Hammer of Angels: A Novel of Shadowstorm by G. T. Almasi Page B

chest and knocks him backward onto me. Target Three aims at me, but my Madrenaline gives me time to switch to plan B. I press my feet against a desk and spring out from under Target One. My body cannons into Target Three’s knees and wipes him out. I roll into the hallway, aim my pistol back into the office, and hammer a half dozen shots into Target Three’s stunned body. The bullets bowl him across the floor and into Target One.
    â€œNice call-out, Darwin, thanks.” My thumb ejects Li’l Bertha’s nearly depleted ammo pack. I pocket the empty, slap in a full pack, and rejoin Brando at the rear stairway. He and I begin to move upstairs, but before we get there, we hear a loud
whump!
from outside. The stairs tremble under our feet and streams of plaster dust tumble from the ceiling.
    â€œRaj, you all right out there?” My partner uses our team channel so I can hear it too.
    The big man comms back, “All clear, Darwin. The guards out front heard all the screaming and tried to bug out. I took them out, but now everybody in Yorkshire knows something is going on. Hurry up.”
    â€œRoger that. The first and second floors are clear. We’re moving up to floor three.” We resume our climb, and then Brando comms again: “Actually, scratch that, Raj. Since you’ve engaged anyway, we’ll move straight to the fifth floor. Brace for our competition on the third and fourth floors to get flushed to your position out front. We’ll mine the back stairs.”
    Raj replies, “Roger that, Darwin.” Raj and I are both Level 9, but he graduated from Camp first and therefore has more seniority than me. This is
my
mission, though, so Raj is expected to accept reasonable direction.
    Brando comms just to me, “Raj is right. We need to get out of here soon. You go to the top floor, and I’ll set our mines on the back stairs here.”
    â€œWhat about the one we used out front?”
    He’s already bounding down the stairs. “I’ll go retrieve it and reset it.”
    Crap.
It feels wrong to split up like this, plus I don’t like my Info Operator getting so involved with the combat aspects of our mission. I curse under my breath, turn, and bound up the stairs.
    Our presence has clearly been noted. My infrared vision shows me the fifth-floor hall is full of tensely postured men with pistols drawn, edging toward the front and back stairways. I hear them mumble into the little commphones plugged into their ears. The Germans invented commphones almost thirty years ago, so they’ve had time to develop a lot of different models. Most police forces use the earplug model, like these clowns are using. Military personnel, like ExOps’s Squaddies, use a helmet-mounted system that’s essentially a ruggedized version of what telephone operators wear. High-end field agents, like all us Levels and Info Operators, get the super-deluxe model wired right into our brains so we don’t even have to speak to use them.
    I stop a few steps from the top and press myself against a wall. I wait for the closest toughie to come around the corner, then I surge upstairs and karate-chop his gun out of his hand. I whack Li’l Bertha against his temple, then grab his throat with my right hand and spin him around so we both face the same direction. Li’l Bertha jabs into his back. Herr Toughie a lot taller than me, so I have to stand on tiptoe to see over his shoulder, but he provides solid cover.
    I propel my strangling shield into the hall and yell, “Hey! Assholes!” There are eleven schmoes in here, all of whom spin around and point their pistols at me.
    Herr Toughie croaks, “
Nein! Nicht scheissen!
”
Don’t shoot!
The other bruisers hesitate and take cover behind filing cabinets and in doorways. Gunfire chatters from downstairs, punctuated by several larger booms that shake the floor like Magic Fingers. More plaster dust falls from the ceiling,