altitude. The guards ambled back and forth, one to the north, the other to the south, staying close to the building. Neither moved like a man expecting trouble.
“Let’s hear it,” Jo said.
Her suit’s com clicked.
“Ah got two guards with slung eight-millimeter Centuros crushing crickets. Nothin’ else.”
“Ditto. My suit’s heads-up says the yard is clear except for those two,” Wink said.
Singh said, “I confirm that.”
“Kay?”
There was a short pause, a couple of seconds. “Something is not right,” she said.
Jo extended her senses to the limits of her augmentation, seeking a sight or sound or smell or something on the electromagnetic spectrum that offered any danger.
Nothing.
“Got a specific, Kay?”
“No.”
“Stand by.”
Between the suit’s sensors and her implants, Jo was about as sharp as a human could get. She made it eight warm bodies inside the lodge, and the placement of those, when she called up the simview, had one of them in a small, windowless utility room, with another in the hallway outside that room’s door. The rest were in various places fanned away from those two.
It seemed pretty obvious to Jo what the situation was: Indira was locked in the utility room, a guard posted on the door. The rest only mattered if they got in the way.
The plan was flexible, but simple: They would go in via the least congested entrance. She and Gunny and Kay would take out the opposition while Wink fetched the girl. Singh would stay outside and cover their backs. Assuming the girl was fit or could be made so, Wink would bring her out, and they’d haul ass. Once they were back in the woods, they’d call Gramps and arrange the pickup point. With luck running their way, they’d be back at the Rajah’s by dawn.
But Jo had learned that Kay was sometimes moresensitive than the suit and her augs put together, so she hesitated. Did another scan and still came up dry.
She had to make a choice.
“We’re a go,” Jo said. “But stay edgy. Gunny?”
“Lined up.”
“On my ‘now.’”
Jo glanced at her carbine, to make sure the selector was on silent. The suppressed mode was pretty quiet, but it did cut down on the velocity of the bullet. The computer sights supposedly took that into account, but it was 150 meters to her target, and she needed a cold-bore head shot, so she liked to calculate that kind of trajectory herself to be sure it matched.
She lined the virtual scope up on the guard to the north side of the lodge. The scope’s optics were good enough to let her see in darkness, which was where she wanted to take the shot, but the transition from light to shadow was tricky. The scope’s adjustment for that took a quarter second, and she needed to allow for that, plus the timing with Gunny.
Range: 148 meters. Wind velocity: two klicks per hour from the south-southwest. Suppressed velocity: 812 meters per second. Local gravity, Coriolis effect, humidity…
The guard was about to walk past the corner of the building, and there was a post that partially blocked the outside spotlight, just there. Her aug gave her the count and she spoke it aloud: “In three…two…one—now.”
Jo pressed the trigger.
The scope gave her the image of the guard’s head jerking and spraying fluid as he collapsed, dead before he hit the lawn.
“Down,” she and Gunny said simultaneously.
“Crank up your bollixers. Southwest entrance, go!”
Jo came up and ran. Their suit’s bollixers put out pulses that should confuse, for a short while, all but the best military-grade motion detectors, heat-sig sensors, and pradar pulses. Not for long, but enough so somebody sitting on a scope would frown and wonder what she was seeing,which should be enough time to get inside. After that, it didn’t matter, the party would be on.
Jo came up and sprinted, carbine held ready to fire if necessary, but there weren’t any targets popping up.
Kay reached the door first, and had the old-style mechanical
“Let’s hear it,” Jo said.
Her suit’s com clicked.
“Ah got two guards with slung eight-millimeter Centuros crushing crickets. Nothin’ else.”
“Ditto. My suit’s heads-up says the yard is clear except for those two,” Wink said.
Singh said, “I confirm that.”
“Kay?”
There was a short pause, a couple of seconds. “Something is not right,” she said.
Jo extended her senses to the limits of her augmentation, seeking a sight or sound or smell or something on the electromagnetic spectrum that offered any danger.
Nothing.
“Got a specific, Kay?”
“No.”
“Stand by.”
Between the suit’s sensors and her implants, Jo was about as sharp as a human could get. She made it eight warm bodies inside the lodge, and the placement of those, when she called up the simview, had one of them in a small, windowless utility room, with another in the hallway outside that room’s door. The rest were in various places fanned away from those two.
It seemed pretty obvious to Jo what the situation was: Indira was locked in the utility room, a guard posted on the door. The rest only mattered if they got in the way.
The plan was flexible, but simple: They would go in via the least congested entrance. She and Gunny and Kay would take out the opposition while Wink fetched the girl. Singh would stay outside and cover their backs. Assuming the girl was fit or could be made so, Wink would bring her out, and they’d haul ass. Once they were back in the woods, they’d call Gramps and arrange the pickup point. With luck running their way, they’d be back at the Rajah’s by dawn.
But Jo had learned that Kay was sometimes moresensitive than the suit and her augs put together, so she hesitated. Did another scan and still came up dry.
She had to make a choice.
“We’re a go,” Jo said. “But stay edgy. Gunny?”
“Lined up.”
“On my ‘now.’”
Jo glanced at her carbine, to make sure the selector was on silent. The suppressed mode was pretty quiet, but it did cut down on the velocity of the bullet. The computer sights supposedly took that into account, but it was 150 meters to her target, and she needed a cold-bore head shot, so she liked to calculate that kind of trajectory herself to be sure it matched.
She lined the virtual scope up on the guard to the north side of the lodge. The scope’s optics were good enough to let her see in darkness, which was where she wanted to take the shot, but the transition from light to shadow was tricky. The scope’s adjustment for that took a quarter second, and she needed to allow for that, plus the timing with Gunny.
Range: 148 meters. Wind velocity: two klicks per hour from the south-southwest. Suppressed velocity: 812 meters per second. Local gravity, Coriolis effect, humidity…
The guard was about to walk past the corner of the building, and there was a post that partially blocked the outside spotlight, just there. Her aug gave her the count and she spoke it aloud: “In three…two…one—now.”
Jo pressed the trigger.
The scope gave her the image of the guard’s head jerking and spraying fluid as he collapsed, dead before he hit the lawn.
“Down,” she and Gunny said simultaneously.
“Crank up your bollixers. Southwest entrance, go!”
Jo came up and ran. Their suit’s bollixers put out pulses that should confuse, for a short while, all but the best military-grade motion detectors, heat-sig sensors, and pradar pulses. Not for long, but enough so somebody sitting on a scope would frown and wonder what she was seeing,which should be enough time to get inside. After that, it didn’t matter, the party would be on.
Jo came up and sprinted, carbine held ready to fire if necessary, but there weren’t any targets popping up.
Kay reached the door first, and had the old-style mechanical
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