Halo: First Strike (2 page)

F.L. Traynor, and SenTrax Board, and that made almost everyone

nervous.

"You leaving out of Myaung U Airport?" Grossback asked.

"No, I've asked for a pick-up south of town."  Like anyone

else who could arrange it, he was not going to fly out of Pagan's

official airport, where partisan groups had several times brought

down aircraft.  Surely Grossback knew that.

Grossback asked, "What will your report say?"

Surprised, Gonzales said, "You know I can't tell you anything

about that."  Even mentioning the matter constituted an

embarrassment, not to mention a reportable violation of corporate

protocol.  The man was either stupid or desperate.

"You haven't found anything," Grossback said.

What was his problem?  Gonzales said, "I have a year's data

to examine before I can make an assessment."

"You won't tell me what the preliminary report will look

like," Grossback said.  His face had gone cold.

"No," said Gonzales.  He stood and said, "I have to finish

packing."  For the moment, he just wanted to get out before

Grossback did something irretrievable, like threatening him or

offering a bribe.  "Goodbye," Gonzales said.  The other man said

nothing as Gonzales left the room.

#

Gonzales returned to the Thiripyitsaya Hotel, a collection of

low bungalows fabricated from bamboo and ferro-concrete that stood

above the Irrawady River.  The rooms were afflicted by Myanmar's

tattered version of Asian tourist decor:  lacquered bamboo on the

walls, along with leaping dragon holos, black teak dresser,

tables, chairs, and bed frame, ceiling fans that had wandered in

from the twentieth centuryjust to give your average citizen that

rush of the Exotic East, Gonzales figured.  However, the hotel had

been rebuilt less than a decade before, so, by local standards,

Gonzales had luxury:  working climatizer, microwave, and

refrigerator.

Of course, many nights the air conditioner didn't work, and

Gonzales lay sweaty and semi-conscious through hot, humid nights

then was greeted just after dawn by lizards fanning their ruby

neck flaps and doing push ups.

He had gotten up several of those mornings and walked the

cart paths that threaded the plains around Pagan, passing among

the temples and pagodas as the sun rose and turned the morning

mist into a huge veil of luminous pink, with the towers sticking

up like fairy castles.  Everywhere around Pagan were the temples,

thousands of them, young and flourishing when William the

Conqueror was king.  Now, quick-fab structures housing government

agencies nested among thousand year old pagodas, some in near

perfect condition, like Thatbyinnu Temple, myriad others no more

than ruins and forgotten names.  You gained merit by building

pagodas, not by keeping up those built by someone long dead.

Like some other Southeast Asian countries, Myanmar still was

trying to recover from late-twentieth century politics; in

Myanmar's case, its decades-long bout with round-robin military

dictatorships and the chaos that came in their wake.  And as was

so often the case in politically wobbly countries, it still

restricted access to the worldnet; through various kinds of

governments, its leaders had found the prospect of free

information flow unacceptable.  Ka-band antennas were expensive,

their use licensed by permits almost impossible to get.  As a

result, Gonzales and the memex had been like meat eaters stranded

among vegetarians, unable to get their nourishment.

He'd taken down the memex that morning.  Its functions

dormant, it lay nestled inside one of his two fiber and aluminum

shock-cases, ready for transport. The other case held memory boxes

containing SenTrax Myanmar group's records.

When they got home, Gonzales would tell the memex the latest

news about Grossback, how the man had cracked at the last moment. 

Gonzales was sure the m-i would think what he didGrossback was

dog dirty and scared they would find it.

#

At the edge of a sandy field south of Pagan, Gonzales waited

for his plane.  Gonzales wore his usual international traveller's

mufti, a tan gabardine two-piece suit over an open-collared white

linen shirt, dark brown slipover shoes.  His hair was gathered

back into a ponytail held together by a silver ring made from

lizard figures joined head-to-tail.  Next to him sat a soft brown

leather bag and the two shock-cases.

In front of him a pagoda climbed in a series of steeples to a

gilded and jeweled umbrella top, pointing to heaven.  On its

steps, beside the huge paw of a stone lion, a monk sat in full

lotus, his face shadowed by the animal rising massive and lumpy

and mock fierce above him.  The lion's flanks were dyed orange by

sunset, its lips stained the color of dried blood.  The minutes

passed, and the monk's voice droned, his face in shadow.       

"Come tour the temples of ancient Pagan," a voice said. 

"Shwezigon, Ananda, Thatbyinnu"

"Go away," Gonzales said to the tour cart that had rolled up

behind him.  It would hold two dozen or so passengers in eight

rows of narrow wooden benches but was now emptyalmost all the

tourists would have joined the crush on the terraces of

Thatbyinnu, where they could watch the sun set over the temple

plain.

