Stackpole, Michael A - Dark Conspiracy 03 (43 page)
Read Stackpole, Michael A - Dark Conspiracy 03 Online
Authors: Evil Triumphant
A B B YY.c
I got som
e more sleep after returning to the Lorica Citadel. I did not dream this time, which was just as
well,
because after being
in Mr. Joniak's death emporium, I might have started having Bat's dreams. Rested and refreshed, I showered again and put on one of my best suits before going up to meet Lilith in the Peregrine on the roof.
With her at the controls, we took off and headed northwest out of Phoenix. She filled me in on the logistical end of the operation I had outlined to her in my dictation earlier. Everything seemed to be working on or ahead of schedule, and I made notes to brief Hal about screening our mercenaries for their ability to see things outside our dimension.
ft look just about an hour to reach our destination, and Lilith set the Peregrine down in the parking lot on the Arizona side of the Hoover Dam without so much as a bump. As she shut the craft down and set the security devices on it, I went back into the passenger compartment
and hauled out a fairly heavy suitcase. Shifting it from hand to hand, we walked down to the dam and
told the guard at the information booth that we had an appointment with Paul Warner, the night
supervisor.
The guard used the phone to confirm our claim, then took us down in the elevator to the offices in the
heart of the dam itself. The place felt mildly claustrophobic to me, but I applauded the idea to locate
offices in the middle of the dam. I felt having to work within the structure would certainly motivate the staff to report even the smallest problem, preventing a disaster that might cause the dam to collapse and kill millions downstream.
Warner looked like a stereotypical civil servant. Not an overly large man, his black hair had thinned
appreciably while his middle had thickened a bit. On his desk I saw a picture of a woman and two
children, which I took to be his family. He smiled when the guard ushered us in and pointed us to two
cracked-vinyl chairs. Lilith discreetly brushed dust from the chair before she sat, but I remained standing.
The supervisor frowned when 1 rejected his hospitality. I lifted the case up and gently slid it onto his
desk, moving the picture of his family aside. "Forgive my lack of manners, but 1 do not have much time.
I appreciate your granting us this meeting at my assistant's last-minute request."
Warner half-smiled. "Ms. Acres was quite persuasive. She said you had a business proposition you
wanted to speak to me about?" He looked around his dingy office, and 1 could read from him an intense desire to escape his job. "What can I do for you and Lorica, Mr. Loring?"
I tapped the case. "In here I have 10 million dolmarks in negotiable securities and Japanese government bonds."
"What for?"
"You have just won the lottery, Mr. Warner. This is the
first payment. You will get one per year of your life, on the anniversary of this date, or your heirs will get a grand total of 20 payments if you die before 20 years is up. Do you understand this?"
The man blinked at me and sat down on the edge of his chair, almost tipping it over. "Jesus Christ! What do
A B B YY.c
you want me
to do, kill somebody?"
"If I wanted someone dead, I'd give 50 dolmarks to some street punk and have him do the job for me." I walked over to the huge map of northern Arizona, south-em Nevada and Utah tacked to his wall. "In that case there is also a cellular phone, a very exact stopwatch, spare batteries for both and a very complete set of instructions. Within the month you will get a call on it. When that call comes in, you will execute those instructions to the letter. Do you understand that?"
"That's 200 million dolmarksr Wamer gasped and loosened his tie. "For that much you could buy this freaking dam."
"I don't want to buy it, Mr. Wamer, 1 just want to rent it, for about an hour, maybe less. When you get that call, the turbines go to full and everything goes to the Mercury grid as per the plan, got it?"
Wamer stared at the map blankly for a moment, then nodded. "Pity about them brownouts in Vegas, but what the hell. I've never won anything there anyway."
The lighter load in the Peregrine made our return trip a bit faster. When we got into Phoenix's airspace, we were vectored west by Scorpion Security and almost denied permission to land at Lorica. Scorpion wouldn't tell us what was wrong, but I switched my radio over to the local commercial stations. KTAR's Charles
Goyette was on the air reporting a massive theft of weapons, explosives and vehicles from the Arizona
National Guard Armory just
east of the Lorica Citadel.
I smiled. We knew where Pygmalion was, we knew who was guarding the approaches and we knew what
we'd need to get to Pygmalion. For the first time since the whole mad war against Pygmalion had been
proposed, I actually began to believe we might have even the slightest chance of defeating him.
