When Diplomacy Fails . . . (32 page)

From the rear, Shaman said, “Hear that?”

They froze momentarily, and Alex heard small arms combat.

“They’re mixing it up now. Hopefully that will slow them.”

“What’s the plan?” Lionel asked as they trooped into the tunnel. A crouch was possible, but Alex knew he’d be crippled after a hundred meters of that. He went to his knees, as Aramis and Bart had.

They stirred up dust that was a combination of spores, grit and drifting insulation. He grabbed for a paper mask and dragged it over his head. Some still got through, and his breathing was hindered by the filter matrix holding his hot exhalations. Still, it was a hindrance, not a stoppage.

Aramis’s voice was muffled by a mask, and echoed oddly. He said, “We go across the street, well, under it. That puts us outside the epicenter. We then go up, and wait to see who comes looking for us. They have to fight through the confusion, and we’ll have a good position.”

Behind him, it was Highland who asked, “What if they wait us out?” She coughed from dust seeping around her mask.

“They’ll want to be fast, and take the opportunity. The longer it goes on, the more likely we are to get backup. Their resources are finite. This assumes they’re logical and reasonable.”

She said, “Huble will be. I don’t know about Lezt.”

“We’ll hope others are, too, or that they make mistakes.”

Elke’s voice said, “Ready to close this end.”

He really wasn’t sure about that. They needed cover and concealment, and to stop pursuit. It was also useful to create the impression that they might be dead. Against that, though, was that they’d be trapped underground, hoping the other end was no worse than this one had been, and that if Elke missed a calculation, it might cave in on top of them.

“As soon as everyone is in, do it,” Aramis said.

“No time,” she insisted. “They’re entering the building now.”

“Everyone move! Babs, do it!”

Behind him came shouts and scrabbles, then a breath-stealing
bang!
That blew debris past him. The ground shook and rumbled and continued to do so, as he scurried like a rat, except a rat had proper feet and wouldn’t wear out its knees the way he was, even with kneepads.

“Elke, it’s still rumbling!” he said.

“The building was unstable. A large part is coming down. Think of it as free bonus destruction.”

“Can it hurt us?”

“I accounted for it.”

If he ever got married again, he’d never be able to trust even a wife the way he trusted Elke.

Aramis said, “There’s already a news churp that Ms. Highland may have died in fighting in the capital.”

She snarled, “Those crab-picking snot ghouls.”

Alex said, “After last time, you think they’d learn not to—”

Aramis cut in with, “BuState denies dead in fighting, insists kidnapped by factions. I’m getting a feed of ‘her’ calling for help and demanding peace from her supporters.”

Highland said, “You were right.” It was so soft it would have been inaudible, except he’d been hoping for it, and hoping not to be right.

“Yes, ma’am, they’re going to build you up heroically, try to kill you, and load your presence into the party. If they can’t do that, look for some embarrassing content to make its way out shortly.”

Elke apparently had reception on her gear. “The Sunni are offering a reward for her capture as a war criminal. The Amala are offering to match it, dead or alive. Highland Campaign Concordance is demanding the government arrest the preceding groups.”

“They’re in quite a frenzy. Good.”

“Access ahead,” Aramis advised.

“Open?”

“Welded.”

“Shit. Elke, forward.”

“I am the creeping thing,” she said.

They pulled up and stopped, face to heel, almost face to ass. A minute later, Elke crawled past, brushing the wall as she did so.

“This is going to be loud. Cover ears, open mouths, stand by. Any alibis? Fire in the hole.”

The explosion sounded deep and low, but felt like a kick in the guts from an elephant. The overpressure absolutely crushed him in the enclosed space. The dust turned opaque, and over it all was a ringing noise where the metal had yielded to Elke’s ministrations.

It still wasn’t open, though he assumed her blast had done as intended. She was neither cursing in Czech nor preparing a second charge.

A tug at his ankles was Highland, who crawled closer and muttered, “Alex, are there clean clothes available?”

