Boone spotted the core immediately. He had more than a passing familiarity with the spherical devices. He’d pulled his share of rotations in the armory aboard the Callaghan, and though his job had been to restock the handheld weapons his platoon used, it had been impossible to ignore his Navy counterpart working in the bay alongside him. While Boone stacked CUSP batteries and filled magazines from ship’s stores, the ensign next door was busy swapping out battle drone cores.
This, he felt certain, came from the guts of just such a device.
He drew it out to study it more carefully. Ordering his wire to handshake with the core did no good; the ping returned an ‘access denied.’ Frowning, he upwardly revised his opinion of the woman who was making her way to the loading dock. Setting the core aside for the moment, he returned his attention to the toolbox for a final assessment. What he found had his jaw tightening in anger.
There were no fewer than eight abandoned soft cases used for stabilizing explosive devices. They sat crumpled in the space beneath where the core had lain.
Other than that, the toolbox was empty… save for one lone, broken crawler.
So, this is how she set the explosive that just went off, he realized grimly.
Crawlers were machines that could be remotely controlled, programmed to carry an explosive device and plant it safely wherever its wielder ordered it to go. The unit could also interface with the bomb and function as a remote detonator.
This particular unit was defective; one of its twelve centipede-like legs was bent at an odd angle, and when he tried to flex it, it broke off in his hands.
The thing must’ve errored out on her. Which meant…
He rummaged more carefully around in the toolbox, until he found what he was looking for: one final soft case, intact.
Knowing he’d already spent more time away from his target than he should have, Boone carefully lifted the soft case, palmed the dazzler’s core, and headed back to the door that would lead him down to the loading bay.
37: EXIT STRATEGY
Tiki Hut
Outside Saltwater pool
The bomb went off while Petra’s head was stuck inside the damn t-shirt. She staggered, her proprioception hampered by the soft material. Shoving her arms through its sleeves, she yanked hard on its hem and stumbled out onto the sidewalk once more. The ethereal singing sound of the cable striking the ES field dragged her attention upward and she gaped in horror at the sight it presented.
He wasn’t supposed to set them where they’d do any harm! Livid that she’d been played and now more convinced than ever that Jay had never been a member of her small band of thieves, Petra raced to catch up to the man escorting the two teens.
Whatever your end game is, Jay Henson, I am not dying for it! And if you’re still alive when I get off this wreck, I’m coming for you…
She spotted the three figures in the distance just as they came to a stop in front of the concession hut.
“Wait! Please,” she called out, legitimate panic sounding in her voice. It caused the man to turn.
He nodded, but only after giving her a swift appraisal. That one look told Petra that taking the time to grab the t-shirt off the rack had been a wise move.
She came to a stop in front of him, breathless. Motioning to the hut, she asked, “Is there room for one more?”
The man stepped aside, wordlessly inviting her to precede him.
So far, so good. Now, to identify which brat belongs to those soldiers, grab her, and get the hell out of here.
There were several youngsters inside, but the girls arrowed toward the back where a woman stood alongside a small group of teenagers. Acutely conscious of the compact pistol resting in the small of her back, Petra took a more circuitous route, keeping her back to the wall. She took her time, sizing up the people in the small, confined space.
The girls huddled together, whispering, the two recent arrivals animated as they described their recent encounter. Petra sidled closer to see if she could identify which one in the group she should target.
* * *
“We need to shut this shit down, now.” Thad indicated the remaining three cables. “There have to be access points for these somewhere. What do you want to bet they’ve been breached, too, and the same asshole who set off that last bomb has the others rigged?”
“Wait.” Gabe snagged him by the arm as Thad began to walk away. “Even a place as old as this has to have a failsafe. Thrusters, small fusion drives, some sort of backup in case of catastrophic failure.”
Thad paused, brows raised. “I hear you, hoss. But with a rust bucket this old, you want to entrust your life to the possibility they’ve been well maintained?”
Gabe remained firm. “One of us needs to head to the office; try to get plans for the platform, talk to someone in charge. With that thing being severed,” he pointed skyward, “it changes things. We’re not just cleaning out two small warring cartel factions. Something else is going on here. That’s a terrorist threat.”
Thad frowned. “You don’t think this is a distraction, to buy them time to get away?”
Gabe shook his head. “We can’t assume that, no.” He inclined his head to the center of the platform. “Look, my NCIC badge got us inside once. I’ll go; you try to secure those cables.”
“Which one are you going to?” Asha asked Thad. She glanced at Gabe, and added, “If any of us sees Boone’s Marine buddies, we can send them to the other two cable access points.”
“Good thinking.” Thad turned and pointed. “Straight up math says that’s the cable that puts us at the most risk right now. I’ll head there. Put Ramirez on that one,” he pointed again, then pivoted and pointed a third time, “and Davila on the last one.”
“Copy that,” Asha said. Her expression hardened as her gaze swept the park. “We know which one’s their leader; Boone’s laundry room feed showed that clear enough.” She looked back at Thad, determination flashing in her eyes. I’ll go after her and persuade her to give up intel on the remaining bombs.”
