The words flash into Spencer’s helmet: hurry the fuck up. He passes it on to Linehan. Who laughs. “Easy for them to say” he says.
They’re deep into an industrial area, about thirty meters down a very narrow chute. The gravity’s intensifying the farther into it they go. Spencer and Linehan are all too conscious of the nature of the tube they’re crawling in. And they know exactly what’s going to happen if it gets put to use …
“Easy or not,” says Spencer, “we got to hurry this up.”
“No shit.”
It’s a tough passage. Linehan’s got his neck and shoulders against one wall of the chute, his feet against the other. There’s just enough room for him to lower his gun arm past his legs. The light on the end of the gun casts a beam that vanishes into the darkness below. But not before illuminating a hatch.
“Okay,” he says. “I see it.”
“About time,” replies Spencer.
They work their way along those last few meters, pry the hatch open. The mass-driver tube they’re now exiting extends straight through half the asteroid. It can fling chunks of rock and metal at speeds well in excess of orbital velocity. It’s a useful shortcut for anyone who’s feeling lucky.
“Now those fucks get to try it,” says Linehan.
“They’ll probably use their thrusters,” replies Spencer. “Now that we’ve paved the way.”
“Pussies.”
“For fuck’s sake, focus. We’re getting close.”
They crawl along what looks like a maintenance tunnel built to service the mass-driver. It’s very narrow. They move along it, slide a door open, go through into a much wider corridor.
Just as the floor beneath them starts to shake again.
“Ahead of us this time,” says Linehan.
“And way too close,” mutters Spencer.
It’s unmistakable. Huge explosions are going off in close proximity up ahead. Triangulation with Lynx establishes pretty quickly where.
“Things are getting hot at the Window,” says the Operative.
“Small wonder.”
“The Rain’s trying to shatter the Throne before the cavalry arrives.”
“The cavalry that’s now about five minutes behind us.”
“Hold on,” says the Operative. He and Sarmax step into the mass-driver chute, ignite their thrusters. They blast down to the hatch that’s still open, turn into the maintenance corridor, turn off their thrusters while Lynx descends after them. The explosions are closer, intensifying. Rockdust starts drifting from the walls.
“We’ve got to get in behind the Rain’s assault,” shouts the Operative. “Find a way to fuck them up the ass.”
“Find a way to get their dick out of ours,” mutters Sarmax.
They descend down ladders, move through a series of air-locked hatches that have been blasted open. They head through a cave that’s filled with derelict mining vehicles—edge past them, down a corridor that’s shaking so hard it feels like it’s right inside their helmets.
But then it stops.
“Huh,” says Sarmax.
“My thoughts exactly” says the Operative.
He releases the tethers, tells the guys on point to start running. He and Sarmax are doing the same, throwing caution to the wind, taking advantage of the fact that they’re now in gravity to sprint. They’re still holding off on their suit-thrusters, though, since that would raise their heat-signature to unacceptable levels. They race down a stairway that seems like it has no bottom, head through a series of interlocked galleries, emerge into another passageway. Spencer’s voice sounds in the Operative’s skull.
“Movement,” it says.
“Where?”
“Right on top of us.”
It’s burning in her fucking brain. She can sense the Rain out there, at the Window. Not as precisely as before—she can’t detect their zone through all the rock. But she knows they’re there all the same. That sixth sense again, telling her that the Rain have done what they came for. But she’s just beginning. Her formation’s tearing its way through low-G factory levels now, coming in through torn rails and storage units, fighting Euro security robots and mining droids—not to mention things that seem to have been created by the very factories that her forces are now destroying. In her mind, calculations slide together in a dawning realization. She’s not surprised in the slightest when Huselid’s voice echoes in her helmet. She suddenly realizes that she’s been expecting this all along.
“Change up coordinates,” he says, reeling off numbers. “Entire formation.”
“Away from the Window?” asks the pilot.
“Just do it,” snarls Haskell.
• • •
They’re pressed up against the walls. They’ve got their camouflage going. They’re looking at so me kind of flame down the farther reaches of this tunnel.
“Don’t move a goddamn muscle,” says Spencer.
That’s what Carson’s just ordered. And Linehan’s obeying. He’s already switched off his light. He and Spencer keep their weapons trained on the thing that’s now approaching: a suit that’s been nailed almost beyond repair, thrusters so gone it’s a wonder it’s still flying. It hurtles in toward them.
“It’s Praetorian,” breathes Spencer.
“You mean it looks Praetorian.”
It’s got the Praetorian colors, that’s for sure. It sears past them, rounds a corner.
Now!” yells Sarmax. He and the Operative fire simultaneously as the suit flashes past them. The thrusters on its back explode: the suit skids against the floor, smashes against the wall. The Operative rushes into the blind spot of its weapons, shoves a gun against its visor. A man’s face stares up at him. Sarmax risks a tightbeam transmission.
“We’re Praetorian,” he says. “Same as you.”
“It’s over,” says the soldier. “We’re fucked. We’re fucked. We’re—”
“Shut him up,” hisses the Operative.
Sarmax lowers his gun, fires, grazes the soldier’s helmet with a shot that melts the man’s comlink. He shoves a tether into a jack on the soldier’s shoulder.
“Now talk,” he says.
And keep it together,” adds the Operative. “You’re a Praetorian for fuck’s sake.”
“Not anymore,” mutters the soldier.
“What?”
“The Throne’s fucking gone.”
“Bullshit.”
“The Rain collapsed our perimeter in nothing flat. They executed him in front of my eyes. Jesus—”
“So how come you made it out?”
“Saw it happen from an observation platform,” says the soldier. “Saw only one way out.”
“You mean this?” asks the Operative. He fires a single shot through the soldier’s visor. Blood and bone churn inside that helmet. Sarmax whirls on the Operative.
“What the fuck’s your prob—”