“Agreed. We stop the nuclear attack first and foremost.”
“Good. It’s not like we have a choice really. If this thing blows, we won’t be able to realize the secondary objectives anyway.”
She has a point. I keep looking at Eleanor’s remote vital signs and wondering what she must be going through right this minute. I also check my charge levels; I am at one hundred and eighteen percent, so soon we’ll be able to go and accomplish our main mission. We have less than one hundred minutes to find and disable that nuke. That’s going to be close. In fact, if the bomb isn’t where we expect it to be, we’ll probably run out of time altogether and that means I am already a dead man walking.
I push the thought away. Now is not the time to let negative thoughts bring me down. I need to go in as sharp-headed as I possibly can. Today I have been off my game and I can’t afford going in the last sprint half-cocked.
But there is another issue that needs to be addressed, and that’s the images of Vassiliki appearing inside my neuronal HUD in place of Tanya’s. What does that mean? At first I was inclined to think a bug involving some leakage from my own memories was at play here. But the more I think about it, the less likely it seems. There is someone trying to tell me something. It looks like they manage to do that through Tanya’s neuronal net but without her knowledge.
Whether it is one of Ahmed’s tricks to throw me off or something else, it is more worrisome than I am willing to admit out loud. Besides, the obvious security leak and all the potential dangers that come along with it also make me extremely uncomfortable.
Could Vassiliki still be alive?
No! Ahmed is trying to get into my head. He has done his job well: he’s found information about my past and is using it as a distraction, so I won’t be at the top of my game. And what better time to introduce this wild-card element into the mix than when he attempts his highest, most devastating life-costing attack yet.
When the charge reaches one hundred and thirty-five percent, my HUD briefly flashes blue to inform me of the end of the charge. I unplug the cable that enters the back of my neck power conduit and travels down my spine distributing power to all my power cells. Taking the long charging tip out of my neck is always an unpleasantly tickling sensation.
I go into the armory room of the secondary safe house and load up on all my favorite weaponry. I take a couple of backups that I usually don’t bother with, but today nothing can be left to chance. I can't risk either equipment failure or the wrong ordnance choice, even if that means taking a little extra charge with me. The overpowered batteries won’t help me compensate power wise, at least until my power levels reach their nominal charge.
I am ready to wage a small war and I have little doubt that this is exactly what awaits me. A small-scale, time-sensitive war. I crack my fingers, wrists and neck bones to prepare myself mentally. I always loved the sound of bones cracking inside my own body; it provides me with a pleasurable release and helps me get pumped up.
I walk into the garage and look at my choices of vehicles. I brush with my fingers the cold, smooth surface of another jet bike, one that’s fully charged. The one I came in with, currently parked on the roof, has seen better days. It is still functional but I have depleted most of its fusion core. My fingers slide off the curvature of the front body work.
“That’s your usual choice,” says Tanya. “It’s also the vehicle we selected in the mission parameters. Are you considering another choice?”
I don’t answer while I ponder the question. This garage has a heavy starfighter, loaded with enough ordnance to blow half the city. I approach it and put my hand on its armor plating. It’s not as smooth as the polished finish of the jet bike, but it’s even colder. I like the tactile feedback on my fingers.
“I thought we agreed on stealth approach?” says Tanya.
“What’s the point exactly? Ahmed is fully aware we’re coming for him. We might as well go locked, loaded and ready to give him hell.”
“Okay, take the starfighter. I guess a stealth approach is no longer mission critical,” Tanya concedes.
“No it isn’t. He’s broadcasting his location by letting Eleanor’s vital signs transmit. He knows we’re coming for him. So yeah, we need as much power as we can get, and that baby has it in spades.”
“Except it’s been primarily designed for space combat.”
“It may be at home in the stars but it’s still a deadly machine on Earth. What’s with you second-guessing me every chance you get today?”
“You’re not yourself today, Cole. So I feel I should point it out whenever you do things differently.”
