New Praetorians 1 - Sienna McKnight

by R. K. Syrus

  Like the specially purposed wing feathers of owls, their plasma rotors break turbulence into smaller currents. The stealth craft floats over the target village like a low-flying cloud. An elderly man walks steadily down an unpaved street. They pass over. Sienna imagines he only feels a brief, warm rush of air. If he were to look up, there might be a shimmer, then it would be gone. The non-combatant does not look up. They proceed to the designated structures.

  The six of them have their own way of doing things. Able as his file says he is, the tagalong SEAL operator is not part of it. Nobu finishes with Denbow and moves on. Their team stenographer typist is next up for comm check.

  “Man, I just got used to this here newfangled relay,” T-Rex protests as Nobu yanks some unneeded wires from his gear.

  “Suck it up, Rex,” his friend says. “Just don’t play any gangster rap over the common channel. Maybe we get this done before breakfast is over on the ship.”

  “Gangsta what?” T-Rex shakes his head. “Man, why you always gots to be all culturally insensitive?”

  As they gripe, they efficiently sync gear and locators. Sienna takes them through the breaching scenarios in their specialized shorthand. No one minds Denbow.

  Following standard procedure, the doorway is wide open. This spec of aircraft is designed to fly that way. As long as interior lights remain off, they can be spotted only by someone with sensitive NVG gear.

  Sienna stands with Bryan, looking at the command monitoring panels. These dimly lit multiple screens face away from the sliding exit. In one rectangle, she sees Whitebread’s 360 heads up display feed. The resolution is good enough to notice he’s got some kind of rash on his arm. Sienna makes a mental note to ask Sarge to ask Whitebread about it. It could be some kind of men’s problem with potential to embarrass her hard-working specialist.

  The rest of the Dogs’ cam feeds and vital-sign monitors wink on one by one. She’ll be on the ground with them and wants to make sure their data is feeding into the mechBrains okay. They’re programmed to alert her if there are any problems.

  “What the…” Snakelips gasps, looking into the central monitor.

  Sienna looks. Snakelips rarely goes off without cause. She definitely has cause.

  A big frame has just flickered on in the main display. It is circular, not rectangular like the others. The image which resolves into focus is of the ground as seen through Ortiz’s custom sniper rifle. The weapon’s scope is a battle-environment monitor as well as a straight-line optic. When switched on, it always defaults to the widest input setting. It shows three concentric ring bands, giving Snakelips multiple battlefield views without her having to take her eyes off a target.

  The first ring is a warped schematic of the whole area of engagement. It takes practice to make sense of the squashed digital map. All her team can do it. The next ring is a wraparound view from the chopper’s belly cam, showing any immediate threats closing in. There are none. The center is the traditional sniper crosshairs and ranging tools. This is zooming in on a live target just under the hovercopter.

  The problem is, Snakelips is standing to Sienna’s left, nowhere near the weapon. She curses. They realize what’s happened.

  Denbow has grabbed the rifle off the rack. The scope cam shows the crosshairs lining up on the sinus cavity of a Khorasani boy of no more than twelve. The friend-foe designator of the mechBrain paints him yellow because he is standing next to a rifle leaning against a wall. The mechBrain recognizes him as possible threat because he is near a weapon. The kid is only a potential threat, which is why he is painted yellow not red. And Denbow is about to blow his head off.

  Sienna leaps the distance between herself and the SEAL operator. She smacks down on the barrel of the high-powered precision rifle. The SEAL’s gloved finger touches the finely tuned trigger. It fires.

  The integrated suppressor shoots a single sabot-sheathed armor-piercing round. It impacts the doorframe of the aircraft with a whunk.

  “Hey!” Denbow barks at Sienna.

  She doesn’t let the weapon go. She jams it back into Denbow’s chest and pushes him back into a flight seat.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Clearing enemy opposition,” Denbow returns aggressively. “They’re in the sanctioned target zone, Colonel.”

  Sienna feels her face flush. If someone were to look at her through IR vision, her head would be glowing like a magnesium flare. She’s burning with anger at this homicidal idiot. She wants to knock him senseless.

