Trial by Fire - eARC (76 page)

“The ambassador fled, pursued by one of the Hkh’Rkh.”

Ambassador?
Well, it would be interesting to learn about that later, too. “Was Caine hurt?”

“I do not think so. Major, could you leave some of your men here with us. And a radio?”

O’Garran laughed. “You want us to get you some takeout food, as well? You’re lucky we don’t gut you here and now.”

Darzhee Kut seemed confused. “But—are you not the security forces of whom Downing spoke?”

Downing? Security forces?
Opal squatted down. “Darzhee Kut, I’m afraid I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

His claws sagged, then came back up. “You have not heard. You are not part of the forces Richard Downing is sending.”

“Sending for what?”

“To protect us from the insurgents and the Hkh’Rkh.”

“What? Why protect you from your own allies?”

“Ah, again you do not know. We Arat Kur surrendered ten minutes ago. But the Hkh’Rkh did not. They are—they are in sun-time. All of them.”

Opal stared at Darzhee Kut but did not see him, could only hear her thoughts moving like a flume pushing through the smoke and dim orange emergency lights.
Okay, gotta secure the HQ. Particularly since these are the senior staff. If they die, the situation could spin out of control. Well,
further
out of control. Besides, it’s good to have a place to fall back on. But I’ve gotta find Caine. He’s out there, unarmed, with a pack of mad-dog killer Sloths after him.

“Okay, I’m leaving a dozen of my men with you. Wu, you and your detachment stay here: provide security. And if they need your radio, let them use it. Within reason.”

Darzhee Kut bobbed. “I thank you Major, but I must ask one more thing.”

“What’s that?”

“Do you have any medical supplies?”

“I’m not sure our supplies would be of any help to you.”

“Actually, a few of your more common anesthetics are somewhat effective on our biochemistry as well.”

“What do you need them for?”

“For administering to First Delegate of the Wholenest, Hu’urs Khraam.”

“How bad is he injured?”

“He is dying.”

Presidential Palace compound, Jakarta, Earth

Barr turned to say something to Rulaine when Caine heard the saw-toothed supersonic ripping noise again. Chunks of the work-shed’s double-layered sheet metal were suddenly flying like buzzsaws around the interior. Several hit Barr, whose head bounced off the back wall, his falling torso sliced open from the left clavicle to the right floating rib. Daylight—suddenly present in the last two minutes—streamed in the holes like spotlights.

Caine looked up. “Jesus Christ.”

Trevor rolled up to one knee and peered out one of the larger holes, his body behind an empty oil drum. “Damn coil gun. Wonder where they have it mounted?”

Caine started moving to better cover. “Might not be mounted. I’ve seen some Hkh’Rkh elites big enough to carry them dismounted as squad-support weapons.”

Stosh’s eyes widened but he said nothing.

Trevor crouched down again. “Pretty quiet.”

Caine agreed, then silently amended,
Too quiet.

A few rounds banged in from the front, followed by another spray of the bug-zapper rounds which ripped the door clean off its hinges. Then silence again.

Caine low-crawled to Barr’s body, took the hotjuice canisters out of his gun, scavenged the ammo and other canisters off his web gear, started tossing them to the others, always glancing toward the shed’s small rear window.

Trevor must have seen him looking that way. “What are you thinking?”

“That last volume of fire was pretty weak, compared to the stuff that got the last of the insurgents, and now, Barr. At first it sounded like they had two coils gun out there, but we only heard from one just now.”

Trevor nodded. “They’re flanking us, putting one of those damn bug zappers at our rear. Caine, you and I—we’re going to cover the back entry of this little deathtrap.” Trevor went prone, started low-crawling over long-unused rakes, hoes, and hoses. “If Tygg doesn’t find us soon, this could get a lot worse before it gets better.”

“Oh, I think you can count on that,” smiled Stosh.

“Stop scaring the new guy,” muttered Cruz.

“Don’t worry about me.” Caine wiped sweat, flicked a shower of it into the dust as he crawled behind Trevor. “I’m about as scared as I can get.”

Stosh was remarkably cheery. “Guess we’ll see about that.”

