Women of War (36 page)

“Acknowledged, Blue One. Green Team will rendezvous with you in three minutes.”

“Incoming, one o'clock high!” yelled Lydecker.

Jumping up, she dove over the wall, rolling and coming up in a crouch, rifle trained on the tall building opposite. The sidewalk exploded as a burst of energy hit it. Globs of molten pavement flew into the air, filling the dense smoke with sparks of fire. A low thrumming told her the suit's air filters were working overtime.

“Where is he?” she demanded. “Dammit, Raines, Beta Unit declared this area cleared!”

“I can't see through the smoke, Captain,” said Raines.

Another explosion, closer this time, taking out part of the wall just ahead of them.

“Brolin, find him! We're sitting ducks! Rest, back up ten feet,” she ordered. Brolin's low cursing about handlers safe on ships sounded through their private comm channel, making her smile. He was the best gunner around, she could ignore his odd lapse of discipline. Angling her head inside the helmet, she hit the targeting grid control with her chin.

A flash of light caught her eye. Instantly she gave it her full attention, blinking twice rapidly to trigger her auto-tracker.

“Got him! Grid ref ...”

“On it,” Brolin sang out as he launched his missile.

Instinct made her duck as it roared over her head. She tracked it, catching sight of another flash from the distant window with peripheral vision.

“Incoming!” Tyler's hand closed on her arm, jerking her to her feet and hauling her backward.

The blast lifted them off their feet, sending them flying through the air to land in a nearby flowerbed in a tangle of armored limbs.

Her first thoughts for her team, she checked the telltales—all present and green, no one hurt. A rapid tattoo of cooling stone fragments rained down on her suit. Movement beneath her drew her attention and she focused on the view outside her helmet.

Tyler grinned up at her. “Gonna have to stop meetin' like this, Cap'n. People gonna start talkin'.”

A loud explosion from behind and above boomed out, counterpointed by Brolin's understated, “He's gone now.”

“Thanks,” she muttered to Tyler, pushing herself off him and getting to her feet. She reached a hand down to help him up as he flicked small chunks of rubble off his suit with his gloved hand. “That was too close.”

“It was,” he agreed, accepting her help.

“Blue Two, I have a red light on your suit integrity,” said Raines. “Please initiate internal diagnostics and external visual scans immediately.”

“Acknowledged, Base,” Tyler responded, flipping open his forearm control panel. He scanned it, then pressed a couple of keypads. “Suit's fine, false warning. No need to evac me.”

“Let me check,” she demanded.

“It's fine, Captain. Raines, you copy? All is green.”

“Copy, Blue Two. Warning light extinguished.”

“Tyler, tell me you haven't overridden the security checks,” she said, switching off the battle channel.

“Green Team approaching on our Six, Captain,” interrupted Lydecker.

“Acknowledged,” she responded as Tyler raised his eyebrows at her.

“It was a malfunction, Captain. No time for a visual check. There's a hostage waiting for us.”

“It better be! I've never lost a man, and I don't intend to start now!”

“Green Team,” he said succinctly.

Annoyed, she turned the battle channel back on.

“Nice shooting, Brolin,” said Kirby, as he strode over. “Slade, I'm taking over. Fall in behind my men. Now the sniper's been dealt with, we're moving into the building.”

“Aye, Captain,” she gestured the rest of Blue Team to follow.

“Don't remember anyone putting him in charge,” muttered Brolin on their private channel.

“Old man's a glory hound,” said Lydecker. “This being a high-profile mission, it's to be expected.”

Still concerned over Tyler's suit, she'd ignored their comments.

She blinked the tears back. Why had she taken his word about his suit integrity? She should have insisted on checking it over, found the fractured air line ... Had she done so, she could have ...

“Done nothing, Captain.”

Jones' voice cut through her reflections. Like Tyler, Jones had an uncanny knack of following her thoughts.

“It wasn't just one incident, Captain, it was the accumulation of several.”

“I wish I believed that,” she whispered, hand tightening on her rifle as they moved through the garden simulation of Hope City Hall.

“Heat signs in two locations,” said Raines. “Four people breaking off. Possibly heading toward the level four elevator.”

“Possibly, Raines?” snapped Kirby, halting both teams behind a waist-high ornamental wall. “I need accurate information!”

There was a short silence. “Green Team, head for the east side entrance. Take up defensive positions in the underground parking lot. Prevent them from leaving.”

“Acknowledged, Base,” Kirby replied.

The whole area was too quiet, she thought, following Green Team through the eastern lobby.

“Don't like this, Captain,” muttered Lydecker, rifle raised as he checked the ceiling high above them for niches or balconies. There was one, straight ahead above the staircase. “Too many chances for an ambush.”

“Stow it, mister,” snapped Kirby. “
Opportunity
's got the place under constant surveillance. Our handlers know exactly where the rebels and hostage are.”

A snigger of laughter, then, “You got us leadin' now, Lydecker. No need to worry. None of those dirt farmers can hide from our scanners!”

She triggered their private channel. “Ignore him, guys. Ship scans aren't foolproof. Stay alert and check everything.”

A low chorus of acknowledgments sounded. All went quiet as they split forces, each team heading in opposite directions around the curve of the lobby toward the short staircase at the rear.

Her glance flicked up to the small balcony ahead as they hugged close to the wall. Something just didn't feel right. It was too easy. Not even their heavy boots made a sound on the marble floor, as if every sound was swallowed ...

She stopped, raising her arm to signal her team.

“Sound shields on. Jones, get up here.”

“Slade, what the hell are you doing?” demanded Kirby on the command channel. “I gave no such order!”

“Place is too quiet,” she hissed. “Might be a sonic device. You got that scanner of yours, Jones?”

“Belay that order! The rebels are civilians, Captain,” said Kirby angrily. “Where would they get hold of such devices?”

