His hired guns arrived in piecemeal, one or two at a time, flying from all over the world on private hypersonic aircraft. At noon, a convoy of trucks laden with the mercenaries’ gear pulled in. The humans, for want of anything to do, helped to unload the trucks and organize their equipment. The giants simply stood and stared in silence until the handlers ordered them to help. The giants might be powerful, but they sure were stupid. Or maybe they were simply pretending to be stupid: one couldn’t tell with the denizens of the Void.
When they were done, the giants wandered off and kept to themselves, leaving the humans to their own devices. They spoke only when spoken to, answering in grunts or monotonous monosyllables. They lacked personality, but he needed killers, not talkers.
By mid-afternoon, Brandt had more guns and men than Hexenhammer could hope to match. When the last mercenary arrived, Brandt gathered everyone and began his briefing.
“Gentlemen, thank you for coming today on such short notice. You may address me as Herr Müller. My two associates are Herren Meier and Schmidt. Treat everything they say as a direct order from me.
“This is a counterterrorist operation. A gang of terrorists will be flying into Switzerland on an airship. They believe I am on their side. I will direct them to land at a kill zone, where you will be waiting for them. Your mission is simple. Kill them all and seize their airship.”
These were soldiers of fortune. For the right price they would do anything: guard a billionaire, kidnap a terrorist leader, overthrow a small country. But none of them knew about the Organization, and he didn’t need them talking about this mission. Better they believe that, if only this once, they were on the side of the angels.
“Your standard rates apply. However, among the terrorists is a woman named Eva Martel. She is their leader. If you can, take her alive. I don’t necessarily need her intact, only well enough to answer questions. If you capture her, I will pay each of you a bonus of ten thousand dollars.”
As he spoke, his subordinates passed out photos of her.
“Make no mistake: she is a hardened killer. She is armed and dangerous, and she is a world-class psion. She may have access to aetherium and nythium. Do not take any unnecessary risks. Your lives come above hers. If you are required to kill her, it is an acceptable outcome and will not negatively impact your performance assessment. Any questions so far?”
A man raised his hand. “Herr Müller, what if there are survivors?”
“There may be Hesperians among them. Separate the Hesperians from the rest and hand them to me for interrogation. As for the others, there will be no survivors.”
“Understood.”
There were no more questions. Brandt continued.
“Based on the intelligence we recover from this operation, there may be follow-up engagements. We will treat those as separate contracts in addition to the current one.”
The mercenaries nodded. Most of them kept poker faces, but their eyes glittered with greed. For men like these, money was the best motivator. At least Brandt had an unlimited expense account for this job.
“Your equipment is in the boxes behind you. Take your equipment and follow me. Your transportation is waiting.”
***
Even by Swiss standards the Koehl farm was remote. Brandt could fight the next world war here, and nobody would notice.
The Koehls weren’t his relatives, of course. He doubted that that was even their real name. When he first took charge of Swiss operations, he learned of a network of safe houses the Organization had established in the country. The Koehl farm was one of them.
It was a way station for Organization operatives to lay low and to recuperate in between missions. The Koehls provided the fiction of employment to visiting Organization members and backstopped inconvenient inquiries from meddlesome government figures. Letting Hexenhammer gain access to the farm was a dangerous double game, but the Organization had plenty of other safe houses, the Koehls had agreed to his plan, and every Hexenhammer member who had been to the farm was now either dead or soon to die.
When the trucks arrived at the farm, the Koehls went out to receive them. There were only two of them today, the middle-aged couple Brandt thought of as Herr and Frau Koehl. He wasn’t quite sure of their exact relationship; for all he knew they might actually be married. As Brandt jumped out of the vehicle, he saw Herr Koehl waving him over.
“Herr Koehl, grüezi,” Brandt said.
“Grüezi, Herr Koehl. It’s been too long, ja?”
“Ja. Shame we have to meet again under such circumstances.”
Koehl shrugged phlegmatically. “It has to be done, ja? Never expected we might have to turn our farm into a kill zone.”
“The Organization will compensate you for damages.”
“This is our primary livelihood, Herr Koehl. If it’s not too much trouble, we ask that you keep collateral damage to a minimum.”
“Certainly. But you must understand, Hexenhammer is the target. You have seen them at work.”
Koehl sighed. “Well, I suppose my family is due a holiday, ja?”
The man’s tic was infectious. “Ja. What’s the status of the farm?”
“We have removed everything valuable off-site, and the guest workers have been dismissed. We have electricity, running water and a week’s supply of food for your men.” Koehl licked his cracked lips. “We might have some difficulty later though.”
“How so?”
“The apple harvest has just begun. Simply letting the workers go was a little unexpected. We explained to them that we had found evidence of disease, and we are suspending operations until we receive a full report from experts.”
“Do you need us to destroy the crops?”
Koehl shook his head. “If only it were so simple, Herr Müller. We grow multiple crops here. We must guard against a single blight wiping out our entire harvest, ja? Disease is no excuse to halt all operations on our farm, and it is extremely unlikely for multiple diseases affecting different crops to strike all at once. Awkward questions will be asked, ja? Further…”
Koehl frowned and looked around Brandt’s shoulder. His frown grew deeper.
