Hell on Earth (25 page)

Hell. Arlene and I were about to go back into hell. We were trying to save living babies from burning in the hell on Earth. She was a good friend and comrade. I liked her a lot and hoped I would not witness her death. But since becoming bold about her sinful interest in me, she was making me uncomfortable. I would find her a lot easier to deal with if I weren't tempted by her.

Or if she would consent to . . . Jesus! Give me strength! Am I really ready to contemplate holy union?
I grimaced; it was a very big step, a life commitment, and I was too chicken to think about it yet. I didn't feel much older than Jill!

My soul was troubled because I
did
desire Arlene. A verse from Nephi kept running through my mind, like a public service announcement:

O Lord, I have trusted in thee, and I will trust in thee forever. I will not put my trust in the arm of flesh; for I know that cursed is he that putteth his faith in the arm of flesh. Yea, cursed
is he that putteth his trust in man or maketh flesh his arm.

“A buck for your thoughts,” Arlene said, standing very close to me. We were taking our first rest stop in an alley. Lately, I was coming to feel safer in alleys than in open spaces.

“I was remembering a passage from the Book.”

“You want to share it with me?” she asked. I looked deep into her bloodshot eyes, the prettiest sight in the world, and there was no mockery or sarcasm. I wasn't about to tell her how hard I was trying to resist temptation and that right now I spelled sin beginning with a scarlet letter A.

But there was an earlier passage from the Second Book of Nephi that spoke directly to any warrior's heart. I quoted it instead:

“O Lord, wilt thou make way for mine escape before mine enemies! Wilt thou make my path straight before me! Wilt thou not place a stumbling block in my way—but that thou wouldst clear my way before me, a hedge not up my way, but the ways of mine enemy.”

“Good plan,” said Arlene.

“God's plan.”

She touched my arm, and I felt relaxed instead of tense. “Albert, what if I told you I'd be willing to study your religion to see what it's about?”

I wasn't expecting that. “Why would you do that?” I asked, probably too suspicious. In the Marines, I got too used to being sucker-punched by antireligious bigots.

“I'm not promising to convert or anything,” she told me, “but I care about you, Albert. You believe in these things, and I want to understand.”

“Cool,” I said; but I was still suspicious of her motives.

She dropped the other shoe: “So if I'm willing to study what you believe, would you be willing to relax a little and we could get together?”

I'd expected more subtlety from someone as intelligent as Arlene, but then again, Marines were not famous for an indirect approach. I had to close my eyes before shaking my head. I couldn't make the word no come out.

“I don't mean to make you uncomfortable,” said Arlene.

“You may mean the best,” I told her, “but it doesn't matter what we do or say. Unless we're married, we can't make love.”

“You mean we can't even fool around?” she asked.

“I mean we can't have sex together unless we're married.”

I could tell by her expression I was a more surprising phenomenon than the spidermind. “You're kidding,” she said. “Not even touching?”

“Not sexual touching.” I wished she'd let up!

She looked away from me, almost shyly. “I'm only talking about a little fun.”

I tried a new tack. “How can you think of fun when the world is dying?”

“Seems like a good time to me,” she said. “We could use a break.”

“Arlene, any sex outside of marriage is fornication, even just touching. That kind of touching. The sin is in the thought.”

She mumbled something. I could have sworn she asked, “How about
inside
marriage?” But she turned away and pretended she hadn't spoken. I suppose Arlene was as freaked about the thought as I was.

I didn't think I was making the best possible case
for my faith, but God isn't about winning a popularity contest. He doesn't have to.

“Albert, if you ever feel differently, I'll be there for you.” I could tell she'd run out of things to say. At this moment, I probably seemed more alien than a steam-demon or a bony.

Fortunately, the rest break was over. I pointed to my watch and Arlene nodded. We could return to the far less dangerous territory of fighting monsters in hell. At least I knew what to expect from them.

