For a long time after the Gurlanin left, Besany couldn’t bear to sit down on the sofa or even use the refresher, because she no longer had any idea what was real and what was illusion. She paced around, horribly awake with no prospect of getting to sleep tonight, and wondered what she could safely do and say even within her own home. But she had her secure comlink, and she needed to trust something right then.
She keyed in Ordo’s code and tried not to think of the Gurlanin who could metamorphose into him so fast, so easily, and so convincingly.
Outskirts of Eyat, Gaftikar, 478 days after Geonosis
A cluster of blue-lit T-shapes wobbled toward him in the darkness, and Darman checked the chron in his HUD.
“Lights out, vode,” Niner said, and the blue lights vanished. Omega Squad were now invisible to infrared and EM scans, and very nearly invisible to the naked eye as well, although it was still easier to see them than detect them with sensors. “Torrents approaching from the south, time on tar-get eight standard minutes.”
“I’m shifting the remote,” said Atin. “There’s activity on the eastern side of city, vehicles moving. Has Leveler got any high-altitude scans online yet?”
Darman’s HUD display was a mass of image icons: the views from the remote they’d sent up earlier to observe the positioning of mobile anti-air cannon, the point-of-view screens from each of his brothers-Fi’s was shaking slightly in a definite rhythm, showing he was back in his private world of deafeningly loud glimmik music-and a composite feed from Leveler, currently displaying a Torrent pilot’s view of a low-level approach over the unspoiled countryside.
Darman never liked having time to think too much, especially now. He kept seeing the restaurant and the mini mall in the unirail station. A’den told him he was overidentifying as part of adjusting to the presence of the civilian world, seeing what he could have been in that world, and that it’d settle back down to worrying about his own shebs very, very fast. He hoped so.
Niner opened the link to Leveler. “Leveler, this is Omega, do you have any real-time imaging you can show us yet?”
“Omega, we do, and we’re trying to identify the civil defense headquarters and the comm station.”
“Leveler, we have anti-air units moving around here. Please advise Torrents.”
“Omega, can you confirm this marked coordinate as the comm station?”
“Leveler, affirmative, but is that now a target?”
“Omega-only for ground forces. We’re targeting the relay satellite from orbit.”
Niner made his impatient-Skirata noise, clicking his teeth. “Leveler, we’d like voice links to the Torrents. Please advise on frequency.”
It wasn’t supposed to be done that way because it made for confusing voice traffic, but Niner always wanted the option of aborting a strike himself rather than relying on a relay via the ship. Leveler’s end of the link went silent.
“I hope he’s asking Pillion or whatever his name is for permission, and making it snappy,” said Fi. “Six minutes to tar-get.”
Atin huffed. “Two triple-A units on the move, Sarge. I’m transmitting the coordinates anyway.”
“Leveler,” Niner said, “triple-A units moving. You should have new coordinates. Can you confirm you’ve identified those?”
“Omega, confirmed.”
“Leveler, I’ll run through the frequency range and identity the Torrent channel…”
“Omega, please avoid direct comm because of risk of conflicting orders. Stand by for sitrep.”
Niner snapped over to the closed squad link for a brief, angry moment. “In your dreams, di’kut. If I lock on, you can’t block me.” Then he flicked back to the ship’s link. “Leveler, understood. Omega out.”
“Mir’osik,” Fi muttered. “We’re the ones on the ground.” Niner checked his Deece. “We’re going to have to teach them respect for special forces someday.”
“Etain thinks Commander Levet is a good vod,” Darman said. “But I’d still feel happier if I could interrupt and point out if they were hitting the wrong target. It gets a bit frantic in the comm center sometimes.”
“Heads up, larties incoming …” A’den’s voice cut into the circuit.
The Null was a thousand meters or so east of them with one group of Marits, who’d brought up an impressive range of cannons and artillery as well as thousands of troops. When Darman focused with his visor on maximum sensitivity, the area looked like an undulating sea, and then he realized it was actually the mass of lizards getting ready to overrun the city. It bothered him. He didn’t know or even care who was right in this planet’s oddly restrained dispute-restrained up to now, anyway-but helping it happen didn’t sit well with him, and it was the first time he’d felt that so clearly.