Enemy One (Epic Book 5) (50 page)

*
      
*
      
*

Dashing to the nearest satellite dish, William slid to a halt and unzipped his demolitions bag. Behind him, Becan was urging him on. “Come on, come on, fast!” In the opposite direction, south of the complex, Tom was mirroring Donald as he did the same thing.

Pulling out a high explosive, William set it down at the base of the dish and synced it with the remote detonator. “Explosive set, move to the next one.” Leaping to his feet, the demolitionist ran full speed for the next satellite in line, the Irishman hot on his heels.

“What’s your progress inside the complex, over?” Lilan asked through his helmet comm. As he waited for a response, he kept his eyes on the two demolitionists as they worked their way from one satellite dish to the next.

David’s voice crackled through. “En route to where we need to be now.”

“We heard gunfire—you guys gettin’ some kind of resistance?”

Tone indicative of his disgust, David answered, “We’ll talk about that later.” The channel closed.

Shouldering his E-35, Lilan looked at the road leading to Hami. “Stay crisp, men! We’re liable to get some action here pretty soon.”

*
      
*
      
*

FLYING LOW IN HER Superwolf and circling in a wide orbit, Tiffany’s focus was a constant switch between the view outside of her cockpit window and her radar screen, which showed zero contacts. Queueing up the
Pariah
, she said, “Guessing we have, like, ten or so minutes before we start getting customers.”

“You getting the hang of that thing?” Travis asked.

She smirked behind her helmet. “ATFs, Vultures, crop dusters…they’re all the same, right?” On the other end, Travis chuckled. “I’m gonna widen my orbit, as long as that’s okay with the chief.”

Scott’s voice emerged. “I’m assuming I’m the chief?”

“Totally are!”

“Widen away.”

Easing her stick, the pilot veered her Superwolf into a wider orbit.

*
      
*
      
*

EDEN Command

THE WAR ROOM WAS bustling with activity when Benjamin Archer marched in. Bypassing the holographic globe completely, he walked straight for one of the supervisors as they leaned over a radar screen. “What’s going on?” the judge asked.

The officer stood erect. “A report is coming in from one of our hub facilities—
Hami Station
, in northern China.”

“What kind of report?”

“Numerous alarms have been triggered, both automated and by the staff. It’s some sort of hostile assault.”

The judge looked totally perplexed. “Is this one of our stations?”

Shaking his head, the officer answered, “No, sir, but our comm satellites use it as a relay. It’s one of the primary hubs of the region.”

“Who’s making the assault?” Archer strode toward the globe.

“We’re still waiting on confirmation.”

Resting his hands on the guard rail that surrounded the globe, Archer’s amber eyes narrowed in thought. Without looking back, he asked the officer, “What would be the effect of losing this station?”

Behind Archer, the officer raised an eyebrow. “In that region, significant—not only for us, but for the world. There’d be a blind spot on Earth.”

“A blind spot on the Earth,” Archer repeated quietly to himself. Ever so faintly, the judge’s nostrils flared. “Contact
Hong Kong
. I want air and ground forces sent to
Hami Station
immediately. And contact Torokin.” His lips twisted into a sneer. “Tell him we’ve found Remington.”

“Right away, sir.”

Inhaling sharply, Archer lifted his chin and stared down his nose at the holographic globe. As the pulsating dot over Hami, China, came around to his side, the judge’s glare fixed on it. “You’re desperate,” he whispered. “And we’re coming.”

Tuesday, March 20
^th
, 0012 NE

1332 hours

Novosibirsk, Russia

LOGAN AND MARTY were in the middle of a cafeteria meal when Torokin burst through the cafeteria’s double doors. Both men lurched upright, rising from their chairs to face him at his sudden entrance. It took only three words for the judge to capture their attention. “We have Remington!” All around the cafeteria, other operatives stopped eating to observe.