38: INFILTRATION
Loading Dock
As Jayden entered the loading dock, her eyes landed on the shuttle Petra had commandeered. The vid recorder built into her wire’s data partition captured the holographic logo emblazoned on its side, advertising one of the food and beverage companies that supplied Searcy with its concession material.
Since she’d been the one to arrange the rental, she’d purposely chosen a shuttle make and model that, after careful research, the legitimate food and beverage company had never owned. This would be yet another nail in Petra’s coffin.
Satisfied she’d captured enough footage to document the shuttle, she spun, eyes seeking the transport she’d arranged for her escape. Tension flowed from her shoulders as she neared the sky park’s maintenance shuttle.
In all, she reflected, things hadn’t turned out too terribly bad.
Truth be told, adding military casualties into the mix could work in her favor. It would make the tragedy that much more newsworthy.
She frowned when she set her palm against the transport, and it didn’t immediately open for her. She looked stupidly down at her hand, as if it were to blame. Then she shook herself with a wry little laugh at her whimsy. If she had learned anything in her checkered and storied career, it was that there was always more than one way inside a shuttle.
Her hand trailed along the side of the machine as she rounded the rear of the craft. She pressed her palm against its aft patch, with no more luck than she’d had at the cockpit door. Frowning when it didn’t respond, she continued her circuit, approaching the front from the shuttle’s far side.
With the bulk of the large airframe now between her and anyone who might wander into the dock, Jayden felt a layer of tension flow from her. No one should be out now, considering the SI’s evac order, but one could never be too careful.
Her eyes landed on the open charging port and the cable attached to it, and she smiled in relief, mentally chiding h
erself for not thinking of this sooner. This explained the locked doors. Safety precautions precluded entrance to the shuttle until the cable was disconnected.
She knelt beside the controls of the charging unit and got to work. Unfamiliar with how this specific model functioned, her hands fumbled around trying to find the release. She muttered a soft imprecation when it didn’t immediately spring open.
“Damned ancient platform with its centuries old tech,” she muttered, grabbing the unit with both hands and wiggling it side to side in an effort to free it from its clamps.
She stilled abruptly. What was that sound?
She sat quietly for a full minute, listening. When the sound wasn’t repeated, she relaxed.
Probably this old hulk creaking, she decided. Losing a tether could shake things up a bit. With only three remaining cables, its center of mass would have shifted.
Returning to her task with renewed vigor, she yanked once more—and went flying backward when the thing finally came free. She tossed the charger to one side and scrambled to her feet, sealing the shuttle’s charging port. She was ready to get the hell off this rickety old platform.
In the end, it would all be worth it. The bombs were set to remote detonate; all that remained was for her to send the command codes. She’d wait until she was far enough away that the blasts wouldn’t negatively impact her. And she’d be damn sure she got plenty of footage, too.
I deserve a medal for everything I’ve been through, she thought. Infiltrating the cartel, behaving like the perfect little crewmember, sucking up to the arrogant and ambitious Petra Cooke.
Looking at her overlay’s chrono, she saw that the timer she’d set on the dazzler’s core still had fifteen minutes left until it went dormant. Once the thing shut down, there would be chaos, the beautiful cacophony of panicked victims flooding the pubnet with their personal accounts of the tragic events at Searcy.
Their frightened pleas would hit the public net just as Jayden herself went live.
Damn, can I orchestrate a drama or what, she thought smugly, a smile teasing her lips as the shuttle’s cockpit door finally opened for her. She slipped inside and began to power the unit up.
* * *
The moment Boone entered the loading dock, he heard a clanging coming from the far side of the bay. It sounded like his target was battling with a recalcitrant piece of equipment. He quickened his steps, needing to get on that shuttle before she departed.
Based on the sounds coming from its opposite side, he felt confident he could make it there in time. As he closed the distance, his eyes swept the stacks of boxes and equipment scattered against the dock’s rear wall, seeking something, anything, that he could use to his advantage.
A coil of carbyne-jacketed nylon rope, lying carelessly on top of a pile of crates caught his eye. Adding the wire to his arsenal, Boone set off at a silent jog for the shuttle.
Coming to a stop beside one of its skids, he ducked his head to peer under it to confirm the woman’s location on the other side. Based on the sounds she made, she appeared to be wrestling with the charging cable that was hooked into the shuttle’s battery port.
He eased his way aft, crab-walking silently, one hand cradling the core while the other held his CUSP at low ready. His sniper rifle knocked quietly against his back at each step he took.
When he reached the rear of the craft, he placed a hand beside the palmpad that would open the transport’s hatch and paused. Ducking his head once more, he kept his eyes locked on the woman’s feet. They shifted back and forth, punctuated by grunts and quiet curses as she struggled with the recalcitrant cable. She staggered back with a sharp inhale as the cable came free, its end hitting the deck with a loud clang.
At the same time, Boone’s hand slammed down on the hatch’s palmpad. He slipped through as soon as the opening was wide enough to accommodate his frame, turning and palming the door shut as soon as he’d cleared it. He took a fast look around at the loading bay as it sealed with a soft hiss. Save for the two of them, it remained empty.