  “This is not a goddamn free-fire zone.” Sienna flicks the safety on and pulls the rifle out of Denbow’s hands. “Rules of engagement are up to me, Lieutenant Denbow. And they are weapons hold.”

  As Sienna tries to get a look at the damage to their ride, Denbow comes back with more lip. “Colonel, with all respect,” he starts off, with enough lack of respect he’s in danger of not needing a rope to exit the copter, “in a couple years that will be a military-aged male. Whether this future combatant eats a bullet now or in five years, what’s the difference?”

  Sienna wants to tell Denbow that five years, five months, even five days can make all the difference in the world. She needs to believe that. And she’s seen that sometimes it’s actually true. But as surely as she knows she’s glad she stopped a kid who had no choice but to grow up in a war zone from having every choice taken away from him by a bullet to the temple, Sienna knows Denbow would not hear her. He certainly would not understand. So instead of saying any more, she kicks the fast rope over the edge of the open hatchway.

  “Rope’s on the ground,” Sienna says. “My mission. My call. Back off.”

  Before Denbow can reply, there is more movement on the ground. A second figure comes out near Denbow’s preteen target. In the frame of the doorway, a thuggish man walks up, smoking the butt end of a cigarette. He swats at the boy, who deftly ducks. Then the adult picks up the rifle. The mechBrain target designator paints him red. The outline of the boy turns green as he makes a local obscene gesture to the militia man’s back.

  Still fuming, but wary of yelling loud enough to give away their position, Sienna walks over to Snakelips. She pushes the mahogany stock of the rifle sideways into her body armor.

  “Here. And Corporal Ortiz,” Sienna says, “keep control of your weapon.”

  “Yes, Colonel.”

  She only ever uses real names and ranks with the Dogs when she is pissed. Everyone knows that. Sienna almost feels sorry for Snakelips. She will take the minor rebuke hard. Sienna is still not through being angry at the homicidal idiot she’s been saddled with. Denbow is the same kind of fool that opens fire on kids playing on the decades-old, disabled wreck of a tank. She turns to the Dogs; they snap to.

  “Everyone got that? Weapons hold,” Sienna repeats. “Use EEL rounds as primary ordnance, but don’t take any chances defending yourselves or each other. Get me?”

  Their response is drowned out by the pilot cutting in on comms.

  “Snakecharmer, we have a little situation brewing directly portside, eight o’clock.”

  He does not have to elaborate. The thug, outlined in red in the monitor, points at them, shouting. Right at their formerly invisible ride. The stray bullet fired by Denbow knocked out the stealth field on one side. From the ground it must have looked far-out alien and slapstick stupid all at the same time. Half a copter appearing in mid-air just like that. You don’t see that every day.

  “Go go go,” Sienna says and kicks the second fast rope out of the gaping doorway. Denbow reaches for the rope. Her RAPTEK-clad forearm halts him.

  “Not you,” Sienna says firmly. “Until we’re back on the deck of the Lee, it’s my mission. You stay here. See if you can fix your screw-up.”

  Sienna points to the big gouge in a critical panel torn by the tungsten-core bullet. The aircraft is not designed to be shot at with SLAP rounds from the inside. The light-bending ar
ray is completely buggered.

  Snakelips aims her reclaimed rifle out the doorway. She quickly switches to antipersonnel rounds and zeroes in on the armed hostile just as he is raising his rifle to shoot at the floating apparition. Delicia Snakelips Ortiz takes him out. Her single round to center mass is instantly incapacitating and instantly fatal. A clean, necessary kill.

  17

  Multiple 3D frames in her visor track Sarge and the others as they quickly secure the poorly fortified mud-brick dwelling. Here is where their best intel placed a local creep codenamed Sidewinder. He has one thing of value: a nugget in his brain. Sienna needs to dig it out. She re-checks everyone’s progress. Ready to jump in if crap happens.

  Resolved to never show it, she always worries about any of them getting hurt. Tonight that weight is heavy. This is her fight. Her birthright battle. At least they have the best equipment military budgets can afford. And one visiting team advantage—personalized stealth.

