Into the Light

by David Weber

  “You got it,” Berke said, willing to be gracious now that he’d won the point. He turned back to the Army Minister. “Come with us,” Berke said. “We’ll get you to safety.”

  Flythyr shook her head and moved forward, so Berke turned and picked his way through the café, trying to dodge the piles of entrails and pools of blood. The assault shuttle waited across the street, hovering over the remains of the building which had previously stood there. He understood the earlier explosions now; the shuttle’s flight crew had destroyed the building to make room to get into the narrow street. The shuttle’s ramp was down, and it almost reached the street.

  Berke looked back and saw Flythyr was slowing, so he went back to the minister. He bent over slightly and pulled Flythyr’s arm over his shoulders, then he hurried the minister across the street to the shuttle, helped her onto the ramp, and climbed aboard himself. The troopers boarded right behind him, and the Starfire streaked towards the heavens before the ramp had even come up.

  * * *

  SHERDYS NORHANSHER LAY very still at the bottom of the shallow hole. The hole was much longer than it was wide or deep, and not just so that she could fit into it. At almost ten seqrans, she was far and away the tallest and strongest member of the team, which was why she’d drawn the most critical role. It was also why she was all alone in her miserable hole, and she closed her eyes to whisper another prayer to Chelth’s crest for the male she loved.

  She shifted very carefully under the concealing, sod-covered tarpaulin stretched over her hide to check her watch and her nasal flaps tightened. Six more kysaqs. Only six. Less than an eight.

  Her mind spun back to the long journey which had brought her and Hansyn and their sworn companions to this spot in the middle of a miserable grain field deep inside the Qwernian Empire. It wasn’t where she’d ever expected to die for God, but the place didn’t really matter. Chelth would know Ous own wherever they fell in Ous cause.

  She remembered the last time she and Hansyn would ever embrace Norsuyl. Ou had longed to accompany them on their journey, but ou was pregnant with the children she and Hansyn would never see, never have the opportunity to hold. The tears had flowed, but there’d been pride with the anguish in Norsuyl’s eyes as ou hugged ous beloved mates one last time.

  Then the long train ride, crossing the Empire’s frontier, the suspicion of every Qwernian police officer they met, and the final bus ride to the small hotel where Nyrtag HalNyrShar had reserved their rooms.

  And now this.

  She checked her watch again. Two more kysaqs. She ran one hand down the hard, reassuring length of her weapon. Hansyn had loaded that for her before he tugged the tarp over her hide and covered it with the squares of sod they’d cut and removed before they dug it. His final wedding gift, he’d said, nasal flaps trying to smile as she stared up, watching the tarp hide his face from her one final time. They’d trained as a team, but there was little point pretending they’d have time for a second shot, and so he’d taken Nyrtag’s place in command of the rest of the team, determined to buy her the time to make that shot count.

  She wondered exactly how Nyrtag had gotten Diantian weapons across the border, given how difficult it had been just to get the members of their own armed team past the beady shyrmal’s eye of the Qwernian customs agents, but the merchant was a veritable sorcerer. He’d made all the travel arrangements, gotten them into position, and somehow gained access to the critical information they needed about their target’s travel schedule. Yet in many ways, she was most grateful of all for the familiarity of those weapons. They were identical to the ones she and her team had trained with. They knew them like they knew their own hands, their own mates’ faces, and at this moment, that mattered.

  She’d told Nyrtag that and seen the mingled pride and sorrow in his nasal flaps. Pride at having given them the tools they needed; sorrow because he’d been forbidden at the last moment to accompany them. But however deeply he’d longed to be with them, he’d had no choice. The message from Trygau HyrShalTry had been inflexible, and it had borne Bearer Sokyr’s personal signature. The Bearer had decreed that as a respected expatriate in the Qwernian business community and the male who’d been able to put the entire mission together, Nyrtag the merchant was too valuable to become Nyrtag the martyr leading that mission. At least he’d live to serve Chelth again. That mattered, too. Ou needed warriors of Nyrtag’s ability. In fact, Sherdys wondered if—

  The field radio at the end of the hole clicked three times as someone keyed the transmit button, and Sherdys NorHanSher breathed one last prayer to Chelth, gathered the rocket launcher—a full three seqrans longer than even her height—and waited for the first shots.

