The Complete Legacy Trilogy: Star Corps, Battlespace, Star Marines. Ian Douglas

There’re too many of them for me to keep track of. That mountain face must be honeycombed with the things.”

      “I have noted 217 distinct openings, not counting the main gate,” the AI said. “Individual tunnels appear to be less than half a meter in diameter, too narrow to admit a Marine in full armor. It will require special tactics to clear them.”

      “Roger that.” Special tactics. The term embraced a number of distinct possibilities, none of them pleasant to think about. Sending small-framed Marines without body armor into those holes was one. Tunnel rat duty was never popular, though Ramsey had no doubt there’d be ample volunteers. Casualties would be high, however, and too large a percentage of his force would be tied down for too long. That was not a cost-effective action.

      The use of chemical or biological agents was another possibility. CB warfare hadn’t been used on Earth for centuries, originally due to moral injunctions against them and later because combat armor and effective decon countermeasures rendered them useless on the modern battlefield. The Ahannu weren’t using sealed armor, however, and were vulnerable. On the other hand, Ahannu biology was still poorly understood, and a gas or bacterial agent would have to be specially tailored to their biochemistry to be effective. There wasn’t time for that … or proper research facilities on board the Derna.

      Of course, a few things were known about the Ahannu. They did breathe, for instance, and filling those tunnels with smoke might drive them out. Might. How long could they hold their breath? Again, not enough data.

      Besides, Ahannu moral codes, beliefs, and psychology were even more poorly understood than their biology. Ramsey’s orders included a most particular injunction against jeopardizing PanTerra’s chances of establishing useful and viable relations with the Ahannu after the mission’s primary objectives were met. If gassing them in their holes meant they would begin viewing humans as monsters or war criminals, the PanTerran people might not be able to pick up the pieces.

      He made a mental note to have a noumenal conference with both Gavin Norris and Dr. Hanson. If they had any further information not included in the regular briefing downloads …

      In any case, Ramsey wasn’t eager to gas the critters. The MIEU One’s mission was one of coercion, not extermination. They needed to convince the Ahannu to accept a Terran presence on Ishtar, to release their Sag-ura slaves … and, just possibly, to be willing to deal with PanTerra on matters of trade, research, and cultural exchange. Besides, Ramsey had no desire to go down in history as the man who’d annihilated the first sentient species to be encountered among the stars, and a poorly controlled or vectored CB agent could do just that. No, there had to be another way.

      Other special tactics included the use of robots—no good, since HK gunwalkers didn’t possess the requisite programming. Teleoperating the things was out too, since control signals wouldn’t penetrate rock. Besides, there were fewer HKs with the MIEU than there were tunnels, and they needed to be saved for other duties.

      Nano agents? As with biological agents, not enough was known about Ahannu physiology. Infecting them all with microscopic machines that put them to sleep or made them decide to quit fighting was great in theory but still well beyond the technical capabilities of nanotech programming specialists.

      No … in this case, “special tactics” probably meant doing things the old-fashioned way, using high explosives to seal each and every one of the tunnel entrances down there. Smoke might work … and if the Krakatoa tunnel complex was as extensive as he feared, there might be no alternative but to use tunnel rats.

      In other words, they would use the same tactics that Marines had used on Saipan and Iwo Jima, in Vietnam and Colombia, in Cuba and Vladivostok—slow, dirty, and all too often, costly. It would be simple enough to identify the tunnel entrances on the outside of the mountain. Cassius had already managed that. But the labyrinth inside Krakatoa was going to be something else entirely.

      “How long do you expect the clean-up to take, Colonel?” General King asked.

      Ramsey started. He’d been so deep in the noumenal awareness, he’d forgotten King’s presence there, looking over his virtual shoulder. “No way to tell, sir,” he replied over the link. “Our people have to go inside that mountain. They’ll have a better picture once they do.”

      “We can’t afford to screw around with fanatic holdouts.”

      “Affirmative, sir.”

      “We have a little over five hours—”

      “Until we come over Krakatoa’s horizon. Yes, sir.” He was becoming annoyed with King’s hovering, dithering worry.

      King missed the exasperation in Ramsey’s mental tone—or chose to ignore it. “Do you think we’ll have to use the cork?”

      “Too early to tell, sir.”

      “Damn it, Ramsey, you’re no help. Who’s the ARLT commander. … Warhurst, is it?”

      “Yes, sir—”

      “How do I raise him directly? Ah … there’s the command channel. …”

      Ramsey felt King opening up the private link with Captain Warhurst.

      “Warhurst? This is General King. You are not to use the cork unless I give explicit orders to that effect.”

      Ramsey didn’t hear Warhurst’s reply. Abruptly, he pulled out of the noumenon, returning his full awareness to Derna’s CIC. King was floating on the other side of the compartment, secured in his harness. “General King. A private word, sir? Outside the noumenon?”

      After a moment, King’s eyes blinked, then opened. Ramsey unsnapped his harness and pushed off from his console, drifting across the compartment to a point near King.

      “This is highly irregular, Colonel,” King told him as Ramsey caught a hand grip on the overhead and pulled himself to a halt.

      “And everything we say over the noumenal link is recorded by Cassius and the Derna’s AI,” Ramsey replied. “I wanted this to be private.”

      King arched a skeptical eyebrow. “Oh?”

      “Sir, we have to let our people down there do their job. Anything else is micromanagement bullshit and is going to jeopardize the mission. Let’s let it play out and see what happens. Sir.”

      “I could order you to stand down, you know,” King told him. “Insubordination! Those aren’t our people on Ishtar, Colonel. They’re the Marine Corps’ people, and since I am the senior Marine officer within eight light-years, they are my people. Is that understood?”

      “With all due respect, General, that’s not how the chain of command works. As regimental commander, I have authority over my units, and that includes Captain Warhurst and the ARLT. You have overall command of the MIEU, and it is your job, therefore, to determine overall strategies that you then implement through me. Sir.”

      “Are you telling me my job, Colonel?”

      “I am reminding the general that our people at the LZ know what they’re doing and that micromanagement will only confuse, slow, and hamper operations. Sir.”

      King opened his mouth as if to argue, then seemed to think better of it. “The success of this mission, our very survival, depends on Warhurst and the ARLT, Colonel. At the same time, however, my orders require me to secure certain potential assets on Ishtar, assets of considerable value to … to Earth. Using a cork would guarantee the destruction of that planetary defense complex down there. But if we can find some sort of control center inside that thing, or access the computer that controls it. …”

      “The ARLT officers and senior NCOs have all been well-briefed, sir. And we have ten people down there with special download programming for dealing with any instrumentation they may find. If there’s any way to capture the facility intact, they’ll manage it. If not. …” He shrugged, the motion turning him slightly in zero g. He pulled himself back to avoid