  Historically, foot soldiering was always about armor versus speed. It was always rock / scissors / rock. From ancient Greek hoplites weighed down by half their body weight in bronze to Genghis Khan issuing all his horsemen arrow-trapping silk vests. Modern material innovations brought in a third option: active camouflage. If the enemy can’t see you, they can’t shoot you.

  Sienna flips her visor down to meet her cheekpieces. As she presses herself against a wall, her outer cover reads the closest background color and projects it out. So does the transparent ceramic of her helmet. Totally chameleon. In fact, DARPA stole the guanine nanocrystal mechanisms from that tricky little lizard. They use advanced photon physics to change colors. It’s not perfect. Sienna’s experienced eye can still see who’s who without HUD-enhanced view. But in darkness, coming up on an unsuspecting enemy, the effect this night is total, awesome shock.

  The lower-floor guards are neutralized before anyone else notices their now very unstealthy stealth copter. Sienna starts to relax. Late breakfast on the aircraft carrier might happen.

  The upper floor of Sidewinder’s crib is one big bedroom. It would have been nice to scout the place with a mini drone. Their tagalong SEAL fixed it otherwise. She has to assume news of their arrival is getting out through militia channels. Checkout time has been moved up.

  Sienna taps her mic. “Everyone, sound off when main floor is cleared. Then proceed up. I’ve got the cellar. Snakecharmer actual out.”

  As soon as she mutes her mic, she stops. In front of her, a rusty rifle muzzle pokes out of the next doorway. It trembles. With one hand, Sienna grabs it, aiming it down and away. Her other hand sends an EEL around the corner. The written manual for the M588 Electrostatic Enveloping Ligature round, and common sense, both hold that touching something in contact with someone receiving fifty thousand volts is not a good idea. Sienna feels a small shock. The combatant gets a hella bigger one. There’s a thud, followed by a groan. The metal barrel sticks to her palm for a second. Magnetic attraction. She shakes it loose. This is a new talent for her RAPTEK.

  Interesting, not important.

  She shoots a fléchette into the weapon’s ancient breech. It shatters. Holding to cover, she flicks her head. The mechBrain in her visor understands. A holographic scanning mirror appears in the air. It gives her a view around the corner. The hostile is down, and alone.

  A pimply faced male of about sixteen lies on the floor in silent spasms. As soon as the EEL struck, he tried to wipe it off. Both the youth’s hands are enmeshed in a clear epoxy resin. In a few seconds, the electric shocks will stop. If he tries to move, the bio sensor chip will shock him again until he learns or passes out.

  Sienna is impressed by the hands-free utility of the RAPTEK. Normally she’d have to sling her main weapon and be conscious of muzzle direction. Now her hands are two muzzles when she wants them to be. And she has the only one in the world. It is a little heavy, like an extra SAPI plate. But heck, so were the first cell phones. Now they have ones that are injectable.

  Nobu’s calm voice cuts through occasional updates from their pilot. “Wirehead to Snakecharmer actual, we have subject. He has hostage and is cornered on second level. We are holding. Over.”

  Okay. Complications. Sienna bounds up the stairs. Bring ’em!

  ***

  The complication waiting for her on the second floor doesn’t worry her. She is still so much more chafed up at Denbow for damaging their ride. And most of all, for playing fast and loose with the rules of engagement. Her rules.

  Outside of very specific parameters, the use of deadly force is simply murder. There is a line. One thinly engraved on a world which too often mocks the concept of sanity. She needs to locate herself on the side of that line that defines the good guys. The line that separates her from havoc.

  Contrary to what most people think, “havoc” was not shouted at the opening of ancient battles. Hundreds of years before Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar made the term famous, it appeared in The Black Book of the Admiralty and again in Grose’s Military Antiquities:

  Likewise be all manner of beasts, when they be brought into the field and cried Havoke, then every man to take his part.

  Cry Havoc, and let slip…

  Since the dawn of warfare, Havoc has given soldiers of armies license to loot and pillage, permission to rape and kill the helpless.

  Havoc urged soldiers to let loose their inner beasts on the innocent.

  Havoc called during battle without authority was punishable by death.

  Sienna has always had a unique perspective on inner beasts and the sinews of will holding them back. If anything gives her quest and her struggle meaning, it is those rules. They sanctify righteous struggle. To Sienna, they are the consecration of her battlefields. They are hallowed.

