“I pray that the rest of you, the vast majority, will be allowed to serve. If anyone can lead you, can make that happen, it is Colonel Bill Booly.
“I have one last mission to carry out—one last task to take care of—then I shall return. That will be all.”
Harco’s image faded to black, the others remained as they were, and Booly looked out over the troops.
His troops. If
he could hold them. He chose his words with care.
“The battle for Earth has begun. Elements of General Kattabi’s 3rd Foreign Infantry Regiment and the 2nd Foreign Air Assault Regiment will land during the next sixteen hours. Half of the 13th DBLE has been airlifted out of Africa, and the 3rd Marine Brigade is on the move.
“No one can promise you amnesty, not at this point, but I will fight for those who are deserving, and so will General Kattabi. So, what will it be? Do you plan to sit on your cans? Or go out and fight?”
There was silence for a moment—silence that stretched long and thin. The voice came from deep within the ranks. “Camerone!”
There was a pause, followed by a full-voiced echo from the cavern and all around the world. “CAMERONE!”
Booly smiled. The Legion was back.
The schoolchildren had been marching for more than a day now. They no longer filled the roadway from side to side but formed a five-mile-long column of twos. Those who had managed to survive hovered on the edge of exhaustion. Teenagers carried some of the smaller kids on their backs, shuffling forward, barely reacting when a robot poked them.
Matthew Pardo rode in the back of an enclosed command car that occupied a slot approximately a quarter of the way back. The bulletproof windows had been polarized, and Pardo sat in the dark. He felt numb. Partly because of the alcohol he had consumed ... and partly because of the rapidity with which conditions had changed.
First came the report that his mother and her supporters had been arrested. Then, while he was still trying to absorb
that
news, four transports dropped out of hyper, all loaded with loyalist legionnaires. Not enough to retake Earth ... but enough to shift the odds.
Kattabi demanded Pardo’s unconditional surrender less than an hour after the fires, attacks, and riots began.
The ex-legionnaire’s first thought was to ask Harco for advice, but that option was gone, and he was on his own. Something he had worked hard to achieve and lived to regret. The truth was that he’d been happier taking orders, doing what he was told, and slacking when he could. Now
he
was in charge . . . and didn’t know what to do.
A teenage girl collapsed three ranks ahead. The driver swerved but reacted too late. The command car lurched as it rode over her body. Pardo swore as his drink slopped onto his pants.
Maylo Chien-Chu stepped off the elevator and out into the reception area. This had been
her
office, or one of her offices, since there were many all around the world.
But that was before the so-called revolution, the Independent World Government, and Noam Inc.
Now she was back, and the time was ripe for some house-cleaning. The sign read “Noam Inc.” rather than “Chien-Chu Enterprises.”
That
was about to change.
An android sat behind the U-shaped reception desk. Maylo had never seen it before and didn’t approve. Customers should be greeted by people,
real
people, regardless of cost. The machine smiled. “Hello. How may I help you?”
Maylo nodded politely. “I have an appointment with Citizen Qwan.”
The receptionist frowned. “I’m sorry. There must be a mistake of some sort. Vice President Qwan is away from the office, and I don’t expect him till sometime tomorrow.”
Maylo listened to the voice inside her head and glanced at her wrist chron. “He’ll be here within the next ten minutes. I’ll take a seat.”
The android opened its mouth, closed it, and used an onboard radio to call security.
Maylo smiled pleasantly, sat with her back to a corner, and kept an eye on the elevator. This was the part that Booly, Kattabi, and Tyspin had objected to.
Especially
Booly, who tried to talk her out of it.
Maylo smiled grimly. Men. Who could understand them? Distant one moment and protective the next.
Never mind the fact that Booly planned to drop in on Harco unannounced—and probably get himself killed.
She
was supposed to wait till the danger had passed. Why? Because business was a secondary concern—a perception that showed how little
he
knew. It was money that made the world go round, and, assuming the counterrevolution was successful, the economy would be critical. Without commerce there would be no jobs, and without jobs there would be no taxes, and without taxes there would be no government services. Serious issues that couldn’t be handled while sitting on her can.
