He picked up the phone cord Rick had passed up, and split the dual line cable. Had it been metal wire he would have had to screw it into place in the black boxes, but because it was fiber optic cable, he pressed a button on each box in turn, shoved cable into the hole that opened up, then let the button go. Pressure kept the cable in place, completing the arming of his bomb.
Noble let himself down through the hole in the bottom of the hovervehicle and felt for the top rung of the manhole ladder with his toes. He found it and quickly scrambled down into the stinking darkness of a sewer tunnel running parallel to the street above. Roughly eight meters below the surface he met his companions in a big storm drain tunnel. Without a word, Rick led them back toward the intersection through which they had turned to find the Armory, then immediately took a crosscut tunnel leading north.
Every ten meters the flashlights picked up the reflective tape they had used to fasten the five hundred meters of phone cable to the walls of the tunnels. The floor pitched up as the tunnel started a climb toward the Heights in Daosha, but Rick took another tunnel that ran around the base of the hills. Further up the tunnel, rats squealed at being caught in the light, their eyes burning like binary stars in the night sky.
Finally they reached a large square of reflective tape on the wall of the tunnel. Rick stopped there and wiped sweat from his brow. "Do you need my light?"
"No, I've got mine." Noble reached into his pocket and pulled out a simple laser pointer. "I once did a fiber optic experiment in one of my classes. I used my pointer to send Morse code to a phone. Never thought I'd be finding a practical use for that lesson."
He flashed the laser against the wall, playing a red dot along the moist stone surface. Looking farther into the tunnel, he pointed his laser at two of the glowing eyes and flashed the dot between them.
"Nice shooting," Rick laughed.
"This will be nicer, trust me."
Noble picked up the end of the fiber optic cable. He pressed the laser to one of the two lines and smiled. "Brace yourselves. Remember we may get secondary blasts."
When his thumb hit the button on the laser, the beam flashed to life and shot down the cable. Moving at slightly less than the speed of light, but not so much slower as to make a difference, the photons shot through the cable, along the twists and around the corners where the cable ran and, finally, up and into the ambulance.
Inside the vehicle, the photons hit a simple photosensitive cell within the black box. The influx photons excited atoms, creating a trickle of electrical current that flowed through the cell and out the leads connected to the blasting caps. They went off with a pop barely loud enough for the MP returning to the ambulance to hear.
With that, the blasting caps exploded the det-cord fuse, which triggered both the det-cord through which it had been looped and the military plastique. As the milplas detonated, it sparked the product of Rose and Fabian's labors to explode. Within a second of Noble's hitting the button on his pointer, the entire metric ton of explosive in the ambulance had gone off.
The MP died before his brain could register any threat to him, the incredible energy unleashed by the bomb literally disintegrating him. The force spread out from the ambulance in a sphere and met its first real resistance on the ground. The sidewalk buckled and fragmented. The asphalt of the street rippled as if it were water. The vibrations broke it into chips and rocks and hurled them outward from the center of the explosion.
When the force hit the Armory itself, several things happened. The Shockwave slammed into the building with uneven amounts of force. The ground floor, which was nearest the point of detonation, took the brunt of the blast. The force lessened as it hit the second and third stories, and again as it moved further up the block to the half of the building on the far side of the doorway. Yet even as the force of the blast dropped off, it was more than sufficient to wreak incredible damage.
The windows imploded, spraying the rooms beyond them with a razored hail of glass. Several people, partially protected by the heavy desks behind which they sat, did not die immediately as the glass flayed them alive. Blind and screaming, they spent their last moments of life in an eternity of agony.
The walls, which were made of rough-hewn stones mortared together, with polished granite for window casings and trim, buckled as the force of the blast built. Mortar crumbled and walls caved in. The explosion ripped the walls into their component pieces, then drove the debris back through the softer interior walls. The floors undulated like flags snapping in a hurricane. With a crackling and popping, floorboards twisted into splinters that flew up and out with enough force to pierce sheet-rock walls.
