by Timothy Zahn
"I am, sir," a young officer said, stepping into view from behind the kneeling medic. "Lieutenant Ramirez, from the Boulder Security office. I'm afraid they got away, Colonel, the assailants and Reger's people both." His lips compressed. "And they seem to have taken General Poirot with them."
"What?" Bailey snapped, ignoring the pain in his head as he forced himself into a sitting position. "Why didn't you stop them?"
"We didn't know until the ground team had penetrated the estate that the general had been taken,"
Ramirez said, his voice under rigid control. "All the spotters could see was that one of the escapees was carrying a bundle over his shoulder wrapped in a blanket."
"Why didn't they come down for a better look?"
"The general had ordered them previously to hold position," Ramirez said. "There was a shouted alert, but no new orders."
"That's because no one was available to give them," Bailey ground out. "Do you at least still have them under surveillance?"
Ramirez's cheek twitched. "Actually—"
"Damn it, all," Bailey snarled. "I want those pilots on report. Every one of them."
"It wasn't their fault," Ramirez said firmly. "The escapees had eight cars, and they set off a smoke bomb before sorting themselves out among the vehicles. They split up just outside Denver, and ... well, there was a certain lack of coordination between the Denver and Boulder offices. By the time we'd sorted it out and had enough spotters in position, we'd lost three of the cars."
Bailey bit back another curse, a chill running through him. It was starting again, just like it had a year ago. Comsquare Lathe and his blackcollars were on the move, and already two jumps ahead of them.
"What about the cars you haven't lost?"
"Their occupants have gone to ground, but we have the various locations under surveillance," the lieutenant said, sounding a little more confident.
"Go in and get them," Bailey ordered. "Paral-darts only. I want them alive and able to talk."
"Yes, sir." The lieutenant pulled a comm from his belt. "This is Lieutenant Ramirez. All Operation Seven surveillance units: move in." He got acknowledgements and returned the comm to its holder.
"Maybe we'll be lucky, sir, and General Poirot will be in one of those groups."
"We're never that lucky," Bailey growled, pushing himself to his feet. "Not with this group. Get away from me," he added tartly, pushing aside the medic's hand as the other tried to take his arm. "All right, here's the plan. Call Athena and have them pull all intel reports on suspected Resistance activity and personnel, including everything we've got on this Phoenix group we keep hearing rumors about. Put surveillance units on everyone whose name shows up in those reports. They're to watch and report, but not to take action without my order."
"Understood, sir," Ramirez said, his comm in hand again. "And then we should get you to a hospital."
"The hell with that," Bailey said, again fending off the medic's proffered hand. His head was starting to throb again, but he was damned if he was going to let that slow him down. Not with General Poirot in enemy hands. "They can fix me up on the ride back to Athena. Get me a car and driver—I want to be there before they start bringing in the prisoners."
"Yes, sir," Ramirez said.
"And after you get those surveillance units in place," Bailey added as he started toward the door, "get someone looking for everything we might have heard about something called Whiplash."
CHAPTER 4
"There—take the next left," Lathe said, pointing toward a rambling building off on the left side of the road, the only one in the area with its lights still on and cars parked in its lot. A faded sign over the door identified it as Hernando's Hideyhole. "I wonder if they're still serving."
"Definitely a proud member of the cheap dive association," Caine commented, eyeing the place dubiously as he turned their borrowed car toward it. "We weren't supposed to stop until we got to the Guardrail Tavern, though."
"It's called getting the lay of the land," Lathe assured him. "There's no way I would just drop in on someone like Shaw without testing the local water first. Mordecai, you're on backup."
"Right," Mordecai said. "You can drop me anywhere, Caine."
Caine pulled the car closer to the side of the road and slowed down. It was still rolling when Mordecai popped his door and hopped out, hitting the pavement in an easy jog and heading for the row of buildings down the street from their target tavern. "We going with the arms-smuggler routine again?"
Caine asked as he pulled back to the middle of his lane.