A tone sounded, the elevator doors slid open, and a pair of security guards emerged. They wore burgundy jackets, gray slacks, and thick-soled shoes. The Noam logo was embroidered on their pockets. The larger of the two stopped in front of the receptionist, listened to what it said, and turned to stare.
Damn! Why couldn’t they have been just a little bit slower? The executive opened her briefcase, placed her hand on the pistol, and waited for the twosome to approach.
The smaller guard had a fist-flattened nose. His name tag read “Linder.” He showed some teeth but kept his eyes on the briefcase. “Sorry, ma’am, but you’ll have to leave. I suggest you call Mr. Qwan’s secretary and make an appointment.”
The elevator sounded again. Qwan stepped off and looked around. The executive’s movements seemed jerky, and his voice was forced. “Miss Chien-Chu! There you are. Sorry to keep you waiting. Let’s use my office.”
The android and the security officers watched in amazement as Qwan palmed the rosewood-sheathed door, ushered Maylo past people she’d never seen before, and led her into her old office. The personal effects were gone, but the furniture was the same. The desk against the wall, the circular table where she liked to work, and the enormous fish tank. It was empty and dry. She put the briefcase down. They turned to face each other.
Qwan gathered his strength and pushed the words through the screen that the other presence had placed in his way. “It’s the alien, isn’t it? The one with the mental powers.”
Maylo nodded. “Yes. Sola offered her assistance, and I accepted.”
Qwan pushed outward, detected a tiny amount of give, and worked to extend it. “So, what do you want?”
Maylo looked determined. “I want the financial records pertaining to Noam
and
Chien-Chu Enterprises ... and I want them
now
.”
Qwan struggled to free himself from Sola’s grip, and the Say’lynt, operating from the far side of the world, felt the human wiggle free. She tried to contact Maylo, tried to send a warning, but it came to late.
Qwan threw himself at her, Maylo crashed into a floor-to-ceiling window, and her head hit the glass.
The fly form rocked from side to side as the antiaircraft shells exploded all around. Though driven from the air, the militiamen had plenty of ground weapons, and it felt as if most of them were aimed at the sky.
Still, there was some comfort in knowing that Tyspin had elected to lead the fire-suppression mission herself, and was kicking some butt.
General Mortimer Kattabi wished he could see through the aircraft’s bulkhead, glanced at his wrist term, and touched a button. Half a dozen miniature holos appeared from nowhere. Some of the officers had been with him on Algeron, and some had been seconded from the 13th DBLE. There was Major Winters, Captain Runlong, Captain Hawkins, Captain Verdine, Captain Ny, and First Lieutenant Dudley.
All of the officers, plus approximately five hundred legionnaires, were headed for the militia base near Indian Springs, in the AR called Nevada.
The Free Forces couldn’t attack the population centers, not without causing a great deal of collateral damage, which explained why the resistance was focused on the cities.
Kattabi’s objective was the Noam Industrial Complex, the home of Noam Arms and the militia’s main arsenal.
Some of the factories, warehouses, laboratories, ammo bunkers, and tank farms had been there prior to the mutiny, but some had been built since, and others remained under construction. With no competition to worry about, Noam Inc. had been working twenty-four hours a day to supply Matthew Pardo’s army with everything from combat knives to missiles.
Destroy it, and five similar complexes spread around the world, and the militia would be forced to capitulate. Noam Inc. knew that, of course, which explained why the factories were surrounded by weapons emplacements, all of which were determined to blow Kattabi’s ass off. Or so it seemed to him. He killed the holos, forced himself to ignore the way the ship rocked back and forth, and remembered what the intel summaries had concluded.
For close-in stuff, the complex was defended by robot-portable, IR-homing, shoulder-launched Fang missiles having a range of six miles.
Those were supported by self-propelled antiaircraft platforms that mounted six-barreled Gatling guns, each capable of firing three thousand rounds per minute and engaging aircraft while traveling at speeds of up to forty miles per hour.
