Women began to tumble to the floor.
"Go easy on them. Marine, lay a hand," Vicky ordered.
"Aye, aye, ma'am," came from several and they safetied their weapons and came to help the first woman to her feet and stand by to catch the next one that was cut free.
The women needed help standing. Their legs and arms were tied to their bodies by intricate patterns of rope loops and knots. Different colored ropes were looped around them, forcing their arms in tight to their bodies, sometimes behind their backs, other times in front. Their legs were tied together as well. Sometimes they were stretched out long, or the legs were bent with feet tightly secured against their buttocks.
Each woman presented a different complex puzzle. The Marines studied them. One said, "Don't try to cut every loop or every rope. Look for the central rope or knot and cut it."
That Marine began roving from Marine to Marine, eyeing their puzzle, and pointing to one rope. If it was cut, legs were freed, or maybe a head could finally move. One cut knot allowed an entire series of loops to loosen, letting a woman move her legs or arms.
While that the Marines worked, the women still wept, cried out in panic, or screamed, still in the grips of the nightmare they'd lived over the last weeks or months.
Medics arrived. Local women followed them. They took the women who could walk out of this room of horrors, through the hole in the wall and away to somewhere they could soothe them.
Vicky continued attacking ropes. The stack of women, as much as three deep, began to flatten out as more women were cut free and lifted off the bed.
Those in the worst shape were carried away in the strong arms of Marines. Somewhere in the other rooms they would be cared for and cut loose from the last of the ropes that restrained them.
In the living room, the same process was going on with the women who had been tied to the couches.
"You're safe," the captain said, softly. Repeatedly. "The Marines are here. No one will ever hurt you again. That piece of shit is dead. Our Grand Duchess blew his brains out."
That soothed some of the woman, but others were way past such easy consolation. They needed to be carried away, held tight, and allowed to find their own way back from the precipice they'd lived on for the last eternity.
Vicky would have preferred to have women rendering care for these poor women, but there weren't enough aides, and these women needed to be moved as far from the next target as possible, as quickly as possible.
When the bottom of the pile was finally reached, Vicky found that this had not been a bloodless liberation. One of her darts had done more than kill the bastard. One woman showed where one bullet had slashed through her breast; in one side, out the other. Another woman's leg showed where a round, maybe the same one, had creased her skin from just below the knee down to her ankle.
Medics took over the care of both of them, and they were soon carried away.
That left Vicky staring at what was left of the man she'd killed. His blood now soaked the pillow his head still rested upon. His eyes were open, a surprised look on his face. He thought he'd had it all.
Vicky hoped he lived long enough to know that how badly he'd misjudged her.
Now it was time to tackle the last one.
Once again, a fire team went to a prone firing position, covering the rest of the hall.
Vicky was down to a single squad and the four engineers when they quietly slipped into the room just down the hall and across from the one they'd just liberated.
Quickly and quietly, they moved through the next two suites, checking to make sure they were empty, then breaching them. The third suite showed a presence.
Vicky studied the situation as the snooper scope peered through the wall. A man was huddled in a swivel desk chair. He held a machine pistol in his hand as he lazily swung around the circle of naked female hostages.
As before, the women were roped together, neck to neck. This time, all of their hands were bound tightly behind their backs and pulled painfully up to their shoulders.
All of them faced in, giving the thug a full frontal view. Every once in a while, he'd reach out and tug a breast or other lady part to continue his slow swing around in his chair.
This time, all the women had wide tape covering their mouths. They might moan or weep, but little of it was audible to tear at this man's conscience.
Assuming he hadn't sold it long ago to any passing demon.
There was an outbreak of heavy automatic fire from below. Maybe someone had suggested it. However, it had no impact on this guy. He actually laughed.
"Keep it up, boys. Kill all those stupid lackies of the Peterwalds. The universe will be better without them."
Unfortunately, he paused long enough to pinch a breast hard enough to make the woman howl through the tape on her mouth. Then he shoved himself off and spun around, laughing.
Vicky saw no good shot.
She continued her watch, but nothing changed. Whether the fire from below was hot or haphazard, the guy pretty much did the same, spinning around, threatening the women . . . and keeping his head down.
Finally, Vicky had had enough. She turned to the captain. "We're going to have to do this the hard way.
"May I offer a suggestion, Your Grace?"
"Please. I have been known occasionally to take good advice."
The Marine officer grinned and spoke. Vicky listened, a grin growing wider and wider on her face.
"By all means, Captain. Let's do it."
28
Vicky hunched outside one final door, her automatic at the ready. In a few seconds, she might well be sending darts into the naked flesh of hostages.
That was why she alone could do it. Her service automatic was the only one in the strike force that was a gift from Kris Longknife. Her weapon alone could be switched to shoot sleepy darts.
If Vicky missed the piece of shit with the machine pistol and hit one of the women, she, at least, would wake up.
In front of Vicky, an engineer worked silently at picking the lock.
On the floor below them, the fake firefight reached toward a crescendo. Let the bastard inside chew on that for a while.
