Iaido glanced at his HUD. The Marine was one floor up and about fifteen paces back with the Squid about the same behind DJ. It was almost the perfect spacing. If anyone of the three got bogged down in a fire fight, the other two were within easy reach for assistance.
A red X popped up on his HUD ten feet in front of him which marked another spot for a crater charge. Planting the explosive, Iaido stepped back, paused for two seconds and began moving forward. It was perfect timing learned from thousands of entries over his time with Omega. He hit the hole milliseconds after the explosion and followed the rubble into the breach.
The proximity alarms built into his ARC suit went off as his HUD filled with a dozen white and yellow circles. Every military-issued powered armor had its own version of an AI, nowhere near as advanced as Pax or Athena, but capable of locating and identifying threats. His suit quickly scanned the two dozen humans in the room and categorized them into one of three types; non-combatants, possible-combatants and confirmed-combatants. Unfortunately, the suit AIs couldn’t distinguish friend from foe, that job was left to the warrior wearing the suit. There were sixteen white circles (non-combatants) and eight yellow circles (possible-combatants) in the room. According to the agenda that Pax had downloaded on approach, this courtroom was supposed to be empty but obviously something had happened and this trial had to be shuffled to another courtroom.
Landing almost in the exact center of the room, Iaido snapped his THAB-Mk9 into position as the built-in targeting reticules of his suit locked onto all possible combatants. Seven of the yellow circles shifted to red as the six police officers assigned to the courtroom pulled their service pistols. Data concerning each tango popped up next to the reticules; including names, statistics, links to their service records and information concerning their weapons. None of their guns were strong enough to penetrate his armor, so at this current time he intended on ignoring them.
The seventh red circle was the defendant.
Iaido’s data indicated that the defendant was a career criminal who was on trial for murdering a family of three. He was claiming self-defense and PTSD, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. Of course, according to Iaido’s corresponding data, he had never served one day in the service. Since he had pulled a knife from under the table and was threatening to kill his attorney, the bounty hunter acted. Engaging his external loud speakers, Iaido pushed the volume to maximum so his voice boomed.
“Guilty!”
Firing two shots from his THAB, the first one took the defendant’s hand off at the wrist sending the knife flipping through the air. His second shot took the accused murderer in the left temple and knocked him over the table. He was dead before his body hit the floor.
Knowing that confusion was his ally, Iaido dropped his THAB to hang by its sling, reached into his belt pouch and pulled out three small metallic canisters. Removing the safety pins, he tossed them into different sections of the room. Even before they landed, the grenades began spewing a thick grey smoke.
As the civilians and police alike got a whiff of the gas, they began coughing uncontrollably. Coughing gas was basically harmless but a very effective way of incapacitating humans without a self-contained breathing apparatus.
All of this took less than fifteen seconds. However, it was still long enough for someone to set off the alarms throughout the building. Knowing that DJ and Jay would be walking into chaos, Iaido activated his own version of the GOTH plan.
Transmitting on their local tac-net Iaido said, “Alarms raised, activate plan Charlie…proceed to objective as fast as possible.”
He knew that on each of their HUDs a new path was immediately highlighted showing the most direct route to their target. Of course, this would take them through some of the heavier trafficked areas but that couldn’t be helped. Iaido saw the green lights in the far left corner of his HUD illuminate that signified that his friends had received and acknowledge the change of plans. Everyone knew that they needed to get to the Rotunda before the Galactic Marshals could enact their plot.
There is an old saying; the shortest distance between any two points is a straight line.
Iaido took that adage to heart, brought his THAB back to his shoulder and headed due north right toward the nearest wall. If there was a door in his path, he used it; if there wasn’t, he created one with the 20mm cannon mounted to the under-barrel of his rifle.
This method had several advantages. First, it was hard for any sort of resistance to form up since he wasn’t taking any known pathways. Secondly, the explosions, while not overly large when compared to some of the other ordinance that he carried, were still large enough to disorient and knock over anyone nearby. And lastly, Iaido hated to admit it to himself, but it was damn fun.
When he reached his entry point, Iaido checked his HUD for the location of his friends. They were closing in on their spots and would be on site in a matter of seconds. The plan now was to make a heavy dynamic entry, blowing through as many floors as necessary to get them into the room as quickly as possible but the timing was going to be crucial. DJ was one floor up and to the southwest, while Jay was two floors up and slightly west. DJ’s entry would place him at the main entry of the Rotunda which was actually on the second floor. Preliminary scans show that this would be the primary entrance for any possible reinforcements. Jay’s entry should put him on the highest corner of the room, dropping him onto the balcony which ran the entire perimeter of the Rotunda. This would put him in a perfect position to act as a sniper.
Iaido reached his entry point, although he still had five floors to go through, he signaled that he was ready to breech. Squatting down behind a large filing cabinet, he set his first charge and preloaded the next four. When the time came, he calculated that it would only take him about twelve seconds to blow through the five floors. Now came the hard part, the waiting. Logically, he knew that his friends would be in place in a matter of moments but even his long years of military service couldn’t override the apprehension and excitement that would creep over him in the next few minutes.