  * * *

  “SIR!” CORPORAL JOHN Williamson exclaimed. “Please get into the vehicle, right now!” He put a hand on Abu Bakr’s shoulder and attempted to guide him into the Airaavatha.

  Abu Bakr shrugged it off. “Why?” he asked, raising a hand of his own to indicate the field of … whatever grain it was that Cholkyr CholAnGen nar Qwern had asked him out to the countryside to see. “We just got here.”

  “I need the Minister to get back into his vehicle, too,” Williamson replied. “Now!”

  As an accomplished one-time freedom fighter—if not a soldier, per se—Abu Bakr recognized the tone of a soldier who was acting on immediate, “danger close” orders, and he jumped back into the car through the side hatch. He left it open and watched Williamson guide Cholkyr back to the second vehicle while the other member of the protective detachment, Private Jim Pascoe, moved to stand in front of Abu Bakr’s door, his Bronto at the ready.

  “What’s going on?” Abu Bakr demanded through the opening.

  “There’s been an attack on the Secretary of State!” Pascoe replied, never taking his eyes off the fields surrounding them. “There have been other—”

  CRACK!

  Sarthian rifles, Abu Bakr discovered, sounded exactly like old-style Earth firearms. And so did a rifle slug whizzing in to ricochet from the Airaavatha’s armor.

  Pascoe’s rifle snapped to his shoulder as Abu Bakr turned in the direction the Space Marine was facing and saw armed Sarthians popping up out of the grain field as if by magic. The Bronto barked its far quieter snap, and one of the Sarthians’ torsos disappeared into a cloud of red mist, but there were at least ten more of them.

  Every one of them had a rifle, and the sound of bullets slamming into the armored vehicle was suddenly a pounding downpour.

  * * *

  DESPITE HER ANTICIPATION, despite her determination, Sherdys NorHanSher jerked as gunfire shattered the pastoral silence. If Chelth was truly good, that torrent of rifle fire might just do the job for them, but Shaymork worked Ous evil in the world, as well. That was why her role was critical. She waited one more heartbeat, then rolled to her knees. She came upright in the hole, leveling the weapon across her shoulder as her eyes sought out her target.

  * * *

  ANOTHER SARTHIAN APPEARED suddenly, well separated from the attackers engaging Abu Bakr’s security detail. The part of Abu Bakr which had fought the Shongairi recognized the tactic instantly, especially when the new apparition leveled what looked like a World War II bazooka—a no-kidding bazooka—over her shoulder. She was barely sixty yards from the Airaavatha, and Abu Bakr’s nerves tingled as he realized he was looking straight into that gaping muzzle.

  There was no way Pascoe or Williamson could possibly engage the new threat before the Sarthian fired.

  * * *

  SHERDYS’ HEART FLAMED with triumph as she realized how good Chelth had been.

  She was perfectly positioned on the Earthian vehicle’s flank, and its hatch was open! She laid the launcher’s ring and post sights on that beautiful, beautiful open hatch. The hatch that made any magical armor the Earthians’ technology might boast meaningless. She heard her team’s rifle fire dwindling. She knew what that meant, but they’d done their job, and she squeezed the trigger.

  Nothing happened. />
  Her eyes flared wide, her right inside thumb pressed the safety, but the lever was already in the firing position, and she squeezed the trigger again.

  Nothing!

  But that was impossible! That—!

  * * *

  ABU BAKR DUCKED.

  It was pure instinct. His brain knew it was futile, but his body didn’t, and he flung himself prone. Yet even as he dove for the Airaavatha’s deck, he couldn’t look away from the bazooka in the hands of his executioner.

  But it didn’t fire. For some reason, it didn’t fire. Maybe the Sarthian had panicked, frozen when the moment came. Maybe there was some other explanation. But as Private Pascoe spun back towards the new threat, Abu Bakr bin Mohammed el-Hiri realized he’d never have a chance to ask her about it.

  * * *

  SHERDYS NORHANSHER NOR Hyul, warrior of Chelth, opened her mouth to scream in furious denial as she squeezed the launcher’s trigger yet again.

