by Naam, Ramez
Becker's mouth turned into a hard line. "Can you take her alive?" he asked.
Nichols shook his head. "Not with those fighters out there."
Becker cut the connection the Boca Raton, dialed National Security Advisor Carolyn Pryce with his personal phone.
Get proof, she'd told him, and you'll have your clearance to go after her.
The phone picked up.
"Dr Pryce, we have a shot on…"
"I'm sorry, sir. Dr Pryce is with the President. Can I have her call you back?"
Fuck.
"This is Deputy Director Becker at ERD Enforcement. I need to speak with her urgently."
"That won't be possible, sir. She's with the President."
"Then get her, please."
"Sorry, sir. It's an important meeting."
"This is absolutely urgent."
"I can see about sending her a note in a few minutes."
Fuck.
Becker ended the connection, slammed the phone down onto his desk.
It was all going to be on him. Election year, he remembered.
He reconnected to the Boca Raton.
"Mr Nichols," he said.
"Yes, sir," Nichols answered. The man looked flustered.
"Mr Nichols, do you concur that video shows a Chinese Confucian Fist commando attacking a US military helicopter?"
"Yes, sir."
"Mr Nichols, does evidence show that this Confucian Fist has just killed multiple US soldiers?"
"Yes, sir," Nichols repeated.
"Mr Nichols, does evidence lead you to believe with a high probability that said commando is the driver and personal bodyguard of Dr Su-Yong Shu?"
"Yes, sir."
"And Mr Nichols, is it your professional opinion that the Chinese vehicle in your sights is engaging in electronic warfare with a US military aircraft and attempting to hijack that aircraft?"
"Yes, sir. Definitely."
Becker looked down at the phone. There would be no help. This was all going to be on his head.
He looked up at Nichols. So be it.
"Mr Nichols, take out that vehicle."
"Yes, sir. With pleasure."
Nichols gave the order.
Banshee Two turned nose down. It fired missiles as it lost altitude to come in low to the monastery again. The AGM-101s zoomed down at the black Opal at ten gees.
Shu felt the missiles fire. They were aimed at the car. She couldn't penetrate the security of the second helicopter, but these missiles were a different matter. They depended on an external source to inform them of their targets. She twisted their primitive minds, sent them spiraling back up at the craft that had fired them.
"Missiles way off course," Williams reported. "Coming back around at Banshee Two. Countermeasures."
Banshee Two fired decoys port and starboard and the missiles went after them, bracketing the stealth chopper in explosions. It flew through the flames, a black shape emerging from a roiling cloud of red and orange, dropping altitude fast for a shot at the car.
"Switch to guns," Nichols said. "Nothing with guidance."
Jane Kim nodded, relayed the orders.
"Roger that," Williams said as Banshee Two spiraled down down down. "Firing." Flames burst from the muzzle of the Banshee in a meters-long gout.
Foot-long, spent uranium-cored shells streaked out from its one-inch chain gun in rapid-fire, rained down on the Opal sedan, ripped it to shreds. The vehicle slumped as its suspension failed. The antenna disintegrated in the first half second. The shells found the engine and the fuel tanks and punished them, tearing sparks from the metal of the car into the escaping fumes, detonating the gasoline, sending up a fifty-foot fireball that tore the car in two.
"Target killed," Williams announced.
Shu almost had the helicopter back. She could see it now, just a few hundred meters away. She would get them back, then she would turn this helicopter on its mate.
Bullets rained down on the car, tearing it to shreds. The connection to the helicopter dropped in the first instants. The car nearly disintegrated, then exploded. Shu watched from the shadow of the meditation hall, angry. They'd tried to kill her. Again.
She reached out with her own mind for Banshee One. It was at the extreme end of her unaided range. She just barely had her mental fingertips on it. There, she had it. It responded to her thoughts. She would bring it home, extract her people, and then show these arrogant Americans who they were fighting.
Oh yes, she would show them.
Then Banshee One's masters started fighting her.
• • • •
"Banshee One is starting to respond," Kim said.
Then she grunted in frustration. "It's still fighting me. Someone else is still in there working against me."
Williams tapped to triangulate. Banshee Two collected data points as it circled above the compound.
"Signal's weaker but still there," Williams said. "Originating from near one of the buildings. If it's Shu, she's still alive."
"Take her out," Nichols ordered.
"Missile launch! Missile launch!" Williams called out. "RTAF fighters are back. Four darts in the air."
"Fuck," Nichols said. "Evasive maneuvers. And activate the spiders. Weapons free. Shoot to kill on primary targets."
"Roger that. Weapons free."
Shu pulled the Banshee towards her. Signals from the Americans fought her, tried to turn it back. She ordered it to lose altitude. The Americans ordered it to climb. The chopper did a crazy dance in the air as they struggled over it.
