Coyote Rising (37 page)

“And Constanza might have led them to Defiance.” Barry glanced at Chris. “You had the right idea, leading him away like that.”

“I had a hunch, that’s all.” Carlos shrugged. “It was the long way, but . . .”

“What sort of . . . ? Wait a minute, I don’t get it.” Now Chris was confused; he looked first at Barry, then at Carlos. “I thought you were taking me back to your camp.”

Carlos knelt by the lantern. “Not the straight way, I wasn’t,” he said, warming his hands. “The path we took is a hunting trail. We put up the bridge late last year as an easy way of getting across the creek to Mt. Aldrich, but it’s not the direct route to getting home.”

“Then you knew. . . .”

“I didn’t know anything.” Carlos shook his head. “Like I said, I only had a suspicion. That’s why I told Barry to meet us upstream from where we found you. If your friends hadn’t shown up, we would have crossed the bridge, then doubled back and met up with them a few miles down the creek. If everything looked safe, then we would have taken you to Defiance.”

He clasped his hands together. “Which brings us back to the here and now,” he went on. “Technically speaking, you’re a prisoner of war. Not only that, but you’re a traitor, too.”

“I told you why I did what I did. You heard what I said last night. . . .”

“That was last night. We didn’t know you were setting us up.” Carlos turned the lantern’s wheel, feeding more fish oil to the wick to make it burn a little higher. Different campfire, but the same conversation, continued only a few hours later. “Cards on the table, buddy. Only way either of us is going to get out of this is to deal straight.”

From somewhere outside, they could hear the Union gyros prowling back and forth across the gorge as they searched for Rigil Kent. “We both have something to win,” Carlos went on, “and we both have something to lose. You want to see your mother again . . . and believe me, she wants to see you, too. We’ve got an injured soldier, and no one wants to wait here until Hernandez sends in another Diablo team. And I think you know by now that she considers you expendable.”

Chris slowly nodded. Everyone was watching him. “We want to go
home,” Carlos continued. “Some of these guys would just as soon shoot you, but I’m willing to give you a second chance.”

“I . . .” Chris hesitated. “Why would you do that?”

“Oh, for the love of . . .” Lars turned away in disgust. “Don’t trust him. He’s a friggin’ boid in the bush.”

“Shut up and gimme your radio.” Carlos held out his hand, staring at Lars until he surrendered his unit. “A long time ago we were friends. We grew up together. Then I made a mistake, then you made a mistake, then . . .” He shook his head. “Maybe it’s time we got past all that. Do you want to go home, Chris?”

For a moment, there was no one else in the cave. Just the two of them, guys who’d played army with toy guns, told each other dirty jokes, shared secrets about teachers and girls. They had gone to the stars together, watched their fathers die, gone on a misguided adventure and survived only to become distant from one another, and finally enemies. Yet Carlos knew that, even if Chris said no, he’d never kill him. He’d had that chance once already that morning and hadn’t taken it. For better or worse, he was still his friend.

“Yeah.” Chris’s voice was very quiet. “I’d like that.”

Carlos nodded. “Okay. We can do that . . . but first you’ve got to prove yourself.”

Chris watched as Carlos unfolded the radio antenna. “What do you want me to do?”

“You’ve been a traitor before.” Carlos extended the unit to him. “Now I want you to be a traitor again.”

G
ABRIEL
76/1036—F
ORT
L
OPEZ

“Have they spotted him yet?” Baptiste approached Cartman; who
was now monitoring communications from Flight One.

“No, sir. He’s still . . .” The sergeant stopped, cupped a hand against his ear. “Just a moment. They’ve got movement on the river, not far from the falls.”

“Pull up the forward camera.” Baptiste watched as the middle screen of the carrel lit to display an image from the gyro’s nose camera. He could see what its pilot was seeing: an airborne view of the gorge, the falls in the background, the creek directly below. The image tilted slightly to the right as the aircraft swung around. “Give me the audio feed, too,” he added. “I want to hear what they’re saying.”

“Where’s Flight Two?” Luisa Hernandez had come up to stand beside him. “They should be close by.”

“Just saw something down there. Close to the creek bank, about seventy feet from the falls.”
The voice of Flight One’s pilot was laced with static, yet discernible.
“Closing in . . .”

“Flight Two coming in to cover Flight One, ma’am.” Without waiting to be told, Acosta tapped at her keyboard. The screen above her board showed an image from the Flight Two’s nose camera, nearly the same as Flight One’s, except from a higher altitude. The other gyro was visible in the foreground, about two hundred feet below. “Do you want audio feed?”

“Negative.” Baptiste spoke before the Matriarch could respond; he caught the sour look on her face, but chose to ignore it. He didn’t want
to be distracted by cross talk between the pilots. “Monitor their channel and tell me if something important comes up,” he told Acosta, then returned his attention to the screen in front of him. “Patch me into Flight One,” he said, touching his jaw. “Flight One, this is Gold Ops. What do you have?”

The image steadied, became horizontal; the falls were no longer visible, and they could only see the rushing waters of the creek.
“Gold Ops, we thought we saw something move down there. Could be our man. Coming down to check it out.”

“We copy, Flight One.” Baptiste continued to stare at the screen. “Get ready for pickup, but keep a sharp eye out. We don’t know what’s down there. Over.”

“Suspicious, aren’t you?” During all this, Gregor Hull had glided up behind him; now he stood between him and the Matriarch, a black-robed specter, aloof yet omnipresent. “You don’t trust our man anymore?”

Baptiste gnawed his lower lip, refrained from making a comment. No, he did not. Ten minutes ago, Flight One had received a radio message on a coded frequency from Chief Proctor Levin. Everyone else involved in the operation had been lost so far, and Levin’s tracer had failed almost two and a half hours ago. Suddenly, Levin had made contact, claiming that he’d escaped from his captors and requesting rescue, with pickup in the gorge below the falls.

