“Of course.” The hacker smiled. “Good luck out there.”
“Thanks.”
“Hágoónee’,” Onyx said in Navajo.
“Hágoónee’,” H124 answered. She’d been picking up bits of the language from listening to Onyx and Raven, and “hello” and “goodbye” had been the first two words she’d learned.
Chapter 19
The journey to the southern continent was a long one, but the Argo, able to stay aloft for weeks, didn’t have to land once. They sailed south, passing over dry, barren land. Jagged mountain peaks rose and fell beneath them, often snowy and visible through banks of clouds. At other times there were only miles of flat plains, stretching on forever.
In one spot a series of step pyramids rose out of the brown soil, arranged in a square pattern, with dusty roads leading off in every direction. The site looked ancient. She wondered who had lived there, and how long ago.
She watched their progress on her PRD, zooming out on the map. The land grew narrower as they headed south, with vast oceans opening up to either side. Then the shores of another continent came into view, and once more they sailed over a vast landmass.
They frequently passed over the ruined remains of PPC megacities, the buildings crumbling and toppled, the shield walls weathering away. All around these sites lay destruction, the land beyond dead. In more than a few of them she could see channels meandering out, evidence of old rivers of human waste like those that streamed from Delta City.
They slept and ate, talked and played cards. Onyx had joined them in case her skills were needed. They all took turns spelling off Winslow. Dirk taught H124 Go Fish, the game he and Astoria had played in the weather shelter after their harrowing experience in Delta City and the Death Rider arena. It felt so long ago now, almost another life. As Dirk dealt the cards, sadness crept into his eyes. He blinked rapidly.
“Want to play a different game?” she asked him.
He rubbed his face on his shoulder rather roughly. “No. Let’s play this one. I like to think of her. It makes me feel connected to her.” After he dealt the hand, he spread the remaining cards in a fishing pool in the center of the table. “It’s like her spirit is here with me.”
They sailed on, heading ever southward, crossing an ocean. Then a coastline came into view, a few large icebergs floating off a rocky shore.
The Argo crept over the ice-coated land. Nothing prepared her for the sheer immensity of the ivory landscape below. She pressed against the glass, marveling at the bright scenery. In the distance rose saw-toothed peaks, where bare rock stuck out in jagged arêtes on their steep sides. The Argo motored towards them, its engines humming through the cabin. Like the genebanks in Greenland and Siberia, she knew this one had also been built into the side of a mountain, deep underground, taking advantage of the natural cold temperatures to keep the samples intact.
Though the sun remained strangely low on the horizon, the sky, dotted with a few wispy clouds, stood so blue against the white snow that her eyes started to tear. She donned her goggles and peered back down. She viewed the brilliant vista, taking in the sculpted edges of ice and windswept rock.
As they neared the genebank, Winslow pulled the Argo to a stop, hovering in the same spot. “We may have a problem.”
Raven rose from his seat. “What is it?”
“Someone beat us here.”
Everyone clustered around Winslow. She’d brought up a display that zoomed in on the genebank, still several miles away across the snowy terrain.
Staring at the display, H124 was eager to spot its entrance. Then she found it and froze.
A tall, grey tower, nearly identical to the one they’d visited in Greenland, jutted out near the base of one of the mountains. But the sight of the immense spire wasn’t what made her blood freeze.
A PPC airship waited near the entrance, its shining silver surface flashing in the sun. Winslow zoomed in. Objects littered the snow nearby, discarded as they’d been at the first genebank they’d visited.
Soldiers emerged from the entrance, carrying maglevs loaded with items. They dumped them unceremoniously into the snow, then vanished inside again. Moments later they appeared with a large shelving unit, casting it haphazardly on the ground.
Winslow pivoted the view. Several other groups of soldiers busied themselves with luxurious furniture from the airship, bringing it inside the genebank—a bed, a tremendous armoire, a plush couch.
The PPC wasn’t just destroying this genebank—they were moving in.
“It’s just a single airship,” Byron observed. “I don’t see a dropship.”
