Legion Of The Damned - 02 - The Final Battle (22 page)

Whenever that occurred, the legionnaire found Warwick-Olson’s pert breasts, narrow waist, slim hips, and long, lean legs to be very distracting. So much so that it would have been quite embarrassing had he been forced to stand up. No such disaster took place, however, so that he was able to get the major properly clothed by the time the briefing was over, and the troops were dismissed. There was a lot of good-natured talking and laughing as the platoon cl
eared the hall. Booly lingered for a moment and was rewarded with a private audience. It didn’t go well. “Lieutenant.”

“Yes, ma’am?”

“You seemed distracted during the briefing. Is there a problem? A gap in my presentation skills, perhaps?”

“No. ma’am! You have excellent presentation skills.”

Warwick-Olson nodded slowly. Her lips made a hard, thin line. “I agree. I do have good presentation skills . . . which means that the problem lies elsewhere. I could have chosen any platoon in this damned city but I chose yours. Why? Because
you
made an instant reputation for yourself by restoring discipline to a neglected command. Your CO was impressed, General Mosby was impressed, and
I
was impressed. All by a piss-ant wet-behind-the-ears lieutenant who can’t pay attention to a briefing.”

The major’s eyes narrowed down to little more than slits. “Well, listen, Lieutenant, and listen good. Because if I catch a bullet tomorrow morning, that will leave
you
in command, and the way things stand right now, half the platoon might die because you were daydreaming. Now take this disk, study my plan, and have it memorized by morning. Fail, and I will drag your ass in front of the company CO. Get it?”

The disk was no larger than an antique quarter and hit the center of his palm with enough force to depress his hand. Booly hadn’t been so thoroughly chewed out since his first year at the academy. A bullet would have been preferable to the shame and embarrassment he felt at that moment. His voice was a croak. “Ma‘am! Yes, ma’am!”

“Good. Now get your ass out of here.”

Booly snapped to attention, did a textbook-perfect about-face, and marched towards the door. It was the longest walk of his life.

 

It had been scheduled to be a sunny day, but the morning brought fog and a thin, steady drizzle. The platoon, formed up into heavily armed squads, stood waiting by their vehicles. Booly, exhausted from a sleepless night spent studying the major’s plan, noticed that she was the only one who had equipped herself with rain gear. Did that mean what he thought it meant? That she had some clout with the Clone Weather Control people? No, the clones wouldn’t even give the Confederacy the time of day, much less the kind of weather they wanted. The woman was maddening.

Booly ran his eye over his troops one last time, checked what he saw against the carefully memorized plan, and found everything to his liking. He g
athered his courage, closed on the spot where Warwick-Olson stood consulting an olive drab porta-comp, and offered a snappy salute.

The major paused and looked down her nose at him. “Good morning, Lieutenant. Thanks for pointing me out to any snipers that might be lurking around.”

Booly felt stupid and let his hand fall like a wing-shot bird. “Sorry, ma’am. It won’t happen again.”

Warwick-Olson nodded. “Good. I’d like to live long enough to see my thirtieth birthday. Now, describe plan Alpha.”

Booly fought the desire to think about the years that separated them and forced himself to focus on the plan of attack. “We move into the designated area from four different directions, seal the main arterials with Trooper IIs, and close on building 4321. The quad will deal with enemy armor should any appear. A pair of Marine assault boats will close off any possibility of an airborne escape.

“You will effect entry with Squad One, I will cover the back with Squad Two, Sergeant Parker will seal the secondary streets with Squad Three, and Sergeant Hafney will position Squad Four as a ready reserve. We will fire if fired upon but every effort should be made to capture the subjects alive.”

Warwick-Olson nodded approvingly. “Excellent. It would seem I picked the right officer after all. Load ’em up.”

The compliment felt good in spite of the fact that it didn’t mean much after screwing up the day before. Which meant that Warwick-Olson was a good leader, he was one helluva pathetic s.o.b., or both.

The troops piled into their vehicles, the security gate slid clear, and the APCs growled out onto empty streets. Consistent with standard security procedures, and true to her word, Warwick-Olson took the point while Booly rode drag. If either were killed, or the convoy was cut in half, one officer would probably survive.