Shu couldn't win this, she knew. The car had been a powerful tool, now lost to her. Fighting this hard without its aid was killing her. Nexus nodes were broadcasting at emergency strength, using every watt of power they had available, exceeding their specs. Waste heat from the wattage was overheating her brain. The physical drain of the energy expenditure was draining glucose from her bloodstream, sapping her, starving this body's neurons.
She dropped to one knee in the doorway. A monk saw her, came to support her. She had to end this now.
Shu put everything she had into a final surge of thought, pushed the chopper down down down, drained power from its rotors. She had one last chance to get them out. She reached out to the limit of her strength, yelled into their minds.
• • • •
Sam grabbed the stick as the chopper started to turn. No good. Nothing she did had any impact on the craft.
A fireball burst up from the monastery ahead. Something had exploded. The chopper shuddered, started behaving erratically. They were almost there, up above the lake at the foot of the monastery now. They started to turn to the right, jerked back to the left, dropped, climbed, spun in the air, tilted and canted crazily. Sam hit controls frantically, with her hands, with the pilot's, tried to get the chopper to respond to her. Nothing she did changed anything. This was crazy.
JUMP INTO THE LAKE. IT'S YOUR ONLY CHANCE.
Shu. The controls were still unresponsive. The chopper was diving now, still doing its mad drunken dance, jerking this way and that, losing altitude. The lake at the foot of the monastery was just thirty feet below them now. The chopper leveled out, spun, stabilized. Sam heard something beeping from the cockpit. Saw the light.
MISSILE WARNING – NO LOCK.
Time to go!
Feng had cut Kade free of the plasticuffs and had his arm around him. Feng hit the emergency door release button and the door blasted outwards on explosive bolts. The night air welcomed them. There were two dots glowing in the sky out there. Exhaust flames from the missiles. Sam heard the missile warning tone change to the LOCK sound.
MISSILE WARNING – RADAR LOCK.
Oh, fuck.
Blowing the door had just blown their stealth and lit them up on radar. Feng jumped with Kade. Sam reached back on instinct, grabbed the belt of the SEAL whose elbow she'd stabbed, and jumped, dragging him with her.
For a moment there was stillness. She swam in cool night air. Everything rece
ded.
Then the missiles slammed into the chopper above her, explosions filled the night with the tortured screams of metal and the deafening whoosh of superheated air. A giant force shoved her down and the water rose up to slam into her.
"Fuck!" Jane Kim swore.
Nichols had never heard her swear before.
"Banshee One is hit. Repeat, Banshee One is hit. Total loss."
Nichols glanced at the other screen. Banshee Two had dodged its two missiles. The two Rudras would be out of missiles now. All they had left were guns.
"Get them back into the clouds," Nichols yelled.
"They're hauling ass, boss," Williams said. "Climbing… climbing. Four hundred meters to the clouds."
On the screen the RTAF fighters were coming back around for another pass. It was a race. And it was clear the fighters had the advantage.
"Visual contact with the Rudras," Williams said, voice tense. "They're opening up with guns."
Onscreen, muzzle flames burst out from the nose guns of the two RTAF fighters, still half a click away. Two hundred meters to the clouds.
Nichols watched on screen as shells pounded Banshee Two, ripped off half the tail, tearing into the main rotors. The Banshee spun madly, tipped over into a forty-five-degree angle, rolled as it lost altitude at a sickening pace. It fell from the sky, spinning end over end, struck the mountainside at a hundred and fifty miles an hour. The rotor tore into the mountain and snapped, driving metal fragments into the chopper at high speed, igniting the fuel, sending up a huge fireball as Banshee Two tumbled in a flaming wreck down the side of the mountain.
"I think we've seen enough," came the voice of the ship's captain. "I'm taking us under."
No one disagreed.
In a monastery dormitory building, in a recently used cell, under a hard narrow bed, a slate's screen came back to life.
CONNECTION RESTORED.
14 MINUTES REMAINING.
49
VERMIN
Kade came back to consciousness in the back of a pickup truck driving up a steep and winding road. He was wrapped in a blanket and soaking wet. Feng had an arm around him. The Chinese soldier had lost his suit jacket and gloves somewhere, was down to a sodden white dress shirt and slacks. Sam was on the other side, bald-headed in drenched nun's robes, with a gun trained on an unconscious Navy SEAL.
Kade coughed. It was a wet cough. Water this time, instead of fire. Maybe he'd be buried alive next time. Or vacuum. Yeah. Vacuum.
Sam caught the gist of his thoughts, chuckled at him. "You're alive, Kade. Be happy."
"I'm…" cough cough cough "totally…" cough cough "fucking…" cough cough "thrilled."
Sam and Feng both laughed.
"We get you in front of a fire, yeah?" Feng said.
Kade nodded. That sounded good. He was shivering, even in the warm Thai air.
Shu met them at the top. She was a sight for sore eyes. She hugged Feng, hugged Kade, even hugged Sam.
