by Alec Saracen
Except there was something, wasn't there?
Ceq, he thought. She wants Ceq.
Why? To finish turning her against me, or just for her V-sight?
Knowing her, it could be both, or neither.
Oh, he realised, belatedly. Clever. Very clever. I send my most trusted bodyguard to help rescue Thier, putting my own life in danger – and proving that I care about him. Maybe it won't convince him, but it's a mark in my favour at the very least.
For a Liberator, Grey Hawk would make an exceptional politician.
“Thank you,” he said. “Excuse me a moment.”
“Of course,” Smicer said, and seemed to melt into the shadows.
Zhai pulled his watch from an inner pocket of his robes and called Ceq.
“I need you to go to Landing,” he said, as soon as she picked up. “Immediately. Take the car, I'll hitch a ride back to the embassy.”
There was a pause of about two seconds before Ceq answered. “All right.”
“I'll brief you soon. Right now, just go. You might want to swing by the embassy and pick up some of your toys.”
Ceq didn't miss a beat. “So it's like that, huh?”
“It is. But be quick. And don't tell Umbiba, he'll only give you grief.”
“On my way,” Ceq said, and hung up. Zhai stowed away the watch, his mind ablaze with possibilities. Few of them were good. He had a queasy feeling that Thier's arrest had pushed Tor over an invisible precipice. No matter whether he lived or died, bloody upheaval was coming.
Zhai became aware of a steadily loudening hum, a low vibration in the evening that grew and grew until it was almost deafening. Overhead, the first military fighter screamed past, trailing luminescent orange smoke that crackled with green lightning bolts. An entire squadron of them followed in formation, followed by two more that crossed perpendicular to each other directly over the mansion, creating an impressive grid of smoke trails. They kept coming, dozens of them, until it was plain to see that it was a show of force. The air was thick with the howling of engines.
The last plane over was a wide, triangular bomber, lazily gliding past with no smoke trail. Its bomb doors were picked out in coloured lights depicting the Torian flag, and they swung open, dropping hundreds of bright projectiles. They fell like silent silver rain, then began to explode into glorious cascades of sparks. The first wave of explosions nearly knocked Zhai off his feet. The fireworks were some of the biggest he'd ever seen, painting the sky with a rainbow inferno, and they just kept coming, exploding ten or twelve at a time, their noise blending into one titanic crash.
Zhai looked down at the pool to watch the fireworks' reflection. As he did, his eyes fell on Parys Hactaur. She wasn't looking at the sky. She was looking at Aliven Cadmer, and he was looking back. An electric conduit of hostility crackled between their eyes.
As the fireworks reached a crescendo overhead, Zhai watched in fascination as the two marshals stared each other down, their faces eerie under the flickering waves of light and shadow. The final round of blasts shook the ground beneath Zhai's feet, and the last sparks blazed brightly before fading slowly into nothingness. The light went with them, pitching Hactaur and Cadmer back into shadow. Even in the dark, as applause began to ring out, Zhai could see them watching each other.
22
Not long after midnight, the reports from the Liberation intelligence agents narrowed to a consensus. Thier had been transferred several times between different vehicles and police stations, finally ending up imprisoned at an army base ten kilometres outside Landing, separated from the other captured members of ResTore's leadership.
In their headquarters, they gathered round a projected collection of maps and 3D models of the base. It wasn't enormous, but it looked well-guarded. Watchtowers, barbed wire, floodlights, regular VTOL patrols, security robots, automatic surveillance systems – and that was just what they knew about.
“Looks like direct assault's not an option,” Red Wolf said.
“It'd be suicide, even for Liberators,” Blue Bull said. He was sitting against the wall, slowly disassembling his own leg with a set of precise power tools. The fabricator was still churning out replacements for those parts too badly damaged for his internal systems to repair, and an array of components were fanned out around him like jigsaw pieces. “Stealth's the only way.”
“Infiltrate a packed military base?” Blue Wasp said doubtfully. “Better than smashing down the front door, sure, but I don't like our chances.”