Nothing else stood between us and the Radio Shack except the corpses of some dead dogs. We broke into the abandoned store, kicking in the inadequately padlocked door. We used our day-night goggles to hunt through the darkness, not wanting to use a betraying light. A number of large spiderwebs were spun across a wall of boom boxes, proof that one Earth life form might survive the invasion unchanged. I was surprised that the store didn't seem to have been looted . . . but then, what for?

“We should be able to find the jacks for Jill,” said Arlene, who giggled right afterward. It took me a moment to recognize what was funny.

She was right, though. In the store's unlooted condition, we found the jacks very quickly. She pocketed them and headed for the front of the store, but stopped at a counter. Something had caught her eye; I couldn't see what.

“I need to ask you a question,” she said.

“Ask away.”

“Do you love someone?”

“That's a very personal question.”

“That's why I'm asking,” she followed up. “Do you?”

She deserved an answer. “Yes, but she's dead.”

“You never made love to her?”

“She died before we married.”

“Thank you for telling me,” she said. “I'm not trying to probe you, Albert. I've succeeded in revealing too much of myself. Now let's get back before I say something else stupid.”

She went out the door, and I glanced at the counter to see a demo music CD of Golden Oldies, led off by Carly Simon singing “Nobody Does it Better.” I'd never heard the song but I could imagine the subject matter. Jesus help us; was this a divine retribution? I shuddered; I hadn't seen any rainbows since the invasion.

We didn't exchange another word on the way back. Her expression was grim, hard. She was probably angry with herself for opening up to me without finding out first how I really felt. Nonreligious people usually had this trouble with us. We really meant it. No wonder we came off like nuts. How could I tell Arlene that she was probably allergic to nuts?

I
let Jill take the next nap on the couch. For a crazy moment I envied the mummy for sleeping so long. Jill didn't seem all that rested when Arlene and Albert returned, but any sleep had to be better than none.

Jill asked if there was any coffee, and it turned out that the chems stored it in the basement. Hot-tap coffee helped bring her around, and with dark circles under her eyes and still yawning, she got to work on the man who was no longer a mummy but still plenty cyber.

She attached the necessary wires, brought up her ultramicro and started hacking. I still had my doubts that this would actually work; but the more excited Jill became, the more I was converted.

Then she said the magic words, “Yes, yes,
yes!”
and got up to pump her arm and strut like a guy. I doubt that sex will ever give her that much excitement.

About a minute passed while she fiddled with the TracPad, listening to handshaking routines on the audio-out. She gave the first report: “I've made contact with his brain at seventeen thirty-two. His name is Kenneth Estes.”

“Does he know where he is?” I asked.

Jill hesitated, and then spelled it out: “He thinks he's dead and in hell.”

“Can we talk to him?” I asked.

“Yup,” said Jill. “I can type questions, and you can read his answers. But you have to scan through the random crap; it's a direct link to Ken's brain.”

“All right, you interpret,” I replied. “The first thing is find out who he is and why he's important enough for demon gift-wrapping.”

Arlene sat up on the couch where she'd almost dozed off. This could well be too interesting to miss. Albert sat in a chair, but he was wide-awake. Jill tapped for a long moment at her tiny keyboard, using all ten fingers, much to my surprise. I thought all hackers were two-finger typists, it was a law or something. She read the first part of the man's story:

“As I said, his name's Ken Estes. He's a computer software designer slumming as a CIA analyst. Low
level stuff, not a field agent or anything. He was born in—”

“No time for the family background,” I interrupted. “Keep him focused on how and why he became a cybermummy.”

Somewhere, water was dripping. I hadn't noticed it before, but it was very annoying while waiting for Jill to pass on the messages in silence. Finally, she spoke again: “When the aliens landed and started the war, Ken was told by his superiors that the agency had developed a new computer which the operator accessed in V.R. mode.”

“What's V.R.?” Albert asked.

“Old term; this guy's in his thirties! Virtual Reality; we call it burfing now, from ‘body surfing,' I think.”

