“Keep up,” he ordered flatly, and took off.
#
Whoever was in command of security for the Command Center hadn’t taken the chance that Damien’s team had landed so close to them by accident. They came around the corner to find a pair of armored personnel carriers rolling straight towards them – and the heavy machine guns mounted on the vehicles opened fire immediately.
The bullets ran into the shield of solidified air Damien was maintaining in front of them, ricocheting away as if they’d hit a solid wall. They intensified the fire, but he barely felt the impacts.
“On my count,” he told his squad. Understanding his intention, Amiri hefted her laser and took aim. The Freedom Wing fighters followed suit a moment. “One, two… three.”
On three, he shattered the air shield and threw its pieces at the APCs. The machine guns stuttered and jammed. He knew from his training that with the lack of anything actually physical blocking the barrels, the modern weapons would clear themselves in moments – but they had a few seconds of silence.
Three battle lasers and five grenade launchers fired into that silence. Full power shots from the battle lasers required a full minute to cool – but also applied a level of force equal to several kilograms of TNT.
The modern, Legatus-built, armor-piercing grenades, on the other hand, simply went clean through the APCs armor before detonating inside their crew and passenger compartments.
One vehicle was, to all intents and purposes, gone – ripped to pieces by the laser hits. The second was still intact… but an empty hulk, its crew and interior electronics shattered by explosions inside the armor.
“Move,” Damien ordered, leading the way past the burned-out wreckage towards the Command Center. Every second they delayed was time for the defenders to get ready for them.
Past the APCs, they rounded another corner to see the slightly larger than usual office tower built on top of the Ardennes Planetary Command Center. Today, any pretense had been abandoned. Planters and glass had disappeared behind thick metal barricades that had risen from the ground, and heavy fixed weapons – mini-guns and automatic grenade launchers – had emerged from hiding places to join them.
A hail of fire greeted them, and Damien used his magic to physically yank the entire team back behind cover.
“Well, that is going to be a headache,” Leclair said quietly.
“We’ll deal,” Damien replied, but a buzz on his wrist distracted him. Tapping a key, he linked his headset back into the Freedom Wing’s net. “What is it?” he demanded.
“We’re receiving an encrypted transmission from the incoming cruisers,” Riordan told him. Despite his determination to be involved, the demagogue had been quietly shuffled into running their central field communications. “I don’t have the code, but I can relay it to you.”
The Hand glanced at the scarred street where he’d almost been shot.
“There’s no such thing as a good time today, is there?” he asked rhetorically. “Put them through.”
#
It took a few seconds for his personal computer to analyze the encrypted transmission and decrypt it. Once it did so, he told it to start with the current location in the message.
“… to reach Hand Damien Montgomery. Hand Montgomery, please come in. This is Mage-Captain Kole Jakab of the Duke of Magnificence, attempting to reach Hand Damien Montgomery. Message repeats. This is Mage-Captain Jakab of the…”
“This is Montgomery,” Damien interrupted, sending the message back through the Freedom Wing’s relay. The recording continued for a few seconds more – if nothing else, the Duke of Magnificence was still several light seconds out – then cut out.
“Hand Montgomery, thank God I could reach you,” Jakab’s interrupted himself. “We have a problem, and it’s one I am supremely grateful to dump on higher authority.”
“What’s going on, Captain?”
“We received a transmission from the surface,” the starship commander said grimly. “Tight-beamed to us, but we were clearly expected to relay to whoever was in command. You… you need to hear this, Lord Montgomery.”
A different voice replaced Jakab’s – not one that Damien was expecting to hear.
“Approaching Protectorate Forces, this is General James Montoya,” a calm, even voice sounded in his ears. “Mage-Governor Vaughn has placed me in command of Ardennes’s defenses against your un-provoked attack.
“I will not mince words or pretend our innocence against whatever charges you have decided to lay against my governor,” he continued. “The destruction of our naval forces has made clear that you are determined to carry this fallacy through to its final conclusion.
“Therefore, you have left me with no choice. As a security measure, thermonuclear charges have been planted in the center of each of Ardennes’ six largest cities. Should you attempt to land troops or intervene in our little rebel issue, you will force me to start detonating warheads. I estimate each will kill a minimum of seven million people. Their blood will be on your hands.
“Once we have dealt with our local issues, we can continue this discussion,” Montoya continued pleasantly, as if he hadn’t just threatened to murder forty-plus million people. “You may enter orbit, but any attempt to act from there will result in unfortunate consequences.”
The transmission ended, and Jakab’s voice returned.
“What do we do?” the Mage-Captain demanded, his voice torn. “We can’t let him kill those people, but…”
Father, if you are willing, take away this cup from me, Damien prayed silently, the words coming unbidden to his thoughts and lips. How could he give orders to face that threat? Did he have the right – did anyone have the right – to risk all of those lives to remove one man from power?
“Vaughn is insane,” he whispered, and Amiri and Leclair looked at him. He shook his head at them and slowly straightened, considering the situation.
“Captain, how long until you reach orbit?”
“Ninety-four minutes and counting,” Jakab replied, clearly relieved to face an easy question.