Grey Hawk nodded. “So we find a middle ground. Cut the odds.” She turned to Red Wolf. “We can contact the surviving ResTore leadership, right?”
Red Wolf frowned. “Right.”
“Then it's simple. We get them to cause chaos in Landing to draw out the troops, then we use the confusion to infiltrate. In and out before anyone can do a thing.”
Blue Wasp looked unconvinced. “A lot of people will die.”
“So what, we abandon Thier to his fate?” Grey Hawk said. “When he's the best hope Tor's got?”
“Not an option,” Red Wolf said firmly.
Blue Wasp raised his hands. “I didn't say it was.”
Red Wolf nodded, staring contemplatively at the maps. “It's not a bad idea,” she said after a moment, with some reluctance. “It's not a great idea either, but time is not on our side.”
“You're talking about asking civilians to put themselves in lethal danger,” Blue Wasp said.
“Thier has to live,” Grey Hawk replied. “No matter what. People will be in danger, yes, but all they have to do is lure the government into deploying the military again. Once they've given us the chance to strike, they can scatter and hide. We're not asking them to fight a war.”
“We're still asking a lot.”
“And they have every right to turn us down.”
“They won't. That's the problem.”
“We're going into that base tonight,” Grey Hawk said. “Either we jeopardise the future of an entire planet, or we jeopardise the lives of a few hundred people.” She looked around the room, making eye contact with each of her squadmates in turn. “If we believe that Thier is the one to liberate Tor, then it's not a choice. It's our duty.”
And as the room returned to a silence broken only by the whirring of the fabricator, Grey Hawk knew that she had won the argument. She was coming to realise that she held more power over the squad than she'd thought. They were veterans, hardened and experienced, grimly familiar with the dirty work that fell to Liberators. They had seen death, lost friends, and witnessed the casual brutality of the galaxy first-hand. It had changed them, just as it was changing her. But right now, in their eyes, she was their link back to the ideologically pure cadets they had once been, and that gave her words immense moral weight to them. She was a beacon, a living fragment of the Liberation they were afraid they were losing touch with, and her judgements were still uncontaminated by the poison of the system.
In theory.
In truth, Grey Hawk was afraid, not for her life but for her mind. She was aware of the moral power she wielded and equally aware of how cynically she was using it, and it was no outlier. She'd uncovered an icily calculating streak in her brain, and there was no burying it again. Every situation was something to be analysed, dissected, optimised, processes that her mind now automatically set into motion without consulting her.
She wanted to blame Zhai, as if he had somehow warped her in their brief acquaintance. It was more comforting to believe that than the alternative: that this was the real Grey Hawk, the true core of her being. That nobody had made her. That she just was.
Blue Bull was in no state to walk, let alone fight. In the violent chaos that had followed the government's surprise assault on ResTore's headquarters, Blue Bull and Blue Wasp had both taken heavy fire from a military VTOL. Though Blue Wasp had escaped with minor damage to secondary systems, Blue Bull's legs had been practically destroyed, and Blue Wasp had made the split-second decision to carry his comrade to s
afety rather than pursue the captured Thier. That left three of them against an entire army base – unless her message to Ambassador Smicer had achieved its desired effect. In a way, Grey Hawk hoped it hadn't. It would prove that she didn't speak Zhai's language yet.
Fifteen minutes later, the desperate remnants of ResTore's leadership had been talked into supporting their plan. Ten minutes after that, they were mobilising hundreds of loyal supporters across the city with orders to cause spectacular trouble.
Ten minutes after that, Ceq called.
*
In the rear of the manual-enabled goods truck obtained by ResTore, the four of them waited for the signal. All over Landing, fires were blazing, bombs were exploding, police were being ambushed, and government buildings were being peppered with bullets. Gunfire and bomb blasts were a constant background noise even this far out. Their truck was parked beneath a tree on the edge of Landing, sheathed in a sensor-deceiving tarp, ready to charge for the army base at a moment's notice.
