Reborn, page 21
But this was a Technology Research Command base, hidden on the Colorado plains. Supposedly filled with people in Joie’s league. Or at least Carter and Romana’s.
Ernesta was of the opinion that nobody was in Joie’s league. She was not alone in that belief, either.
Through half-filled racks of wooden and steel boxes and containers, Joie led them past the big freight elevators to a back corner that was invisible from pretty much all sides. They paused there, out of sight on the end of a row with a big, red exit sign over the nearby door.
“Back staircase, if I had to guess,” Joie said in a quiet voice. “Carter, were these places pretty standard in design?”
“Utterly, Joie,” the man replied. “Once you got your blueprints approved by everyone, nobody wanted to go back and ask for any sort of variance. Careers got ended by the bureaucrats over that shit.”
Ernesta nodded. That sounded like most governments.
“Okay, once we go into those stairs, we’re committed, and have no idea where we might find him, or how quickly we’ll run into someone who recognizes one of us. Romana, you stay at the back and try to use the others as cover as much as you can, since you’ll be the one they probably know. At this point, I’ve been gone so long that I’m probably forgotten. If they do know who I am, the second arm throws them off, or they assume that Bouchard brought me back and they weren’t important enough to be told.”
“Would he be at the bottom of the shaft?” Ernesta asked her, having seen how the place was laid out. “Or near the top, to make sure he’s within the field?”
Everyone turned to Joie. She turned to Romana.
“It it a cloak or a sphere when projected?” Joie asked.
“Little of both,” Romana hedged. “Possibly, you could find a way through the entire planet from the back, but that would be so fuzzy as to never work. I like Ernesta’s idea that he’s as deep as they have quarters, which might be the old base itself, back when this thing had missiles. I’m guessing refurbs meant that they added all the new quarters to the first few floors down, since this place isn’t normally a target anymore.”
Ernesta nodded with the others. It made sense.
Now, they just had to sneak through an entire enemy base filled with soldiers at a much higher level of competence and alertness than her old Federales back home, and kidnap the guy in charge, and drag him out to where Yormevs could grab him.
That, and survive.
CHAPTER 56
Joie led.
Her team. Her mission. Her responsibility. Cōng Mǎ would stand out, but nobody here should know who she was, so they wouldn’t automatically assume a problem. More like one of them who had been teaching. Or something.
You were trained not to ask questions in this business. If you needed to know, someone would be instructed to tell you. Otherwise, you kept your yap shut and your head down.
She went down the stairs like she belonged, rather than taking them three or five at a time in a rapid assault.
Speed was not of the essence. Stealth was.
Surprise.
She did, however, get two stories down quickly, just in case. There were five underground here, so three more.
Any mistake she made would be bad, so she kept going down. Back stairs, mostly an emergency exit and access in the old days for mechanics that needed to service missiles and hardware.
Hopefully unused.
Except that she heard steps coming up towards them. One set. Heavy tread. Nailing every single step with a rhythm instead of taking them two at a time or moving relaxed.
Joie moved to the inside of the stairs and looked down. Saw a shadow coming up from five. One person only.
She had to gamble.
She moved to the outside and gestured everyone else against the wall before moving down again. When whoever it was came into sight, she could pounce on them at speeds they might not imagine possible.
Hopefully, quietly.
The man coming up met them at the next landing. Total surprise when he saw her boots, then glanced up at her standing there. Shocked eyes. Earbuds blasting some sugary pop number totally at odds with the man’s hardass killer look.
He stumbled to a halt. Joie shook her head at the man and scowled.
Looked like someone running up and down these stairs for exercise.
He nodded, glanced at the others, and put his head down.
Bang. Bang. Bang. Up the stairs and turn. Up the next.
Joie moved a little faster going down now. The man might have been a good enough actor to get clear and sound an alarm, but she doubted it. Health nut. Except around here, probably just a paratrooper, defined usually as a guy who runs twenty kilometers, then smokes a cigarette so you don’t think he’s a sissy or something.
They got to the bottom quickly enough. Joie motioned the others to remain here at the bottom and opened the door as quietly as possible.
Machine shop or something. Maybe that was a spare rocket engine. Or something. Hard to tell and she’d never been a motor pool gearhead.
Still, nobody in sight.
Joie motioned the others to join her, then moved off to a spot back in a nearby corner. Possibly the southwest corner of the base itself, from the way the walls squared off.
“Now what?” Ernesta whispered.
“Now we start hunting,” Joie replied. “Everyone spread out a little, but stay close enough to come in if we find someone. Remember, whoever it is needs to be taken down quickly and quietly. Otherwise, we raise alarms and have to fight our way out. I doubt we can bluff it at that point.”
She turned to the true outsider here. Considered all those late nights in the dojo. All the mean things Cōng Mǎ had taught her about the ways to trick Humans.
“I want you on point, Sifu,” Joie said. “Your costume and haircut will confuse them, as you no doubt expected.”
