Stackpole, Michael A - Dark Conspiracy 02 (36 page)

Coyote looked off toward the south. Cutting across the meadow, he saw an S-shaped track of golden light that reminded him of a timed-exposure picture of car taillights at night.It stood almost twice the Yidam’s considerable
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height, and he thought he could see humanoid silhouettes moving within it. Most moved through in the ground, heading from west to east, but a few moved in the opposite direction in the upper area. He had no way of telling how wide it was, but it extended from the middle of one hillside to halfway up the next and apparently ended in the same place it began: nowhere.

“What is it?”

Crowley shrugged. “I don’t really know. Could be a tunnel through dimensions, I suppose. I’ve never seen its like before.”

The Yidam stared at it, then folded his lower arms. “I’ve not seen such a thing either, but I have heard tales. I think this may be a conduit between dimensions. I suspect having it track through here is to let it avoid detection.

Chances are excellent, Coyote, that the turbulence we felt as we walked here was our cutting across its path.”

Coyote frowned. “Is it Fiddleback’s?”

“No. Too elegant.” Crowley shook his head. “Another Dark Lord’s work, I’d guess. Maybe the Empress of Diamonds or Midas Longclaws.”

“We don’t have time for this. Where is the dimensional transporter?”

Crowley flattened some grass back behind himself, and Coyote saw a low ring of stone. “You’re in the middle of it.

That stream over there powers it. Rearrange the stones in the pool in the right way, and it works.” The occultist stepped over the stone ring and in the direction of the stream Coyote heard gurgling in the darkness. “I’ve got it targeted for a clear area about 20 meters south of El-Leichter’s device.”

“Are you coming with us?”

Crowley nodded toward the lightwall. “I think I’d best check that out. I’ll report back as fast as I can. Good luck.”

Coyote threw Crowley a wave, then charged the Stormcloud and took it off safe. The Yidam likewise worked a shell into the PTRS’s breech, then held it ready.

”We check. Go, Damon.”

Coyote heard the swish of water, then the world lurched

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sideways. The night sky and lightwall vanished into a cool, black ocean. But before he or the Yidam could get used to that, thunder cracked the darkness, and they reap-peared in a world of fire.

Sin reached over and opened the Japan Gray Line tour bus’ front and back doors. “This is the Galactic Brotherhood Institute. Everybody out!”

Hal and Jytte led a coterie of Japanese men and women wearing oversized, garish Hawaiian shirts and dresses from the bus. They milled around, chattering away pleasantly, each carrying a tour bag and with cameras looped around their necks like talismans to ward off evil. Nagashita alighted last and tugged his gray blazer into place. Shouting at the tourists to line up, he marched to the front door, and they followed in lockstep.

The two GBI employees on duty looked at each other, then both came to the doorway. Sin recognized neither the man or woman from his first visit or from the classes he had subsequently taken. They paused at the door and shouted muffled questions at Nagashita. The colonel, in turn, just bowed politely, smiled and pointed at the lock before bowing again.

The man opened the glass door. “I am afraid we are not expecting you.”

“So sorry,” said Nagashita. He reached inside his coat and came out with a silenced Beretta automatic. His hand bucked twice, and both GBI employees died with a bullet through the brain. Nagashita yanked the door wide open and waved his people through.

The callousness with which Nagashita had killed the two GBI peons irked Sin. He had agreed that the Internal Defense Cadre would secure the lobby, but he’d somehow imagined Nagashita would take any employees prisoner.

Then again,
he reminded himself,
he’s treating this like a
hostage rescue in which he’s freeing the emperor’s grandson. There’s bound to be retribution in the mix.

Sin keyed the radio he wore. “Team 1 is in. C’mon.

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Natch, have your folks hold.”

A black van roared up and came to a quick stop behind the bus. The side panel slid open, and four black-clad ninjas poured out. Each carried a silenced and suppressed HK MP-7 submachinegun and wore a traditional
katana
across his back. Two carried between them another satchel that they hustled into the lobby, then dropped in the midst of their compatriots. The first team’s ninjas had peeled off their colorful clothing beneath which they wore the dark togs of their profession.

Sin grabbed his own tour bag and tore his gray Gray Line shirt open. He walked straight past the two ninjas stationed at the door and met Nagashita. Sin pulled his own Beretta from his bag and screwed a silencer on it as Nagashita pried one of the doors to the auditorium open.

”Clear.”

“Let’s do it.” Sin slipped through the door and crouched low to the right. He swept his gun across the dark room, ready to shoot anything he saw. Nagashita entered the room right behind him and likewise found it clear. Sin looked over at him and caught his nod, then the two of them ran across the room to the security door while the rest of the IDC ninjas entered the auditorium and fanned out.

“This is the door you can defeat?” Nagashita pressed his back against the wall beside the light panel.

Sin nodded and tucked his pistol in his waistband. “This Tojicorp door lacks a bit. When someone presses his palm against it, he leaves a handprint. The Allard Technologies version of the device maps the print both for comparison for identification and to screen out in the future. The number of maps it keeps varies, but Tojicorp dumps the map information fast, saving on storage and making its unit cheaper.”

He reached into his bag and brought out a huge Kobe steak encased in clear plastic-wrap. Using his right hand, he pressed it to the panel, and the green scanning light activated. It passed down, then up again.

Nagashita grabbed his shoulder. “Why is it not open?”

“Give me a minute. The meat provides the correct backdrop to make the old palmprint stand out. It’s probably just sorting through all the marks left on the glass.” Sin held his breath as the light repeated the cycle,
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then let it out in a low “yes” as the door clicked open.