Then, to deal with medium-range targets, the militia had carefully sited mobile air defense stations equipped with long-range, over-the-horizon, back-scatter radars and highly effective Kaa surface-to-air missiles. Not a pretty picture.
Strangely enough, it wasn’t a shell that disabled the aircraft, or a hostile missile, but debris from another fly form. A large chunk of metal was sucked into an intake, shredded by the rotating fan blades, and shoved into the compressors, where it destroyed the engine. Goya felt the equivalent of pain, lost fifty percent of his power, and looked for a place to land. The quad clutched beneath his belly was heavy, very heavy, and the fly form entered a glide similar to that of a rock.
It was tempting to release the payload, to let it drop like a bomb, but borgs take care of borgs. Not to mention the fact that General Kattabi was aboard and some bio bods, too. No, there was no easy way out, which left only one alternative: the
hard
way out.
Goya gritted teeth he no longer had, demanded full military power from the remaining engine, and chose the only possible crash site—smack dab in the center of the enemy complex. A tower whipped by, tracers floated up past his
nose cam, and the ground rushed to meet him. Goya barely had time to yell “Five to dirt!” before his skids hit, absorbed some of the impact, and failed.
The quad took the punishment after that, skidding fifty yards on her armored belly before the fly form hit the side of a building and finally came to a rest.
The quad, a borg named Obuchi, knew things were bad. Rather than land where they were supposed to, a mile short of the complex, Goya had dumped them right in the middle of the damned thing! It was time to move, and move fast.
Obuchi triggered the two-way clamps, or tried to, but found they were stuck. No problem—explosive charges had been provided to deal with that very possibility. She “entered” a code, blew all four of them, and “felt” the fly form shudder as 20mm cannon shells pounded the lightly armored fuselage. One of them found Goya’s brain box and blew it open.
Obuchi felt a sudden surge of anger, extended her legs, and shrugged the wreckage off her back. A single missile would have been sufficient, but the borg was pissed, so the gun platform took two. The explosions sent shrapnel flying in every direction, ripped holes in a metal-clad building, and destroyed a fuel pump. The fire started with a pop, began to roar, and sent flames shooting into the sky.
Kattabi, along with the soldiers who shared the quad’s cargo bay, were thrown back and forth. Harnesses held them in place. All eyes were glued to the overhead monitors. They saw the gun platform blow. Fykes, who had volunteered to lead the general’s bodyguard, was the first to speak. “Damn! We’re right in the middle of the bastards!”
“You took the words right out of my mouth,” Kattabi said dryly. He turned to the others. “Check your weapons and prepare to deass the quad.”
Major Winters was two miles to the west, standing next to a command-and-control bot, wondering where her boss was, when his voice sounded in her headset. “Hammer One to Hammer Two. Over.”
Winters perked up. “This is Hammer Two ... go. Over.”
Kattabi watched the surroundings blur as Obuchi turned to her right and opened fire. The Gatling gun found the antiarmor team and tore them to shreds. The shoulder-launched Noam Lancet was armed and still in the tube. It blew the remains into even smaller pieces. The general winced. “Sorry to be such a slacker, Two ... but we’re gonna be
real
busy for the next twenty minutes or so. The battalion is yours.”
Winters frowned, took a look at the holo tank attached to the robot’s back, and scanned for Kattabi’s marker. There it was, centered in the middle of the enemy complex, blinking on and off. Shit. It would be hours before any kind of rescue
could be mounted. He knew that ... and she did too. The officer ran her tongue over parched lips. “Roger that, Hammer One. Watch your six. Over.”
Kattabi gave her two clicks, felt the quad shudder as she took a couple of missile hits, and eyed the squad. “Get ready to bail!”
Obuchi collapsed as one of her legs was blown out from under her body. The deck tilted, and the quad went down. Kattabi released his harness, stood, and hit the emergency hatch release. It whirred open.
Fykes stood, waved the squad forward, and said, “What the hell are you waiting for? A frigging invitation?”
The noncom was the first one down the ramp. He turned right, ran forward, and climbed the cyborg’s steel flank. His boots fit into recessed steps, there were handholds to grab, and the steel felt warm.