He wasn’t going to ask which way she’d cut loose. These things happened in war, and her expression was completely forlorn.

“Not at present, ma’am. I’ll see what we can find.”

“Thank you.”

Aramis pried at the metal, Bart shoved, and shortly it shrieked and relented.

Aramis said, “Yeah, a lot more trash here, and ripe. Wow.”

The stench indicated the stairwell at this end had obviously been used as a latrine, trash dump and general pit. There were coffee scents, rot, piss, fermented vegetables and god only knew what else.

Behind, another round of rumbles started.

Elke said, “That was not me. Someone just struck the other building.”

“So they know we’re in this area. Move.”

Aramis said, “Yeah, there’s a plastic pallet here. We can walk over that for a few steps.”

“Whatever helps. Move!”

Fortunately, it was mostly stink, though the floor was slimy and disgusting. “Watch your step!” he advised, as he crawled through the hatch onto the pallet, stood and turned.

Bad news, they had a ladder, not stairs, though there was a small landing at the top.

“Okay, this place already stinks, everybody drain. That corner, ladies first.”

Aramis and Shaman stood there facing out, creating some illusion of privacy. Highland looked embarrassed and ashamed. Jessie half-moved and hesitated, stuck between needing to and unable to, until Elke grabbed her and went back herself. Cady said, “I’m fine.”

Several of the men took turns to unzip and drain, and Alex went last as Aramis ascended the ladder behind him. There was a respectable puddle, several liters, but the detritus on the ground was so squishy it didn’t seem it would matter.

That done, he turned to the stairs and climbed up, hands on the sides to avoid gripping the muck left from Aramis’s boots. Then he knelt, turned and offered a hand to Highland. As she came up, he could see she had wet her pants. Well, explosions and collapses could do that to one. He wasn’t going to mention it. If they could find clean clothes later they would. For now, he helped Jessie up, and Cady made the small landing completely full.

The door was partly off the hinges and askew. Beyond it was a cabinet of some kind.

There was movement to the sides, and he got the impression there were combatants.

Aramis had a pen-sized periscope, and Bart slid a small probe through another crack. Good. Elke’s shotgun-fired recon rounds would not help here.

Aramis whispered, “There are four routes underground we could have taken. That disrupts the pursuit. This appears to be local militia. Red bandanas with Arabic as their uniform.”

From the ladder, Jason asked, “Does it say ‘Arm of God’?”

“How the fuck would I know? I don’t speak Arabic. Hold on. Bart?”

Bart nodded, fingered controls, and pulled an image. It meant little to Alex, though it was familiar. Jason said, “Yes, that’s them. Sunni. Adequately trained. Looks like they have current generation gear.”

Alex asked, “Estimate on numbers?”

“Possibly thirty in this space. Beyond that, unknown.”

He sighed. Frontal firefights were a bad thing, even with the element of surprise. These guys had rifles, light armor, and looked ready to rumble.

“Well, we do what we have to. We can take them. But some discretion would have been nice.”

Jason said, “My Arabic is good enough I can sound like an Amala.”

“Will they believe it, the way we’re dressed?”

“Shouting will do it.”

“Likely. Then I guess we do. Judgment calls. Balance ammo with damage. Aramis and Bart split the front. I’ll take forward.”

Cady said, “I’m on the right,” and shifted her carbine to a left-handed stance. She and Jason were both largely ambidextrous.

Jason said, “I’ve got right. Marlin, Lionel, take left. Ms. Highland, Jessie, huddle down in the middle while we clear some space, then be ready to sprint for cover. Shaman, Elke, stay with them, bring them up the rear”

Jason slapped his ankle, he prodded Cady and goosed Aramis. Aramis nodded, said, “Go!” and kicked at the door.

It didn’t break cleanly. It splintered. It was plastic, not wood, but old and crazed and some kind of extrusion. His boot went through and he wasn’t going to be able to pull it back out. Bart slammed his forearm against the upper section, and it gave way, and the two tumbled through, shoving the cabinet until it caught on the floor and fell over. They tumbled, rolled and came up.