Feng carried Kade off towards the massive hearth in the kitchen. The whole monastery was in chaos. There were army trucks with mounted machine guns and micro-missile launchers. Ananda was talking to a military officer. Conscious monks were dragging unconscious monks to the meditation hall as a makeshift infirmary. Sam threw the big SEAL over her shoulder, looking comical carrying such a bigger man, and said she was going to get him tended to and handed over to the Thai military. Shu said she had to speak to Ananda.
The kitchen had half a dozen Thai cooks in it. They were making giant pots of tea, even bigger pots of soup. Feng found a chair for Kade, dragged it to the hearth, deposited Kade in it almost gently. Everything hurt inside again.
The Confucian Fist found the smallest of the pots, poured tea for both of them, brought a mug of it to Kade.
"Thank you, Feng. And thank you for saving us. I owe you."
Feng nodded, crouched down in front of the hearth near Kade. "You should thank Su-Yong," he said. "This will cost her."
Kade nodded. "I will. It'll cost her how?"
Feng looked at the fire. "Bosses in China, they won't like this. Very messy. Very public. She… how do you say it? She played a lot of cards."
Kade didn't know what to say. He stayed quiet.
Feng kept staring at the flames.
"You know, when we meet, you called me robot? Slave?"
Kade nodded. "Yeah."
Feng nodded back, still staring into the roaring fire. "I'm free. I'm free because of her."
He swallowed tea. "I choose to serve my country, now. But more than that. More than that I choose her."
Su-Yong Shu chose that moment to enter, a smile on her face. She radiated relief and resolve.
"Only one dead," she said. "One monk, anyway. Everyone else will be fine. And the Thai are beefing up defenses here. The Americans can't try that again without declaring war."
Kade felt a shortness in his chest. "Which one?"
Shu looked at him quizzically, without understanding.
"Which monk? The one that died? What was his name?"
"Ahhh," she said. "A novice. He was hit, and then broke his neck falling down a flight of stairs. Bahn."
Bahn… Kade stared down at his tea. Another one dead.
"You shouldn't look so glum," Shu began.
Then her eyes lost focus. She was far away. Kade and Feng both looked up at her in alarm.
Her eyes regained focus. She exuded shock. Anger. She stared at Kade.
"What have you done?"
Spider BR-6-7-21 lurked in the corner of the room. Combat status had been initiated thirty-seven minutes ago at 01.08 local time. The active Engagement Protocol, previously Observe, was now Terminate.
Weapons free.
Find and eliminate primary targets.
BR-6-7-21 slowly walked around the room, in the long corner where wall met ceiling, identifying targets. It was in this mode when possible matches Primary Target Gamma and Tertiary Target Sigma entered the room. BR-6-7-21 slowly crawled along the ceiling to get a better view. Yes, with high confidence, the two human-shaped objects were Primary Target Gamma and Tertiary Target Epsilon. Even as it confirmed this, Primary Target Alpha entered the area.
Human Control was currently offline. BR-6-7-21 reviewed its instructions and combat status again. The active Engagement Protocol was Terminate. These were valid targets. Weapons were free.
Not having access to Human Control, it conferred with its sisters, as it slowly and stealthily moved towards its targets. The responses came back even as it reached firing range. Greater than ninety-five percent of reachable sisters agreed with its conclusions.
Spider BR-6-7-21 steadied itself against wall and ceiling, extruded the tiny launcher for its neurotoxin microdarts, loaded up its clip, and fired a controlled burst.
"What have you done?" Shu demanded of him.
Ow! Something stung Kade on his right hand. He looked down in annoyance and surprise, saw a prick of blood there.
Feng was moving, intense alarm emanating from him. The Confucian Fist was already at the stovetop, a giant pot of boiling water in his hands. He flung the water at something high up on the wall, jumped forward, brought the pot itself down on something that fell to the ground, again and again and again.
Su-Yong Shu had fallen to her knees, between Kade and the fire. There was a spot of blood on the side of her neck. Feng turned to her. There was a spot of blood on his chest.
Kade's hand was numb. He couldn't feel it any more.
"Neurotoxin," Shu said softly. "Save the boy."
Feng whirled. There was a chopping knife in his hand. A giant cleaver. Kade's eyes went wide.
"Feng, no!"
Feng's free hand came down on Kade's wrist. He raised the cleaver high.
Kade tried to pull his arm away. It was like trying to pull it out of a steel manacle.
"Feng, no!!" he screamed. "No!!"
Firelight turned the cleaver's blade red. The world slowed to a crawl. Kade had time to see a tiny twitch
of a muscle on Feng's face, a tightening of tendons in his wrist, and then the man's expression hardened and the cleaver came down, down, down, whistling in a long arc through the air, glinting in the firelight as it fell, until it came clean through Kade's forearm and embedded itself deep into the wood of the chair with a meaty thunk. Kade jerked back. His upper arm came away.