Haywire (38 page)

“
Maybe I’m in a better mood now,” he replied. “Either way, we have you. And don’t think about trying to escape. We’ve mined this area with explosives that’ll take you out and everyone around you. We want you alive, but we’ll blow this whole city to dust if we have to.”

Hill’s eyes swept from his targets over to his people, and back again. Everyone was at high alert, their hearts pumping. The female Titan extended claws, her eyes murderous slits as a helmet grew around her head, but the male Titan, his face so young, looked less sure.

“
So are we going to do this painlessly?” he asked.

One of the agents raised his chin and said, “You could say that.”

Loud beeps pounded against Hill’s ears as his armor detected a flurry of movement around him. Suddenly more guns were pointed in the direction of the lift, but they weren’t his guns, and the men who held them weren’t under his command. The new arrivals had Eurasian Union flags on their armored shoulders, and their targets weren’t the Titans, but himself and his people. The trap he’d laid out had been turned on him.

“
You are enemy soldiers on our soil,” one of the armed soldiers said, his gun unwavering as it pointed at Hill. On his chest plate was the bronzed fig leaf of a Union Lieutenant Colonel. Beneath that was a name patch that read POWELL. “Lower your weapons and power down your armor. Now!”

The fury that boiled through Hill’s body was enough to melt steel. In an instant he’d been overtaken by a force greater than his own. How they’d managed to pull that off, he didn’t know, but that didn’t mean he was out of options.

“
Unless you want to lose a lot of civilian lives, Colonel,” he said, “I’d recommend you back away and put those guns down. I’ve got explosives planted all over this place, and I won’t hesitate to use them.”

Several Union soldiers stepped forward and held out bundles of light brown boxes by their cords. His fury went ice cold, and with it went his only play.

“
You mean those?” Lieutenant Colonel Powell asked, a laugh in his voice. “We’ve had eyes on you since you got here, Soldier. You have no bombs, you’re surrounded, and we will bury you here if you force us to. Stand down or be put down – your choice.”

Hill didn’t want to hear what his higher-up would say about this, but he wasn’t suicidal, and he wouldn’t waste more of his people’s lives.

“
Understood,” he said, lowering his gun and shutting down his armor’s power, turning it into a useless anchor around his body. “Everyone, lower your weapons.”

For a moment he was afraid one of his soldiers would take matters into their own hands and figure death was better than surrender, but all he heard were dropped rifles and the whirr of armor powering down.

Somehow, somewhere, someone had screwed up. He figured he’d get blamed for it, but this hunt had been a boondoggle from the start, and he wasn’t going to take the fall for it.

“
Thanks, Colonel,” Agent Delgado said. “Glad you came.”

His words were a sucker punch to Hill’s gut. In an instant it all became clear, how he’d gotten jumped, and the discovery poured more fire in his veins.

“
You called for help from your enemy?” Hill asked, disdain dripping from his tongue as one of the Union soldiers put restraints around his armored forearms. His helmet was then removed.

Agent Delgado turned slowly, and the gaze he leveled on the major was ice cold. “The Union isn’t our enemy. An enemy is someone who shoots at you. Last I checked, that was you.”

Hill sneered. “I’m a soldier who follows orders.”

“
We all have our orders,” Delgado said. The agent walked over, and even before he swung, Hill knew what was coming. The blow to his right cheek was solid, and he would have fallen over were it not for the weight of his armor and the soldier standing next to him. “You just better hope shooting an unarmed civilian woman is something you’re prepared to deal with. Pray she doesn’t die, because if the courts don’t get you, I will. And if not me, then her son.” The agent pointed over his shoulder at the male Titan who looked at him with burning hate. “And the sad thing is, you and the people above you don’t even know what’s going on, and through your stupidity you almost condemned our race to extinction. Luckily the Union didn’t shoot at me when I called to warm them you were probably on our trail. And, when they pass the data I gave them about the real threat along to Alliance military, hopefully whoever gets it will be a bit smarter than you and the people who run you.”

