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Covert Ops

Page 10

by T. R. Cameron


  She activated her microphone. “Back, good to go.”

  Diana’s voice replied immediately. “Front, good to go. Anik and Rath are getting into position now. Glam?”

  Kayleigh, clearly excited, spoke quickly. “Warlock and I are good to go.”

  “Okay. Rock and roll. Let’s get us a pirate.” The boss sounded irritated, which was well in line with her second-in-command’s own feelings about their target.

  Cara and Hank broke into a jog toward the door as the first defenses materialized. Two men in mismatched camo gear—Seriously? In a damn warehouse?—appeared from behind each side of the opening, rifles held to their shoulders. She curved left and her partner went right, dashed in a zigzag route to avoid the initial bursts, and took position on the opposite sides of the metal walls from their opponents. “Flashbangs out.” She threw one grenade at a diagonal across the gap and risked exposing her arm to toss the other inside the building close to her position. They detonated, and she ran forward. Hank’s shotgun boomed a second before her carbine’s triple burst and both enemies, already stunned by the grenades, fell.

  She grinned for the first time in what felt like a long while. It made her face muscles twinge. “Initial opposition down. Moving in.”

  Diana replied, “Same here.” She and Tony checked in a circle around them to be sure that no immediate reinforcements were inbound before each set down the case they carried and laid it on its side. They knelt together and popped the catches. In Tony’s box were four heavy-looking spheres. Hers held a pair of miniature drones, fragile objects folded in upon themselves for transport.

  Deacon spoke to Tony first. “Stark, take those out of the box and set them on the ground wherever.” As the first one touched the concrete floor of the warehouse, lights began to blink on it. It rolled in all four directions, a few feet each, and returned to its center point. After a short pause, it raced away into the factory. They repeated the process with the other three.

  The former detective sounded amused. “What exactly are those toys, Warlock?”

  “Sensor spheres. They’ll help us map the space. However, they’re crap at climbing stairs.”

  Kayleigh jumped in. “Which is why we’ll free the two drones in your case, boss. Be gentle with them. Those things are still way too fragile.” Diana knew they were experimental, something the techs had worked on together. The level of sophistication required to function in three dimensions demanded delicate components. She detached one from the power cable that connected it to the container and placed it in a clear space. Beside her, the last ball rolled away and Tony stood and scanned the area. The barrel of his shotgun traversed the space in tandem with his gaze.

  The four fans on each were stacked in two pairs in collapsed mode, and they unfolded as she watched. Lights glimmered on the back as the device performed its startup diagnostic, then with a whir, the machine elevated and rotated a full turn. “The feed is fine,” Kayleigh reported. “Set out the other one and you’re free to move about.”

  Diana followed her instructions and stood. A panel appeared on the right of her display with a wireframe map of the facility that became more detailed with each passing moment. Gunfire barked deeper within, and Warlock cursed. “Bastards. Someone shot one of the spheres.”

  “Don’t worry, we’ll get payback for that, too.” Tony sounded as irritated as Deacon did.

  She shook her head. “Khan, status.”

  The demolitions expert was out of breath. “Your end is done. I’m starting on the right side.”

  “Friday, are you able to show me the enemies?” Red dots appeared in her display to mark where the drones and spheres had detected members of the opposition. “Okay, then. Time to clear these idiots out. Glam, if you can locate our primary target, that would be good.”

  “I’m on it. Wherever he’s hiding, my canaries will find him.”

  Cara crept around the side of a machine on her approach to one of the red dots in her display and Hank trailed a few steps behind. She’d ordered him to stay far enough away that her stealth wouldn’t be compromised. We should have suppressors for this kind of op. Something to discuss with the boss later.

  On both her left and right were long machines, each with a roll of steel mounted on the end nearest their entry point. A track of some kind pulled the metal along a waist-high channel toward four robotic arms equipped with cutting lasers, presumably programmable for different shapes. Her target was on the other side of the machine to the right, near the first set of waving mechanical arms. Their articulation kept them from expanding very far outward, but his positioning still smacked of confidence she would have lacked with those giant appendages in motion nearby.

  It also made the final part of the approach difficult. She reached a position behind him on the opposite side of the machine and ducked as he started yet another full turn with his weapon extended. The loud entrances from either side had clearly spread the alarm throughout the building, but she didn’t want to reveal her position by shooting him. When he turned away from her again, she moved. With her right hand on the machine in the small space between the moving metal and the edge, she vaulted forward and aimed her kick at the back of his head. Her heels connected with his skull exactly as planned, propelled him forward, and dropped him on his face. That was the upside.

  The downside was the way his weapon careened from his hand and landed in a machine across the aisle. Laser cutters on that side sliced into it and the ammunition sparked and exploded. The resulting burst of noise confirmed her position far better than if she’d stood on top of one of the machines and yelled. Dammit. Bad luck atop bad luck. “Get moving, Hank. We’ll have company.” Her partner made the leap over the equipment with slightly less grace than she had and was at her side as a trio of enemies appeared ahead. Two men with rifles flanked a woman with a wand. She was dressed all in red, a striking image in the otherwise black and grey factory.

