Firemask: Book Two of the Last Legion Series (18 page)

“Who cares?” Hedley said. “Like the old joke says, the fall’s going to flipping kill us anyway.”

He scratched his chin.

“Angara, my friend, we
could
let our young friends in on a secret. Like where there are nearly two thousand spare bangsticks.”

Njangu and Garvin looked startled.

“Go ahead,” Angara said reluctantly. “The ‘Raum are who they were for in the first place. I guess the gods’ve got a pretty wacky sense of humor.”

“Seems toward the close of the late unpleasantness,” Hedley said, “a flipping spaceship just happened to trundle through the Cumbrian skies, and happened to get shot down by one of our Zooks. Everybody dead in the crash, but it was easy to ID the ship and crew as coming from Larix/Kura. It appears that grand gentleman Red-flipping-ruth was trying to stir up the issue by sending guns to the goblins.

“We still don’t know who his liaison with the ‘Raum was, but at least we’ve got the guns, carefully stashed in one of our arsenals.”

“You two,” Njangu said, “don’t keep secrets half bad.”

“Of course,” Hedley said comfortably. “That’s why we outrank you. Now, the question is, do we give these perfectly functional guns to Poynton’s Pistoleers?”

The three looked at Angara.

“I’m acting commander of the regiment,” he said slowly. “But this one I think I’d better clear with
Caud
Rao. He’s in Kerrier. I suspect he’ll approve, on the old saw that the enemy of our enemy is our friend. So you can go ahead and prepare to get the weaponry over to the Eckmuhl. Hedley, you’ll be in charge of the whole operation.”

“I gave Poynton one of our off-channel coms,” Njangu said. “I’ll com her right now.”

“The real flipping problem,” Hedley said, “is to make sure this little transshipment doesn’t get spotted by our friends, which’d be sure to end this nonshooting situation we’ve lulled them into.”

“If it does, it does,” Angara said. “I figure we’ve stretched their patience about as far as we can with the stalling game. The rubber band’s going to go
twang
in another day or so anyway, and we’re as ready as we can be.”

• • •

Caud
Rao considered, gave his approval, ordered the operation to be mounted immediately.

• • •

Someone set off a bomb in a warehouse on the outskirts of Taman City, close to the Third Regiment’s field headquarters, not long after full dark two nights later. The warehouse had been stuffed with waste lubricant from the Force’s ACVs, waiting recycling. The bomb blew the lid off the long building, and flames roared high into the skies, attracting planetary attention.

Everyone scrambled — the holo lifters, all heavy fire vehicles. Even the Musth patrols, more from curiosity than anything else, went at full drive toward Taman City, about a thousand kilometers from Leggett.

No one saw an in-system freighter, one of the Force’s unrostered acquisitions, lift from the Force’s hidden base on Mullion Island, and, flying nap of the earth, soar across Dharma Island’s narrow peninsula, just east-southeast of Leggett. It held low over the bay, then banked north, and came in low and fast on Chance Island, landing beyond Camp Mahan, in the maze of ammunition/weapon dumps, its loading ports yawning wide.

Two Griersons and one
aksai,
flown by Ben Dill, escorted the ship.
Haut
Jon Hedley was aboard one Grierson. When the freighter landed, the escorts grounded on one of Camp Mahan’s distant ranges, waiting.

A three-company-strong working party was waiting for the freighter. Cased weapons, five to a case, were hurriedly loaded aboard, and the freighter lifted off.

It stayed low, over the water, at a moderate speed, and its escorts quickly caught up with it.

The freighter lifted just high enough over the Leggett waterfront to keep from alarming anyone, then landed just inside the Eckmuhl’s walls, antigrav hissing softly.

Waiting were Poynton, Garvin, Njangu, and several hundred ‘Raum.

No commands were necessary. The ‘Raum scurried into the ship, came out lugging cased rifles and ammo crates, disappeared into the depths of the Eckmuhl.

“They’ll be broken out of the cases and out of the Eckmuhl for our other fighters before dawn,” Poynton said.

“Smooth,” Garvin admired.

