“Dragon One, this is Acid Two, do you copy?” Chris said on the comm.
“I read you,” Elton’s voice crackled from the safe house. “Are you in position?”
“Affirmative. Your signal’s weak.”
“A lot of storm clouds overhead. They must be interfering with our roof transmitter.”
“Copy that. Do you have eyes on the street?”
Wyatt listened as Elton gave a rundown of multiple intersections and side streets. They didn’t know the exact route or timing of the next supply delivery, but the Marines had long ago hacked into the city’s traffic camera network. Now Elton acted as their analyst from the makeshift NOC back at the safe house. So far, no sign of the truck.
“Is Acid One on the line?” Elton asked when he was done.
“I’m on,” Wyatt said.
“You’ll be happy to know your team found your spacecraft. They made radio contact right after you left.”
Relief swelled inside Wyatt’s chest. “Outstanding news. What’s their status?”
“En route to the city outskirts as we speak. Your pilot said something about casualties, but I don’t have the details.”
Chris’s head turned toward him, watching carefully.
Wyatt took a deep breath. “Understood.”
He wondered what happened, who was hurt. But Wyatt knew he would have to wait. He needed to stay focused in the meantime.
Elton began a regular update of vehicular traffic on each of the monitored routes. Chris pulled on his jet-black CORE helmet and watched the camera feeds firsthand through his neural stub.
Wyatt couldn’t figure out how the Marines made the networking all come together—multiple systems, different protocols, any number of hacks to get access. Then it hit him. The word POLICE traced the jawline of Chris’s helmet in faded letters. Chris had a law-enforcement helmet that would allow native access to the traffic camera network. He wondered suddenly if he hadn’t given the Marines enough credit for staying ahead of the government with their resistance efforts.
“That’s interesting,” Chris said out of nowhere.
“What?”
“A hunch. Alonso’s running the perimeter on an aerobike, and he thinks he may have found our inbound supply delivery. I’ll go check it out and contact you if it’s our guy. Otherwise, no point in risking all of us moving around in the open.”
Chris and Finn took off down the street and left the others behind in the abandoned restaurant. Suddenly idle, Wyatt sat down on a chair near the window and pulled out one of the precious few paper street maps they had of the city.
A noise caught his ear as Kenny rummaged behind the bar. He picked up a glass and one of the fountain guns. “Too bad the drinks are turned off.”
Laramie glanced over from the far wall. “It figures they shut off everything before they boarded the windows—whoa. Is that bar made out of wood?”
Kenny rapped on it with his knuckles. “Sounds like it. Why?”
Laramie shuffled across the room and spread her hands over the bar top, caressing the surface in amazement. “You don’t see wood here, hardly ever.”
“Why not?
“Because there ain’t no trees on Juliet, Kenny. Lots of different grasses and stalky-things, but no trees.”
Kenny cocked his head like a dog that heard a strange noise. “Juliet doesn’t have trees?”
“No.”
“What about paper?”
“Grass pulp.” Laramie rested her cheek against the bar, eyes closed, a wide smile forming on her lips. “The import tariffs on this must have been huge. Oh my God, this is neat.”
Wyatt eavesdropped on the exchange as he traced routes on his folded street map. Paper manufactured from grass pulp. He thought of harpoon grass and shrugged away the image of a paper mill worker getting shredded to death as he cleaned out some giant machine.
Two uneventful hours went by. Each of Wyatt’s troopers took turns keeping watch by the window. Kenny eventually found a carbon dioxide bottle in storage and Maya helped him get the fountain drinks running. It didn’t take long before all of them were exceptionally hydrated. Wyatt visited the restroom twice.
“Everyone, this is Dragon,” Elton’s voice crackled. “Confirming we have eyes on our supply truck at Gervais and Marconi, heading northwest. Acid, if they keep going straight, they’ll be one block east of your position in about three minutes. Over.”
“Roger.” Wyatt held his map out, studying the nearby intersections. “Chris, did you copy?”
“We copy.”
“Can you get us a blocking position at Gervais and Cleese?”