The same was true for office equipment. The explosion shattered plastics and broke wooden furnishings into tiny fragments. It twisted chairs and metal desks into unrecognizable lumps and crushed refrigerators like aluminum cans in the hands of a BattleMech.
People in the offices, being somewhat less dense than their office equipment, did not survive collision with pieces of wreckage.
Outside, the explosion penetrated the ground to a depth of nearly ten meters, obliterating the tunnel Nobel and his team had used for their escape. The crater, with all the dirt, asphalt, piping, and wiring in it being cast into the air, spread out to a diameter of roughly fifty meters, undercutting the whole Armory and the buildings on the other side of the relatively narrow street. Those buildings had none of the sturdier Armory's structural integrity. They collapsed as if made of cards, major chunks of them sailing away through the air amid the dirt being blasted up out of the crater.
Oddly enough, there had still been very little in the way of fire in the area. As the apartments around the Armory collapsed gas mains ruptured, sending fireballs up into the sky. Some debris ignited and, when it came down, fell on other flammable materials, spawning a number of fires. The fact that water mains had been cut by the blast would mean a loss of water pressure in the area and that would severely hamper firefighting efforts until the Black Cobra could bring in their 'Mechs to deal with the situation.
When computing how much explosive he would need to level the Armory, Noble had done all the math very carefully. That meant plugging into an arcane formula things like the nature of the materials used in the building, their resistance to force, and compression factors for the explosive itself. Confident that his calculations were correct, he used one last factor that he knew would get him the desired result.
He doubled the amount of explosive his computations indicated were needed.
As a result, when the force from the blast hit the explosive storage lockers in the Armory basement, it was great enough to make the military plastique detonate. This created another explosion in the heart of the Armory—one with roughly four times the power of the ambulance bomb—and the ruins of the building launched themselves into the air.
Three hundred meters away, in a storm tunnel buried inside a hill, bracing for the Shockwave was of no use to Noble, Rick, or Cathy. As the initial explosion rippled through the ground, it knocked them off their feet and onto the curved floor of the tunnel. Rick's flashlight smashed when it hit the ground, leaving his section of tunnel drowned in darkness. Cathy's flashlight stayed on, but she cried out as she went down.
Then the second Shockwave hit. Noble covered his head with his hands and tucked his head in toward his chest as he felt the ground begin to swell. Suddenly he found himself launched into the air. He saw stars as his head and hands smashed into the roof and he heard something snap. He hoped it wasn't part of himself, but the pain of hitting the ground again kept him from pinpointing any injury. Unsure which way was up, he bounced back and forth a couple of times, then lay still as the ground movement subsided.
He tried to take a deep breath, but the air was so thick with dust that all he could do was cough. Rolling over onto his belly, he pulled his T-shirt up over his nose and mouth to filter the air. He could still taste the dust as he breathed in, but he wasn't coughing now.
"Rick? Cathy?"
"I'm here, Noble. Bruised and beat, but alive. Cathy?"
"Here, ow! Dammit, my ankle!"
Noble turned in the direction from which their voices had come. He saw Rick's silhouette moving through the darkness and realized that was only because the explosion had popped a manhole cover from a spot behind Rick to let a wavering light pour in.
Working his way forward, he found Cathy and scooped her up. "Head for the manhole, Rick. I'll pass Cathy up to you."
The doctor did as he was told and in no time they were once again out in the cool evening air. A little way down the hill a hovercar's lights flicked on and off, and Noble flashed them with his laser pointer. The hovercar rose up on a cushion of air and started toward them.
Beyond the roadway and down the hill, Noble saw the smoking hole that was all that was left of the Armory. For blocks around it in every direction buildings sagged in on themselves. Broken gas pipes ended in little yellow flames. Four different buildings had caught fire. Strobing lights and shrieking sirens filled the night.
Noble took off his baseball cap and from his pocket pulled one of the Dancing Joker cards. He stuffed the card inside the band and tossed the hat back down the manhole.
