A Day for Damnation

THIRTEEN

AND THEN everything was silent.

And pink. The light was pink. The windows were pink.

We were canted forward at a steep angle. We'd hit once on the belly of the ship, smacking against the pink drifts of whatever, then bounced up high as the wind-filled parafoil dragged us on-we came down again hard, skidding forward until the nose caught on something and we plowed our way in. But the tail didn't stopit swung up and forward, tilting the ship even steeper. We were lucky we hadn't flipped all the way over on our back.

Something smelled sweet.

I wondered what we'd landed in.

The stillness was incredible-as if we were smothered in marshmallow. The sound of my breath seemed unnaturally loud. "Colonel?"

"I'm all right. Yourself?"

"Yeah." I started pushing the still half-inflated airbag away from me. I could hear the air swooshing out of it as I pushed. "Duke?" I called.

He didn't answer.

"Can we get some light?"

"Hang on." There was the sound of switches. I could hear Lizard's hands moving across the console. "Let's try this-"

Whatever it was, it worked. The boards in front of us came back to life. The panel lights lit up, the screens began to glow. Several small alarms started beeping.

"Shut up!" Lizard said. She punched buttons. They shut. "Now, let's do a little fire prevention. . . ."

There was a hissing sound. Suddenly the air felt wet and. smelled of menthol.

She thumbed her radio on. "Ducklings, this is Banshee-6. We're down and safe. Possible injuries to one of our party. Do notrepeat, do not-attempt to rescue us. The pink clouds are dangerous. Do you copy?"

There was static for a moment, then a military voice came back, "We copy. "And then, more personal, "Are you all right, Colonel?"

"I'm a little annoyed."

"I got it. Keep your channel open. We're getting a bearing on you. What happened?"

"We hit a hard cloud."

"Yeah, we can see it. It's rolling south like a big pink carpet. Thanks for the warning. We're heading out over the ocean to get clear of it. What the hell is that stuff anyway?"

"I don't know yet-but it blows up engines. We lost the rotor and both turbines. We came down on the parafoil." She hesitated for a second, then added, "Listen, I'm pretty sure this is something Chtorran. You've got to let Denver know. This is what's knocking down our skyballs. It's just like hitting a wall of cotton candy." She sniffed. "It even smells like cotton candy."

"All right, we've got our fix. We'll be sending a rescue ship back as soon as the candy clouds pass."

"Thanks. I'll keep this channel open as long as I've got power. Out."

Lizard went fumbling beneath her seat. "Here-" she handed something across to me, a flashlight. "See what happened to Duke. And be careful. It's steep. I'm going to try to get the emergency power on."

I couldn't swivel my seat backward, not while the chopper was pointed so sharply downward. I guessed we were tilted at a thirty-degree angle. I unbuckled my safety harness and nearly pitched forward onto the controls.

"I told you, be careful."

"Yeah, I will." I angled myself around and swept the flashlight across the rear of the chopper. Duke was sprawled-no, caught-in the right side bubble. I couldn't see his face, his head was below the deck level, he was almost upside down in the seat. I started climbing toward him.

It was hard to find handholds. I had to use my seat and Lizard's to climb. Once I got past them, there were deck rings on either side for securing cargo. I grabbed for the ones on Duke's side of the ship. Halfway up, the chopper lurched-and shifted. The metal groaned. I thought I heard Duke gasp. I froze where I was

"It's your weight," said Lizard. "You're bringing the tail down. Keep going."

I started climbing again, this time even more carefully. The chopper creaked once and lurched once-then it was still.

"I think that's it," Lizard said. "That last one felt pretty solid." I'd reduced the angle of tilt to fifteen degrees.

Duke's eyes were closed. I lifted him out of the bubble and stretched him out on the floor of the ship. There was blood on his face, streaming from his nose and a bad cut on his forehead-but he was breathing.

"Duke-?"

"There's a red-bordered panel on the floor there," said Lizard. "Open it. That's the primary first aid."

I found the panel she was talking about and pulled it open. There were three plastic boxes stored inside. One was labeled WATER, one was labeled FOOD. The third simply had a red cross on it.

I took out an ampule of ammonia and broke it under Duke's nose. For a moment, there was no reaction-then he twisted his face away and started coughing. The spasms lasted for only a few seconds. He coughed and looked up at me. Then he lifted his head and looked around the darkened chopper. He glanced toward Colonel Tirelli, then looked back to me. He coughed and said, "I sure hope she can fuck better than she can fly."

I glanced foward to see if Lizard had heard that. She was holding her earphones close to her ears and concentrating on something she was listening to. She hadn't heard. Good.

I turned back to Duke. "I'll let you know when I find out," I whispered.

He grinned at me. "No. I'll let you know when I find out."

I sat back. "I was going to ask if you were all right," I said. "Obviously, you are."

Duke closed his eyes for a moment, as if he were mentally counting something. "Taking inventory," he said. He opened his eyes again. "All here."

"You sure? It looked like you took quite a beating."

He levered himself halfway up. "I hurt a lot, if that's what you mean; but everything is working like it's supposed to."

