by J. N. Chaney
I couldn’t make it out on the feed. The team was grouped around whatever had been in the trailer, obstructing it from view.
“Uh guys,” Mack said suddenly. “Those are hover bikes.”
She was right. Two of the operatives swung legs over the bikes and took off. I switched the feed off, returning to what I could see with my own eyes. They zipped through the two sets of trees and headed right in our direction.
“They’re not done,” Tyndell said. “My credits are on them doing a pass of the ridge.”
“There isn’t time to get back down the other side,” Aaron remarked calmly.
He wasn’t wrong. The bikes flew over the flat land, already halfway to our position. If we moved now there was a decent chance they would see it.
“Do what you can to become part of the scenery,” I instructed tautly.
I waited to move until they were up the far side of the ridge. My position behind the rock no longer worked because it faced the top of the ridge, right where they would pass by. The camo tech was good at long distance, but they wouldn’t be fooled at such a close range.
The smart thing for them to do would have been to put someone on the roof to see if their tactic caused any unusual movement. Since they didn’t, I worked my way down the side of the rock opposite of the direction they were coming until I reached the very front.
“Mack, can you mark them on my visor?” I asked it as loud as I dared, a hair above a whisper.
She didn’t respond, but two red dots appeared, moving closer at a slow pace. No one spoke. I barely dared to breathe and I sure as hell didn’t move. The slightest shift in my weight could send pebbles scattering and alert them to our presence.
Mack kept us updated to their activities as they passed each of our locations. They moved slow, but nothing suggested that they suspected a hostile force on the ridge. Just a routine patrol. Farah, Calliope, and Aaron were passed by without incident. Three out of five was a pretty good start in my opinion.
By the time I heard them in close range, I was sweating bullets. Mostly from the heat and effort of staying still, though a little came from nerves.
The two were talking, indecipherable at first, the low purring of the bikes garbling their voices. As they came within a few meters I started to catch bits of the conversation.
“This seems overkill, doesn’t it?” Guy 1, complained. “It’s not like anyone is out to get him. He’s a Vice-Admiral, not even a politician.”
“Yeah, but that’s the job,” Guy 2 replied. “Sometimes we get exciting gigs, sometimes not.”
I listened intently, waiting for the conversation to fade out.
“I’ve got some leave saved up,” Guy 1 continued, his voice now carrying from the other side of my boulder, but still close.
“Hold on a sec, I gotta piss,” Guy 2 interrupted.
The bike squeaked as he dismounted. There was a fifty-fifty chance that the operative would come down my side.
So, help me gods, I thought, if this guy pees on me…
The crunch of boots on the ground grew closer and I groaned inwardly, tightening the grip on my rifle. Rustling and the telltale zip of a fly being undone just off to my left side sealed my fate.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” Guy 1 warned.
Guy 1 paused. “Why the hell not?”
“If Kaska sees you taking a whiz from his window, you’ll probably get court martialed. You know he has a reputation for being harsh.”
With a lamented sigh, Guy 2 retreated to the other side, grumbling under his breath about entitled command.
“Anyway, as I was saying.” Guy 2’s voice was slightly muffled, giving me the sense he was facing the other side of the ridge. “I heard Neblinar is the place to be. One of my old platoon mates knows someone who knows someone else that opened a new skin bar there.”
“Neblinar is banned. You get caught on that planet, you’ll be the one with a court martial.” Guy 2 laughed and remounted his bike.
The two continued to banter, their red dots moving away on my HUD. They stopped briefly to check the trees and bushes, making me relieved that I’d avoided them. We waited to see if they would double back, but they didn’t, instead returning to the house post haste.
“That was a little close for comfort,” Calliope said.
“For some more than others.” Farah snickered.
“Alyss, I swear, I was crossing my fingers, arms, legs—everything I had for you,” Mack vowed.
“I do not believe in luck,” Vega chimed in, “but Miss Woods instructed me to display the number eight on the holo. She informed me that it means good fortune.”
I laughed. “Thanks, V. It must have worked.”
“What would you even have done?” Aaron wondered.
“Shot them, obviously. Not really. Honestly? I have no idea. I’m just glad it didn’t come to that.”
Really, really glad.
“Hey, at least you have a new war story.” The last comment came from Lieutenant Tyndell, who said it solemnly, making it all the more funny.
“True,” I agreed. “Okay, everyone. Do I need to remind you that we’re in the middle of a mission?”
I said it lightly, but I meant it too. Kaska had been on planet less than two hours, and we planned to observe him for at least a few hours more. Getting lax now when we were so close could lead to disaster.
Kaska didn’t do anything noteworthy besides make one rather long trip to the lower level. Mack picked up traces of the Neutronium case and surmised he was storing it down there. His guards continued to patrol the grounds, with the exception of one that stayed with him inside.
We studied their movements, making note of each guard’s individual habits. When I told the others about my naming the two on the hover bikes Guy 1 and Guy 2, Mack changed their labels and decided to tag them all that way.
Guy 1, the complainer, was responsible for the south portion of the property. It came as no surprise when he cut corners on his route by not checking the tree line each time and not going all the way to the edge of his designated area or giving the ridge a second glance.
