by Dan Abnett
"No heroics." Huckelbery nodded.
"We get the fuck out if anything, I mean anything, feels off. Even a hair off. No pretard plays. None of that pressing on no matter what."
Huckelbery looked at his toecaps for a moment. Then he glanced up.
"Goran? Rash?"
"I'd go with Bloom's suggestion," Goran said.
"No heroics," said Rash. "Back right off the moment it looks compromised."
"Okay," said Huckelbery. "Okay."
He checked his wristwatch.
"Prep and ready. Fifteen minutes. I want us on that hill while it's still dark. I'll work ahead with Three, scout in, make the call, yes or no. Rash, you and your boys get to run support. Go tell 'em. Bloom, you and Preben escort Mouse and Masry. I'd like a look at a hard-print map of the hill and the station. Can we get one?"
"Yeah," said Falk. "I'll pull one from the registry."
"Fifteen minutes," Huckelbery said. Everybody started moving.
Falk headed back to the office. Backmasked voices whispered to him out of the shadows. He found the best detail map of the area, snapped it with his glares and then tore it out of the folder. While he was at it, he took some copy snaps of the other area maps too.
Bigmouse came into the room.
"Thanks," he said.
Falk held out the map sheet.
"Go give this to Huck."
Bigmouse nodded, took it and shuffled back out.
Falk keyed playback and watched the recording again.
The figures crouching in the doorway against the light, murmuring something, then rising and approaching. End.
He played with the sound balance a little, and washed it through a modulator option he found on the audio menu. A few words, or partial words surfaced. The girl was clearer than the man. Falk listened to the brief scraps of sound three or four times over. She was speaking Russian, so although he could make out some of the words, it was still useless. Useless. With a linked celf, he could have translated it in under a second.
One word stood out from the others. It stood out because it wasn't Russian, or at least it didn't sound like a Russian word. She said it twice, close together. It sounded like she was saying "calico" or "heligo". Something like that. What did that mean?
The cramp ambushed him again, made him grunt in pain, made him grip the edge of the lightbox to stop himself falling. The snake in his gut, the snake of fear, bit its own tail and squirmed around, sliding him along on its sheer, dry scales, bearing him on towards death.
He waited for the pain to let go of him again, for the snake to glide away. Slowly, he straightened up, took a breath. He unclamped his fingers. Pressure and perspiration had made the tips adhere to the lightbox. He peeled them away, and saw that he had gripped so tightly, he'd actually created a stress crack across the surface of the lightbox, a hairline fracture like something ominous showing up on an x-ray.
Falk buttoned up his jacket, tightened up his blate and picked up the Koba.
They would be waiting for him.
They assembled in the yard outside, under the plastic roofing. It was still dark, but there was a pearlescent stain in the corner of the sky where the sun was due to arrive. Rain was tapping off the roof, and rippling the puddles in the yard. The hill and the hilltop station were black on black.
Huckelbery was still studying the map that Falk had procured. He got everybody grouped in under a lamp, demonstrated the route he wanted to take, the spread he wanted, the point of angle and entry at the hilltop. He got Bigmouse and Falk to confirm the location of the boomer. Everybody took snaps of the map and Huck's pointers with their glares. Huck finished his brief by indicating the fallback options, in order of preference.
They had everything with them, everything they could carry. Fastened up against the rain, they checked each other's blate, front and back, and readied weapons.
"Now let's take a moment," said Huckelbery.
They bowed their heads. Hands slid over hearts, or clasped ID brooches. Falk heard several sets of LEAF servos purr.
"God of my personal conviction," Huck began. If any of them was repeating his words, they were doing it silently. "Watch over me on this morning, and throughout this endeavour, and watch over my comrades in this group, even if they are heathen sunbitches who believe in some other god than thou. Help me to maintain honour and courage, and uphold the great institution of the Settlement Office, and the constitution of the United Status, amen."
Amen. Heads came up.
"All right," Huck said. "Don't balls this up. If I say pull out, we pull out. Understood?"
They all murmured assent.
"Then let's go execute this fucked-up plan, shall we?" he said.
They bumped fists and swiped knuckles, and headed out into the rain, into the last sigh of the night wind, across the yard and into the darkness.
The automatic lights of Eyeburn Slope fell away behind them. Up ahead, in the black, the windfarm uttered its steady, threatening chop, like a disapproving slow handclap.
It was hard going. Within minutes, Falk was wet through and cold to the core. His face was numb, fingers too, and he kept slipping and turning his ankles on the blind terrain. He and Preben stayed tight to Masry and Bigmouse. The other two teams were just ahead of them.
The slope grew steeper. Falk started to sweat, hot wet against the cold of his skin, chilled by the wind despite the insulation of his kit. The wind noise, and the increasingly loud whup-whup-whup of the turbine farm, were blending to fill his ears with a dull roar, like the hush of the ocean meeting a beach, like the ambient background on a poorquality playback.
Calico? Heligo? Helical?
The Koba got heavier and heavier. He adjusted the strap, but his hands were cold. He climbed the track, terrified that the cramp might come back and bite into him.