Jones looked at her. “Never without it, Captain.”

“Not our job to know, Captain Kirby.” She turned her body slightly so her hand gestures were hidden and signaled Jones to start scanning. “They got hold of other illegal weapons, like that pulse rifle they were shooting at us.”

“Move out, mister, and follow my orders!” Kirby's voice almost deafened her.

Jones pulled a small scanning device from his belt then pointed it at the balcony. She watched the display panel as he scanned.

Harris gave a raucous laugh. “Trust a woman to get spooked by silence!”

A loud oath drew her attention briefly from Jones as Harris jostled the man ahead of him and knocked over an ornamental floor vase.

From the corner of her eye she saw the scanner light up like a Christmas tree as the vase hit the floor and shattered.

All hell let loose as wave upon wave of sound emanated from the device concealed on the balcony, shattering all the windows. Even with her aural shielding on, the sound vibrated every bone in her skull, giving Slade an instant headache. Overlying it were the screams of Kirby's team as their unprotected ears took the full brunt of it.

The familiar roar of Brolin's missile launcher going off inches from her helmet was a relief in comparison. The balcony exploded in a cloud of debris, instantly silencing the awful noise.

As the echoes of the explosion died, she shut off the command channel and looked to Kirby and his team writhing on the ground, clawing ineffectually at their helmets. Her team's tell-tales were green, but Kirby's all glowed red.

“Everyone okay?” she asked on their channel, switching her attention to the lobby around them.

“Affirmative,” came Tyler's response.

“Blue One, report in!” Raines broke in on their private channel. “Telemetry shows multiple injured Greens.”

“Blue One, Green Team triggered a sonic device. Immediate evac needed.” She gestured Hutton toward them. “Sending my medic. Current status of rebel heat sources?”

There was a delay as their handler obviously conferred with someone else.

“Cancel your last order, Captain Slade. An evac unit has been deployed for Green Team. Continue to the basement parking lot. Heat source movements are unreliable. Either their numbers are growing, or they're creating extra sources of heat to throw us off.”

“I can't just leave Green Team unprotected,” she objected.

“It's imperative you stop any escape by the rebels. We need the basement covered now. Armored government vehicles are parked there,” said Raines.

“I want the layout of that parking lot, Raines,” said Slade as Hutton headed back to her side at a run. “And isolate Green Team from our battle channel.”

“Acknowledged, Blue Team. Isolating Green Team. Will feed the layout for the parking lot.”

“You all heard our orders,” she said. “Move out. Jones, up front with me and Tyler. Keep scanning for traps. Does that gizmo of yours show movement as well as heat sources?”

“Sure, Captain. It can track them on noise too.”

“Track 'em any way that works,” she said before flicking on the now quiet battle channel. “Raines, send the basement feed to Jones' HUD, as well as mine and Tyler's.”

“That's a highly unusual request, Captain Slade ...”

“Do it. Blue One out.” She flicked the channel off.

Slade shifted her position for the fifth time as she and Jones crouched in what was ostensibly Hope City Hall parking lot, waiting for the narrator to brief their audience of school children on the next phase of their mission. She hated this tour of duty, and all it stood for. It was rehab for her and Jones, and was supposed to be a public relations exercise for the military, to take the civilians, especially school children, behind the scenes and show them that an active military was necessary, that peace was a precious commodity that had to be defended, no matter the cost. But it was failing.

Through the glass that separated them from the public, she could see the large infoscreen that existed in every public area in all the domed cities on Mars. The competition. Everything was being televised these days, broadcast to the people in an unending stream of exposés and larger-than-life interactive episodes. This had become just one more episode in that daily diet.

She punched the helmet controls with her chin, opening a private channel to Jones. “Is he stringing this out longer than usual?”

“I don't think so,” said Jones. “It just seems like it.”

“That's for sure.”

“I heard they're disbanding another regiment. Only two left.”

“I heard. Channing and the United Worlds are pushing this antiwar movement.” Specialist teams like theirs were safe, for now. There was always the odd hot spot of unrest that refused to accept the U.W. rulings, be it on Earth or Mars.

“You can't blame the president, considering what happened,” said Jones. “Not that I'm blaming you,” he added. “You know I don't.”

“Channing does, and Sandler and his cronies. Sandler knew the truth but still covered it up! We perpetuate it every day with this bloody stupid reenactment!”

“Try to see it as just another day.”

She nodded. It was easier than telling him the obvious.

“We're having a get together tonight in the mess bar. First anniversary. Join us, Captain. Everyone wants you to come.”

A year? Where had the time gone? She was spared the need to answer as the tech gave them their cue to begin the final segment.

The small lot was L-shaped, the longer leg only 150 feet long, with the standard guarded barrier to allow access. Wide concrete pillars were set close to the walls every forty feet. Between the pair nearest the elevator were three vehicles, with a fourth opposite, and one more at the far end of the shorter leg, by the exit. Except for directly in front of the elevator, a low metal railing between the pillars separated a five-foot wide walkway from the parking area.

“Fan out,” she ordered as they emerged from the staircase at the far end. “Tyler, Lydecker, check the guard post and the single vehicle. Brolin, Hutton, check those ahead. Jones, stay with me. Keep scanning.”

She and Jones ran the few feet to the nearest pillar.

“Nothing showing on the scans, Captain,” said Jones quietly.

“Can you set it to pick up the elevator if it starts moving?”

“Should do.”

“Do it.” She turned her attention to her team's tell-tales.

“Vehicles clear,” said Hutton.

“Cover the elevator,” she said.

Moments later, Tyler called in. “Guard post and vehicle clear. Want us to cover the exit?”

“Affirmative. Jones and I are moving position to cover the staircase.” She gestured Jones to follow her.