Baptiste shot a glance at the Matriarch from the corner of his eye. Her face remained stoical, registering no emotion. The moment the Diablo teams had hit the ground, she’d written off Levin as expendable; he’d been little more than bait for Rigil Kent, not worth saving if he got in the way. Now that he was known to be alive, she wanted him back. All well and good. The mission had been a failure; they might be able to salvage something from it yet.

Nonetheless, before Diablo Alpha had been brought down, the team leader’s camera had captured two men on the bridge. The camera had moved away before their blurred features could be discerned. One of them had opened fire upon the hunter-killer team just moments before it was wiped out.

He could have been Carlos Montero. That was what the Matriarch believed. Yet he might have been someone else . . .

“Visual acquisition.”
The pilot’s fuzzed voice jerked him from his reverie.
“We got someone, Gold Ops. Two down, dead ahead . . .”

Baptiste rested his hands upon the back of Cartman’s chair, leaned close to study the screen. Yes, there he was: a small figure, standing on a boulder near the creek’s edge, waving both hands above his head. The camera zoomed in, caught a face: a young man, in his late twenties, with long blond hair and a short beard.

“That’s him.” The Matriarch smiled. “Flight One, go down and take him aboard.”

“I don’t think that’s . . .”

“We need him,” she said, barely glancing his way. “He’s been in close contact with Rigil Kent. He may know something we . . .”

“Gold Ops! We’re . . . !”

A sharp bang, followed by a high-pitched screech. In the same instant, the screen went dark. “Flight One down!” Acosta shouted. “Flight One is down!”

Hernandez’s mouth dropped open. “What? I . . . what did you . . . ?”

Baptiste shoved her aside, bolted toward the next carrel. Acosta stared at her screen, watching in openmouthed horror as a flaming mass plummeted into the creek, rotors still spinning as it disintegrated against the rocks. “It just . . . sir, it just . . .”

“Get them out of there!” Baptiste yelled. The warrant officer was in shock, unable to perform her duty; he shoved her aside, stabbed at the console. “Flight Two, this is Gold Ops! Get out of there! Return to base at—”

“No!” The Matriarch rushed forward, tried to pull Baptiste away from the console “He’s down there! Rigil Kent is down there! We’ve almost got. . . !”

Baptiste turned around, shoved her away with both hands. Staggering back, she tripped over the feet of the sergeant. She would have fallen to the floor if one of bodyguards hadn’t been there to catch her. “Hold her!” Baptiste yelled, snapping his finger at the Guardsman. “Detain the Matriarch! That’s an order!”

The soldier hesitated, caught in a moment of uncertainty about whose authority was greater. Baptiste was a Union Astronautica senior officer, though, while Hernandez was a civilian, so his duty was clear. He gently grasped Hernandez’s arm, murmured something to her. For a moment it seemed as if she would resist, then she surrendered.

“We copy, Gold Ops. Returning to base.”
Baptiste looked at the screen again, saw the gorge disappear as the gyro peeled away. The pilot was probably grateful to receive the order to withdraw. Someone down there had an RPG; the next heat seeker would have his name on it.

“You’re out of line, Captain.” Hernandez glowered at him, still held back by the Guardsman. “I can have you placed under arrest for this.”

“No, ma’am, you can’t.” Before Baptiste could respond, Savant Hull stepped forward. “This is a military operation, and Captain Baptiste is the commanding officer. In this instance, his authority supersedes yours.”

She stared first at him, then at Baptiste. “You can’t . . .”

“It’s done.” Baptiste let out his breath. “This mission is over. I’m not going to put anyone else at risk just so that—”

“Matriarch?” Acosta looked over at her. “Flight Two says they’re receiving another ground transmission. The person sending it says he wants to talk to you . . . personally.”

For a second, no one said anything. “Put it on so that we can all hear,” Baptiste said quietly. “And tell Flight Two to remain on station.”

A few moments passed while the orders were carried out. Then the fuzzed tones of a low-frequency radio signal filled the situation room, and they heard a young man’s voice:

“Matriarch Hernandez, do you hear me?”

Acosta nodded, indicating that she was patched into the comlink. The Matriarch prodded her jaw. “I hear you, Chief . . . Chris, I mean. Good to know you’re alive and well.”

“Yeah, I’m still here.”
A short, rancorous laugh.
“How nice of you to be concerned, considering that one of your men put a hole in me. Know what a laser feels like when it’s going through your shoulder? Hurts like hell, lemme tell you.”

“I’m sure it was a mistake.” The left corner of the Matriarch’s mouth
twitched upward. “We tried to pick you up, but we came under enemy fire. If you’ll tell us where you are, we can make another attempt.”

A low hiss from behind Baptiste. From the corner of his eye, he saw Cortez standing nearby. Like everyone else in the room, he was silently listening to this exchange. The Matriarch’s calm self-assurance had returned; she cast a smug look at Baptiste. This wasn’t over yet. She’d get her man back, then they’d hunt down Rigil Kent.

“No, I don’t think so, but thanks anyway. Before I go though, a friend of mine would like to talk to you.”

The Matriarch’s eyes widened. She was about to reply when another voice came over.
“Matriarch Hernandez, this is Rigil Kent. . . .”

Murmurs swept through the room; Baptiste heard someone mutter something obscene. Acosta reached to her console, trying to get a lock on the source of the signal.
“I’m going to make this quick,”
the voice continued.
“You’ve succeeded in getting a lot of your people killed today, I’m sorry for that, but you picked the fight, not us. We appreciate one thing, though . . . convincing Chris that he was on the wrong side. He’s back with us now. Thanks for that, at least.”