He didn’t even know what level of the Command Center Montoya would be on. Presumably, Vaughn would also be able to detonate the warheads. If they were together, he could neutralize them both – but all he could count on was that they were both in the Command Center.
Yet not my will, but yours be done, he finished the quote in his head. Regardless of what he wanted, he’d taken the damn Hand, and he’d led everybody this far. No-one would take this particular cup of poison from him.
“Mage-Captain Jakab,” he said quietly, firmly, “these are your orders: if by the time you reach orbit you have received no countermanding orders from me, you will initiate a sustained heavy kinetic bombardment of the Ardennes Planetary Command Center. I see no other way to save the other cities but to accept collateral damage in Nouveaux Versailles.”
Amiri and Leclair were staring at him in shock, and Jakab was silent.
“These orders are non-discretionary, Captain, and should be recorded in the records as such,” Damien told Jakab gently. “If I fail, the fault will be mine alone.”
“If you fail?” Jakab questioned. “What are you going to be doing?”
Damien sighed and glanced back at the scarred roadway.
“I’m going to be assaulting the Command Center.”
#
As soon as he was clearly off the line, Amiri started to speak, but Damien waved her to wait as he triggered another communication code he’d saved in his personal computer.
The little wrist computer hummed for a moment, and then a very young-sounding cheerful voice answered.
“Lieutenant Chau, Ardennes Army Command,” the young man introduced himself. “I’m sorry, General Zu is occupied, can I take a message?”
“Tell Zu that it’s Montgomery,” Damien told the cheerful young aide, “and I need to speak to him now.”
He could hear the young junior officer swallow. Zu had apparently given th
e aide answering his phone enough information to at least recognize Damien’s name.
The aide was also clearly screening the General’s calls, as Zu was on the line immediately.
“What’s going on, Montgomery?” he demanded. “It’s taking everything I’ve got to keep some of Vaughn’s loyalists bottled up, so this better be important.”
“It is,” Damien told him. “Listen to this.” He forwarded Zu Montoya’s message.
Zu listened to the message, and Damien could hear the muttered mix of curse words in at least three languages.
“I might be able to swing a few of the fence-sitters with this,” he admitted. “Hell, I might even get some of Vaughn’s appointees on board, but…”
“I don’t need you to go into battle, Zu,” the Hand said quietly. “What I need are evacuations. Starting yesterday. Can you get your men to do that?”
The General was silent for a long moment.
“Fifty million lives,” he said finally, his tone suddenly utterly matter of fact. “Yes, My Lord Hand. For fifty million lives, I will get you your evacuations. One way or another.”
#
Chapter 41
“My Lord, can I have a moment of your time?”
The last thing Mage-Governor Michael Vaughn expected as he stood in his office, watching the tactical display of the warships sweeping in to end his regime and the terrorists ripping apart his defenses, was Captain Duval’s quietly calm voice.
Montoya was the only other person in the office, and he ignored the officer. The General’s attention was on his wrist computer’s holographic display as he attempted to co-ordinate more forces to help defend the Command Center – at least one Freedom Wing team was supposedly right at their doorstep.
There wasn’t much for the Governor of the planet to do at this point, so Vaughn sighed and stepped out of his office, looking at the young officer he’d promoted so recently.
“What is it?” he demanded crossly.
Duval glanced at the other officers and techs in the room. They were all focused on their screens, all three shifts of staff trying desperately to co-ordinate the defense of a planet that was falling apart at the seams. Most of the terrorist attacks seemed to be in Nouveaux Versailles, but entire cities had erupted into rioting and the Army was refusing to respond to Vaughn’s orders.
“You need to see something,” Duval told the Governor and led him out of the Command Center into a side room. “Montoya ordered us not to tell you,” he said softly, once they were out of sight and hearing of the others. “He made a transmission to the Protectorate fleet in your name.”
“In my name?” Vaughn demanded. “I did not authorize any such thing.”
“I know,” Duval admitted. “We… weren’t supposed to listen in. But I’m running the com network, and it didn’t make sense for you to not know if he spoke in your name.” He shrugged helplessly. “I can’t… you have to see for yourself.”
The young officer flipped a voice recording to the Governor’s personal computer, and Vaughn eyed it for a moment. This could be some kind of plot, but Duval seemed to have taken his promotion to heart and tied his star even more tightly to the Governor than the rest of the Scorpions.
He hit play, and listened to Montoya’s transmission with ever-growing horror. His heart collapsed in his chest as he realized just what his oldest friend’s ‘insurance policy’ actually was.
“Son…” he stopped and cleared his throat, swallowing several times as he tried to understand just what was going on. “Captain Duval,” he continued.
Then an alarm klaxon triggered, and both of them charged back into the command center as the main screens lit up with the image of the front entrance.
Vaughn had seen the same camera footage moments before, and the sight of the dozens of Scorpions with their heavy weapons and thick metal barricades had provided a reassurance that Montoya’s transmission had turned to ash.
Now, the last remnants of that reassurance slipped away. The barricades were gone, ripped apart by some unimaginable force. Red and black uniformed bodies lay everywhere and even the concrete seemed to be burning. A single figure walked forward, slowly, implacably.