  The crimson witch’s voice dripped with faux sweetness. “Welcome to our home. You’re just in time for the barbecue.” She pointed her wand at Hank and a cone of flame seared across the distance between them. He rolled in the only direction he could—toward his teammate—and the fire tracked him. Cara lunged and slid under it, then jerked upright on the far side with her carbine extended. A triple burst eliminated the rifle wielder on the left of the woman, but rounds from his weapon battered her vest and flung her onto her rear. Hank’s gun barked, followed quickly by a shout of pain that sounded male. The spent shell clattered across the floor in a strange instant of silence before a piece of cut metal detached from the machine nearest her with a loud scraping sound.

  She hurled herself onto her back, and the sharp-edged plate missed her by inches. It stopped in front of the witch in time to intercept the next two shots from Hank’s shotgun, which failed to penetrate and instead, richocheted wildly. The metal careened away from the witch and into Hank and knocked him off his feet. His partner scrambled up and fired at their adversary, but she was already in motion to evade and ducked into the cover of another piece of equipment behind her former position. The second man lay on the ground with a wicked wound in his leg from the shotgun, but when he saw her advance toward the witch’s hiding place, he tried to reach for his weapon. She knelt and punched him in the head, and the impact and the stun from her gloves combined to knock him out.

  As she stood, she realized she was glad that the sneaking around was over and the outright fighting had begun. “Come out, come out, wherever you are, Red Riding Hood. The big bad wolf is here to end you.”

  Diana raced toward the man ahead of her, who was armed with a wand. She raised her rifle and fired, but the bullets went through his head without stopping. In the instant that her mind registered the illusion, a giant piece of metal struck her from the left side, where her hidden foe had presumably waited for her to enter his line of sight before he dispelled his duplicate and hurled the object at her. The impact catapulted her into Tony, and the two of them landed hard in a
tangle of limbs.

  Her instinctive reflex was to cast a force shield around them both, and that was all that saved them. A rain of bullets bounced off it before another large slab of metal pounded into it. Her energy trickled away as she maintained the defense and she struggled to untangle herself from her partner and used him as leverage to rise. Her magical foe was supported by two men who fired at her. The former gestured with his wand to levitate an even larger piece of steel, and the other two had paused to change magazines. They all wore predatory looks on their faces. She realized why when the first bullet plunged through her defense without slowing and buried itself in her vest.

  “The bastards have anti-magic bullets.” Her shout was accompanied by a grunt of effort as she yanked the piece of metal out of her foe’s grip with a rage-fueled burst of magic and hurled it at the shooters. It plowed into them at a downward angle and crushed them under it. Her body registered that several rounds had hit her and that she likely had at least one fractured or broken rib, judging by the way breathing hurt. She put it from her mind and focused on the adversary to her left. He brought his wand to bear, and she reached out with her telekinesis and tried to rip it from his grasp. She failed, but it bought Tony the time he needed. His shotgun barked twice in quick succession and the enemy mage toppled and lay still in an expanding puddle of red.

  The detective’s lip was bloody and split from where she’d hit him with her rifle when they collided. “Asshole. He deserved worse.”

  Diana nodded. “These guys suck. Glam, any guidance?”

  There was a delay before Kayleigh responded. “We only have one canary and one sphere left, so we’re trying to keep them in the shadows. But there is a second floor with a number of catwalks leading to a section that’s all offices and control centers. Our guess is that he’s in there, but we haven’t actually located him yet.”

  “Give me a path.” The most direct route illuminated on her glasses, and she nodded. It was ahead and to the right, near the midpoint of the factory, which meant having to fight their way through more chaff before they reached the wheat, no doubt. She looked at her partner, and he gave her a nod. “Okay, we’re moving forward.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  Cara lined up the witch she was stalking in her sights. The woman’s feet were exposed under the edge of the equipment she hid behind. The chase had been a good one but she’d expended most of a magazine prior to that moment. She raised her rifle barrel to chest height and pulled the trigger. The carbine clicked empty, but the armor-piercing bullet drilled through the machine panel and the woman behind it. She fell soundlessly but with a look of shock frozen on her face.

  The agent nodded in satisfaction and echoed Diana’s last words. “Give me a path.” Her glasses showed that the staircase to the second level was forward and to the left, at the center of the facility according to the map. She grinned at the thought of eliminating a few more of the scumbags, and her smile widened at the idea of finding the pirate. It would be a pleasure to pummel him until he revealed where the people who hired him to help with the prison breakout were hiding.

  They knew each enemy position in advance on their way to the center, thanks to the remaining sphere rolling around on their side of the building. As the red dots moved, they were able to react accordingly and fire at their opponents as they stepped from cover. A mage who used a piece of steel as a shield had presented a momentary problem until Hank fired at the small gap between the floor and his defensive barrier. He’d yelped in pain and dropped the metal on himself, which led to another scream and ongoing moans of agony from the weight of the slab atop him. The partners had exchanged looks that threatened to turn into adrenaline-fueled giggles, so they faced resolutely forward and continued to move deeper into the facility.

