World Divided: Book Two of the Secret World Chronicle-ARC

by Mercedes Lackey; Steve Libby; Cody Martin

  “True enough.” Saviour raised an eyebrow at Pride and Bella. Pride shrugged.

  “We can’t do a move on that base without Verdigris finding out. It’s yours, Commissar,” Pride agreed.

  “I can’t see any other way,” Bella seconded. “Ramona can sneak you on an Echo transport, in the jump seat, unlisted. If anybody asks, you’re doing another CCCP parts run.”

  “Horosho. We are agreed. It remains for Murdock to pack.” Saviour looked as satisfied as a wolf with a full belly.

  “And me to get Ramona to siphon CCCP some cash,” said Bella. “Maybe purloin a couple gadgets that might be useful.”

  “And me to cover your tracks in the systems and make things vanish from inventory,” added Vickie.

  “Then we have plan.” Saviour raked them all with her startling blue eyes. “What are you waiting for? May Day parade? Davay!”

  Davay they did.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Roll the Bones

  Mercedes Lackey and Cody Martin

  Finally, a payday. Finally, what we had been working for, hoping for, praying for. Never mind that Dominick Verdigris had struck us a blow that would have been mortal—except that Echo wasn’t alone. The faithful of Echo had an ally that, I suspected, Verdigris was dismissing just as Saviour’s own father and Worker’s Champion had dismissed them—the CCCP. They were wrong; they were all wrong. Nat and her crew had something to prove, and this was the chance to do it. She had been fretting at the bit, I knew, tired to death of always playing a defensive position, of being reactive instead of proactive.

  And she was right. Oh boy, was she ever. Even Sun Tzu would have advised against such a strategy. The Thulians could whittle us down a little at a time until we were small enough to crush.

  But now, now we had a chance to strike back. Finally, we were on the offensive rather than the defensive, acting rather than reacting.

  And me? Now it was my time to really do my stuff.

  “So. That’s what I’ve got. That’s all I’ve got,” Vickie told John Murdock. Not that she was face to face with him; she was just a voice in his ear. She might have been a ghost, except for the stack of transmitted pages Saviour had handed to him before he boarded an Echo cargo plane headed for a small airstrip outside of Wichita. As the CCCP was an Echo ally he got access to empty seats on no notice and with no records—though Vickie, careful as ever, had a simple cover story that he was picking up more of the antiquated equipment that was CCCP’s standard. The flight had actually passed quickly, and in a way he hadn’t expected. Vickie had piped music to him—asked for a basic playlist and played DJ for an audience of one. The cargo-master had given him a pitying look after a glance at the sheaf of equipment he was supposedly purchasing. John tried not to feel too much resentment.

  After all, if Vickie and Bella were giving him the straight dope (and he had no reason to think that they weren’t), Bella had already raided Echo for some of their best and newest gear during that raid on the Vault, and would continue to do so and pass the results on to CCCP under Verdigris’ radar. That was enough to make the Support Op’s smirk a little more palatable.

  Before touching down, he had been able to have a Rental-Wreck truck arranged through Vickie: American-made and not all that new. It’d fit in with the usual traffic, which was important. John didn’t want to stick out in the slightest for this assignment. Through some sleight of hand she’d been able to have it left at the airport in the long-term parking lot, though these guys normally didn’t do delivery and pickup. Maybe it had been money. He hoped she was raiding Verdigris’ petty cash.

  After driving for about three hours and change, he was on the outskirts of Kansas City. He took the time to stop the truck on the side of the road and to get out to survey it, just take things in. He was still on schedule, but the few minutes it’d take him to orient himself would be worth it. A voice piped into his ear, interrupting his thoughts.

  “If it’s abandoned, my plans will be good. If the Thulians have it, I would bet that the underground plans are still good. Those things were built to withstand a direct nuke, and it’s going to be hard to alter the basic layout or where the ventilation, plumbing and wiring goes.”

  “Hey, Vic?” John adjusted his baseball cap, waiting for a reply.

  “Roger?”

  “You’re ruining the moment.”

