Freehold (28 page)

“Stay out of the junkyard,” he warned, curving right to skim the edge of the metal fragments. Then there was no time to talk, as enemy interceptors came up through the holes in the broken mine field, spewing coherent energy and missiles in every direction. Interceptors from both sides paired off in individual duels, one on one, two on one, three on five; it didn't matter. While the Intersystems fighters had started with a numerical edge, the mine field had cut that down, and in the first few minutes of combat it quickly disappeared altogether.

Falco's fighters came out of the sun. They picked their targets with care and fired with precision. The Intersystems pilots were angry about their dead comrades who had been caught in the mine field, and their anger affected their judgement. In addition, many had never seen real combat before. They made mistakes and paid for them. Their ships blew up in bright orange balls, tumbled across the face of the planet like pinwheels, and dived down to the surface like shooting stars. But it didn't last. Those who survived the first five minutes were good. Very good. And they began to take a toll. Falco winced as a voice screamed in his headset and a Falcon flipped over and spun down toward the surface. The radio traffic was fast and furious.

“Shit ... they got Cal.”

“Shut up, stupid ... there's one on your tail.”

“Got him ... I got the sonovabitch! Watch out, Slim—damn, that was close.”

“Come to mama ... come to mama ... that's it ... mama has a nice torpedo for baby ... gotcha!”

“Jack! There's two of ’em on your tail!” The voice cut through Falco's gut like ice-cold steel. A quick glance at his stern screen confirmed what he'd been told—two heat-seeking torps were running straight for his tubes. He automatically dumped a load of hot chaff and rolled left. The torps fell for it, and exploded with a blinding flash as they hit the pieces of metallic mesh; but the interceptors didn't. They were still right on his ass. A host of buzzers and trouble lights went off as one of them scored a hit on Falco's stubby left wing. So much for going atmospheric. He jinked back and forth, but the blue pulses of coherent energy were weaving a pattern of death that couldn't be avoided much longer.

“We're comin', boss,” a voice said in his ear, but he knew they'd never make it in time. He saw one last chance—a trick that would work, or it wouldn't. If it didn't, he wouldn't have a chance to feel stupid ... he'd be dead. Gritting his teeth, he fed both drives more power and headed straight for the wall of metal that had been created by the exploding mine field. “Hold ... hold ... hold;
now!
” He pulled all the way back on the stick and felt his chest creak under the added Gs, as his fighter climbed up the curtain of metal. Behind him, there were twin explosions as both enemy interceptors ran into the cloud of shrapnel.

“Nice goin', boss!” one of his pilots called, but Falco didn't reply. He couldn't. His teeth were chattering too badly.

Stell stared into the plot tank. They were winning, but just barely. Thank god they didn't have to take the planet. They'd never make it. What they had to do was bad enough. Phase one, the elimination of the mine field, had gone even better than he'd dared hope, thanks to the idiot who had placed the mines too close together. Phase two was almost complete. Soon they'd control space and the atmosphere. And only a few of the Intersystems interceptors had made it through the Falcons to attack his ships. Most of those had been blasted into their component atoms by the heavier weapons of
Avenger
and the two Destroyers. But one suicidal pilot had managed to ram his craft through the torps, the energy beams, and the defensive screens, hitting a Destroyer just aft of her bridge. A series of explosions had rippled the length of the Destroyer, opening her up like a meal pak. Captain Kost, and the entire crew of the
Masai,
had been aboard. All were dead. A part of Stell had died with them. Later, he would mourn them, but now he knew he must concentrate on the living, because they could be saved. And it could've been worse. The whole damned brigade was crammed onto the single transport, and if they had managed to hit that ... But they hadn't. So now it was time for phase three.

Stell looked up from the tank. For the first time, he noticed that Captain Boyko was getting old. There were deep lines etched in her face and her dark hair was shot with gray. But her fiery eyes were as determined as ever, and her mouth was a hard, straight line. “Phase three, sir?” she asked calmly.

“Yes, Captain,” Stell acknowledged. “Execute phase three.” As she began giving orders through her com-set, Stell turned his attention back to the plot tank. Now the assault boats packed with brigade troopers would drop to the surface, fight their way into the headquarters complex, and hold it long enough for special teams to locate and liberate Freehold's money. It wasn't going to be easy.