“If you died in a dream and woke up right after it, still able to feel your flesh burning on your skin and not knowing what the hell has happened, you’d be rattled as well.”
“So, do you think it was a nightmare or not?”
“I’ve had plenty of nightmares in my life. Whatever that was, it’s wasn’t a nightmare.”
“I just don’t understand why this is reason enough to throw caution to the wind.”
“We did that the moment we lost Eleanor and failed to stop Ahmed earlier today.”
“You mean when you didn’t want to betray your principles when you got the chance to end both him and the mission?”
That stings but also happens to be the truth. She is right, I could have easily killed him. Or perhaps he would have also activated his augments and the outcome would have been the same or worse. There is no point in trying to rewrite the past, no matter how ironic that sounds in my line of work.
“Duly noted,” I say, resigned not to debate the issue any longer.
I walk under the cockpit and activate the trapdoor with my neuronal interface. The round trap door slides open and a blue light spills on me, turning everything in my sight blueish. I feel the force of the magnetic field lifting me upwards and inside the ship. When I’m inside the cockpit the pilot’s chair slides from behind and cradles me in smoothly. The trapdoor below closes with a whoosh.
The instruments on the ship come to life. What was once a dark cockpit is now teeming with colors in a mesmerizing light show. The engines hum to life, accompanied with a slight, almost undetectable vibration. I could grab the joystick that morphed in front of me and fly this thing manually. But instead I close my eyes and link my neuronal net with the ship’s control systems. I can now fly it just with my thoughts.
I reach out farther and call out to all the active drones in the city, including every drone from the other safe houses.
“Isn’t that overkill, Cole?”
“Nothing is today. We go all in. In fact, I’m taking the liquid nano-appendages as well.”
“The prototype could be helpful but it hasn’t been cleared for mission deployment yet. It may not perform as expected. In fact, it could compromise your other augments if something goes wrong.”
“I’m willing to take that chance.”
I am out of the garage and in the air in no time, cruising at full speed towards ground zero position. It is the World Security Center building, one of the largest, most imposing skyscrapers in all of New Geneva. Drone Two and Three are flying in formation on my wing.
“Tanya?”
“Yes, Cole.”
“In case things don’t go as planned . . .”
“None of that, Cole. Remember our motto: failure is not an option.”
“Be that as it may . . . I want you to know that I’m grateful for your friendship. You’re more than just a tactical AI to me. I hope you know that.”
“I know, Cole,” she says with an unusual weight behind her words.
We are only a couple of minutes away from our destination.
“Cole, how much do you remember from your . . . nightmare?”
Was it a nightmare? A vision? Or something else entirely? I wish I knew for sure. It would make my next move easier. If it had been a nightmare, then none of what I experienced in it can be trusted. Yet my instinct tells me that, no matter what it was, I need to pa
y close attention to it at least; that it holds the key to my survival this time around.
“I can remember only the second phase of the mission, where I am about to catch Ahmed. Before he . . .” I stop.
“Before he kills you,” Tanya finishes for me.
“Yeah. That’s the one part we won’t let happen this time around.”
“I’m glad to hear that.”
I don’t want to die today, nor let countless innocents suffer that fate as well. But that is a far cry from feeling totally confident about the final outcome.
I hear something over Eleanor’s mental link, then she unleashes a scream that freezes my blood.
“Dear lord,” says Tanya.
I grit my teeth, trying to stay calm, but anger is yet again knocking at the door of my psyche. Each new shout and scream from her feels like a knife hacking at my heart. I have to use the full force of my logical abilities to not let negative emotions take over me.
Tanya cuts the transmission.
“We don’t need to hear more of it.”
She is right. I don’t think I could have endured much more of it anyway.
“Can you locate the source of the transmission?” I ask.
Tanya overlaps the source of Eleanor’s comm to the schematics of the World Security Center we are flying towards. The signal comes from the middle of the building, its fifty-third floor.
