“We’ll hold here,” it says. “Maintain open comlink by laser. Give us the heads-up if you see anything.”
“You’ll be the first to know,” mutters Linehan.
The Operative can guess what’s happening. A Rain hit team on the warpath is virtually impossible to stop. Especially in a situation where an opponent can retreat in only one direction. The Praetorians outnumber the Rain by at least ten to one. But with the makeshift zone gone, they can’t coordinate with one another. They’ll be going down like ninepins. The Operative and Lynx crash through a wall, past more engine blocks, through another wall, through a weapons chamber from which all the weapons have been stripped. They crash through into the chamber where the Throne briefed his senior officers so recently. Two of them drift there now.
“Fuck,” says the Operative. He leans toward them while Lynx covers him. “Fuck. Both dead.”
One of the men he’s looking at opens his eyes. The Operative leaps backward, his arms up, guns at the ready.
“No,” says the man. He’s barely whispering. “Carson … save … save …”
“Where is he?”
“They … cut us off.”
“Murray. Where the fuck is he?”
“Engine block,” says Murray. “Third,” he adds—coughs. Chokes. Dies.
“Engine block number three,” says the Operative. “What the fuck’s he trying to do there?”
“Stay alive,” says the Operative—hits his jets.
Sarmax gazes at the screens. The president’s ship is down to three of its six segments. It’s hurtling toward the Earth. But by the time it gets there, this’ll be long over.
“How can two men succeed where a whole shipful of Praetorians couldn’t?” asks Haskell.
Sarmax looks at her. “I doubt they can.”
“In which case?”
“We nuke that ship and head for Earth.”
“To see if I can reconfigure our zone there?”
He nods. Something on the screens catches her eye. She gestures at it.
“Hello,” she says.
Sarmax stares.
And starts screaming orders.
Spencer! Cauterize and go!”
Spencer needs no urging. Titanium doors slam shut two rooms back. Engine block number one blasts to life. The new ship starts roaring forward. Though it’s not much of a ship. It’s basically the cockpit and the engines, speeding away from what’s left.
“What the hell’s going on?” asks Linehan.
“The Throne’s on the hull,” says Spencer.
• • •
Jets and minds racing, the Operative and Lynx hit the engine room, which has just gone silent, surge across the chamber, past the turbines and into the crawlspace that’s still warm with the heat signatures of the armor that just passed through. The Operative leads the way, finds the point where the engine shaft’s been melted through with thermite. He goes through, rockets down it and into an adjoining vent. Lynx follows him. His voice crackles in the Operative’s ears.
“We’re sitting ducks in here!”
“Shut up and get ready to fight!” screams the Operative.
Sarmax floors it, starts piloting the craft along an arc that turns it back toward the bulk of presidential ship. It’s shooting headless through space. Ten more seconds, and he can start bringing the forward guns to bear. Haskell works the cameras, adjusts the magnification.
“What we got?” asks Sarmax. “Two assholes after the Throne.”
Fuck,” says Linehan, “can’t you hold us steady?”
“It’s tougher than it fucking looks,” hisses Spencer.
He’s got his work cut out for him, that’s for sure. The truncated cockpit-ship’s maneuverability is for shit. He’s trying to bring it round and back toward the scene of all the action. The debris that constitutes what’s left of the Europa Platform is a speck upon the screen. Spencer’s getting the ship under control, turning it …
• • •
The Operative and Lynx blast out of the vent to find themselves in a wilderness of panels and struts and wires. No one’s in sight. “Spread out,” says the Operative.
Lynx knows the drill. The two men get some distance between them. They’re keeping low, keeping each other in sight the whole time. And now the voice of Sarmax echoes through the Operative’s ears.
“Carson,” it says, “they’re on the other side. We’ve got visual on them. We’ve—Shit!”
“Talk to me, Leo,” snarls the Operative—even as he sees what Sarmax is talking about.
He must have stashed it out there,” says Haskell. A man who thinks ahead: the rocket-sled that’s now streaking from the ship’s hull is piloted by the president himself. It’s scarcely bigger than his own suit. It’s making good progress all the same.
“Let’s get in there,” says Sarmax.
“I don’t think so,” says a voice.
Haskell whirls along with Sarmax. One of the suits in the back is stepping forward, reverting from its Euro trappings to its real ones in a swirl of shifting hues. A minigun’s sprouting from its shoulder. A woman’s face smiles mirthlessly behind the visor. Her face isn’t familiar. But Haskell can see that Sarmax is shaking anyway.
“Indigo,” he says.
“You’ve forfeited the right to know,” says the woman.
“For fuck’s sake, talk to me.”
“Sure, I’ll talk to you. Take us thirty degrees left or I’ll blast you both into that dashboard.”
• • •
He’s veering away,” says Spencer.
“So ask him why.”
“He just cut off contact.”
“Christ,” says Linehan, “that’s a fucking sled out there.”
“What?” asks Spencer, and suddenly feels something smack against his shoulder and lodge there. He turns in his chair, sees that he’s been hit by a strange-looking gun. It’s held by the ship’s navigator, who’s still slumped against the wall, blood clearly visible behind his visor—but he’s turning the gun on Linehan all the same. Spencer dives from his chair, bringing his own guns to bear.
Even as his armor freezes, shuts down as a hack pours from the projectile now embedded within it. Spencer tries to fight it—gets shoved back into his own skull. He floats against the floor. Out of the corner of his eye he can see Linehan drifting helpless, fury on his face. The navigator pulls himself forward to the instrument panel. Blood’s dripping from his mouth. He starts working the controls. His words sound in Spencer’s head.
“I’m dying,” he says. “But you’re already dead.”