Lizard came back to join us then. She squatted next to Duke and touched her fingers to his carotid artery. "Pulse is good," she said. She plucked a pocket light from her shirt pocket and peered into Duke's eyes. "Reflexes look normal. Hand me the medi-kit, Lieutenant."

Duke frowned as she applied the sensors to his forehead. They looked like little poker chips. "Is this necessary?" he grumbled. Colonel Tirelli ignored the question-she just pushed him back down onto the deck and continued pasting the chips. She unbuttoned his shirt and applied three more to his chest.

I passed her over the console. "Shh," she said, as she thumbed it to life. She studied its screen thoughtfully. "Mm hm," she said. She looked at Duke as a person for the first time. "You took a few scratches, but otherwise you're fine."

Duke said dryly, "I could have told you that without the medi-kit. "

"Yes, but it's nice to have a second opinion, isn't it?" She stood up. "There're clean jumpsuits in the back. I'll get you one."

Duke looked at me and shook his head. "This is not my idea of a good time." He sat up, grimacing, and started peeling off the poker chip sensors.

Lizard returned with a sani-kit and a plastic-wrapped jumpsuit. Duke thanked her for it. She nodded and returned forward. "Do you need any help?" I said.

Duke gave me a look that made me sorry I asked.

"Right," I said, and followed Lizard forward. I climbed back into the copilot's seat. Even at this gentler angle, it wasn't comfortable. I still felt like I was about to be tilted out. I looked at Lizard. "How are you doing?" I asked. "Are you all right?"

"Only my pride is injured," she said. She was checking her controls with a sour expression. "I've never crashed a ship before."

"Really?" The word fell out before I could catch it.

She raised an eyebrow at me. "Is that a comment on my flying?"

"Um-uh, sorry," I flustered. I pointed to the controls. "How bad is it?"

"We broke the keel of the ship. That took out most of the cables. We have lights forward, nothing aft. There's no power for anything aft. I can run a bypass for the door, or we can pop it manually if we have to. Anything else, I don't know." She rubbed her eyes. For a moment, she looked tired. I felt sorry for her. I remembered what it felt like when I cracked up my first new car two weeks after I bought it. I'd wanted to die then. She probably felt the same way about this chopper.

I looked away politely. There really wasn't anything I could say that would help. Probably I should just keep out of her way for a while. I stared out the front window.

Now that the ship was canted at a gentler angle, we could see out the front windshield. We were staring at a frosty pink landscape. Frosty pink trees and frosty pink bushes-everything was covered by frosty pink snowdrifts. The world looked like the top of some gaudy baroque dessert-one of those Valentine's Day surprises my mother used to make; we never knew what was hiding under the thick pink whipped cream. We'd hated them. We thought they were tacky. That's what the frosty snowdrifts reminded me of. I felt there should be maraschino cherries on top of each delicious-looking mound. That made me think of breasts.

I looked at Lizard, speculatively. She was studying a radar scan on her screen. She had nice breasts. I wouldn't mind a better look at them.

She looked up and caught me studying her. "What's on your mind?" she asked.

"Um-uh, how long do you think we'll have to wait?"

"Depends on the size of the clouds and where they're coming from. We came down right at the leading edge, so we'll have to wait for the whole mass to pass over. I tapped into the weather net for satellite photos, but it didn't show anything we didn't already know. I expect we'll have to be lifted out, and probably not before tomorrow. "

"Will we be okay until then?"

"Oh, sure. This ship will never fly again-but most of her equipment's still good. She'll sustain us." Lizard patted her console affectionately. "You done good, baby. " Then she added, "A salvage chopper can pick her up and take her back to Oakland where they can strip her for parts. Then we can melt down the rest and try again." She slapped a wall with her hand. "Most of this is foamed Kevlar. The frame is the easiest part of the chopper to fabricate. During the Pakistan conflict, the Lockheed plant was putting out two hundred and forty frames a day. That's almost two thousand machines a week. Incredible. There'd never been a fleet like that before. You should have seen the dogfights. These birds are light, cheap and powerful-and quick to build. Most of the parts are modular, designed to be assembled by robots. That's good, because we're probably going to need a lot more of them-and very soon."

"Why do you think that?" I asked.

"Well-" she gestured toward the window. "For one thing the Chtorran ecology doesn't seem to like jet engines. For another-we'll need them to control the spread of infestation. That nest we hit will be back to normal within weeks. We're going to need ten times the number of ships we had today if we're going to hold them back. And that infestation isn't the worst I've seen."

"We don't have enough pilots, do we?"

Lizard shook her head. "No, we don't. Probably, we'll have to start flying drones. But these ships are programmable. A good pilot can control a whole wing." She looked annoyed. "I've been recommending it for a month. Maybe today's videos will convince them. God knows it isn't a question of money any more." She snapped off the screen. "Well, there isn't anything else I can do here now. I need to check outside."

We clambered into the back and Duke joined us at the hatch, zipping up his jumpsuit. Lizard opened a hull panel, grabbed a lever, pushed and-grimaced. "Damn! The frame must have bent." She braced herself and pushed again. The lever resisted for a moment, then snapped loudly into position. "All right, we're on manual now."