“That’s what worries me,” Njangu said. “That means something’s bound to go wrong on the back end.”

Poynton caught his eye, motioned him to her. Garvin saw the action, discreetly walked a few paces away, to where their Cooke waited.

“Thanks,” Poynton said. “Although I swore I’d never say that to any soldier, even you.”

Njangu shrugged. “Keeping things stirred up’s what makes life interesting for me.” He grinned. “Seems like you can’t stay away from guns, can you?”

Poynton started to get angry, then saw the humor.

“They won’t let me, it seems like.”

“Maybe you should’ve gone with the main chance, and enlisted like some of the others in The Movement did,” he suggested.

“I thought about it,” Poynton confessed. “But I wasn’t sure if the amnesty extended as high up as I was.”

“So you found a nice, safe hiding place … right in the middle of PlanGov. Subtle, very subtle, Jo.”

She smiled. “It worked, didn’t it? Nobody blew my cover.”

“True,” Njangu said. “So what now?”

“We go to ground, and go back to what we know best,” Poynton said. “Except we’ll be sniping at Musth when the time is right for shooting.”

“They’re bigger targets,” Njangu said. “One thing. Remember what happened to Brooks?”

“He got dead,” Poynton said, voice becoming harsh.

“That wasn’t what I meant,” Njangu said. “My call is he was starting to get ideas about the future. Big ideas. I’m not sure, if you folks had won, you would have ended up with the power going where you thought it’d go.”

Poynton’s lips thinned.

“And you think I could go the same way … even if I concede you were right about Brooks?”

“Having a thousand or so people backing whatever you say with guns can get real seductive, I’ve been told.”

“Don’t worry,” Poynton said. “I’m not that sort.”

“I don’t think you are,” Yoshitaro said. “But there’s nothing wrong with a warning, is there?”

Poynton gave him a hard look.

“You surely know how to get back into a person’s good graces, don’t you?” Njangu grinned.

“That’s why you’re the Councilor and I’m the guy running through the bushes. No goddamned tact at all.”

For some reason, Poynton found herself answering Yoshitaro’s grin.

“Look,” he went on, “you keep that com I gave you handy. It might be my turn to need some help next.”

“If we can, we will.”

The two looked at each other, and Njangu had a sudden desire to lean over and kiss her, and see if she wanted to remember a different night, when she’d worn a blue-velvet jumpsuit.

Perhaps he swayed a little close, perhaps she moved toward him a trifle.

But Garvin called softly.

“Let’s hike! The ship’s unloaded!”

They broke away, both looking a little embarrassed.

“Next time around, hey?”

Poynton nodded, and trotted after the column of ‘Raum, disappearing into the ruins.

The freighter lifted off, turned, and climbed over the walls of the Eckmuhl, headed for the bay.

“Let’s go,” Garvin said to his pilot as he and Njangu climbed into the Cooke. “Hang a zig west out to sea before we cut back toward Mahan. I’d just as rather not be around that freighter. Too big an echo.”

The pilot obeyed, and the Cooke climbed above the Eckmuhl’s walls. Ahead was the glistening water of the bay, and Camp Mahan’s lights.

Garvin could just see the freighter, above the water as it cleared land.

“This is Toy Six,” his com said. That was Hedley. “In the air. Climax Mass.”

Continue the mission.

Suddenly a xenon searchlight speared from the darkness, caught the freighter.

One of the coms on Garvin’s Cooke scanned to the standard watch frequency:

“Unknown ship, unknown ship, this is the Planetary Police. Identify yourself at once and come to a hover, over.”

Another com came on.

“Planetary Police, this is Confederation business. Douse your light and break off, over.”

But the police, now visible in a modified Cooke, didn’t give up.

“Unknown broadcaster, this is Planetary Police. We have no clearance for any operation at this time. Identify yourself at once, and obey our instructions, over.”

“This is Toy Six,” Hedley said. “I say again, this is Confederation business, none of yours, over.”

“This is Planetary Police. Illuminate yourself or prepare to be fired on. This is your only warning.”

“Toy Baker, this is Toy Six,” Hedley’s voice came on the operation’s frequency. “Take the cop out.”

