sir, we have a problem here."

The guard didn't even bother to glance at me this time.

"Mr. Insect sir, sorry to bother you, but the other prisoners have escaped."

This time the guard did look up. To him, it looked as if the cell was empty, except for myself and Matt. I mean Rob.

The Insect buzzed and approached the forcefield. He didn't have a weapon, but with those sharp claws, didn't need one.

"I need Bender now," I muttered.

The Insect guard walked up to the forcefield.

"We're going to lose, it's going to see through our deception, we can't escape," I muttered.

The Insect guard peered through the forcefield. It couldn't see the other prisoners, but there was no obvious avenue of escape.

"It's so sad, so very very sad," I said, starting to weep.

Suddenly, Rob's right hand turned into a large wooden spoon. Rob was gone, and now Bender was here.

The guard lowered the force field. "Stand back," it buzzed.

"All right," I whispered. "Now make something you can hurt it with."

"All right," Bender sighed.

The guard stepped into the cell, buzzing as its multiplexed eyes scanned the area. As it momentarily turned away from us I shouted, "Now!"

-and Bender hit the bug with his spoon hand.

The guard, feeling the slight impact, turned to face us.

"No, something stronger!" I screamed, ducking under a claw that came at me.

Suddenly, Bender's spoon hand transformed into a large metal spoon, one four times the size of a hand, Bender lunged forward and wacked the Insect, hitting several claws so hard that they wilted as if they had been broken.

The Insect howled in pain.

"Again!" I yelled.

Bender hit the Insect again with the giant spoon, but its midsection was more armored. The Insect was now on the defensive, however, trying to fend off the attack of the giant spoon hand, but I could see that more would have to be done to finish it off.

"The legs!" I said, and Bender obligingly wacked the Insect in the legs.

That didn't kill it, but it did hurt the creature, and get it down on its knees, low enough to-

"The face!" I yelled.

The giant spoon didn't have much effect against the bug's body, and it could only hurt its arms and legs, but the face were another matter. The giant spoon smashed against the multiplex eyes, first one, and then the other, and the bug started to bleed green liquid profusely screaming, running into walls, going around and around until Bender clubbed it enough times so that it lay still.

During the beginning of this combat, the other occupants of our cell had become visible again, and they looked very surprised. Perhaps they had never seen an Insect beaten to death by a giant spoon before.

I gave the Insect body a diagnostic kick; it didn't move. I turned to Bender. "Nice work. But I asked you to change into something you could hurt it with."

Bender shrugged. "I did."

"I think a sword or sharp weapon would've been better."

"What does it matter?" said Bender, looking sad.

Bender was always sad.

The prisoners were just now realizing that they were free.

"Let's get out of here!" one of them said, starting to rush for the door as the others got up to follow him.

I tripped him and held him down.

"Let me go!" he said.

"Stop!" I said, in a commanding voice. And sure enough, they all did.

"Consider this: we are all unarmed. And we are still in an Insect stronghold. How far do you think we'll get if we just go rushing out of here?"