Presidential Palace, Jakarta, Earth

“Major, my
real
GPS is working now.” O’Garran frowned at the unit. “Although God knows how.”

“Bet they seeded this part of low earth orbit with station-keeping geosync-emulators as soon as the Arat Kur lost orbital control,” Opal speculated. “What’s the good word, Miles? Do we have Riordan’s telemetry, now?”

O’Garran nodded, poked his head out the rear floor door of the largely shattered HQ building, evidently blasted by the last of a long daisy chain of demo charges that had started out beyond the walls of the compound. He squinted across a broad tree-framed esplanade and pointed. “One hundred forty meters that way. My best-guess map puts him in that old garden shed you can just see over there.”

Opal came erect out of her crouch. “That’s where we just heard a shitstorm of fire.”

“That’s right, ma’am. And there’s another problem on the way.” He handed her his binoculars, pointed to the northeast. She looked.

At least a dozen Hkh’Rkh were flanking the tool shed the long way around, staying off the esplanade and behind a facing row of low buildings. One was carrying a ponderous coil gun eminently capable of cutting the shed into tin strips.
Shit.

Before Opal was fully aware of it, she was giving orders. “Little Guy, set up squad two as the base of fire to cover our advance across the open ground toward the shed. Squad one is splitting into three fire teams: number one with me, number two with you, number three with the squad’s senior remaining NCO. Running leapfrog advance. Propellant mixes at the hottest and grenades—

“Major?”

“What?”

“That’s what I want to ask you: what? As in, what the hell are you doing?”

“What does it look like I’m doing? I—we—are going to rescue Cain—Mr. Riordan.”

“Major, all due respect—because I know you’re bulletproof—but that’s almost one hundred forty meters of open ground.”

“Which we can cross before those Hkh’Rkh get that coil gun in position to hit the shed, if we move now.”

“Seems like we could be sticking our necks way out on this one. We could take a lot of fire.”

“Why? Have they seen us yet? Do you see any other forces?”

“Well—”

“Right. Me neither. Whatever force is still hitting that shed is probably just a light pinning unit with regular assault rifles, keeping our guys pinned down while those other Sloths bring up their one big piece of artillery to finish off the humans they’ve trapped.”

O’Garran looked out at the esplanade, saw the Hkh’Rkh disappear behind the building that would screen them from being seen by the humans in the shed, but which would also screen the tunnel rats from being seen by them. “Seems right, but there’s a lot we don’t know.”

“Little Guy, there’s always a lot we don’t know. That’s where luck and boldness come in.” Opal looked at the Chinese fire team behind her. They were alert, terribly afraid, even more terribly committed. “On me. Run when I run. Drop when I drop. Got it?”

One of them nodded. The other two looked at him.

O’Garran looked at the hedges and arbors framing both the north and south edges of the esplanade. “Ma’am, I just don’t know about—”

Poor Little Guy. Such an old lady
. She didn’t hear the rest of O’Garran’s tactical reservations. She was out the door and into the swirling dust, with one sharp phrase tossed over her shoulder:

“Cover me!”

Presidential Palace compound, Jakarta, Earth

Trevor had extraordinary eyes. “I’ve got movement, back by the Arat Kur HQ.”

It took Caine a moment to see it. A small group, running directly toward them. Humans, from their size and their gait. Then they dropped, and a second group of four persons appeared running behind them, moving about twenty meters beyond the first group before dropping. Then a third was visible—

“Looks like reinforcements,” commented Trevor, sounding like he was trying to control a surge of ecstasy and relief.

It did indeed look like reinforcements. And as the first group moved up and ran beyond the third, now no more than fifty meters away, it also looked like they were being led by a woman. A woman who looked remarkably like—

Caine stood:
shit.
“Opal!”

* * *

Opal? Where? Ohmigod—
“Jesus, what the hell is
she
doing here—?”
Which is a bullshit question because you know the answer: she’s here to save Caine’s sorry ass.

And she’s coming across too fast, too directly, not sending scouts into the arbor she’s paralleling
. Jesus Christ, Opal. Get down, get under some cover!

Caine’s shout was a duet with his thoughts. “GET DOWN! COVER!”