“If your men are using that kind of hardware, there may be unexplainable damage that cannot be hidden. We might be forced to relocate under new identities.”
“I understand. Do not worry: the Organization takes care of its own. When this is over, we shall discuss what needs to be done.”
“Excellent, Herr Brandt. Is our continued presence required?”
“Nein. We don’t know when the targets will show up, and we can take care of things from here. You are free to go.”
“Very well. Alles Gueti.”
The Koehls drove off in their private car. The mercenaries unpacked their gear in an open field, practically drooling over the equipment. He recognized some of them from his service in the Army: SG 656 assault rifles, P480 pistols, body armor. The rest he had never seen before, but the leader of the mercenaries, a Hesperian who went by Snow, had insisted on them, and whatever he wanted the Organization provided.
The mercenaries got to work, studying the area and setting up defensive positions. Snow had tried to explain what he intended to do, but Brandt demurred: he was a spy, an intelligence man; his art was the shaping of nations and the swaying of hearts, not the killing of men. Brandt simply placed the giants under Snow’s command and let the mercenary do as he pleased.
Brandt established an office inside the den on the first floor of the farmhouse. Within ten minutes, he had his satphone, slates, encryption units, battery packs and everything he needed to run an operation. Checking his Organization-issue slate, he discovered a new mail.
We may have discovered the target’s airship. Please call me.
There was a phone number below the text. Brandt sank into a comfortable couch, powered up his satphone, attached an encryption unit to the device and dialed the number. The man Brandt knew as Portier picked up after a single ring.
“Oui?�
��
“It’s me,” Brandt said, switching to Gallian. “I read your email.”
“Ah, fantastique. We’ve found anomalous air traffic that may be linked to Hexenhammer. A single airship that meets your criteria.”
“Please tell me more.”
“Three days ago, an airship appeared in Rhosia. It landed in Tula and then took off again. It flew under the radar and reappeared at the Novgorod airport. After a brief stay, the airship departed Rhosian airspace.”
“What’s so special about this airship?”
Brandt sensed the man’s smile.
“It was at Amarantopolis and Rome on the dates you provided us. As for the date you gave us for Dusseldorf, the airship was at Brussels Airport the following morning. I’m sure you agree this is no coincidence.”
Brandt hadn’t told Portier what had happened in those cities, but he had no doubt Portier could put two and two together.
“What’s the name of the airship?”
“Ah, that’s the interesting thing. During her flight across Pantopia she was named Kalypso. She flew over the Baltic Sea for a while and then abruptly changed course and headed back to the continent. Now she calls herself Helene.”
“How did you spot the airship?”
“The Kalypso is a converted Soviet-era military airship. Very distinct radar signature. After reaching the Baltic, she descended sharply and dropped off the radar. Three hours later, an airship with the same flight characteristics reappeared on the German air defense net, but her transponder claimed she was Helene.”
It was a cute trick. Against a single military, it might have worked. But the Organization had tentacles everywhere. Brandt had no doubt that Portier had a man inside the Atlantic Alliance Integrated Air Defense Network with access to the continent-wide radar network.
“Where is the Helene now?”
“Its last stop was Amsterdam, and it filed a flight plan to Geneva. Presently… it has just crossed the border into Switzerland.”
Mein Gott! She was fast—faster than he had expected. His mercenaries had barely made it in time.
“Merci. Keep me updated on its movements.”
Once again, he reminded himself that she was good. But he was better.
She had a ragtag group of second-rate vigilantes and maybe some covert Hesperian support. He had men, money, munitions, materiel and most of all, the full backing of the Organization. He was sure she had a surprise planned for him. But so did he.
He was sorely tempted to place another phone call. The AIADN controlled the Alliance’s particle beam defense systems. A few blasts and everyone aboard Helene would be history. It was as easy as snapping his fingers.
On the other hand… if the Hesperians were backing Hexenhammer, he needed to know. The Organization needed to know. After a particle beam strike, there would be no survivors to interrogate and no intact electronics to download. There would also be the rather inconvenient problem of convincingly explaining away the crash and the PB discharge.
No, better for the airship to land and for his men to take care of the situation. Nobody else needed to know about the Organization.
He laced his fingers behind his head and exhaled sharply. He could feel this operation coming to a head. And no matter what happened, he—and the Organization—would come out on top.
5. The Nature of the Game
The flight from Amsterdam to Geneva lasted eleven and half hours. We spent that time on last-minute rehearsals: equipment checks and familiarization, weapons drills, close quarters battle training. Mainly for Eve.
“We need you to stay at the rear of the stack at all times,” I said. “Don’t take this the wrong way. You don’t have the training we do, and we don’t time to bring you up to our level. What you can do is carry the spare ammo and watch our backs.”
“Understood,” she said.
In the starboard cargo hold, we laid down tape on the floor, recreating every floor of the buildings we might have to clear. The dimensions were off, so we had to rely on Eve’s memories to reproduce the interiors, and we could only train on one floor at a time. It wasn’t a shoot house. We couldn’t fire on targets, and we had to run with dry weapons.
