“All right, Jewel,” Riordan said quietly as the city lights started to fade behind them. “I’ll be honest - I’m going on faith here because a dead Hand means we are so fucked I’m willing to grasp at straws. I’d love some clue of what sort of straw I’m grasping for, though.”
“My name isn’t Jewel,” she replied.
“No shit.”
“My name is Julia Amiri, Special Agent for the Protectorate Secret Service,” she continued, ignoring his outburst. “Alaura Stealey assigned me to Ardennes as a forward operative. My mission was to infiltrate the Freedom Wing and establish lines of communication for once Vaughn had been arrested.
“Once Stealey arrived on planet, I provided her with a onetime drop code to establish further communications or use as an emergency SOS.
“After the crash, I received an SOS code and these co-ordinates,” Amiri concluded. “Since I know Hand Stealey wasn’t on the shuttle, I presume she provided the code to Envoy Montgomery, and that he survived the crash.”
Her companion was speechless. Leaving him to process, the agent checked the cases in the back for weapons. Two of the cases were bog-standard assault rifles, made to the same pattern across the Protectorate. This pair had been manufactured on Amber, a world with notoriously lax laws on, well, everything.
The third case made her eyes light up. “Can you even use this?” she demanded of Riordan as she ran her eyes over the bulky lines of one of Legatus Arms newest and most dangerous toys.
“I have a rough idea,” he admitted.
“I’m fully qualified,” she told him. “I’ll handle it.”
She smiled, running her fingers over the Legatus Arms Tactical Battle Laser, Mod Five. It was one of very few energy weapons manufactured in the Protectorate, and one of the best she was aware of.
“Remind me why the hell I’m driving a Protectorate special agent into the middle of the country to rescue a Protectorate Envoy?” Riordan finally asked. “Last I checked, I was technically a traitor.”
“No, you’re a rebel,” Amiri corrected him. “It’s a fine distinction, but when a planetary government gets as down in the muck as Mage-Governor Vaughn’s has, it’s a hair we’re perfectly willing to split.
“The real answer to your question, though, is that Damien Montgomery is the only person on the planet with the authority to charge Governor Vaughn with Hand Stealey’s murder. If he lives, Vaughn falls. If he dies… your rebellion will probably be collateral damage of the inevitable fallout to Stealey’s death.
“Things are worrisome right now. Everything is teetering on the edge - and Montgomery might be able to salvage the situation. You have to pick a side, Mikael.”
“It’s not my side I’m worried about,” the rebel told her. “It’s yours.”
“I work for the Protectorate of the Mage-King of Mars,” Amiri said quietly. “Our job is to protect people - even, when necessary, from their own governments.”
Silence filled the car for a moment.
“There’s a roadblock ahead,” Riordan suddenly told her. “What do you want to do?”
“We can’t stop,” she replied. “Even if Montgomery was somehow uninjured from the crash, he won’t have much time before the Scorpions move in. Hell, if there’s a roadblock…”
“The Scorpions have probably already moved in,” he agreed grimly. “The car has the armor of the military version. I suggest you hold on.”
With a small smile, the first sign of anything except anger or despair Amiri had seen out of the man since he’d picked her up, Riordan gunned the engine.
The blockade consisted of a handful of plywood barriers and two highway patrol cars. The three women and one man directing traffic back probably had no idea why the road was closed - and likely would have been furious if they knew they were being used to reduce potential witnesses to murder.
They were not expecting the big armored truck to ignore the flashing lights directing people off to the side and slam forward at full speed. The plywood barrier splintered under the impact, and Amiri got a perfectly clear glimpse of the senior officer’s utterly stunned face as they plowed past.
She still half-expected gunfire, or some kind of response, but whatever the highway patrol had been told was going on, they were clearly willing to write off some idiots as evolution in action.
The barrier cleared, she took a deep breath and pulled the battle laser from the back seat. If they were lucky, they’d find Montgomery, stick him in the car, and disappear before the Scorpions arrived.
Given the day so far, she didn’t expect to get that lucky.
#
If the gunship had picked up Damien’s Planetary Positioning System signal, the pilot hadn’t regarded it as enough reason to call for backup. The single aircraft swept over the forest, bare meters above the trees as a spotlight played over the ground below.
Damien, too tired to keep running, stood on the edge of the expressway watching it come. Injured and exhausted, he couldn’t reach out far enough to bring the helicopter down from a distance - plus, technically he remained an agent of the law. He wasn’t supposed to strike first.
The gunship crew were clearly focused on the forest beneath them, since they’d emerged into the cleared zone around the highway before they noticed Damien standing there watching them.
As soon as they did notice him, the spotlight immediately settled on him. The light hammered spikes into his concussion, and Damien reeled away, covering his eyes from the light with his hand.
“Put your hands over your head and freeze where you are!” an amplified voice bellowed. “This is an interdicted area. Identify yourself immediately!”
Blinking away the dizziness, Damien straightened and faced them, keeping his hands exposed though not raising them as ordered.
“I am Envoy Damien Montgomery,” he shouted back to them. “I am in need of transport and am commandeering your craft under my Warrant. Land immediately!”