“What are they doing here?” H124 asked. “How could they know about this place?”
Raven eyed Onyx. “Could they still be listening in?”
“No way. But they could have gotten the information a while ago, when Astoria originally let them in.”
Dirk looked out the window, clenching his jaw. Astoria had given the PPC access to the Rover computer systems to save his life, and she knew he still felt guilty about it.
“Wait—I see more movement down there. An exec is coming out,” Winslow told them.
A man in an immaculately tailored grey suit emerged, blinking in the bright Antarctic sun. “Give me the nocs,” Willoughby said. He zoomed in on the man.
“That’s Caster, a junior exec from Delta City.” A slender woman joined the man, dressed in a blue suit that blazed against the white terrain. “And that’s Fino, a producer I’ve worked with in the past.”
They ordered the troopers around, gesturing angrily when one of them dropped a massive canopied four-poster bed. The troopers hurried inside with it.
“What are they doing?” H124 asked.
Raven pulled out his own nocs, studying the ground around the entrance. “They’re throwing out the DNA samples to make room for their own stuff.”
H124 joined him, zooming in on the suited pair, watching as troopers carried in bulky settees, mahogany desks, and stained-glass lamps.
Raven lowered the nocs. “They must think they can ride out the big impact inside the vault. We’ve got to get them out of there.”
“Will more PPC people arrive?” Winslow asked.
Willoughby pursed his lips, considering. “I doubt it. They wouldn’t want other people to know about the location and risk having a mob down here, with PPC execs vying for space and resources. They’re probably hoping to wait out the impact, then move up to Melbourne City.”
Where Olivia was heading, H124 thought. She’d told them of Olivia’s plan to take over the PPC in Melbourne City. “Maybe she spared these two execs so she’d have support people.”
Willoughby lowered the nocs. “Makes sense. They’re both on Olivia’s immediate staff. Been with her for years. Both are absolute sycophants. Looks like they don’t have a lot of troopers with them, not in a ship that size. Probably just a protection detail.” Willoughby leaned over the controls, zooming in on the soldiers’ uniforms.
H124 noticed the tattered state of the black uniforms: sleeve stitching pulled away, threadbare pants with the knees worn through, face shields dented, scuffed helmets scored and scratched, all as if they’d been through countless battles.
“It’s a DisPos unit,” Willoughby breathed, wincing.
“What’s that?” H124 asked.
“The PPC uses them for tasks where the soldiers are disposable. They kill them at the end of the mission. Usually they’re prisoners or troopers who disobeyed orders, or even soldiers who annoyed an exec a single time.” He looked away from the display, meeting her gaze. “Under those helmets, they’re likely wearing cranial webs.”
“What are those?”
“Metal nets fitted to the skull, full of electrodes. If the troopers don’t follow orders, the nets deliver an excruciating dose of electricity. It’s agonizing. Each time they disobey, the shock get
s worse, until eventually it becomes lethal. The PPC lies to the troopers, telling them that once they complete whatever task they’ve been ordered to do, they’ll remove the web, and the troopers can resume their normal duties. Or if they were a prisoner, they’ll have some time taken off their sentence. So they go along with it, not realizing what’s in store for them after they do the PPC’s bidding.”
H124 rubbed her arm. “That’s terrible.”
Willoughby nodded.”
Byron came forward, his Henry repeating rifle in hand. “So when the PPC sees us, they’re going to order that DisPos unit to fight to the death.”
Willoughby winced. “That’s my guess.”
He cocked the rifle. “Then we’d better be ready.”
“How do you want to play this?” Dirk asked, studying the grouping of troopers on the screen. He glanced around at H124 and the others. “Obviously a frontal assault won’t work. We’re outnumbered.”
Byron nodded, leaning over the display. “This will require stealth.” He looked out of the window, scanning the terrain. “There.” He pointed to the ridge that lay between them and the vault. “Drop us off there, and we’ll snipe them from that ridge. Even the odds.”