She closed the panel and hit the large red button next to it with the heel of her fist. The hatch popped open with a bang. It swung out and up and out of the way. The ramp dropped into the fluffy pink dust and disappeared. A puff of pink smoke rose around it.

We stared down at it. How deep was this stuff anyway? We could smell the sweetness of it in the air. It was thick and buttery. "Mm," Lizard said, "it smells like fresh bread."

"Nope," said Duke. "Too much sugar. It must be cake."

"So?" I asked. "Who wants to be first?"

Neither Lizard nor Duke answered. The intense pink landscape was somehow intimidating. We studied it in silence. The drifts kept sliding and collapsing under their own weight. We were in the middle of a rolling sea of powdery dunes.

I realized I'd been making an inaccurate comparison. These weren't snowdrifts-this was dust as fine as smoke, and piled as delicately as spider silk. The rosy powder was so fine the light glittered and sparkled as if the dunes were made of magic. It was impossible to see them clearly. They were bright and vague and hard to focus on.

There were tiny motes floating in the air. I could feel my eyes starting to water. But I had an odd thought about this stuff-I had to test it.

I stepped down the ramp, three steps, four-knelt and scooped up a handful. It felt like talcum, smooth and powdery-but with a curious silkiness. It was almost liquid.

I sifted a little more, till I was rubbing the last of it between my fingers. "It's very faintly gritty. There must be some larger particles in it too. I don't know." I touched a fingertip to my tongue. It was sweet. I glanced back upward. Both Lizard and Duke were watching me with curious expressions. "It tastes as good as it smells."

I scooped up another handful and blew on it. It puffed away like smoke-like dandelion fur. The motes drifted in the air like snowflakes. I was right in my guess.

I came back up the ramp and stepped back into the chopper, brushing the last of it from my hands. "I know what this stuff is-" I said it hesitantly. The realization was numbing.

Both Lizard and Duke looked at me.

"Remember Dr. Zymph's speech at the conference?" I said to Lizard. "-The one where she listed some of the different creatures in the Chtorran ecology? Well, these are the puffballs! Or what's left of them-they powder like dandelions."

"But so much-?" wondered Lizard. She looked out at the frozen pink landscape again.

I shrugged. "I guess they all blew up at once. The right combination of heat and sun and wind and who knows what else and you get puffballs. But they're practically pure protein," I said. "You can eat all you want. The stuff is harmless-"

"Harmless to everything but precision machinery," Lizard said. "Dammit. The one decent thing in the Chtorran ecology and it knocks airplanes out of the sky."

"Have you got a science kit here?" I asked. "I want to bag some of this."

"Yeah, wait a minute-" I followed her into the back. She opened another panel and dug out a pack for me. I returned to the hatch with a plastic bag.

"This stuff's a mess," coughed Duke, stepping around me. "We're going to need masks."

"I'm already getting them," called Lizard. "And goggles too."

"The puffballs powder as soon as they hit the ground," I reported. I stepped down onto the ramp again. There were fresh puffballs drifting down now-the great wall of clouds were just coming overhead. Some of the puffballs were as large as apricots-but so ethereal to look at they were hardly there. They were just spherical hints in the air, bursting like bubbles if they even brushed against each other, or anything.

"They can't even support their own weight," I called. "The stuff must be compacting under each new layer." I began filling the plastic bag.

"Here's a mask," said Lizard, reappearing in the doorway. I came back up the ramp to get it; she handed me an O-mask with goggles. And an air pack. "That stuff is pretty fine," she explained. "You'd better carry your own air."

"Good thinking," said Duke. He was already pulling his mask down over his head. "What about weapons?"

"What do you want?"

"What have you got?"

"Come take a look-"

Duke followed her aft. I heard the sound of a floor panel being pulled up. Then Duke whistled. "Holy Jesus! This ship is better equipped than a man with three balls!"

"I like to be careful," I heard Lizard say.

I wasn't surprised. I remembered her from my last visit to Denver. The woman was inhuman. What would surprise me would be seeing the famous Colonel Tirelli caught unprepared. I hoped I'd never be there to see it happen. I doubted there would be survivors.

I stepped out onto the ramp again and looked around.

Something moved.

On the far side of the dune, just behind that pink bush. Something small.

I thought I saw eyes. A face. Staring at me.

I wanted to call Duke, but I was afraid of scaring it off. InsteadI took another step down the ramp. Slowly.

The face didn't move. The eyes blinked.

I wondered what Duke and Lizard were doing. I wished I could warn them not to make any sudden moves or loud noises.

I took another step. Very slowly, I shaded my eyes against the sun and the glittering pink dust.

The eyes behind the bush were large. And gold. The face was pink. And furry. But it wasn't a worm face. Worms didn't have faces. Worms had two eyes, sort of, and a mouth, sort of-but that still didn't add up to a face. A worm had no more face than a snail. This was a face. Almost... human. I couldn't tell if the fur was really pink or just covered with dust. I'd bet the latter.

I took another step down. I was on the lowest step of the ramp. One more step ...