Red Wolf had taken some persuading to allow Ceq to accompany them. Her objections had been plentiful: Ceq wouldn't mesh with the rest of the squad, would be too easily killed even wearing body armour, couldn't be trusted... It had taken Ceq offering to spar hand-to-hand with Red Wolf to convince her, and even then the two had circled each other for five full minutes, Ceq nimbly dodging every single blow, before Red Wolf had finally acknowledged the usefulness of her predictive V-sight.
Grey Hawk had invoked their duty as Liberators again, arguing that Ceq would be a net benefit to the mission and was therefore a necessity, and Red Wolf had grudgingly agreed. It wasn't unprecedented. Liberators often worked with local auxiliaries, though the bodyguard of a Coalition ambassador was a first. Still, if not for that incredible V-sight, Red Wolf would never have accepted Ceq, no matter how well Grey Hawk had argued.
“What's it like?” Grey Hawk asked.
“What's what like?”
“Your V-sight.”
Ceq, sitting cross-legged on the floor, shrugged. “What's not having it like? I see the future in my head. Always have, always will.”
“You see it all the time?”
“No. I could if I wanted, but it'd give me a bitch of a headache.”
“We must seem so slow to you,” Grey Hawk said.
Ceq grinned. “Oh, yeah. It's hard to remember sometimes. Every day I watch people do the dumbest shit.”
“You don't tell them?”
“I used to. They usually got pissed off and did whatever it was anyway, then blamed me when it went wrong. Now, I just let it happen.” She shrugged again. “It's easier.”
“You ever see your own death coming?”
“A couple of times, yeah,” Ceq said, inspecting her nails.
“What's it like?”
“Everything just – goes black. No more future.”
“So what do you do when you know whatever you were about to do is going to get you killed?”
Ceq looked at her like she was stupid. “Something else. Or nothing. Just not that.”
Grey Hawk shook her head wonderingly. “If I had your V-sight, I'd be invincible.”
“Or if I had your body,” Ceq said, grinning. “Like Iron Prophet.”
“Who?”
Ceq's mouth fell open. “Iron– do you guys just not watch movies?”
“Not really.”
Blue Wasp raised a hand. “I do.”
“Twins. Do yourself a favour, watch Iron Prophet. The original. You'd like it! He's a cyborg with tech so advanced he can scan the world and predict the future. There's this one part where he has a whole fucking army after him, dropping bombs and firing missiles and snipers and everything, and they all miss because he knows ahead of time where they're going to shoot, and he's just walking towards them while the music goes–” Ceq mimicked heavy metal guitar riffs. “So fucking cool. Watch it.”
Grey Hawk smiled. “I'll try to find the time,” she said. She'd never met anyone like Ceq. Even though their military aptitude was practically all they shared, she found Ceq's complete, idiosyncratic unpretentiousness oddly charming.
“So do you–” Ceq began, but broke off, looking to Blue Wasp, who was standing still with his eyes shut.
Two seconds later, he twitched and opened his eyes. “Scouts on the roads have just reported seeing a military convoy inbound,” he said. “Twenty vehicles or more.”
“That base can only support thirty or so,” Red Wolf said. She glanced at Grey Hawk. “Looks like we're in business.”
“It's not the vehicles we should be worried about.”
“True.”
“What should we be worried about?” Ceq asked.
“Oh, the usual,” Grey Hawk said. “Robots. Turrets. Lasers. Mines. Cameras.”
Ceq nodded, apparently unconcerned. “Cool.” She opened the black bag at her feet and lifted out an assault rifle by the barrel. Grey Hawk winced at the lack of gun safety, but it occurred to her that Ceq had no reason to worry about it. If something was going to go wrong, she'd see it coming.
“There's a good chance you won't make it out alive,” Red Wolf said.
Ceq began checking over her rifle. “Uh-huh.”
“You're not worried.”
“I've got a better chance than you,” Ceq said mildly, and inserted a magazine with a definitive click.
Red Wolf looked helplessly at Grey Hawk, who couldn't help but smile.
There was a small jolt as the truck shed its cloak and rolled out.
Blue Bull's voice crackled over the squad channel. Grey Hawk saw Ceq raise a hand to her ear. “All right. You're on your way. Six minutes ETA.” There was a pause. “Good luck. Wish I was going with you. Come back alive, you hear me?”
