by Timothy Zahn
"I doubt it very much," Lathe assured him. "I'm pretty sure that was wholly for our benefit."
"That's what I thought," Mordecai agreed. "So you feel like an evening's stroll by the light of a spotter's searchlights?"
Lathe smiled tightly. "Don't worry," he said. "We'll figure something out."
* * *
Haberdae clicked off the comm and turned to face Galway. "Clever little things, aren't they?" he said sardonically as he draped his headset around his neck. "Obviously think we're as stupid as they are smart." He gestured to the tech at the board. "You still in contact with Unit One Leader?"
"Yes, sir," the other said. "He requests orders."
"Tell him they'll be leaving his car near the west mall entrance," Haberdae instructed. "He's to double-time it there, then get over to Intercept Two and join the net Units Two, Three, and Four have set up. Then tell Spotter Two to watch the area west of the Unit One car and make sure Lathe and Mordecai don't go that direction. I know he won't be able to keep track of them long with all the pedestrian traffic out there, but he's to make damn sure they don't head for Intercept Two."
"Yes, sir." The tech turned to his mike and began issuing the orders.
"This all assumes, of course, that Shaw and Judas will come up that particular stairway," Galway warned. "What if Shaw decides to keep going to the next exit instead?"
"He won't," Haberdae said. "Next exit's over two kilometers away, and it's one he should know we've already found. No, he's got to be figuring the Thirteenth Street slot is still secret. Besides, with two units on their way down behind him from the casino he can't afford to spend any more time down there than he has to."
"Sir, Spotter Two reports Unit One's car has parked near the west mall entrance," the tech announced. "Two men getting out—"
Distantly, through the headset around Haberdae's neck, Galway heard a yelp. "What is it?" he snapped.
"Nothing," the tech assured him as Haberdae hastily put his headphone back on. "They turned the car's searchlight on Spotter Two, that's all. Dazzled them for a moment until they could get out of the beam."
"So where are they now?" Haberdae demanded into his mike. He listened a moment, his lip twisting. "They were dazzled just long enough for Lathe and Mordecai to slip away," he said sourly, looking at Galway. "No idea which way they went."
Galway looked at the board, his stomach tightening. "They're heading west," he said.
"No." Haberdae was positive. "There's no one heading west. Both spotters agree on that."
"Then they're going the long way around," Galway insisted. "Or maybe they're going to grab one of the civilian cars in the lot and drive there."
"Galway, will you calm down?" Haberdae said in a tone of strained patience. "We have spotters in the air, we have men and cars on the ground, and every one of them knows Lathe and Mordecai by sight. They're not going to get within a hundred meters."
"A hundred meters might be close enough."
"Fine—they won't get within two hundred meters," Haberdae growled. "You want me to make it three hundred?"
"Prefect, Lathe isn't going to abandon the others," Galway said, forcing his voice to remain calm and reasonable. "That's not the way he does things. Unless you get to them first, he is going to rescue them."
"And what exactly do you suggest?"
Galway looked up at the board. "Send your men down the Thirteenth Street entrance now," he said. "Catch Shaw between them and the casino units and make the capture underground where Lathe can't interfere. Once you've got him, flip a coin as to which exit you use to bring him out. Even Lathe can't be two places at once."
"You want me to send my men down a dark subway tunnel where the quarry has all the advantages?" Haberdae countered. "Don't be ridiculous."
"You'll have them in a pincer—"
"I'll have my men in a crossfire situation, that's what I'll have," Haberdae cut him off. "Look, Galway, Lathe is a blackcollar, not a magician. He can't fly, he can't dematerialize, he can't cloud men's minds. And flexarmor or not, he can't just charge through a line of men armed with lasers. Not without getting himself killed."
"Prefect—"
"We're going to do this according to plan," Haberdae cut him off. "We're going to push Shaw to the rat hole and nail him as he comes out. If you're that worried about Lathe, I'll call a car and you can go over there and help watch for him."
"You know I can't do that," Galway bit out. "If he finds out I'm on Khala, it could wreck the whole operation."
"Exactly," Haberdae said with satisfaction. "And if you're not really here, you can't tell me how to do my job, can you?"
Galway sighed silently to himself. Haberdae simply refused to understand. "Fine," he murmured. "It's your show."
"Damn right it is." Haberdae turned back to the board. "What's happening with Unit One?"
"They've reclaimed their car and are heading over to Intercept Two," the tech reported.
"Good." Haberdae looked back over at Galway. "Tell them to keep an eye out for Lathe and Mordecai along the way," he added, almost reluctantly.
"They're already doing that, sir," the tech said. "So far, no sign of them."
"Fine," Haberdae said. "Alert all units to stand ready. Let's get this done."
CHAPTER 8
The short ride from the mall parking lot had been a rough one, Lathe thought as he braced himself against the inside of Unit One's trunk. Still, he had little cause to complain. Mordecai, hanging to the underside of the vehicle, had it considerably harder. He just hoped the other hadn't fallen off somewhere along the way.