“What do you want to do, Cole?”
“Doesn’t matter what I want; we go for the third floor like we planned, where we know from our pre-jump mission data that the bomb should be. Ahmed is clearly trying to get me to come to a higher floor in an attempt to divert me from my main objective.”
“Agreed. He is using her to divert your attention. I’m sorry your friend is being used this way against you. It must be painful and frustrating to be in that position.”
Tell me about it. My heart is telling me to save my friend while my brain tells me I can’t let her pain be a reason to change tactics. Frustration doesn’t even start to cover how I feel right now.
“If we get a shot, we kill the sucker. You hear me, Tanya? In fact, I want you to confirm a priority one order right now.”
“I’m listening.”
“If I’m unable or unwilling to kill that asshole, for whatever reason, but you can override me and do it for me, I want you to take over and make sure he dies.”
She doesn’t answer right away.
“Promise me, Tanya!”
“What if that conflicts with another one of your wishes, like saving Eleanor? What if he uses her as a shield or a means to escape?”
“That’s why I’m giving you that order now, because I can’t predict what he might do, and I don’t want any unforeseen emotional burst to interfere with finally getting rid of Ahmed Al’Hasi. That son of a bitch is torturing my friend and partner and he’s turned her comm on so I can listen to her suffer. He wants me to be emotionally compromised. We can’t let him use her this way. God knows what else he is willing to do to stop me from putting a round in between his fecking eyes.”
“Alright then, but . . . tell me the truth, Cole: aren’t you already compromised as we speak?”
“I sure hope not, or this might very well turn out to be our last rodeo together.”
“That’s a scary thought. Your vitals tell another tale.”
“Then I’ll depend on you to try to compensate with the right amount of drugs. Turn the whole emotional side of my brain off, if you feel you have to.”
“Are you sure, Cole? Perhaps your anger, if channeled correctly, could be of use. You said so yourself earlier on.”
“I’m not telling you to do it now; just use your best judgment if you feel it’s needed. But if . . . No!” I correct myself. “Not if. When the time comes, make sure he gets what he deserves, no matter how I feel in that moment, even if I tell you otherwise.”
“Very well, Cole. Priority One order acknowledged. Please lock-in the order with your password.”
“Agent Cole Seeker, Tango Alpha Seven Three Gamma Delta Tango Seven. No overrides.”
“Order locked-in; overriding of order disabled.”
I have little doubt that with this order I probably forfeited Eleanor’s life for good.
C H A P T E R
XVI
Mission completion time: T minus 83 minutes.
It doesn’t take long for the shit to hit the fan. Four klicks before arriving to ground zero, we’re greeted by three lightly armored fighters and a pair of jet bikes. They open fire the second they come within firing range. I artificially boost my adrenaline levels so I can pilot not only the ship with my mind but also a few of the drones that are already in range.
Three missiles are on their way to my ship. I deploy countermeasures before breaking hard right. All bogies follow me and try to reacquire a missile lock on me, but I don’t let them. I go evasive and use the drones to pound on their shields, focusing on one target at a time. The drones’ heavy rate of fire brings the shields of the current target to a satisfying low level. I swivel the ship around, lock onto its center and add my own plasma guns to the mix. The shields are down in less than a second.
Multiple blaster fire impacts with my frontal shields as I keep pounding on my current target, but already my guns are taking chunks of its armor away. I lock a missile and fire it. It cuts through the air and the incoming blaster fire and hits its mark. The ship explodes in a huge fiery cloud.
Another two missiles are on their way. I decide to hold on my countermeasures this time, but instead I change vector, activate my after burners and make a run for it. I direct the drones to my next target and they take position on that tango’s six, pounding its rear shields while I vector back towards it, with two missiles in tow. The fighter tries to go evasive and avoid drone fire which gives me the opportunity to approach it from the side and veer past it at the last moment. Right after that, I turn my engines off. The missiles acquire my target’s engine instead and they send it and its pilot straight to hell.