Swapping a fleeting, shocked look, the two men threw their utensils down and took off out of the cafeteria. Running full speed to keep up with the judge, Logan shouted out after him, “Where is he?”

“China!”

Logan blinked.
“China?”

“His unit is attacking a satellite station!” As the trio turned for the airstrip, they ran into the other members of Vector, all of whom were responding to the call. Forming up, they made a beeline for their V2.

“Did you say a satellite station?” Pablo asked as he caught up to Torokin.

The judge nodded. “They are attacking a station in Hami! That is all that I know.”

A sense of urgency came over Pablo. “We must stop them before they destroy that facility!”

“Why?”

“Because if that facility is destroyed, it will erase all my efforts to communicate with
Jīngshén-2
. I will have no way of tracking the outlaws’ communication in Krasnoyarsk!”

Marty shook his head fervently. “Forget
’dat
part of it! ’Dis is our shot to actually
nab
the suckers. We ain’t gonna have to worry about trackin’ Remington if we got him in a six-by-eight cell!”

Dashing up the ramp of the Mark-2 Vulture and toward the cockpit, Minh said, “I can have us there in twenty minutes!” Behind him, the rest of the hunter team strapped in.

Logan looked at Pablo crossly. “What reason would Remington have for attacking that facility on his own? Does it offer any other tactical advantage?”

“EDEN will lose comm traffic, but only for a short while until things swap to an auxiliary system.” For once, the technician wasn’t smiling. “The only lasting impact destroying
Hami Station
would have is in how it affects us with
Jīngshén-2
.”

Speaking to Torokin, Logan asked, “You know what I’m wondering, don’t you?”

There was no hesitation from the judge. “Yes, I do.”

“What are y’all wonderin’?” asked Marty, who was strapped in next to Lisa on the other side of the troop bay.

The Australian looked at him. “I’m wondering if Remington knew what we were trying to do.”

Torokin looked at the group at large as he stood at the bottom of the ramp. “I cannot go with you. I have been forbidden from engaging in combat. If I go on this mission, I
will
engage.” Spoken like a man who knew himself. No one argued the point. “Good luck, gentlemen. I will await your return here.” He looked at Logan. “This one is yours, comrade.”

Nodding his head, Logan said, “Lock and load—let’s get airborne!” He gripped the handrail as the V2’s rear bay door went up, giving a final look to Torokin before the door was closed. The transport rose from the ground.

*
      
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Hami, China

DEEP INSIDE
HAMI Station
, Valentin and the infiltration team were desperately searching for the room Boris needed to download the access codes from. Though there were only four hallways to explore, they’d already gone down two of them and found nothing but break rooms and kitchens. With each minute that passed, the group got more anxious.

Despite David’s warning to the keeper, Valentin had taken several more shots at workers in the station—though fortunately for the workers, they’d managed to duck into rooms without getting slain. For whatever it was worth, Valentin didn’t waste time pursuing them for the sake of killing them. The keeper’s mind was one-tracked on progression.

“Tell me you have found something!” Valentin asked as he followed Boris into a room the technician darted into.

Boris was standing before a massive row of computer consoles in what looked like some sort of server room. His eyes darting in every direction behind his slayer helmet, he stood almost in a trance of some sort. At long last, his gaze widened, and he rushed toward one of the consoles built into a rack. “This is it! This is what I need.” He looked at his followers and pointed to it. “This is the kind of hardware places like these use to—”

“I don’t care about the history—download the codes!”
said Valentin.

Without a word and with trembling hands, Boris opened up his hacking kit.

*
      
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*

Hovering above the facility in the
Pariah
, Scott’s attention was glued to the radar, despite knowing that Tiffany’s Superwolf would detect any incoming aircraft far sooner than the
Pariah
would. Addressing the infiltration team on his comm, he asked, “What’s the status down there?” Time was getting critical, and he was yet to hear any news of progress. They needed to get those codes and get out of there.

“We found what we need!” answered David. “Boris is working.”