A bullet came between them, right over Alex’s head, and he swarmed forward, high-stepping over the wreckage.

Then Bart opened up with the cannon.

Peripherally, he saw two men on the left explode into meaty goo. The cacophony echoed. Aramis fired three bursts right. Cady fired. There was a momentary pause for targets, and Jason started wailing something in Arabic, of which Alex only recognized, “
Allahu akbar!
”
God is great
. Well, that depended on whose god and the circumstances.

Ahead of him, someone kicked a door in, and started to spray the room. He pointed, filled them with a burst, and fired another, slightly sustained one down the corridor. That was about twenty rounds of his fifty-round mag gone.

Bart fired off some kind of grenade. Or maybe it was Elke. But the concussion was painful. Even moderate charges were brutal with reflective surfaces. Fire picked up all around as the eight mercenaries filled the space.

Alex realized there weren’t any more targets for him. The room was a dusty, smoky, choking haze of debris with the acrid smell of propellant and the salty tang of blood. Computers were shattered, a respectable commo unit had been expertly hit. The mic and headset were shattered by pinpoint shooting—probably Jason’s work.

Elke said, “Light military vehicle outside.”

Aramis said, “My map says there’s a perfect position for an OP at the top of this building.”

“Then we’re definitely not going there. Suggestions?”

“Yes, take the vehicle. I recommend frontal drive south.”

“What’s there?”

“More Sunni, then the army. There’s a peace control point about three kilometers ahead.”

“And Paramils overhead.”

“Bart can handle them, or Jason.”

“Yeah, and they won’t want to be seen in that mix. Though same rule applies.” He pointed in the direction of the door and started moving as he spoke. “They’ll be unseen in the mayhem. Also, contact forward.”

A squad of someone was arriving on the street front, taking up position across.

Alex ordered, “Block in principal, advance with cover fire, move.”

Shaman and Lionel stood directly in front of Highland and Jessie. Bart and Aramis opened up until it sounded like the world exploded. Elke and Jason did something on the left, Cady went right, and Alex followed. There were tens of troops, at least, advancing leapfrog, though most of them did dive for cover when shot at. He picked one, and his first shot grazed and creased the man’s back. Second shot was through the top of his helmet, and the man jerked like a frog. Two others shot back, and he flinched, but they weren’t close. It was always good to be a moving target.

The vehicle was some equivalent to a Grumbly. Unarmored, unarmed at present, but decently mobile. The block of protective meat flowed and climbed the back, and Lionel dove from the open bed, through the back hatch, into the cab. Jason ran up the passenger side, waving a tool roll, fired a burst from some locally procured dump gun, dumped it, yanked the door and jumped in.

Alex waited for the rest of Cady’s team, and she boarded second to last, then helped yank him up into the bed. They did not present a low profile, but they presented a heavily armed profile. Marlin had acquired some local machine gun, and Bart stood up against the cab as support and antiair.

“Roll!” he and Cady both said at the same time.

They were driving into an approaching mass of armed people, heading east again, and needed to turn south. Troops spilled into the street, mostly second-rate militia, though that was probably generous. Little of this planet deserved the sobriquet of second rate.

They’d planned for action, even if they didn’t want it. They were about to get it.

CHAPTER 26

HORACE MOVED FAST ENOUGH
to keep Highland’s grip under tension, so he knew she was following. Outside, bullets cracked, but none close enough to worry him terribly. At the curb, he swung, detached Highland’s hand, and helped her into the bed with a shove. He frowned. She was soaked. Not critical in the field, but it had to be unpleasant and disturbing for a civilian.

He swung up after her, no longer being young enough to spring, and rolled ungracefully to a bench.

“You stay down, ma’am, miss,” he insisted. Then, holding his carbine over the rail in case of targets, he dug into his kit. Right side, lower, angled pocket, and . . . there.

He handed her a flat packet.

“Super absorbent gel. Pour it in your hand, and it will soak up the spill.”

