Major Gervase pointed at the map stuck up on the wall. "Radio is being intermittently interrupted again, so we'll be using telephone linkage as much as possible. The SITREPS coming in are confused as hell." His lips quirked slightly. "As you might expect, given the—ah—unusual situation."
Sergeant Anibal Cruz swallowed. He wasthe leader of first squad, second platoon, B company, so part of his mind had paid close attention to the details of evac zones, aid stations, LZs. Another part of his mind was still shrieking: Aliens? He glanced to the northwest, as if he could see the pyramid and the wreckage inside the Regenstein Library almost half a mile away. Then, he forced himself to concentrate on the major's words.
"To summarize," Gervase was saying, "we have two mission objectives here. Firstly, the MPs will assist with the setting up of a perimeter cordon. You will be liaising with Chicago Police Department, who are here in—ah—force." A little gesture was enough to indicate the hundreds of policemen who were now swarming the University of Chicago and its immediate environs.
Gervase frowned at the MPs. "You are not responsible for evacuating the area. Let the police deal with any civilians. I want to remind everyone that under the Posse Comitatus Act, soldiers of the United States Army are not permitted—"
As the major continued with his summary of the legal complexities involved, the officers and NCOs of the two companies under Gervase's command listened attentively. None more so than Sergeant Cruz. There was still, of course, a bit of an air of unreality about the whole thing. The heavily wood-paneled room exuded an aura of sedate, staid, scholarly decorum—quite out of keeping with the soldiers and military hardware which had piled into it.
But the major himself quite obviously took the situation dead seriously. And his men were in the habit of taking him the same way.
"Okay," Gervase concluded. "Captain Marcus will continue your detailed briefing. Follow him."
After the MPs had moved off, the major turned back to the map. "We'll be setting up a staging area for the troops which are coming in just south of us. Here"—he pointed to a spot on the map—"in Midway Plaisance. But, at least for the moment, HQ will remain here in Ida Noyes Hall."
He gave the assembled officers and NCOs a hard look. "Let me state something clearly. We are not going to assault this thing. The Pentagon just wants accurate and reliable SITREPS for the moment. That is all. Unless aliens emerge from the device. Then—if fired upon—we may return fire. But only then. Is that understood?"
The center of the University of Chicago—with live ammunition. Aliens!!! Cruz swallowed. His sensei had been right. You can never train for everything.
A tall red-headed corporal standing nearby grimaced. Tapped his head. Cruz scowled faintly. That McKenna kid was heading for trouble. Mind you, it looked like they all were. . . .
The major was now talking about containment. Containment! Cruz was a bit of a science fiction fan. If David Drake and David Weber were anything to go by, that thing might be beyond the ability of two paratrooper companies to handle. Still, there were more troops on the way. According to the major, backup from the 82nd would start arriving in forty minutes. After ten years, Cruz knew what that meant. On time, possibly; late, probably.
Liz De Beer looked out from the window of her office in the Department of Ecology and Evolution. They were running around like mad ants down there, swarming in front of the huge library across the street. She shook her head. She'd been in America for less than two months and she was still confused half of the time. There were just too many people. It was even worse than Jo'burg.
Looking out at the lanes of milling vehicles, almost all of them police cars and paddy wagons, she finally reached her decision. She was going home. Well, back to Cape Town anyway. Screw this post doc. She'd only come here because of Nick, and that was all over now.
A helicopter came over, low and fast. Military. Jeez. Maybe something really was going on after all. She shrugged and turned away from the window. It would probably turn into a storm in a teacup. Americans seemed to count as "disasters" what people in Third World countries regarded as daily life.
If the visiting South African biologist had continued to watch, she'd have seen what happened when the helicopter flew into the pyramid's selection-perimeter zone. That would have changed Liz De Beer's mind about the seriousness of the incident.
Cruz, taking up position with his squad behind a large ornamental wrought iron gate, did see. The pyramid itself, still buried somewhere inside the Regenstein, wasn't visible from their vantage point. But a sudden violet flare seemed to reach through the wall of the library and intersect the body of the Blackhawk.
It didn't disintegrate the helicopter. It did cut the engines.
It also "disappeared" two of the soldiers inside the helicopter, including the copilot. Reacting frantically to the Master Caution Light—practically every light on the warning panels was on—the pilot lowered the nose steeply to avoid stalling and flattened the blades. Forty feet from the ground, he yanked on the collective to make the blades bite and slow the descent.
Watching from the ground, Cruz knew nothing about what was happening inside the helicopter. But he did understand that the pilot was trying to bring it down by autorotation—and Anibal knew as well that "autorotation" is a euphemism for controlled crash.
He was hollering for a medic before the helicopter hit the ground in a crumpled mess straddling the pavement and the street. Men spilled out like fury, running for cover. The pilot, his face a bloody mask, staggered out clinging to someone's shoulder.
Sergeant Cruz exhaled. He hadn't even realized he'd been holding his breath. Aliens!
He tried to console himself with the thought that the helicopter hadn't actually been disintegrated or anything. The thought did not cheer him up very much.