Vengeance

by Brian Falkner

  “If they can,” Chisnall said. “But any which way the free territories go boom-boom, bye-bye.”

  “Grenade!” Brogan shouted. “Everybody down!”

  Chisnall hit the floor, lying in a black pool of old oil as a sharp crack lit up the darkness around them.

  “Wall, frags!” Brogan called. She stood, taking cover behind a pillar. Wall took a pair of grenades from his belt and tossed them to her.

  “Frag out!” Brogan shouted. She pulled the pins and hurled them, one after the other, at the entrance. The firing from that direction stopped as the roar of the grenades echoed through the parking garage.

  “Can you stop the raid?” Chisnall asked.

  “We could try,” Price said, “but I doubt they’d listen. The ACOG bigwigs think this will end the war.”

  “End the war, or end the world?” Chisnall asked. “They don’t know about the positronium bombs.”

  “The what?” Barnard asked.

  Chisnall did not reply. He was silent, thinking.

  “They’re pulling back,” Wall said.

  “Boo-yah,” Monster shouted.

  “It ain’t a good thing,” Brogan said. “They’ll be back.”

  “Gotta move, Ryan,” Price said. “Whatever you think, we’re going to get slaughtered if we stay here.”

  “Okay. I have an idea,” Chisnall said. “It’s pretty wild and we’re going to have to have real big cojones to pull it off.”

  “Big cojones we got,” Price said. “But they’re no use to us if we’re dead.”

  “We gotta go!” Wall shouted.

  More gunfire now, a rolling wave of it as Bzadian soldiers advanced into the underground garage. Price tossed Chisnall a side-arm and he took position behind a pillar, firing quick shots at dark figures silhouetted in the light from the entrance.

  The walls seemed alive with bullets and ricochets. Concrete spat and shattered, more lights went out in a shatter of glass.

  Amid it all a quiet voice came from behind them.

  “Is this a private party or am I invited?”

  “Tsar!” Barnard was the first to react.

  Chisnall looked around at the truck to see The Tsar lying just inside the doorway.

  “Hey, Ryan,” The Tsar said.

  “Good to see you, Tsar,” Chisnall said.

  “So you want to get out of here?” The Tsar asked.

  “Just a bit,” Price said.

  “And if I don’t get to a hospital soon, I’m gonna be toast, right?” The Tsar said.

  “Tsar, you’re gonna be fine,” Price said.

  “One day I’ll teach you how to lie convincingly,” The Tsar said.

  “Tsar …” Barnard began.

  “Frankly, I don’t want to die, not yet,” he said. “But the only way I’m going to get to a hospital is if the Pukes capture me. So let them.”

  “What are you talking about?” Barnard asked.

  “I can’t walk,” The Tsar said. “But I can still drive.”

  SEVEN KINDS OF CRAZY

  [0940 HOURS LOCAL TIME]

  [BZADIAN CONGRESS, CANBERRA]

  “I told you I wanted them all alive,” Goezlin said.

  “Pull the soldiers back,” Nokz’z said to Dequorz. “Get me Captain Jazki of the Nzgali.”

  The Republican Guards were regarded as the elite of the Bzadian army, tasked with defending cities and major installations. But the Nzgali were the elite of the Republican Guard. The Nzgali were specialists: troubleshooters, sharpshooters. The team that was called in when things went wrong. Their equipment, skills, dedication and training were legendary. Their uniforms: jet black.

  Ten minutes later, Nokz’z watched the large screens that lined the wall of the mobile command centre as two Nzgali assault teams converged on the entrance of the parking garage in armoured cars. The images were coming from the surveillance rotorcraft, hovering overhead.

  The Angels would not stand a chance.

  The armoured cars manoeuvred around a battle tank that Nokz’z had ordered into position on the road directly outside the garage, in case the infiltrators tried to make a run for it.

  “Alive,” Goezlin said, unnecessarily, Nokz’z thought. He had already made his point a number of times.

  The armoured cars accelerated into the driveway, one on each side, the entry and the exit lanes.

