Vengeance (19 page)

“Move, move, move!” Price said.

They reached a cross corridor. In the middle of the intersection was a rest area. Twin sofas facing each other. Brown leather, creased and cracked by years of use.

“Okay, hold here for a moment,” Price said. “Barnard, where the hell are we?”

Chisnall sank into one of the sofas. It was not like him, Price thought. The constant pain was making him weak.

The rest of the team automatically spread out into a defensive pattern, covering all four directions.

“Mainly offices on this level,” Barnard said, studying the schematics of the building on her wrist computer. “The medical centre is one floor down, south corner.”

“Do we have time for this?” Wall asked.

“The skipper’s not much use with a broken arm,” Price said.

“I’m not the skipper, you are,” Chisnall said faintly.

“We can talk about that later,” Price said.

“Nothing to talk about,” Chisnall said.

“Anyway the Pukes don’t know where we are yet,” Price said.

“Won’t take them long to figure it out,” Brogan said.

“We’re going to the medical centre,” Price said. “Tactical column. Monster, you’re on point.”

They ignored the elevators, preferring the stairs, and found the centre exactly where Barnard had said it would be. It was deserted.

“All right, Brogan,” Price said. “Time to earn your keep.”

“Again?” Brogan asked.

“You going to help or not?” Price asked.

Brogan moved across to Chisnall and examined his arm.

“Lie down, Lieutenant,” she said, indicating a treatment bed attached to one wall.

“We can’t stay here,” Wall said, again raising his concerns.

“It’s a big building and they don’t yet know where we are,” Price said. “Will this take long?”

“It’s a quick process,” Brogan said. “But he can’t move until it’s finished.”

“Okay,” Price said. “Get on with it. The rest of you out in the corridor; set up a defensive perimeter.”

“Ouch,” Chisnall said, as Brogan eased his arms apart and positioned the broken one on an adjustable rest.

“Grit your teeth,” she said. “This ain’t gonna take you to your happy place.”

“Give him some painkillers,” Monster said.

“No,” Chisnall said. “There’s no time.”

Brogan took firm hold of Chisnall’s arm and squeezed, manipulating the bone inside. Price didn’t need an X-ray to know that she was re-aligning the broken ends of the ulna.

Chisnall’s face went white and his forehead glistened with a sheen of sweat, but he made no sound.

Brogan nodded to herself, then restrained Chisnall’s arm using small metal straps attached to the armrest. She checked the position of the broken bones once more after she had finished, extracting a wide-eyed silent scream from Chisnall.

“Sorry, skipper,” Brogan said.

“I keep telling you guys, I’m not the skipper,” Chisnall said. His voice was feeble.

“Okay, let’s talk about that,” Price said. Anything to distract him from the pain. “You’re the senior officer here. This is your team. I’m just the caretaker. Besides,” she smiled, “you’re Lieutenant Lucky, and I think we could use some luck today.”

Brogan moved a portable machine over to the treatment bed and positioned it above Chisnall’s arm, using a video X-ray screen on the back to align two sets of crosshairs over the break in his bone.

Chisnall winced as the machine above his arm began to whirr, knitting the bones back together.

“Lucky.” Chisnall did not smile back. “You know why they call me lucky?”

“No, why?” Wall asked.

“Because people around me get very unlucky and that makes me look lucky by comparison.”

Price could see the pain in his eyes and she knew exactly what was on his mind.

“Brogan, is there anything else you need to do?” she asked.

Brogan shook her head.

“Then join the others,” Price said. “I’ll keep an eye on Chisnall.”

“Call me when it finishes,” Brogan said on her way out of the room.

Price found a chair and sat by the bed.

“Ryan, you’ve got us out of all kinds of scrapes,” she said. “You’re the luckiest guy I know.”

“Tell that to Hunter, or the Demons. Or the soldiers on Task Force Magnum,” Chisnall said.

“You think you’re the only one carrying that weight?” she asked. “Do you want me to tell you about Emile, or Nukilik, or Wilton? The Tsar was nearly killed this morning. So was Monster in the Bering Strait. I don’t know whether I’m being too reckless or too cautious. I’m not a leader like you.”