The woman just grinned. Nobody around here had a shaggy mop like hers save Carter. Joie’s was long and braided, like Ernesta’s. Sometimes, you did that in this game.
“Did you remember to bring a couple of glass bottles filled with tea?” Cōng Mǎ asked.
It took Joie a moment, then she chuckled. Throw a bottle at them like a knife, aiming for the upper chest or face. If it hits, it probably knocks them down.
Then shatters and they are laying in sharp shards as they try to roll over and stand back up.
Beyond rude, which was exactly the thing here, because it wasn’t immediately lethal, either.
“I did not, Sifu,” Joie bowed her head in mock-penance. “I did one better.”
“Oh?”
“I brought my friends.”
CHAPTER 57
Stone had considered just going back up to the cab of the truck once Team One was out of sight. Waiting until the corporal at the gate managed to find someone to send over a forklift to pull stolen MREs out of the back.
But that would be out of character.
No trucker wants to sit and wait on a dead-head. Even when the truck would mostly drive itself. Civilians got paid by the kilometer, not the hour, so they always wanted to be in motion. A soldier would rather get back to his own rack than trust that the ijits around here had washed the bedding since the last time someone had been forced to use it.
So he stood for a time. Waited until the clock in his head went off, then stomped over to the office and threw the door open.
Good, three in here, and none of them ranked him.
“Where’s my forklift operator?” he snarled at a pitch just below an angry yell.
Grumpy sergeant who has had enough of your shit. Not that he had any experience at that sort of thing. Heavens no.
The two privates turned to the corporal. She got flustered.
“Sergeant?” she asked blankly.
Stone turned to point behind him, using the shoulder that hadn’t been rebuilt when he’d had to stop being a paratrooper.
“My truck has a load for you yahoos,” he said sternly. “Four pallets. I want somebody to drive their stupid little toy over there and offload it, so I can get home in time for dinner. Simple?”
His scowl must have been working overtime, from the way all three of them blanched.
“Right away, Sergeant,” the woman said, reaching for a phone.
Stone nodded and slammed the door angrily behind him as he walked back out to stand next to the open trailer, nodding at Freya’s reflection watching him in the side mirror.
Gotta be normal. That means grumpy about all this. Emergency run for you fuckups and I want to get home, thank you very much.
He crossed his arms and practiced scowling at the entire warehouse. A skill you should not get out of practice using.
A few minutes passed, but not long. Somebody had gotten a fire lit under his ass, because the forklift came barreling around the corner like a cowboy chasing a calf. Squealed to a halt, but Stone just gestured the private who was driving it right into the trailer. Everything had been loosened by Joie’s folks before they left.
Forks lined up, lifted, and the woman driving backed it out.
“Where does it go?” she asked.
Stone considered lines of fire and pointed to a nearby spot that would give him cover if all hell broke loose shortly and somebody started shooting at him. The woman deposited it and went back for more.
She knew her shit, too, because Stone was reasonably confident he couldn’t have gotten all four out that quickly. Still, gruffness was called for.
“Good,” he yelled as she set the last one down, like teeth across the way.
Or battlements.
Stone closed the back up without looking over his shoulder and locked it, listening to the forklift drive away, mission complete.
Both missions. He’d created confusion. And left somebody a mess to clean up later.
Stone walked around to the front and climbed up in the cab.
Freya was keeping a low profile, but nodded as he closed things up and engaged the drives.
“Now what?” she asked.
“Seen anything we need to blow up?” Stone asked.
That had been her mission, scouting the surface for radio installations that might be helpfully destroyed to open the skies to friendlies. He’d just been driving.
“Got a few interesting targets,” Freya said. “Drive forward about one hundred meters and pull over like you need to read the map and I’ll point them out.”
He nodded and lurched the beast into motion.
Out into the sunlight again. Almost mathematically level terrain around here, but it was all artificial anyway. Dig a great, big, freaking hole in the ground then pour concrete in and build something.
Until some yahoos with fusion weapons come along to blow it all to hell.
Stone had left his window open, so he heard the alarm sirens start up behind him.
Everybody had just run out of time.
CHAPTER 58
Cōng Mǎ moved with deliberation, though in perfect silence. Training going back to that one place where you had to walk on tissue paper and not leave a tear or make a sound.
When you got good enough, they dampened things first.
Black-on-black cotton fabric. Simple. Flowing. Cuffs and braids in white, as was somewhat traditional, depending on who you asked. Large, heavyset woman walking along the interior of a secret Army base.
As was natural.
She led.
Out of the machine shop. Or whatever it had been. Tools and stuffff strewn about as though forgotten.
Cōng Mǎ came to a locked door. Locked from this side. She listened briefly, then unlocked it and cracked it just enough to peek out into a receding hallway, matching doors down both sides.
Missile silos mostly on her left as she crossed the southern face. That suggested bunks on the right, and perhaps offices on the inner portion of her left.