Despite everything the PPC had put them through, H124’s stomach turned at the thought of sniping unwilling soldiers in cold blood. But they had to think of the bigger picture—to secure that genebank. She also knew the soldiers wouldn’t hesitate to kill them in the same fashion.
“Okay,” she said reluctantly.
They donned the white snowsuits, with thick mittens over liner gloves and crampons on their boots. They didn’t want to leave Winslow alone with the Argo, so only Byron, Dirk, and H124 elected to go on the initial outing. Armed with long-range rifles and pistols, they piled out of the Argo as it set down gently on the snow. Her boots crunched the compact drifts, and a bracing wind tugged at her parka hood. Her eyes teared in the cold. She donned her goggles, lowering her hood briefly. It was enough for the cold to penetrate to her eardrums, now stinging and throbbing. She replaced her hood quickly.
Moving stealthily on the far side of the ridge, keeping out of sight, the Argo motored off slowly, ready to circle the genebank and gather more intel.
The three climbed to the top of the ridge. The going was slow, and even with the crampons they slid often, losing their forward momentum to gravity.
More freezing gusts assaulted her, so she zipped her parka all the way up, shielding her face even more. The thick mittens felt awkward as she held the long-range rifle. She didn’t know how she’d have the dexterity to aim and fire properly, but without them, her hands would surely be frostbitten.
Beside her Dirk scrambled, one mittened hand in front of him as he climbed, the other gripping his rifle. Byron did the same as they made slow progress up the ridge.
At the very top she gripped the exposed rocks and hefted herself up, hooking her elbows on the far side and lying flat in the snow. Already she could feel the cold through her suit, but as yet, it wasn’t unbearable.
As Dirk and Byron lay down on either side of her, she pulled out her diginocs. They were a little over two miles from the genebank now. She zoomed in on troop movements by the entrance. A flash of red drew her eye to the left. H124 sucked in a breath. A woman stood there in a crimson suit, arms crossed, her silver hair flapping lightly in the wind. Olivia.
A group of DisPos troopers stood around her in a semicircle. As she addressed them, they each peeled away, seeing to some order or another. When they’d all gone, H124 was shocked to see the man standing next to Olivia. It was the head Death Rider from the PPC ocean liner attack, his skull epaulettes decorating his jacket, his immense stature towering over Olivia.
H124 swept the area, looking for more Death Riders and spotting three, then five more, moving among the DisPos unit, carrying furniture and equipment.
She could picture Olivia making a truce with him on the ship. “Don’t kill me and you can wait out the asteroid impact with me. I know of a place.” She remembered Olivia pointing up to the sky, indicating the impending asteroid impact.
“Do you see what I’m seeing?” Dirk asked, puzzled.
“If you mean a bunch of Death Riders, then yes,” Byron answered.
“It doesn’t look like the PPC are their prisoners, or the other way around.” Byron lowered his nocs.
H124 zoomed in on the main Death Rider’s face. When Olivia wasn’t looking, he peered down at her with blatant disgust, but he made no move against her. He stood with his arms crossed, looking out at the others imperiously, occasionally shouting orders to his subordinates.
She counted seven Death Riders in all, four men and three women, all with human body parts as fashion accessories—ribs, necklaces of teeth and finger bones. From her belt, one woman wore a battle axe that flashed in the sunlight. The haft appeared to be a human femur.
Among the DisPos unit, H124 spotted a small collection of regular PPC troops. One of them approached Olivia and spoke, and she pointed to the airship, gesturing with her hands, as if describing some object. The soldier nodded and hurried toward the ship, emerging moments later with some kind of elaborate wooden box. She nodded at him and he rushed inside, no doubt delivering it to whatever room Olivia had selected as her private residence where she would wait out the impact.
H124 studied her grandmother’s face. The woman stood with her hands on her hips, wearing a smug, conniving expression. When Epaulettes wasn’t looking at her, she likewise gave him a disgusted appraisal. Clearly these two would betray each other at the first opportunity, but for now they were unenthusiastic allies. Olivia gave out a few more orders, then disappeared inside the genebank.