Rick smiled at him as Anne Thompson stopped the car. "You think they're going to need that to identify who did this?"
"Probably not, but if we don't take credit, someone else will." Noble got into the car beside Cathy, then pulled the door shut behind him. "Xu Ning has himself a problem, and I want to make certain he knows who it is."
37
The soldier, above all other people, prays for peace, for he must suffer and bear the deepest wounds and scars of war.
—Douglas MacArthur
Australarctica
Morges, Lyran Alliance
5 December 3057
Khan Phelan Wolf nodded to the holographic image of the older woman as it materialized in his holotank. "Greetings, Star Colonel Mattlov. I am honored Khan Chistu thought enough of me to send you after me."
Spite flashed through the older woman's eyes. "Spare me, freebirth. I am attacking this world. With what do you defend it?"
"Quickly to business, I see." Phelan was uncertain about the source of her urgency, but thought it might have to do with being called away from being the spearpoint for the Jade Falcons' renewed offensive against the Inner Sphere. "Before I make my bid, allow me to say that I always thought the fiction of Chistu stripping Clusters from your Galaxy was transparent. I am glad to see the Peregrine Galaxy together again."
The computer colored Mattlov's cheeks. "I neither need nor desire your commentary on my situation. I am come to destroy you. With what will you meet me?"
Phelan opened his arms. "I have the Wolf Clan's Alpha Galaxy, with the addition of the Sixteenth BattleCluster. I also have two regiments of the Kell Hounds. I will not be employing my battleships in this engagement. We are defending Australarctica and have cleared the area of noncombatants."
Mattlov looked to the side, out of the image frame, then faced Phelan again. "What of the Omega Galaxy? It was reported to us that they accompanied your retreat from Clan space."
The Wolf Khan shrugged. "I do not include them in my bid, so their location is immaterial. Suffice it to say, they are well away from here and will be unable to intervene in our fight. Consider my defense being conducted by nine frontline Clusters."
"You overvalue these mercenaries of yours."
"And the Smoke Jaguars underestimated them at Luthien. Bid against them what you think they are worth. With the Omicron Galaxy in tow, you have five frontline Clusters, a solahma unit, and five garrison Clusters. I will be content to wait if you decide to request more troops."
Mattlov snapped to attention as if she'd been hit by lightning. "No freebirth Wolf has ever dared speak to me as you do."
"Remember, Star Colonel, I am a Khan! You have my bid. You may send as many or as few of your troops as you will against me. Those I do not kill I will make my bondsmen— including you, if it comes to that." Phelan folded his arms. "Are you prepared to bid at this time?"
"Yes." Anger suffused her words. "No WarShips. This will be warrior to warrior. I will bring all of my Clusters, even the solahma. We will land in a day and initiate combat within the week. Mattlov out."
Her image faded and Phelan focused on the people standing beyond where it had been projected. "With the garrison units and the solahma, we're slightly outnumbered, but probably very even on strength."
Morgan Kell nodded, his expression grave. "Why did you make her angry?"
Phelan smiled. He thinks that was not wise, but instead of criticizing me for it, he asks my reasons. Therein is the difference between a leader and a commander. "The Falcons are probably the most reactionary and hidebound of the Clans. Angeline's willingness to employ a solahma unit— one made up of has-been Mech Warriors usually assigned to disgracefully duties such as bandit-hunting—means she has contempt for our troops. By being condescending to her, I reminded her of just how far apart we are. She will demand that her troops prove how much better their ways are than ours. Until Theodore Kurita initiated reforms in the Draconis Combine's military, similar thinking proved a tactical handicap for them."
Daniel Allard scratched at the back of his neck. "With our defenses and deployments, she has to be mad to come at us with equal strength."
"Agreed, but she does not see it that way. If she concentrates on one portion of our positions, she can direct overwhelming strength against it. Her job is to destroy us, while we merely need to survive." Phelan shrugged. "Because loss is not possible in her thinking, visions of victory will always linger just a bit beyond her grasp. If she keeps going for it, and we can outlast her, she'll overreach herself and then it will be our turn."