“You really think it was any different for me?” Chisnall asked. “I went through the same agony with every decision I made. But think about this. You’re here. Apart from one injury, your team is okay. You don’t have to be perfect, you just have to be good enough. You are good enough. If you weren’t, your team wouldn’t be here right now.”

“I don’t think I’m cut out for it,” Price said.

“Price, I’ve been watching you,” Chisnall said. “You’re doing a great job as leader. I’d be happy to be on your team.”

“Ryan …” Price began, embarrassed.

“It’s been asked, and answered,” Chisnall said.

“Thanks, Ryan,” she said. “That means a lot.”

“So what are your orders, LT?” Chisnall asked.

“You’re the one with the plan,” Price said.

“Okay,” Chisnall said. “But you’re going to think it’s seven kinds of crazy.”

“Tell me,” Price said.

“We kidnap Azoh.”

[0950 HOURS LOCAL TIME]

[SHOPPING MALL, CANBERRA]

The scene commander was a young Nzgali captain. She was examining the interior of the fire truck when Nokz’z arrived. She stepped down and visibly paled when she saw who was with him.

“Colonel Nokz’z,” she said. “Commandant Goezlin.”

“This is Captain Jazki,” Nokz’z said. “One of my most competent officers.”

Jazki waved away the compliment with a brief touch of one hand to her face.

The yellow truck, battered and blackened and peppered with shrapnel, had crashed into a pillar just by the large glass doors to the mall. The nose of the truck was crumpled like tissue paper and all the windows were shattered.

A body lay on the ground beside the truck, surrounded by soldiers.

“Your report, Captain,” Nokz’z said.

“When we arrived we found the scene much as you see it,” Jazki said. “The occupants had escaped, except for one who we found unconscious on the floor in the back of the truck.”

“Alive?” Nokz’z asked.

Jazki nodded. “Badly injured though.”

“From the crash or the rocket attacks?” Nokz’z asked.

“Neither,” Jazki said. “The dressings aren’t ours. Looks like he was wounded earlier and they patched him up as best as they could. He should be in hospital.”

Nokz’z leaned over the injured Angel, examining the face. “It is the one they call The Tsar,” he said.

“They left him behind?” Goezlin asked.

“They had no choice,” Nokz’z said. “They could never have escaped dragging him along with them.”

“If you want my opinion,” Jazki said. “They left him behind deliberately. They knew we’d get him to a hospital. He wouldn’t last much longer without proper medical treatment.”

“I want to talk to him,” Goezlin said.

“He is not conscious,” Jazki said.

Goezlin stared at her.

“I’ll see what we can do,” Jazki said.

“That really is crazy,” Barnard said.

“Have you got a better idea?” Chisnall asked. Price had called the team back to hear Chisnall’s plan.

“No,” Barnard admitted. “But that doesn’t make it any less crazy.”

Brogan was examining the screen on the machine that was mending Chisnall’s arm.

“Can it go any faster, Brogan?” Chisnall said. “We gotta get moving.”

“We’re not going anywhere till Humpty’s together again,” Brogan said.

“Tell us about these positronium bombs,” Barnard said.

“According to my source, Fezerkers have hidden these bombs in all major cities, including Washington,” Chisnall said.

“A decapitation strike,” Barnard said.

“A what?” Wall asked.

“Decapitation,” Barnard said. “Cut off the head. Then the orders to fire our nukes would never be given.”

“Wouldn’t the sub-commanders fire them anyway?” Price asked.

“They can’t,” Barnard said. “All our nukes are strictly controlled, to stop a rogue commander from starting a nuclear war. They can only be launched with codes supplied by the Pentagon.”

“So what is a positronium bomb?” Price asked.

“I don’t really know,” Chisnall said. “Any idea, Barnard?”

“Maybe,” Barnard said. “I know about positronium.”

“Tell us. But try to use little words,” Price said.