The woman had finished sealing the charging port. As she walked around the nose of the craft to get to the cockpit door, Boone did a quick recon of the interior. Other than a pair of cargo straps piled in a corner, it was empty. He added them to the coil of wire he’d procured and crawled into the passenger area, silently thankful for electrochromic windows that defaulted to opaque while the transport was at rest.
There were four rows of passenger seating between cargo and the cockpit. A quick assessment told him the best spot to hide was behind the first row. The high back of the row in front would completely obscure him from view. Through the cockpit windscreen, the top of the woman’s head disappeared as she ducked beneath the air intake nacelle. It was time to move.
He slid into place, crouching just behind the pilot’s side first bench as the woman opened the cockpit door. Boone slipped the carbyne-jacketed wire over his shoulder and set one of the cargo straps on the bench behind him within easy grasp.
Reaching under the bench, he carefully pushed the second strap until it overlapped the line where the partition between cockpit and cabin would rise. He’d been chewed out by Navy pilots for ‘fouling the sensors’ enough times to know how easy it was to do. The tip of a boot, a piece of poorly placed gear, or even the sleeve of a drakeskin suit could keep the partition from rising. The cargo strap would do the job just fine. The core he settled between his feet. CUSP in hand, he waited.
Given her lack of situational awareness up to this point, Boone was banking that the woman wouldn’t check the shuttle’s interior for intruders. He figured she’d be more focused on potential threats from the loading bay than any that might lurk inside.
He’d take her out if he had to, but it was a bit hard to get intel out of someone when they weren’t conscious.
Just get in and fly the damn thing, he thought.
Fortune favored him. As he’d predicted, the woman’s gaze remained fixed on the bay outside the shuttle as she slid into the cockpit. Not once did she glance behind her.
She operated the dock’s ES field airlock system with a confidence that told Boone she’d done this a time or two. As she eased the transport out into Beryl’s twilight sky, he shifted forward to catch a glimpse of the windscreen so he could get a feel for where she was headed. She banked and brought the shuttle to a hover. Curious he risked another look. The shuttle’s holodisplay was up, the autopilot showing a racetrack pattern with the platform at its center.
He pulled back, mentally reviewing what he’d just seen, and came to a grim conclusion. At this distance, they were far enough away that the transport would be safe from any overpressure wave caused by another blast.
On the other hand… He looked down at the core. They were also far enough away that the core between his feet should no longer influence the platform. Thad and the rest of the team should have comms back by now.
39: UNJAMMED
Sky park grounds
Thad was halfway to his destination when the combat net reestablished itself. He came to an abrupt halt as four icons populated on his overlay, each one designating the location of a team member.
{Sitrep!} he barked out, one eye on the sky park’s map that displayed on his overlay, the other on his surroundings as he eased past a cluster of leafy vine-like undergrowth.
{Bungee One clear,} came Ramirez’s voice. {Ran into Agent Alvarez; he pointed me to cable three. On my way there now.}
{Bungee Two, clear, one tango trussed and ready for pickup,} responded Davila. {Need me at a cable, sir?}
{Affirmative. Get your ass over to the one by the infinity pool, port side.}
Davila sent a fast two-click in response to Thad’s command.
{Found the guy you winged,} Asha broke in.
Something in her tone caught Thad’s attention. {You bag and tag him?} he asked.
{Nope. Someone else did. Permanently.} Asha’s voice was hard. {Even dead-checked him. Drilled him through the back of the h
ead a second time, just to be certain.}
{One of the smugglers?} Gabe asked.
Asha sent a mental nod. {It must be. All the enforcers are accounted for. It tracks, especially if they’ve upped the ante with explosives. Based on Boone’s surveillance feed, it must be one of the two missing women.}
At her mention of the corporal, Thad’s attention swung back to the icons showing over the combat net. The young Marine’s ID was absent.
{Boone! Report.}
There was no response.
* * *
Petra had just determined which girl was related to the warriors who were indiscriminately taking out both her team and the enforcers when the jammer suddenly quit.
{Boss!} Delia’s voice came across her wire a beat later.
{Where are you?} Petra demanded, opening the distance between herself and the gaggle of girls, now that she’d made positive identification.
{I loaded the goods onto the shuttle, like we discussed, and then came back out to find you and Kele when the net went down,} the woman replied. {Boss… the tether. We need to get out of here.} Delia’s normally confident tone sounded strained.
{Yeah, I know. I’m working on a plan right now.}
Petra’s gaze landed on the girls once more, but then moved on when she caught the man staring at her with an expression bordering on suspicion. She walked over to the entrance and looked out.
{Better make it quick, Boss. Hey, do you think the enforcers are responsible for the explosions?} Delia asked. {Oh, and Jay needs to get his eyes checked. ‘Only three enforcers,’ my ass. This place is lousy with them.}
Sudden Death (A Military Sci Fi Thriller) (The Biogenesis War Files) Page 17