"Might as well," Lathe said. "It's a convenient way to stir people up." He paused, and Caine could feel the comsquare's eyes on him. "You ready?"
Caine took a deep breath. "Let's do it."
Inside, the Hideyhole looked even less promising than it had from the outside. It was about a quarter full, with a clientele that ranged from the scruffy to the downright frightening. The conversational buzz faltered as Lathe, Caine, and Spadafora headed toward a four-person table near a partition leading into a currently unlit back room, and out of the corner of his eye Caine could see the occupants giving them a suspicious once-over. Across at the bar, a big man who looked nearly as disrespectable as the worst of the clientele murmured something to the bartender, then angled over toward their chosen table.
He reached it just as they were seating themselves. "Evening," he grunted. "Morning, rather. What'll you have?"
"Three glasses of your best beer," Lathe told him. "You still serving anything besides alcohol?"
"We got a few things on the menu," the man said. "Anything special you're looking for?"
"Depends," Lathe said, looking around the room. "What does everyone else around here like?"
"Whatever's hot at the moment," the waiter said, a subtle new edge to his voice. "You buying just for the three of you?"
"Actually, we're more on the selling end," Lathe said. "Party favors for the more sophisticated sort."
The other frowned. "Party favors?"
"Noisemakers," Lathe said. "Small fireworks. That sort of thing."
The nearest tables had gone quiet, their occupants listening to the conversation. "Don't have much cause to celebrate around here," the waiter said. "With that new base the snorks just put in across town, it's going to be even bets as to whether it'll be Security or a Chryselli raiding party who nails us first."
"And it's a wise man who'll be prepared for either," Lathe said. "Like they say, the one who dies with the most toys wins."
"But he still dies," the waiter countered. "We're lying low, friend. If you want to do elsewise, you're welcome to do it elsewhere."
"Understood," Lathe said calmly. "We'll have our drinks, and be on our way."
For a moment the waiter seemed to measure him. Then, with a curt nod, he turned and headed back toward the bar. "Off to call Security, you think?" Caine asked quietly.
"Actually, I don't think he is," Lathe said, his eyes following the waiter's progress. "We may be in the one criminal hangout in the entire TDE where the patrons really are just going to leave us alone."
"In that case—" Caine broke off as his tingler began tapping code into his skin: two cars approaching; eight armored men.
"Or maybe not," Lathe amended, his battle-hood and gloves already in hand. He lifted his other hand toward the bartender and the waiter, conversing again at the bar. "Excuse me, gentlemen," he called.
"You have a back door out of here?"
The two men looked at Lathe, their eyes widening momentarily as they saw the distinctive blackcollar gear. "Yeah, there's a door through the back room there," the waiter said, pointing toward the darkened room.
"Thanks," Lathe said as he pulled out his slingshot and unfolded the wrist brace. "You might want to move everyone over to the walls. Spadafora?"
"Ready," Spadafora said as he pulled a handful of bright yellow pellets from his ammo pouch. He tossed two to Lathe and set one of the others into his slingshot's pouch. "Double volley, then I
handle the rest?"
Lathe nodded. "Caine, go check out our back door."
"Right," Caine said, standing up as he finished pulling on his gloves. He headed toward the archway into the back room, noting that the bar's patrons were making a hasty but orderly retreat away from the center of the upcoming action.
He'd just reached the partition when the front door was flung open and two armored and helmeted figures walked purposefully into the bar. Behind their faceplates Caine could see their eyes darting back and forth, their paral-dart pistols swinging warningly around the room.
They'd made it three steps inside when Lathe and Spadafora lifted their slingshots and sent a pair of yellow pellets squarely into the intruders' faceplates.
No nonexplosive projectile could penetrate that plastic, Caine knew, certainly nothing propelled by human muscle. But unlike the blackcollars' regular slingshot rounds, these pellets weren't designed for destruction. Instead, they burst on impact, splattering the faceplates with a thick, instant-setting paint.