Maybe it would distract him.
The engineer handed off his lock pick and took a firm grasp on the door.
"On three," he whispered.
Across from him, two Marines each pulled the pins on a grenade. With hostages in the next room, the grenades were flash-bangs, meant to disrupt and confuse.
Hopefully, they'd fluster and befuddle the gunman enough that he would not pull the trigger on his weapon but it would keep him distracted long enough for Vicky to put him to sleep.
What she'd do with him then was a matter of some concern, but she'd face that when the time came.
"One. Two. Three."
As the chatter of weapons from below rose even higher, the engineer opened the door just wide enough for the Marines to toss two grenades in. They were on a one second fuse.
From inside the candlelit room came a rattle of bangs. Maggie counted down Vicky's head. A second before the grenades would go silent, she snapped. "Open the door."
The room Vicky saw as the door swept open was a tableau from hell. Naked women in various stages of hysteria stood, fell, or were on their knees around a man in a comfortable desk chair. As luck would have it, he had been facing the door. He'd taken the full impact of the flash-bangs.
Maybe the flesh of some of the woman had stood between him and the grenades, but the incessant pounding of the bangs had driven the two women in front of him to their knees.
Vicky had a clear shot.
He struggled to shoot her before she could shoot him.
He lost.
Vicky sent three sleepy darts into him even as he strove to raise his weapon.
The gun fell from his numb hand. Though his eyes were wide at the sight of Vicky, they soon closed as his head fell forward until his chin rested on his chest.
He pitched forward, out of his ch
air. He was dead to the world as his heavy body bore the screaming hostages down.
Roped together and with their arms roped behind their backs, the woman fell painfully to the ground.
"Marines," Vicky ordered. "Free these women."
As the Marines raced in to obey her command, Vicky strode toward the prostrate gunman. Her eyes were hard, her lips were a tight glower.
She yanked the machine pistol from his hand and safetied it. Rolling him over, she found only shock on his face.
The Marines moved the former hostages away from the thug. Their screams of terror were winding down to sobs and wails. A medic appeared and began checking them over even as the Marines cut them free of the ropes that painfully bound them.
The women fell into each other's arms, sharing their freedom as they'd shared their hell.
"Anyone think this punk should live?" Vicky asked. She glanced around. The women she saw were too traumatized to form any sort of an answer.
A medic arrived to care for the women.
Vicky intercepted him. "Do you have any drug that can wake this punk up?" she demanded.
"What put him to sleep?"
"Wardhaven sleepy darts," Vicky snapped.
"I don't have any of the antagonists for it, but I have something that probably will work."
"Give it to him."
The medic did, then took one look at Vicky and fled back to care for the women.
The former gunman and redcoat became agitated in his sleep. While he was being forced to wakefulness, Vicky studied her choices. She had her automatic. She had his machine pistol. There was a balcony off the kitchen that he could be hurled off of.
She also had the knife that had cut the women free. It was a long Bowie knife and had brought terror to the eyes of the women even as she freed them.
She'd shot criminals between the eyes today, or maybe that was yesterday. Did this man deserve a death that clean and quick?
As his eyes blinked open, she made her decision. With her foot firmly planted on his chest and her automatic aimed right between his eyes, she announced her verdict.
"I am the Grand Duchess Victoria. You are convicted of high crimes deserving of death. You will die." So saying, with her left hand she slid the point of the knife into his flesh below his sternum, then aimed in and up.
She shoved, and the knife slipped through flesh to his heart. There it halted for a moment, strong muscle resisting even a knife that sharp. Then it lost and the knife sank home.
The man screamed as he saw blood pumping out of his chest.
He screamed and struggled to get out from under her boot, but he was still weak from the drugs she'd shot him with. Still, he was wide awake as the terror drained from his eyes.
Then his face contorted in terror. He saw death coming for him. Vicky hoped it was a demon from the deepest pit of hell.
She held him down until he quit kicking, until the contortions of coming death became few and shook him less violently.
Around Vicky, the sight of his death had a calming influence. Several of the women stepped forward to spit on him. Some did so while he was still conscious.
One of the women who seemed to have it more together than the others spat, then turned to Vicky.
"You're the Grand Duchess."
"Yes," Vicky said.
"Can I swear fealty to you in both my name and the name of my planet?"
"I am accepting the fealty of Oryol," Vicky told her.
"You won't ever let them . . .." She ran out of words, but one furious glance at the cooling body beside them was enough.
"The Bowlingames and their cronies will never harm a hair on your head, ever again."
"Thank you. Now, if you'll excuse me," and the woman vomited on the body. It wasn't much, she'd eaten little, but her stomach was in revolt and she knew where she wanted it to go.
A newly arrived woman came to her. "Helen, I'm so sorry."
"Don't be, Amy, at least I survived." The former hostage Helen glanced around the room, seemed to relive the horror stories of every patch of blood on the carpet. The woman began to tremble, and her friend helped her out of the room.
Vicky found the captain at her elbow. He studied the body.