Dark Conspiracy 3-32.jpg
I found Natch waiting for me in my suite at the top of the Lorica Citadel, but one look into her cerulean eyes told me that she was not my visitor. "To what do I owe the pleasure?" I asked as a loosened my tie.
The Empress of Diamonds forced Natch into a stiff shrug. "What 1 have learned leads me to believe you will be taking action soon. I would have thought you would have made things easier for me by having
Natch accompany you on your preliminary operations."
"I thought about that, but I knew ft would produce some difficulties. First and foremost, information here is handed out on a need-to-know basis and, quite frankly, she has not needed to know. If I were to draw
her in, Vetha would notice and Fiddleback would become curious. Second, and just as vital, Natch has an
emotional attachment to Bat and having her come back has doubtlessly improved both his disposition and
increased his healing rate. I need him as much as I need her."
A B B YY.c
"As m
uch as you need me?"
I shook my head and dropped into a squarish chair with white leather upholstery. "On the power level we're talking about, no. But in terms of the operation where you will be vital, yes and more so. Without
them, getting to the point
where we can destroy Pygmalion
and
Fiddleback is impossible."
She nodded uncharacteristically long for Natch. "I understand, and I do trust you, Coyote."
"Good." I gave her a quick grin. "One thing—to cover a contingency plan—Crowley suggested that Fiddleback has control over a proto-dimension where he has a dead dimensional gate. Hesays the gate
wesetup in Pygmalion's dimension will interrogate that gate, then create the link. What do you know
about the dimension where he will be waiting for us?"
Match's left hand toyed with the solitaire diamond in the pendanthangingatherthroat. "Notmuch.
1'veneverbeen there—it is too far from my power base for me to travel safely—and 1 have never met
anyone who has and returned to talk about it. Why do you ask?"
I smiled. "Once we leam the coordinates and bring him to Pygmalion's dimension, I was thinking of
sending a truck bomb through to blow up that dead gate. It would make sure he remained where we
wanted him. I need to know if that will work, or if the physics there will scotch that plan."
"I wish I knew, because I think that would be a most interesting course of action. Alas, I do not." She flipped me a brief salute. "You are most dangerous. I admire that."
"Thank you. Be ready and arrive promptly." I briefly outlined what I intended we do to Fiddleback. "We don't want to tip Fiddleback to your presence, so you must wait until Pygmalion is dead before you come
in."
"I understand. Until then." Natch blinked her eyes a couple of times, then staggered a bit. She looked up, surprised and concerned about finding herself in my suite. "Coyote?"
I nodded. "You said you wanted to give me a report on Bat's condition? How is he?"
"I did?" She shuddered, then smiled sheepishly. "Bat's fine. Still has stitches in him, but he's ready to roll."
"Good, he has four days. We have to be ready to move then. Got it?"
"Word up." She gave me a haunted grin. "That will be the fight, right?"
"The main event, Natch." My smile slowly died as all that was at stake flashed through my mind. "The big fight—winner take all."
Two days later, Bronislaw Joniak called me to set up a meeting with the officers of Omega Ranger Company.
We had filled our line troops and reserves, with the vast majority of the men being able to see and operate in other dimensions. Crowley noted that while the empathic skills necessary to be able to do that were rare in the human population, he had noted a propensity for the more creative and adventurous in the population to
A B B YY.c
posses
s those talents. Even Joniak had tested out positively, so he was clear to pilot his aircraft in Pygmal
ion's
dime
nsion.
The meeting with them went well, with their tactical experience adding minor refinements to my general
assault plan. After we had all signed off on it, we decided the assault would go down 48 hours later. During that time, we completed the conversions of two Lorica CV-27 Peregrines, and Joniak was able to fully arm his bird. Nero Loring got his equipment loaded up and in position for deployment.
I faxed Watson Dodd the password routine and a copy of our battleplan that left out our air assets and the half-dozen Bradley M2s Joniak had procured from his "warehouse" at the National Guard Armory. The area around the base really left little in the way of room for defenses against a truck invasion like the one we outlined on the paper I sent him. He would be forced to gather his forces
in certain areas where the natural landscape created defensible positions, and we could eliminate them very easily with either air support or a convert assault by the Rangers on the ground.