  She never had the chance to make a sound. Her crested head exploded into a finely divided cloud of bone and brain matter as the Bronto round hit it at six times the speed of sound.

  Two shots later, every other member of her team was down, as well.

  * * *

  THE HATCH ON the other side of the Airaavatha opened, and Williamson jumped into the driver’s seat while Pascoe climbed in through the door he was standing next to. Williamson jammed the accelerator to the stops and the counter-grav to full almost before Pascoe’s hatch closed, and the IFV rocketed up and away.

  “What about the Minister?” Abu Bakr asked.

  “With all due respect, Sir,” Williamson snarled over his shoulder, “screw the Minister! There’ve been a number of attacks, Secretary Dvorak may be dead, and my priority is to get you to safety!”

  As the Airaavatha continued to climb, it finally dawned on Abu Bakr. If Dvorak was dead, he was now in charge.

  . XVI .

  PUNS VANGUARD,

  SARTH ORBIT

  “You were lucky to make it out of there alive,” Rob Wilson said grimly, then twitched a thin smile. “Especially without me or any of the vampires to drag your ass out of the line of fire this time!”

  “I know.” Abu Bakr gave him a smile of his own, one of shared memories, then shook his head.

  The two of them stood in the flag briefing room aboard PUNS Vanguard, waiting for the rest of the attendees to arrive. Abu Bakr had arrived aboard less than ten minutes earlier, delivered by the Starfire which had picked him up from the Qwernian capital. Wilson had only just arrived in the briefing room, but he’d come aboard over an hour ago. The meeting wasn’t supposed to begin for another quarter hour yet, and he’d had a niece who needed him more than his highly competent staff aboard Troy did.

  “I know I’m lucky,” Abu Bakr repeated more soberly, and raised an eyebrow at Rob. “Is Dave going to be equally lucky?”

  “We think so,” Wilson replied, blue eyes dark. “It was a damned near thing, even with modern medicine, though. Without it, he’d’ve been gone before the medevac team even got there. Hell, he looked worse than you did after Naya Islamabad!” He shook his head. “The docs aren’t letting him out of the life-support tank for at least a week.”

  “A week?” Abu Bakr looked at him in shock.

  “At least.” Wilson shook his head. “Six vertebrae gone. A rib through his heart. Not one but two skull fractures. Left lung perforated in three places. Half his liver turned into hamburger. He damn near bled out completely, even with Malachi and Corporal Celaj right there. They got the sealant into the wounds and stopped most of the internal bleeding, then hit him with the nano blood expander, but—” his expression went very grim “—they aren’t certain yet about his brain. He lost a lot of blood, Abu, but it’s the bits and pieces of bone they pulled out of his cortex that really have them worried. So they plan on keeping him in the tank, total life-support, until the nannies have time to repair any neural damage. So that ‘at least a week’ is probably grossly optimistic. I’d say we may be looking at something more like three weeks. Maybe even a month.”

  Abu Bakr looked at him for a moment longer, then laid a hand on the Space Marine’s right shoulder and squeezed hard.

  “You and your Marines do seem to have a habit of pulling people’s shot-up posteriors out of the fire, don’t you?”

  “A modest talent, but my own,” Wilson acknowledged in a tone much more like his own, and Abu Bakr squeezed again.

  “Inshallah, my friend,” he said. “Dave is tough. Besides that, Allah has plans for him. He wouldn’t have made him so irritating if He didn’t still expect great things out of him.”

  “One way to put it,” Wilson said, then chuckled. Abu Bakr raised another eyebrow, and the Space Marine shook his head. “He’s got to make it. If he doesn’t, I can’t rat him out to Sharon for not wearing a seat belt. Idiots would’ve been fine instead of bouncing around the interior like frigging pinballs if they’d been strapped in. As it is, he’s the only one who made it.”

  “Like I said, inshallah. On the other hand, Allah obviously has a sense of humor, too. After all, look who He’s left in charge on the civilian side!”

  “You’re up to it,” Wilson said encouragingly. “Besides, you’ve got Longbow and his people in your corner.”

