Rogue(125)

He said, “If we move in we’ll see the perimeter. It’s about a hundred meters out from the house. They’ve got guards up.”

“Noted. What do you suggest?”

“We take them out when we get a chance. Inside, I know the general layout. They’ll want her as a hostage. They won’t kill her until after you’re dead.”

I said, “I’m not taking that bet.”

The shimmer in front of me said, “Neither am I. I’ll take the other corner. They’re expecting me to call before the third div shuttle.”

“So we’ve got a div to penetrate.”

“I think so,” he said.

“Okay. I’ll move on your sign as soon as we have an opening. You lead inside. I’ll be right behind.”

“Sounds simple.”

“It always does.”

He said nothing else, but slipped away. He was quieter than I expected.

I slunk in slower and lower one limb at a time until I was on hands and knees, delicately placed. Once I saw the clearing, I went prone and shimmied slowly, resembling a snake. It shouldn’t sound like a person, and I moved slow enough there shouldn’t be any disruptive noise. I got right to the edge, then pulled some leaves over my head to kill my outline and reflection.

There were two guards at the front door. I faced them from the side. Beyond them was a long driveway, bricked and paved and with beautiful borders. Timurhin liked his style. Shame he didn’t have the culture to go with it. I assumed there were more guards at the gate, but maybe not.

Just in from me was a sensor wire, and I could see beams faintly in the dust. Had they been thinking better, this place would be a walled prison. They apparently had little enough respect for Randall they thought he’d bring me in, and that I’d go along. Either that or they figured I’d have killed him and then they’d contact me for further deals. Staying alive might be as easy as me proving he was dead and bowing out. But, as I said, the problem was I had no way to trust them.

The guards checked in periodically, and they had an officer of the watch as well. What I wanted to do was catch the officer with these two, and dispose of all three at once. If he was late elsewhere, they’d be suspicious, but it would take time for worry to propagate. If he found someone down or missing, it would be an instant alarm. I needed him gone.

I settled down to wait. It would be a little while longer. At least they didn’t have any visible IR or thermal filters. They relied on the lights around the property, and presumably the sensors in the woods I’d carefully passed by.

The good came with the bad. The watch officer arrived with their shift replacement. There were now five of them. After that, it would be some time before he returned.

It wasn’t ideal, but it did offer the chance to take out five hostiles at once.

There were two main strategies I could use. Either wander up, looking helpless, or full frontal charge. The first wouldn’t work. Out here, they’d assume something was wrong and alert on a stranger. Then they’d probably recognize me.

So I Boosted. As soon as I felt the ripple, I dropped into a sprint. I leapt clean and high over the perimeter sensors.

I came in on a long curve. Eventually they saw the movement, looked confused at the speed and my odd silhouette, IDed me as human and an attacker, and by then I was within ten meters. I dodged twice. They fired and missed, though not by much, then I was on them.

I hit the first one in the throat with my thumb, turning up under the jaw with a hand heel strike. His head snapped back and he dropped. I caught the second with a V of my thumb and fingers into his throat. He turned horizontal and fell, and I stomped on his face as I dove at the third. En route I snagged the gun from the one I’d just smeared.

I caught the third, the watch officer, shoulder first in the chest, throwing his arms back, then driving my knee so his balls reached his stomach. I shoved the pistol muzzle in his kidney and shot, the report damped to a wet thump, like it would in mud.

I stood up with his rapidly dying body in front of me, casually pointed at the fourth and shot him in the face. The other turned to run but hadn’t moved a step—I was that fast—and I shot him in the base of the spine, then in the base of the skull. I dropped the meat shield and scanned for incoming. Safe for the moment.

In two more seconds, I had another pistol, a knife and a shotgun —an Alesis. I scanned again, rummaged and found a wrist phone and a key coder on the shift leader. I decided the shotgun was too bulky, and tossed it into the brush. Two pistols would do me.

A shuffling shadow was Randall. Barely visible, and went past me, snagging the coder as he went.

Beyond the recovery breathing from the exertion, I had to avoid hyperventilating in panic. Logic and tactics said they’d use my daughter against me. However, there was a slim but real chance they’d just kill her.