The car made one final turn and braked to a halt. Four doors opened and closed as the Security men made their exit, and then all was silence.
Lathe gave it a fifteen count, then dug to his tingler. Mordecai—report.
Inside Security perimeter, the reply came promptly. Clearly, the other had made it through okay. Estimate fifteen to twenty in ambush formation—eight more in backstop position.
Lathe nodded to himself. So he'd been right. Security expected the others to pop out of the subway at the allegedly secret Thirteenth Street exit and were hoping to nab them as they did so. Clear to exit? he signaled.
Clear.
Lathe found the trunk release and popped the lid. Easing it open a crack, he looked outside.
He was facing away from the main ambush ring, looking back toward the mall half a kilometer away. The eight-man rear guard was positioned a dozen meters behind him, a thirty-degree arc of protection standing silent vigil behind the row of parked Security cars, waiting alertly for the missing blackcollars to appear.
Only they were facing the wrong way.
He opened the trunk a few centimeters more and looked up at the sky. The spotters hovering overhead wouldn't be making that same mistake, of course, at least not to the same degree. Still, he would bet heavily that their attention was currently split between the subway exit and the area west of the mall where he and Mordecai had disappeared. Theoretically, parked Security cars should be of little interest to anyone at the moment.
Time to find out whether or not that was true. Giving the rear sentry line one last look, he opened the trunk just far enough to roll out, pulling the lid mostly shut again as he landed on hands and knees on the pavement. Dropping to his belly, he crawled quickly out of sight beneath the car.
"Pleasant ride?" Mordecai murmured as Lathe joined him. The smaller man was working industriously at one of the throwing knives he'd wedged into the car frame earlier to serve as a handhold.
"A little bumpy," Lathe told him. "You?"
With a final tug, the knife came free. "I've had worse," Mordecai said, slipping the weapon back into its thigh sheath. "How do you want to work this?"
Lathe crawled to the side of the car where he could get a better look at the Security cordon. It was a fairly standard containment formation: four men in each of four clusters, the nearest of them about twenty meters away, crouching behind small bushes and parked v
ehicles at the edge of a narrow and mostly empty parking area. The focus of their semicircle was a large storage shed fastened against the rear of what seemed to be a hardware store on the other side of the lot.
The hunters' equipment was something of a hardware store in its own right. Two of the men in each foursome sported paral-dart rifles, the third carried a flechette rifle, and the fourth had one of the snub-nose laser rifles that had once been Security standard issue. Each man also had a couple of grenades in a sling carrier at his belt. Everyone wore visored helmets and protective vests.
Mordecai crawled up beside him. "Is that the exit?" he asked.
"Up through the ground and out the shed," Lathe confirmed. "You don't see Galway anywhere, do you?"
"Not in this group," Mordecai said. "Were you expecting him to show up personally for the capture?"
Lathe shrugged. "I thought he might."
"Galway's not that stupid," Mordecai said. "Did you notice the grenades?"
Lathe nodded. "Concussion, most likely. No one's wearing enough armor for them to risk frags."
"Still shows they're pretty serious," Mordecai said. "I presume we'll be doing a standard cannonball with the two nearest groups?"
"Cannonball with those, steamroller with the others," Lathe confirmed.
"Taking out the flanking laser gunners first?"
"Yes," Lathe agreed reluctantly. Ideally, he would have preferred to neutralize the entire bunch with hands and feet and nunchaku, minimizing the risk of killing any of them. With Whiplash, enemies like these were also possible future allies.
But two shots with those lasers could punch through their flexarmor, and they couldn't afford to let anyone get that second shot. "Of course, once we're finished we'll still have that sentry line behind us to deal with," he reminded Mordecai.
"Plus the spotters overhead," Mordecai said.
"True." Lathe rubbed his cheek. "Maybe Shaw will have some ideas."
Right on cue, his wrist tingled. At exit. Situation?
Lathe slid two fingers beneath his sleeve. Sixteen-man Security trap cordon—eight-man rear guard—one or more spotters in air.
Weaponry?
Paral-darts, flechette rifles, lasers, grenades.
There was a short pause. Take out cordon—get laser to me.
Lathe cocked an eyebrow at Mordecai. "He is a tactor," Mordecai pointed out. "I assume he knows what he's doing."
"We can hope," Lathe agreed. Acknowledged, he sent. Attack in ten.
Acknowledged. Laser to me in thirty.
Giving him and Mordecai a whole twenty seconds to deal with the rest of the cordon, Lathe noted wryly. The man was too generous. "Ready?" he murmured.
Mordecai had already shuffled across to the other side of the car. "Ready," he murmured back.
Pulling out two shuriken and his nunchaku, Lathe counted down the rest of the seconds; and as his mental clock reached zero, he rolled out from under the car, got to his feet, and headed silently toward the nearest group.