Trooper IIs, backed by the massive quad, loped along behind. The time of day, combined with the bad weather, reminded Booly of his childhood on Algeron.

He would always remember the sound of his uncle’s voice as it woke him from a deep sleep; the soup’s creamy texture as he spooned it into his mouth; the hard, almost unbearable pressure on his bladder; the trip to the freezing cold underground privy; wonderfully warm clothes snatched from beside the eternally burning fire; the ascent to the world above, where snowflakes flew, wooly dooths awaited their owners, and mountain trails led towards adventure.

Yes, his father had come along occasionally, but his duties as chief and ambassador left little time for hunting. It was one of the few things Bool
y regretted about his early childhood—that his father was missing from so many of his favorite memories. A radio transmission interrupted his thoughts. The voice belonged to Warwick-Olson. “Green One to green Two.”

“Green Two. Go.”

“Checkpoint One coming up. Execute. Over.”

“Roger that. Out.”

The plan called for the APCs and cyborgs to part company at the intersection designated as Checkpoint One and follow different routes to the objective. It was common knowledge that the clones kept a close eye on the Legion’s movements so it was important to make the whole thing look as innocuous as possible.

Seated next to the APC’s driver, Booly watched the appropriate intersection appear on the control screen, gave the necessary order, and felt the vehicle swivel to the right. A quick check of a smaller screen confirmed that a Trooper II named Omanski had peeled off and was following behind.

True to the regimented way in which the clones chose to live, the streets were empty, and would remain so until 0700 when everyone would pour out of their nearly identical apartment buildings and head for whatever work their genetic inheritance dictated. It made life in the Legion seem free by comparison.

Terrified of missing one of the turns necessary to reach their objective, Booly monitored street signs with extra care,
and
tracked the APC’s position via a Confederacy-controlled global positioning satellite. This backup procedure took into account the possibility that the clone underground might have changed the street signs in an effort to confuse Legion forces. Just one of the many variables Warwick-Olson had planned for and he hadn’t thought of. Her voice sounded in his ears. “Green One to Green Two.”

“Green Two. Go.”

“Position check, over.”

“Position confirmed, over.”

“Roger that, Green Two. Green One out.”

Booly felt his stomach muscles tighten as the APC turned the last comer and headed for their final destination. A robo-cleaner, its lights flashing yellow, scurried to get out of the way. Booly ignored the warnings that bleated over the public com channel and sent a message to his squad. “All right, folks . . . we’re almost there. Prepare to de-ass the vehicle. Don’t fire unless fired upon. Lock and load.”

Warwick-Olson’s voice was crisp. “Green One to Green units . . . objective in sight. Two?”

Booly checked the picture supplied by the rearwards-facing vid cam. The Trooper II named Omanski had taken up his position at the last intersection and was quickly dwindling in size. “Check, over.”

“Three?”

“Check, over.”

“Four?”

“Check, over.”

“All units are in position. Execute Option A, I repeat, execute Option A. Over.”

The APC swung into an alley and stopped so as to block the ramp that led up and out of the apartment building’s underground parking facility. The rear hatch made a clanging sound as it hit the concrete and the squad de-assed the vehicle. Booly opened the side door, looked to make sure he wasn’t jumping into a hole of some sort, and bailed out. He checked, saw his legionnaires were headed for their preassigned positions, and turned towards the elephant gray building. In spite of all the preparation, all the prior thought, what happened next came as a surprise.

There was a barely heard thump as Warwick-Olson and the first squad blew the security door, effected entry, and raced up towards the sixth-floor apartment where the cell was headquartered. Glass shattered over Booly’s head and a gun barrel poked out. Armor-piercing rounds had already started to punch divots into the APC’s armor by the time he found cover behind a rusty red dumpster. The building housed hundreds of innocent people and a hail of bullets would almost certainly kill some of them. Booly gave his first combat order. “Hold your fire! Donk . . . be careful . . . but nail ’em
if you can.”

