Consider Phlebas

Horza couldn't believe they were going in without some sort of reco

Horza and several of the others hadn't been very impressed with this reading of the situation, but there was nothing they could do. So here they all sat, sweating and nervous and being shaken up like the ingredients of a cocktail in this clapped-out shuttle, slamming into a potentially hostile atmosphere at hypersonic speeds. Horza sighed and checked his rifle again.

Like his antique armour, the rifle was old and unreliable; it had jammed twice when he tested it on the ship using dummy shells. Its magnetic propulsor seemed to work reasonably, but, judging by the erratic spread of the bullets, its rifling field was next to useless. The shells were big — at least seven-millimetre calibre and three times that long — and the gun could hold only forty-eight at a time and fire them no faster than eight a second. Incredibly, the huge bullets weren't even explosive; they were solid lumps of metal, nothing else. To top it all, the weapon's sight was out; a red haze filled the small screen when it was turned on. Horza sighed.

"We're about three hundred metres above the trees now," Kraiklyn's voice said from the shuttle flight deck, "doing about one and a half sounds. The CAT's just started its run-in. About another two minutes. I can see the dawn. Good luck, all." The voice crackled and died in Horza's helmet speaker. A few of the suited figures exchanged glances. Horza looked over at Yalson, sitting on the other side of the shuttle about three metres away, but her visor was mirrored. He couldn't tell if she was looking at him or not. He wanted to say something to her, but didn't want to bother her over the open circuit in case she was concentrating, preparing herself. Beside Yalson, Dorolow sat, her gloved hand making the Circle of Flame sign over the top of her helmet visor.

Horza tapped his hands on the old rifle and blew through his mouth at the mist of condensation forming on the top edge of his visor. It made it worse, just as he thought it might. Perhaps he should open his visor, now that they were inside the planet's atmosphere.

The shuttle shook suddenly as though it had clipped the top of a mountain. Everybody was thrown forward, straining their seat harnesses, and a couple of guns went sailing forward and up, to clatter off the shuttle ceiling before slamming back to the deck. People grabbed for the guns and Horza closed his eyes; he wouldn't have been at all surprised if one of these enthusiasts had left their safety catch off. However, the guns were retrieved without mishap, and people sat cradling them and looking about.

"What the hell was that?" the old man, Aviger, said, and laughed nervously. The shuttle began some hard manoeuvring, throwing first one half of the group on their backs while the people on the other side were suspended by their seat webbing, then flipping in the other direction and reversing the postures. Grunts and curses came over the open cha

"Bit of hostile fire," Kraiklyn's clipped tones a

"What?"

"Hostile fire?"

"I knew it."

"Oh-oh."

"Fuck."

"Why did I think as soon as I heard those fateful words, "easy in, easy out", that this was going-" began Jandraligeli in a bored, knowing drawl, only to be cut off by Lamm.

"Hostile fucking fire. That's all we need. Hostile fucking fire."

"They are gu

"Shit, who isn't these days?" Yalson said.

"Chicel-Horhava, sweet lady; save us all," muttered Dorolow, speeding up the tracings of the Circle over her visor.

"Shut the fuck up," Lamm told her.

"Let's hope Mipp can distract them without getting his ass blown off," Yalson said.

"Maybe we should call it off," Rava Gamdol said. "Think we ought to call it off? Do you think we should call it off? Does anybody-"

"NO!" "YES!" "NO!" shouted three voices, almost in unison. Everybody looked at the three Bratsilakins. The two outer Bratsilakins turned their helmets to look at the one in the middle, as the shuttle swooped again. The middle Bratsilakin's helmet turned briefly to each side. "Oh, shit," a voice said over the open cha

"I think maybe we should-" Rava Gamdol's voice started again.

Then Kraiklyn shouted, "Here we go! Everybody ready!"

The shuttle braked hard, banking steeply one way, then the other, shuddering once and dipping. It bounced and shook, and for a second Horza thought they were crashing, but then the craft slid to a stop and the rear doors jawed open. Horza was on his feet with the rest of them, piling out of the shuttle and into the jungle.

They were in a clearing. At its far end a few branches and twigs were still tumbling from huge, heavy-looking trees where the shuttle had just seconds before torn through the edge of the forest canopy as it dipped in for the small area of level, grassy ground. Horza had time to see a couple of bright birds flying fast out of the trees near by and caught a glimpse of a blue-pink sky. Then he was ru

So far they still couldn't see the Temple of Light, but according to Kraiklyn it was just ahead of them. Horza looked round at the others on foot as they clambered over fallen trees covered in moss and swept past creepers and suspended roots.

"Fuck dispersing; this is too hard going." It was Lamm's voice. Horza looked round and up, and saw the black suit heading vertically for the green mass of foliage above them.

"Bastard," said a breathless voice.

"Yeah. B-b-bastard," Lenipobra agreed.

"Lamm," Kraiklyn said, "you son of a bitch, don't break through up there. Spread out. Disperse, damn it!"

Then a shock wave Horza could feel through his suit blasted over them all. Horza hit the ground immediately and lay there. Another boom came through the hissing helmet speaker as it fed in the noise from outside.

"That was the CAT going over!" He didn't recognise the voice.

"You sure?" Somebody else.

"I saw it through the trees! It was the CAT!"

Horza got up and started ru

"Black bastard nearly took my fucking head off…" Lamm said.

There was light ahead of Horza, through the trunks and leaves. He heard some firing: the sharp crack of projectiles, the sucking whoop of lasers and the snap-whoosh-crash of plasma ca

"There she is!" Kraiklyn shouted. Horza looked along the earth bank and saw a few of the Company, in the same prone position as he was. "Wubslin! Aviger!" Kraiklyn shouted. "Cover us with the plasmas. Neisin, you keep the micro on each side of the grounds beyond, as well. Everybody else, follow me!"