Outlanders 23 Far Empire, page 4
As he reduced his ship's speed to 100 mph, Grant's ears started buzzing. He recognized the sound as the radar lock-on warning, piped from the forward sensor array into his helmet.
"Hear that?" Kane asked.
"Very clearly," Grant answered gruffly. He punched a series of numbers into flight control computer, trying to achieve a fix on the radar emitters. "Uh-oh," Kane commented mildly.
"What?" demanded Grant.
"We should've known they'd beef up the perimeter defenses after the last time we were here."
A red square of light suddenly appeared on Grant's HUD, superimposed over a small, grid-enclosed area of the terrain. Simultaneously, the warning chime sounded. Then another red glowing square appeared and the chime bonged again.
From the lake bed, two cylindrical ten-foot-tall towers arose, sand and pebbles cascading down from their domed tops. The towers rotated, the laser targeters mounted on top of them popping on, following the Mantas' flight path. Protruding from four oblong slits on each side of the towers were multiple blaster barrels.
Grant stared at the image of the Vulcan-Phalanx gun housings on his helmet display. The rotating, multibarreled weapons fired uranium-tipped explosive shells at 6600 rounds per minute. The Vulcan-Phalanx system was a standard defense of the network of villes stretching across the length and breadth of the cranny. The housings were automated, containing tracking and firing control radars. He and Kane had seen similarly camouflaged emplacements before. Flickering spear points of flame erupted from the slits of the housings. Kane's Manta lurched to port as a shell exploded in a flaring shower of metal and flame against the tip of its starboard wing. The fragments rattled noisily against the fuselage of Grant's own ship.
"Climb!" Kane shouted.
Applying full throttle, Grant pulled the TAV into a steep climb, the Manta rising no swiftly and sharply that it appeared to be standing on its tail. The maneuver created a force equivalent to three times that of gravity, but the pilot seats instantly compensated for the increased pressure.
At the apex of the ascent, with the airspeed decreased to thirty knots, Grant pushed the stick forward and nosed the Manta into a steep dive. The cockpit resonated with the high-pitched whine of the stressed ramjets and the slipstream of air sliding around the hull.
He dropped the TAV rapidly to an altitude of barely fifty feet, while increasing its airspeed to a 120 mph. Absently he saw Kane expertly duplicating the maneuver. Both men leveled off their crafts, and the Mantas hurtled forward, skimming the rocky ground, leaving streams of grit swirling in their wake.
The thudding hammer of the Vulcan-Phalanx guns continued, and Grant knew the few seconds' respite from the radar could be counted on the fingers of one hand. The tracking controls would reestablish their lock at any second. His fingers hovered over the nose- mounted cannon trigger, and his HUD automatically adjusted the CGI crosshairs, superimposing them over the image of the gun turret. The warheads of the cannon shells contained incendiary properties and the immediate result of an impact was a flash fire. If the projectiles struck a flammable target such as a fuel tank or ammunition, it would cause them to instantly explode.
Grant achieved target acquisition and squeezed the trigger. A stream of armor-piercing steel and tungsten carbide shells punched a cross-stitch pattern in the dirt in front of the housing. The lines of impact scampered across the lake bed, flinging divots and tongues of flame in all directions. They intersected with the base of the tower, penetrated the metal and the explosive warheads detonated.
The Vulcan-Phalanx gun tower was swallowed by a billowing, red-orange fireball. The staccato hammering of the gun ceased abruptly as the circuitry within the turret was smashed, scorched and melted. "You want to take the other one?" Grant asked casually, "or should I give you the Birds?"
"All things being equal," retorted Kane, "I'll give the Birds my undivided attention."
ALTHOUGH HE WAS sorely tempted, Kane didn't fly toward the gargantuan hangar or the scattering of ruins. He knew ninety-nine percent of the Area 51 installation lay deep beneath Groom Lake, shielded by hundreds affect of steel-reinforced bedrock. The base extended even into the foothills of the mountain range, so there was little point in staging an attack against the surface structures. They were exactly what they looked like—ruins dating back to the nukecaust. He jockeyed his TAV toward the swiftly approaching Deathbirds, pulled the Manta into a climb and performed a swift loop that sent the little space plane-arrowing toward choppers from behind. The Bird on his right veered around in a fast curve, a Shrike missile flaring from its port-side stub wing. It streaked beneath the Manta and impacted against the lake bed amid a spray of gravel, sand and a yellow-orange fireball.