She looked overwhelmed from the fire, but she recognized that, seemed to come back to ground, and said, “Thank you.” She started dumping it and applying it.

Technically, it was a clotting agent, but principal’s mental health mattered, too, and they’d already given this woman more adventure than her press releases had ever dreamed. The overload was apparent in her face.

Bullets cracked past, occasionally slapping into the sides. Marlin twitched and threw himself prone. Horace ducked, checked, saw a crater in his armor, and slapped him on the shoulder.

“You’re fine, just a spall.”

“Roger, thanks.”

Bart fired forward, something from each tentacle. The man was really getting good at controlling that beast; if only they made them less monstrous, but of course, batteries and ammo took volume and mass. One gun pointed to each side, ready to hose buildings. One pointed straight up against drones, and at that moment it swung and stuttered. Light pistol rounds were all that was needed to take down most of those things. The grenade launcher he kept pointed forward. He also had a dump gun under his left arm, for close-in hosing.

Elke shouted, “Recon!” and slammed a shell overhead. “Heavy foot traffic ahead, and fighting between vehicles. We’ll be dismounting in two hundred meters,” she said.

Alex shouted, “Understood, stand by.”

Cady said, “Edge and Helas are well-covered and safe. They’ll keep activating repeaters. Five left.”

Alex said, “Understood. Every ten minutes should do it.”

Horace kept his eyes on his sector. Until there were casualties, he was a gun. It always amazed him how few casualties there were. He had first-hand experience on how effective training, movement, and avoidance could be. Right then, a man, head wrapped in a rag and pointing a rifle, rose above the sill of a broken window. Horace twisted his gun that way and fired a burst. Whether he hit or not he was unsure, but the man didn’t shoot.

He heard sobbing. It was Jessie, not Highland. By touch, he located a mild tranquilizer and a mild stim. He reached back and said, “Slap these on your neck.”

Fingers clutched at them. It took her three tries. That was about right for the level he’d prescribed. Then she grabbed that small wooden penguin again. Good.

Bart called, “Obstruction in a hundred meters, checkpoint two hundred past that.”

Alex asked, “Hostiles?”

“I presume they all are.”

“Then feel free to target any threats. With prejudice.”

The battle was fairly intense by local standards, with several hostiles per block. Of course, they’d just hit someone’s headquarters.

Alex said, “Jessie, churp our location.”

“Oh,” she said, and pulled at her phone. She seemed lucid, but slowed. That wasn’t the trank, that was shock.

“Corcoran, cover me,” he said and slid down next to her. He took the phone from her, unshielded it, slid in the battery.

She still had trouble focusing.

“Big battle. Current location. Ms. Highland fleeing antigovernment factions. Trying to reach friendly lines of the Sufi.”

“We’re trying to reach the Sufi?”

“That’s what we’re saying.”

“Oh.”

She got it done, and he wondered about disabling the phone again or letting her keep it live. Their location would be known in moments anyway.

Lionel shouted, “Traffic stop, prepare to unass!”

Amidst the rattle of weapon checks and reloading, Horace turned to Highland. “Ready, ma’am?” he asked, coaxing her from a sit to a squat.

“Yes, I am,” she said. She brushed residual sorbent off her pants and strained into position.

A glance confirmed there were a lot more combatants around here.

“Listen to me,” he said, and waited for them both to face him. “I will debark first, and help each of you down. Marlin will front for Jessie. Ms. Highland, you follow me. We will move quickly to improvised cover. Then we can expect to be moving under fire constantly for a while. If I go down, follow Marlin until someone else gives instructions. If he goes down, follow me. Understood?”

“Yes.”

“Uh huh.”

“Stand by.”

He craned enough to get another glimpse. There weren’t a lot of hostiles, though there seemed to be quite a few snipers. There was a crush of vehicles that would stop any progress.

“Here we go,” he said.