Behind his helmet, Scott was sweating. “What about you, colonel? How are those explosives?”

Several seconds passed before Lilan replied. “They’re getting it done. Probably about a third of the way finished now!”

A third. That wasn’t bad.

“Or maybe a quarter,” Lilan said.

Scott half-frowned. Not quite as good. Looking up from the radar screen, Scott watched as the Superwolf streaked across the
Pariah
’s horizon line, far ahead. At any minute, she was going to announce that she’d spotted a contact. Scott was just waiting for it.

*
      
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“Okay,” Boris said, fidgeting with his helmet. “We have a little bit of a problem.”

“What kind of a problem?” snapped Valentin, his gaze focusing for a moment on Boris’s adjusting. At long last, as if making a conscious decision, he stepped forward and twisted the helmet off. “Use your real eyes for this!”

Boris’s black mop of hair was dripping with sweat. “They are using outdated software. Before I will be able to connect with it, it must be updated.”

Leaning into the room from outside, Javon said, “You kiddin’ me? You gotta update their
computer
?”

“Yes,” said Boris, exasperated despite his fingers flying across the keyboard. “Log onto the internet, find the software, download the software, install the software…”

“Come on, man, for real?”

The technician nodded. “Then restart the computer…”

Snarling as he spun around and approached Boris again, Valentin said, “We do not have time for this!”

Boris snapped. “What do you want me to do? It must be done! You are yelling, and I do not like it!”

“Hey—
hey
!” said David, grabbing Valentin before he could enter Boris’s personal space. “Let the man work.”

Valentin relented and said nothing. Tucking Boris’s helmet away, he retreated back to the doorway.

Assault rifle fire erupted from the hallway, prompting all four men to spin that way. Leaning in from where he’d been out of view, Pyotr offered them a wave. “It’s okay! I was just killing that guy down there.”

The group stared at Pyotr for several seconds before returning their focus to Boris. Leaning in close to David and with his voice hushed, Javon said, “I ain’t a real big fan of how these guys operate.”

David shook his head in disgust. “Yeah, you ain’t the only one.”

*
      
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*

“How’s it looking down there, colonel?” Scott asked.

After a burst of interfering static, Lilan answered, “Got about a third of ’em, now!”

Now it was a third? They had to move faster than this.

“Contact!” Tiffany announced over the speaker.

Behind his helmet, Scott’s face paled.

“Two Superwolves out of the southeast, coming in at Mach-5! They’ve gotta be from
Hong Kong
.”

“Two Superwolves,” Scott said, looking over at Travis. “She can handle two Superwolves, right?”

Travis shook his head. “Those are probably the first two out of fifty.”

Well, that wasn’t good. “How fast is Mach-5?”

“Fast.”

*
      
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*

COMING AROUND IN her orbit, Tiffany placed her hand atop the throttle. “Permission to intercept?”

“Do you think that’s the best thing to do?” Scott asked over the comm.

“Lemme put it to you this way. If I don’t intercept, you guys are probably all gonna die. If I make a beeline for them, I can keep them far, far away from what you guys are doing here. If they’re too busy fighting me, they can’t come here to fight you!” She glanced at her radar as more contacts appeared. “Four more, same heading—all from
Hong Kong
.”

There was a pause. “Intercept.”

“Intercepting.” Breaking the Superwolf out of its orbit pattern, Tiffany pointed its nose to the southeast, pinning the throttle down as the fighter’s engines burst with power.

*
      
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*

“TICK, TICK, TICK,” said Boris nervously as he watched the software update with agonizing slowness.

Scott’s voice crackled through the comm. “Team, we’ve got enemy Superwolves en route! What’s the status report?”

The group stared at Boris as he winced. Lifting his comm to his lips, he said, “We are almost ready to begin, in about ten minutes.”

“Did you say
begin
in ten minutes?”

Boris covered his face and cursed in Russian.