“Oh, the net,” said Albert.

“We'll go back to school later,” I jumped in. “Get on with it, Jill!”

“High-ranking officers within the agency induced Ken to accept the implants ‘for the good of the United States.' Told him he'd be able to help fight the aliens. Instead, it turned out they were traitors within the Company—”

Jill stopped for a moment, swallowing hard. She took another sip of coffee before continuing. We were back to her deep disgust for human traitors. She made herself read on. She wouldn't be guilty of dereliction of duty.

The high-ranking officers had cooperated with the aliens, joining a criminal conspiracy against the country they were sworn to defend—and incidentally, against their own species. Ken “told” us more through Jill:
Company ‘borged me, attached me to alien net, one not part conspiracy waited too long, tried to save killed conspiratora-tora-tora befora took him out . . .

“How did the aliens intend to use him?” I asked.

Jill asked, and the answer came:
Hoped him conduit betwalien biotechputer netputer and webwide human d'bases crlsystems.

“Jeez, it's like a sci-fi James Joyce,” I said. “From now on, you interpret, Jill. It gives me a headache!”

“We live in a science fiction world,” said Arlene, wandering over from the couch, wide-awake, as Ken's tale unfolded. “Fly, I'd like to ask a question,” she said.

“Be my guest.”

“Jill, would you ask him how much of the alien technology was biologically based?”

Jill asked and passed on: “Ken says that
all
the alien technology is biotech, except for stuff they stole from subject races, like the rocket technology for the flying skulls.”

“Yes!” exclaimed Arlene, as excited as Jill at a moment of vindication. “We've been on the right track all along, Fly. The original enemy went as far with biological techniques as they possibly could. Perhaps the first species they conquered lived on the same planet, but had a mechanical technology they were able to adapt to their own use. Eventually, they conquered the Gate builders; we monkeyed with the Gates, turned them on, and the invaders poured through. That would explain why in any choice between organic and mechanical, they always opt for the biological.”

“And it would also explain why our own technology shows up in odd places,” I agreed, “and why they use firearms.”

“They're pragmatic,” said Albert. “Their study of us proves that, these demonic forms they take.”

I tried to get the show back on the road: “Jill, can he tell us how they communicate with one another?”

There was a long stretch before Jill helped us out with our immediate communication needs. “He says
it hurts to think about this, but he will. He . . . realizes we're free. I've told him a little about us and . . . he does want to help.”

“Tell him we appreciate anything he can do,” I said.

Another moment passed and he answered the question beyond my expectation: “There are neural pathways integrated into the computers. Psi-connections carry all the orders. The aliens don't need to
tell
their slaves what to do! They merely think the orders, but it's different than merely thinking. No word. Project? Psimulcast?”

“Does Ken know where the commands originate?” I asked.

“He doesn't understand the question,” Jill answered quickly.

“Uh, I'm not asking if he knows where the ultimate leaders happen to be right now. But does he know how the chain of command functions for the invasion?”

Jill's forehead showed some extra furrows as she passed on my thoughts, probably doing some translating along the way. Finally, Ken passed on a detailed report, filtered through Jill.

“Question is meaningless; no hierarchy.”

“Hive culture? Collective?”

“Nope; they just . . . huh? Uh, they just all do the same thing. The aliens themselves; the slaves—I think that means everyone not part of ‘the people'—fight like crazy. That's why they're not ‘the people.' ”

“Can Ken issue commands?”

“Fly, that's what he was made for! Receive alien commands and convey them to human systems.”

“I mean, the other way 'round?”

She tapped, stared. “He doesn't understand the question. It's like he's not allowed to think about it or see the question. Some sort of protected-mode thing firm-wired in. Wait, he's talking again . . .

“This ‘invasion fleet' is actually an exploration fleet. Highest-intel aliens are the entities inside the spiderminds. Send out fleets, probe, when feasible conquer alien worlds, no reason other than raw power. Well, Ken can't understand the reason, if there is one.