  “Bite me, monkey boy.”

  He grinned, then returned to his truck, starting it and driving towards Kansas City.

  ***

  John didn’t take long to find a fairly rundown motel to check into; he’d developed a keen eye for these sorts of places when he had first gone on the run six years ago, back when he still had enough cash to actually afford a place to stay. It was the kind of motel that had hourly, weekly, and monthly rates. “No-Tell Mo-Tel.” Using an assumed name and an extra few bills slipped to the night clerk, he checked in and received his key for the room. He had made sure to back his truck in to park it, with his room being on the ground floor; if he needed to split in a hurry, the extra few seconds both considerations would afford him would be worth it.

  “You want anything besides the motel cable for entertainment?”

  “Yeah. Brief me some more on the facility while I unpack.”

  “Turn on the TV, find an empty channel and tell me what it is. Make it one from the sat dish or cable.” John did so. “Now take the remote and hit pound sign 4573. I have to send feed to the whole motel but that will unscramble it.”

  “Done.” John threw the remote onto a recliner in the corner, then bent down to heft several large duffel bags onto his bed.

  The first thing that came up was a map, side by side with a military satellite picture of the whole site, which was a couple hundred acres. Missile silos tended to not have neighbors, or at least not close ones.

  John unzipped the duffel bags, and began unpacking them. An M4A1 assault rifle with an attached suppressor, his old Springfield .45 ACP pistol with its own suppressor, load bearing equipment, breaching charges, several different types of surveillance gadgets, AN/PVS-14 night vision device, a number of miscellaneous other gizmos that he’d either been given by Vickie or picked out himself.

  “We are pretty sure this was a coordination center for the Invasion, maybe even temporary C and C. We’re also pretty sure there’s still function there. It’s not big enough for a deployment base, and its very nature as an early sixties-era hardened facility gives it limited advantage as a communication center, but it’s definitely still live and manned, which means we have a ninety-percent shot at extracting some intel from it, especially if we can sneak a line into their data-cloud. Here in the north you’ve got your best access. See the creek?” A cursor traced the path. “It crosses under Section Line Road NS 272 at the quarter-mile mark after EW 440.” The map scrolled up a little. “This is a winter shot, so all the leaves are off the trees. If you pull in here”—the cursor pointed at a place just off the road—“you can pull the truck right under the bridge and it won’t be seen from the road. Then you walk in on the creek. It’s pretty well overgrown with trees the whole way.”

  “Right. Now, for once I get there; we got any intel about access to the base itself?”

  The maps—clearly on computer windows—closed. A new map came up. “This is the old plan for the base. As you can imagine, the aboveground stuff can be penetrated from several places. The creek is the most obvious and so is the most likely to have old booby traps still there. Or new ones. Or both.” The cursor moved around as Vickie identified which buildings used to have which functions. “Now…I don’t want to tell you how to do your job…”

  “Then don’t, comrade. Are there any structures topside attached to the silo? As opposed to the service tunnel with the blast doors.”

  “Just the old guardhouse and ready room. There’s just no good quiet way to get down there. One way in.”

  “If you say, ‘ventilation duct,’ I’ll strangle you.”

  “Staircas
e.”

  “That’ll work. All right, I’m gonna kit up and start out. I ought to be gettin’ there right early in the morning; hopefully they’ll be running a little sloppy that early.”

  “Oh, one other thing? If this is Thulians running the show, don’t expect to plug that relay port I gave you into anything. This is not a movie. Aliens do not use Minisoft.”

  “I’ll worry ’bout that when I get there. I’ll feed ya some video ’fore I use the comp link on anything. Now, be useful and play me some CCR.”

  “Ten-four.” The screen of the television filled with images from some random screensaver while the tinny speakers relayed his own private station.

  John smirked as he readied his gear. “Y’know what this whole bit reminds me of, Vic?”

  “I’m guessing it’s not The Sound of Music.”

  “Naw. It’s the Doolittle Raid.”