Kane pulled back on the joystick controls again and went up over the Deathbirds, banked in the opposite direction, then dived again.
Opening full throttle, he sent the Manta skating beneath the helicopters and turned sharply into a barrel roll. Through the canopy Kane saw the horizon wheeling crazily. When it straightened out, he brought the closer of the choppers into target acquisition and squeezed the cannon's trigger.
He glimpsed a ragged series of holes appearing in the black hull of the Bird, then a shaved sliver of a second later, he was all but blinded by a hell-hued blossom of light as the Deathbird's fuel tank ruptured, ignited and exploded. Flying pieces of machinery rang reverberating chimes on the Manta's hull. Fragments of the main rotor blade, pinwheeling at incredible velocities, smashed into the TAV's frontal armor and bounced away.
Cursing, Kane pushed the control stick forward and put the craft into a sharp dive, then he pulled up equally sharply. A missile smoked from the surviving Deathbird's launcher, arcing well below him. The Deathbird climbed in wind-screaming pursuit, little spear points of orange flame flickering from the chain gun. Kane winced at the series of ear-knocking clangs as .50-caliber rounds struck the Manta's hull. Kane didn't know if the TAV's armor would withstand a prolonged pounding of .50-caliber blockbusters, but he was certain a high-ex missile scoring a direct hit would certainly disable the ship. Most of the Shrikes carried incend and high-ex warheads, so a solid strike had the capacity of piercing armor plate to a depth of twelve inches.
Kane pulled back on the stick, dropping both the Manta's speed and altitude. The Deathbird overshot him, roaring directly overhead. It fought to turn to face him, performing a straining, clumsy pirouette, until the tinted Plexiglas port faced the Manta. Missiles burst from both the Bird's wings, streaking and flaming all around. For a moment, all Kane could see were yellow-red tongues of fire and spark-shot vapor trails. He banked sharply ninety degrees to starboard. A hail of steel-jacketed hornets stung and splattered against the wings of the TAV, as the Deathbird unleashed its full arsenal of machine-gun fire and missiles. Craters of varied size and shape burst open in the lake bed.
Kane pulled back on the control stick, and the acceleration of the vertical thrust slammed down on him, pushing him hard against the back of his chair. The HUD's speed gauge icon scrolled with numbers. He disengaged the throttle until the Manta lost speed. Then he ruddered the craft around sharply, shoving the joystick forward. Kane dropped the ship in a sharp dive and came rushing up on the Deathbird from below and behind. The sensor scope targeted the chopper and he launched two missiles.
The missiles flamed from their pod sheaths on the TAV's wings. He felt the craft shudder slightly with the explosive release of the projectiles. The missiles inscribed fiery trails toward the Deathbird. The chopper banked around, and the flare of return fire spit from its missile launchers. Kane sent the Manta straight up, engines at full thrust and over on its back in a half roll. The rockets sketched a wavering track well below him.
The Sidewinders impacted against the Deathbird and detonated in eruptions of fiery smoke. Shards of metal spun out in flashing, flaming sprays. The Bird's control cables were sheared away, locking out the horizontal and vertical stabilizers. An oil line burst amid a squirting of black fluid, and the engine stopped.
Kane caught a fragmented glimpse of an orange mushroom of fire ballooning outward from the Deathbird's fuselage. The black chopper slid sideways in the air at a swiftly decreasing angle and plowed into the ground. The whirling blades struck the hard- packed earth and shattered into gleaming shards. The entire body of the aircraft exploded a moment later, a sheet of flame interwoven with boiling coils of red and orange, leaping in all directions like the blossoming petals of a huge flower. A funnel of gray smoke billowed skyward. Flickering sparks corkscrewed into the air, like a swarm of fireflies just released from a jar.
Kane saw another flower of flame blooming in the lake bed, and through the canopy he saw the second gun housing engulfed in a lapping cocoon of fire. Grant's Manta soared over it.