With their attention the other direction, the Security men never saw him coming. But someone in one of the spotters obviously did. He'd covered only half the twenty-meter gap when suddenly everyone gave a sort of simultaneous group twitch and spun around.
Lathe's first shuriken took out the closer of the two laser gunners, catching him in the narrow gap between helmet visor and the top of his chest armor. The second, more distant target fell with the other throwing star buried in the same place. A cluster of paral-darts bounced off Lathe's shoulder, while another cluster and a high-velocity flechette whistled past without even touching him. The rest of the gunners, taken by surprise and clearly rattled, were firing wildly.
Given time, they would undoubtedly correct their aim. Lathe had no intention of giving them that time. A second volley of paral-darts caught him in the stomach; and then he was in the middle of his target group.
He took out the first of the remaining three men with a side kick to the other's chest, the power of the blow against his armor sending him crashing hard onto the pavement. The second man swung his gun sideways toward Lathe's head; dropping into a one-legged crouch, Lathe slammed his fist into the man's thigh in a punch that paralyzed the muscle and likewise dropped him to the ground. The last man sent a final burst of paral-darts uselessly at Lathe's back before the blackcollar's nunchaku swung around and slammed into his helmet.
One group down; one to go. Lathe snatched up the laser rifle still gripped in the dead gunner's hands, using the momentary pause in the action to check out Mordecai's progress. The other blackcollar had likewise taken out his first batch and was sprinting toward his next set of targets. With the borrowed laser rifle in his left hand and his nunchaku in his right, Lathe turned and headed toward his own second group.
They were holding their ground, he noted with a touch of professional admiration. Two of the men had dropped to one knee, the third standing behind them in a standard volley formation. As Lathe started toward them, they opened fire.
The flechette gunner was good, his first shot catching Lathe squarely in the chest. The impact staggered him, slowing his charge and throwing off his balance as the flexarmor went rigid to absorb the blow. The gunner's second shot was nearly as well centered, this one bouncing off his abdomen and impeding his charge even more. Then, as his third shot also connected, the gunner shouted something to his companions.
And one of the kneeling paral-dart gunners dropped his weapon and dived for the laser rifle lying on the ground beside the dead gunner.
Lathe swore under his breath, dropping the laser rifle he was carrying and trying to get to his shuriken. But the flexarmor rigidity that had protected him from the high-velocity flechettes was now unexpectedly working against him. He was still trying to force his stiffened arm down to one of his weapons pouches when the Security man reached the laser rifle and scooped it up, swiveling back around as he brought it to his shoulder.
And then, as Lathe's fingers finally closed on one of his throwing stars, a flash of light sizzled past his face from the right.
The rear sentry line had joined the battle.
Clenching his teeth, Lathe dropped to one knee, the agonizingly slow movement slowed even further as a fourth flechette hammered into his abdomen. The laser gunner in front of him was nearly into position now, the barrel of his rifle swinging around to point directly at him. Lathe finally got his shuriken free and struggled to raise his arm to throw, knowing he wouldn't be in time.
But as he braced himself for the blast, the gunner jerked suddenly to the side, his laser swinging wildly away as both man and weapon sprawled onto the ground.
Lathe had forgotten about Shaw. Apparently, so had everyone else.
He looked to his left. The tactor was framed in the open shed door, his arm windmilling as he sent a second shuriken on its way, this one taking out the flechette-gunner marksman. Reaching down, Lathe picked up the laser rifle he'd dropped and tossed it toward Shaw, then half turned to send his own shuriken in the direction of the rear picket line. There was a burst of laser light from behind him—
And from the center of the picket line came a brilliant flash and a thunderclap that slammed Lathe flat onto his back.
Trained reflexes took over, bringing his arm down to slap out the impact and then rolling himself back up into a crouch. His ears were still ringing; fortunately, the battle-hood had protected him from most of the concussion from the grenade Shaw had set off with his laser shot.
The men in the rear picket line, though, were definitely down for the count. The man who'd been wearing the particular grenade Shaw had hit was probably down permanently.
The final gunner in the group Lathe had been heading for had also been thrown to the ground by the concussion, and Lathe could see him visibly twitching with the aftereffects of the blast. For a second he considered making sure the man stayed put, decided it wouldn't be necessary, and turned again to Shaw.
The tactor was still standing in the shed doorway, h
is eyes and laser now pointed upward. "Need any help?" Lathe called.
"Get us some transport," Shaw called back, firing a pair of shots into the sky. "Caine? Let's go."
All of the Security cars, as Lathe had noted earlier, were parked in a loose group between the two lines of Security men. He ran to the closest, found the key still in it, and climbed behind the wheel. Ready, he signaled with his tingler.
No one tried to stop the others as they piled into the car. Twenty seconds later, they were back on the street.
"Everyone all right?" Lathe asked as he pulled onto one of the major thoroughfares, throwing a quick look at the two men in the rear seat.
