Marcus waved a hand at the garden beds. “We don’t have much choice. Brendan has a point. If one of them looks up at the wrong moment...”
Frog bobbed a little higher. “I don’t think either of them will notice a thing.”
“Are you sure?” The team took a peek.
“Well, then...”
“Ooookay.”
“Is that even allowed in public?”
Stephanie pressed her fingers against her forehead and groaned. “While I hate to spoil a moment,” she murmured and her hands glowed blue, “I don’t think we can risk it.”
Shrouding herself in magic, she stood and whistled. The couple sat up and looked around. A quick flare of magic froze them before they could say anything, and a second flare knocked them out.
“Do you think they saw you?” Frog whispered. “Oh—”
“Nope.” Her form wavered back into visibility.
“Nice trick.”
The team sprinted to where the couple lay. They stopped when they reached them and crouched behind the cover of the rose bushes. Lars surveyed the sleeping pair. “No one’s ever going to believe they simply fell asleep.”
“Just... Cover them or something,” Stephanie hissed. “We don’t have all night.”
“And they certainly didn’t get all night.” Frog snickered. “I bet that’s the last time she lets him take her anywhere.”
Brenden nodded sagely as Lars pulled the blanket out from under the pair and draped it over them. “Yup, that’s one relationship ruined.”
“Go,” Stephanie whispered. “Lars and I have this covered.”
Frog waggled his eyebrows. “Uh huh. I’ll bet you have—”
He stifled a yelp as Johnny curled a hand under his bicep and dragged him in the direction of the footpath. One by one, the rest of the team followed. Vishlog tapped her on the shoulder. “Lars and I will finish here.”
She glanced at where Lars nudged the guy’s foot under the blanket and nodded. “We’ll wait at the edge of the park.”
“No,” Lars told her. “Keep them moving and get eyes on the consulate. We won’t be far behind you.”
“Done.” Stephanie moved swiftly after the team and the two cats stayed close.
She looked back in time to see Lars pull his wallet out and tuck a couple of notes in the guy’s hand.
“Dude,” the team leader’s whisper came over the comms, “buy some new underwear. You’re embarrassing the males of the species.”
Soft coughs and snorts showed what the team thought of that, but they kept them muffled and remained in the shadows.
“Head to the consulate,” she ordered. “We need to take a look at how close the data matches what we see.”
“So, we gonna peek over the fence.” Frog did not sound impressed. “It looks quiet—”
Lars slapped him on the shoulder. “It looks like you’re up, butthead. I need visual on the inside and I’d like the front door opened without having to knock.”
Stephanie cleared her throat. “You get the visuals. I can deal with unlocking an entrance.”
She glanced at Frog. “It doesn’t have to be the front one. We only need the clearest path to the biggest concentration of bad hats.”
Frog caught hold of Johnny. “We’re going home after a late night out,” he said and his teammate gave him a lopsided grin.
“Uh huh. Like New York.”
He grinned. “Egshactly!” he slurred.
Lars groaned. “Everyone else, get ready to go really loud, real soon. We’re not allowed to let these guys kill themselves.”
“Aw, why not?” Marcus gave a mock whine.
Avery pushed him and they both smirked.
The two men crept around the corner and re-emerged to wander down the middle of the street. It looked like they meant to cross but hadn’t worked out how since neither of them could steer a straight path.
Frog constantly poked Johnny and pointed at things they passed. When he did, they’d both exchange glances and giggle stupidly. They reached the sidewalk outside the consulate several feet down from the gate.
The smaller man pointed at the shadows under the archway.
“Uh, I gotta...”
Johnny unwound his arm so fast, his teammate stumbled, but he wove his way into the shadows and nothing happened. The larger man stepped behind the opposite pillar.
“He isn’t...” Stephanie watched Frog, horrified.
Marcus nodded sagely. “Yup... If that doesn’t bring them out, nothing will.”
“Tell me he’s not like that in real life.”
The guys exchanged glances before Avery replied. “Okay, Steph. He’s not like that in real life.”
He sounded exactly like he was repeating the words she’d asked and didn’t mean a single one of them. Brenden snickered.
“Heads up.” Lars had watched the gates and immediately noticed when one opened. He raised his blaster. “Let them handle it, but don’t let them get dead.”
“Gotcha,” Stephanie replied and quietly drew eMU in and held it ready. This time, she didn’t let it play across her hands. There was no way she wanted to be the one who gave them away.
Frog wheeled as a guard stepped through. He brought his hand down on the man’s shoulder and leaned toward him. “Esh tut...” he began.
A look of disgust crossed the man’s face as he pushed him away. “Hau ab!”
He stumbled back a few steps and the guard watched him start to turn. “Arschlo...”
Johnny stepped from behind the column to grab him, knock him out, and drag him through the open gate.
“Who’s the arschlock now, blödmann?”
“I told them I’d open the door,” Stephanie protested and Lars shrugged.
“You also told him he had to get into the system. The terminal’s on the inside.”
“And you didn’t—”
“There wasn’t time to explain.” He stood and led the team across the road. “It’s time to go.”
