“I’m here. What do you need?”
Bishop drew his weapon while taking a bullet out of his jacket pocket. While he loaded the single bullet into his gun, he said, “You have our location?”
“Yeah.”
Bishop fired the round into the wall. Instead of making a hole, the round flattened out and became a thick blue liquid that ran down the wall.
“I just put a transmitter round in the elevator. I need you to hack into this building’s system. Take control of everything you can, and do it fast.”
“Consider it done.”
Bishop put away his gun and drew the multi-firearm from behind his back. “We don’t have a few minutes, Switch.”
“I heard those things jam a lot,” Whistler said as they reached the brothel floor.
“Not this one.” Bishop shook his head then looked at Seven, who was pulling a pair of guns out of her bag. “I like the dress. Does it do anything? Like the suits?”
“Makes my ass look great.”
“I guess I can’t complain about that,” Bishop said as he stepped out of the elevator and started working on an escape plan.
22
The tanks moved into positions on three sides of the building, with one team of men moving to cover the rest of the building.
Major Ferris led a squad of eight men inside, followed by a second squad of eight. They came in hard and fast to make sure the patrons thought twice before reacting to defend themselves.
Ferris took eight men up while eight others kept the staff and the patrons on the ground floor subdued. They burst in, ready to engage in a firefight, but found the floor appeared to be empty.
They moved through the offices and kept searching until they were satisfied the floor was clear.
Ferris went to the elevator and pointed a cube at the control panel. His cyber-team, back in Inferno City, relayed to him the elevator’s most recent use.
“They went down, sir. You just missed them. They skipped the bar and went straight to the brothel.”
“Keep the place locked down until we find them,” Ferris said.
He and his eight men used the elevator and went to the bottom floor.
“Benji’s no fighter, but Mason is dangerous, and if Whistler made it here, his bodyguard is a former nameless and they cannot be underestimated.”
The elevator reached the bottom floor, and Ferris and his men burst into the lobby with their guns raised. They saw five half-naked women and the stimmer named Hamilton waiting by the bar in the lobby.
“You guys going to be done soon?” one of the girls asked. “I don’t get paid to just sit here.”
“Which way did they go?” Ferris asked.
All six pointed down the hallway. Ferris looked down to see rows of doors. There were a lot of rooms to clear.
“How many?”
“How many what?” the woman said.
Ferris stepped forward and punched the woman in the face, knocking her over the bar with the force of his blow. She was out before her body hit the floor. The stimmer rose from his stool but stopped when multiple soldiers pointed big guns at him.
“This is me being nice,” Ferris said. “Tell me how many are with Mason.”
“He the bald guy?” Hamilton asked.
“Yes.”
“Benji and Whistler, plus Dean and Whistler’s bodyguard and some tall chick with a body I would kill anybody for.”
“She on payroll?”
“Not here. Benji would never let any of us have guns.”
“Four capable hostiles, plus Benji and Whistler, who probably is tougher than he looks,” Ferris said. “Send down another team.”
One of the men shot Ferris a look.
“I know we could take them,” Ferris said. “But why even give them the slightest chance?”
Before the man could reply, one of the soldiers upstairs called down to Ferris through his headset.
“Elevator is frozen, sir,” he said.
“Well, unfreeze it.”
“We’re trying.”
“Stairs?”
“Locked down, sir. We could try and hack the lock.”
“Do it,” Ferris told him, then he turned to the man who questioned the backup by shooting him a look. “I guess you may get your way. Let’s get started. The longer we stay here, the more likely they may start to move against us.”
They’d moved two steps toward the hall when one of the soldiers’ armor flashed red.
“Something locked on to me,” he said.
Then the other soldiers’ armor lit up too.
23
General Grieves monitored the various feeds that sent him updates on the mission to capture Mason, Laura Lionheart-Crane tried to contact him. He knew the rich daughter of the head of one of the world’s largest corporations was an important part of the Lord Inferno’s plan. Her money alone had done much to advance the cause.
He ignored her call anyway. She would be upset, but her money didn’t put her in charge. Her obsession over her daughter had already wasted too many resources, as far as Grieves was concerned. Another call came through, but he ignored it too. On the off chance Ferris didn’t take Mason alive, Grieves wanted to see him die in real time.
A member of the cyber-team approached him.
“Shouldn’t you be at your station?” Grieves said. With the mood he was in, he was set to do horrible things to the young man as he stood there.
“Hollister and Evans called me on a private controller cube, sir.”
“Why aren’t they here working?”
“The girl escaped and locked them in her quarters.”
“What? How?”
The tech shrugged. “They didn’t say. But, according to them, she did kill Newton. If she hadn’t left his cube, they wouldn’t be able to contact us.”
“Well, get them out. And bring me something with her scent on it.”
“Her scent?”
“Just do it, do it right now.”
The tech hurried off, breaking into a jog before he left the room.
“If they find Mason, send the feed to my cube,” Grieves told the tech as he hurried out of the room himself.
