The terrible massacre did not pause until the ground was littered with corpses and the still-living Bejana had retreated in paroxysmal fits of terror toward their flimsy canvas homes. The streets that snaked between the makeshift homes were streaming with dead and dying things, detritus from the fleeing mass, all of it revealed in Apollo's divine clarity by a relentless floodlight-white.

  Above them the latticework of rusted ladders set against the rock-face and leading up into the mushroom-structures were crawling with desperate figures. The TAF were shooting at them and bodies were falling like tears to their demise upon the hard ground.

  Cacliocos' adamant protests were shading into vitriol, and as harsh invectives spewed continually from his mouth the Jegorichians stood by dazedly, their weapons half-raised and their minds unready to join in the killing. Entuban had fallen back amidst the chaos and his form was contorting itself in myriad gestures as he sought to convey his anger or outrage or general confusion at the TAF and their willingness to commit atrocity.

  "Stop them!" Cacliocos was yelling, "they have overstepped all bounds," and Entuban and Von pulled the Jegorichians from their stupor and rallied them and attempted to make for Hrodwulf at the far end of the blood-caked space, only to meet halfway the grim-faced Gombrovich and a palisade of guns trained upon them.

  A semblance of stillness descended over that small slice of space, as the TAF and the Jegorichians eyed each other with hostile and fearful eyes. The massive pile of Bejana-provided oxygen tanks sat between the opposing forces, flushed to the left flank of the TAF contingent and shielded on all sides by expandable barricades scavenged from the leftover stores brought along in the TAF APCs. Every exosuit rang with the dizzying broadsides exchanged between Cacliocos and Hrodwulf, and accusations of impropriety, illegal acts and treason shuttled back and forth with febrile intensity.

  About a hundred meters from the tense stand-off, the TAF veteran CFC Messanal Carrera had on the orders of Hrodwulf taken a platoon's worth of men up toward the canvas tentages to dispatch as many Bejana as they could find. Already they had sent several volleys of armature-rounds into the Bejana's homes, tearing huge and gaping holes into the fluttering canvas and killing all who had taken refuge therein.

  "You know as well as I why we're still jammed," Hrodwulf declared. "The mutants are in league with the enemy. They've jammed whole chunks of this godforsaken planet. And yet you're defending them? I took you for a traitor from the first second I set eyes on you, Cacliocos!"

  "That doesn't make them combatants you damn maniac! We're supposed to use proportional force to achieve limited military objectives—We have the oxygen—we take it and we go! Call off your dogs, Hrodwulf, call them off!"

  Some tens of meters from Carrera's contingent, a Bejana boy who could not have been older than thirteen was running down from the wall of mushroom-structures, snot-nosed and clutching a massive object clothed in velveteen. From the distance Betelgeuse could not tell what the thing was, but it was clear to him at least that the boy was making straight for Carrera and his contingent.

  "It's a bomb, Chromie, kill him!" Hrodwulf commanded, his rasp resounding through every exosuit.

  "Don't you dare—" Cacliocos began, and the Bejana youth reached a Messanal caught, hesitating, between the conflicting instructions of his superior officers.

  Time slowed and Betelgeuse, though too far away to discern the expression upon the boy's face, observed that darkish figure twist and jump and soar through the air down the slope, clutching against his body, as he fell, the object imperfectly wrapped. As he traced a smooth trajectory through the air the velveteen cloth billowed and inverted over the boy's body, revealing in his arms a spheroid shape which looked very like an oxygen tank.

  Messanal, the veteran CFC leading the troop, had already overcome his knee-jerk response to conflicting instructions. He depressed the trigger of his railgun, sending several shots lancing into the thing hurtling toward him, punching holes that threw up a dark mist into the air, the mist splaying out and becoming momentarily suspended like a grim shroud over that blood-soaked place.

  Then, light.

  An immense conflagration was raised and the ground reverberated with the explosion. Betelgeuse' teeth clattered painfully together and his vision filled with light. Bits of gravel tinkled against his visor, and the shockwave was so powerful his thoughts were blasted to the back of his mind.

  When the light died down, phantom streaks were imprinted into his vision, and a crater had been created where Messanal and his troop once were. Around its edges and strewn upon the scorched and smoking gravel were a multitude of flensed shapes imitating limbs and half-bodies curled into alien positions.