"A lot of ifs there, son, quiaff?"
"Aff." Phelan threw his arm around his father's shoulders. "But if an old hound like you can learn a few Wolf tricks, there's no way a birdbrain could ever beat us."
38
How are the mighty fallen in the midst of battle!
-II Samuel I.XXV
Plain of Curtains, Twycross
Steel Viper Occupation Zone
7 December 3057
As effortlessly as if the metal flesh she piloted was her own, Natasha Kerensky turned her Dire Wolf to the right, a Jade Falcon Uller impaled on her crosshairs. She hit the triggers for her two right-arm PPCs and each vomited a coruscating cerulean beam that burned deeply into the Uller's right arm and right flank.
Marco Hall's Hellbringer also came around to face off with the wounded Falcon 'Mech. A trio of lasers on his 'Mech's left chest shot volleys of ruby bolts out at the hole Natasha had opened in the squat Uller's chest. His laser fire turned the 'Mech's internal structures into a molten red liquid that gushed from the hole as the Uller began to falter. With its next step the 'Mech's right leg punched up through the chest and the right arm fell away. The 'Mech hit the red dust of Twycross face-first, then the cockpit canopy exploded as the pilot blasted free of his dead machine.
"Where are they, Marco?" With so much sand filling the air, Natasha could see barely thirty meters in front of her machine. The conditions had kept the fighting sharp and furious, and conducted at close quarters. The Uller had less been looking to attack them than trying to find its way back to its own lines. Had things been going according to plan, the Falcon lines should have been as close as the Uller had come, but something was wrong,
"They are not coming, Khan Natasha. They are not being drawn in."
Natasha pounded a fist on the arm of her command couch. With Chistu sending so many 'Mechs against her, the Black Widow had worked hard to lure the Jade Falcons into a trap. Star Colonel Ravill Pryde, commander of the Falcon Guard force, had bargained hard and well with her. She smiled. He was almost Wolfish in his enthusiasm for this fight.
That enthusiasm she had put down to the fact that Ravill had not been with the Falcon Guards when they were virtually destroyed the last time they ha
d seen the Great Gash. Few of those who had survived that last battle on Twycross were still with the Guards, and these Guards seemed more than anxious to get at her troops. The other units—garrison Clusters—had been more scornful of her force. Natasha decided they would pay for their insolence before she destroyed the Guards.
To frustrate Ravill Pryde, Natasha had put her Thirteenth Wolf Guards in the rear of a diamond formation. The 341st bore the brunt of the assault, but as instructed, they fell back quickly, the Sixth Provisional Garrison of the Jade Falcons hot in pursuit. When that happened the Third Battle Cluster and 352nd Assault Cluster opened up on the Falcons from each flank. Great chunks of the Sixth Provo died on the Plain of Curtains.
The other two garrison units, the Fifth Talon and Eighteenth Falcon Regulars, had come in more cautiously, but the 341st advanced again to hammer them as they engaged the wings of Natasha's formation. Under pressure from the Falcon Guards, the 341st broke and passed through the Thirteenth Wolf Guards and into the Gash. The Third Battle Cluster and the 352nd Assault Cluster also drew back into the Gash while the Thirteenth Guards gave ground until they plugged the mountain gap.
Natasha's last unit, the Eleventh Battle Cluster—the only unit yet to see action in the campaign—lined both sides of the Gash up on the plateaus above it, ready to pour fire into the Gash itself. Natasha intended the Guards to chase her into the trap, but, according to Marco, they weren't corning.
"Have our survivors start loading up in the DropShips, Marco. They're to head out immediately."
"Do we go with the original plan, or do you want them to drop in behind the Falcons?"
Natasha considered that bit of tactics, then rejected it. "We've hurt them here today, but not as much as I wanted." The image of Ravill's face, complete with cocky smile, played through her mind. "We've not killed the bodies, so we must kill the heads."
Bred for war Page 29
