Dark Star. Don Pendleton

a full platoon of armed soldiers in body armor standing guard, along with a pair of Bradley Fighting Vehicles. The Bradleys were angled toward one another, forming a narrow channel too small for any truck or car to get through, and spike strips had been laid in case somebody tried to ride a motorcycle through or around the imposing the blockade.

      Located near the artillery range were half a dozen long-range cannons, their barrels pointed at the sky. Everything the base had was primed and ready for battle, big antiaircraft shells set to explode at different heights to fill the sky with a deadly maelstrom of shrapnel.

      Massive Abram battle tanks were parked on the parade grounds, positioned back-to-back in a large circle for fast deployment. Wearing slickers and “hot com” helmets, grim soldiers walked the flat roofs of the PX and library, carrying Stinger missile launchers and lugging cumbersome, four-barrel, HAFLA multirocket launchers.

      “One minute!” called the sergeant, checking his watch. “Move it or lose it, people!”

      “About time we finally saw some action,” a private said, grinning as he lay his black letter on a shelf. Everybody going into combat was strongly urged to leave a goodbye note for his family in case he didn’t come back. That was just standard operational procedure for the U.S. Marines.

      “Don’t get too excited, kid, until we find out what we’re fighting,” a corporal replied gruffly.

      Whenever some boot heard that they were being trained to fight in space, a specialist in zero-gravity combat, they always started to make jokes about Space Marines as if nobody had ever thought of it before. Nine times out of ten that started a fight, but it was often held behind a barracks or in the motor pool after reveille, where such matters could be settled with quiet and decorum. What the CO didn’t know couldn’t get you cashiered.

      It confused and offended the troops that so many people thought it was odd that America had taken steps to protect its interests in space. A paratrooper was specially trained to fight while falling out of the sky. Commandos did it behind enemy lines, snipers did it from a mile away, scuba divers did it under water and Navy SEALs could fight anywhere, hanging upside down from mountain peaks if necessary. The United States of America had thousands of satellites in low-Earth orbits and a fledging space station in high-Earth orbit, and was planning to expand it, even build another one, before going back to the moon. The same as the Red Chinese. It would be foolhardy for the Joint Chiefs not to make plans to protect those stations with troops.

      “Time!” the sergeant announced, throwing open the exit door.

      Forming a rough queue, the men walked neatly into the rain. Across the road was a line of nondescript Hummers waiting to take them to Pope Air Force base as the first step in their rapid journey to the Cape. The vehicles were parked near a large bronze statue of General Bragg, the soft rain blurring the features of the officer so that it almost appeared as if he were crying.

      Shaking off the unnerving sight, the men of the Special Space Combat Unit started across the road when they paused and began to shudder. Dropping their duffel bags, several of them bent over and started vomiting onto the gravel. Clambering out of the Hummers, the drivers rushed to aid the fallen men when they also started to shake violently, then topple over, foaming at the mouth, streamers of red blood pouring from their eyes.

      Utterly horrified, the sergeant standing in the doorway of the barracks took a step toward the rain outside, then changed his mind and turned to sprint for the emergency button on the wall. Smashing a fist through the thin glass, he hit the switch and a strident siren began howling above the barracks. Knowing help was on the way, he went back to the doorway. Fighting the urge to rush outside, he looked over the fallen men, twitching on the ground. What in the holy hell was going on here? he thought. Wild screaming came from all over the base and, squinting against the rain, he could see a gunner topple limply off the roof of the PX, and then another from the library. Bloody hell! If he didn’t know any better, the sergeant would have swore that this was a—

      Suddenly a sharp pain filled his lungs, and the Marine lunged forward to try to shut the door, but it was already too late. His fingers felt like jelly. The soldier slipped to the floor on boneless legs, his eyesight dimming even as his mind recognized the deadly symptoms of VRL nerve gas. No. Impossible! VRL was banned by every civilized nation in the world.

      Struggling to drag in a lungful of air, the sergeant could hear the sirens of an approaching ambulance. Throwing himself forward into the rain, he cried to wave off the others, struggling to shout out a warning. But there only came a horrid burbling from his dissolving throat. Suddenly a terrible cold filled his body and the man felt himself falling forever into an inky blackness darker than space.

      H OVERING A MILE above the rumbling storm clouds blanketing South Carolina, the pilot of the X-ship waited until the canisters of VRL gas were completely empty before boosting the engines and streaking away for a quick refueling on the tropical island of Fiji, and then on to his next target. At last, the preliminaries were over, and now Dark Star could begin its real mission.

       CHAPTER FOUR

       Beijing, China

      A flash of light from above drew the guard’s attention just before his world exploded into flame.

      Moving along the top of the wall of the People’s Maximum Security Prison, the hovering X-ship burned out both searchlights and all three guard towers before anybody had time to react.

      A dozen guards burst from the last tower, blowing whistles and desperately loading 5.56 mm Norinco machine guns. As they raised the weapons and touched the triggers, bright red laser beams shot out from the tiny black box clipped under the barrel. For a moment it looked like a burning spiderweb filled the air as the lasers swept along the smooth hull of the gigantic X-ship.

      “Fire!” a sergeant bellowed, and the machine guns cut loose with streams of soft lead that bounced off the side of the huge ship.

      Just then, a steel door slammed open and a big corporal strode into view carrying a massive machine gun with a long belt of 7.8 mm rounds dangling from the side, a bipod attached to the vented barrel. Working the arming bolt, the corporal aimed the machine gun at the X-ship, then paused in shock as he saw the red dot of a laser pointer resting on his chest. For a breathless moment he waited for the prison guard pointing the Norinco at him to move the beam aside, then in cold realization he understood the beam was angling down from the invading vessel.

      Jerking up his head, the corporal looked into a grinning face of a man crouching in a small open hatch in the side of the X-ship, some sort of angular rifle in his hands. Instantly, both men cut loose. The heavy-duty 7.8 mm combat rounds hammered briefly across the adamantine hull of the X-ship, then the guard exploded, guts and blood spraying outward for yards.

      The gunner was cut in two. The ragged remains of the torso fell into the exercise yard, while his undamaged legs toppled outside into the freedom of the night.

      Quickly turning, the man disappeared from the hatch and a salvo of rockets shot out to impact on the inside of thick granite wall. The noise was deafening, and billowing smoke exploded across the enclosed prison yard.

      On the ground, a lone guard threw an arm across his face and braced for the impact of shrapnel, but nothing occurred. Hesitantly, the guard lowered his arm in confusion. But how could that be? He saw the missiles hit! Could they have dummy warheads that only produced smoke and noise? But that would mean…

      “Jail break!” he bellowed, running blindly through the dense fumes. “Alarm! Alarm! Mass escape!”

      Sirens began to stridently howl as the double doors of the dining hall slammed aside and out poured a howling mob of prisoners, their gray work suits fluttering with prison ribbons. Howling like wild animals, the murderers and rapists spread across the courtyard, grabbing the fallen weapons of the dead guards and firing at the other guards. The smoky air was alive with red laser beams.

      Staying safe inside the dining hall, four men poured water over their clothing and hair, then flipped over a table and crouched behind the impromptu shield.

      A