Doom 3™: Worlds on Fire

34

THE EARPIECE SQUAWKED TO LIFE AGAIN. ANOTHERscreech, a burst of static, then a voice…

A human voice. And as Kane moved through the underground corridors, he was glad to hear it.

“Kane? Kane, you down there?”

“Yes, Sergeant. I’m down here.”

Kane kept up his pace, rounding the curve of the Convergence Chamber. A blast of gunfire, yells in his ear that drowned out Kelly’s voice.

“Try that again, Sergeant.”

“The condition, damn it. What’s your—”

More gunfire. Kane knew that Kelly was near Delta, an area that Kane hadn’t seen on the grand tour. And things didn’t sound good…

“I’m alive. Not too sure about anyone else down there. Not—”

He came out to the intersection leading to the elevator out of this maze. He saw the worker who had greeted him earlier.

One arm looked blown away, replaced by a tweedy stump. An eye dangled out of its socket, hanging by threads. Enough to kill any human.

And like Ishii, he now started moving to attack, its jaws chomping at the air as if getting ready to chow down on a nice juicy steak.

Kane stopped. “Fuck…”

Now, both guns out, he began blasting. By instinct, he targeted the heart, but when that didn’t slow the worker, he raised both guns, their arcs nearly convergent, aimed at the maintenance worker’s head.

“Kane, what’s happening?”

More blasts in his ear from Kelly’s position.

Then: “Kane—Maria here. You okay?”

Maria. In Alpha.

“Just a minute—”

He pulled both triggers, and the automatic handguns started drilling the worker’s head. Until there wasn’t a head anymore.

Yeah, thought Kane, some jail time in the states might have been the better option.

He turned back to the elevator door, which was when he saw some other grunts had just arrived—three marines just ahead. For a split second, Kane didn’t feel alone.

Maria heard Kane’s gun blasts. She was about to check if he was okay, when things got a bit too busy for her in Alpha.

The thing that used to be Rodriguez lay at her feet, dead, its body riddled with shells from her weapon.

Andy Kim and Deuce Howard, both also in Bravo Company, and both amazingly okay, came running up to her.

“What the hell happened to Rodriguez?” Kim yelled. “Did you—”

Maria nodded. “Listen, Kelly is in and out. And who the hell knows where Hayden is. I think we better try to secure this area.”

Deuce Howard laughed. “You mean ‘secure,’ like make sure if anyone else goes Rodriguez’s route they also get killed?”

“Yeah. That’s exactly what I mean.”

Kim gave Maria’s shoulder a bump. “So you’re the boss lady now?”

“We could debate strategy, if you like, while these things start spreading throughout the city. And speaking of that, how the hell did you two miss that blast?”

Kim grinned. “We sneaked off into a storage room for a smoke. We have spots where the air detectors are off. A little technique we developed. Though I think the whole computer system is all screwed up.”

“I bet,” she said. “Okay, let’s hit the corridors together. Eyes open. Not sure what happens if one of those things—”

“You mean the zombies?”

They both turned to Howard.

“Zombies?”

He nodded. “What the hell else you gonna call ’em?”

“Zombies…” Maria repeated.

The three of them started running down the half-lit corridors of Alpha.

Jack Campbell stood up in the weapons room. The lights had gone out, and for a few moments after the blast—

An earthquake? A reactor explosion?

—he was knocked to the floor in total darkness. After the lights flickered back on, he felt the back of his head. A gash, some blood.

But he wasted no time going to his PDA, scrolling down to Swann’s ID. For a few seconds there was no signal. The shockwave must have taken down the communications system throughout the city.

He touched the contact icon again and this time heard the chirp of the signal connecting. Then a voice: “Y-yes.”

About as frightened a single word as Campbell ever heard.

“Hey,” Kane called, “you guys know—”

The trio turned slowly, in a way that was already becoming sickeningly familiar. They used to be space marines.

Used to be,Kane thought.

Now, who knew what the hell they were. They started moving toward him, faster than Ishii.

All that good marine training, Kane guessed. Semper fi’.

He whipped out his handguns, while they prepared to level a range of much meatier weapons at him. Kane’s eyes darted left and right, looking for cover.

He spotted a niche backing up to what looked like a storage locker, and he quickly moved into it.

Great. This is just perfect. Boxed in here, while they keep coming.

Bullets from their weapons, the machine guns, and blasts from their high-powered rapid-fire shotguns, started pinging and ricocheting and blasting into the walls beside Kane.

No. This would never do.

He crouched down, and when there was the slightest letup in the hail of bullets, he leaned out, crouched as low as possible.

