''Plan B it is, Captain,'' Gunny replied on net. Kris echoed him, all grin out of her voice.
Captain Thorpe cleared his throat. ''One last thing before we break this link. I am required to remind you marines that this is not a slapdash search-and-smash mission. We have been invited by Sequim to assist their police forces. As such, you will operate under local law enforcement procedures. I expect you to take prisoners, not come back with a load of bodies.''
Kris keyed her mike. ''You heard the skipper. Those bastards have the right to face a jury of their peers. Then the people of Sequim can hang ‘em.'' The troopers growled happily at that bit of information. Kris had done the search; Sequim had yet to ratify the capital punishment clause in the Society of Humanity's Human Rights Declaration. Kris's father had almost lost his chance at the prime minister's job because of the tactics he used to delay Wardhaven's ratification of that same clause just long enough for Eddy's murderers to hang. Strange, Kris could never think of little Eddy suffocating. But she had no trouble with his murderers dangling at the end of a rope.
Done with talk, Kris did a quick check on the hunting lodge. The Stoolpigeon still circled. Its sensors reported all quiet. ''Sergeant, does Ensign Lien have me on sensors?''
''Yes, ma'am.''
''Tell him to tuck you in close behind me. I'm heading for the pond five klicks north of the target.''
The pause was short. ''Ensign Lien says LAC Two will conform to your movements.''
That would take some good flying. This was, after all, a dark and very stormy night. Kris aimed to set the LACs down in the shallows of a pond near the hunting lodge. From where she was at 20,000 meters, she could make out two or three nasty-looking storm cells between her and there. ''Nelly, connect to the local weather satellite.'' Interesting, the LAC's uplink to the Typhoon was hashed, but Kris's own civilian commlink worked fine.
The weather feed let Kris plot a series of descending curves around the most dangerous of the storm cells. Still, the last 15,000 meters was bumpy. Rain lashed at the canopy, blurring Kris's vision; her racing helmet would have been crystal clear. All the complaints about standard-issue equipment served up by the lowest bidder took on hard meaning as she peered into the darkness, trying to make out something before that something made a very big hole in her. Father, we have to talk. From behind her, marines provided a chorus of groans, grumbles, and, in general, wishes to get this damn thing on the deck.
Kris's altimeter claimed 1,000 meters between her and sea level when she broke out of the slope. More importantly, the arctic tundra was supposed to be no higher than 650 meters around here, leaving Kris to do the happy math. However, the topo maps of the area reported enough hills, trees, and other exciting terrain features to make Kris wish she could dare a couple of radar sweeps. With bad guys as well-equipped as this bunch seemed to be, she doubted they lacked a radar detector or even a few radar-homing missiles. No, using radar anywhere above their horizon was a dead giveaway. Death in this case was spelled with a little girl's name.
Kris put her craft into gentle circles, each one lower, keeping her LAC just above stall speed. Corporal Li reported LAC Two out of the last squall and right behind them, three maybe four kilometers back. Kris grinned. At least if she put her squad into a hill, Gunny would avoid their funeral pyre. Half of them would still arrive to take on the kidnappers.
Right on schedule, Kris's low-light system detected the snag she'd chosen for the start of her landing way. Her LAC touched water, hissing from residual heat, tossing spray as it bled off the last of its speed. She put the stick over as the craft started to settle. A moment later, she came to a jerking halt on a narrow, sandy beach.
''Corporal, pop a night light for Gunny.'' Kris said. As the canopy rose above her, she hit her restraint release. Throwing her legs over the LAC's side, she vaulted to the ground. Wow, was she pumped, a rush beyond any race. She opened her faceplate and drew in a deep breath, laden with the perfumes of water, night, and living things. It felt wonderful to be alive and breathing. She studied her squad as they stamped their feet, checked their weapons, brought their systems up.
''Okay, crew, we're down. I know a little girl who could use a hug about now and some bastards who need a hard kick in the ass. Let's do it.'' The five marines returned grim, determined nods.
I'm coming Eddy, I'm coming.
CHAPTER THREE
Gunny's LAC slid to a stop on the sandy beach ten meters from Kris. As Gunny and his squad readied themselves, Kris hiked over to them, stepping over driftwood and a half-eaten fish thing, and had Nelly beam Approach March B to Gunny.
Long before the call came for the Typhoon to drop everything and jump for Sequim, Kris had been following the kidnapping; it was the number-one media event this month among the rim worlds. The betting in the wardroom had been two to one that Sequim would holler for the Navy when the second attempt went bust. Kris had put the bets down more to hope than expectation. Then the third local effort to storm the cabin ended with two of their best trackers taking a dive off a 100-meter cliff into raging white water. That, fifteen clicks from the cabin, was the closest the local police got. Kris figured the Navy would get a call, but she never expected the Typhoon to answer it or that she'd lead the platoon. But as an old commander growled at OCS, ''Ours's not to reason why, ours's but to do and then fill out the paperwork.''
So Kris had spent every waking moment for the last four days either preparing her platoon or planning this assault.
Gunny and Captain Thorpe wanted a fast drop and grab, so Kris prepared for a fast drop and grab. Still, one of Father's Rule Ones was always to have a backup in your hip pocket.
With little spare time on her hands, she drafted Tommy to help look for plan B.
''That tundra looks mighty rough,'' Tommy said, studying the Stool pigeon feed of the front yard they were to drop in.
''It's summertime. Tundra gets messy. The computer says it's within standards. Don't you trust the computer's standards?'' Kris asked with a nudge in Tommy's ribs.
''Nope,'' Tom answered without looking up. ''If I or someone I trust haven't fed the computer the numbers, why trust it?''
''So you trust God, but not computers.''
''And didn't my Grandma Chin tell me to?'' he answered without so much as a blink.
''Find me a back door to this place,'' Kris said.
''I could set the LACs down on this pond, and you could walk in from there,'' Tommy pointed out.
Kris had been studying the pond and the ground between it and the hunting lodge housing the kidnappers. ''These woods show as much electronic noise as these other places where the civilians got themselves dead.'' Kris had memorized the electronic signatures of the three different spots civilian rescue teams had died. Their bodies were still there; no one would risk bringing them out.
''But isn't the swamp kind of quiet, I ask you?'' Kris pursed her lip, studying the mud and muck.
Unlike some city kids, Kris had no illusions about how nice Mother Nature was in the raw. She'd split her last summer at university between running brother Honovi's election campaign and hiking the rugged Blue Mountains of Ward haven. ''Just the kind of place some lazy hoods might not bother with.''