He found King in his favorite spot by the window, napping in the sun. He was part grizzly bear but he slept more like a cat. He would be more than glad to wake up for this.
“You want to go hunting, King?” Grieves gave the beast a rub on his back to bring him out of his slumber.
King responded with a loud and hearty roar. It had been a while since King had been able to hunt. Something that a lion was born to do. Grieves had wanted an ultimate killing machine, and with King, that was exactly what he got.
King had a pep in his step as he followed the general back to the control center.
The tech carried in the blanket Darlene had used as he brought back Hollister and Evans. Both were bloody and beaten and looked terribly frightened, likely from what they thought Grieves was going to do them. Likely because they were right.
They knew they had screwed up and knew General Grieves had no tolerance for mistakes. Their sense of fear heightened when they caught a glimpse of King walking by the general’s side. Flashes of being eaten alive crossed their minds.
Grieves could have eased their fears, but he didn’t. He would like to feed them to King, but his cyber-division was already lacking now that Darlene had escaped, and he couldn’t afford to lose his best men.
He motioned for the blanket as he approached, and the tech handed it to him. He set it on the floor at King’s feet. Grieves said, “Hunt.” Once the beast caught the scent, King roared and headed down the hall.
“Follow him,” Grieves told Hollister and Evans. “He can’t unlock doors, so one of you idiots will need to do it. When he finds her, get of his way and send me the video feed. He deserves the reward of a fresh kill.”
24
Laura didn’t like being ignored. The smug look on Corvan’s face when the general refused to take her call was not helping
. She tried to reach the second in command, Major Ferris, but he also wouldn’t answer.
She was, however, able to reach a man named Donner, third man in charge. Laura believed he’d reached this rank in part because both Ferris and Grieves just loved to have someone to shit on.
“Put the general on,” Laura told him.
“I can’t do that.”
“Can’t or won’t?”
“Both.”
“Why?”
“You don’t need to know.”
“I’m bankrolling a large part of this operation, so I need to know.”
“All I can say at the moment is a combat mission is in progress,” he said.
“I thought Whistler had cooperated.”
“He did.”
“So?” she asked.
“This is different.”
“Different how?”
“Just different. I need to go. I’m sure General Grieves will give you a complete briefing when you arrive.”
“I was supposed to be briefed before all combat operations.”
“If I could go back in time, I would make sure you were informed, but since I can’t, you will get a full report after it is done,” Donner said.
“They had better,” Laura said, but the hologram of Donner had already disappeared.
“The general not behaving?” Corvan asked.
“Possibly.”
“That is the problem with working with crazy people—they tend to be rather unpredictable.”
“The way of Lord Inferno is far from crazy. One could say that being a follower would be the only sane thing you could do.”
Corvan didn’t reply.
“Can this thing go any faster? I have a bad feeling the general is about to screw things up, if he hasn’t already.”
“Really? They are soldiers. Combat operations are what they do.”
“Since I have embraced the ways of the Lord Inferno, my intuition has been nearly infallible.”
“Infallible?” Corvan said, remembering how she had failed to see her daughter being sentenced to the vault, and, upon her escape, she’d failed to get a feeling that Gemma’s rescuers were not bringing her back.
“Can you go faster or not?”
“I can, but I was trying to save fuel. I wasn’t aware that we were in such a hurry. Besides, if you and the general are going to cleanse the world with raging hellfire, I think I need to stay airborne.”
“Get to top speed, please,” she said. “Once we arrive at Inferno City, I’ll make sure you receive all the fuel you need.”
Corvan looked skeptical.
“He has Pawn City in his pocket,” she said. “They will give us whatever we ask for.”
“That doesn’t sound like the Whistler I know.”
“Unless Grieves exaggerated, Whistler will not only provide us with the fuel cells, he will load them up himself.”
“This sounds like an occasion for a wager.”
“The stakes?”
“Another round in the bedroom?”
“Sounds like a win/win for me,” she said. “Set the course for Pawn City. We can fuel up first then settle up in the bedroom later.”
25
Bishop used the guided-missile feature on the multi-firearm and the targeting system in his shades to lock on to six of the soldiers in the lobby. He wished the targeting system could lock on to Ferris specifically, blow his ass to bits, and be done with it all. But his gun had no such capability, and Bishop had no such luck.
With nine men out there, it would have been nice to have more than six shots in the clip. Bishop figured Ferris was probably leading the way, so he made sure to lock on to the first man he saw behind the door.
He pulled the door open and pressed the trigger once. Six missiles shot out of the bottom barrel and rocketed down the hallway one after the other.
The army of the Inferno were well-trained soldiers with the latest high-tech armor. They took cover as soon as their armor’s AI informed them of the presence of a rocket’s guidance system. Most took the blast on the heavy part of the armor and seemed to be okay except for some that were clearly dazed. But they’d trained for that, and were ready to fight in seconds.
One soldier took a hit directly on the shoulder, where his armor was the weakest, mainly to allow movement, and his arm was blown clean off, severed at the joint; his shoulder sprayed blood as he was blown backward against the elevator door. He hit the floor, where he quickly bled out.