“Toy Baker, roger that.”

“Oh shit,” Njangu muttered.

He saw a spit of fire from out at sea, a missile launch from the other Grierson, and the police Cooke exploded, spun down toward the water.

“This is Toy Six,” Hedley’s came voice came. “Climax Mass, over.”

Garvin clicked his mike sensor once, stomach roiling for an instant, thinking about a pair of stubborn men who’d just gotten very dead, when his driver swore, and pointed to the radar screen.

Over the tiny, spread-out flotilla was a blip, larger than anything except the freighter.

“What the hell … Musth, by the speed of it,” Garvin muttered. “We’re for it now.”

An instant later, the freighter blew up as three missiles from the Musth
velv
that’d appeared from nowhere, attracted by the police lights, struck home.

The com waves were a blur of surprise, shock.

“This is Toy Six, Toy Six,” Hedley’s voice hammered. “All stations, keep silence! Stand by for orders!”

But before he could give any, the action had ended:

Ben Dill, lying full length in his
aksai,
had seen the
velv
as soon as it’d fired on the freighter, fed full power into a climb, touched two controls, and missiles whispered out of his launch pods. They barely had time to arm before homing on the
velv.

The nose of the Musth ship vanished, then its rear finning. The
velv
spun, the pilot regained control for an instant, then lost it, and dived down toward the water. There was a flash of fire, quickly extinguished.

“Son of a bitch,” Njangu said. “That’s torn it.”

CHAPTER
12

For three days there was nothing from the Musth except an ominous silence.

Then, at dusk, they struck Camp Mahan out of the setting sun, arcing around from their base in the Highlands and coming in vertically from space, from Silitric, E-Cumbre.

Velv
and mother ships held altitude, lobbing missiles down against the feeble antimissile barrage.

It was as if they’d surprised the Force garrison again, and the missile batteries were taken out within minutes.

Wlencing ordered the landing force down, and
wynt
poured out of mother-ship bays, while
aksai
flew security.

Then the real Force missile stations on Chance unmasked and opened fire. The sites that’d been suppressed had been dummies or automated. Less than half a dozen Force troops died in that first attack.

The missiles came up in swarms, overloaded the Musth ECM operators, struck home in the
wynt
formations.

For a long moment it was boiling madness in the skies. Then Wlencing and his subordinate war leaders regained control, and the invasion continued.

Wynt
landed in dead ground behind Camp Mahan, or on the beaches, and Musth warriors bounded out.

The beaches and approaches to the base had been mined, and Musth screeched and died in sandy explosions.

Furies bank-launched, and the rockets harrowed the Musth ranks as Force cannon fired canister at pointblank range, shrapnel spraying the attacking aliens. The Musth were so close that Shrike operators had to send their missiles on a loop out to sea while they armed. Some were hit by Musth antimissiles, but not enough to matter.

The first wave hesitated, fell back to the shelter of their
wynt,
and Shrikes were guided in on them.

The surviving Musth commanders called for immediate support, or permission to lift off, abandon the attack.

Wlencing denied it, ordered the second wave in, preceded by an all-out aerial attack.

Aksai
and
velv
strafed the island, attacking any building or possible target. Barracks, hangars, and buildings on Mahan exploded, and flames built a whirlwind into the darkening skies.

But the Force was far underground, in bunkers, gun positions, and launch stations.

More missiles came out of the smoke, and more Musth died.

The second wave came in, was riddled, and pinned down in a thin perimeter around the Force base.

Wlencing hid his rage, claws moving in and out as he paced the bridge of his command ship.

A few minutes later, his intelligence analysts reported all Confederation codes had been changed.

He needed no explanation. If the codes could be changed that rapidly, that meant the Confederation knew he’d been reading their “secrets,” and were sophisticated enough to make sure they weren’t real secrets at all, but false data they wanted him to believe.

And believe it he had, Wlencing thought in fury. He’d thought the Confederation were passively kneeling under his whip, whereas it was obvious they were waiting for the right time to react. Perhaps they’d lost the initiative at the beginning, but now it appeared they might have been calling the shots for some time.