  “As in the bomber strike on Tokyo. Huh. I can see that. The only disconnect is there was no real strategic reason to bomb Tokyo at that point in the war, and they did damn-all damage, but the psychological effect was huge.”

  “Two things, girlie. One: Psychological effect is huge strategic effect. Never forget that. Make the bastards afraid to fight, they won’t fight. Two: Well, this whole thing is making me grin like a bastard.”

  “What? ’Cause we’re finally going to kick ’em in the knee instead of reacting?”

  “Not just that,” and John’s grin did go even wider, “but because after this…we’re gonna drop a couple of real bombs on these sons of bitches.”

  “Yeah…well…we gotta pull this off first. If we shoot craps here, we’re never gonna get a second chance.”

  “If we shoot craps here, I’m dead. Either from Kriegers or the Commissar’s wrath. So, lemme jam out while I get my guns ready. Roger, comrade?”

  “You got it.”

  ***

  John had arrived on-site at about 1:30 in the morning, which was perfect for him. There was a light fog, and the chill clung to him. Kept him focused and awake. For the next hour, he took his time creeping along the creek that Vickie had described to him earlier. It was low; obviously there was a lot more water in it during the spring. Now there was barely enough to wet his boots. And there weren’t any booby traps, thankfully. Still, he wasn’t about to get lulled into a false sense of confidence, and he performed listening checks every few meters. All he heard were mourning doves and bobwhite quail. He reached the terminus for the creek just on the perimeter of the guardhouse, then stopped to observe. Less than a minute later, he saw what he’d been expecting: a roving guard, dressed in simple, nondescript fatigues.

  John keyed his throat mic, whispering low. “Vickie, y’there?”

  “Roger.”

  “Think y’can do some wizardry for me? I need you to scan for about the next half hour, check out if these guys are using their radios at all. Sendin’ ya some vid now.” Tapping a switch, the miniature camera on his shoulder came to life, transmitting live video.

  “While you do that, put one bare hand on the dirt please.”

  He grumbled. “I already have; I’m flat on my stomach, here.”

  “Skin contact. This is the magic part, JM. If I work through you I have to work through you.”

  John peeled off the Nomex glove on his left hand, keeping his movements deliberate and slow. “Get on with it.”

  There was a pause. An ant decided that John’s sock looked like a good place to make a home He hoped it wasn’t a fire ant. “Okay. There are two guards topside. One you can see, one on the other side of the old barracks. There are three people in the old barracks, they’re asleep. I can’t magic-see inside the silo, it’s too dense with man-made material.” There was another pause, a longer one. “Okay. Coded check-ins. I think they’re checking in with an automated system. Both guards used the same number sequence, typed in, one number off for the one at the barracks.”

  “Got it recorded? Can y’fake it?”

  “Is the bear Catholic?”

  “You’re weird. Tell me when you’re good to go.” John slowly pulled his drag bag by its strap, bringing it up to his chest. He’d practiced stalking like this before, so the actions were nearly automatic. Keeping his eyes trained on the nearest guard, he pulled out his rifle and checked to make sure that it was both loaded and that the suppressor was attached properly. Finally, he shouldered the rifle, turned on the 4x scope, and breathed. His sight reticule found the guard’s temple easily.

  “Anytime.”

  G’night, Gracie. John squeezed the trigger of the M4, and was half-surprised when the rifle lightly kicked against his shoulder. He had sighted it in with the suppressor attached, so he was absolutely certain of where his rounds would strike. The single 5.56 projectile impacted with the guard’s head; he dropped instantly, making nary a sound.

  “Moving.” John unhooked himself from his drag bag, and then loped towards the guard’s body. He checked for a pulse with his off hand, and was satisfied to find none.

  “Turn off his radio so I can fake it,” Vickie requested. He performed as asked.

  “Gimme a countdown for when the next guard will round the…NE corner of the barracks. Copy?”

  “Ten-four.”

  John brought himself up into a half-crouch, leveling his rifle for where an average-sized man’s chest would be. He waited patiently, settling into his stance and measuring his breaths.