The assault boat rocked back and forth as it hit the atmosphere, shuddered as surface-to-air missiles exploded nearby, then slid sideways as its pilot took evasive action. Stell had been through it a hundred times before, but it still scared him. This was the worst part—sitting helplessly in a metal can, while outside everyone tried to poke holes in it. He forced himself to grin nonchalantly to the troopers lining the bench seats around him. They all managed to grin back.

“Is it always like this?” Mueller asked, looking a little green around the edges from the boat's wild gyrations. The little man had insisted on joining the second wave along with Stell.

“I'm afraid so,” Stell replied. “For some reason, people always seem to resent it when you drop out of the sky onto their real estate.”

Mueller shook his helmeted head in mock amazement. “I know what you mean. People just aren't hospitable any more.”

“How's our guest doing?” Stell inquired, looking past Mueller to Nars, who was perspiring freely in his huge atmosphere suit.

“Just fine,” Mueller replied confidently. “In exchange for missing the front row seat you promised him, Administrator Nars has agreed to help me find our money, or something of equal value. Haven't you, Wilson?”

The fat man gave no reply, and Mueller shook his head sadly. “I'm afraid Wilson doesn't like flying much ... but I'm sure he'll be properly cooperative when we get dirtside.” As he spoke, the little comptroller fingered the huge handgun he'd been issued before the drop. Nars stared at it, apparently fascinated. Stell grinned. Mueller had enough guts packed in his little body to equip a full section.

Just then the boat rolled over and dived, throwing Stell against his harness, and making his stomach flip-flop. “Sorry about that, folks,” the pilot said over the intercom. “There's enough metal flying around out there to build a fleet. Hold on.”

As the small craft jinked right and left, dodging ground fire and missiles, Stell managed to ignore it by considering phase three. The first wave had hit the Landing Zone about three local hours earlier. They'd encountered stiff resistance. The Intersystems security forces were well trained and well armed. If it hadn't been for the brigade's slight numerical advantage, it would've been all over. As it was, they'd only barely managed to take and hold the LZ. As things stood now, they were surrounded and pinned down about a klick from the admin complex. If things went according to plan, the second wave would arrive, regroup, take the admin complex, recover their money, and lift. He was suddenly thrown down and back, as the pilot hit his retros and prepared to dump groundspeed. The whole ship shuddered as it fought its own inertia, and then hit with a thud as it pancaked in.

As they fought to free themselves from their harnesses, the pilot's voice flooded the intercom. “On behalf of the crew and myself, welcome to the Bitch. It's a bit cloudy, and raining lead, but otherwise a fine morning. We'd like to thank you for flying Suicidal Spacelines, and hope you have a nice day.”

Stell grinned in spite of the tight knot of fear in his gut. He stepped up to the hatch, threw himself out and into a forward roll. As he came up, he immediately dived again, this time into the cover provided by a wrecked vehicle. Slugs from a light automatic weapon screamed overhead and whined as they ricocheted off the boat's armor. Around him, troopers found what cover they could, and then began moving forward under the instructions of their noncoms. Looking back, he saw Nars fall, rather than jump, out of the assault boat—apparently propelled by Mueller's foot. Then the comptroller jumped himself, landing right on top of Nars, using the fat man to break his fall.

Teams of medics quickly loaded six stretchers through the open door. They jumped back as the assault boat lifted and hovered for a moment, while the pilot took the opportunity to hose down an area well beyond the LZ with his auto slug throwers. Everyone within a hundred yards was sandblasted by the flying dirt and debris blown out by the boat's retros. Then, with a scream of tortured jets, the ship was gone, lifting on full emergency power for the relative safety of space, its sonic boom rolling like thunder across the land.

“Welcome dirtside, General.” Stell turned to find that Sergeant Major Flynn had joined him. Her visor was up, and the smear of dirt across her face made her look more like a farm girl than the brigade's top noncom. “Major Wang sent me, sir.”