  Hrodwulf loosed a strange and guttural cry. He turned and pointed at the Jegorichians, his face twisted with a mixture of rage and hate. "Kill them!" he screamed, "kill the fucking traitors—" and his voice was abruptly interrupted by Cacliocos' order to retreat to cover, flatly delivered.

  Retreat they did, under heavy fire. Sound and static was in Betelgeuse' ears and someone fell beside him. He turned. The boyish-faced Private Mizzarin Asaghar had stumbled and fallen to the floor, and Betelgeuse reached out with his hand, intent on helping Mizzarin back to his feet; there was barely enough time for the man's tender eyebrows to rise, grateful, when his chest was punched through by an armature-round, causing him to shudder violently as his innards and Incunabulum were perforated and punched out in great chunks.

  Then, his head was disintegrated by a rush of air and metal. Blood and detritus flung from that exposed cranium, spattering Betelgeuse gray-white and red.

  Someone gripped onto his arm and pulled, dragging him violently toward the idling APC-line. He snapped his head around and found Thete Jutson, her teeth gritted and her prosthetic eye flashing. Every muscle in her body was focused on getting the fuck away.

  Betelgeuse pumped his legs in concert with hers, gripping onto her shoulder and blazing across the white-lighted landscape faster than he could ever dream of running. They bucked and tumbled behind an APC as a volley of shots snapped past their heels. Death, barely avoided.

  A second later Entuban limped across them, his right arm shot through and half-separated from the rest of that massive appendage about the forearm.

  "Entuban!" Thete yelled in alarm. Betelgeuse, struggling to regulate his breathing, raised his head to see Douglas, Voke and a pale-faced Edith already covering behind the same APC, all of them winded.

  "Don't be worrying. We're strung out here. Need to be getting out," Entuban rumbled through blood-flecked lips, barely fazed by the vicious injury.

  "Shut off all joint comms. All comms traffic to go through company comms-link," Cacliocos sounded through their exosuits, his voice steady as a rock. Betelgeuse scanned the immediate vicinity. The Subaltern was nowhere to be seen, but he could still be heard—meaning that he was close by, given that the Chimerae jammers were still up. "Make for APC plate number 7Q2069PDF, second-to-last in the movement column. Remain in cover behind the APC-line while moving—Hrodwulf is unlikely to chance any of them getting damaged."

  "Sir, Venna and Julla, they're still in the support-coy casevac vehicles!" Entuban returned. Voke and Thete were frantically foaming up Entuban's brutal wound, to limited success. Betelgeuse peeked around the end of the APC and saw that the TAF soldiers had split into two separate contingents, one covering behind the oxygen pile's barricades, the other in the midst of traversing the frontage and making for cover at a rock pile by the closest of the Bejana tentages.

  With measured breaths Betelgeuse took aim and fired, blasting the head from the shoulders of one of the TAF making across that craggy land.

  The body tipped and Betelgeuse snapped back into cover even before it tumbled to the ground. 'That could've been someone I knew,' he thought, a wry smile dancing at the corners of his lips.

  "Venna, Julla, do you read?" Cacliocos sounded. Static.

  Cacliocos again: "Entuban, not sure if you could receive their transmission, but they said they're in the last vehicle. I will get them. If we lose comms—you focus on getting the rest to the APC. Remember, third from the back. If you get there before me, load up and sit tight."

  "Kak," mumbled Entuban, regaining his feet and tottering slightly and waving off Voke and Thete from his limp arm. "I see Belekov and Von over there, by the next APC. I'll put down covering fire. Gap-crossing, Thete."

  "Roger that, Staff," Thete replied, nodding. She turned to glance at Edith and indicated that scared expression to Betelgeuse. "Your friend's not rigged for company comms-link, is she, B.T.?"

  "No, but she will understand," Betelgeuse said, tapping Edith on her visor and motioning over to the other APC. She nodded.

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  "Okay, ready on three, two, one—"

  Entuban twisted and snapped off one, two, three shots. Section Five plus Edith hurtled across the space at breakneck speed.

  They'd just crossed the gap and slammed into the ground beside Sergeants Belekov and Fenak when the familiar tendrils of compulsion gripped onto Betelgeuse and caused his chest to tighten. He shook his head, breaking its hold with barely any effort. The power of the compulsion matrix was weak—threadlike—but as he saw Douglas' eyes start to glaze he realized things could get bad very quickly if he didn't act fast. Belekov and Von were wheeling slowly toward each other, as if in a trance, their weapons held ready.