The first question was: How long?

Wlencing growled aloud, wanted to hurt something, anything, anyone. But he found control. A new thought came, and he almost wanted blind rage to return: What else had the Confederation managed to conceal from him?

He had no answers … and needed some, badly and quickly.

• • •

More than a thousand kilometers away, on Seya Island, men and women had trotted out of hasty prefabs in and around the massive junkyard the Zhukovs had been abandoned in, just as Force Headquarters reported the first incoming Musth ships. They’d been waiting for some time, after they’d been secretly shuttled back to their ACVs, with nothing to do but practice on sims and be bored.

The Zhukovs, already fueled and armed, were airborne within a dozen minutes, and, in three-ship combat elements, sped toward Chance Island.

Two hundred kilometers from Dharma Island, they climbed into the low ionosphere.

Haut
Chaka, CO of Golan Flight, opened his mike and reminded his flight:

“Golan Element, we’ll go straight down on ‘em. Try for the mother ships, then the transports. Don’t play glory girl yet, leave the
aksai
alone. Straight through, then climb, and we’ll go back through ‘em again.”

Other commanders gave like orders as the Zhukovs closed on Chance Island.

A fisherman, far below and out at sea who’d been staring at the turmoil above Chance Island saw, distant in the sky, gleaming in the last light of the dying sun, flashing reflections. He wondered what they were, went back to gaping at the whatever-the-billy-blue-hell was going on over at the soldiers’ camp.

The Zhukovs weren’t the most maneuverable combat vehicles ever built, but were among the most heavily armed.

As they dived, their gunners launched ship-killing Goddards. Most of these were taken out by Musth countermissiles, but two hit a mother ship and sent it spinning out of the fight, and four more homed on
velv,
destroying two of them.

Then the
aksai
were in the fight, slashing into the Zhukovs as the heavier craft bucked and swayed, trying to evade combat and go for the soft-skinned troop carriers.

Now it was the Force’s turn to take casualties, and Zhukovs blew up, rolled, dived, smoking toward the far-below ground. But more than enough were beyond
aksai
range, covered by Force antiaircraft, and they swept over the landing grounds, missiles hissing out, 150mm autocannon thundering, chainguns chattering.
Wynt
blew up, and the third wave of attacking Musth was shattered.

The
aksai
and
velv,
on Wlencing’s orders, screamed down, heedless of AA fire, intent on smashing the Zhukovs.

Then the secret ships from Mullion Island struck, everything from yachts and speedsters with improvised missile racks to close-system patrol craft to the three lovingly restored
aksai.

The skies were swirling madness, and not even the best of the gunners in RaoForce could hold a target long enough to make a launch, nor be sure they’d be able to guide a missile in without a friendly getting in the way.

Ben Dill put two missiles into a
velv
and took his
aksai
in a tight loop, almost through the wreckage of the ship he’d brought down.

“This is Scythe Six,” he said. “Scythe Flight, are you still with me?”

“That’s affirm,” a rather breathless voice came. “This is Three. Two’s back up there going after a mother ship.”

“This is Two,” a calm voice came. “Have a mother ship acquired, two seconds to launch, one … SHIT!”

The air went dead, and Dill saw a flash of red in the darkness.

“Aw,
giptel
-doots,” he swore, forgetting his mike was open, climbed toward where his flightmate had died, saw two
aksai
diving.

“Now let’s see who blinks,” he mumbled, sliding to full drive. “Come on, come on …

The two
aksai
banked sharply, exposing their bellies.

“
Thought
you’d back off first …”

Dill launched two missiles. Both homed on the rear Musth ship, and blew it in half.

He and his wingman were hard on the tail of the first Musth ship, but it was pulling away fast, in better and newer shape than the two remaining Force attack ships.

An all-ships signal blasted into Dill’s speakers: “Recall, recall, recall.” Most of the Force’s ships broke contact and fled, dumping antiradar cheff and ‘casting every electronic spoofery they could, for previously assigned fields, some on Mullion, others in equally secluded parts of Cumbre, some with little more than stacked fuel supplies, two or three mechanics, and an officer or noncom with a communicator. The Musth ships, shocked by the unexpected battle and the tenacity of a defeated enemy, were reluctant to track the Force craft too closely, and so all but a handful were able to break away.

