revised scenes: the battle moves into the tunnels

== 2064: Benue River Restaurant, Aristillus, Lunar Nearside

Major Van Duong walked around the perimeter of the evacuated Nigerian restaurant. The restaurant was big, but not quite big enough for all of the men of first company – especially in their bulky spacesuits; his men occuppied all of the tables and chairs, and a few were even standing at the restaurant’s counter and condiment bar.

Their laptop screens showed the tactical displays of their rovers. The men inside the restaurant had removed the gloves from their suits to give them better control over the mice and trackballs. Outside the restaurant a few fully suited soldiers – freshly painted black stripe logos diagonally bisecting their torsos – patrolled the tunnel.

Major Van Duong looked out through the restaurant’s plate glass window into the tunnel. The neighborhood was quiet. Most of the people who hadn’t been scared away by the betting markets showing an likely invasion through the large construction airlocks nearby had fled over the past 15 minutes when the alarms sounded and the message boards exploded with pictures and grainy video of the invasion fleet on the surface. From time to time a few individuals still sped past as they evacuated on foot, on motorbikes or on delivery skids, but the tunnel was growing quieter and quieter.

Van Duong turned from the view of the tunnel and looked over one of his men’s shoulder at his terminal. He winced as the invasion ships’ turrets flashed and panned back and forth. He glanced at the rover stats counter. Eighty rovers dead ALREADY? They weren’t even deployed yet!

Van Duong clicked to the command broadcast channel. “All captains, pull your rovers back ; hide them in shadows”. There was little activity – for the most part his men had ALREADY pulled their machines back after they’d watched the PK ships destroy the Solar Installation machines.

Eighty down? Van Duong shook his head. Going up against the armored ships would only result in the destruction of their own rovers. Better to wait for the ships to open their hatches and disgorge its infantry, and then engage the soft targets. It shouldn’t take too long. He waited – and was soon rewarded. Just a moment after the last of the Solar Installation machines was destroyed the nearest ship opened its vast armored door. Were all the invasion ships doing this? Van Duong walked to stand behind another of his men and looked over his shoulder to get a view of another ship. Yes, this one was too. He took a few more steps and looked at another screen.

All of the ships were opening, their hatches swinging out and down like huge ramps. What was behind them? He squinted. The contrast between the bright lunar-noon surface and the dim interior meant that he couldn’t see anything. They would wait until the earth infantry came out – shoot too early and the ships might button back up and let their turrets take care of his rovers. He issued a command spoke over the broadcast circuit, “Hold your fire, ” then watched the ships.

Finally there was movement.

Shit.

What spilled out of the ships’ holds were not space suited infantrymen, but rovers much like the ones he and his men were operating. Van Duong looked at one of his operators screen The target acquisition counter flashed. Dozens. Hundreds. The counter hit a thousand and kept climbing.

Major Van Duong grimaced. He spoke on the command channel again. “Everyone, get your rovers back inside the tunnels.” A moment later Captain Tuan Hung, First Company commander, started to object, then apparently thought better of it. On the other side of the restaurant the captain stood and moved towards him. “Major – the plan to minimize civilian -”

Van Duong cut him off. “I know the plan. But we can’t fight out here. There are too many ships – once they know where our rovers are they’ve got us in a crossfire. Even then, I’d stay up there if we could take out the invasion force. But we can’t – they’re sending rovers our first. Now get your company’s rovers back inside. We’ll fight in first level, where we’re not in the cross fire.”

Captain Tuan Hung nodded and began to issue the order. Van Duong turned to an assistant. “Tell Command that we’re going to fight inside, then have the airlocks broadcast the white code.” He thought for a second “- and contact the PKs on an open channel. They need to know that we’re not going to contest the locks”.

A minute later the aide responded “Major, all the locks in our sector are broadcasting the Vatican code.” He paused as he listened to something on another channel ” -and I’ve got protocol confirmation that the PKs got the message.”

“Good”. Van Duong watched on the screen as the expat rovers fell back before the wave of PK rovers. The whole time the guns on the fleet ships panned back and forth, occasionally firing as some expat rover or other target briefly exposed itself.

Five minutes later Captain Tuan Hung announced “All my companies rovers are inside; we’ve got one squad at 300 meters back, and the rest in reserve.” Van Duong nodded with out answering; the other company commanders were giving similar reports to him over his suit coms.

