He glowered at the other holographic displays floating in his superbly equipped office, and this time his scowl was a snarl. Light-speed transmission rates weren't the only things that could contribute to uncertainty. Finding someone—anyone!—who knew what the hell was going on could do the same thing. And despite all of the sophisticated communications equipment at his disposal, he didn't have a clue yet what was happening at the Palace. Except that it was bad.
Very bad.
"Plasma rifles!" Trey snarled, rolling back from the corridor as a blast cooked the far wall. "Nobody said they had plasma guns!"
"Plasma in the morning makes me happy!" Dave caroled in a high tenor. "Plasma in my eyyyyes can make me cryyyyyy!"
"Bill?" Catrone said.
"They just started popping up," the technician replied over Catrone's helmet com. "Seven sources. They must have had them shielded in the basement someplace. Three closing. Two in Alpha Quadrant, moving right.
"Then they've got the stairs," Catrone said. They'd made it to the second floor, but now they were getting pinned down and surrounded by heavier firepower.
"I'm down to twenty rounds," Clovis said, thumbing in another magazine. "Starting to see what your friend meant about combat troops. Which is the only reason I'm not killing Dave right now!"
"Yeah, we need some serious firepower," Catrone agreed tightly. "But—"
"Tomcat," Bill said. "Stand by. Help's on the way."
"Did you know they had plasma guns?" Despreaux asked as she triggered another burst at the left side of the doorway.
"No," Pedi said, aiming carefully at a leg which had exposed itself on the right side of the door. She missed... again. "Did you?"
"No," Despreaux said tightly.
"It's not like you could have told us, or anything," Pedi said, deciding to just spray and pray. Most of the rounds hit the wall, which they had discovered was armored plasteel. "So, if you did know, you can admit it. Just to me. Between friends."
"I didn't," Despreaux said angrily. "Okay?"
"All right, all right," Pedi said pacifically. "How do you reload one of these things, again?"
"Look, just... stay down and let me do the shooting," Despreaux said. "Okay?"
"Okay," Pedi replied with a pout. "I wish I had my swords."
"I wish I had my Roger," Despreaux said unhappily.
"Look, Erkum," Krindi said gently, eyeing the weapon his friend was carrying. "Let me do the shooting, all right? You just watch my back."
He looked up at the towering noncom one last time, while a small, still voice in the back of his brain asked him if this was really a good idea. Erkum was the only person, even among the Mardukans, who could have carried one of the light tank cannon the Alphanes had supplied—and its power pack—without benefit of powered armor. The sheer intimidation factor of seeing that coming at them should be enough to convince Siminov's goons to be elsewhere. Of course, there were possible downsides to the proposition... .
"Watch my back," he repeated firmly.
"Okay, Krindi," Erkum said, then kicked in the front door of the Neighborhood Association and stepped through it, tank cannon held mid-shoulder-high and leveled. The sudden intrusion froze the group of guards at the other end of the corridor for a moment as they turned, and their eyes widened in horror as they caught sight of him. Then he pulled the trigger.
The round came nowhere near the humans. Instead, it blew out the corridor's entire left wall, opening up half a dozen rooms on that side, then impacted on a structural girder and exploded in a ball of plasma.
Pol's finger, unfortunately, had clamped down on the trigger, and two more plasma bolts shrieked from his muzzle, blowing out a thirty-meter hole that engulfed the ceiling and most of the right wall, as well. The building was instantly aflame, but at least between them, the follow-up bolts had managed to take out most of the guards who'd been his nominal targets.
"Water damn it, Erkum!" Krindi dropped to one knee and expertly double-tapped the only human still standing with his bead rifle. "I told you not to fire!"
"Sorry," Erkum said. "I'm just getting used to this thing. I'll do better."
"Don't try!" Krindi yelled.
"Ooooo! There's one!" Erkum said as a guard skittered to a halt, looking at them through the flames of several eviscerated rooms on the right side of the mangled passageway. The human raised his weapon, thought better of it, and tried to run.
Erkum aimed carefully, and the round—following more or less the damage path to the left of their position—went through the room and hit a stove in the kitchen on the back wall, blowing a hole out the back of the building and into the one on the other side of the service alley, which promptly began spouting flames of its own. If the running guard had even noticed the shot, it wasn't evident.
Erkum tried again... and opened up a new hole in the ceiling. Then his finger hit the firing button to no avail as the cannon's internal protocols locked it down long enough to cool to safe operating levels.
"I'm out of bullets," he said wistfully. "How do you reload this thing?"
"Just... use it as a club," Krindi said, running to the end of the corridor with Erkum on his heels. Despite this planet's hellish climate, he was pretty sure he wouldn't have needed his environment suit anymore. The building was getting hot as hell.
"What the hell was that?" Clovis shouted.
"I don't know," Trey said, checking right, "but this place is seriously on fire!" He fired once, and then again. "Clear."
"I'm melting!" Dave shouted in a cracked falsetto. "I'm melllllting!" he added, taking down two guards who had just rounded a corner at the run.
"Up," Catrone said. "Whatever it was, it's given us an opening. Let's take it."
He tapped Dave on the shoulder and pointed right.
"Daddy, don't touch me there, please?" Dave said in a little kid's voice as he bounded down the corridor and skidded around the corner on his stomach. He cracked out three rounds from the bead gun and then waved.
"Corridor clear," he said in a cold and remote voice.
"Office of the Prime Minister," a harassed woman said, not looking up at the screen. Sounds of other confused conversations came through from behind her, evidence of a crowded communications center without a clue of what was happening.
Eleanora cursed the fact that the only current number she had was the standard public line.
"I need to speak to the Prime Minister," she said pointedly.
"I'm sorry, Ma'am," the receptionist said. "The Prime Minister is a busy man, and we're all just a little preoccupied here. Perhaps you could call back some other time."