But Ben Dill was intent on his own battle, after the fleeing
aksai.

“Oh no, oh no, I need you, I want you,” Dill growled, lifted his ship’s nose, and launched three missiles, howitzer-arcing them over the fleeing Musth ship, into its projected flight pattern.

The
aksai
climbed straight into Dill’s first missile, and part of its wing came off. It whipped into a spin, then lazily flip-flopped down toward the planet below.

“And aren’t I Mrs. Dill’s favorite son, all gifted and — ”

A wandering missile that should’ve self-destructed but hadn’t, rather tardily sensed a possibility and exploded about ten meters behind Dill’s
aksai.
The ship bucked, and its drive abruptly quit.

“Oh come on,” Dill pleaded. “I really don’t want to go swimming tonight.”

The
aksai
wasn’t listening. It lurched, flopped onto its back, and started down. Dill sawed at the controls, felt nothing but mush.

“Scythe Three, Scythe Three, this is Scythe Six. I’m in a Mayday condition.”

Nothing came back at him, and he noted all the indicator lights on his com were out.

“Dunno if I’m broadcasting,” he said into the mike. “But this is Ben Dill, punching out. Somebody be good and come get me. Out.”

He pushed a small overhead bar to one side, and the
aksai’s
canopy blew off. Wind roared into the cockpit at him, more than 180kph, pulling his cheeks back until he slammed his helmet visor shut. Dill hit the button that seared away his safety straps. Now the only thing that was holding him was the hurricane into the open pod.

His
aksai
spun on its axis once, dumping Ben Dill out into the night sky, the dropper that’d been stuffed between his ankles behind him.

He fell about five seconds, tumbling, long enough to decide he really was going to be dead. Then the dropper cut in, and he realized he was slowing as the antigrav lowered him at walking speed toward the ground.

Dill was hanging half-in, half-out of the dropper harness, and he managed to pull the straps together, fasten them. Now the small box was above him, like an old-fashioned parachute, and he was dropping toward … toward what?

He looked down, saw blackness.

At a distance, there were lights. He guessed that would be Dharma Island.

That meant the blackness below was ocean.

“Crap in my hat,” he muttered. “And I never made the swim team, either.”

Then lights came at him, blinding him, and an aircraft slashed by and Dill had a moment to see it was an
aksai.

“I’d just as soon not be gunned down when I’m out of the fight,” he muttered, and the
aksai
banked past again and he thought, hoped, it was his wingman or maybe just a chivalrous Musth.

He held out his hands in perplexed helplessness, pointed down, made swimming motions.

The
aksai
slowed almost to its stall speed, came past again. He couldn’t see inside the cockpit pod, make out the pilot.

Dill looked down again, saw greater darkness in front of him and what might have been a dim line demarking it.

Breakers? An island? If it’s a mass as big as I want it to be, Mullion Island?

Who knew?

Especially about Mullion Island. Good legends — aquatic monsters, amphibious monsters, land-dwelling monsters, everything except cannibals. All that was known for sure was the area around the secret base, which, if he was triangulating himself right, would be somewhere over there. Quite a ways over there.

Then he saw a flicker of some kind of light.

The moons are obscured, so what am I staring at? A fishing boat? A village? A hopeful thought?

He found the dropper’s tiny control box on the harness, pried its cover open, breaking a nail in the process, and touched sensors, steering the dropper toward the light.

The
aksai
came past again, then dived away, went back to speed, was gone.

Ben Dill saw darker blackness below, hoped he was coming in for a nice soft landing in some trees or in beach sand. The light he was steering for was not far distant, almost level with him.

Come on, be nice, be land,
he thought, looked at where the horizon should be, kept his boots together, let his legs go limp, grabbed the dropper harness high, tried to remember a prayer, and struck water, salt water, his arms coming down to cover his face, and then he was underwater, roiled by the current, drowning.