Nagashita gave him a look that could have pierced his Kevlar vest. Tossing the steak aside, he pulled the door open, and four ninjas poured in to secure the hallway.

They reported it clear, and Sin followed them. As they moved up the hallway, Sin looked into the offices they cleared, then waved Jytte and Hal into the second one on the right.

He pointed at a computer console and the bank of mainframes behind it. “Jytte, can you take security down from here?”

The computer empath concentrated for a moment, then nodded. “I think so. I found some codes for the Taos center they just opened. I should be able to use them and get in.”

“Good. Go to it” Sin helped Hal unfold the blueprint of the place and pointed out their current location. “We’ll keep reporting where we are. Coordinate us with the Yakuza, if we have to bring the Dogs in.” Hal gave him a sidelong glance, and Sin amended his statement. “Bat’s with them, so
when
they come in, direct them to areas where we won’t come up against each other.”

“I’m supposed to be here, right?”

Sin turned as Rajani entered the room and killed a laugh. Swathed in Kevlar, she looked like the child of an overprotective mother who has been amply insulated for the first snow of winter. Her bright eyes still glittered, but she looked decidedly uncomfortable. “Yes, here. Warn us if Fiddleback brings us any surprises. You okay?”

She nodded. “First time I’ve felt warm in a while.”

Sin laughed and winked at her, then dashed out the door and down the hallway. The ninjas of Falcon Team—

his team—had reached the far end of the security corridor.

”Jytte, we’re at the end of the hallway.”

Sin got no reply over the radio, but the door latch buzzed. He twisted the knob, killing the sound in seconds and stepped out into the corridor. To the right it looked clear, but a guard emerged from the men’s room at the far end of the corridor. Left hand pressed against his sagging stomach to hold it back, he tugged at his fly with his right.

He looked up with that surprised, fearful expression worn
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by anyone who had been caught with his fly undone in public, then started to take a half-step backward when he saw Sin’s gun.

Sin snapped off his first shot hurriedly, creasing the man’s stomach. The gun made almost no sound because of the silencer, but the metallic
thwang
of the bullet ricocheting off the bathroom door jamb sounded incredibly loud to his ears. The guard gave a yelp, then scrambled into the lavatory on all fours.

Sin and two IDC ninjas chased after him. They paused at the door, and one ninja tossed a concussion grenade into the room. By way of return, they got two shots fired back at them.The bullets blewthrough the tile wall and out through the plasterboard wall in the hallway, but aside from stinging plaster shrapnel, the blind shots did no harm.

The concussion grenade went off with a loud bang.

Smoke poured from the narrow, tiled corridor leading into the washroom. The lead ninja swept the room with criss-crossing patterns of fire, tracing an X on the wall of the stalls. The toilet bowls shattered, and a body splashed down back in the corner. Water mixed with blood ran out and into the central drain.

“Falcon is compromised. Let the Dogs go.” Sin heard acknowledgments through his radio, then met the rest of his team back out in the corridor. They pressed on, heading toward the area in which the students had been housed. “Hal, does Jytte have a room number for Ryuhito yet?”

“Negative, Falcon. She’s working on it.”

He heard Nagashita’s voice on the radio link. “Eagle is moving into the islands.”

“Roger that, Eagle.” Hal’s voice paused for a second.

”Falcon, Eagle, we have a change in the schedules.

Ryuhito should be in the Sun Court right now. Go!”

The Sun Court, Sin recalled from the orientation tour, was the largest of the island courtyards that ran through the center of the complex. Located north of the Khmer and Yellowstone courtyards, it had a huge circular fountain full of solar imagery done in a Mesoamerican style reminiscent of the Aztecs. Their guide had described it as a place used for initiation ceremonies and celebrations like mar-Generated by ABC Amber LIT Conv
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riages. She had said the fountain could double as baptismal font, if needed, and was lit at night.

Sin sprinted down the corridor and took his first left down another corridor. The second corridor linked the two halves of the complex, so he fired twice at the big plate-glass window, then stepped through the hole as soon as the glass stopped falling. That brought him out into the junglelike Khmer courtyard. He ran to the nearest palm tree and slapped his back against it.

“Falcon is in K-land. We’re inbound for Helios.”

“Eagle has Y-land. Converging on Helios.”

“Falcon, be advised Rajani has bolted.”

“What? Why?”

“Don’t know. She ran out of here fast.”

Shit!Sin nodded at two of his ninjas and sent them running forward to the next position. The white, serpentine paths of crushed stone all converged on the open area in the center where he had been enjoying drinks with Ryuhito before things had fallen apart. In their advance, Falcon team avoided the pathways and headed on an oblique angle toward the middle.

Peering out from behind the bole of another palm tree, Sin saw the giant stonehead had vanished. He thought he saw something else there, but couldn’t be certain, so he waved two people to the edge of cover to check it out. As they moved up, he saw the head’s replacement move, and he dove for cover screaming “Down!” into his radio.

The RamTech Roboguard IV had been painted over in the orange and black striping of a tiger, but its resemblance to any living thing ended there. It squatted in the middle of the courtyard like a streamlined mechanical toad, only rising up to its full three meters of height when it flicked on its running lights. The clawed feet dug into the gravel with a crunch as the stubby, L-shaped right arm mounted on the side of its clamlike body raked back and forth across the courtyard. The 9mm bullets from the built-in submachinegun sliced through the undergrowth at a meter above the ground.

The projectiles shredded vegetation and cut one of Sin’s two scouts in half. His companion had started to dive