BAMF- Broken Arrow Mercenary Force Omnibus
Page 53
“God knows if anyone is in charge inside the Mountain,” Roach said.
“Hey, we got another live one out here.” Roach didn’t remember the woman’s name, but she recognized the voice as one of the late Conrad Bonner’s pilots. She’d met her at their base. “I think he’s one of yours, Broken Arrow.”
Roach didn’t want to let the hope spark inside her, didn’t want to get her expectations up before she saw for herself, but she couldn’t help it. She kicked in the thrusters and headed out above the burning trees, flying nearly a full kilometer back up the road before she came to the area on her HUD’s map where the IFF transponder was located.
The LV-426 Hellfire was down at the base of a rock outcropping, standing over what remained of a mech, broken and smoking on the rocks. Sitting on the shoulder of the mech, right arm cradled in his left, blood trickling from a gash just above his hairline, was Hector Ramirez.
“Found him crawling out of the cockpit here, Broken Arrow,” the LV-426 pilot informed her. “His comms are out.”
Roach let out a breath and felt a hint of a smile tugging at the corner of her mouth. She set her mech down next to the LV-426 machine and scrambled out the egress hatch, the weariness and the aches and pains retreating with the relief.
“Hey, Roach,” Ramirez said, not trying to stand. His voice wavered a bit and she saw him blinking at the late morning sun.
“You got a concussion, don’t you?” she accused, climbing up on the rock beside his downed mech.
“Maybe,” he allowed, noncommittally. “I mean, if I did, I probably wouldn’t know, would I? My arm’s broken, though, I’m pretty sure about that.”
He winced as he shifted in his position on top of his machine’s shoulder.
“So, is it over?” he wondered. “Did we win?”
“We survived,” she told him, leaning against the rock. It was still cooler than the surrounding air. “Whether we won or not depends on what happened with Nate.”
“You know,” Ramirez said, sounding groggy, “I wouldn’t mind moving out here. I like the mountains.”
“This one’s on fire,” she reminded him, nodding toward the smoke billowing up south of them.
“You think they’d let me enlist?” he wondered. “In the regular Army, I mean?”
“After today,” Roach said, a dark cloud descending over her thoughts, “I’m not even sure there’ll be a regular Army.”
She looked down at the helmet in her hands, turning it around and staring into the visor as if she could discern the secrets of the universe in its surface.
“That fucker Franklin killed the President, and between his dupes and the Russians, they’ve destroyed a good portion of the mechs in the national arsenal. If the Russians or the Chinese hit us hard now…” She shook her head.
“Roach, this is Nate. Do you read me?”
The transmission was distant, staticky, coming in over her helmet speakers. Roach’s eyes widened and she pulled the helmet back on, keying her mic.
“I read you, Nate. Are you okay? I hope to Christ you have some good news for us.”
“Good and bad, Rachel.” Even through the radio, she could make out the sadness in his voice. “How’s the team?”
“Broken Arrow is still around,” she told him. “A bit banged up. The rest of them…” She blew out a breath. “They got hit pretty hard.”
“I need a favor, Roach.”
“Anything, Nate,” she said instantly, not having to think about it.
“I need you to meet me somewhere. Just you, no one else. And especially no one from the military or the government.”
She looked around at the destruction, the confusion, saw a military medical evac helicopter taking off from a pad somewhere in town.
“That part,” she told him, “won’t be a problem.”
“I’m just a technician,” Dr. Kovalev insisted, sweat streaming down from his receding grey hair. He wiped at it with the back of his hand, eyes darting back and forth between the three of them. “I do what Mr. Franklin tells me, that’s all!”
Nate wasn’t sure whether the older man was more nervous about their drawn guns or Anton Varlamov’s scowling Russian features. The rest of the technical staff was drawn up behind him, huddled together as if using Kovalev’s bulk for shelter. There were only six of them in all, most far younger than the grey-maned chief biologist, and none wore what his Prime would have expected from the technical staff at such a facility. No white coats, just street clothes, though clean-room suits were hung on a rack inside a glass case at the wall of the old warehouse.
“Well, Mr. Franklin is dead,” Nate said flatly. “So now you’re going to do what we tell you to do, if you’d like to leave this place alive.”
“Of course, whatever you say!” The man spoke English well, without much of an accent, but Nate could tell he was from Russia originally. Even if he hadn’t been able to tell, Anton would have figured it out.
“First,” the Spetsnaz officer put in, “we want to know where you store Franklin’s DNA and his memory tapes. The ones he used to make dupes of himself.”
“He keeps them in a safe,” Kovalev said, pointing to a metal-sided trailer still attached to the rear of a Hemet truck. “In there. I can’t open it…”
“You don’t need to,” Anton assured him. “I’m sure enough plastic explosives will take care of the lock. And the contents.”
The Russian glanced aside at Nate, arching an eyebrow.
“You know, Nathan, if someone had told me even a day ago that I would be here, with the two of you…” He shook his head. “Life is a tale told by an idiot,” he quoted, “full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”
“And speaking of life,” Roach said, “what about this tele-thing you were talking about?”