“When antimatter and matter collide, it releases tremendous amounts of energy,” Barnard said. “But you can stop them colliding, temporarily, by getting the particles to orbit each other. That creates a mass called positronium. But there’re two problems. Firstly, it’s not stable. We’ve never been able to make it last for more than a few billionths of a second.”

“Billionths?”

“Yeah. Blink and you’ll miss it. A billion times. Here’s the second problem. A gram of positronium would produce an incredibly powerful bomb, but in the entire history of the earth we’ve never managed to create more than a millionth of that. And it disappeared almost as soon as it existed.”

“So where did the Pukes get all their positronium?” Price asked.

“I don’t know,” Barnard said.

“From the engines on their transporters,” Brogan said.

“There were thousands of spaceships!” Chisnall said.

Brogan shook her head. “Most of the transporters jettisoned their drives into space as a safety precaution before beginning their entry into Earth’s atmosphere. Remember that transporter that crashed? Imagine if that one had had its drive on board.”

“Boom,” Wall said.

“That’s why when we inspected the transporters we found no sign of a power source,” Barnard said.

“Yes. Mostly. Of the thousands of transporters, a very small number risked atmospheric entry with their drives on board. Any one of those drives has enough positronium to create a dozen bombs, each bomb a thousand times more powerful than any nuclear weapon.”

“Now you see the problem,” Chisnall said. “The Pukes are backed into a corner. As soon as they feel there is a real possibility of defeat, they’ll decide there’s no other alternative but to blow us humans off the planet. First step: take out Washington.”

“So how does Azoh help us stop this?” Price asked.

“They revere Azoh above everything,” Chisnall said. “To them, she’s like Mother Teresa, Gandhi and Jesus Christ all rolled into one.”

“I still don’t see how that helps,” Price said.

“If someone kidnapped Jesus, wouldn’t you do your best to get him back?” Brogan asked.

“Exactly,” Chisnall said. “If we could spirit Azoh away somewhere, we’d have the biggest bargaining chip of the war. Plus, if the Pukes don’t know where she is, they’re not going to start blowing up cities in case they kill her.”

“Nobody want to nuke Jesus,” Monster said.

“We may be able to force the Pukes to negotiate some kind of truce with ACOG,” Chisnall said.

There was a silence as they all thought through the implications of that. Price looked around at the team, noting the furrowed brows. The very idea of kidnapping the spiritual leader of their enemy was outrageous.

“We’d have to get past all her guards and somehow get her out of the country,” she said.

“You’re right; it’s crazy,” Chisnall said.

“You’d have to be crazy to even think of attempting it,” Barnard said.

“Monster crazy always,” Monster said with a grin.

“I’m with the big guy,” Wall said.

“Chisnall, you put me in charge,” Price said. “So it’s my decision. And I think it’s suicide.”

“You know what your problem is, Price?” Brogan asked.

“I’m sure you’re going to tell me,” Price said.

“You’re still hoping to come out of this alive,” Brogan said.

“And you’re not?”

“I honestly don’t care,” Brogan said. “And that means I can function as a soldier. You’ll never achieve anything unless you’re prepared to put your life on the line.”

“Like The Tsar just did,” Barnard said.

“At least The Tsar only had his own life to worry about,” Price said.

“Exactly,” Brogan said. “Stop worrying about us and start thinking about your mission objective.”

“She’s right,” Barnard said.

“This plan may be crazy, but at least we die in style,” Brogan said.

“I hate to say it, but I’m starting to like this chick,” Wall said.

Price put her head down, staring at the floor, thinking. If she had learned one thing on this mission, it was that being too cautious was as dangerous as being too reckless.

“What about security?” she asked.

“Very light,” Chisnall said. “Bzadians don’t have crime. Humans might have a history of murdering their leaders, but the idea wouldn’t even occur to a Bzadian.” He stopped and corrected himself. “Usually.”

“Okay, we go back to the original plan. Gain access to Azoh’s private quarters,” Price said. “Knock out her guards with some puke spray, tie her up, sling her over our collective shoulder, and whistle a jaunty little melody as we saunter on home.”