Earth Afire (The First Formic War)

thing. Help Patu capture it from every angle. Fatani, you and I will scan for survivors. There’s a rice field to the immediate north. There were probably workers down there when this thing hit. Look there first.”
    Mazer gave his shoulder harness a shake to make sure it was tight then blinked out the command to open his door. A gust of wind and dust blew into the cockpit as Mazer’s door slid back. He leaned out as far as his straps would allow and looked down, zooming in with his HUD.
    The mudslide was a blanket of brown, with broken trees and the shattered remains of houses jutting up here and there through the muck. It was total devastation. If there were survivors, there wouldn’t be many. Mazer activated his thermal scanner, but the screen showed nothing promising. If there were people trapped under the muck, Mazer couldn’t see them.
    He lifted his head and looked farther west, to the edge of the mudslide. There he saw his first body. Someone lay facedown in the water of a rice paddy, arms extended, half submerged, not moving. Mazer couldn’t tell if it was a child or an adult, but either way, the person was beyond help.
    He looked farther west toward a village built into the side of a neighboring mountain, a kilometer away. A few people were running from their homes, heading down into the valley, presumably looking for loved ones who had been working in the fields. The rest of the villagers were scrambling up the mountain, fleeing in the opposite direction, away from the lander, their arms full of meager supplies.
    Mazer’s eyes returned to the rice fields, scanning right and left. He figured he was best off sticking to the edge of the mudslide. Or even just beyond it. That’s where he had the greatest likelihood of finding someone alive.
    Then he saw it.
    A large tree near the edge, half buried, branches broken. From under it, right at the edge of the mudslide, a pair of legs emerged, skinny and barefoot. The head and upper torso appeared buried. For a moment Mazer was certain the person was dead, suffocated under the mountain of mud and debris. Then the legs kicked, moved.
    “I got somebody,” Mazer shouted. “Computer, lock on this position.”
    The HERC’s AI tracked where Mazer’s eyes were looking and put a targeting icon on the moving legs. The coordinates were immediately entered into the computer, and the image of the survivor was shared with the team.
    “I see him,” said Reinhardt. He banked the HERC to the right, moving in that direction. “How are we going to get him out?”
    “Drop me at the site,” said Mazer. “I’ll get him an oxygen mask, then we’ll use the talons to lift the tree away and pull him out. Patu, get the triage kit ready.”
    A deafening noise filled the air. Metal creaking, screeching, grinding. A machine as big as a city coming to life.
    “What is that?” said Fatani
    “Swing us back around,” said Mazer.
    Reinhardt rotated the HERC until they were facing the lander again. They hovered there, high in the air, a hundred meters away from it, with a clear view of its top, watching it.
    The noise was unbearable. Piercing, painful stabs of volume. Mazer wanted to rip off his helmet and press his palms to his ears.
    Then in an instant everything changed. The lander began to spin clockwise like a top. Fast, urgent, and easy, as if it lay atop water or air instead of earth and stone.
    “What’s it doing?” shouted Patu.
    The lander picked up speed, spinning faster, screaming like a turbine, slinging up dirt and debris. Small clods of earth and crushed stone pinged against the windshield.
    “Take us higher,” shouted Mazer.
    Reinhardt didn’t need to be told twice. He yanked up on the stick, and they flew straight up, well beyond the reach of the slung dirt.
    The lander was a blur of motion. The sound was worse than before, high and shrill. Mazer could feel it in his teeth. He looked west. The people running into the fields from the village were falling over, screaming, unable to stay on their feet, the earth shaking beneath them.
    “It’s digging into the ground,” said Fatani.
    It was true. The lander was burying itself into the surface, sinking deeper and deeper, spraying gravel and dirt across the valley like hail. Is this its weapon? Mazer wondered. To cause earthquakes? Or will it dig with its shields straight through us, putting a hole through the center of the Earth like a bullet through the brain?
    Mazer looked back at the valley floor. The