Cold War

Chapter 23

Ligacheva slid the brimming shot glass across the table to Schaefer.

”Here, American,” she said bitterly. “A toast to Yashin’s success.”

Schaefer stared expressionlessly at the drink. The vodka was Stolichnaya, of course, and the glass was reasonably clean, but he didn’t pick it up right away.

Ligacheva lifted her own glass and contemplated it. “So eager to engage the enemy, my Sergeant Yashin. So eager to taste first blood,” she said.

”They’re all going to die,” Schaefer said flatly. “All those men.”

Ligacheva paused, her glass of vodka in hand, and stared at him.

”Yashin is acting just like those things,” Schaefer told her. “He lives for the fight, the thrill, the blood.” Schaefer picked up his drink and swallowed it. “Hell, maybe we all do.” He thumped the empty glass down on the table. “The thing is, they’re better at it than we are. So Yashin and the rest are all going to die.”

Ligacheva lowered her drink and set it gently on the table, still untouched. “I thought you Americans were the world’s great optimists,” she said. “You talk of freedom and peace and color television, and you go about your lives happily certain that someday you’ll all be rich…” She shook her head and stared at Schaefer. “So what happened to you?” she asked.

Schaefer reached for the bottle. “I got a look at the American dream,” he said. “Two-car garage, June Cleaver in the bedroom, one and three-fourths kids-and a Smith amp; Wesson in the dresser drawer, just in case things don’t quite work out.” He poured. “Except lately it seems the cars are in the shop, June’s on Prozac, the kids are on crack, and the Smith amp; Wesson’s getting plenty of use.”

”I don’t know this Prozac,” Ligacheva said. “And I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

”It doesn’t matter,” Schaefer said. He bolted the second shot. “Look, you think I don’t care what happens to your men-maybe I don’t. Maybe I can’t care anymore. But that’s nothing. What matters is that nobody cares. The people who put us here sure don’t give a shit. We’re just numbers to them, an allotment, another piece of equipment; we’re low tech and easy to maintain.”

Ligacheva shook her head and gulped her own first drink. “That can’t be true,” she said. “Some don’t care, maybe-there are always bad ones.”

”Nobody cares,” Schaefer insisted. “Except those things out there. That’s why they’re going to win-because they believe in what they’re doing here. Nobody sent them. Nobody ordered them to come. Nobody screwed them out of their jobs, or their freedom, or their lives. They come here because they want to, because it’s fun.”

Ligacheva frowned. “You seem to believe you have a special understanding of these creatures. You say these things as if you know them.”

”Maybe I do,” Schaefer said. “I’ve survived dealing with them once, anyway, which most people don’t. I understand enough about them to know there’s something wrong about their being here, in this place.”

”Explain.”

”They don’t care much for the cold,” Schaefer told her. “I should know-the last time we met, the only thing that saved my ass was a half inch of summer rain. They like it hot-so what the hell are they doing here? And they come here to hunt, to kill people for fun, to collect our skulls as trophies, well, I don’t see a lot of people around here, do you? Besides, if they were here to hunt us, if they really wanted us dead, we’d have been hanging from the yardarms hours ago, like your friends down the corridor.”

”Why are they here, then?” Ligacheva asked. “Why did they butcher Galyshev and the others? My squad-they killed them, too, but maybe we were intruding, getting too close to their base. But what did the workers do? You say they hunt for fun, as we hunt animals-all right, where is the sport in such a slaughter? And why ruin our heating system?”

Schaefer shook his head. “Those workers were just in the wrong place at the wrong time, would be my guess,” he said. “Whatever they were after, I don’t think the aliens were looking for those men. Hell, I don’t think those things wanted to be here at all. I think this is a detour, the wrong exit, something went wrong and landed them here, and they don’t like this shitty weather any more than we do. They’re in a bad mood, and your buddies got in the way, that’s all.”

Ligacheva shuddered.

”They took things,” she said. “Pieces from the pumps and the wiring.”

”Spare parts,” Schaefer said. “Their ship… maybe something’s broken, and they’re trying to fix it.” He considered the bottle thoughtfully, and then put it down without pouring a third drink. “Must be like trying to repair a Porsche with whalebone and baling wire,” he said in English. He didn’t have the Russian vocabulary for it.

”Surely, these things are capable of great ingenuity,” Ligacheva said in Russian.

”Surely,” Schaefer agreed. “Aren’t we all?”

As Ligacheva and Schaefer spoke in the pumping station’s common room, the other Americans sat dejectedly in the military barracks.

”This is embarrassing,” Dobbs said. “The Russkies took us down before we could get off a shot! “

”I want to know what happened to that lousy cop,” Wilcox said. “We’re freezing our asses off in here while he’s kissing up to that butch lieutenant…”

”Shut up, Wilcox,” Lynch said. “All of you shut up.”

”Why?” Wilcox demanded.

”So we can plan how we’re going to get out of here and what we’re going to do once we’re out,”

Philips told him. “Did anyone see where they put our gear?”

”That storeroom across the hall,” Lynch said. “But, sir, I don’t see how we’re going to get out of here.”

”Our orders were to secure the alien ship,” Philips said, “and we sure as hell can’t do that from in here, now can we?” He reached down and pulled a flattened cylinder from his boot-the Russians had taken their packs and had patted them down, but the search hadn’t been very thorough. “So we grab our equipment, we secure the station, and then we head out for that ship. Now, give me a hand with those mattresses

…”

A few moments later the guard at the barracks door heard shouting and banging. He turned, startled.

He had had English in school, of course, everyone did. He hadn’t used it in years, though, and he had never actually spoken English to anyone outside a classroom. He struggled to make out words through the locked door.

One voice seemed to be doing all the shouting. “Hey!” the American called. “You out there! You speak English? Ever seen a Super Bowl? You watch X-Files? What’s the capital of Sacramento?”

The guard could not follow that. He struggled to remember the words he wanted.

”Slow,” he shouted back. “You talk slow, please!”

”The door!” the American shouted.

The guard frowned. He knew that word. It was almost like the Russian. “Door” meant dvyer. He unslung his AK-47 and stepped closer to the door. “What, door?” he asked.

”It’s got termites bozo!” the American shouted. The guard had no idea what the American was talking about, or what “termites bozo” might be. He stepped up and put a hand on the door.

It seemed solid enough. It was cold to the touch-extremely cold-so the crazy American wasn’t worried about a fire.

”What, door?” he repeated.

”C-4 termites!” the American said.

The blast smashed the door upward and outward-the lower hinge was torn from the frame instantly, since the C-4 charge had been almost at floor level, and the lock gave as well, but the upper hinge held at first, so that the upper two thirds of the door pivoted up like a gigantic pinball flipper and smashed the guard off his feet. The explosion reduced the bottom third of the door to bits and drove four-inch splinters into the guard’s legs, belly, and groin.

Inside the barracks the blast was absorbed by the stacked mattresses that had been piled on top of the little surprise package from Philips’s boot. The sound was still startling, almost deafening.

”Come on,” Philips barked, leading the way over the resulting heap of cotton stuffing, broken wood, and blood.