* * *

Opal heard a voice roaring at her from the shed.
That’s Caine! But—

He’s calling for cover. He probably needs covering fire. Shit. They must be rushing him from the rear! We’ve gotta flank the shed, get around it to draw down on the bastards—

She didn’t wait for the third team to advance past her. “Follow me!” she shouted and rolled up into a sprint toward the concealment of the south arbor.

* * *

Trevor saw Opal jump up to lead the first group in an off-sequence advance—and saw her go down just as quickly, suddenly obscured by a blood-red mist.

* * *

Caine barely heard the thunder-splitting drill of the coil gun which the Hkh’Rkh had evidently positioned in the south arbor.

He thought as he moved.
Out the door, selector switch on the grenade tube to full automatic, pull the arming distance back to zero: contact detonation.

The first step carried him out the doorway, with good momentum.

I’m out of time.

His second step became a forward roll. The supersonic crackle of more coil gun projectiles sped over and past him. He rolled to a stop, facing in the direction of the fire and, with a slight sideways jog of the gun, squeezed the trigger. The three grenades arced into the south arbor’s clutter of bushes and trees with a rapid
foomfoomfoom.

The three answering explosions were a bit more ragged. Some rounds hit a harder surface than others. But they erupted as a rough row of smoky orange flashes—one followed almost immediately by a short, loud sputter of similar blasts: secondary explosions. Someone’s ammo had gone up.
That buys me one second, maybe two—

Riordan yanked a smoke grenade off his web gear, nulled the fusing timer, heaved it a third of the distance to Opal. It was fuming and pluming as it left his hand. Then a quick roll to the left, and another grenade, thrown farther along that same trajectory—just as the splintering cracks of coil gun rounds started spatting overhead again. Another roll to the left that ended with him coming up into a crouch and a first low, sprinting lunge toward—

* * *

Trevor jumped up as the three tube-launched warheads went off, saw
Caine heave a grenade.
Good: he’s putting down a path of smoke to get to her.
“Stosh: get up here now!”
Gotta wait, watch
—Caine threw another smoke. Still no counterfire from the south arbor.

Keep waiting…

Just as Stosh came shoulder to shoulder with him, the coil gun resumed its shrill screaming. Trevor heard the crackling of the supersonic rounds, made his eyes follow the path of the sound his ears had detected, saw disturbance in the underbrush. Dumping his clip at it, he yelled. “Suppression!”

* * *

The volume of human fire erupting from the shed flowed into a high tide just as the skies broke again and the rain came down in sheets. Opal could sense, more than see, feet running past her, streaming up into the south arbor that had hidden the second squad of Hkh’Rkh and their coil gun.

And then a face was over hers, close, almost nose to nose. That nose was dripping rain onto her nose. It was a nose she knew as well—maybe better, now—than her own nose. She smiled. “Caine.”

Then the firing, which had apparently moved around to the other side of the shed, ebbed, died away like a tired tide.
Good. It’s going to be all right, just as soon as I get my breath back—

Oh Christ, I’m such a liar. Even to myself.

* * *

The smoke from the grenades swirled around them, the drifts struggling up against the battering rain. It washed the dirt off Caine; it washed the blood away from the two gaping holes in the front of Opal’s right torso. It kept washing more blood away. He forced himself to smile, touch noses—she liked that—and lifted his head to call for help, hoping he’d discover a way to do so without alerting her to the severity of her wound.

Trevor came up, took one look, turned away, cupping his hand over the audio pickup on his headset, speaking urgently.

Looking down, he saw she was smiling. “Caine,” she said again, her eyes very bright, brighter than he had ever seen them, other than the time in the deputation module, right before her first interstellar shift, right before they first made love.

He held her hand. “We’ll get you something for the pain.” Caine held her hand more tightly. “And don’t worry; you’re going to be all right.”

She tried to laugh through her tears, couldn’t, gasped against the pain. “Not me—not me that I’m crying for.”

“Then who—?”

She shook her head. “For the baby.”

He hadn’t heard her correctly. “For the what?”

“For our baby.”

His eyes and nostrils suddenly ached and stung all at once, and his vision became as blurred and indistinct as the world seen through the windshield in a rainstorm. He wiped a hand across his eyes, leaned over to smile reassuringly.