A breeze flows beneath the canopy. It flutters Rihab’s shirt and lifts ghosts out of the dust. She prays for it to carry some of the fumes away, and she squeezes the trigger.
Simultaneously, there is a flurry of gunshots in the ravine.
A second later, all hell breaks loose.
Miles is taken by surprise when the assault starts. He didn’t hear Chris initiate it. He only knows it’s on when True fires the first shot and Rihab crumples. The air reeks of gasoline fumes so he’s surprised when the shot doesn’t ignite a flash fire. God help Shaw Walker if that happens.
One of the armed Al-Furat soldiers yells. Miles picks him for a target, squeezing off rounds from his pistol. A streamer of blood on the man’s shoulder suggests he’s been hit but he doesn’t go down. The two with the cameras try to retreat to the house, while the armed men, including the one Miles wounded, turn their guns on the slope. They don’t know exactly where their enemy is hidden, but they start laying down suppressing fire.
Miles ducks behind the rocks. True goes belly-down too. Rock chips and lead fragments pepper them.
Another gun opens up from a position off to the side and lower on the slope. Rapid shots a half-second apart. A rhythm so precise, it’s got to be Roach.
From below, a drawn-out, agonized scream and, simultaneously, a roar of raw, guttural rage. Someone holds down the trigger on an assault rifle, chewing through the magazine, sending dust and broken twigs fountaining around Roach’s position.
True chooses that moment to stand up. She brings her weapon to her shoulder—but she doesn’t fire. There’s no return fire. Even Roach stops shooting.
A pastoral silence spreads across the slope: a breeze rustling through the brush, the muttering stream, the faraway bleating of a goat. Miles is acutely conscious of his rapid breathing. He asks himself: Is it over?
He lifts his head to look cautiously past the rocks. Under the canopy, everyone is down. Pools of red blending with dust in the filtered light. He counts six Al-Furat soldiers, plus Shaw.
There should be two more.
Behind him on the slope, the faint distant crack of a stick. Still on his knees, he wheels around, pistol raised. Motion just below the road. An electric charge erupts across his skin and he reacts before his conscious mind understands what he has seen. He dives at True, knowing it’s already too late. One of the road warriors carried an assault rifle outfitted with a grenade launcher. What Miles saw, what he reacted to, was the black mouth of that weapon aimed in their direction.
But as True’s knees buckle, as he drags her to the ground, he hears the soft hum of a starburst copter and four quick shots. Then a withering explosion as the grenade blows up somewhere high in the air above them. Miles ducks his head, hunches his shoulders against the concussion. A double punch is delivered against his ears. A blast of searing heat. He feels the pummel of fragments impacting his vest and a sharp pain in his skull.
For a few seconds after that he hears nothing but the ringing of his ears. Then Chris’s voice, sounding muffled: “Miles. True. Report.”
“I’m good,” True says, voice husky. “Miles, get off me!”
He realizes he has her pinned and rolls aside. In a moment she’s up on her knees, doffing her visor, peeling off her camouflage hood. Her face is flushed, her eyes frantic, sweeping past him to look downslope. She puts her visor back on and picks up the Triple-Y. Then she’s away, boosting herself over the rocks to charge at an angle toward the bottom of the slope.
Miles starts to follow, but Chris shouts over comms, “Stay put! Stay put! We’ve got enemy still in the house!”
True keeps moving, stumbling and sliding, dry brush bursting apart as she hits it.
True is trusting Roach and the starburst copter to cover her. They’ve owned this battle so far. She’s pretty sure the copter took out the two road warriors on the high ground, hitting one just as he pulled the trigger on his grenade launcher, sending the explosive on a wild arc.
She reaches the bottom of the slope. Cuts right to angle across the flat. As she does, Roach emerges from the brush in front of her. It’s a meter-long monster, moving with swift, revolting grace on its stout insect legs, gun-barrel head supported on a jointed mast as it snaps around to target her. She is so startled, she cuts sideways and almost screams. The barrel shifts again, upslope, where she left Miles.
It doesn’t shoot. Both of them are white-listed. True imagines a database table updated with her current position, a description of her that reads “potential obstacle,” and the instruction “do not harm.”
Roach moves on, skittering with frightening speed toward the house just as the copter buzzes into sight, appearing around a corner of the building and flying low. The copter banks around the SUVs, then cuts under the canopy, a half-second behind Roach.
Two soldiers are still in the house. With the mechs pressing the assault, True knows the firefight could erupt again at any second—but the way to the SUVs is clear.
She sprints for the one with the twenty-liter jugs. Her hands are slick with sweat beneath the fabric of her gloves as she grasps the cap of the blue jug and wrenches it open. She smells it to be sure. Water. Hauls it out of the bumper rack without bothering to cap it again and runs with it beneath the canopy, the forty-pound mass banging against the outside of her knee and water sloshing out. She runs to where Shaw is pinned against the ground.
Gunfire again. A single shot. So close and so loud, every muscle in her body tenses. A glance shows her it’s Roach, shooting into the house through the open door. The mech skitters inside. The starburst copter swoops away, out from under the canopy and out of sight.
Leaving the conclusion of the battle to Chris and Tamara, True sets the water jug down. She drops to her knees. The stench of gasoline that’s rising from Shaw is almost overwhelming. His eyes are open but he doesn’t seem to see her. She tips the jug, spilling water over his face. His eyes squeeze shut. She drenches his face, his scalp, his neck, his shoulders. She wets the ground around him and he starts shivering. He turns his head to retch, then whispers something. She leans over him to hear him better. He says it twice more before she understands: “No way back.”
She is crying. She takes off her MARC visor and drops it beside the Triple-Y, using her sleeve to swipe at her eyes. Then she grabs the steel loop around Shaw’s neck that’s helping to pin him to the ground. There’s hardly enough room to get her gloved fingers around it, but she does. She tugs at it. It’s solid, so she rocks it a little, back and forth, careful not to hurt him as she loosens it. After a minute she’s able to pull it out. She pitches it away.
Only then does she notice Miles standing a few feet away, bright red blood staining his collar as he watches her with what looks like simmering anger.
Righteous Justice
When the shooting stops only a handful of seconds after it started, Lincoln wonders, Is it done?
He and Rohan are still charging toward the house, scrambling around boulders, not trying to be quiet anymore. More shots fired. “Chris!” he pants. “Report!”
“True and Miles are ambulatory, we have secured Shaw Walker, and Roach has two combatants pinned down in the house. I need you up there, Lincoln. Someone’s got to accept a surrender.”