Trevor grabbed one of the mugs off the table, threw it away from himself, against the wall that was directly opposite Mingo.
Who, along with his crew, promptly blasted away at the sound. Mingo’s response was short-lived, however: “Shit! I’m out.” His silhouette jabbed a finger frantically at his gun’s magazine release. Trevor moved toward him, pressed against the same wall, keeping his weight on the sides of his feet.
Mingo had a new magazine out, snapped it up into his weapon—
As he did, Trevor shoved his body against Mingo’s flank, rotating him slightly out from the wall as the thug finished reloading. In the same instant, Trevor reached over the kidnapper’s left shoulder with his left hand and grasped the right side of his jaw, just as Trevor’s right hand locked in a secure grip on the left rear side of the thug’s neck. Trevor uncrossed his arms in a sharp X motion: his left hand yanked Mingo’s head swiftly to the left; the right kept the neck from rotating with that sudden turn. There was a sharp snap, like a piece of well-dried kindling broken over a knee, and Mingo went limp, a shout dying out of him as a breathy gasp.
Trevor snagged the MP-5 in mid-fall as he dropped to one knee, made sure the slide was back, and snapped the selector switch to semiautomatic.
“Mingo—Mingo, man—”
Trevor aimed for the center of Peak’s mass and squeezed twice in rapid succession. Peak screamed, went backward, firing wildly, still screaming without words. Mel froze in place—thank you, stupid—and, taking about half a second to aim, Trevor centered two rounds into him, as well. Staying low, Trevor crossed the room, knowing what he would have to do when he got there.
Peak was still screaming, heard someone approaching. “Help me, man—oh, oh, shit—fuck, help—”
Trevor crouched so he was very close and fired a single round into the center of Peak’s bucking forehead. He snatched up the thug’s pistol—another ten-millimeter Sig Sauer caseless—and headed back to the airlock’s inner door, which he opened wide before returning to the center of the room. He snatched up his life-support unit, reached in through the jagged hole where its base plate used to be, and burned his hands as he yanked out the empty smoke canister that had been installed in place of the second air tank. He reached in again, pulled out a black disk the size of a hockey puck, flipped back a cover, pressed the single concealed button, and placed it in the center of the floor, looking away as he did. There was a flash that he could see quite clearly in his peripheral pickups: the thermite filament fuse had lit—and would burn for about three minutes. He pulled a small packet out of the ruined base of the LSU before strapping the unit back on.
Then over to the table as he pocketed the small packet, found his helmet, latched it on and toggled the communicator as he started moving in the direction of the storm room. “Crossbow, this is Quarrel. Crossbow, this is Quarrel.”
“Quarrel, this is Crossbow. Go.”
“I am in. Beacon is set. Have you acquired lock?”
“Negative, Quarrel. I’ll have to come closer to see the heat from the fuse. Not getting the UV phased-spectrum signal from your beacon at all.”
“Roger. Any sign of laser targeting beams?”
“Negative. Looks clear. No sign of fixed defenses or heavy weapons.”
“Take no chances. Use the antilaser aerosols as you approach.”
“Pretty marginal effect, Quarrel. Wind is over forty klicks, here. And rising.”
Trevor had spun open the storm-room hatch. “Use the aerosols anyway. Out.”
“Out.”
He swung the hatch inward—and found the hostage, taped to a chair in the center of the room. The duct tape was so thick on her that she seemed half-mummified.
He slung the machine pistol, stuck the barrel of Peak’s weapon through a utility ring on his belt, grabbed her chair by the backrest, dragged it out of the door’s sightline, speaking as he went: “We’re getting out. No time to talk. Answer my questions—and only that.” She nodded as he pulled the razor off the sole of his boot, and started sawing at the tape binding her legs.
“Nod for yes. There were eight of them, all told?”
Nod. He moved on to her arms and hands.
“See anything bigger than a machine gun?”
She shook her head.
“You know how to use a rescue ball, right?”
A pause. Then a tentative nod.
Great. That pause meant she didn’t really know. He began to slice at the wraps that bound her midriff to the chair. There were a lot of those. And there was some distant, tentative shouting: the rest of the rogues’ gallery was on the way, no doubt.