Issue In Doubt - By David Sherman Page 0,8

for the elevator station’s control building.

“Recording.” Corporal Anthony P. Damato and Lance Corporal Frank P. Witek headed to the elevator.

After the two teams searched their first objectives, the squad would reassemble and move on.

Lummus remained where he was so he could coordinate the two pairs. One Marine in each pair had a vidcam on his helmet, keyed to his eye movements; the vidcams would record everything the Marine looked at. As a just-in-case, the vidcams had a “deadman switch” arrangement that would automatically transmit their contents to the starship loitering above if the Marine was killed or incapacitated.

The Elevator

Damato and Witek were closer to their objective and reached it first. An executive elevator cab was in its docking cradle. Scorching around the open hatch gave evidence of fighting. The two Marines checked their surroundings and didn’t detect anybody nearby except for the other Marines.

“Go,” Damato sent. He and Witek went around the cab-dock in opposite directions to meet at its rear. Neither saw or otherwise detected anybody either along the way or once they rejoined. The elevator cab was an oblate spheroid, with three observation ports equally spaced around its circumference, and the airlock in the position of a fourth port.

“Cover.” Damato climbed an access ladder to the top of the docking cradle as he gave the order, while Witek remained on the ground watching their surroundings. Another ladder looked to Damato like it went up the elevator’s pylon at least as far as the anchoring stays. But he was only going up it far enough to look into the port on that side of the cab.

The cab’s interior lights were off, and little ambient light reached inside, so Damato used his infrared scope. All he could make out was the passenger seating and the refreshment console next to the attendant’s station, or rather their remains. The interior of the cab was wrecked. He removed his feet from the ladder rung they were on and slid down the ladder the same way he would going from level to level in a starship. That saved his life.

The Control Building

Sergeant Kinser and Corporal Stein reached the control building a minute after Damato and Witek reached the elevator’s foot. The building was small. They knew from mission prep that it had two rooms, an administration room and a control room. The former had front and rear entrances, as well as a window on each exterior wall and another into the control room. The latter was windowless, climate controlled, and had no direct access to the outside. The main door, off center on the front wall, was off its hinges, blown into the building. The front window was broken.

“With me,” Kinser said. He led Stein in a circuit of the building. They trod on shattered glass going past the administration room; the windows on the side and rear were broken out from the inside. The broken back door was on the ground, also knocked out from the inside. On the way around, Kinser looked in through the windows while Stein checked the area with his eyes, ears, and all of his detectors.

Back at the open entrance, Kinser said, “Inside.” The two Marines held their weapons the way a police officer would; finger outside the trigger guard, muzzle pointed up. An infantryman entering a building like this would have his finger on the trigger and the muzzle pointed where his eyes were looking.

The interior of the admin room was a shambles. Everything—desks, chairs, cabinets, office machines—was overturned and broken. Files, hardcopy and crystal both, littered the floor. Using infrared, Kinser and Stein saw stains on the floor, walls, and furniture that experience told them was most likely blood. They saw no bodies or body parts. Looking through the broken door and shattered window to the control room, they could see that the computers and other equipment in it had been smashed.

Kinser and Stein had just turned to enter the control room when they heard the first shot.

Downtown Millerton, Fifteen Kilometers From the McKinzie Elevator Base

Fourth squad’s pod touched down on what looked like a junkyard, but had actually been a parking lot. Corporal James L. Day began recording the instant the Squad Pod dropped its ramp to let the Marines out. PFC Joseph W. Ozbourn began recording as soon as his feet hit the pavement. Land vehicles of all manner were in the lot, every one of them smashed, tumbled, leaning on or piled on others. The Marines headed rapidly for the nearest unblocked exit