“We hear you, brother,” Blue Wasp said. “We'll do our best.”
“You'd better. Let's cut the chatter and get this done.”
Grey Hawk pulled on her protective smarthood, transparent on the inside and opaque on the outside. Direct headshots were still a threat, but it gave her a solid chance at surviving them – and it would keep her anonymous to any cameras. The other three did the same, their features disappearing into dark, shapeless masses. Silence descended.
The truck started to judder as they went offroad, and they had to hang on to straps on the ceiling to stay upright. Blue Bull was taking them in a wide arc around the base, and the truck rolled to a halt about a kilometre out. Silently, they disembarked.
The clear night didn't help them. With their artificial eyes and smarthoods, the moonlight was a hindrance. Grey Hawk would have preferred pouring rain. As it was, all they could do was rely on their angle of approach and the distraction in Landing to stay out of sight. Grey Hawk glanced over her shoulder at the cluster of lights on the horizon that was Landing. The orange glow of dozens of fires was unmistakeable.
Sirens were already ringing in the base, their distant keening cutting through the still air. The blue-white glare of floodlights betrayed the base's location, and as they drew closer, high, barbed-wire-topped concrete walls and guard towers rose into view.
“Stop!” Ceq hissed urgently. Grey Hawk froze, one foot in mid-air. Ceq motioned furiously for her to look down, and Grey Hawk saw a hidden tripwire beneath her raised foot. She switched her vision to a deep scan, and the flickering outline of a landmine swam into view.
With great care, she set her foot down again.
“Switch to scanner five,” she said. “This is a minefield.”
“You sure?” Blue Bull said. “Intel disagrees.”
Grey Hawk shook her head in disbelief. A mine might not have killed her, but it sure as hell would have put her out of action for the foreseeable future. “I'm looking at a mine right now. If she hadn't stopped me, I'd have stepped right on it. This is a fucking minefield.”
Blue Bull heard her tone of voice and recalibrated. “Noted.”
They picked their way through the minefield, marking every mine on their collective smarthood feed in case they nee
ded to make a high-speed escape back the same way. There had been no warning whatsoever, which had to be illegal. They were still more than four hundred metres away from the base. Newly laid, maybe. Ready and waiting for ResTore to make its move.
Red Wolf was their designated sniper, and every now and again she would stop and take aim down the sights, never quite firing. They were within effective range of their silenced ammunition now, though if possible their plan was not to fire a single shot.
Grey Hawk doubted it was possible.
They closed on the walls quickly after they negotiated the minefield. The exterior cameras were obvious black blobs, and after a hushed debate they decided to shoot one out and quickly climb the wall before anyone noticed, hoping that the sheer number of cameras ringing the base meant that the failure wouldn't be detected immediately.
Blue Wasp fired an EM-charged projectile from his underbarrel, which was enough to fry the camera without physically destroying it, and they began to scale the wall. Grey Hawk leapt straight to the top, three metres straight up, and ripped the barbed wire away with her hands. On the other side was a narrow, empty alley between her and the prison complex.
“Shoot him!” Ceq said urgently. Grey Hawk's head whipped around just in time to see the guard on the nearest tower, who had been looking her way with an open mouth, slump sideways. Another quiet phut came a second later, and the guard on the next watchtower went down too.
There was no time to worry about whether they'd been seen. Grey Hawk anchored two ropes, one on each side, and dropped down silently into the complex.
“Door,” Ceq said from the other side of the wall, and as Grey Hawk approached the nearest door to the prison complex, it swung open away from her and two soldiers emerged, unaware that anything was wrong. Grey Hawk shot them both in the head and dived forward, just catching the steel door before it slammed shut. She yanked it back open and scrambled to her feet, covering the corridor it opened onto. It was empty.
Within seconds the other had joined her. As Blue Wasp deployed three tiny remote-control drones so that Blue Bull could reconnoitre the compound, Red Wolf looked at the two bodies and, to Grey Hawk's surprise, picked them up one after the other and hurled them up and over the wall, leaving only bloodstains behind.