“Affirmative, on our way.”
“Let’s go, people.”
The team grabbed their gear and hustled back out to the street. Wyatt set a quick pace, passing abandoned vehicles and empty buildings and wondering what happened to the people who had once lived there. The intersection where they would spring their ambush lay two long blocks from the restaurant. They had to hurry if they were going to intercept the truck.
“Truck is now at Gervais and Zapata,” Elton said.
Laramie pulled on her CORE helmet, which gave her voice a clearer tone on the comm. “How much further, LT?”
“One block,” Wyatt said, panting. “Acid Two, what’s your position?”
“Coming up on the intersection now.”
“Copy,” Wyatt acknowledged.
They rounded a corner with an old bicycle discarded against a streetlamp. The ambush point lay a block ahead of them. Wyatt could see a maglev track running down the middle of Gervais, which was a large road that approached downtown perpendicular to Magellan, the other main artery. The street looked very wide even from a block away. Wyatt had a sudden pang of doubt that they’d be able to stop the truck. Maybe they’d just spook the driver and cause him to make an evasive maneuver around them.
“I see the target approaching,” Chris said. “Twenty seconds.”
“Copy.”
Wyatt realized they were moving too slow. He broke into a sprint. They couldn’t miss the truck.
Up ahead, the whine of a methane-turbine engine echoed off the walls of the buildings. Wyatt pulled back his run just in time to avoid darting into the middle of the intersection. He careened instead into the doorway of a ransacked shop. To his right, the supply truck rumbled along the deserted street, oblivious to the impending interruption.
“Laramie, Kenny, get ready on my mark!” Wyatt barked.
“Ready.”
“We are in position,” he signaled.
“Acid Two in position,” Chris replied. “Ten seconds.”
Wyatt peeked around the corner. The truck was bigger than he expected, with a cab floor that sat a good two meters above the street. The cargo bed looked like it could easily accommodate two containers side-by-side rather than just the smaller pod currently mounted on its back.
“All elements, stand by,” Chris said. “Acid Three, on my mark.”
Wyatt blinked. Who was Acid Three?
The truck cruised closer toward them.
“Acid Three, go.”
A turbocharged engine shrieked from the other side of the street. Wyatt watched as Alonso burst into the middle of the intersection and stopped his aerobike right in the path of the truck. It seemed such a foolhardy challenge. The light frame of the bike hovered like a dragonfly, its vectored nozzles howling at the pavement, while the cargo truck rolled forward like a rhino in the middle of a charge. For a moment, Wyatt wondered if the truck would bother to stop at all.
Then he heard the hiss of air brakes. The truck visibly slowed, its driver startled at the sudden blockage.
“All teams, now, now, now!” Chris yelled.
In an instant, Marines and RESIT Troopers swarmed around the cargo truck with Vectors aimed at the crew cab. The driver was a young man with blond hair hanging over his forehead. He saw them and jerked back into his seat, his eyes growing wide at the array of weapons pointed at him. A second man, abou
t the same age but with a shaved head, sat on the passenger’s seat. The vertical barrel of a Viper was visible in front of him.
Wyatt approached, waving his arm at the driver to stop. Laramie, Kenny, Chris, and Finn glided to the sides of the cab, their CORE helmets feeding targeting telemetry to their weapons.
The truck still moved forward.
“Stop your vehicle now!” Wyatt shouted. He waved again, praying the driver or guy riding shotgun didn’t freak out. The interior of the cab would get spackled by the charred remnants of their skulls.
The driver wisely decided he wanted to see his next birthday. Air brakes squealed louder and the six-wheeled vehicle rumbled to a stop.
“Turn off the engine and exit the vehicle. No sudden moves.”
The turbine spun down, ending the stereophonic symphony with the nearby aerobike. Two pairs of hands rose above the dashboard and unlocked the cab doors in exaggerated slow motion. Kenny and Finn climbed the truck and guided the two men down to the street. Flex cuffs graced their wrists a few moments later.
“Get their ID badges,” Chris said. “We’ll need to doctor them for the checkpoint.”