  The rear lights of the vehicles had just disappeared when there was the sharp crack of an explosion, followed by another. A swirl of dust and smoke filled the entrance. Through it, with the roar of a powerful engine, came the large yellow nose of a fire truck.

  “They were waiting for you,” Goezlin said.

  The fire truck bounced up the sloping driveway, swerving around the battle tank, and hurtled off down the road towards the security perimeter.

  The gun turret of the tank swivelled after them as the fire truck gained speed.

  “Do not fire,” Nokz’z shouted. “We will stop them at the gates.”

  The road ahead was well blocked by heavy concrete crash barriers.

  The two armoured cars reappeared at the garage entrance, bursting out of the dark underground cavern after the fire truck. They were both just metres from the entrance when the garage exploded.

  A great ball of fire and smoke snorted out of the twin openings, like the nostrils of a dragon. The force of it lifted the armoured cars by the back axles, flipping them over on their sides. Even the mighty battle tank rocked on its suspension.

  “I want that truck stopped, and the occupants captured alive!” Nokz’z roared, aware that he was losing his calm, but unable to help himself. Too much was riding on this.

  The fire truck turned along the inner road, avoiding the perimeter with its concrete and wire defences. It raced around a corner, veering across the lawns, dry and hard from a lack of rain, over onto the forecourt of the building.

  Now Nokz’z realised what they were doing. Leaving the roads, sticking to the grassy fields, racing down the grassy mall that led to Old Parliament House, now a Bzadian museum. There were fences erected across those lawns, but only light ones, no crash barriers. No tanks.

  “They’re making for the museum,” he said, his voice under better control. “Bring up tanks and cut them off at the museum entrance.”

  They tried. They failed. They were simply too slow.

  The fire truck hit the fence at speed, splitting it in two, hurling broken bits of wire and metal into the air.

  It reached the museum road well before any tanks were close, racing around it, through it, screaming back onto the main road that led across the lake.

  There was an explosion just to the left of the truck, rocking it. It went up onto two wheels but it somehow regained its balance and settled.

  “Who fired that?” Goezlin shouted.

  “Find out,” Nokz’z ordered.

  They watched through the eyes of the rotorcraft overhead as the yellow vehicle bounced over a curb and crossed an intersection on the wrong side of the road to avoid a hastily erected roadblock. It stayed on that side, narrowly avoiding oncoming traffic.

  More explosions now, left and right of the fire truck, showering it with debris as it hurtled into the built-up streets of the city.

  “The rockets are coming from one of our gunships, sir,” Dequorz said.

  “Tell them to stop,” Nokz’z said.

  “The Angels must know we are tracking them,” Goezlin said. “What kind of game are they playing? What do they hope to achieve?”

  The answer to that question became clear as the fire truck spun around corners on the north side of the lake, edging closer to a large complex to the east of the circular park that marked the very heart of the city.

  On the screen Nokz’z could see the lights of security cars converging on the truck and on the mall. They blocked the street.

  With no other option, the truck hurtled around into a wide driveway to the mall.

  The truck disappeared into the car park entrance.

&nb
sp; “Seal off the building. Seal off the area!” Nokz’z said. “I am on my way.”

  “Stay frosty, check your corners,” Price called as the team moved down a featureless corridor, somewhere in the depths of the Congress building. They had blown a hole in the back wall simultaneously with the explosion that had destroyed the main entrance. The maintenance corridor had taken them deep into the building. The Tsar had bought them some time, escaping alone in the fire truck, but as soon as the Bzadians caught him they would realise the trick.

  “Clear,” Barnard said, on point, risking a quick glance into a side corridor ahead of them. She checked it again, then motioned the team forwards with a hand signal.

  “Move, move, move!” Price said.

  They reached a cross corridor. In the middle of the intersection was a rest area. Twin sofas facing each other. Brown leather, creased and cracked by years of use.

  “Okay, hold here for a moment,” Price said. “Barnard, where the hell are we?”

  Chisnall sank into one of the sofas. It was not like him, Price thought. The constant pain was making him weak.

  The rest of the team automatically spread out into a defensive pattern, covering all four directions.