Moments later Hill and his team were rounded up and marched toward a waiting van. As they moved, the major saw the Titans and federal agents pick up their bundles and head toward a docking bay. He didn’t understand everything that the agent had said, and at that moment he didn’t care to. Being captured gave him more than enough to wrestle with. He did know, though, that if the agent thought he was getting away clean, he had another thing coming.

“
Culper
, we’ve got a problem.”

The words filtered down from the overhead bridge speakers in an irritating drizzle. It was the last thing Townsend wanted to hear.

“
Report, Wendigo,” he said, wishing like hell he could turn the radio off and go home.

“
Your team’s been captured by Union forces. I don’t know how they knew you were here, but the ambush your guys set up ended up being turned against them, and now they’re all captured.”

Townsend clutched the arms of his chair tightly. “Christ… What about the targets? What are they doing?”

“
Getting off this planet as quickly as possible, by the look of it. The Union soldiers are escorting them to a docking bay.”

Something wasn’t right, and Townsend knew it. Why would they go to Mars, only to leave it again? Was it all a way of luring their hunters out? What was their ultimate end? Was the Union also in cahoots with pirates and Titans? There was more going on than he knew about, and that only made him angrier.

“
Do you have any idea what they were doing there in the first place?”

Wendigo didn’t immediately reply, but after a few seconds he came back online, his breathing labored. “Sorry, these guys are in a hell of a hurry. And negative on that,
Culper
. The Titans are carrying large bundles of something, maybe metal canisters, and the feds are carrying some too, but what’s in them is unknown.”

“
We have to find out what they’re carrying,” the captain said, clenching his right hand into a fist so hard his nails dug into his palm. “See if you can’t get–”

“
No can do,
Culper
.” Wendigo panted and his words bounced as he ran somewhere. “They’ve just passed through docking security, and those soldiers are making sure the rear flank stays guarded. They’re out of my reach.”

Townsend had an immediate need to pull at his hair, but then a cool calmness settled over him as he realized that soon the Titans would be in his playpen. If the Marines couldn’t hack it, then he’d show them how it was done.

“
Understood,” he said. “We’ll take it from here.
Culper
out.”

The captain waved his hand at his throat and then stood up. He was too hot to stay seated any longer. “Roberts, tell me when that shuttle lifts off from Bellona. As soon as we’ve got eyes on it, I want us diving on it like a hawk. Nothing should be left of it by the time we’re done.”

Angry cheers went up around the bridge, and he was glad to see it. Each person worked hard at their station, getting themselves ready, making sure their area of the ship was prepared. Blood was in the water, and they were hungry.

“
Captain, the federal shuttle has lifted off.”

Townsend smiled. “Helm, activate stealth systems and give me maximum speed.”

The ship vibrated beneath the captain’s feet as the helmswoman repeated his order and opened the throttle. He had to grab a nearby console and hold on to keep from falling backward. Part of the ship’s energy entered him through the deck and console, and his grim smile widened.

On the radar screen the federal shuttle grew closer and closer, an unsuspecting mouse scurrying across the ground. Townsend’s free hand opened and closed like claws anxious to sink into flesh.

“
Gunnery control, power up our forward guns. When they’re in reach, give them everything we’ve got.”

The gunny nodded and worked the keys of his station with an eager zeal. The scent of blood thickened by the moment.

Suddenly Roberts turned her head and said, “Captain, I show two Union gunships have left their orbital patrols and are moving to flank the shuttle.”

Cold water splashed across Townsend’s face. “Have they seen us?”

“
Unknown, Sir.”

“
And will they make it in time?”

Roberts looked at her screens and pressed a few buttons. Her eyes narrowed. “The shuttle is shifting its course to join them, Sir. They’ll have escorts before we can strike.”

Uncertainty tore through the captain’s middle. He wanted to destroy that shuttle with everything fiber of his being, but doing that meant he would most likely die in the process. The chance that he could instigate a war as well sat heavily in him. He had his orders, though, and how he felt about them didn’t mean shit.