“Allahu Wakbar, motherfecker!” I exclaim.
I re-engage my engines and start firing at another missile launched from an enemy jet bike on an approaching vector.
I blow the missile off with plasma fire and decide to play a game of chicken with the incoming bike, now raining blaster fire on me. It does drop my aft shields somehow but I’m redirecting power from other systems to compensate.
Let’s see how big, if at all, these assholes’ balls are. I lock onto the bike, score a handful of plasma shots of my own, lowering its shields significantly.
It doesn’t seem to veer away, which surprises me. Meanwhile the other bike and the remaining fighter are getting on my six, raining blaster fire towards my engine pipes. I use my drones as decoys and they return fire, providing me with the necessary cover and time I need to get rid of the incoming bike.
Even if it doesn’t veer away at the last moment, both my shields and armor are so much stronger that I will cut through it like paper. I do risk damaging systems in case of direct impact at these velocities, but I’m willing to take that chance. Is he?
I redirect some of life support and inertial dampeners’ power to the maneuvering thrusters and shields. Time seems to slow down when we’re only a few yards away from one another. Eventually I can see the pilot eyes, and that’s when I see him flinch. He veers away upwards at the last moment, but then I respond in kind by rotating my craft ninety degrees. The tip of my wing slices through the lower half of the jet bike with a grinding metal screech. A second later the bike explodes in the purple night sky.
“A for effort; F for execution,” I say out loud.
Two more bogies to deal with and time is short so I decide I’ve had enough fun as it is. I need to get moving and get to the nuke now. Both targets on my tail are firing everything they’ve got at me. I think my last move has had them spooked. I release countermeasures to deal with the incoming missiles as I go evasive. They’re pretty decent pilots and they keep up
with me. That’s until I hit hard on the brakes, inverting my thrusters and using in-atmosphere airbrakes flaps all at once.
Having forgotten to re-assign power to my dampening field generators from earlier on, I take a serious amount of Gs during the maneuver, but nothing my augments, that are monitored and optimized by Tanya, can’t compensate for in real time.
They shoot past me and before they can react to having become the prey in our chasing game for a change, I rain down plasma fire on the bike first, finishing it off with a single missile. It partially explodes and gets into a wild, uncontrollable spin, impacting with the fighter next to it.
The fighter veers hard to port and tries to make a run for it. I’m in a hurry so for a split second I evaluate the possibility of letting it go. But then I decide against it. None of these feckers will survive today, not if I can help it.
It’s rather a waste, but since more drones are on the way, I simply use the nearest one, drone three, to shoot at the already compromised fighter while I set it on a collision course. The fighter never sees it coming and both target ship and drone explode upon impact into a thousand pieces.
“Having fun?” Tanya coos.
“I wouldn’t go that far; just another day’s work at Rewind.”
“Who do you think you’re talking to, Cole? You and I both know you live for this shit.”
“Alright then, I’ll plead guilty on that one.”
I am less than a minute away from ground zero. I scan the World Security Center but get nothing, Soon, the turrets on the roof of the building detect my ship and begin to have a field day shooting at me. I go evasive and lock all the turrets from the side I’m approaching the building from. Once I get the lock tones back I fire six simultaneous missiles. Four of them find their target while two of them are destroyed on their way by turret fire. I send Drone Four and the newly arrived Drone Five to dispatch the last two turrets while I make my landing approach.
Soon I’m hovering my ship in front of the building’s entrance, trying to get a visual on whatever welcoming party Ahmed has cooked up for me. But the smart-plexi solar shading is activated to maximum and I can’t get the visual data I am looking for. Neither can I get any scan data. Ahmed has erected the mother of all jamming fields around the building.
Rewind 717: The Adventures of Time Traveler Anti-Terrorist Agent Cole Seeker Page 15