"Last tour of the day," the cart said.  "Very cheap, also

very good exchange rate offered as courtesy to visitors."

It wanted to exchange kyats for dollars or yen:  in Myanmar,

even the machines worked the black market.  "No thanks."

"Extremely good rate, sir."

"Fuck off," Gonzales said.  "Or I'll report you as

defective."  The cart whirred as it moved away.

¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤

Gonzales watched a young monk eyeing him from the other side

of the road, ready to come across and beg for pencils or money. 

Gonzales caught the monk's eye and shook his head.  The monk

shrugged and walked on, his orange robe billowing.

Where the hell was his plane?  Soon hunter flares would cut

into the new moon's dark, and government drones would scurry

around the edges of the shadows like huge mutant bats.  Upcountry

Myanmar trembled on the edge of chaos, beset by a multi-ethnic mix

of Karens, Kachins, and Shans in various political postures, all

fierce, all contemptuous of the central government.  They fought

with whatever was at hand, from sharpened stick to backpack

missile, and they only quit when they died.

A high-pitched wail built quickly until it filled the air. 

Within seconds a silver swing-wing, an ungainly thing, each huge

rectangular wing loaded with a bulbous, oversized engine pod, came

low over the dark mass of forest.  Its running lights flashing red

and yellow, the swing-wing slewed to a stop above the field, wings

tilting to the perpendicular and engine sound dropping into the

bass.  Its spots picked out a ten-meter circle of white light that

the aircraft dropped into, blowing clouds of sand that swept over

Gonzales in a whirlwind.  The inverted fans' roar dropped to a

whisper, and with a creak the plane kneeled on its gear, placing

the cockpit almost on the ground.  Gonzales picked up his bags and

walked toward the plane.  A ladder unfolded with a hydraulic hiss,

and Gonzales stepped up and into the plane's bubble.

"Mikhail Gonzales?" the pilot asked.  His multi-function

flight glasses were tilted back on his forehead, where their

mirrored ovoid lenses made a blank second pair of eyes; a thin

strand of black fiberoptic cable trailed from their rim.  Beneath

the glasses, his thin face was brown and seamedno cosmetic work

for this guy, Gonzales thought.  The man wore a throwaway

"tropical" shirt with dancing pink flamingos on a navy blue

background.

"That's me," Gonzales said.  He gestured with the shock-case

in his right hand, and the pilot toggled a switch that opened the

luggage locker.  Gonzales put his bags into the steel compartment

and watched as the safety net pulled tight against the bags and

the compartment door closed.  He took a seat in the first of eight

empty rows behind the pilot.  Cushions sighed beneath him, and

from the seatback in front of him a feminine voice said, "You

should engage your harness.  If you need instructions, please say

so now."

Gonzales snapped closed the trapezoidal catch where shoulder

and lap belts connected, then stretched against the harness,

feeling the sweat dry on his skin in the plane's cool interior. 

"Thank you," said the voice.

The pilot was speaking to Myaung U Airport traffic control as

the plane lifted into twilight over the city.  The soft white glow

from the dome light vanished, then there were only the last

moments of orange sunlight coming through the bubble.

The temple plain was spread out beneath, all murk and shadow,

with the temple and pagoda spires reaching up toward the light,

white stucco and gold tinted red and orange.

"Man, that's a beautiful sight," the pilot said.

"You're right," Gonzales said.  It was, but he'd seen it

before, and besides, it had already been a long day.

The pilot flipped his glasses down, and the plane banked left

and headed south along the river.  Gonzales lay back in his seat

and tried to relax.

They flew above black water, following the Irrawady River

until they crossed an international flyway to Bangkok.  Dozing in

the interior darkness, Gonzales was almost asleep when he heard

the pilot say, "Shit, somebody's here.  Partisan attack group,

probablyno recognition codes.  Must be flying ultralightsour

radar didn't see them.  We've got an image now, though."

"Any problem?" Gonzales asked.

"Just coming for a look.  They don't bother foreign

charters."  And he pointed to their transponder message flashing

above the primary displays:

THIS INTERNATIONAL FLIGHT IS NON-MILITARY.

IT CLAIMS RIGHT OF PASSAGE

UNDER U.N. ACT OF 2020.

It would keep on repeating until they crossed into Thai airspace.

The flight computer display lit bright red with COLLISION

WARNING, and a Klaxon howl filled the plane's interior.  The

pilot said, "Fuck, they launched!"  The swing-wing's turbines