While the others handled the detainees, Wyatt circled around to the back of the truck. They needed to clear space for the team to ride. The steel cargo pod sat mounted on the end of the bed with a bright orange biohazard tag looped around the door latch. He tried untying the lanyard with no success. Frustrated, Wyatt pulled the utility knife from his vest sheath and sliced it off.
Footsteps sounded on the pavement. Chris appeared from the other side of the pod, his black CORE helmet fixated on the tag with an eyeless gaze. “What is that?”
“Let’s find out,” Wyatt said. He grabbed the latch handle and forced the mechanism to release the door.
The interior of the pod was cast in darkness. As Wyatt’s eyes adjusted, he saw the outlines of dozens of bundles slowly come into focus. Large, bumpy yellow bags stacked one on top of the other, with some kind of zipper along the length. By the time Chris uttered a curse, Wyatt had already stepped back from the door in disgust.
“Jesus. These are body bags. What the hell?”
Chris stormed around to the prisoners. He stood over the prone driver and grabbed a fistful of hair, hauling him half upright by his head.
“What’s the deal with the corpses in the back?”
“It’s just the weekly shipment from the Justice Department—”
“Justice? Wait. You mean a death squad killed those people?”
“I just drive—”
Chris ripped off his CORE helmet. “Where did they come from?”
The driver started to panic. “I-I don’t know. From Justice. I’m just the driver.”
“Where?” he roared.
The boy lost it. “I dunno, I dunno! The pod’s already loaded up when we get it. We just put it on the truck. It comes from the Justice Department. I don’t know anything else!” He burst into sobs.
Chris threw him back onto his stomach, furious. Wyatt reached for the Marine’s elbow and tugged him away from their prisoners.
“They’re culling neighborhoods. I know it,” Chris fumed. “Then sending them to the Health Department for some kind of science project. Damn them, Wyatt.”
“What if they already died? You don’t know what put them in those bags.”
“They wouldn’t be coming from Justice if they were lying on the street.”
Finn approached them from the sidewalk with a shiny pair of cards in each hand. “IDs are done—” He cut off his words when he saw Chris’s expression. “Did I miss something, Top?”
“No,” Wyatt said preemptively.
In the Marine’s hands were the same identification cards they’d confiscated from the truck crew, only now each had a new picture. Wyatt spied a cleaned-up version of Chris behind a holographic sticker. He wondered how long ago that must have been, whether it had represented a happier time.
Finn waited a beat, skeptical at Wyatt’s deflection, then plowed on. “You’re the driver, Chris. I’m the meat with the Viper.”
Chris took the badges and inspected them. “OK. These are good. Grab the shirts off those two and let’s get into costume.”
“Aye, aye, boss.”
Finn started back toward their prisoners. Wyatt glanced at Chris and saw the anger in his eyes had given way to an immense sadness.
“You okay?”
“These people deserve better. Help me end this. Please.”
“I’ll do everything I can, Chris.”
The master sergeant turned to face the open pod door. He inhaled a deep breath, his shoulders sagging at the end.
“Pull some of these bodies out to make room.”
24
Truck
Juliet, Alpha Centauri A
2 March 2272
The truck rumbled down the street and jostled everyone inside the storage pod. Wyatt and the others clung to wall-mounted anchor points meant for cargo nets instead of human hands. One large bump sent the beam from Wyatt’s tactical flashlight dancing across Laramie and Maya in their CORE helmets. A morbid thought passed through Wyatt’s mind that maybe they should have left a couple cadavers inside for padding.
“We’re approaching the Health Department campus,” Chris said over the comm. “Radio silence from this point on.”
“Copy,” Wyatt said.
Their forward movement slowed for half a minute before finally coming to a complete stop. The turbine engine vibrated in protest at being forced into idle.
“Hope this goes okay,” Laramie said.
“Me too. Don’t really want a shootout with an APC cannon.”
“Copy that, LT.”