  “Assuming we want to unleash them. I’m afraid I have somewhat … mixed feelings in that regard.” Abu Bakr’s tone was wry, and Wilson snorted.

  “There’s plenty—” he began, then broke off as the hatch opened to admit Admiral Swenson, Captain Jeng, and Captain de Castro. Commander Néhémial Routhier, Swenson’s chief of staff, and Lieutenant Commander Penelope Quinlevan, her staff intelligence officer, followed them. Alex Jackson and Major Anthony McIntyre, Wilson’s own S-2, came in with Routhier and Quinlevan. The brigadier looked a question at McIntyre, and the major nodded in reply.

  Swenson walked towards the two early arrivals, accompanied by Jackson, and paused, looking at Abu Bakr. He looked back, wondering why she’d stopped. Then Jackson cleared his throat gently and twitched his head at the seat at the head of the briefing room table.

  Abu Bakr felt perplexed for a moment, but then he nodded in understanding as his brain finally caught up. He’d been wrong—or at least not completely accurate—when he’d said he’d been left in charge “on the civilian side.” As Dvorak’s deputy, he’d just become the commander of the entire expedition.

  It was not, he discovered, a comforting realization, and he wondered if he hadn’t thought about it before because his subconscious hadn’t wanted to.

  “Admiral Swenson,” he said, and she nodded back respectfully.

  “Director,” she replied, and waved her own hand at the conference table.

  “Of course,” Abu Bakr said.

  He walked to the chair at the head of the table. Swenson crossed to her own place, facing him from its foot, then waited until he’d been seated before she sat herself. The others remained standing until Abu Bakr cleared his throat.

  “Be seated, please,” he said, wondering in a corner of his brain how Dvorak had become so apparently comfortable in the same role.

  He waited while everyone else sat, then cleared his throat again.

  “I realize I’ve just inherited Secretary Dvorak’s position, at least until he’s up and around again himself,” he said. “I don’t think we can organize any effective response to what’s happened until we understand exactly what has happened, though, and I’ve been just a little busy for the last ninety minutes or so. So with your concurrence, Admiral, I think it would probably be a good idea for our intelligence people to bring us up to date on what we know so far.”

  “I think that would be an excellent place to start,” Swenson agreed, and looked at Routhier. “Néhémial?”

  “Of course, Ma’am. Ambassador.” Routhier nodded politely to Abu Bakr, then cued his phone and brought up a three-dimensional map of Sanda, spotted with broadly scattered, glaring scarlet icons.

  “As you can see,
” he began, “with the exception of the attacks on Mr. Berke and Director Bakr in the Empire, Ms. Simmons’ assassination in New Dianto, and Mr. Ivanov’s assassination in Desqwer, all of the incidents occurred in the Republic. About thirty minutes ago, a Diantian radio station received a ‘manifesto’ from a Chelthist organization associated with Sokyr ChelSo nor Chelth claiming responsibility for all of them, including the ones outside the Republic. We’ve had our own recon assets—including some of Brigadier Wilson’s Scultator drones—looking for Sokyr ever since the attack on the Secretary, because given his past rhetoric we considered him a prime candidate for this from the get-go, but wherever ou is, ou’s hidden ousself very successfully. We’ve had a single sighting of Trygau HyrShalTry, who appears to be ous tactical coordinator, in Dianzhyr, but he disappeared again before we could vector in the Diantian authorities or drop in on him ourselves.

  “Commander Quinlevan’s also run a search of all the Sarthian newspapers and broadcast news looking for either of them, and we’ve run a computer search of our standard recon imagery, as well. As far as we can tell, no one’s even seen Sokyr in the last two local days. He’s fired off a couple of manifestos, but he was due to be interviewed by one of the Myrcos radio stations day-half before last, and he never showed. That’s not like him, and we only have a couple of recon hits on Trygau in the same period. That can’t be just a coincidence, given what’s just gone down. I don’t think either of them know about the Scultators, but they obviously have a pretty good clue about orbital recon—probably because of the satellite pictures we’ve been sharing with their weather services and that search-and-rescue for the lost kids we helped with last month.” The commander grimaced wryly. “We might want to go a little easier with that on the next planet we contact.”