  “Mainly offices on this level,” Barnard said, studying the schematics of the building on her wrist computer. “The medical centre is one floor down, south corner.”

  “Do we have time for this?” Wall asked.

  “The skipper’s not much use with a broken arm,” Price said.

  “I’m not the skipper, you are,” Chisnall said faintly.

  “We can talk about that later,” Price said.

  “Nothing to talk about,” Chisnall said.

  “Anyway the Pukes don’t know where we are yet,” Price said.

  “Won’t take them long to figure it out,” Brogan said.

  “We’re going to the medical centre,” Price said. “Tactical column. Monster, you’re on point.”

  They ignored the elevators, preferring the stairs, and found the centre exactly where Barnard had said it would be. It was deserted.

  “All right, Brogan,” Price said. “Time to earn your keep.”

  “Again?” Brogan asked.

  “You going to help or not?” Price asked.

  Brogan moved across to Chisnall and examined his arm.

  “Lie down, Lieutenant,” she said, indicating a treatment bed attached to one wall.

  “We can’t stay here,” Wall said, again raising his concerns.

  “It’s a big building and they don’t yet know where we are,” Price said. “Will this take long?”

  “It’s a quick process,” Brogan said. “But he can’t move until it’s finished.”

  “Okay,” Price said. “Get on with it. The rest of you out in the corridor; set up a defensive perimeter.”

  “Ouch,” Chisnall said, as Brogan eased his arms apart and positioned the broken one on an adjustable rest.

  “Grit your teeth,” she said. “This ain’t gonna take you to your happy place.”

  “Give him some painkillers,” Monster said.

  “No,” Chisnall said. “There’s no time.”

  Brogan took firm hold of Chisnall’s arm and squeezed, manipulating the bone inside. Price didn’t need an X-ray to know that she was re-aligning the broken ends of the ulna.

  Chisnall’s face went white and his forehead glistened with a sheen of sweat, but he made no sound.

  Brogan nodded to herself, then restrained Chisnall’s arm using small metal straps attached to the armrest. She checked the position of the broken bones once more after she had finished, extracting a wide-eyed silent scream from Chisnall.

  “Sorry, skipper,” Brogan said.

  “I keep telling you guys, I’m not the skipper,” Chisnall said. His voice was feeble.

  “Okay, let’s talk about that,” Price said. Anything to distract him from the pain. “You’re the senior officer here. This is your team. I’m just the caretaker. Besides,” she smiled, “you’re Lieutenant Lucky, and I think we could use some luck today.”

  Brogan moved a portable machine over to the treatment bed and positioned it above Chisnall’s arm, using a video X-ray screen on the back to align two sets of crosshairs over the break in his bone.

  Chisnall winced as the machine above his arm began to whirr, knitting the bones back together.

  “Lucky.” Chisnall did not smile back. “You know why they call me lucky?”

  “No, why?” Wall asked.

  “Because people around me get very unlucky and that makes me look lucky by comparison.”

  Price could see the pain in his eyes and she knew exactly what was on his mind.

  “Brogan, is there anything else you need to do?” she asked.

  Brogan shook her head.

  “Then join the others,” Price said. “I’ll keep an eye on Chisnall.”

  “Call me when it finishes,” Brogan said on her way out of the room.

  Price found a chair and sat by the bed.

  “Ryan, you’ve got us out of all kinds of scrapes,” she said. “You’re the luckiest guy I know.”

  “Tell that to Hunter, or the Demons. Or the soldiers on Task Force Magnum,” Chisnall said.

  “You think you’re the only one carrying that weight?” she asked. “Do you want me to tell you about Emile, or Nukilik, or Wilton? The Tsar was nearly killed this morning. So was Monster in the Bering Strait. I don’t know whether I’m being too reckless or too cautious. I’m not a leader like you.”

  “You really think it was any different for me?” Chisnall asked. “I went through the same agony with every decision I made. But think about this. You’re here. Apart from one injury, your team is okay. You don’t have to be perfect, you just have to be good enough. You are good enough. If you weren’t, your team wouldn’t be here right now.”