She stood upright, tossed her hair once for effect, and stepped into the hallway.
“Eight paces,” she instructed Joie, knowing how quickly she and her friends could move these days when pressed.
Right down the center of the hallway, rather than skulking, though she did pause to look for traps.
In Africa, one tribe of ancients had hunted elephants by digging pits in the center of a trail and covering them with leaves. Nobody else was so arrogant as to stomp proudly in the middle of things, and thus avoided falling to their deaths.
She took the lesson to heart, but the floor appeared stable. Still, elephant hunters.
The rooms on both sides were numbered, but the little slot where you could insert a nametag or something had been left empty. Probably empty and unused, if she was lucky, though that punk Bouchard and his minions might not have been able to bring such things with them.
Carter had the rear position, so she would have to rely on him to keep someone from opening a door behind them and exiting a room.
Her position was to lead.
Ah, that looked promising.
Cōng Mǎ came to a corner and peeked, just because. Door athwart the next hallway, rather than on the side. Operations Center in painted letters, faded and chipped by time.
She motioned Joie close and pointed. Joie nodded.
“At a minimum, I would expect alarms,” Cōng Mǎ said. “Personal or electronic remain to be seen, but I cannot imagine electronic unless that door is locked and we have to force it. Carter can look at that point.”
Joie nodded and watched.
Cōng Mǎ stepped around the corner and approached the door. No camera on this side where someone might unlock it from the interior. No visible alarms. No keyfob sensor, though there was a slot for a metal key in the handle itself.
She rested her hand on the cold brass and gripped it firmly. Turned slowly and carefully enough to assure herself that it was unlocked.
She turned back to Joie to nod.
Once she opened it, a timer would start. She might have minutes. Cōng Mǎ suspected that she would have seconds.
Best make them count.
She turned the knob the rest of the way and leaned into the door.
CHAPTER 59
Valmy had been reading. A chunk of old Russian literature that someone had left behind at some point. Even the book was thirty years old, but that didn’t mean anything. Dostoevsky was timeless, for good or ill.
The Ops Center had been left mostly intact. He was just down here so as to stay out of mind of the troops on higher levels, while he waited for a few Senators and Representatives to work out some details among themselves.
Like who would get the first shot at immortality.
Valmy hadn’t wanted to play his trump card for another decade, but he was confident his freedom of action was likely measured in days at this point. He would need the rest of the US government riding in if other aliens had decided to get involved.
It had taken them long enough to notice.
Vanlaere was watching something on a tablet with earbuds in, passing time same as he was. Konicek had run upstairs for something. Probably checking with the messhall to see what lunch would be and how easily it could be delivered to the basement.
None of them wanted to emerge into the sunlight right now. Chile had left them all a little off-balance.
There had been an alien starship available for the stealing for nearly fifty years, and nobody had noticed. Valmy kept wondering what he could have done with such a thing.
Would other aliens have welcomed him, or would he have been an even bigger outlaw once Algom’s people realized what had happened?
Water under the bridge.
A door opened in his peripheral vision and Valmy looked up.
Konicek. Smiling, even, when the man was usually more dour and subdued.
“Good news, General,” he said as he closed the door behind him and came to rest.
Vanlaere paused her vid and looked up as well.
“Command sent a truck with an additional four pallets of food and such for the base,” Koniceck said. “Not that chow hall had been worried, but they’ve got more options.”
“Why would they do that?” Valmy asked, confused.
Konicek paused.
“Somebody told them we were here and needing to be fed?” he asked, voice slowing with each syllable.
“Nobody knows where we are, below the rank of Lieutenant General,” Valmy intoned.
He put his book down and rose from his chair. Considered his options.
This had to be a failure of operational security somewhere. But what?
Movement on his left caught his eye. Valmy turned, but didn’t recognize the woman standing in the doorway to the barracks where he and the others slept. Where nobody should be. And he knew every face in this base.
The stranger started to charge, but Vanlaere exploded into action, intercepting her. Valmy saw others behind her.
The base had been penetrated. How was that possible? The alien generators were supposed to keep everyone at bay.
Somebody had outsmarted them.
Then Valmy recognized the second person entering the room.
Daring.
How the fuck did she keep doing this?
He leapt sideways and found the alarm switch, lifting the cover and snapping the rocker. Around him, sirens began to wail.
Then Joie Daring was on him.
CHAPTER 60
Cōng Mǎ had an instant to take it all in and formulate a plan of action.
She was back in the Philippines, in that one shack on a nameless beach. Enter the room and take one second to place everything. Then be blindfolded and walk through a small maze to retrieve a single bottle of beer on a small table, without brushing anything or stepping on anything sharp or noisy.
The good old days.
Bouchard was obvious from the man’s air of command. Chelsea and Garrison had been with Joie’s Hanoi team, and Cōng Mǎ had gotten good descriptions of both.
All three had been augmented by magical technology until they were supposedly better life forms. Comparable to Joie and her team physically.