"A knife?" he simply asked.
"To the heart. It's faster when you can be the judge and executioner."
"I guess so. All the buildings along the park blocks have been cleared. Now only the Imperial Hotel remains."
"No doubt it holds the command headquarters."
"That is what the people say."
"Have we scouted the hotel?"
"What we could. They're conducting an active defense with two or three gunners walking each hall. We tried to slip some rolling drones down from the roof, but they've got snipers up there, too. Nothing got in the front door, even after we blasted all that glass."
"Roving guards?" Vicky asked.
"No. They collected all the couches and chairs together into a kind of fort. Hostages are in every seat with nooses around their necks and the rope secured behind them."
Vicky let out a tired sigh. "You think we'll have to fight our way through the building, floor by floor?”
"It sure looks like it. General Pemberton has established a command center next door in the Farm Bureau."
"Then we must join him," Vicky said.
She retrieved her knife, cleaned it on the dead man's pants, then snapped it into its scabbard. Done, she followed the captain as he headed for the stairs.
29
General Pemberton quickly filled her in on all that they didn't know about their final target. He finally ran down with one last issue.
"When we blew the glass in the front and back windows into the foyer, a few of the gunmen jumped up. Not much, but enough that our sharpshooters got a shot. The rest have an awful lot of women shields tied down in front of their overturned tables and couches. They're being a lot more careful to keep their heads down. Problem is, they can shoot between the heads of the women hostages. Rough on their eardrums, but even harder on our troops who they're shooting at."
Vicky processed everything he'd told her. She did not like the way it all added up. Even though she knew the answer, she asked the question anyway.
"What would you recommend?"
"We have to storm the building, and quickly."
"No negotiatiations?"
"They've demanded a ship out of the system."
"You've told them they aren't going to get one," Vicky said.
"Yes, ma'am. There are four dead bodies out in front of the hotel. They released five hostages. They told them to run. They'd only shoot four. The one woman who made it to our line is in pretty bad shape."
"When will they kill the next group?" Vicky didn't have to ask if they would, only how soon.
"In thirty minutes. A group every four hours. At noon tomorrow it goes to every two hours."
"They have a lot of hostages?"
"They say they do."
"Okay, General, where's your lead assault company? I'll be joining them."
"Sorry, Your Grace, but no, you won't be."
"General?" Vicky snapped.
"Your husband has told me that you are not to be allowed out of my headquarters until I leave it."
"General," Vicky growled.
"Don't growl at me, Your Grace. You know damn well that Kris Longknife's husband had the legal right to lock her in the bedroom if she got lost in a death wish, and, woman, what you have now is a death wish. He told me to keep you here with me, and I agree with him. We can't afford to lose you, ma'am. This Empire needs you alive, not dead."
Vicky's scowl at her insubordinate subordinate was of Olympic proportions. "And if I choose to walk out of here and join the fight?"
"I'm hoping that you won't, ma'am, but I've got four strapping Marines assigned here to see that you don't."
Vicky turned around to see four of the biggest, meanest looking Marines she'd ever seen standing between her and the door. After an
instant of reflection, she faked right, then went left. She hadn't gone two steps when a Marine blocked her way. Soon it was two, and two swung in behind her.
"Your Grace," the general said, "you can give me your word that you won't try that again, or, well, ma'am, I have some leg manacles with a very short chain."
"You wouldn't," Vicky growled.
"Gunny Sergeant," he ordered.
A big, grizzled sergeant stepped away from the wall. He held up a pair of nice, shiny manacles with likely less than thirty centimeters of chain between them.
"Your Grace," he said, with an honest face and adamant eyes.
"General, you are getting a hell of a performance review this year," Vicky muttered.
"I'll take any review you choose to give me, Your Grace, so long as you are alive to give it."
Vicky changed the subject as she turned back to the general and his board. "About the snipers on the roof. Can we suppress them?"
"I have snipers back four blocks. That's too far for their damn machine pistols, but just fine for our long rifles. We can keep them down. My main concern is that they'll drop hand grenades from the roof on any large force we move forward."
"So, how do we storm the hotel?" Vicky asked.
Fifteen minutes later, the assault began.
30
The drone imagery showed dark shadows detaching themselves from the surrounding buildings and closing on the front and back of the hotel. No one clumped up. A shot might pick off one, but they were a waste of a hand grenade.
In a few minutes, a small force huddled, low to the ground around the front of the foyer, awaiting the signal. It came with a pair of soft "whumps".
A moment later, the foyer lit up with flashes of light and brutal pounding. Two whiz-bangs had gone off.
Immediately, two scouts were up. Their helmets were equipped to strobe the light out of the wearer's eyes and tone down the noise. They dashed forward, into the lobby and were shooting down the thugs skulking behind their human hostages even before the last grenade burned itself out.
When the lobby fell silent, only the screams of the hostages were to be heard. There were a few moans from the redcoats, but a shot to the head relieved their pain.
Implacable: Vicky Peterwald, #5 Page 15