* * * * *
DJ couldn’t contain his grin.
Of course, since it was hidden behind the opaque dome of his helmet and no one could see it but it was there. There was probably some sort of psychological diagnosis for someone who considered breaching a building with an unknown number of combatants with the odds completely stacked against them as fun. The non-technical term of crazy came to mind, but then… he was a Marine and that term has been used to describe them for centuries.
But it was true; he was having more fun than any one moment over the last decade. Ever since the day he shot his company commander. For a fleeting second, DJ felt a sense of remorse for killing his lieutenant back in his service days. He knew that the LT wasn’t really a bad person, just a scared kid. But his unit had been pinned down by the Confederates and they were slowly being picked off by snipers. The LT had lost his courage and fled. Unfortunately, he was the only one with a working sat-com and DJ had been forced to kill him to keep the satellite communications gear intact and with the unit.
DJ had contemplated that single moment which changed his life so many times over the last decade but he couldn’t figure anyway else it could’ve turned out different. Unconsciously, the shoulder flaps on his HAVOC-V suit popped open and closed as he shrugged.
An old Strike acronym came to mind… FIDO; Fuck It Drive On. The simple mentality that when all else fails, keep driving forward until something stops you or you have a reason to change directions.
Arriving at his breaching point, DJ signaled he was ready and set his charges. He knew that he had five floors to blow through and he would probably land in the middle of the proverbial hornet’s nest. One way or another, this was going to be the time of his life; either the last few minutes of it or the most exciting moments of it.
Either way, he was ready.
* * * * *
Jay was different than his friends.
This was neither fun nor exc
iting but fearful. He didn’t regret offering his help. As a friend and a former solider, it was a duty. But fighting was no longer his calling, perhaps it never was. He had always preferred tinkering to fighting.
Reaching his entry spot, Jay took a deep breath and signaled ready. Almost immediately, Iaido and DJ’s lights went from green to red signaling that they were breaching. His HUD automatically started a sixty second countdown in the upper right-hand corner of his vision. Since he was going to be the over-watch, he was supposed to enter one full minute after the others. This would enhance his odds of entering undetected in the confusion created by the other two. Of course, this would be one of the longest minutes of his life… ranking right up there with standing in the pass on Gilese as the bugs charged.
Jay smiled slightly.
This entry might be bad but after living through Gilese…nothing was ever going to be as dire as that.
CHAPTER 29
As soon as Iaido saw Jay’s light turn from red to green, he fired off his first crater charge and rode the rubble down.
His HUD displayed a countdown and graphic display of his entry. When he was two seconds from hitting the next floor, he set off the next crater charge and so on and so on.
There was no way that Iaido could know exactly where everyone in the Rotunda would be standing during his entry. Knowing full and well that it was dangerous to assume when going into battle, Iaido didn’t have the luxury of a full recon and was forced to make several educated guesses given the overall layout of the auditorium.
He presumed that the General would be in one of two places; either sitting in the Speaker’s chair, which was the highest spot behind the podium or pacing back and forth in front of the accused during his interrogation. The members of the High Council would be seated to the left and right of the Speaker’s chair.
The Galactic Marshals would probably be positioned near the members of the High Council and flanking the notorious thief and criminal, Jagger Jax. Iaido also knew that somewhere there would be a news crew filming the whole procedure; there was no way that the General would pass up this type of photo op.
Breaching the final floor, the room erupted into chaos.
As Iaido followed five floors of rubble down the three stories opening that was the Grand Rotunda, the only analogy his brain could come up with is that it must be akin to riding an avalanche straight down to hell.
With a flick of his eye and a simple thought, he engaged his inertial dampeners which shifted his body weight to half of normal. This wouldn’t slow his fall but would make surviving the impact at the bottom easier.
His ARC suit’s AI began scanning and correlating data at a staggering speed. Instead of the seven Galactic Marshals that he was expecting, his HUD showed twelve red circles spread throughout the room. The only good thing was that there weren’t any questionable tangos; well not really…his HUD did mark Jagger Jax with a yellow circle.
Trusting his instincts and training, Iaido fired five shots even as he was falling. He knew the moment he fired that only one was a kill shot. Nevertheless the resulting blasts knocked the Praetorians away from the five most senior High Council members.
On the upper left corner of his HUD, four icons with corresponding numbers popped up. The first was a small white skull with a one underneath popped into view, confirmed kills. Next to that was a red cross, injured combatants, with the number four beneath it. The fourth was a set of crossed swords to mark the number of combatants within a hundred foot radius. The last was a yellow smiley face for friendlies in the same area.
It was a tad low tech but he had developed this method during his years in the military to help track his killed and wounded count in the chaos that was battle. It followed the simple analogy of K.I.S.S…Keep It Simple Stupid.
Once Iaido engaged an enemy, numbers became secondary but keeping an accurate count was a necessity. However, combat for him was more primal, almost instinctual. If someone confronted him with a weapon, they were an enemy and Iaido did what he did best. He attacked. But not every assault was designed to kill. Some were just meant to delay or incapacitate an enemy. In the pandemonium that was battle, how could he accurately count or keep up with those that were just wounded instead of killed?