I could almost hear him complaining in my head. “Why should I bother to check the trees? I’ve already done them three times!”
It was also expected that Guy 2 did the opposite. I’d gotten the sense that he took the job seriously, babysitting or not. He was responsible for the west part of the property. I watched as he carefully inspected the trees, even going so far as to shake some of the branches and shine a light in them.
To the north, Guy 3 worked similarly to Guy 2. Mack followed his movements on her end, since none of us had a constant eye on him, and gave us sporadic updates.
Guy 4 covered the east and was another story entirely. The outbuilding largely blocked any view from the house, and he used that to his advantage. And by advantage, I mean that Guy 4 used it to take a nap. He did this by pretending to check the outbuilding, but every time Mack checked, he was in the same corner of the structure.
He did his patrol, of course. Twice. It was also more of a wandering meander, as though he were out for a stroll on his day off. It was sad, but Guy 4 made Guy 1 look like employee of the month.
It was Guy 5 who got the honor of guarding the Vice-Admiral in the house. Well, he was actually a she, but to keep it simple she stayed Guy 5. In any case, Guy 5 checked four things every hour. The windows, the doors, each room, and the rooftop. The rooftop was always last, and she always took an extra ten minutes to pull out her datapad. It appeared as though she were talking to someone, a lover perhaps.
Interestingly enough, the most important piece of information didn’t come from the guards. Not directly at least. Whenever they came close to the inner perimeter marked in red, nothing happened.
“Could it be a badge?” I asked Mack when we noticed it.
“Sure,” she said. “It could be a number of things, really. RFID bracelet, necklace, et cetera. Hell, it could be a shirt button or built into their weap
ons, though I highly doubt they’d go to such lengths.”
I chewed on that information for a bit. My first instinct was to send a one or two-man team to find out what they were using to bypass the security. That idea had a few pros and cons. On the pros side, Mack might be able to duplicate their tech and give us a way inside without getting caught. The main reason I thought it might work was because of Guy 4. He was the least likely to notice he was being snuck up on.
It could work, but there were a few potential issues. Which brought me to the cons. Firstly, there was always the risk that one of the other Guys might get lucky and glance over at the wrong time. Secondly, we had no idea what the tech was, or if it was out of sight, say in a pocket or under their tac vests. This was my biggest concern. In that scenario, the team would come back empty handed because any interaction would raise the alarm and render the mini-op null.
I’d just decided against it when all the guards stopped moving and stood at attention. Guy 2 turned to face the house, and Vice-Admiral-Kaska stepped out between the trees and into the open.
22
I had the evil son of a bitch in my crosshairs.
One well-placed shot and his face would disappear in a satisfying cloud of pink mist.
Not so long ago, someone else had been in my sights. A teammate. At the time, I’d wrestled with the decision to take Ensign-Haas out and make my and Farah’s lives easier. I couldn’t do it then because taking out an unarmed soldier from behind went against everything I stood for. Or wanted to, anyway.
My hand tightened on the grip hard as my finger itched to squeeze the trigger, just as it had then. I reasoned that his death would put an immediate stop to all of his plans.
But again, I hesitated.
This time it wasn’t a question of morals. Not for killing the man responsible for so much death and who planned even more. But if I killed him here and now, the effects would ripple out in unknown ways. For one, the five-man team would come to the Vice-Admiral’s aid. We might have to kill them all, and it was just as likely they’d take some of my people with them. If we were unlucky, backup could arrive before we retrieved the ingot and got out.
Another scenario flashed in my mind. The government might very well turn him into a martyr and declare war on the rebellion. I still wasn’t entirely sure how far the Initiative’s arm reached but I had a hunch it was further than expected. An all-out civil war would bring death to many and there was no guarantee that the Empire wouldn’t prevail. What if they decided to take away all rights for non-true born civilians?
The endgame was to save lives, not put hundreds of thousands of innocents in mortal danger for a quick solution.
Mind made up, I laid the rifle down. I vowed to make Kaska eventually pay for his crimes, but he wouldn’t die by my hand tonight.
“Pack up and move out,” I ordered when he went back inside. “We have enough to work with.”
Dusk had fallen again, and no one disagreed. The day had been long, hot, and stressful. It was time for my people to get some rest, so we weren’t useless for the real mission tomorrow.
Back in our temporary cave lodgings the atmosphere was subdued, bordering on glum. No one had spoken on the return trip, too tired to do more than drag one foot in front of the other. Even Mack had signed off without saying much after we were safely inside the rock shelter. We ate the last round of MREs in relative silence and the sounds of heavy breathing and snoring soon filled the cave.
Despite my exhaustion, sleep didn’t come as easily for me. I kept picturing Kaska, out in the open, almost begging me to take the shot.
Rolling over, my last thought before I fell into uneasy oblivion was one of hope. Hope that I didn’t come to regret my decision not to take Kaska out when I had the chance.
The next morning came too soon for all of us. It didn’t escape my notice that Calliope and Aaron didn’t spring up as they had the day before. Extended hours on the ground tended to do that to one’s body.