One of the soldiers managed to get a grenade launcher working again. A burst of three grenades flashed out at the figure, only to stop in midair and fling themselves back at their launcher. Even as they hit, a tiny white spark flashed into existence underneath the gun – and then exploded with a brilliant flash.
The attacker had just turned a tiny portion of the ground into antimatter. It was a trick many Mages – any decent Ship’s Mage, for example – could do. The conversion was the key to the Protectorate’s antimatter-driven economy.
It was normally done in vacuum, in sealed environments, and with a touch. Vaughn wasn’t aware of anyone who could do it at a distance as a weapon.
“That’s not possible,” he whispered. “The Hand is dead.”
“A Hand falls… another rises,” Duval replied, staring at the image. “My Lord… what do we do?”
If Montoya realized the Command Center itself was breached… he would trigger his bombs. Tens of millions of people would die – the very people of Ardennes that Michael Vaughn had sacrificed so much, twisted so much, to uplift.
“Get out of here,” he ordered aloud. “All of you – evacuate the Command Center. Let our friend come to me.”
The duty supervisor glanced towards the closed door of his office, where Montoya was waiting, focusing on the scenes far away from the Command Center.
“I AM YOUR GOVERNOR!” Vaughn bellowed. “This Mage – this Hand, if that is what he is – will face me. Get out!”
He kept a careful eye on his office door as Duval ushered the rest out – and made damned sure the Scorpion officer in charge didn’t get to Montoya.
In all things, in all ways, this was now Michael Vaughn’s fight.
#
General James Montoya was still focused on his tablet when Vaughn walked back into his office. He looked up at his Governor and paused. Something about Vaughn’s face clearly gave something away.
“What is it?” the General demanded.
“The outer defenses have been breached,” Vaughn told him calmly. Something about knowing that he was doomed made it… very easy to decide what to do now. “I’ve ordered everyone to evacuate. It appears we have a Hand on their way.”
Montoya held up the arm with his wrist computer. “Then we should access the PA system,” he suggested. “I think it’s time to discuss our insurance policy.”
“The one where you blow up my cities and kill my people to save your sorry ass?” Vaughn asked conversationally and watched Montoya recoil as if struck.
“If it was about my sorry ass, I’d have been on a fast ship a week ago,” Montoya snapped. “If this was about self-preservation, I’d have run when you killed a fucking Hand. This was to get you out. It’s the only leverage big enough to even get you a head start.
“Besides, this all started when you blew up Karlsberg,” the General continued, his voice suddenly calm, silky. “A little hypocritical to be arguing now?”
“Karlsberg was a necessary sacrifice,” Vaughn told him gently, shaking his head as he removed his gloves. “Their deaths were a sad necessity to maintain order. Everything we did, James, was done to improve Ardennes and the lot of her people! A few broken skulls, a few rigged elections – these were nothing against what we could do for our planet!
“But to slaugher the very people we set out to uplift? These are my people, James. Everything I have done is for them.”
“Because the luxuries and the money and the power were nothing?” Montoya asked sardonically. “I’m afraid I don’t buy your bullshit, old friend. And I won’t let you die for your bullshit, either!”
“And I won’t let you blow up my cities,” the Mage-Governor replied, channeling power into his runes and preparing to fight his oldest friend.
That moment of preparation, of steeling himself for
what he had to do, was a moment he didn’t have. He wasn’t sure where the gun had come from, but it was in Montoya’s hand and trained on him.
“I’m sorry, old friend,” Montoya said calmly. “I’m with you to the end of the line, but I won’t hang with you.”
Vaughn hesitated. Montoya didn’t.
#
Chapter 42
Damien had just finished ripping the doors off of the elevator shaft when his computer buzzed again.
“What is it?” he demanded harshly, looking at the wreckage of the building.
“It’s Zu,” the Ardennes Army General told him bluntly. “Are you okay?”
“I just killed thirty-four men for no reason other than that they were between me and Vaughn,” Damien replied. “No. What do you want?”
“Trying to help you,” Zu said. “Do you have any idea where you’re going?”
“I have the building schematics from my download,” Damien answered, glancing at the holographic display. “Command Center is buried beneath me, accessed via a secure elevator.”
A somewhat less secure elevator now.
“Right,” the General sighed. “You want the seventh level of the Center, third from the bottom. The elevator opens into a lobby, directly through that lobby is the main Operations Center. Vaughn has set up in an office just off the Center.”
“Thank you, General,” Damien said after taking a deep breath. “I apologize.”
“Don’t,” Zu said calmly. “I’d rather you be aware of who you kill. There are a lot of people in that Center.”
“The fewer of them who end up in my way, the more live,” the Hand replied bluntly. “Not having to search helps.”
“Good luck, My Lord Hand,” Zu finished after a long moment of silence.
Damien cut the channel and stepped into the elevator shaft.
One of the first things a Ship’s Mage learned was controlling gravity. In space, it allowed them to walk on ships lacking gravity runes or centrifugal gravity. On a planet, it allowed Damien to control his fall as he plummeted.
Hand of Mars (Starship's Mage Book 2) Page 30