"Took you long enough to attend to that damn thing," Kane grunted.
"I held back in case you needed help with the Birds."
"Thanks," Kane retorted sarcastically. "You want my help with the Cat?"
"Sure," Grant said breezily. "Why the hell not?" The Sandcat had begun chugging at top speed away from the blockhouses, cutting a straight swath across the basin toward the distant collection of ruined buildings.
The snout of the MG in the turret swiveled and spit flame toward them. Kane swerved as a few stray bullets sparked off the Manta's hull. "You know," he remarked, "I think we've made our point. We could just let them go."
There was a moment of silence as though Grant were pondering the merits of the suggestion. Then he said, "Nah."
He dived in toward the fleeing vehicle, a missile bursting from his TAV's wings. The Sidewinder vectored in and exploded in a flaring fireball on the Sandcat's rear armor, spreading a blanket of flame up over the ob ports and the gun turret. The warhead punched a deep cavity into the back of the Cat. The concussion shook the vehicle violently, and fragments of metal spun away from the chassis.
The left-side treads sheared away from the rollers, the entire track thrashing in a long flapping strip, crashing against the hull. Sparks showered and metal screamed as the tread slashed deep scars into the armor. The vehicle rocked to a shuddering, clanking halt. Smoke boiled from the gun ports and the seams, but the doors weren't flung open. Circling the disabled vehicle, Kane assumed the Mags inside the Sandcat had either been incinerated or suffocated. Neither possibility made him feel happy.
"I'm taking out the gun emplacements next," Grant said as calmly as if he were announcing his intent to take off his shoes.
"All by yourself?"
"All by myself."
"For all we know," Kane said, "there may be Mags in them."
"True enough."
Grant's Manta came screaming around in a fast, flat crescent. He expended two missiles apiece on the blockhouses, and all four struck dead on target. The cupolas vanished in eruptions of billowing orange-yellow flame. The quadruple detonations hurled chunks of concrete upward like a reversed hailstorm. A Magistrate lunged away from the right-hand blockhouse, sprinting madly toward the burning Sandcat. Grant triggered the nose cannon, the jackhammering roar sounding like stuttering thunderclaps. The short burst of tungsten-carbide shells spun the Mag in a spray of blood, flinders of black polycarbonate armor flying away from his body. Fountains of dust exploded all around him as he hurtled backward, his chest seeming to burst open in tatters. "And that," announced Grant with a great deal of satisfaction, "is pretty much that."
"You know," Kane commented offhandedly, "I can remember a time when you went out of your way not to kill Mags."
"That was before." Grant's voice held an ominous note, silently warning Kane not to pursue the subject. Kane ignored the warning. "Before what?" "Before they attacked New Edo."
Even though Grant couldn't see him, Kane nodded in understanding. A Magistrate is virtuous in performance of his duty. The panegyric phrase drifted through his mind. The duties and obligations that came with the badge and blaster were drilled into him—all Magistrates, for that matter—from the day he first entered the academy. The oath was a part of a Mag's every action and reaction—a justification and a reason to live at once, a moral sword and a shield for the work he performed in service to maintain order, in service to the baron. And as Kane and Grant learned, in service to a lie, a conspiracy to manipulate that was hatched hundreds of years before any of them were born.
Kane banked his Manta, looking toward the line of buildings and ruins. His HUD registered no signatures of any sort, no motion, mass or thermal. "It doesn't seem like they're scrambling another interception committee."
"Under the circumstances," Grant inquired, "would you?"
Assuming the question was rhetorical, Kane didn't bother with an answer beyond a mirthless chuckle The security forces of Dreamland were more than equipped to contend with interlopers of the kind who had arrived by truck, but he was certain none of the planners had anticipated an assault from above—particularly not of the kind of craft he and Grant piloted. He wondered briefly if the irony was lost on the people who occupied the vast installation.
Two hundred years before, the Dreamland complex was where America's most advanced weaponry and aircraft were developed. Most of America's top-secret aircraft were rolled from the hidden hangars of the Area 51 complex.
"What do you want to do about the slaggers?" Grant asked.