It took only seconds for the three marines to see that Kane had gone down to the ground. In that moment Kane fired straight up, wasting no time on body shots, instead blasting away at the skulls. Shots immediately sent two of their skullcaps flying to the ceiling, while the entire corner was sprayed with their blood.

But even in the dim light, Kane could see that their blood wasn’t red anymore.

Was it even blood? Or something else?

The two marines, now largely headless, stumbled back, then down to the ground, knees smacking hard to the ground.

But where was number three?

The answer came suddenly, surprisingly, from the side as something curled around Kane’s neck, tightened, and with amazing strength yanked him to his feet.

Maria worked with Kim and Deuce, forming a three-person phalanx. Some of the zombies—

(She had now accepted that term. After all, what other word could they use?)

—were workers. And they moved slowly, stupidly. Without any weapons, they were easily dispatched.

Maria recognized some of the distorted faces, men, women she had seen in the corridors of Mars City, or in the cafeteria. Now twisted, misshapen, like wax faces left out in the hot midday sun.

“Christ,” said Deuce. “This is too much. What the hell—”

“Easy,” said Kim. “We got other company.”

Maria glanced back at Kim’s corner of their three-point defensive position. Space marines coming toward them, now zombies, dragging their weapons like kids might drag a teddy bear.

But then, one—a guy Maria had seen for a year and hadn’t said more than two words to—started to pull up and aim his dragged weapon.

“Hell, they’re going to fire at us!” she said. “Kim, keep those others away. I’m going to turn.”

Then she spun around so that now both she and Deuce faced the marines. She fell to one knee and raised her machine gun, sending an arc of fire flying right up one zombie marine’s body as if trying to create perforation lines right up the center.

But then that creature kept coming and started to raise his weapon.

“Damn,” she heard Deuce say. She felt Kim at her back, plugging away at the civilians.

Then she looked at the zombie’s poached-egg eyes, the dime-sized pupils moving back and forth.

Fucker’s trying to take aim. Let’s see how he does that without eyes.

Maria blasted both sockets. And not only did it stop the zombie from taking a shot, but she had stopped it cold.

“Good, I got one—”

But then next to her she heard a groan. Deuce dropped his weapon, and his hands went to his chest where an opening bloomed, squirting blood.

Maria only glanced at her dead partner, then returned to shoot at the zombie about to attempt to blow her away.

“Bastard,” she said, firing. “Eat this—”

And she sent a half-dozen shots neatly into the thing’s head.

“Maria, Deuce, I got them, I think—”

Andy Kim turned around and saw Deuce on the ground, the open chest wound still gurgling.

Deuce Howard’s lifeless eyes were beyond caring.

“Come on,” Maria said. “We got to clear this area. God knows how many more of these are walking around.”

Kim seemed frozen, numb, glued to the ground.

“Come on Andy. He’s gone! Now get the hell up.”

And finally Kim stood up and they started walking through the corridors of Alpha.

“All right, listen up, Swann. Are you someplace safe?”

Campbell waited.

“I—I think so. Quiet here. Nothing coming out of Delta. Doors sealed, I think.”

“Good. That’s good. Okay, here’s what we’re going to do…”

Campbell imagined Swann crouched in some dark corner, shivering maybe, his body a wreck from fear.

Got to give him a little steel,Campbell thought.Get some balls into the guy.

“You’ve done good, Swann. You’re out of the lab. You’re alive, safe. I’m going to try to secure Administration, get Hayden to make sure that this part of Mars City is clear.”

“Right.”

“But I need you—”

He heard a breath of air.

“Weneed you to get to the Comm Center. It’s the only way to get a communication out to deep space until all systems are back up and running. We’re going to need reinforcements. The armada is out there, just circling. Describe the situation—”

“The situation? The situation! Campbell, what the hell is—”

“Swann. Calm down. You hear me?” He raised his voice. “Okay. I don’t know what it is, counselor. But whatever the hell is going on here, we can’t handle it ourselves. So, someone has to get that message out, someone with the clearance to have it listened to. You’re over there; it has to be you.”

Nothing for a second.

“Swann, you still there?”

“Yes.”

“Can you do this?”

A longer wait. Definitely a lot to put on the plate of the UAC’s legal mouthpiece.

“I can do it.”

“Good. Stick to the shadows, watch every step. But move fast.”

“Okay.”

“Let me know when you get there.”

“Okay.”

“Oh, and Swann? Good luck.”

“Right.”

The signal went dead.

Good luck—because the poor bastard was going to need it.In fact, we all are.

He looked down at the massive chunk of firepower that was the BFG.

Campbell touched it.

You and me, hm? My new best friend.

Just in case it all goes south here…