  She reaches the top floor under the crooked roof. “What we got?”

  She has a pretty good idea. The schematics of Sidewinder’s hideout are etched in her mind. A small motion dismisses her personal mechBrain’s offer of an interior diagram. Sienna slides along the second-floor wall to where T-Rex, Sarge, and Nobu have their main objective at bay. He’s close, shuffling around the corner. Nearly close enough to touch.

  “One hostile. With one pint-sized hostage,” reports T-Rex. “Can’t try an EEL. Girl’s all, like, pint-sized as sheit.”

  Nobu crouches on the other side of the doorway. He’s using an old-school dental mirror to keep an eye on the scene inside. All ways out are covered. Sidewinder is trapped. Sienna flicks through her team’s POV displays to her sniper’s scope view. Snakelips watches through the window. She has no shot. Sienna takes off her helmet and visor. They need Sidewinder alive. She hopes the price won’t be too high.

  Her belt drops. The webbing holding a sidearm and Jane Bowie falls to the wooden planks. She keeps the RAPTEK. No way is he going to recognize the shoulder-mounted mass driver. There is only one. That’s her play. She exhales.

  Careful to use polite intonations, Sienna speaks standard Dari. “I am not armed.”

  She inches out into plain view.

  “And I would like to speak with you, kind sir.”

  Her words and her gloved, empty hands are not to Sidewinder’s liking. He shows his disapproval by firing wildly. Sienna ducks back to hard cover. The door-frame splinters. Small chunks of plaster and wood fly. Her team reacts to assess the threat and any damage, then instantly revert to normal stance. Though no one normal likes being shot at, it’s nice to see the band is still in tune after a long layoff. Inside the room, glass falls.

  “Wassrongwifyou?” T-Rex hisses around the corner, outraged by the terrorist’s inhospitable act.

  Sienna stands on the balls of her feet. She’s in the best spot to tackle the guy if he makes a break for it. A few tense seconds pass. Sidewinder stays put. She’ll give appeasement another try.

  Before the badly aimed shots were fired, she got a look into the room. The hostage i
s a small girl. Burning in Sienna’s brain is the image of the twin orbs of the kid’s eyes. She has to be only five or six years old. Her violet eyes are underscored by the glinting edge of Sidewinder’s knife under her chin. If Delicia has no incapacitating shot, they can’t risk a frontal breach.

  Scratch that.

  Even if Ortiz had the perfect shot, Sienna would stand her down. Sidewinder is the frayed end of a thread she needs to reel in. Asrah Qazi, the Scythe of Heaven, is on the other end of that thread. She can’t let it break. Not now. Not after all she’s gone through to get here. No one else has to die here. And despite Sidewinder’s best efforts, she’s not gonna let him.

  She tries to smile. Army psychologists say people can hear you smile in the tone of your voice. Whatever. Sienna just needs this jerk to do nothing for a few more seconds.

  “Kind sir, we are not here to kill you.” You lucky mook. “Only talk. There is a way we can both get what we want. There is a bargain here. But if you shoot again, no bargain. We roll in a stun grenade, and if you wake, you will be in chains.”

  Sidewinder fires back, this time verbally. “Don’t speak nonsense, woman,” he yaps in rough street Dari. “It’s the girl you want! She will die in blood and pain. I will roll her head out to you if I do not get what I want.”

  His voice does not have a smile.

  Sienna decides it’s time for her to risk getting shot. Any more chitchat and Sidewinder will think they are delaying and tricking him. Which they are. What did he mean they are after his hostage? They’ve come for him. For one small fact inside his squirrely brain. Sienna knows nothing about a girl.

  She walks straight past Sarge Bryan’s disapproval and around the corner. Into the line of fire. Bed clothing lies in disarray. Money and jewels spill out of motorcycle saddle bags, signs of a hasty escape plan abandoned.

  Sienna takes in the whole scene like a fresh snapshot. A fish tank sits in a corner, shattered. Hit by a ricocheting bullet. No water inside. Only sand. It is the same color as the desert. Multiple dark shapes crawl over the mess. Scorpions.