  “Approximately sixty seconds. Thirty. Ten. Five. Three, two, one. Mark.” At that exact moment the guard rounded the corner. John fired three shots; two at the man’s chest, and one at his face. All three found their target, and the guard crumpled with the slightest whimper.

  “Same drill, get his radio. And update, someone in the barracks had to tap a kidney.”

  “Roger.” John was already up and moving when Vickie started speaking; in no time at all, he had disabled the second guard’s radio and dragged the body over to the first. “Is the fella that’s awake facing away from me, with the door as a frame of reference?”

  “No. Urinals are on the door side.”

  Screw it. “Going in.” Without waiting for Vickie to protest, John opened the door to the barracks. He still had his NVGs on, and immediately spotted the sleeping forms of two of the Thulians. Taking a moment to gauge where their heads were, he let his rifle hang by its sling at his side, unholstering his .45. The pistol was quieter suppressed than the rifle, due to the rounds being naturally subsonic. Two more shots, two more bodies. John reoriented his sidearm on the bathroom entrance, the dim light coming through like sunlight to his night vision.

  The Thulian appeared in the door, and there was something just slightly off about his appearance, things that, if you already knew he wasn’t human, would have clued you in. The skin was slightly shiny, as if it didn’t have any pores at all—which was, in fact, the case. The eyes were too far apart, the nose too flat and the nostrils were a pair of slits. The mouth was too wide and too thin, and almost lipless. The eyes widened for a moment in shock when the Thulian saw John, and the kidney-shaped pupils dilated. John’s pistol jumped in his hand, and the life slipped out of the Thulian’s eyes.

  “I’m clear in the barracks. Heading for the stairwell.” He hit a relay on a flat and squarish device on his left forearm; a series of three LEDs lit up, then went quiet. Toggling another switch, he tested to make sure the device was in working order. “Just checked your sniffer. If’n ya get any spikes with your superstitious mumbo-jumbo before this gizmo picks ’em up, lemme know.”

  The only reply was the sound of Vickie blowing a raspberry.

  John holstered his pistol, bringing up his rifle again. With practiced calm, he entered the stairwell and began to descend into what he was sure to be a Thulian stronghold. It was a spiraling metal staircase; John had to take extra care in controlling his footfalls in order to minimize his sound signature. He reached the bottom without a single peep from the sniffer device on his arm. So far, so good.

  “Any u
pdates ’fore I venture on?”

  “All I got is the old plans. And I need bare earth or something less man-made to be able to make like a witch doctor.”

  “Wonderful. Keep on those radio checks and the sniffer. I’m headin’ in.”

  ***

  It was only midway through the facility that John started encountering problems. Up to that point, nearly every room had been cleaned out, and he had dropped little packages that Bell had given him in each one. There were scuff marks on the floors from heavy equipment being moved around; pieces of furniture and nonvaluable bits had been left behind, but for the most part there was nothing left in the rooms. He’d made sure to stop by what was the equivalent of a power control station for the silo; the two guards there hadn’t posed as much of a threat as the security camera. After having Vickie tap the radios of the two guards and record a loop for the camera, he made sure to shoot out all three, thanking his lucky stars they were using human tech. Once his business was done in the power room, he quickly moved on towards what he hoped would be his main objective.

  Now, he had a problem. He was at a juncture between several halls; at the end of the one he needed to get to was what appeared to be an automated sentry gun of some sort. And it wasn’t human tech. It waited with the inhuman patience of the inanimate, a wicked-looking muzzle pointing in his direction. He’d used a fiber optic camera to peep around the corner in order to avoid being detected by it; from the fuzzy picture projected onto a built-in LCD screen, it looked like the entire juncture had been covered from all four ends at one point. Now, only the single sentry gun remained; whatever it was guarding had to be important.

  “Well, that’s ugly.”

  “It’s mean. Got any suggestions?” John snaked the fiber optic camera back from the corner, coiling it and stowing it in a pouch.

  “It’s Thulian. So it’s armored in their alloy and it’s probably an energy gun. Get the reflector shield. There’s no way you’re getting past that quietly so just get past it alive.”