Legionnaire LeRoy Donk, a graduate of the famed “one for one,” or “one round for each kill” sniper school on Algeron, was still taking aim when Warwick-Olson screamed into Booly’s ear. “We’ve got a runner, Green Two! He’s on a unicycle and coming your way!”

Booly had barely enough time to remember the gyrostabilized units used by the local police, and to visualize how one could be ridden inside the building, when the back door exploded, and a man on a unicycle surged out through an avalanche of safety glass. He had a mini-launcher in one hand and a machine pistol in the other. The one-wheeled vehicle was controlled by a combination of foot pedals and pressure-sensitive knee pads. It bumped its way down the short flight of stairs without the slightest hint of difficulty.

Time slowed as the launcher fired and a series of miniature explosions marched across the area and flashed around the APC. Booly was in motion by that time, sprinting towards the point where his path would intersect with the unicycle’s, firing low in hopes of disabling the machine. Rain
spattered against his face and the smell of garbage filled his nostrils as the machine pistol winked red and brass casing arced through the air. He saw the man’s face, read the hatred written there, and fell as a bullet slammed into the center of his chest. He tried to scream, tried to call for help, but couldn’t get his lungs to work. Pain squeezed and darkness pulled him down.

 

The room was large, open, and tastefully decorated. A gas fire burned in the large tile-framed fireplace and carefully arranged lights added to the overall sense of warmth. It was midmorning and General Marianne Mosby was talking via a scrambled satellite link. She listened carefully, asked some questions, and nodded approvingly.

“Thanks, Major . . . I’m sorry the runner escaped, but outside of three casualties, that was the only flaw in an otherwise perfect operation. Congratulations. I’ll see you at oh six hundred tomorrow.”

Marcus-Six, his day robes swirling around his legs, entered with a tray. Steam rose from a pair of ceramic mugs and filled the air with the rich scent of chocolate. He put them down on a low-slung table as Mosby folded her communicator in half and dropped it into a civilian-style handbag. “The chocolate smells delicious, Marcus, thank you.”

Marcus smiled, reveled in the scent of her perfume, and sat down beside her. He knew he shouldn’t, knew she would test his resolve, but did so anyway. The truth was that he found her aggressive free-breeder ways strangely attractive and couldn’t help himself. “I’m glad you like it. How did the raid go?”

Mosby lifted a cup, tested the liquid against her lips, and decided to let it cool. “Very well indeed. Thanks to the information you provided. One person got away. The rest were captured and will be interrogated.”

Marcus shrugged noncommittally. “The interrogators won’t learn much. All of the cell members trace their lineage back to five or six sets of political fanatics who were quite willing to die rather than to compromise their cause. Our founder thought such individuals might come in handy and my brothers have taken full advantage of their existence. They will be furious when they learn what the Legion has accomplished.”

“Which is one more reason why you should consider an alliance with us,” Mosby said smoothly, “before your brothers destroy all that the founder sought to build.”

It was the perfect argument, directed at his brothers rather than the system the three of them represented, and the Alpha-Clone knew that. Knew she was manipulating him. Then why did it work? How could he know
what she was doing and be so powerless to stop it? And what did she want? An alliance with him, or with the Hegemony he represented?

Then he looked into her eyes, felt himself drawn slowly but surely to the eager softness of her lips, and knew the truth. General Marianne Mosby wanted both.

 

Poseen-Ka strode into the
Death Dealer’
s enormous wardroom and saw that the necessary preparations had been made. The court, comprised of his old protégé Grand Marshal Hisep Rula-Ka, a relatively young war commander named Mimbu Zender-Ka, and a grizzled old sector marshal named Hulu Hasa-Na were already seated.

In keeping with the nature of the occasion, their chairs were backed by solid steel. His seat had an open back that symbolized his complete vulnerability and was located in front of them. He strode towards the chair and sat down. This was the second occasion on which he had faced a court of inquiry during his career and would almost certainly be the last. Not only had he lost an entire fleet to the humans, but the war as well, and the penalty was obvious. Death. It was an ignominious but altogether appropriate end to a failed career.