No one was dead when they returned to the platoon, and Gunny clapped Bonzo on the shoulder, a rare gesture of praise. If he wasn’t always outsmarting himself, Bonzo could have been a halfway decent gunny.

WHAT SCALE? Bonzo signed.

Gunny thrust his index and pinky fingers forward, and then craned his wrist back, a sign that wasn’t in any USL dictionary. Bulljit. Bonzo raised his bushy eyebrows, but he didn’t force the issue.

READY TO POP, GUNNY, Bango signed. There was a neat spiral of explosive HiEx rope adhered to the disc Gunny hoped was a door. A sixty second igniter bulb was ready to prime. This Bango worked neat, Gunny was gonna miss him.

Gunny peered at the disc, tapping the armored fingertips of his gauntlet on the jawline of his helmet. This was the most likely ingress. He’d blown vaguely similar discs on other whales with good results. Usually, discs were relatively thin and led to a series of three small chambers that were a good place to set up an airlock with quickseal and vacsheet.

But that was the thing about whales. When you started thinking you knew something, that was when you were about to chuck up really bad and get everyone deaded. Gunny clunked over to Bango and trunked up.

“She’s too pretty to blow, Bango. Take it all down.”

“Aww, what for, Gunny?”

“Something’s chucky.”

“Aye-aye, Gunny,” Bango agreed, trusting Gunny’s gut. It was strange to hear Bango through the constrained frequencies of the trunk wire. He had the deepest voice in the platoon.

Don’t get attached, Gunny reminded himself.

YOU WANT SAW? Lefty signed, indicating he was ready to hook up the pedal-driven ablative disc saw. Gunny gave the thumbs down.

He pounded on the disk with the ham of his fist, ran his tongue over his teeth, then held the palm of his gauntlet against the smooth surface and whanged on the disc with his other fist. He thought about the valknut scales. An image sprang to mind, a luminous purple fireball scouring the hall like dragon’s breath.

YANK, Gunny signed, and Mad Yank’s eyes lit. He’d been waiting for this. Yank lofted the hundred-kilo sledgehammer, eager to go. Too eager! Gunny signed for him to wait, but Yank was already moving towards the door, which was still covered with explosives.

Bango waved his hands, but Yank had eyes only for his target. He wound up, ready to knock the door into orbit when Gunny’s gauntlet clamped on the neck of the sledge. Yank looked back in confusion, not understanding why his sledge wouldn’t swing.

“WAIT, YOU JUPED PIGGER!” Gunny bellowed, loud enough that a whorl of fog appeared on the inside of his visor.

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

Bango had his hands held over the sides of his helmet, as if covering his ears would help. Yank pivoted to face Gunny, peering back at the door in confusion, not understanding why the sergeant had stopped him.

BOMB! Gunny signed, pointing at the door, where the explosive charges were still stuck.

At last, Yank realized what he’d been about to do. His mouth dropped open, and the massive sledge slipped from his gauntlets. It hit the deck just inches from the explosives satchel with a thunk they felt through the armored soles of their boots.

Gunny rolled his eyes, and then whopped Yank at the back of his head so hard it nearly knocked him over. Gunny shook his head in exasperation. They’d all nearly died half a dozen times, and they weren’t even inside the whale yet.

STRIP IT, he signed at the door. Then he trunked up to berate Yank. Lefty would have company on squat duty if either of them survived.

They waited while Bango carefully peeled his demolition charges from the door, leaving a spiral of adhesive residue clinging to the disk. Gunny signaled for everyone to fan out.

Anything could happen when you started fooling with a whale. The disc could shatter like crystal, it might activate like a giant piston and launch Yank into deep space, or it might melt and suck him in. Everything was a gamble.

Gunny looked to Lefty, then pointed to Yank, making the thumb flipping yea-or-nay sign. Lefty replied with the thumb-pinky wobbling hang-ten. Maybe, maybe not.

HIT IT, Gunny gestured.

YOU SURE? Yank signed.

DO IT! Gunny shot back.

Yank grinned ear to ear. The belting hadn’t fazed him. He had just one driving desire in this life, to hit things with that sledgehammer as hard as he could. Yank wound up and drilled the disc dead center with a tremendous swing. There was a flash of motion and, suddenly, Yank was blasted backward, spinning so fast he was a blur.

He whirled across the corridor and crashed into the wall almost twenty meters away, and they all winced. They waited to see if he would get up. A moment later, Yank popped to his feet and gave them a thumbs up. Yank clomped back over to the platoon. He’d never lost grip on his sledge.

STICKY! ROD UP! Gunny ordered.

Sticky was a pole specialist. He wore a quiver full of sampling rods, prybars, and other long-handled tools they needed. Sticky drew a sampling rod, stripped off the protective covering, and tried to thrust it in front of the hole, but a powerful force ripped it out of his hands and sent it rocketing out of the corridor, bound to fly through deep space for all eternity.

The Marines were lucky Yank hadn’t shared the sample rod’s fate. Now they understood what was happening, the chamber on the other side was heavily pressurized.

Sticky braced with both hands and tried again. This time, he managed to hang on long enough to get a read. He illuminated the rod’s tip with the beam from the chemiluminescent lamp on his shoulder, checking the testing strips affixed to it.

SILANE, Sticky signed. All their eyebrows rose, except for Heafs, who had probably forgotten what silane was.

SiH4—not alive anymore, went the mnemonic they’d all been forced to repeat over and over.

Silane was a tremendously explosive gas. The demo charges or the cycle saw would have killed the entire platoon. Lefty tapped on the side of his helmet, grinning at everyone. There was silent applause from the platoon. Many had already forgotten Lefty had dropped the saw and nearly blown them all up just a few minutes ago.

NO SPARKS! Gunny signed emphatically. USE CROWS, MAKE HOLE BIGGER. They widened the hole with crowbars, vented the silane from the room, and prepared to enter the alien hulk.