“Good.” Stell had to yell over the roar of a descending assault boat. “Let's not keep the Major waiting.” Flynn led him on a zig-zag course through the rubble of bombed buildings, between overturned vehicles, and down streets filled with broken glass and chunks of masonry. Twice they were forced to stop and take cover, as a computer-controlled mortar barrage marched by, the successive explosions filling the air with a fury of sound and flying steel. Then they were up and running once more. As they ran, the sounds of fighting grew louder, and the roar of assault boats landing and blasting off became fainter. Here and there, bodies were visible. Many wore the crest of Intersystems Incorporated, but scattered among them were bodies clad in the black armor of the brigade. Too many bodies.

They found Major Wang's command post in a bomb crater. He was sitting on an ammo box, calmly giving orders over his com-set. What remained of his right leg was propped up on a plastic crate. It was missing below the knee. A bloody, self-sealing pressure bandage covered the stump. Around the sides of the crater, other wounded awaited evacuation, while some techs field-stripped a misfunctioning missile launcher, and some harassed-looking cooks tried to sort out some kind of a screw-up with the meal paks. For some reason, all they had was desserts.

Wang watched Stell and Flynn roll over the edge of the crater and tumble to the bottom. As they stood and dusted themselves off, he said, “Welcome, General.” He grinned lopsidedly. “You'll excuse me if I don't get up.”

Stell shook his head. “Hell no, Major ... everybody's entitled to a break.” For a moment, the two men just looked at each other, a whole host of thoughts and feelings passing unspoken between them. Stell didn't have to say what he felt about Wang or his performance. It was in his eyes. Wang spoke first.

“She really is a bitch, sir.” He gestured at the medics bringing in wounded and the second-wave troopers moving toward the perimeter—all against a background of rattling automatic weapons fire, screamed orders, and exploding grenades. He shook his head. “It's like fighting ourselves. That asshole Malik taught ’em all our tricks.”

“He'll get his,” Stell promised grimly, hoping it would be true. “Meanwhile, you've done a helluva job, Major. I'm relieving you. Medic!” A team of medics ran across the crater and Stell pointed to Wang. “Get him back safe, you hear me?” They both nodded and said, “Yes, sir.”

Stell turned to tell Wang good-bye, but he'd fainted.

Lady Almanda Kance-Jones looked from the plot tank to Malik, and back to the plot tank. She had to admit that, for the most part, he'd done very well. She had been watching him give orders for more than an hour now, and outside of a regrettable tendency to throw away lives, he had done a good job. Unfortunately, however, it wouldn't be good enough. He couldn't see it yet, but she could, and did. The second wave of brigade troopers now landing would make the difference. If properly led, they would soon overwhelm the security troops and take the admin complex. And there was little doubt that they were properly led. She had failed; Stell was still alive. The knowledge hurt. Even worse was the knowledge that Chairman Olin had already lifted off-planet in a tiny speedster. With him went her chance for freedom. Even if they managed to defeat the brigade, she'd never be forgiven a major fiasco like this one.

Beside her, Malik's face was red with rage as he screamed orders into his com-set. He was chewing someone out for a minor mistake. As she watched him, she thought of the abuse she'd suffered, and all for nothing. The thought triggered a flow of energy through certain circuits. Tiny pulses of reciprocal energy sampled the incoming current, and then raced back to her brain. It confirmed that such a reaction was appropriate, and amplified the response. Gradually the feeling grew stronger, escalating from indignation to resentment, to anger, to rage and, finally, to fury. She welcomed it, and did nothing to intervene, as other programming was brought on line and activated.

Stell brought the binoculars up to his eyes and pressed the zoom control. The distant admin complex leaped forward to fill the viewfinder. He thumbed the rangefinder and a white dot appeared in the middle of the image. As he manipulated a tiny toggle control on the side of the instrument, the white dot moved, and as it touched various objects, their range appeared at the bottom of the frame via digital readout. He was pretty sure the energy cannon was hidden in a ruined building about a thousand yards out. His guess was suddenly confirmed, as blue death stabbed out to touch a mound of dirt about a hundred feet to his right. Steam rose as the water content of the soil was liberated. Then, as atoms moved faster and faster, it began to melt, and ooze quickly away. Suddenly the mound disappeared altogether, allowing the blue light to touch the two brigade troopers who hid behind it. They were instantly boiled inside their A-suits. When all their bodily liquids had evaporated, there was a brief flare of light, and they were gone. The cannon moved on to another target before their ashes had even dusted the ground.