Another solider had a missile catch him around the neck, sending his head straight up until it struck the top of the ceiling. The rest of the soldiers had survived.
Ferris, who had moved to the bar to punch the prostitute, escaped relatively unscathed. He was knocked to the floor and that was it.
The women scrambled for cover, most of them climbing over the bar as VP-23 rose from his hiding place on the other side of the bar with a gun in each hand. At the desk on the far side of the lobby, Seven rose wielding duel guns.
The first man to rise after dodging the rocket attack took bullets from both barrels of VP-23’s guns. With his armor weakened, the bullets ripped his insides to shreds. Seven did the same to the next two men who dared to rise to their feet.
A solider rose to left of VP-23 and was shot in the face as he was coming out of his daze. Ferris stayed low and fired from his back over the bar. VP-23 was forced to take cover as cheap liquor and glass rained down on him from the shelf.
The one soldier unaffected by the blast swung his gun Seven’s way. She dove behind the desk as gunfire ripped into the wall behind her. Bishop came into the hall firing, but had to duck into an adjacent room as the soldier swung his gun, aiming his way. He was concentrating on Bishop, and Seven and didn’t see a hidden doorway near him slide open.
Benji thought the sight of a closet containing cleaning supplies destroyed the mood and the aesthetic of the room, so he’d created a nearly invisible door to store them.
This made it an excellent place for Dean to hide. The soldier swung the gun Dean’s way, but was picked up and slammed against the wall before he was able to get off a shot.
Hamilton, who had dropped to the floor when the shooting started, saw Dean destroying the wall with the soldier and then went after Ferris, looking to do the same. Ferris was quicker than his soldier, though. Even Hamilton’s thick skin and bones couldn’t stop the heavy rounds Ferris pumped into him.
VP-23 rose again, looking to take out Ferris, but the major spun and shot VP-23 square in the chest. As soon as VP-23 fell, Ferris turned his weapon on Dean, who was still smashing the soldier’s head against the wall and smiling.
Bishop rushed back into the hall and fired his multi-firearm in machine-gun mode, taking Ferris down where he stood. The major’s high-tech armor kept him alive, but there was nothing he could do to stop Bishop from kicking his gun away and leveling the weapon at his face.
Bishop switched his firearm to a shotgun.
“Déjà vu all over again,” Bishop said.
Ferris didn’t have a chance to respond. A hidden door on the opposite side of the room exploded as the backup team was moving down the stairs.
Ferris didn’t have to say a word.
Bishop turned and,, as he had planned aimed the shotgun at the first man that entered the room, knocking him back to the stairwell.
“Grenade,” he said, and he fired his first round, but as he did, Ferris kicked up into his ribs. The round missed the intended targets coming down the stairs, and had Seven ducking back for cover as launched toward her.
The round went high as Seven went low. She curled up as debris from the wall rained down on her, hoping that any large chunks wouldn’t hit her.
Ferris pulled his sidearm and shot Bishop in the chest. The suit’s armor kept him alive, but the impact knocked him back a step, where he tripped over a soldier, fell on his back, and lost grip on his multi-firearm.
Ferris rose to his feet, looking to put a bullet in Bishop’s face, but the body
of the man Dean had turned to hamburger hit Ferris before he could fire. After tossing the body at Ferris, Dean charged at him just as a soldier coming through the door fired at him.
Bishop pumped rounds into the soldier until he fell, and then scooped the multi-firearm up from the floor as the next soldier filled the room with bullets. Bishop dove over the bar, twisted, turned, and fired a grenade, which gave them some breathing room, but he knew more would be coming.
“This bar’s not going to hold up,” a bleeding but still alive VP-23 said. “You aren’t the only one with grenades.”
“Can you run?” Bishop replied.
“It’s not like I have a choice.”
“Bleeding to death is an option.”
“I’m ready when you’re ready.”
Bishop said, “Shotgun full auto,” and dove over the bar again, this time sending buckshot toward the oncoming soldiers.
The bar blew up as VP-23 moved clear, firing his guns as he followed Bishop down the hallway.
As they moved into the first open room, Bishop voiced an order to Switch through his coms: “Lock the door.”
Ferris tossed the dead man off him and stood as his men came into the lobby. Three had been taken out by Bishop and the nameless, but he still had five men left to hunt them down.
26
X-1 hadn’t expected the brothel to be surrounded by tanks. Even more surprisingly, the twins had followed him out and caught up when he stopped to assess the situation as the tanks rolled on to their destination.
Quato, amazed at the happenings at Benji’s, was hobbling on a crutch, rushing to catch up.
X-1 said, “Everyone needs to get back to the plane. Wheels up ASAP.”
“What’s the hurry?” Little Lister asked.
“You recall Gemma’s mother. The pirates?”
“Yeah.”
“They are en route.”
“Shit.”
“Exactly,” X-1 said. “I need Gemma to cooperate, but if we have to leave Seven behind, that will be difficult to achieve.”
X-Squad Pawn City Page 7