What we could do was reacquaint ourselves with the basics of CQB, rehearse actions on target and cram Eve’s head with critical information.
After lunch, we worked on long-range infiltration. We could teach Eve how to precisely move her limbs to minimize the chances of being spotted. We could try to cover up her lack of technique with camouflage gear and invisibility cloaks. But in the end, it was up to her to make the use of it.
Bob and Ricky handled this part of training. She had to stalk from one end of the cargo hold to the other without being spotted. Whenever the duo saw her, she had to restart. Which she did, repeatedly. At least she was getting better quickly.
Keith brought me aside, taking us out her earshot.
“Think she can hack it?” he asked.
“If she can’t, we’ll leave her behind,” I replied. “And look; she made it.”
Eve stood triumphantly at the finish line. Bob and Ricky applauded and then sent her back to the starting line.
“Stalking across the length of a cargo hold is one thing. Stalking across an open field for hours under observation by enemy snipers is another. One wrong move, and she’ll get her head blown off.”
There was one thing we could not do. A stalk demanded infinite patience and discipline. We could not test for that here, nor could we instill it in her.
“That’s why she’s in the least mission critical role,” I said.
Keith looked at me for a moment. “That’s cold, man. I thought you wanted to deal her in?”
“I have faith in her… but she’s not one of us.”
“This isn’t just about her. If she’s spotted in the infil, all of us will be compromised.”
“You know the standard response. Pop smoke, launch rockets, fire and maneuver, breach and clear.”
“If it’s just the six of us, we wouldn’t be having the conversation.”
“Yes, but do you want to fight eight giants with just three psions? I don’t like the hand we’re dealt. We’ve got to roll with what we’ve got.”
His eyes narrowed. “Is it just that?”
“Of course it is. If she were a normie, I’d leave her aboard without a second thought.”
“This had better work out. Our asses are on the line here.”
“Mine, too.”
***
We arrived at Geneva in the evening. We had dinner in the airport, filled the ambrosia bladders in our backpacks and then waited for sunset. The moment it grew dark, we returned to the airship, kitted up and headed to our insertion point.
At midnight, the airship approached a clearing in the middle of a forest. Gathering in the drawing room, we suited up, donned our packs, checked our loads, readied our weapons and donned our burqas.
In previous wars, snipers built ghillie suits out of local vegetation to disappear into the background. A ghillie suit was hot—even hotter if you supplemented it with thermal insulation layers—and you had to move extremely slowly to avoid being spotted.
Today, metamaterials had changed the game. A metamaterial cloak could completely bend light around itself; a person who looked at anything wrapped in a cloak would only see what was behind the object and maybe a faint outline if he were an arm’s length away. Military-grade cloaks had built-in thermal insulation layers. Anyone who wore one was virtually invisible. Thick, heavy and voluminous, the cloak covered every square inch of the body while providing ample space for the wearer to conceal an assault pack and load carriage equipment under the cloak. It also uncannily resembled a burqa, right down to the mesh screen covering the face.
Our AK-122s had similar camouflage sheaths. Checking myself in a mirror, I saw my black assault gloves, the AK’s optics, the suppressor, the magazine, the exposed metal tube of its telescoping stock, the soles of my assault boots and a blurry ou
tline of my full-face helmet. The burqa couldn’t make us completely invisible, but it would prevent the enemy from spotting and recognizing human silhouettes until it was too late.
I patted myself down, checking that I had everything. Ammo, tools, radio, armor and a bladder filled with UHCA.
The last thing we did was peel off flaps on the shoulders of our burqas, exposing infrared reflective panels. We still had to see each other in the dark, but once on target, we’d refasten them.
The airship landed. The boarding ramp dropped. We spilled out in the darkness, taking up security positions around the aircraft. I stayed near the ramp, watching and listening.
The cries of nocturnal insects surrounded us, punctuated by the occasional hooting of an owl. I turned my fusion goggles on. The four tubes mounted at my forehead fed what they saw to my visor, combining night vision and thermal imaging. I saw nothing to worry about.
As the ramp raised behind me, I clicked the push-to-talk switch three times. Keith, Bob and Eve fell in on me. Ricky and Alex collapsed on Keith. Glancing behind me, I saw six faint patches glowing red against a dark green backdrop, and a few splotches of slightly brighter green. It was the only sign that there were people there.
Holding my left arm behind me, I waggled it left to right, letting everyone behind me see the movement of my arm’s infrared panel. Then, I swept it forward in an exaggerated arc. The team formed a wedge behind me. I glanced at Pete. He gave me a thumbs-up. I returned the gesture.
We set off.
***
Twenty-five kilometers was a long way to travel on foot. At least for civilians like Eve. But the exoskeleton bore the weight of our packs and kit, completely negating the burden. All we had to do was put one foot in front of the other.
A sea of stars glimmered above my head. It was bright enough to navigate by the naked eye. I headed south by southeast, orienting myself by the stars and double-checking with my compass.
Hammer of the Witches Page 45