  They reached the center at the same time as Diana and Tony, who arrived at a run. Cara asked, “Are you having fun?”

  The former detective quipped, “We were until we found you here. The pirate is ours.”

  She shook her head. “Oh, hell no. He’s mine.”

  Hank shrugged. “Well, since she’s my partner, I’ll have to back her up on this. Plus, we were here first.”

  Diana raced past them and ran to the staircase. “Yeah, but we’re faster.”

  They pounded up after her. The stairs switched back on themselves twice and finally ended on a second level about three stories up. Below, the factory floor was dotted with fallen enemies, either dead or severely wounded. Impressively, they’d managed not to destroy any of the factory’s equipment, which for a BAM mission showed a significant degree of restraint. Yet. Diana grinned. The night’s still young.

  At the top of the metal staircase, catwalks led left and right along the wall of the warehouse, with connectors to the opposite side about halfway toward the far wall. She turned and saw that an actual floor had been built out over a portion of the factory, with walls to create an enclosed area. The crossing pieces connected to another catwalk that ran in front of the constructed office area. The only entrance to that space was in the center of the walkway. Long windows extended down each side of the structure, most likely the control spaces Kayleigh had mentioned.

  Diana went right, so Cara dashed left. She knew that on most days, she was faster than the boss, which should bring her to the pirate first if he was back there. However, the defenders who attacked her seemed determined to make things more complicated than they should be. She stopped at the crosswalk and studied her adversaries. They had rushed out at the sight of the ARES agents and carried large metal shields that protected them on three sides. One was halfway across, another three-quarters of the way across, and one awaited them on the rear catwalk. She gestured for Hank to take the long way around—which would at least force the rearmost ones to decide on which approach to defend—and Diana did the same with Tony.

  Those at the back reacted as she’d anticipated and scurried down to position themselves at the corners. Kayleigh’s voice broke through the quiet on the comms. “I’m not sure if you’ve noticed, but there are firing notches in those shields.” Cara magnified her glasses and confirmed that the tech was correct.

  “Damn. Look at them, all prepared and stuff.” Tony and Hank had halted their advance at the news as neither had much in the way of defense against fire that might come from behind the shields. The good news was that the items themselves looked heavy and unwieldy enough that the people protected by them probably only had pistols. Hopefully, anyway. The bad news was that she’d been too careless with her AP ammo and had none left to penetrate the shields. “So, it’s essentially a stalemate at the moment. I say we charge ʼem.”

  “Cara, you’ve always wanted to fly, right?” The boss had the tone in her voice that she got when she thought fast about something that would probably end in disaster.

  Diana calculated the angles for both her and her second-in-command when the other woman replied and sounded more than a little dubious. “Uh…yes?”

  “Okay, here’s your chance. I’ll drop you behind the back one.”

  “Holy hell. Okay.” Cara lowered her rifle, drew the Bowie knife from the back of her vest, and lowered herself into a crouch. “I’m ready when you are.”

  Diana focused her mind, envisioned her internal pathways, and directed power to both her force magic and telekinesis. With the former, she hurled Cara forward. The woman kept her limbs curled tightly, which made it easier to adjust her trajectory gently. She dispersed the magic and relied on momentum to carry her the rest of the way. The agent’s boots struck the metal only inches away from where she’d intended and about two feet behind the rearmost defender on her catwalk.

  Shouts of alarm accompanied the landing, and Cara whirled to her right as Diana launched herself over her foes in the same way. She had much better control of her own flight and was able to use her body weight and magic together to maintain the proper angles. When she landed, she tumbled ahead to avoid the attack of the defender, who had identified the maneuver quickly enoug
h to try to intercept her.

  She rolled up into a crouch, spun with a hiss of pain triggered by her damaged ribs, and thrust her right arm forward to punch the air. A blast of force smacked into the defender’s midsection, doubled him over, and forced him onto one knee. Damn. That was a little too high. She lunged into a follow-up attack and punched him in the temple to remove him from the fight. Her assault had positioned her perfectly and she grinned, extended her arms, and rammed the nearest shield into the one beyond it. The defender who had rushed toward her bounced off the piece of metal she’d set into motion and rebounded into his own shield. She didn’t wait to see if he got up but pivoted and reached for fire to release it at the man on the far end of the catwalk.

  “Damn it to hell,” Cara cursed. Out of the corner of her eye, she’d watched her knife—thrown with all her might at the enemy nearest Hank—fall short of its target by several feet. That hadn’t stopped her turn toward the man who brought his pistol to bear on her. If he’d reacted faster, I’d be toast. I guess he didn’t expect me to do a super-jump to get behind him. To be fair, though, I didn’t either. She snorted at the inane meanderings of her mind and lunged forward at the end of her spin, grasped his wrist with her right hand, and shoved the gun away from her.

 

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