There on the ground directly ahead of them was a near duplicate of the blockhouse back at the Shiloh ville, and rising majestically above it was a framework of girders and struts supporting an enormous dish. The structure looked solid.
“Hot damn!” a sec man cried, peering out a blasterport. “We’re going to be the pussy patrol for rest of our lives!”
“Not yet,” Campbell said, scratching his head. “We got to make sure it’s intact. But it looks mighty good, boys. Mighty fucking good! Adams on the 25 mm, Mac stay in the LAV. You two come with me.”
Grabbing their blasters from a wall rack, the men kicked open the rear doors, fingers on triggers. Nothing stirred in the grass. Cautiously, they stepped from the wag and circled to the blockhouse. Campbell tried the metal door, but it was rusted shut.
“Need explosives to open that,” he stated, stepping back and looking at the dish towering above them. “Rest seems okay, though.”
The framework was badly coated with rust, but still stood ten times the height of a man into the cloudy sky. The dish itself spread above them like a slice of white ice.
“Perfect!” a sec man said, sighing.
Experimentally, the sergeant reached out and slapped the main support girder. The steel vibrated from the soft blow, making the entire structure tremble slightly. With his heart in his throat, Campbell waited, but the quaking didn’t stop, it only got worse. Soon pieces of rust started to sprinkle to the ground as the framework began to wobble.
“Oh shit, get back!” he shouted, sprinting for the LAV. The others were right behind him.
The driver of the wag stared in horror as cracks appeared along the struts, spreading like some horrible disease, the gaps widening as the metal yawned apart, braces shattered into dust.
Frantically, he started the engine and threw the APC into reverse, slamming on the gas pedal. The vehicle spun all eight tires in the damp grass, then they reached dirt and the wag lurched backward, racing away from the falling dish.
Campbell grunted a curse and headed for the nearby trees. Those would offer some protection, if only they got there soon enough! Then the air driven before the falling dish slapped the men off their feet and threw them at the woods like broken toys.
The sec men inside the LAV cried out as the wag slammed into a tree, coming to a abrupt halt. Struggling with the stalled engines, the driver could only watch as the weakening supports broke completely apart and the huge dish fell from the sky, its shadow falling over the APC like a shroud. A man screamed, another covered his head with his arms, and the dish thunderously slammed into the ground only inches from the vehicle, a strut scraping the wag’s armored prow. The predark material crumbled into a compact pile of debris, spewing a cloud of dust and pulverized plastic. More pieces fell, a few bounced off the wag with loud bangs, and the crashing noise continued for minutes. Chunks of the dish fell to the ground only to break apart again and start the whole process over, but on a smaller scale. Only the cracking and shattering of the plastic, and the groan of the twisting metal could be heard. Nothing was visible within the roiling dust cloud.
Fifteen minutes passed before the noise of the destruction reached a level low enough for the men to shout at one another, and finally the weak breeze blew away enough of the dust to make seeing possible again.
Rising from a bush, Campbell glared at the mountain of plastic debris piled high before the LAV. He wanted to be furious, but the driver had done the correct thing. If he had stayed, the LAV might have been buried under that crap forever. He walked closer to the destruction, surveying the unlimited wreckage. There was nothing left of the predark dish except for twisted scraps of plastic and lumps of rusted metal.
Turning, the sergeant looked for his men and saw their still forms sprawled on the ground. One was at the base of a tree, his blood and guts spread along the track like jam. The other lay pinned in place with a long shaft of white plastic shoved through his body. Fuck! Four men down, and this only their first stop.