They hurried across the street, keeping a close eye on the consulate walls and windows. Stephanie shrouded them in magic to dull their outlines and quiet their footsteps. She held the magic around them after they’d made it safely past the gate and into the grounds.
A short, sharp whistle from Frog drew them into the shelter of the wall.
“I’m gonna need you to get us in there,” he said and pointed at the windows. “And it would be nice if you could do that thing you did at Sanmar’s. You know, with the little balls.”
She groaned. “Now, why didn’t I think of that?”
“Because you are not the Frogster...” he replied in perfect mimicry of Todd.
It startled a laugh out of her and she clapped her hands over her mouth. The guys moved, shifted several feet down the wall, and sank into a different set of shadows. As soon as they had settled again, she conjured several translucent spheres and used a little eMU to unlock the closest window.
A few short moments later, she reported back.
“There’s only one guard on the east entrance.”
Lars nodded. “That’s our way in, then.”
Stephanie raised her hand. “Yeah, but it’s a Dreth.”
“I can deal with him,” Vishlog interjected and Lars nodded.
The warrior smiled as he slipped away into the dark.
“Did you find out where the rest of them are?” the team leader asked.
She wished she had the magic to simply deliver the details directly to their HUDs and frowned. Now, how...
It seemed simple enough. She only had to get the magic ball to interface with the helmet...and she only had to do it with one...
It would be exactly like the Meligornian magic worked—although that was essentially equipment powered by magic. Still, it was the same principle, right?
That was when she realized that experimenting with the HUDs not only when they were at the start of a mission but while they were actually on people’s heads might be a bad idea.
&n
bsp; Yeah, Steph. Let’s not blow their tiny little minds.
She smirked and ignored Lars’s curious look. “It was only a thought.”
“The last thought you had ended disastrously for those involved.”
Stephanie pouted, read the information from the returning globes, and pulled her tablet out of its case. The guys crowded around, shielding the glow from outside eyes.
With the information from the spheres, she quickly populated the map with the exits that were guarded and the location of the main rebel body, two automated gun turrets overlooking the courtyard, and the patrols.
“Well, damn...” Lars murmured as she shut the tablet down hastily and shoved it into its pouch.
Avery and Brendan eliminated the lead guard when he rounded the corner of the building, and Johnny and Lars dealt with the next two. The cats took care of the last ones. None of them left any rebels alive to question.
“Did you have to kill them all?” she asked and the team leader shrugged.
“Oops?”
“And I thought you were the responsible one.”
“I didn’t want to risk any of them passing a warning.”
They dragged the bodies into the garden bed and tucked them out of sight beneath a thick hedge under a double window.
“Do you think we can block all the exits?” he asked and she frowned in thought.
“I can jam the doors so they can’t reach the windows in the outer walls,” she suggested.
“And we can get you to block the entry to any of the unpopulated areas,” he added.
“I’ll merely rearrange the structure,” Stephanie told him. “Like I did with the ship.”
“Except this time, you’ll deal with wood and stone,” he told her. “Do you think you can manage it?”
“Give me a minute.”
It took more than a minute and Vishlog had returned by the time she was done. Wood and stone were very different to work with than ship metal. She opened her eyes in time to watch the Dreth stow another body under the hedge when he arrived.
“There are others we can preserve,” he told her.
She sent out another half a dozen orbs to verify that she’d managed to do what she’d hoped by checking the tablet once again.
“Yes!” She grinned and noted the way the stone had flowed over and around the edges of the doors. “No one will open those in a hurry.”
There was now only one way in and out and she highlighted it on the map.
“There,” she told them and pointed it out on the device. “That’s our way in.”
Chapter Sixteen
They went in fast. Vishlog took the lead and the two cats ran by his side.
“Here squeekie, squeekie, squeekie,” he roared and the animals’ ears pricked.
Stephanie wondered how long it would take Bumblebee and Zeekat to work out the Dreth meant something entirely different than what they thought of when he used the word squeekie.
They raced down the corridor until they reached the area the rebels had set up. According to the floorplans, this had once been an administration wing. It made sense since it would have had all the connections they needed to the interplanetary web.
“We need to clear them from the bottom up,” Lars shouted. “Steph, I need that stairwell blocked.”
She directed a blast of magic down the corridor, blew out the wall and door leading to the stairwell, and filled the cavity with debris. The dull boom as the building shook to its foundation was followed by the sound of doors being thrown open in panic.
Some of those were slammed closed again equally as fast.
“Did your magic bubble drones show if these rooms were interconnected?” Lars shouted, and she shook her head.
“I looked for life signs, not doors.”
From the other side of the wall, they heard doors slamming and footsteps running as rebels moved from room to room.
“Well, that answers that, then,” Frog muttered and blew a hole in the closest door.
Bumblebee bounded past him and leapt out as quickly again when purple streaks of magic crackled overhead.
“They have magic!” Avery yelled as Bumblebee reversed direction and hurtled through the door with a roar.
Frog laughed. “That’s all right. We have cats.”
Zeekat echoed Bee’s roar and ran after him.
Seconds later, the first shriek resounded from the room beyond. Another scream followed, then more footsteps as the remaining occupants fled.