“Retelomerization,” Nate supplied. Kovalev’s eyes snapped up at the word, in recognition. “I’m a dupe. About seven years old. I understand you’ve developed a process to lengthen my life expectancy to something close to normal.”
Kovalev nodded, grunting agreement.
“Past normal,” he bragged. “You might well live into your hundreds with this procedure. If you came back and repeated it, perhaps even longer.”
“Can you do it here?” Roach demanded.
“Yes. It’s not ideal, but we can make it work.”
“Go get set up. Do whatever you need to do. And remember,” she told him, motioning with the barrel of her sidearm, “if you cooperate, we let you go. If you try to fuck us over, I’ll kill you all. And if I don’t,” she went on, jerking a thumb at Anton, “the Russian will. Do you understand me?”
“Completely,” Kovalev assured her.
She waved him off and he turned to his staff, barking orders in Russian and scattering them to their tasks. Anton Varlamov headed for the trailer, intent on seeing to the final disposal of Robert Franklin.
Probably still pissed he didn’t get to pull the trigger.
“I don’t know about this, Roach,” he admitted, shaking his head.
“About what?” she asked him, her gaze as sharp as her tone. “Living a full life? What, you think you get to die early and leave the rest of us to deal with this shit? No fucking way, Nate.” She put a hand on his arm, squeezing with a gentleness that belied the tone of her words. “I know you’re hurting, but from what you told me, Svetlana died saving your life. That means she thought it was worth something, and so do I. If you want to honor her memory, then keep your promise and keep living your life.”
Nate snorted his skepticism.
“I don’t know what the hell she thought I could do. I’m just a mercenary mech driver.”
“You did this,” she said, waving around them. “You got us all together and stopped Robert Franklin from taking over two countries. And once the dust settles, you’re going to have a good amount of influence with whoever winds up in charge of the military.” She frowned. “I don’t know why you’re keeping this Spetsnaz asshole around, though.” She kept
her voice low, even though Anton Varlamov was well out of earshot. “We should turn him over to the Army.”
“I don’t think so,” Nate said. “If there’s ever going to be an end to this war, it’ll be men like Varlamov that have to do it. Maybe it wouldn’t hurt us to have a Russian Spetsnaz officer out there who owes us a favor.”
“Does that mean you still plan to be around?” She was smiling, but there was hurt behind her eyes, and he knew it was from seeing so many people under her charge die. He felt a pang of guilt for putting her in the circumstances.
“I suppose so,” he said, giving in.
He supposed he knew he would, eventually. It was what Svetlana had wanted, and it was the least he could do for her.
“If nothing else,” he admitted, laughing softly, “I’m kind of curious to see what happens next.”
Afterword
Thank you for reading the Broken Arrow Mercenary Force series. We hope you enjoyed the books and that you will consider posting a review online. We appreciate you taking the time to read in our world. Thank you again.
Drew and Rick
About Rick Partlow
Rick Partlow is that rarest of species, a native Floridian. Born in Tampa, he attended Florida Southern College and graduated with a degree in History and a commission in the US Army as an Infantry officer.
His lifelong love of science fiction began with Have Space Suit---Will Travel and the other Heinlein juveniles and traveled through Clifford Simak, Asimov, Clarke and on to William Gibson, Walter Jon Williams and Peter F Hamilton. And somewhere, submerged in the worlds of others, Rick began to create his own worlds.
He has written 20 books in six different series, and his short stories have been included in nine different anthologies.
He is working on a sixth, new series for Aethon books, a six-volume military SF saga about a mercenary unit called Wholesale Slaughter. The first three books should be out this summer.
He currently lives in central Florida with his wife, two children and a willful mutt of a dog. Besides writing and reading science fiction and fantasy, he enjoys outdoor photography, hiking and camping. Learn more about Rick and his books by visiting his website at www.rickpartlow.com.
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More to enjoy from Rick Partlow
The Duty, Honor, Planet trilogy
Glory Boy
The Birthright trilogy
The Recon series
Last Flight of the Acheron
The Tales of the Acheron trilogy
The Psi War trilogy
Seeds of Gaia
About Drew Avera
Drew Avera is a Navy veteran, musician, and the bestselling author of the Dead Planet series and the Alorian Wars. He grew up in Mississippi with his nose in a stack of comic books when he wasn’t terrorizing the neighborhood practicing his trumpet or guitar. Eventually, he left small-town life and enlisted in the Navy at the age of seventeen. Since 2000, he has deployed on various aircraft carriers as an aviation electrician and has accumulated more than four years on the open seas.
Drew began his author career in 2012 with his book Exodus, and is best known for writing space opera, dystopian, and cyberpunk, though he enjoys writing in other genres as well. He lives in Virginia with his wife, daughters and two cats which may be plotting against him when he isn’t looking. For more information about Drew and his books, visit his website at www.drewavera.com.
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More to enjoy from Drew Avera
The Dead Planet Series
The Syndicate Series
The Alorian Wars
Chancerian
Skye Byrn