H124 made a quick scan of the present weapons. The DisPos soldiers carried only flash bursters and batons. She didn’t see any energy rifles or sonic weapons among their tattered group. The few PPC soldiers carried flash bursters and energy rifles on their backs, and as usual, the Death Riders were armed with a range of deadly weaponry, from shotguns to pistols, cattle prods, and swords. One woman had throwing knives strapped to her thighs.
“What’s the plan?” Dirk asked.
“I say we take out the Death Riders first,” Byron said. “Then the regular troopers, then the DisPos. And if we get a clear shot at any of the PPC execs, get rid of them for good.” Byron glanced at her. “Unless you…” his voice trailed, off but she didn’t need him to finish. She knew what he meant. Unless she had a reservation about killing Olivia. She did, once, when Astoria had stood over the woman, revolver pointed at Olivia’s head. H124 had hesitated then. And it had cost them all dearly. Sanctuary City lay in smoldering ruins. Willoughby had been tortured and almost repurposed. She would show no mercy now. She nodded to Byron, and he gave her a sympathetic look, then gazed back down at the enemy.
“Once we start firing, it’s going to be a mad house,” Byron warned. “And look at this slope.” He pointed to the far side of the ridge that angled down to the genebank. If soldiers wanted to ascend the ridge to attack them, they’d have a much easier time climbing than they’d had on the far steeper side facing away from the genebank. “We can still pick them off if they try to come up here, but only as long as they don’t vastly outnumber us.”
Her PRD beeped. She opened the comm channel. Willoughby appeared, his expression grave. “We’re on the far side of the genebank now. Let us know if you need some kind of distraction. Maybe we can lure some of them over this way. Divide and conquer.”
“Thanks,” she told him.
“All right. Here goes,” Byron said, and he readied to take the first shot. “I’m going for the big one first.”
Peering into his scope, steadying the barrel of the long rifle on a rock, Byron aimed for Epaulettes. He fired. Through her own scope, H124 watched a spray of viscous red erupt from the gigantic man’s neck. Astonished, he slapped a hand to the pulsing jets he collapse
d in the snow. Two nearby Death Riders instantly dropped the equipment they were carrying and rushed to his side, dragging him inside the airship. A second round from Dirk hit him in the leg.
“If that airship takes off, we’re going to have a hard time getting out of here,” she pointed out. She scanned the crowd for anyone dressed as a PPC airship pilot, then spotted one on the right side of the genebank, talking to a weapons officer. She could pick off both of them in short order if she was any good with the rifle. She’d never used a scope like this before, and they were so far away that wind and distance would play a vital role in making the shot. She studied the scope’s readout, the rifle’s built-in anemometer apprising her of the wind speed and direction. The reticle accommodated for these factors, and a laser told her exactly how far away she was from her targets. With these automated assists, she hoped she could make the shots. The rifle also served as a dual weapon, being mounted with a grenade launcher. It only held two grenades, but she’d stuffed a few more in her parka pockets.
Dirk squeezed off two more rounds, hitting one of the Death Riders in the side as he helped their commander to the airship, but missing the second one entirely. “Damn!” Then they were out of sight, up the ramp and into the airship. “You know that thing has a medpod,” Dirk said through clenched teeth.
Chaos erupted. With the crack of the shots reaching them two miles away, troopers turned in confusion, trying to figure out where the sniping was coming from. The weapons officer pointed to the airship, gesturing for the pilot to come with him. H124 held her breath as he walked in front of the pilot. She fired just as their heads lined up, one in front of the other. The round struck the weapons officer in the skull, spraying the pilot behind him with blood. But the pilot wasn’t hit. He started running for the airship, and again she held her breath, leading the target. The scope readjusted for distance and angle, and she waited for him to run into the shot. As soon as the targeting system flashed red she fired, striking him in the chest. He staggered, falling to his knees. He brought a hand to his chest, and it came away slick and red. He struggled to his feet, gasping, limping for the airship ramp. She tightened her chest and took another shot, this time hitting him in the side of the head. He collapsed like a sack of grain.
Shattered Skies Page 20