“
Stay on course, we’re not–”

A bright flash of light in the distance over Mars silenced him and forced him to cover his eyes. Alarms flashed across multiple control stations.

“
What just happened?” he asked.

Roberts, her eyes wide, bent over her station and worked her controls like a woman possessed. “Captain, sensors indicate a… a wormhole just opened. I can’t tell if… we have a reading! One ship has crossed through the wormhole, and it’s... Oh my god, it’s huge! I’ve never…”

“
What is it, Roberts?” Townsend’s head whirled for something to hold onto. “It can’t be one of ours…”

“
It’s not, Sir,” the radar operator said. Her face was pale, and she looked like her world had just ended.

“
The
Amsterdam
and
Shenzhen
are with us,” the shuttle pilot said, a hint of relief in his voice at having the Union gunships on their wings. “It looks like we have clear skies all the–”

An alarm sounded, and a light on the cockpit control panel blinked furiously.

“
What’s going on?” Alex asked, shoving his head between the two pilots even though he didn’t understand anything he saw there.

The co-pilot hit a quick series of buttons, then sweat suddenly wet his brow. “Oh, shit. Head’s up! We’ve got a Hezrin dreadnaught incoming!”

Alex scanned the controls, but all he saw were flashing lights, so he turned his gaze to the forward window. The last of Mars’s thin atmosphere peeled away, revealing a black expanse peppered by diamond chip stars.

“
Damn it!” Artemis said. She balled up a fist and hit one of the storage lockers. The thin metal crumpled with barely any resistance, and her blow took out two more, leaving them all a mess of twisted scrap. “They’re too ear-r-rly! Our plan... we... We can’t lure them in-into the Zeus now.”

A pit opened beneath Alex as he quickly came to the same realization. Their plan had hinged on baiting the Hygeia mining asteroid and using the nanite kill switch when Thanatos and his Titans landed on it, but doing that required time they no longer had. They’d hoped to have hours yet to work, but now they had minutes, maybe not even that.

“
I have an idea, but I don’t know if it’s what you want to hear,” Shawn said. His face was pale, and the metal covering his body shifted in shape and color, a reflection of the turmoil everyone in the shuttle felt in their guts.

“
You might as well spill it then,” Alex said.

Shawn stared at him, then turned his eyes on everyone else before looking finally at Artemis. “If you can’t bring the Titans to Zeus . . .”

“
You bring Zeus to the Titans,” she replied, the blue glow of her eyes dimming.

The pit at Alex’s feet yawned wider. “You can’t be serious.”

Artemis glanced at him and nodded. “We are. But, this st-st-still isn’t a fight we want to have here. We have to minimi-i-ize their threat as much as possible. We-e still go to Hygeia. But I have an idea that sh-sh-should increase our chances of getting aboard that ship.”

Alex shook his head and looked back out the forward window at the glittering space ahead of them. Somewhere out there was a dreadnaught waiting to blow them apart, and soon he would have to throw himself straight into its path. If things could go more wrong, he didn’t know how.

“
You have got to be shitting me,” Harper said, so angry he slammed his cigar into an ashtray. Sparks flew from the lit end and swirled around his unflinching hand. He didn’t know just how much more he could take.

Major Fuqua shook his head, ignoring the outburst as he always did. “No, Sir.”

“
So, what, we get some half-assed intel from the Union, and we’re supposed to take it as gospel?”

The XO tapped an icon on his tablet, read for half a beat, then said. “According to our man in the president’s office, yes. And, Sir, it fits with the flashcast data from Titania.”

Harper stood up from his desk so quickly his chair flew into the wall behind him. He didn’t give his seat a second look as it clattered and thumped onto its side. “Jesus Christ, Fookie! First we had one Titan, then we had two, and now we’ve got... what? A dozen? A hundred? By this time tomorrow we could all be up to our asses in Titan overlords, and that’s if we’re not all slaughtered. I can’t–”