  "Listen to me, Belekov, Von… Thete, Douglas, Voke," he transmitted, grabbing onto Edith as he did so, finding her eyes focused on something distant. She was struggling against him in sporadic bursts, and he kept a firm grasp on her arms.

  It was the first time he was attempting a mass neutralization of the compulsion. He reached out with his own intentionality and groped and felt for the threads of compulsion, felt their dark power, felt their informational content. There was a proximity to his power, he intuited, and though his mind was exhausted he reveled in the exercise of control—finally, some control! With a surge of intent he snuffed out the weak threads of the compulsion, and he let go of Edith and permitted her form to plop down into the dust.

  Then he turned and saw Entuban no further than ten meters away, making to walk out into the open. As quickly as he could muster he sought for the hold the compulsion had over Entuban and, calling out "Entuban!" to get his attention, ripped it apart.

  "Look sharp, all of you. Hrodwulf had you under the compulsion matrix," Betelgeuse sounded, motioning to a confused Edith the direction they should be going down. She had stopped struggling, and her vacant expression had been substituted for a heightened perturbation.

  "Fool, what are you saying? You've been the traitor all along!" Belekov hissed, blinking his eyes clear and pouncing toward Betelgeuse faster than the others could react. He swung the butt of his railgun as he moved, aiming for Betelgeuse' head; Betelgeuse stepped into Belekov mid-movement, bringing his shoulder up and bracing himself.

  The impact of Belekov's chest-piece against his shoulder-pad was swift and savage and more powerful than any strike he had experienced from another human being. Ignoring the pain lancing up his side, Betelgeuse slammed his visor straight into Belekov's and rammed the Sergeant back several steps. "Snap out of it, you stinking piece of offal! It was the compulsion!"

  Belekov blinked, lowering his weapon and stepping back, his jaw masticating nothing as he processed what had just occurred.

  'The compulsion had already been broken,' Betelgeuse realized, 'but his intentionality aligns with Rolf's. That's why it took him longer to break out of the lingering effect.'

  "What was that?" Cacliocos transmitted, his voice showing a hint of emotion, and as his voice dropped the comms-link filled with a smattering of surprised mutters and loud comments from Entuban and Von.

  Douglas contented himself with slapping Betelgeuse in the back and winking knowingly as their gazes met.

  "The compulsion matrix. Hrodwulf turned it upon us, sir," Betelgeuse explained. Cacliocos muttered a curse that was swallowed up by static.

  "How… how are you still—" Entuban mumbled, clearing the space between the APCs in the span of a single, impressive bound.

  "No time, Staff Entuban. We have to get moving," Betelgeuse interrupted, pointing to the APC opposite. Then, he retrieved a grenade from his pouch: "We nade the tires. Won't penetrate blacksteel but it should slow them down."

  "Just listen to him. Hate to admit it but he knows what he's doing," Thete grumbled, glaring warily at the sullen-faced Belekov and digging through her pouches.

  The pins were pulled and they left their grenades resting against the immense tires. The group made for the next APC down the line and as they did so they heard behind them multiple explosions resolving into low rumbles.

  They had just reached the next APC when it vibrated with a sputtery engine ignition and began moving. The driver was panicking, having seen what they had done to his brother APC. Entuban caught the underside of that vehicle with his good arm and, heaving mightily, his boots crunching deep imprints in the gravel ground, lifted the multiton vehicle and tipped it over on its side, leaving its wheels whirring uselessly in the air.

  "Betelgeuse," Cacliocos voice cut through the static once again, "note the compulsion's power is affected by proximity."

  "I already know that, sir," Betelgeuse responded, crouching in the shadow of the tilted APC. Voke was before him and gesticulating wildly to Edith.

  "It's also affected by the user's affinity and level of mastery. The more targets it has, the weaker it is. If somebody's caught—you need to beat those guys over the head."

  "I have a better way, sir," Betelgeuse said, signaling to the others that they should make for the next cover, a rock pile several meters away which Karella and Misha had taken refuge behind, "but it is limited. Anything you can do?"

  "My use of the matrix can keep your intentionalities aligned, effectively countering Hrodwulf. But the problem is visibility and proximity. Keep out of Hrodwulf's sight as far as possible. Make it difficult to target you."

  "Roger that, sir. Entuban, can you… pull the APC along with us?" Betelgeuse said, turning. "There's quite a gap and I don't want to chance us getting vaporized."