Whatever curses the Security men might have uttered were lost in the double shot they sent blindly in the direction the pellets had come from, one of the paral-dart clusters scattering off the top of Caine's battle-hood as he ducked into a low crouch. Lathe and Spadafora were already out of the line of fire, Spadafora moving to the right with another paint pellet in hand, Lathe moving left and forward and stowing his slingshot in favor of his nunchaku. Caine caught a glimpse of two more Security men crowding in behind their comrades as Lathe swung the flail into one of the blinded men's helmets, sending him staggering, and Spadafora threaded a shot neatly between the two front men into the faceplate of one of the newcomers.
Caine didn't wait to see any more. He slipped around the partition into the back room, his own nunchaku cocked and ready under his arm. The room's chairs were stacked neatly on top of the tables in preparation for cleaning, and the only light showing was a single panel glowing softly in the ceiling.
Senses alert, he made his way between the tables to the rear exit. For a moment he paused there, listening, then eased the door open.
It opened into a deserted alley. Carefully, he leaned out and looked out.
And staggered back into the edge of the door as a cluster of paral-darts slammed into his face, most of them ricocheting from his goggles and hood but a few sinking into the exposed skin of his cheek.
He dropped his nunchaku as his face went instantly numb, his hand grabbing for the tingler on his wrist.
But the drug in his bloodstream was too fast. Even as his fingers dug under the sleeve, both arms went dead. Half a second later his legs folded under him and he sprawled helplessly in the doorway, lying halfway out into the alley.
He'd landed with his face turned uselessly toward the bar's outside wall, but he could hear the running feet coming toward him. The footsteps came to a halt, and he was pulled the rest of the way through the door and turned onto his back. A half dozen hard faces were looking down at him, and out of the corner of his eye he saw a couple pairs of hands unfastening his coat and throwing it open. Other hands attacked the civilian clothing beneath the coat, unfastening it as well and deftly maneuvering the shirt and slacks off his paralyzed limbs and tossing the clothing to someone outside his field of view. They took his nunchaku and slingshot from their respective sheaths, removed the knives from his forearm and calf sheaths and the shuriken from their thigh and belt pouches, and took his tingler from his wrist. Then, clad only in his flexarmor and the undersuit beneath it, he was lifted and hurried down the alley in the direction from which the ambushers had come. There was the muffled sound of a vehicle door opening, and he was shoved unceremoniously into the back of some kind of van.
Waiting for him there was Prefect Jamus Galway.
"Caine," Galway said gravely as the door closed again behind him and the vehicle lurched forward. The prefect's face was strangely somber as he gazed down at his trophy, with no hint of triumph or even satisfaction that Caine could see. "My apologies for all this. If it makes it any easier, let me assure you that we have no intention of killing or even hurting Lathe and the others. They're far too valuable to us as they are."
Too valuable. To us. With his face still paralyzed, Caine couldn't reply. It was, he reflected, probably just as well.
* * *
The first Security man staggered and collapsed, the impact of Lathe's nunchaku penetrating his helmet to stun the skull and brain underneath. The comsquare brushed against the second blinded man as he fell, who responded by spinning that direction and firing another blast of paral-darts. Lathe ducked beneath the shot and swung his nunchaku into the back of other's leg, toppling him on top of his friend.
Two more men were charging in behind them. One had already been blinded, and as Lathe swung his nunchaku around in a half circle and cocked it again beneath his arm Spadafora sent a fourth paint pellet past his head to splatter over the other's faceplate. Lathe made a crouching leap over the tangled bodies of the first two attackers and slashed his nunchaku across the third Security man's gun arm, sending his weapon spinning off across the nearby tables, then slammed a kick to his stomach that folded him up and dropped him to the floor.
The fourth Security man was firing off random rounds, clearly in hopes of hitting something, when Lathe's nunchaku slammed across his yellow-coated faceplate with a force that flipped him halfway over before he hit the floor.