The vehicle stopped fast but relatively smoothly, given the damaged road and trash. He leaned far back, and grabbed Highland’s shoulder to stop her falling forward. Corcoran did the same with Jessie.

As the momemtum slackened, he slid out the back. Corcoran and Marlin dropped off on either side and fired suppressive bursts. Then Highland slid off the deck, followed by Jessie.

Elke was ready to have fun. She had shotgun, carbine and toys, and no one to stop her until they reached cover. She sprung over the side of the truck, soaked up the impact sting in her feet, and tossed a smoke forward. She raised the shotgun, selected smoke-bangs and fired both, one each way down the street. The two teams swarmed past her into a building, and she brought up the rear seeking anything to shoot. She tugged the lanyard off the present on the truck.

A shot cracked the concrete next to her. She followed it generally back, looking for the source. Across the street and up three floors, a rifleman leaned out a window. Silly, silly. She thumbed for antiarmor and shot. Bart did, too, with a burst of mid caliber, and Jason swung for a shot. The man exploded into goo, but she was fairly sure her charge had blown his armor through his chest a moment before the others.

As she backed through the door, she heard, “Through that?” from an incredulous Cady.

Aramis and Alex stood together. Aramis had a route projected on a filthy gray wall.

“Yes,” Alex said. “En masse, shooting anything in our way, straight along the alley. Then turn left and meet the checkpoint.”

“How do we stop them shooting us?”

“Yeah, I’m working on that,” Aramis said. “Hopefully they’ll recognize some combination of us or Ms. Highland.”

Lionel asked, “Did this seem like a good idea at the time?” while he and Jason loaded more ammo into Bart’s rig.

Alex said, “Still does, barring any new ones.”

“No, I have nothing. Except ammo.”

“Let’s move.”

Elke checked locations of her accessories by touch and fell in behind Bart and Aramis. It was always best to lead with firepower.

As they left through the south, someone finally got courage to go for the vehicle. She heard the boobytrap hiss in that sibilant white noise, which presaged a shrieking scream of anguish. Flammable metals didn’t stop for much, certainly not textiles, and moist flesh just made them react more.

They made it across the street as a mass before anyone caught them. However, as they entered the alley, fire behind them erupted.

“Man down! Man down! Corcoran is down!”

Cady shouted, “Marlin, stay with him, get to cover.”

They might lose a lot over this. In the meantime, though, Elke turned and shot her last three obscurants to the alley mouth, and dumped a gun into the haze. It ran empty, she slid a prepared case into it, and pulled the trigger. She tossed it aside for some local to find. When he opened the breech he’d be without a face.

Peasants never learned not to mess with strangers. Perhaps, though, she could improve their manners a bit with gentle reminders.

Her load was significant and she panted. Thank god she didn’t have the principal, the hanger on, or the Medusa.

At that moment Bart splashed something else overhead. Another drone.

Aramis said, “We have lots of recon. Active searches right now.”

She pulled her monitor from her chest pouch and looked. There were lots of feeds, lots of scans.

“They’re searching all frequencies and nets. They’ll have us in a moment.”

“A hundred and fifty meters,” Bart said.

Alex said, “Good. Ms. Highland, please look up in the air for a few moments.”

“Uh?”

“Look up. We want them to see you. We’ll go between these buildings single file, and fast. That will put us one street from the CP. Okay, that’s enough.” Highland was still staring up. She seemed completely broken and pliable now. It was amusing how impending death changed people’s self-assessment.

It was also interesting how far one hundred fifty meters could be in hostile territory.

“We should go active,” Elke said.

“How?”

“Bart and I clear the route, loudly. After all, we want notice.”

Alex said, “Do it. Formation, check loads, thumbs up, and go.”

Elke led the way down the gap. It wasn’t even an alley. If someone collapsed the building, they were all fucked and forgotten. She went at a sprint. Behind her, Bart scraped and banged the walls. He had only two functional guns now, one carbine, one rifle. The long-range and grenade guns were dry.

“Dump that in the street,” she called over her shoulder.

“I plan to,” he huffed.