The captain turned to go back to the table where he was watching a console but the major halted him. “Captain – wait. I saw some non-combatants out in the tunnel not ten minutes ago. Once those PK rovers get inside the lock, we may not be able to hold them for more than a few minutes before they turn the corner from tunnel 92 and get in here with us in 73. Detail a few men to make sure -”

Major Van Duong froze mid sentence as he saw a very dark skinned girl – no more than 12 or 13 – enter the restaurant. Jesus – as if he needed visual aids to make his point!

“You – what are you doing here?”

The girl stopped and looked at him brazenly. “This is my restaurant – what are you doing here?”

“We’re fighting the PKs! Now what the hell are you -”

“Hey! You should use nicer language when you’re talking to me on my own property!”

He blinked. “Uh…Sorry.” He paused. “Kid, we might have PKs here in ten minutes or less, and -”

One of the men yelled out “Major!”

Van Duong took one last look at the girl “Get out of here!”, then turned to the screen.

A variety of PK rovers were approaching the concrete apron outside the huge construction lock in the center of their sector. Most were of a tracked design that was pretty similar to the standard expat model, but one vehicle out there much larger – more like a tracked delivery skid with a mid sized cargo container on top.

Van Duong pointed at the screen. “What is that?”

The man shrugged. “Doesn’t look like the APCs they used in the last attack, but still – a troop transport, I think. These idiots are bringing infantry in in the first wave after all!”

Van Duong shook his head. He’d seen combat as a young man. Dreams of defending the fragmentary, chaotic Vietnamese border when the Chinese state fell apart still woke him up at night occassionally. Unlike the young rover operator in front of him, he wasn’t thrilled with the idea of unarmored troops – of any flag – marching into combat. He’d seen what machine guns could do to a human body.

– but, yes, it would be a win for the good guys. “OK, let’s see what they’re going to do with infantry.” Van Duong watched the screen as the PK troop carrier rolled into the open airlock and the massive outer construction lock door slid ponderously shut behind it.

Van Duong keyed the command circuit. “Captains – tell you men that we want to avoid excess bloodshed. If they’re going to march into the meat grinder, kill only as many as we need to. Pay attention for anyone dropping their weapons or surrendering. It’s not going to be easy to detect surrenders in suits, but -”

Van Duong was cut short by a cataclysmic explosion. He stumbled and felt something crash into him. He blinked. He could taste copper. What was – was he on the floor? Had he passed out? What was going on?

He climbed to his feet and looked around in the darkness. Darkness? The lights were off. He looked out through the plate glass window – well, were the window had been a moment before – and saw that the tunnel was dark as well. A moment later emergency lights came on. He looked around. The entire restaurant was in disarray – tables toppled, men picking themselves up from the floor, computers smashed. There was something in his mouth – he spit out the dust and grit – and something sticky on his forehead. He wiped his forehead and came away with blood. What was that huge roaring?

He shouted “What the hell was that?” but got no response. Could anyone even hear him over that huge sound? What was happening? Van Duong looked around and saw a rover control station at his feet. He picked it up and set it on a counter. The list of first company rovers was mostly red but he found one green one that was still alive, still broadcasting. The map said that it was at the 300 meter barrier. Perfect – that would let him see the PKs. He selected it and looked out through its cameras.

The view showed tunnel 92, but – he squinted – where the tunnel should end in the massive armored door of a construction lock something wasn’t right. What was he –

Van Duong blinked. My God.

He was looking out a ragged hole where the vast airlock had once been. The darkness beyond – that was the sky. The lunar sky.

The PKs had detonated an insanely huge bomb inside the airlock – with both doors closed! The explosion had ripped the lock out entirely – both doors, walls, everything. All of tunnel 92 was exposed to vacuum. THAT was the source of the insanely load roar. It wasn’t echos of the demolition charge, but the freight train mass of kilometers of atmosphere roaring out of the tunnels and into the void.

Jesus.

And if tunnel 92 was open to vacuum, that meant –

Looking around at his men and the destroyed restaurant did a quick calculation. The hole was huge – devastatingly huge – but the tunnels were even larger. They wouldn’t depressurize instantly, but they would depressurize in time. He didn’t know if they had seconds or minutes. He yelled out “helmets on!”

He still couldn’t he heard over the roar, but his men were independently realizing what was going on and were snapping on helmets and gloves.

Major Van Duong closed his own helmet then switched from the command circuit to the full battallion circuit. “All members of the 30th – we’ve got a tunnel breach. Seal your suits, and make sure that any wounded are sealed up too.” He clicked over to Command and reported to General Dewitt, then ended the call.

A few rover operators in First Company were already suited up and were back at their stations. Good. Van Duong looked at the screen on the console he’d picked up. His men were maneuvering surviving rovers behind barriers and detritus at the 300 meter line.