Any chance that they were actually there to rescue him vanished as the gunship immediately jumped away, the pilots engaging in the standard anti-Mage maneuver of ‘create distance’.
Damien was saved from having to decide if that was enough aggression for him to act by the aircraft’s gunner opening fire moments later. Two missiles detached from the sides of the helicopter gunship, and a nose-mounted mini-gun opened up half a second later.
There were limits to a Mage’s power and reaction time, and if he hadn’t been expecting exactly that it might have been enough.
As it was, he’d raised a shield before he’d even seen the attack craft. The missiles exploded in the air ten meters away from him, and the stream of fire from the mini-gun ended in the same place. The explosions and gunfire lit an invisible sphere in the night.
Damien winced, his attention wavering as his concussion screamed against the strain of the spell. Bullets tore through the momentarily vanishing shield, tearing up to the dirt to his left before he restored the shield - but he couldn’t keep this up for long.
A second salvo of missiles screamed through the night, hammering into his shield and driving him to the ground. His concussion sent spikes of pain stabbing into his skull, and he struggled back to his feet, forcing himself to both hold the shield and locate the helicopter.
They’d left the spotlight on. It might have helped them target him - but it also helped him find them.
Another stab of pain ripped through his head and then, for a moment, his head was clear and he could see the spotlight, though not the gunship itself.
The wall of force he conjured didn’t need to be that accurate. It crashed down on the attack gunship like the fist of an angry god and yanked the Scorpion aircraft out of the sky.
It slammed into the asphalt with enough force to make the ground tremble under Damien’s feet, and then promptly exploded as munitions met fuel and sparks.
The explosion hammered into his shield, which came apart into fragile wisps under the blow - but still sheltered Damien from its
force.
Silence fell over the twilit road. The acrid scent of burnt plastic and metal wafted towards Damien from the crash, accompanied by the popping sound of the burning remnants of the aircraft.
Wavering against the concussion and the energy drain of so much magic, Damien trembled, trying to find the momentum to keep moving.
He struggled through his pockets, finally finding another set of the anti-nausea meds and slugging them back. He clearly hadn’t grabbed enough of anything - he didn’t have the food or water for an extended hike, and he probably wasn’t going to have the time.
As if summoned by his thought, he began to hear the faint sound of rotors again. Two pairs, most likely the other two aircraft from the search squadron. They’d know where the other gunship died, and he didn’t think he could fight two ships through his concussion.
Nonetheless, it wasn’t as if running was an option. He turned to face the rotors, hoping the drugs were enough to keep him standing.
Focused on the oncoming aircraft, he missed the engine of the approaching vehicle until the big utility vehicle came to a sharp stop behind him and a familiar voice shouted at him.
“Hey, Montgomery,” Julia Amiri told him. “As pretty a fire as you’ve made, I get the feeling being elsewhere is a better idea, right?”
He turned towards her, blinking in surprise as her presence completely failed to process. She wasn’t registering as a threat - she just wasn’t really registering at all.
“Shit, he’s been hit hard,” another voice, one he didn’t recognize, told Amiri. “Quick, let’s get him in the car - we don’t have much time.”
He was… conscious enough to get halfway into the car with Amiri’s help. He fell the rest of the way as the driver gunned the engine.
“We do not want to be here,” the strange man announced calmly as the door slammed shut behind the sprawled Mage.
Damien was unconscious before he could agree aloud.
#
Chapter 18
The fires were starting to burn out.
There wasn’t much left of Government House. The fires, the explosions, and general devastation had turned the seat of a planetary government into a shattered ruin. Rebuilding would be expensive if it was even possible. It might be necessary to simply write off the old structure and build a new mansion.
If Vaughn’s plan came even close to working, it would be a more than acceptable cost.
He’d relocated to a small conference room, still buried in the command center barely a kilometer from the smoldering ruins of his home. A pair of Scorpions, both of them fully trained Enforcer Mages and members of the Presidential Security Detail, kept most of the staff and media from bothering him.
Montoya, of course, simply walked right past his men. The Governor waited for the door to close behind the commander of the Scorpions before speaking.
“Well?” he demanded. He knew that the backdrop of the burning city on the wallscreen behind him would be unsettling, even to a hardened man like Montoya. Perhaps especially to Montoya, who knew damned well who’d ordered the disaster still taking shape above them.
“The SDF has confirmed what Cor’s people said,” Montoya replied. “There were no survivors from the Tides of Justice. Of course, our brave men and women thought they wanted to find survivors, so they were looking hard.”
Vaughn nodded silently, considering. That was one mess neatly cleared out of the way. The crew of the Tides had clearly realized something in their final moments, but with their deaths it would go to the only safe place for secrets: the grave.
“And the House?” he demanded, gesturing at the fire on the screen behind him.
“We have a clean sweep,” Montoya confirmed. “Planted Alaura’s body in the middle for the rescue crews to find, and every member of her staff is confirmed dead.
“Two of them were Mages no-one had bothered to mention to us,” he continued. “Recruiting Mages for the Action Wing was a good idea, though I made damned sure neither of them survived the pursuit.”