The troopers stewed in confinement while they mentally followed what would be happening outside. A guard challenging Chris to roll down the window. Chris turning over his forged ID card. Possible questions about where was the usual driver, or the cargo, or their route. Wyatt prayed that nothing was out of order, that Chris knew his way around government protocol well enough to bluff their entry into the garage.
The whine of the engine suddenly disappeared, taking the gentle thrum of vibration along with it.
“They turned off the engine,” Maya whispered.
A muffled voice sounded outside the pod wall. Was someone walking around back?
Wyatt felt the hair on his neck stand up.
“Firing positions,” he said softly. “On my order only.”
Multiple bodies scuffled quietly inside the cargo pod. Wyatt raised his Vector and kept his tactical light on, pointing it at the rear door so that his eyes wouldn’t struggle if it opened and let in a blast of sunlight. The round circle of light jiggled as he took a deep, steadying breath.
More voices from the side of the truck. A stifled laugh that moved aft.
The soft tick of safeties clicking off filled the interior.
Wyatt cleared his throat. “Be ready to displace. Find cover from the APC.”
“Yes, sir.”
Stifling silence. All Wyatt heard was his own pulse in his ears. Sweat trickled down the back of his shirt.
A sudden, high-pitched whine announced itself from the front of the truck. Wyatt jumped. It took a moment before he realized the engine had started. Seconds later, a guttural scrape signaled that the truck had slipped into gear. The pod lurched forward and pitched Wyatt to his hands and knees.
They rumbled slowly ahead. Wyatt felt the front of the truck dip downward and had to grab at a cargo hook. They were headed underground, into the garage. A minute later they leveled out and stopped, the engine once again spinning down to off.
One of the cab doors opened and closed with a distant whump.
Wyatt still wasn’t sure what to expect. Maybe Chris and Finn had been detained, and one of the police guards had driven the truck inside to the freight dock. He motioned for Laramie and Kenny to move close to the door. Kenny kept his Vector ready. Laramie put her hand on the hilt of her combat knife.
&
nbsp; The latch clacked and the door swung open. The harsh white of overhead garage lights flooded into the pod interior.
Wyatt saw Chris standing at the tailgate and they all visibly relaxed.
“Okay, we got through the opening act,” Chris said. He looked over his shoulder. “Time to do some damage.”
The troopers jumped out of the pod, with Wyatt crawling out last. The parking garage extended across the entire footprint of the building. Heavy white pillars that smelled of fresh paint shouldered the ceiling, while another ramp on the other side of the space appeared to descend further underground. Commercial vehicles filled most of the spaces not occupied by cargo containers.
“Why did you turn off the engine? I just about had a heart attack.”
“Sorry. The guard asked me to. He was hard of hearing.” He dragged a duffle from the back of the cargo pod. “Clock’s ticking now. Let’s get busy.”
The two Marines changed back into their tactical gear while Maya and Kenny covered the entrance ramp. Laramie hustled to the fire door near the stairwell and made sure it was clear. Wyatt followed her, checking the chem mag in his weapon to busy his nerves.
“Fire door’s ready,” Finn said. He turned to Laramie. “I’ve got a block of C-X on the backside, Staff Sergeant. If you need to displace, slam it shut and hit the arming switch. Then get the hell up the stairwell, because it’ll be nasty when it goes off.”
“Thanks, Finn. We’ll try not to kill ourselves.”
“Please don’t,” Wyatt said. “Chris, lead the way.”
The four of them climbed the staircase and left Laramie and Kenny—Chemo—in the garage to secure their exfiltration route. Wyatt watched Chris scan for heat signatures with his helmet sensors. They reached the ground level without any trouble and stacked up next to the interior door.
“Check the hall,” Chris said.
Finn put his hand on the latch underneath a keycard reader. “Locked.”
“Burn it.”
With the gain on his Vector turned to minimum, Finn pointed the barrel at the latching mechanism. He pulled the trigger and a smoke plume began to appear from the metal. A barely audible hiss quickly indicated the tumblers had been reduced to slag.
Escape Velocity (The Quantum War Book 1) Page 17