Kane made a slow, low pass, glancing down at the wag below him—and the people huddling around and beneath it. He counted at least eleven people in the bed of the truck, several of them children.
"Not all of them are slaggers," he said. "Let's set down and put on our act for the ones who are."
Chapter 4
Engaging the vectored-thrust ramjets, Kane and Grant dropped their Mantas straight down and gracefully brought them to rest on the extended tripod landing gear. Fine clouds of dust puffed up all around. The two men opened the seals of their helmets and unlatched the cockpit canopies. Sliding them back, they climbed out of the TAVs and shoulder to shoulder they marched toward the wag. Kane arranged his expression into a grim, foreboding scowl, knowing the image he and Grant presented was likely to be far more frightening than that of the Magistrates. A very tall, very broad-shouldered man, Grant's heavy brows were drawn, shadowing his dark eyes. A fierce, down-sweeping mustache showed jet black against his coffee-brown skin. Gray showed at the temples of his short hair, as if sprinkled there by a diffident hand. His heavy-jawed face was set in a threatening scowl.
At an inch over six feet, Kane was not as tall or as broad as Grant, but every line of his supple, compact body was hard and stripped of excess flesh. He looked like a warrior; from the hawk-like set of his head on his corded neck, to the square shoulders and the lean hips and long legs. Kane was built with the savage economy of a gray wolf, with most of his muscle mass in his upper body.
His high-planed face held a grim expression, as did his narrowed, gray-blue eyes. A faint scar showed like a white thread against the sun-bronzed skin of his left cheek.
As different as Grant and Kane were physically, they were clad identically. From throat to fingertip to heel they wore one-piece black leathery garments that fit as tightly as doeskin gloves.
Kane had christened the garments shadow suits, and though they didn't appear as if they could offer protection from a mosquito bite, he had learned they were impervious to most wavelengths of radiation. The suits were climate-controlled for environments up to highs of 150 degrees and as cold as minus ten degrees Fahrenheit. Microfilaments controlled the internal temperature.
The manufacturing technique known in predark days as electro-spin lacing electrically charged the polymer particles, weaving a dense web of form fitting fibers. Composed of a complex weave of spider silk, Monocrys and Spectra fabrics, the garments were essentially a single-crystal metallic microfiber with a very dense molecular structure. The outer Monocrys sheathing went opaque when exposed to radiation, and the Kevlar and Spectra layers provided protection against blunt trauma. The fibers were embedded with enzymes and other catalysts that broke down all toxic and infectious agents on contact. The spider silk allowed flexibility, but it traded protection from firearms for freedom of movement.
Grant still preferred the polycarbonate Magistrate body armor to the shadow suits, but he had stopped arguing about it. Ever since they absconded with the suits from Sindri's stronghold on Thunder Isle, the garments had proved their worth and their superiority to the Mag armor, if for nothing else than their internal subsystems.
Built around nanotechnologies, the micro-electro-mechanical systems combined computers with tiny semiconductor chips. The nanotechnology reduced the size of the electronic components to one-millionth of a meter, roughly ten times the size of an atom. The inner layer was lined by carbon nanotubes only a nanometer wide, rolled-up sheets of graphite with a tensile strength greater than steel. The suits stern almost impossible to tear, but a heavy-enough bullet could penetrate them, and unlike the Mag exoskeletons, wouldn't redistribute the kinetic shock.
Although they rarely wore the armor any longer, they still carried their Sin Eaters, snapped to holsters on their right arms. Sensitive actuators attached to the weapons popped the Sin Eaters down into their waiting hands when they flexed their wrist tendons in the right sequence, putting the pistols there in an eye blink. There was no trigger guard, and when the firing stud came in contact with their crooked trigger fingers, the pistols fired immediately.
They unleathered their weapons, keeping their index fingers straight. The Sin Eaters slapped solidly into their palms as they approached the wag, walking on either side of the dragon's-teeth obstacles. Kane looked at the truck with an appraising, critical eye. Despite the dented, rusted-out bodywork, it appeared to be in reasonably good condition, at least compared to some of the other wired-together rattletraps he had seen elsewhere in the Outlands.