“Good,” Vaughn grunted. “The rest of the Wing?”
“Over-extended and shattered,” Montoya said calmly. “Between my boys and Caleb’s, we killed over eighty percent of the teams deployed for the attack. No-one’s going to be surprised when the remnants are hard to find and disconnected from the rest of the rebellion.”
That had been a concern when they’d set up the Action Wing - its actions were intended to draw the attention of Protectorate law enforcement away from other things, and to tarnish the overall Freedom Wing. But, necessarily, the Action Wing had only the most tenuous of links to the Freedom Wing.
The Action Wing having been smashed to pieces alongside its greatest ‘triumph’ would make that lack of links seem perfectly reasonable.
“What about the contact points?” he asked.
“Three of our contact officers died in the attack,” Montoya replied with a shrug. “Brockson was with Montgomery, so he’s probably dead. The others are making sure the members of the Wing who know them… don’t survive the pursuit.”
“And Montgomery?” Vaughn asked.
The commander of his special forces sighed.
“The shuttle was shot down, and the jet escaped without being identified,” he confirmed. “But…”
“But what, Montoya?”
“Our ground sweep got caught up in the forest fire triggered by the crash. But they did manage to confirm that Montgomery was not among the dead,” the General said quietly. “We lost contact with one of the aircraft ten minutes ago. The other pair are moving to support, but they’d spread pretty far out.”
“You lost contact with…”
“With a forty-five million Martian dollar imported helicopter attack gunship, yes,” Montoya said bluntly. “I’d like to assume they’re having communication difficulties. Unfortunately, I suspect…”
He cut off as his wrist computer buzzed. Tapping a key, he opened a holographic window.
“Report, Lieutenant,” he said sharply. “I’m with the Governor, connect me to your video feed.”
A moment later, one of the views of the wreckage of Government House was replaced with a moonlit highway and a burning wreck.
“Not entirely sure what we’re looking at, General, but I’m pretty sure that’s Hussar Two,” the pilot reported. “They look… flattened.”
“Is there anyone in the area?” Vaughn demanded. “Any thermal signatures?”
He could hear the pilot swallow hard when he realized who was talking.
“We’ve run scans,” the pilot reported. “The entire forest west of here is going up in flames, but if he followed the road or went east, we’d be able to pick him up. If he was on foot, we’d have found him by now, sirs.”
“What are you suggesting, Lieutenant?” Montoya asked.
“Someone picked him up, General,” the Lieutenant reported. “Probably after he killed Hussar Two. We can’t pick out the tracks of a single vehicle, too many have passed in even the last few hours.”
“I’m sorry, Sir, Governor - he could have gone either way, and with a vehicle he’s long gone. We’ve lost him.”
Montoya held a hand up to forestall Vaughn speaking.
“Thank you Lieutenant,” he said calmly. “Return to base and organize a medical unit for Hussar Two.”
“Thank you, sir.”
The voice channel cut out, and the video link froze on the last picture of the wrecked gunship.
“Yelling at the pilot won’t help us, sir,” Montoya told Vaughn as the Governor glared at him.
“Two people needed to die, James,” Vaughn said harshly. “Two people - with the authority to hang us both. Everything was about making sure Alaura Stealey and Damien Montgomery died. And now you’re telling me Montgomery lives, and you have no idea where he is?”
“We’ll find him,” the Scorpion replied calmly. “He has no resources, no contacts, and no allies. He may have found a ride on the highway, but he still has to find somew
here to sleep. Every method of payment the man has is a government card, and we can track those.”
“And if he meets up with the rebellion?”
“The Wing is going to go into deep hiding, the kind only the Hands will drag them out of,” Montoya pointed out. “Without that kind of authority and resources, Montgomery won’t be able to find them.”
“He doesn’t need to find the Wing to find allies,” Vaughn pointed out. “We have other ‘friends’ out there. What happens if he hooks up with the fucking Greens?”
Montoya shrugged.
“They know perfectly well their seats in the Parliament are on sufferance,” he pointed out. “Would they really back him?”
“To bring us down?” Vaughn demanded. “Hell yes. We both know they’ve skirted the edge too many times to ignore, and would happily put Montgomery in touch with the Wing. Hell - one Hand falls, another rises to replace them. Just keeping Montgomery alive until the next Hand shows up could screw us.”
The leader of the Scorpions eyed his Governor. Vaughn turned a determined gaze and a cold smile on his most reliable subordinate.
“You get your wish, James,” he said bluntly. “I don’t trust the Greens, they’re a vulnerable point with the Envoy on the loose, and we know where they are.”
“If you don’t have evidence, manufacture it,” the Governor of Ardennes ordered. “And then lock up their whole ‘Annual Convention’.”
#
Chapter 19
Hauling an unconscious man into a hotel gave Amiri a strong sense of deja vu. From the quirk on his lips, Riordan was drawing the same connection as he and a hotel staff member held a side door open for her.
“Where are we?” she asked as they proceeded as delicately as possible down a staff corridor.
“High Ardennes,” he told her. “Second-best mountain resort town on the planet, closest ski resort to Nouveaux Versailles.”
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