The 300 meter line. He’d had his rovers deployed there so that when they opened up with their weapons they wouldn’t endanger the airlock. But if the PKs weren’t playing by the rules, the gloves were off…and besides, the airlock was already gone. He began to issue orders to captain Chi Ngo, of fifth company. * * *

Ewoma crouched behind the stainless steel counter, holding tightly on to the cash bag she’d just removed from the restaurant safe.

She looked around and listened to the roaring. The atmosphere was blowing out of this tunnel quickly. She had to get somewhere safe – and she had to do it immediately. She stood and ran out from behind the counter, through the restaurant. Outside in the tunnel she the roaring was loudest from the right.

She turned left and ran.

* * *

Major Van Duong tabbed between different rover viewpoints. The 300 meter line was being reinforced with more rovers pulled from his reserve. The trackless gun stations that had been winched up into the ceiling infrastructure were in place, but were powered down – hopefully the PKs wouldn’t see them until it was too late. There were even a large number of improvised landmines glued down to the roadbed. Van Duong shook his head – just two hours ago he’d been arguing with Captain Chi Ngo that the mines might be a bit too much because they could harm the infrastructure. Well, with the air still whistling away through the devastating breach, he saw how wrong he’d been on that call.

Duong leaned forward and zoomed the display. The PK machines were starting to pour in through the blasted hole and into the tunnel.

* * *

Ewoma leaned into the steady wind and ran through the dim emergency-lit tunnel as the world roared in her ears. She batted pieces of packing foam and food wrappers away as they flew at her, but she kept running. She had to get someplace safe, behind a pressure door. How far was the closest one? It was up by O’Grady’s Icecream Shack, right? No, wait – there were new ones that they’d installed a few weeks ago! Where was the closest one? A bit over a kilometer.

She panted as she ran. The air was getting thin. Of course it was – the e-p-doors had probably all been shut automatically. And that meant that it wasn’t going to take hours for the tunnel she was in to empty out of air – it might take just minutes. She tried to pick up the pace as she turned left at the next intersection, but it was hard – really hard – to run. The cash bag was banging uncomfortable against her left thigh but she tried to ignore it. She concentrated on the route.

She was barely halfway to the e-p-door when she slowed to a walk. She had to go faster, she knew – but she just couldn’t. The air was too thin. Walk? That would take longer, and the air would get thinner yet. What other options did she have? She bent over in the middle of the tunnel with her hands on her knees and panted.

Think. Think!

She could let herself into utility tunnel that ran parallel to this tunnel. Playing hide-and-go-seek with friends after work had taught her how to jimmy the door over by Ling’s Hardware – but, no, the ends of that that u-tunnel been sealed off when United Delivery went bankrupt and their warehouse got subdivided. Ewoma thought the word “shit” and tried to bite it back. She agreed with her grandmother – she didn’t want to be one of the bad kids using language like that. “Crap”, then.

She couldn’t run. Walking would take too long. What? What could she do? She just wanted to cry.

But if she sat down and cried, she’d die. Ewoma rubbed her eyes. There had to be some – the old mining emergency suits! Her dad had showed her some once. Were they still around? She looked around the tunnel. Where?

What was she supposed to look for? Ah – a big blue arrow, that was it. She looked to the left. A red arrow – great! Wait, no – that was the wrong color, and it was pointing to a glass-fronted cabinet with a fire hose coiled inside. Darn it! Wait – there! She followed the blue arrow down…and it pointed to a vending machine. That had to be it, but someone had put a stupid vending machine in the way. She put her family’s cash bag coins down and walked over to the vending machine. She grabbed one corner and pulled.

Ewoma was tall for her age, but not very strong. The machine refused to move. Even in the lighter gravity, the built-in microwave oven and the huge load of refrigerated goat burgers had enough weight to stymie her. A “shit!” escaped her lips. She stepped back and looked at the machine – and saw the locking casters. Ah-ha! She kicked one caster’s release toggle, then the other, then pulled on the vending machine again. This time the it rolled slowly out of the way.

Behind it, flush with the wall, was the old style emergency suit locker. The locker was dirty – dust covered the warning sign and instructions. That didn’t matter – as long as it still worked. She grabbed the handle and pulled, and she was gratified when the door sprang open. She paused and looked inside the cabinet at the adult-sized suits. She gritted her teeth. Didn’t the people who designed this thing know that kids lived here? Actually, this WAS one of the oldest tunnels around. Maybe there hadn’t been any kids when this was installed.

So what was she going to do? She could fit into a big suit like that, but she’d NEVER be able to walk in it.

She stared at it for a moment and had an idea.