She shaded her eyes with her hand, staring towards the post office. Or, rather, towards the flaming, tumbled heap of rubble which had been the post office. She could see one or two people staggering around, clutching broken limbs or bleeding wounds. More lay writhing-or motionless-on the sidewalks, and half a dozen ground vehicles added their own smoke and flame to the hellish scene. Kornati's tech base was sufficiently primitive that most vehicles still used petrochemical fuels, and tendrils of liquid fire flowed across the pavement, seeking the storm drains, as bleeding fuel tanks gushed flame. And she could see other people already beginning to rip and tear at the wreckage in frantic efforts to rescue anyone who might be trapped under it.
Gutsy of them, a cold, thoughtful corner of her brain acknowledged. Especially after the way we set up the Nemanja bombing. Maybe it's time we started setting follow-up charges again.
She turned her attention towards the second explosion, but it was farther away. She could see the smoke, hear sirens, but she couldn't actually see anything. Not that she needed to. Another truck, from the same courier service, had been parked in a basement garage under the city's largest department store. Judging from the smoke and dust cloud, the bomb must have been even more successful than she'd hoped.
Then the third bomb detonated-the one in the stolen ambulance parked under the marquee of the Sadik Kozarcanic Army Hospital. She'd had her doubts about that one. There'd been a far higher chance that the team charged with placing the ambulance would be detected and intercepted, which would have alerted the authorities to the fact that an operation was underway. And even if they weren't, security remained too tight, despite the growing certainty she and the Movement had both been killed, for them to get the ambulance close enough to do the kind of structural damage they'd managed at the post office and department store. But she'd decided it was still worth the risk as a psychological blow. They hadn't attacked hospitals before. And, in fact, she had no intention of adding hospitals to the list. Not civilian hospitals, anyway. But there was no way for the government or the general public to know that, now was there?
The fourth bomb went off, but it was clear across the city, too far away for her to see it from here. Not that she needed to. The neat operational planning file in her head checked it off as sharp, harsh thunder rattled the one-sun's windows.
First Planetary Bank, she thought cheerfully. Again, they hadn't been able to get the bomb actually inside the building perimeter, and the Bank building itself was built more like a bunker than a commercial establishment. But, knowing they wouldn't be able to place the bomb as close as they wanted, she and Drazen Divkovic, Juras' brother, had put the bomb under a tanker truck. In theory, it contained fuel oil; in fact, Drazen had sealed the tank and filled it with natural gas, creating what was in effect a primitive fuel-air bomb.
Then Drazen himself had driven the truck into position, stopped it, gotten out, and opened the hood to bend over the turbine, obviously checking for malfunction. He'd tinkered with it until he heard the first explosion. Then he'd smashed the fuel line with a single, carefully placed blow from a wrench, to make sure no one else could drive it away, and vanished into a subway station. By the time anyone realized the "driver" had abandoned his truck, Drazen had been kilometers away. And by then it was much too late for anyone to move the deadly vehicle before it exploded like a tactical nuclear warhead.
The vaults may survive. I don't think any of the rest of the building will, though.
She looked out at the plumes of smoke one more time, then, shaking her head in obvious disbelief and horror, turned and headed back towards the stairwell. She wanted to get back to her apartment and its cheap, tiny HD in time to see if the news channels played her prerecorded message claiming responsibility for the bombing attack in the name of the FAK. And, just incidentally, informing the Kornatian public that she wasn't dead, after all.
She was halfway down the stairs when the fifth and final bomb of this attack exploded in yet a third delivery truck. That one was parked outside the Karlovac Metropolitan Museum, and she spared a moment to hope the museum's fire suppression systems would save most of its artworks. It was probably a little schizophrenic to hope one of her own attacks would be less than totally successful, but she couldn't help it.
She shook her head at her own perversity as she reached the bottom of the stairs and checked her chrono again. Assuming her delivery arrangements worked, the news outlets wouldn't have her recorded message for another few minutes. It would be interesting to see how long it took the first news service to get it on the air.
And while she waited, she just had time to check the turkey again and put the bread into the other oven.
Chapter Thirty-Six
"So much for the demise of the Freedom Alliance," Baroness Medusa said bitterly.
Gregor O'Shaughnessy simply nodded. There wasn't much else to do as he and the Provisional Governor watched the news clips which Colonel Basaricek had appended to her official report.
It was bad, he thought. Worse even than the Nemanja bombing. The casualty count was higher, the damage was spread across a wider area of the city and-especially in the area of that tank truck bomb-far more severe, and the sheer psychological shock effect after the extended false calm was equally severe. The commentary on the news clips Basaricek had included carried a new, harsher flavor than the reportage before Nordbrandt's assumed death had. Much of that anger was directed at the FAK, but a disturbing amount of it was aimed squarely at the Kornatian government this time.
"I don't like how critical they're being of Rajkovic and Basaricek," Dame Estelle said, as if she'd been reading his mind, and he nodded again.
"Hard to blame them, really, Milady. Oh, the newsies ought to know better. Probably do, really. But after the sense of euphoria, the belief the storm was over, this had to have a major psychological effect."
"Well, now we know why she didn't bother to disabuse us of the fond assumption that we'd actually managed to kill her. And while you're being so understanding about their reporters, Gregor, you might bear in mind that one reason those same reporters are hammering the government right now is to keep from admitting they were the ones-not Vice President Rajkovic or Colonel Basaricek-who announced that the lack of activity meant she had to be dead. Rajkovic was always careful to keep cautioning people that there was no proof of that."
"Granted, Milady. But it would be unrealistic to expect anything else out of them, really. And at least it proves Kornati really does have a free press, doesn't it?"
The baroness gave a sharp crack of laughter and shook her head.
"You're not usually the one looking for the silver lining, Gregor. Do I really sound like I need cheering up that badly?"
"I wouldn't put it quite that way, Milady." He smiled crookedly at her. "In fact, I think I may be the one who needs the cheering up this time."
They turned their attention back to the grim sights and sounds from the wounded city. It didn't take much longer to get to the end, and Dame Estelle turned off the HD with an almost vicious jab at the remote. She sat for a moment longer, still glowering at the blank unit, and then shook herself and turned back to O'Shaughnessy.
"The timing on this could have been better," she said with massive understatement. Twelve days had passed since Hexapuma had departed for Montana. Probably the cruiser was already in-system and decelerating towards the planet in the continued blissful belief that the situation in Split was under control.
"Yes, Milady," he agreed, "the timing could indeed be better. But however inconvenient it may be, my immediate impression is that this-" he gestured vaguely in the direction of the silent HD "-fundamentally changes our analysis of which flashpoint is the more dangerous. And the more deserving of our most effective intervention."
"No argument," Dame Estelle said. "Although there is the interesting question of exactly how well inclined towards Aleksandra Tonkovic I am at this particular moment. And, assuming we do put Split at the head of our list, there's also the question of whether or not we can afford to spend the time to hand it to Terekhov and Bernardus. It may be time for us to stop worrying about our 'storm trooper' image or whether or not we'll be seen as supporting suppression and just drop Colonel Gray's Marines in on Nordbrandt's head. Crush her as quickly as possible and then hope we can repair any damage once the shooting's stopped. And if we do that, we can send someone else-like Captain Anders and Warlock -like Khumalo wanted in the first place."