Two more Security men were charging through the door, this pair already firing before they'd even made it inside. Lathe spun around to put his back to them, letting the salvos scatter off his flexarmor as he snatched out a pair of shuriken. His spin brought him back around to face them, and he hurled the stars hard into their kneepads.
Their guns wobbled off target as they fought for balance. Ducking beneath the weapons, Lathe took one of them down with his nunchaku and the other with a sweep and a heel-kick as he hit the floor.
He had just delivered a knockout blow with his nunchaku to the last man when his tingler came to life: outside clear. "Let's go," he called back to Spadafora. "Caine?"
There was no answer. "Caine!" Lathe called again, digging for his own tingler. Caine?
Outside, the reply came. Coming around to front.
Acknowledged, Lathe sent as he got to his feet and looked around. Aside from the downed Security men, everyone else in the bar seemed to have been untouched by the brief battle. "Sorry about the trouble," he said, nodding to the bartender and waiter.
There were two unmarked Security cars parked by the front of the building. Spadafora headed directly to the closest and pulled open the door, leaning halfway inside as he studied the interior. Mordecai was standing between the two cars, a shuriken ready in each hand, his head moving back and forth as he watched for trouble. Two more armored men lay sprawled unconscious at his feet. "Where's Caine?"
Lathe asked him.
"Here," the younger man called as he came jogging into sight around the side of the building. "Sorry—I thought we were going out the back."
"Change of plans," Lathe said. "Spadafora?"
"Looks clear," the other called, still leaning into the car. "Not picking up any tracers, and I don't see any booby traps."
"Good enough," Lathe said. "Everyone in."
He got into the front passenger seat, the other two blackcollars climbing into the back, as Caine slid in behind the wheel and started the car. "Where to?" he asked as he pulled out onto the road again.
"Guardrail Tavern," Lathe told him. "Now we can go meet Tactor Shaw."
* * *
Tactor Kieran Shaw, chief of the Khala blackcollars, wasn't at all what Judas had expected.
Lathe and Spadafora certainly weren't huge men, but they were at least a bit bigger than average, with a calm but almost tangible presence that made them seem even larger. Mordecai, the smallest member of the Plinry contingent, was noticeably shorter than the other two, but he had even more of a sense of coiled-spring danger about him than the others. Eve
n Caine, paralyzed on his back in an alley, had nevertheless managed somehow to maintain a sense of dignity during the brief time Judas had seen him back there behind the bar.
Shaw, completely bald and shorter even than Mordecai, seemed neither dangerous, charismatic, nor dignified. Considering this was a man who'd achieved the second-highest rank in the blackcollar hierarchy, it was a severe disappointment. "You certainly took your time getting here," he said almost peevishly as they were escorted into a windowless room in the electronics manufacturing plant where the Khala blackcollars had apparently set up shop. "You get lost? Or couldn't you wait until you got here to find yourself a drink?"
"We stopped by a bar on the west side to try to get the lay of the land," Lathe said. His voice was civil enough, but Judas could see in his face that he wasn't overly impressed by the man, either. "Trolling for Resistance or criminal elements is part of the standard procedure."
"For the record," Spadafora put in helpfully, "we never actually drank anything."
"For the record," Shaw said, his voice going a little fussier, "stirring up Security is always a bad idea.
Especially when there's no reason for it. Considering the present situation, it was an extremely bad idea."
"Our presence here alone would have stirred them up," Lathe pointed out. "I doubt the incident at the bar changed things one way or the other."
"I'm glad you're so confident about that," Shaw said stiffly. "Which then leads us to point number two.
Namely, what the hell are you doing here in the first place?"
"You told General Lepkowski—"
"I told Lepkowski about the Khorstron Tactical Center so that he could pass on the information to the Chryselli," Shaw cut him off. "I never intended for him to blab about it all over the TDE. I especially never intended for him to invite a bunch of wild cards to drop in and get in the way."
"I apologize for the misunderstanding," Lathe said, his voice starting to take on a little acid of its own.
"The fact remains that we're here, and we're going to take the tac center. You can either help us or stay out of our way."
