lock open before Gunny arrived, a hair ahead of Jo. She heard Wink coming up behind her, double-checked with a quick glance. The suit, good as it was, sometimes had trouble on the ID circuit when the bollixers lit—
Then they were inside. Jo killed her bollixers, looked at the heads-up for targets, and saw the muzzle flashes and heard the shots incoming almost instantly.
So much for surprise—
Kay said, “Wait—”
A round blew past Jo, missing by centimeters—
Her suit flashed a red warning sig: AP—!
Shit—!
She spotted a man aiming a J&S Rail Rifle at her and hit him with a triplet from her own carbine, two center of mass, one to the head. He went down—
In the heat of it, with her augs and the suit spewing info at her, Jo knew one thing:
It was a trap!
“Wink!”
“Not her,” his voice came through the com, as if he was offering an opinion on the weather, no excitement at all. “It’s a guy with a gun—hold on—
ow
—mother
fucker
!”
“Disengage!” Jo said. “Out, out, out, right fucking now!”
Kay bounded past, paused a half second to shoot somebody Jo saw peripherally, and was gone. Kay had known a hair before the first round went off—
Jo was followed by the Vastalimi—
Gunny was at the door, firing past Jo at targets behind her—
AP bullets smacked into the thick log walls next to Gunny and punched through thirty centimeters of wood and into the night. Those would hole their suits.
They
knew
we were coming—
“Evasive action, rendezvous point Alpha,” Jo said. “Go!”
The sound of an airborne troop transport rumbled over her. She felt the repeller charge make her hair stand up.
Jo glanced up to see rounds spangle and spark off the transport’s hull, every tenth one a tracer.
Singh, in the bushes—
“
Move
, Singh!”
An antipersonnel rocket lanced down from the carrier at the source of the rifle fire—
“Singh!”
“I’m clear,” he said. “Hold on—”
There was a small
whump!
to her left, and she saw the IR sig of a rifle grenade as Singh fired his launcher. It went off level with, but to the port side of, the transport, and was close enough to cloud the pilot’s armored window with shrapnel.
The carrier sheared off to avoid taking more fire but dropped fast.
Even as she ran, Jo saw the transport land and troops start pouring out.
“We got company, people, get gone!”
She cranked it up, moving much faster than an unaugmented human, the suit notwithstanding.
Fuck—!
Kay would have preferred to stop and use her claws on the human who stepped out to block her intended path; her rage was hot, but the transport had alighted and there were thirty more heavily armed troops on the ground, and she couldn’t afford the time. She shot the carbine, no sights, indexed the angle—
The bullet went through the man’s eye and exited the back of his skull.
Her way was clear. The rendezvous was a kilometer into the forest, off the approach line they had taken coming in. She didn’t wear a suit, but she could sense the others of her team. So far, they were all still alive and moving.
It had been a gull. The kidnapped female had not been in the building. She hadn’t been able to tell for sure until she was inside, and by then, the attack had begun. They were lucky none of them had been killed.
She was going to speak to a certain Rel about this—
Wink ran, feeling as alive as he ever had. A firefight. Unexpected, dangerous, they might still die, but so far, they had survived.
He had a small problem: One of the armor-piercing rounds had skewered his suit. It hadn’t done any real damage—it had hit just under his left arm, halfway down the lat, punched through the muscle, and exited the suit’s back. Kiting gave you good lats. The suit’s rudimentary medcomp stiffened a patch over the wound, a memory-foam pad that applied enough pressure to mostly stop the bleeding. The suit asked him if he wanted a local or a systemic painkiller, and he opted for
Then they were inside. Jo killed her bollixers, looked at the heads-up for targets, and saw the muzzle flashes and heard the shots incoming almost instantly.
So much for surprise—
Kay said, “Wait—”
A round blew past Jo, missing by centimeters—
Her suit flashed a red warning sig: AP—!
Shit—!
She spotted a man aiming a J&S Rail Rifle at her and hit him with a triplet from her own carbine, two center of mass, one to the head. He went down—
In the heat of it, with her augs and the suit spewing info at her, Jo knew one thing:
It was a trap!
“Wink!”
“Not her,” his voice came through the com, as if he was offering an opinion on the weather, no excitement at all. “It’s a guy with a gun—hold on—
ow
—mother
fucker
!”
“Disengage!” Jo said. “Out, out, out, right fucking now!”
Kay bounded past, paused a half second to shoot somebody Jo saw peripherally, and was gone. Kay had known a hair before the first round went off—
Jo was followed by the Vastalimi—
Gunny was at the door, firing past Jo at targets behind her—
AP bullets smacked into the thick log walls next to Gunny and punched through thirty centimeters of wood and into the night. Those would hole their suits.
They
knew
we were coming—
“Evasive action, rendezvous point Alpha,” Jo said. “Go!”
The sound of an airborne troop transport rumbled over her. She felt the repeller charge make her hair stand up.
Jo glanced up to see rounds spangle and spark off the transport’s hull, every tenth one a tracer.
Singh, in the bushes—
“
Move
, Singh!”
An antipersonnel rocket lanced down from the carrier at the source of the rifle fire—
“Singh!”
“I’m clear,” he said. “Hold on—”
There was a small
whump!
to her left, and she saw the IR sig of a rifle grenade as Singh fired his launcher. It went off level with, but to the port side of, the transport, and was close enough to cloud the pilot’s armored window with shrapnel.
The carrier sheared off to avoid taking more fire but dropped fast.
Even as she ran, Jo saw the transport land and troops start pouring out.
“We got company, people, get gone!”
She cranked it up, moving much faster than an unaugmented human, the suit notwithstanding.
Fuck—!
Kay would have preferred to stop and use her claws on the human who stepped out to block her intended path; her rage was hot, but the transport had alighted and there were thirty more heavily armed troops on the ground, and she couldn’t afford the time. She shot the carbine, no sights, indexed the angle—
The bullet went through the man’s eye and exited the back of his skull.
Her way was clear. The rendezvous was a kilometer into the forest, off the approach line they had taken coming in. She didn’t wear a suit, but she could sense the others of her team. So far, they were all still alive and moving.
It had been a gull. The kidnapped female had not been in the building. She hadn’t been able to tell for sure until she was inside, and by then, the attack had begun. They were lucky none of them had been killed.
She was going to speak to a certain Rel about this—
Wink ran, feeling as alive as he ever had. A firefight. Unexpected, dangerous, they might still die, but so far, they had survived.
He had a small problem: One of the armor-piercing rounds had skewered his suit. It hadn’t done any real damage—it had hit just under his left arm, halfway down the lat, punched through the muscle, and exited the suit’s back. Kiting gave you good lats. The suit’s rudimentary medcomp stiffened a patch over the wound, a memory-foam pad that applied enough pressure to mostly stop the bleeding. The suit asked him if he wanted a local or a systemic painkiller, and he opted for
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