Farah checked Calliope over and gave her a clean bill of health, stating that the antivenom and clotting powder had done their work. She looked fine as far as I could tell, but I suspected the wound on her neck would leave a nasty scar to remind her of the incident.
“Morning guys,” Mack said, sounding more chipper than all of us combined.
I mumbled a response.
“The itinerary is on your wrist units, including a countdown to the meeting,” she continued.
With the MREs gone, this time the medic doled out meal bars, aspirin, and an upper for breakfast. “I’ll call this one the ‘Look Alive’ cocktail,” she joked after swallowing hers.
“Let’s make that a special edition, one-time thing,” I told her, wrinkling my nose. “These meal bars are terrible.”
“Tastes fine to me,” Aaron said, the words muffled by the entirety of the meal bar he’d packed into his mouth.
Lieutenant Tyndell shook his head ruefully. “I promise you I didn’t train him that way.”
The back and forth brought morale up again. I teased Calliope that she’d have a tale to tell her kids about how their dad had saved her from the sand hornet. She stammered and made some excuse about taking care of business. Aaron pretended not to hear, but his cheeks flushed a dark red color.
She came back more composed a few minutes later and I started the discussion of tactics. Now that everyone was rested, fed, and more or less awake, we needed to get down to business.
“Guy 4 is the obvious way in,” I began.
That was met with collective agreement.
“Put him to sleep, take whatever it is that counteracts the alarm, and get someone inside,” Tyndell said, continuing that line of thought.
I nodded. “Yes, but I want to take them all at once, or as close to it as we can get.”
“That can work,” Farah said. “Four of us on the ground? One to one odds are pretty good. Better than usual. Once Guys 1 – 4 are down, it shouldn’t be hard to take care of 5.”
The next hour was spent fine tuning the details. When it came time to go, we poked fun at each other as we packed up for the last time and went to go steal one super powered weapon.
No sand hornets attacked this time and the suns were barely up when our group reached the ridge and got into position.
“Those aren’t the same guards,” Aaron said.
I saw he was right when I focused on who should have been Guy 1.
“They aren’t,” Mack confirmed. “The relief crew came in last night. Based on when they left and the assumption that they took eight hours to rest, they’ll be back around the time Kaska is leaving.”
“That would fit SOP,” Tyndell agreed.
The only thing left to do was wait.
Mack alerted us to another convoy’s approach two hours prior to Kaska’s meeting. The guards started to move in closer to the house, no doubt ready to go home after a long, boring night.
That was our cue to move. We eased down the ridge, the camo sheet masking most of our movement, their distraction and the landscape covering the rest.
The vantage point changed drastically on the ground, and the trees in front of the breach point dominated our view. Mack and Aaron would be our eyes and the latter would take care of any immediate threats.
Getting to the edge of the perimeter was the easy part. Crossing the mostly flat land with only boulders for cover presented the real challenge. The visors provided the route, marking the best spots to take cover.
I went first, keeping low as I ran to the first boulder.
“Keep moving,” Mack instructed.
Farah and Calliope came next, followed by Tyndell.
“Talk to me, Mack. What are they doing?” I said.
“They’re talking to the team from last night. The escort team just got out of the second vehicle.”
Now that we were all stationary, she sent the feed to our visors so she didn’t have to keep giving a play by play. After a few minutes of what I assumed was shop talk, the nig
ht team left.
“Kaska’s on his way out,” Mack said.
“Son of a bitch,” I murmured.
The Vice-Admiral’s limp didn’t seem to have improved, as evidenced by the cane he still carried in his left hand. That wasn’t the problem. He was carrying the Neutronium case.
“What is he going to do, leave it in the transport?” Farah demanded.
My brain went into overdrive, cycling through every mission and tactic I could remember, searching for one that might work in this situation. With the other team out of play, that left ten of them to our five.
Aaron would have to disable Kaska’s transport before it even left the property. We had arrived on foot, so worst case scenario—
“Hold up, he’s getting out of the vehicle,” Mack said, interrupting my planning.
I hadn’t been paying attention to the feed and focused on it once more. The Vice-Admiral disappeared inside, leaving the door open. The image shifted to the poorer quality scan and I watched as he moved to the lower level and set the case down.
“I can’t believe that just happened,” Mack said when the transport finally left.
Me too, I thought. My pessimistic side was suspicious of the good fortune. but the other part of me was tired of it. Besides, sometimes things did just go the way they were supposed to.
Our Guys returned to their respective posts, forcing those of us on the ground to stay radio silent. We almost needn’t have worried. Guy 1 walked the perimeter thoroughly, but only gave the space inside his patrol a cursory glance. He no doubt believed what his eyes told him, that the land was safe and any enemy would come from outside.
“The meeting is about to start,” Mack informed us.
The itinerary blocked out one hour for the meeting. I wasn’t banking on that though; their business could always conclude early. The plan was to get in and out quickly, without being seen.
According to his marker, Guy 4 was already on his first break of the day. Guys 3 and 5 didn’t have a line of sight on us, leaving Guy 2 the only one to worry about. We needed to access the breach point while he was on the northernmost side of his patrol zone.