Enter his tally system.
Long ago he had reasoned that if the AI in his suit was advanced enough to analyze and recognize threats, than it could also track tangos if they were alive or dead after they engaged in combat. Iaido’s AI also identified and marked the camera crew with a yellow box to signify them as non-combatants. His smiley face tally system showed a dozen friendlies in the room; the nine members of the High Council, the General, the glamorous reporter and her liberal holo-recorder. Luckily, the media types were to the south end of the room and out of the line of fire.
Five of the remaining seven Galactic Marshals pulled out two weapons, a powered gladius and a Peregrine Disruptor Mark II. Judging from their choice of weapons, it was obvious that their orders were to kill and not take prisoners. However, the two Praetorians which were the President’s bodyguards did something that was completely unexpected. One grabbed the General and held a powered gladius to his throat while his partner freed the criminal Jagger Jax.
Using the advanced optical capabilities built into his suit, Iaido scanned the faces of the Galactic Marshals and ran their image against his memory and the Omega Squadron database. Unfortunately, they all came up negative. None of these Praetorians were his brother’s clone.
None were Aeneas.
Not waiting to see how the Praetorians would react, Iaido attacked and his world seemed to slow down as his combat senses kicked into overdrive. Even as the debris and rubble were still falling, he was on the move. His next shot, and kill, was to the Marshal holding the General. As much as he hated the man, he was still the elected President of the Coalition and it was his duty to save him.
The resulting blast from his THAB took the Marshal’s head off and scorched the right side of the General’s face. If they both survived this encounter Iaido knew that the General would be pissed and would chew him a new ass but that was an argument for another time.
Tackling the President, Iaido engaged his force shield on his left forearm and twisted his body to place the energy barrier between the General and the incoming disruptor blasts. All five shots hit his shield center mass. Any of the shots would’ve easily killed the unprotected politician or damaged his ARC suit but not his energy shield; it was designed for just such a purpose.
Iaido smiled inwardly at the slight advantage the Praetorians had given him. Even though the PDMkIIs were some of the deadliest weapons in the known universe, they had a very slow rate of fire. Only about one shot every one point nine seconds; which in this type of combat was an eternity.
Tossing the General behind him and over the prosecutor’s desk, Iaido snapped his THAB back to his shoulder and trained it on the five Marshals who were preparing to fire their second volley. He got off three kill shots before the incoming rounds hit him. Luckily, two of the disruptor blasts hit his shield and were deflective harmlessly off to his left. The other three he wasn’t so lucky with. Two blasts caught him in the waist and right leg. The carbon alloy steel absorbed much of the blast, enough so that Iaido didn’t lose any body parts but the composite alloy began to immediately break down. The last incoming disruptor blast hit the barrel of his THAB just as he was shooting his fourth round and the resulting explosion destroyed both the carbine rifle and much of the weakened armor on his right side.
Iaido was knocked aside. Instinctively, he went with the energy and rolled with it instead of resisting the blast. His roll took him to the corner of the podium. He left a trail of metal and blood in his wake but he was still alive. Just before his armor completely shut down, Iaido took one last look at his tally marks; five kills, five wounded, two combatants, nine friendlies and one unknown.
Even as his HUD flicked and died, he attacked. Not having any other choice, Iaido shifted his left sid
e toward the lone threat on the podium, drew his energy blade and jumped. It was a binary solution, either this attack worked or it didn’t. He was out of options and out of time.
The Praetorian had one shot left before Iaido could close the distance and he took it. The disruptor blast seared the entire left side of his armor and Iaido felt the heat building on his skin but ignored the pain. Landing gracefully, Iaido’s energy blade sliced right through the Marshal’s neck, completely beheading him.
Even as the remnants of his ARC suit fell off of him, Iaido heard someone clapping behind him. Turning back toward the remaining Praetorian, he paused when he saw who was applauding.
Standing next to the last Marshal in the same outfit that Jagger Jax had been wearing earlier was his brother’s clone…Aeneas.
CHAPTER 30
Lt. Kristopher was standing in the lobby of the New Atlanta Hall of Justice waiting on an elevator with five SWAT officers in full tactical armor.
Judging from the alarms going off and the mass of people fleeing the building, Iaido had begun his entry. He called up the evacuation plan of the Hall of Justice to see if there was any faster way other than the main elevators for them to get to the twenty-eight floor. There was a freight elevator on the south end of the building that could take them to the maintenance floor. Shunting this information to his team, the six NAPD officers headed to the opposite end of the building.
“El-tee, I’m curious as to why we are here,” asked one of his SWAT escorts.
Kristopher called up the identifiers and basic records of his team. The officers were drawn from two different tactical teams. He scanned the list of names, he had three from SWAT-Four; Sgt. Hamilton, Officers Muncy and Buchannan, and two from SWAT-Six; Officers Ernspiker and Spurgeon.
The Last Spartan: Different Paths Page 26