  "Hah hah! Crazy fucker. Thete, Belekov, Von, we should be able to do this," Entuban sounded, and the four of them, the uncharacteristically reticent Belekov included, arranged themselves in a line and grabbed onto various sturdy parts sticking out of the underside of the canted APC.

  "In three, two, one..."

  Entuban lifted the back-end of the APC clean off the ground, and Betelgeuse furrowed his brow in amazement at the amount of strength that man could put out of a single arm. The whole group proceeded to move slowly toward the rock pile like this, the APC dragged along like some sort of makeshift shield, with Voke, Douglas, Edith and Betelgeuse snapping off shots at regular intervals to suppress the TAF. The twang of railgun fire resounded up ahead—covering fire from Karella and Misha.

  "We're six o'clock of your APC, sir," Betelgeuse sounded as they reached the rock pile and linked up with Karella and Misha.

  "I'm in it," Cacliocos sounded. "I have Venna and Julla and some others with me. Private Reese, we need to reverse. Entuban, Betelgeuse—standby for embarkation."

  Entuban slumped to the ground, spent, his face looking rather blue and unhealthy. The grievous wound to his arm was taking its toll. He managed, despite all that, a raspy, "roger, roger."

  "We need to set down covering fire. If you have nades, throw those," Betelgeuse commanded, skirting Entuban's form and throwing a DUS-nade out before sending several shots flying toward the oxygen pile's barricades.

  As he flitted back into cover a hailstorm of armature-rounds scoured a shallow crater where he had stood. They waited for the enemy fire to die down, and once it did Douglas, Voke and Karella returned their own volley of bullets.

  APC 7Q2069PDF was twenty meters away now and closing in upon them fast. Its whinging engine was loud and rough and Betelgeuse could see Cacliocos within the open back of the troop compartment, staring and motioning at them. He recognized Venna, Julla, Gelam and Smit, all of them beside Cacliocos and flush against the partition-wall separating the driver seat from the troop compartment. Armature-rounds poured from the TAF forces, several glancing off of the front-plating.

  The vehicle glanced off the rock pile with a loud thunk, swerving slightly and shuddering backward before coming to a full stop under the cover of the rock pile and the still-uselessly-accelerating side-turned APC-cover.

  Belekov, Karella and Misha rushed forward, jamming into the open troop compartment. Outside, Thete and Von were hefting Entuban by his armpits and inching forward with stuttering steps. Edith, Betelgeuse, Voke and Douglas added their strength to the mix, raising Entuban's legs up and atop their shoulders and almost buckling under the weight of those oaken trunks.

  "Hurry up, dammit!" Cacliocos yelled.

  Edith jabbed her elbow into Betelgeuse' side and, straining under Entuban's weight, jutted her chin at the rock pile beside them, her eyes filling with fear.

  'Danger?' thought Betelgeuse, remembering Edith's Incunabulum-gifted sensitivity to violence and realizing she was still plugged into the TAF comms-link. "Get down!" he snapped, turning and indicating the rock cover to the others. Entuban was dumped, groaning, onto the floor as his bearers obeyed Betelgeuse without hesitation.

  The rock pile had already started to grow red, the dull cerise tones turning bright orange, and before five seconds was up it exploded in a shower of rock fragments that blasted across their heads. One of the TAF soldiers must have gotten their hands on a plasma boltrifle. Betelgeuse ignored the drizzle of stonedust and regained his feet and, instructing the others to "get up, quickly!", hefted Entuban's leg with some difficulty.

  With titanic effort they managed to stuff the hyperventilating Entuban into the APC; Cacliocos' was yelling and the hull door was starting to rattle upward on pneumatic hinges. APC 7Q2069PDF was moving even before the hull was fully closed, bucking forward like a rodeo bull and careening past the other APCs in the line; Cacliocos was half-screaming at Corporal Jackson and Private Reese to 'accelerate, accelerate', and the APC veered demonic angles, causing them to tumble over themselves and into each other and into the sides of the troop compartment.

  Betelgeuse righted himself and struggled valiantly to climb over the tangle of bodies, making toward the front-aperture and Cacliocos; through the windshield he could see the light dim and pass into hues that were green and blue, and then disappear entirely.

  Now stranded amongst the spindling tunnel-ways, the visible universe consisted of twin cones lancing out into shadow and darkness.