“Frog, we need that data—and any rebels the cats left alive,” Lars ordered. “Johnny, cover him. Vishlog, take Avery and Brenden and clear the other side. Marcus, we have Steph.”
She took the central corridor. Unable to see where the rebels had gone, she stalked down it, blasted doors off their hinges, and demolished wall panels. One of the rebels discovered the blocked stairwell, took one look at her, and tried to dive out the window at the end of the corridor.
Stephanie flung out an upraised hand and he bounced off the glass to land flat on his back in the corridor. She ran forward, grasped his shoulders, and thrust him back to the floor when he started to rise. Lars shot another one before he could fire at her.
“Prisoners!” she shouted, and he altered his aim on the next to shatter a shoulder.
“Goddammit!” Marcus swore and fired a short burst toward the end of the corridor they’d just come down. “We have cockroaches making a break for the front door.”
“Zee! Bee! Fetch!” she shouted and pointed the two felines in that direction as a Meligornian peered through the door at them.
The cats roared and the man dropped the spell he’d been preparing and ran. Another rebel dashed past the door, shooting blindly through it as he passed. The animals dodged to the side before Zeekat took two long bounds and crouched.
The rebel panicked and froze as Zee leapt high, pounced over the rebel’s SMG, and landed in a scratching, rending frenzy of claws.
“I guess he doesn’t like it when they’re pointed at him, either,” Marcus noted as the SMG went off.
“Zee!” Stephanie cried but the feline continued its destruction unharmed.
Marcus, on the other hand, gave a short gasp of surprise and doubled over. “Of all the maggoted fucking luck,” he muttered, and dropped onto his knees. Lars crouched beside him, surprised that the round had penetrated the armor. He wondered if they had been enhanced in some way, or if it was simply an unlucky flaw no one had picked up.
“Steph,” he called when he’d been able to unfold Marcus enough to see the wound. He undid the armor and lifted it enough to take a look before he dragged her down beside him. “You need to stop the bleeding. I’ll take care of the cats.”
He didn’t wait for her to argue but ran toward the stairs. “Johnny, Avery, Brenden—on me. Frog, I want that data.”
“Man wants the data. Froggie mind the car,” his teammate bitched and shouted, “What happens if I want to shoot some asshole?”
“You’ll get your turn!” Johnny yelled in response as he headed out the door. “But don’t get shot while I’m gone. Steph’s pissed off enough.”
She heard the words as if they came from a distance. Blood oozed from under Marcus’s body armor and he was breathing fast.
“If...you...can...do...something for the shock, too...” he told her. “Be grateful.”
“You’ll be fine.” She laid a finger over his lips
He managed a bubbling laugh. “Already that...”
Stephanie closed her eyes and ribbons of blue arced over her hands and along her arms. He kept his gaze on her face and continued, “...Freaked out...Insecure...”
He gasped when she slid her hands under the armor and took a longer breath as magic flowed over his skin and the pain eased.
“Do that again...”
She smiled at him and shook her head. “Nuh-uh. Medics will fix the rest. Right now, I hafta go obliterate the auto-guns.”
Marcus stared at her, his face pale and sheened with s
weat. “Lars—”
“He is chasing roaches and I don’t want him distracted—or shot. Yeah, that, too.” She looked away. “Frog! Don’t let him get shot again.”
“Oh, sure, because I can pull data and take care of the dumbass doing impressions of a sieve.”
“If he gets shot, you’ll be the one looking like a colander.”
“What the fuck’s a colander?”
“A swiss cheese bucket.”
“Fine. I’ll explain to Marcus why he’s supposed to not get shot.”
Stephanie ran past him and he glared at her. “Don’t mind me. I like looking after the car.”
“I’ll remember that.”
“He needs a blanket.”
“Get him one—and call the Navy in while you’re at it.”
With that, she was gone.
“Fuck!”
He checked that the download was running smoothly and headed over to Marcus. On the way, he dragged a silver emergency blanket out of his first aid kit.
When he reached his teammate he asked, “Are you okay, fuck-knuckle?”
“Do I look okay?”
“You look like you should be taking me to dinner and dancing.”
The other man laughed, then groaned, and Frog surveyed the area around them. Thankfully, it was clear, and he looked at his teammate. “She’s not real great at fixing what gets broke.”
“Did a good enough job...on me.”
Frog patted his chest. “I’m sure she did. You’ll be fine.” He found the Navy frequency and called the shuttle in. “Steph’s dealing with the auto-guns, now,” he said. “You should be cleared to land.”
“We’d better be. You get my boat scratched and you’ll polish it out.”
“Buddy, we ain’t that close.” He smirked and cut the connection.
He made sure Marcus was covered and checked the computers. The download was running uninterrupted, and he frowned. Nothing should be this easy.
With the other man to watch over, he didn’t have time to ride shotgun on it and returned to his teammate. “So,” he said. “What are we gonna tell your girl this time around?”
“Don’t have a girl,” Marcus replied.
“Yeah, you do. That cute redhead with the china-doll eyes.”
“She left the last time I got shot.”
Witch Of The Federation III (Federal Histories Book 3) Page 19