The view ahead wasn’t encouraging. She turned over her shoulder and shouted, “I’ll need to create a new door over there.”

Alex was behind Highland this time, against his better judgment, but the firepower was up front, the principal in the middle, and he needed to ensure she made it. The rest were expendable. Meat shields were useful, but they’d get in the way of the firepower.

He heard Elke’s statement and knew that meant explosives. Shit.

Elke reached the street. He knew because it got loud and smoky, then louder still. Bart fired a long burst, then unslung the Medusa.

That was a hint to hurry the fuck up.

He burst into light followed by Cady, and a scan showed the problem. They’d come out exactly between two factions, right in the middle. He’d thought Aramis meant that as a hypothetical, not to actually do it. Both sides tried to fire through the smoke.

Elke fired two rounds one way, turned and fired two the other, yanked something on her shotgun, and threw it. She slung two things on slings each way, and sprinted across the street.

Aramis and Shaman had Highland and rushed her behind. Lionel scooped a finally exhausted Jessie over his shoulder and followed.

Alex shouted, “Run you fuckers! Fire in the hole!” He made a quick head count by eye, and charged for cover.

Ahead, the world exploded. Again. This couldn’t be healthy.

He groggily cleared the street just as the Medusa went into self-destruct mode. It locked onto anything moving and fired until it ran dry. Ten seconds later it exploded. So did Elke’s shotgun. Enough explosive should dissuade anyone. It was certainly dissuading him.

The building he entered had been secured by barriers until Elke had cut her way in. The concrete still smoked from whatever she’d used to pierce it. He jumped over the rubble to find a door-shaped hole blown in the building’s extrusion, if doors were round and cut by platter charges.

Inside was barren, stripped of all but structure. He strode fast to catch up with the others, halfway across.

“I’m surprised they didn’t just demolish it,” Cady said.

Indeed. It was a shell of metal and plastic struts, decaying concrete, with occasional weeds growing through the debris.

Jason said, “Rules. Cultural and environmental protections. Even a mundane dump like this can’t be demolished, but it can be stripped.”

“What do we do outside?”

Cady said, “There should be military barricades and interdiction weapons. We can call and negotiate, or disarm and not present a threat.”

“Jason, Elke, can you jam them for a moment?”

Jason said, “Hah. No. Spoof, possibly. Throw up enough chaff, we can distract the automated systems. But someone has to go out unarmed.”

“I will,” Cady said. “I’ll take Jessie.”

Alex looked at Jessie. She nodded nervous agreement.

“I’ll call first. Stand by.”

He pulled out his other phone, punched in the number manually and connected. When the operator answered he cut the man off with, “This is Chief Marlow.”

“Yes, sir, please stand by.”

A moment later he heard, “This is Consul Beaumont. Your request is approved. Where would you like to meet the Special Service detachment?”

“We’re still working on that. Who should I contact?”

“Senior Agent Machac.” Alex memorized the number and recited it. Elke nodded acknowledgment that she had it, too.

He closed the connection, put out a hand for Elke’s spare phone, then used that to call.

“Agent Machac.”

“This is Marlow.”

“Yes, sir.”

“We need to meet with you to transfer Minister Highland to your protection. Is this agreeable?”

“Absolutely. We will accept responsibility on transfer.”

“Yes, did they tell you we’re under attack right now?”

“They did not, but I can follow the news. We can come to your location.”

“Thank you. Sir, I trust you implicitly once we connect. I do not trust our communications or other agencies. We will meet you. Stand by, please. I will be in touch.”

He closed again and looked around.

Elke said, “I have little left at this point. We’ll have one shot and it better work.”

Cady said, “Let us go first. Use it if we need to retreat.”

Alex said, “Go ahead.” To himself he said,
if we need to retreat we’re pretty much dead. Highland’s fanclub are squawking chickens, the army won’t help or will be stuck in a bureaucratic loop, and the administration is trying to get her dead
. No joy. He’d have words about this with Meyer when they got back. If.