  “I don’t think I’m cut out for it,” Price said.

  “Price, I’ve been watching you,” Chisnall said. “You’re doing a great job as leader. I’d be happy to be on your team.”

  “Ryan …” Price began, embarrassed.

  “It’s been asked, and answered,” Chisnall said.

  “Thanks, Ryan,” she said. “That means a lot.”

  “So what are your orders, LT?” Chisnall asked.

  “You’re the one with the plan,” Price said.

  “Okay,” Chisnall said. “But you’re going to think it’s seven kinds of crazy.”

  “Tell me,” Price said.

  “We kidnap Azoh.”

  NZGALI

  [0950 HOURS LOCAL TIME]

  [SHOPPING MALL, CANBERRA]

  The scene commander was a young Nzgali captain. She was examining the interior of the fire truck when Nokz’z arrived. She stepped down and visibly paled when she saw who was with him.

  “Colonel Nokz’z,” she said. “Commandant Goezlin.”

  “This is Captain Jazki,” Nokz’z said. “One of my most competent officers.”

  Jazki waved away the compliment with a brief touch of one hand to her face.

  The yellow truck, battered and blackened and peppered with shrapnel, had crashed into a pillar just by the large glass doors to the mall. The nose of the truck was crumpled like tissue paper and all the windows were shattered.

  A body lay on the ground beside the truck, surrounded by soldiers.

  “Your report, Captain,” Nokz’z said.

  “When we arrived we found the scene much as you see it,” Jazki said. “The occupants had escaped, except for one who we found unconscious on the floor in the back of the truck.”

  “Alive?” Nokz’z asked.

  Jazki nodded. “Badly injured though.”

  “From the crash or the rocket attacks?” Nokz’z asked.

  “Neither,” Jazki said. “The dressings aren’t ours. Looks like he was wounded earlier and they patched him up as best as they could. He should be in hospital.”

  Nokz’z leaned over the injured Angel, examining the face. “
It is the one they call The Tsar,” he said.

  “They left him behind?” Goezlin asked.

  “They had no choice,” Nokz’z said. “They could never have escaped dragging him along with them.”

  “If you want my opinion,” Jazki said. “They left him behind deliberately. They knew we’d get him to a hospital. He wouldn’t last much longer without proper medical treatment.”

  “I want to talk to him,” Goezlin said.

  “He is not conscious,” Jazki said.

  Goezlin stared at her.

  “I’ll see what we can do,” Jazki said.

  “That really is crazy,” Barnard said.

  “Have you got a better idea?” Chisnall asked. Price had called the team back to hear Chisnall’s plan.

  “No,” Barnard admitted. “But that doesn’t make it any less crazy.”

  Brogan was examining the screen on the machine that was mending Chisnall’s arm.

  “Can it go any faster, Brogan?” Chisnall said. “We gotta get moving.”

  “We’re not going anywhere till Humpty’s together again,” Brogan said.

  “Tell us about these positronium bombs,” Barnard said.

  “According to my source, Fezerkers have hidden these bombs in all major cities, including Washington,” Chisnall said.

  “A decapitation strike,” Barnard said.

  “A what?” Wall asked.

  “Decapitation,” Barnard said. “Cut off the head. Then the orders to fire our nukes would never be given.”

  “Wouldn’t the sub-commanders fire them anyway?” Price asked.

  “They can’t,” Barnard said. “All our nukes are strictly controlled, to stop a rogue commander from starting a nuclear war. They can only be launched with codes supplied by the Pentagon.”

  “So what is a positronium bomb?” Price asked.

  “I don’t really know,” Chisnall said. “Any idea, Barnard?”

  “Maybe,” Barnard said. “I know about positronium.”

  “Tell us. But try to use little words,” Price said.

  “When antimatter and matter collide, it releases tremendous amounts of energy,” Barnard said. “But you can stop them colliding, temporarily, by getting the particles to orbit each other. That creates a mass called positronium. But there’re two problems. Firstly, it’s not stable. We’ve never been able to make it last for more than a few billionths of a second.”