By the time they reached the first agreed marker, it was alarmingly light. Falk knew that was mostly down to his eyes getting used to the low light levels, but the sky was growing paler all the time. They could see the texture of the land, the grey distance of the sea, the silhouettes of the turning turbine heads. In the valley behind them, Eyeburn Slope and the hortiplex fields seemed ridiculously overilluminated.
Ahead of them, up the steep mound of the hill, there were lights on in the weather station. They moved up to the next marker, a rusting demountable that had been butted up alongside two refab sheds. Falk could smell tar paper and cold metal. Weeds in the shed gutters danced in the wind.
This was the point where they'd divide. Huck was moving ahead with Three to scout, Hotel Four pulling wide to cover them. Falk, Preben and Bigmouse were staying put with Masry.
"I need to see the boomer," said Masry.
"You will," said Huck.
"I need to assess it."
"We had a plan," said Huck."Fucking stick to it. Stay here until we tell you to follow us in." He glanced at Falk and tapped his brooch. "Keep reading us," he said.
Falk nodded.
Kilo Three broke cover and moved off up the hill, heads low, shadows amongst the black undergrowth and brambles. Hotel Four split to the right, working around the hill a little way. Falk adjusted his glares, tracking their aura codes in the darkness. Four this way, four that. They could message via their medical updater panes.
"Where is the bird?" Masry asked.
Falk pointed.
"Up that way, the other side of the sheds, in the yard. It's pretty exposed."
Masry only had a PDW for armament. He had suggested taking the thumper or the recaptured PAP 20 with its dregs of ammo off Bigmouse, because Bigmouse wasn't well enough to use them, and he'd been told "no" several times.
Preben had his M3A up, sighted to his face, tracking the codes of Huck and Three through the target sampler. Falk looked to Bigmouse, who was leaning his weight against the side wall of the demountable so he didn't have to carry it. In the twilight, he looked like he was made of snow.
"Okay?" Falk asked.
"I'm wealthy,
Nestor," said Bigmouse. "I'm golden."
Falk grinned.
The wait time became unbearable. Masry couldn't keep still. Out on the horizon, the pale band of sky spread, and low cloud banks were edged with silver, like their paint had been buffed back to bare metal. Daylight was going to overtake them.
"Got it," said Preben. "Let's go."
Falk took a quick look, and picked up Huck's medical alert pane.
Move in.
They started to move, coming around the demountable and up through the angled undergrowth of the bank. Big spots of rain started to fall, cold and heavy. Bigmouse could only move so fast, and Falk kept with him to support him. Masry's eagerness swept him ahead.
"Slow down!" Falk hissed.
Masry didn't answer. Preben glanced back at Falk quickly, then made an effort to stay with Masry and keep him on a leash.
"Sorry," said Bigmouse. "Sorry I'm slowing you down."
"Shut up," said Falk.
He knew the snake wasn't far away, knew it was just waiting to loop its coils back into his belly, drawing the cramp with it. He swallowed the spittle building in his mouth, tasted the blood in it. Sour, metallic. A man's spit shouldn't taste like that. Not a healthy man's.
He heard Preben hiss, "Fuck it, Masry."
Masry was almost running.
Falk and Bigmouse followed them up into the yard. The station was off to their right, a bundle of black oblongs against the sky, lit by internal lamps. Pika-don sat to their left, tilted slightly on the muddy slick of the yard like a sleeping bird, head tucked under one wing. It was just a black shape, the silhouette of a piece of sculpture, stark and angular with the slate-grey sky behind it. The sky was pale enough to appear reflected in the yard puddles, pieces of gleaming off-white.
Weapons up and hot, Huck and Three had the yard covered. Two pipers, two PAPs. Valdes's pane, misspelled, reported the sound of voices and the smell of cooking from the main buildings. Rash's team was out of sight but close.
Masry was all but sprinting towards the boomer. Preben was with him, and Bigmouse and Falk followed. Huck's team held position, watching the angles, looking for movement or discovery.
Masry circled the Boreal, assessing it. He bent down, trying to see how much damage had been done to the undercarriage, tried a different angle, knelt down in the mud and got his head and shoulders in under the nose to look. Preben stood point.
"Here," said Falk when Masry reappeared. "Here, and here." He showed him where the other hits had struck, the hull impacts, the through-and-throughs, the h-beam that had sliced an ugly hole in the front screen. The blister had cooled, hardened off.
"It's okay," said Masry. "It's okay. It's not structural. The bodywork will hold together, good enough. The gear's shot out, which isn't great, but I can compensate on lift-off and we'll just be setting down with a bump."
"You sure?"
"Yeah, yeah."
"Masry?"
"It's fine. She's wealthy."
"Okay."
"I've got to get inside. Prep. Get her set and started."
"How long?" asked Falk.
"Five minutes."
"Masry, can it be less?"
"Maybe."
"Masry, listen to me. Listen to me." He forced the PO to look at him.
"Start the prep, fast as you can," said Falk. "You listening to me? Start it and prep it. Do not fire anything up without you warn us first, okay? Okay?"
"Okay, Bloom. Jesus."
"Masry, if you're going to make this baby make a noise, if you're going to power up or start an engine, warn us. It's going to bring them running, and we need to be ready."
"Okay."
Masry opened the side door and climbed into the pilot's seat. He started to check over the instrument display.
"Get on board," Falk said to Bigmouse.
"What?"
"Get aboard," Falk repeated. "Don't wait around."
Bigmouse nodded and started to haul himself up into the payload space. Preben saw he was having trouble, and helped him.
Falk waited. Day was straining to break. Before it could get there, the snake bit him.
The cramp came back, in his throat and the back of his neck as well as in his belly. Falk made as little noise as he could, a muffled snarl, but still it felled him, dropped him to his knees in the mud beside the boomer's slide door. He heard Bigmouse call his name, heard Preben moving to him, heard Huck.
Heard rain. Heard the chop of the windfarm.
Heard himself gasping, his blood pounding.
"Get him up, get him up!" Huckelbery said.
Hands on him trying to lift him, stretching out the tendons that attached the pain to his bones.
"What happened to him?" That was Preben.
"Just get him up!"
Madness. Coiling pain, hissing like a kettle, like a snake, rushing up from his belly, up the pipeline of his spine, into his brain, too much pain to live through.
"What's wrong with Nes, man?" That was Valdes, behind him.
"Keep scanning!" Huck replied.
"Is he dying, man?"
Yes, I'm dying, Falk thought. This much pain could only be dying. This was the snake-pain, the hate-cramp, that came to get you when your time had come.
"Keep watching the station!" Huckelbery snapped. "Preben, help me get Bloom in the cabin."
Hands hoisted him. He saw the boomer's door sill close up, raindrops on it like diamonds, the worn, bare metal of the deck grille, then Bigmouse, stiff with his own pain, looking down at him with frightened eyes.
Someone started screaming. A low, guttural complaint that grew and rose into a whine, a scream, a howl.
Not someone. The engines. Masry had fired the boomer's engines. The fan jets thundered into life. Blown mud-spray lifted in a halo around the hopter.
Falk was on his side, tight in a foetal curl, on the cabin deck, with Preben trying to pull him further inside. Masry had started the engines. No warning. No countdown. No cue. The airframe was shaking. Over the jet roar, Falk could hear shooting. He tried to see. He got one hand on the hatch pillar and tried to look out.
Gunmen were spilling out of the station. Gunmen, insurgents, black hats, terrorists. Falk didn't know what they were, what name they wanted to be known by. The pain made certain he didn't care. He barely cared for the SOMD men outside, the men whose fate he was sharing. About the only emotion that was bright and sharp enough to pierce his shield of pain was his hatred of Masry, of Masry's selfish panic and thoughtlessness.
The gunmen were in their drab, dark all-weather gear, like mountain hikers or hortiplex labourers, like the people who had tried to kill them earlier. They had Kobas and a few appropriated SO weapons. They came from both the front and side of the station, moving low, weapons up, firing tight bursts. They were professionals. Falk, just playing at being a soldier, could recognise real ones. It was the way they moved, carried themselves, used cover, blocked for each other, fired their weapons.
Goran, Valdes and Clodell were returning fire, backing rapidly towards the howling transport. Huck was firing from the door. Preben had given up trying to drag Falk any further inside and was lining up with his M3A. There was no sign of Hotel Four.
Falk wanted to shake the pain off, get up, add his Koba to the fire they were laying down. The cramp wouldn't let him. It wasn't done with him. The snake constricted around him, kept him pinned and scrunched up. The only thing he could do was hold on to the door pillar and make noises through his teeth.
"Fuck you, Masry!" he slurred. "You fuck! You fuck!"
Masry said something from the front. Falk couldn't hear it over the fan wash. Pika-don lurched a little, as if actually about to lift, like a big animal shifting in its sleep.
"Hey! Hey!" Preben yelled.
Hard rounds spanked off the hull. Huckelbery started to move away from the bird, firing, yelling.
"Fuck's he going, man?" Valdes shouted.
"Chief!" Goran bellowed. "Stay here! Stay with the bird!"
Huckelbery was trying to make an opening. He was yelling for Rash and the rest of Hotel Four. He was yelling at them to close in, to head towards the bird, to get to the dust-off. Maybe they were pinned down around the side of the station. Maybe Huck was trying to punch a hole and let them through.
Pika-don lurched again.
"Masry, you fuck!" Falk gasped. "You've got to wait! You've got to wait!"
It was too late for Clodell. Hard rounds felled him, bouncing off his blate. He went sprawling in the mud, alive but winded, dented, bruised. Falk heard another round crack one of Clodell's blate panels, actually fracture it. Clodell started to rise. An h-beam took his head off. It just scorched it off, vapourised it. There was a bang, a puff of smoke and a little shower of black debris, a brief, intense smell of burned bone, and Clodell's body tipped back into a puddle with just a smoking, fused stump sticking out of the neck of his blate. It was a gnarled lump, charred, steaming, that looked like a bad barbecue cut, a chunk of flesh and a piece of jaw with a couple of teeth still sticking out of it.