Cobra Guardian: Cobra War: Book Two (36 page)

What was bothering him was what his mother
wasn't
saying.

Because there was something she was holding deep inside her. Something tense and unpleasant. Lorne had always been able to detect one of his siblings' illnesses, usually before even the sibling was aware of it, and he could clearly see the signs of stress in his mother. He could see the extra tension around her eyes, well beyond even what their current situation warranted. He could hear the slight hesitation in her voice during her rare comments, her careful weighing of every word as if she was afraid she would slip and say something she shouldn't. He could see it in the way she'd been gripping her husband's hand ever since they'd all sat down together.

Even more significantly, he could see it in the Qasamans' faces. Though they were clearly trying to hide it, all four of them were paying close attention to her, their eyes flicking over to her for a quick evaluation every few seconds. Zoshak in particular seemed to be not quite settled on his patch of ground, as if he was expecting he might have to leap to her side at a second's notice.

Was there something important that she and the Qasamans were holding back? Something of the same caliber as the Aventinians' own Isis secret?

Or was it something more personal? She'd told them briefly about the injuries Merrick had suffered in the Qasamans' final attack on the invaders' occupation force. Had she been wounded, too, perhaps internally where it didn't show?

He didn't dare ask, not here in the middle of a war council. But he would find an opportunity to do so. And soon.

"Well," Harli commented when the last report was finished and the last question answered. "I guess I never really believed that Caelian was the whole focus of this whole Troft invasion. But I would never have believed how damn serious they were about the whole thing, either." He eyed Jin thoughtfully. "Though the reason why Warrior and his buddies would send you to Qasama still eludes me."

"Perhaps
because
you wouldn't otherwise have believed that the Qasamans had also been attacked," Jin suggested. "If Siraj Akim and the others had shown up here alone, would you have listened to them?"

Harli made a face. "Probably not," he conceded, looking over at Siraj. "I'm still not sure what you think we can do for you, but right now that's kind of a side issue. Our first job is to figure out how we're going to get these damn Trofts off Caelian." He threw a hooded look at Warrior. "No offense," he added.

[Offense, I do not take it,] the Tlossie assured him.

"So what exactly is the situation over there?" Lorne asked. "You said the one ship had fallen onto the town's outer wall?"

"Was pushed over onto it, yes," Harli said. "A good-sized section was crushed, which is going to be another rollin' problem pretty quick down the road. Anyway, the second ship has set up shop right behind it, and they've put a cordon of armored trucks and troops around both of them. Your sister's currently got the best vantage point of any of us, and her guess is that they're trying to take off the downed ship's grav lifts and reposition them so that they can get the thing stood upright again."

"They can't just turn the grav lifts around in place?" Croi asked.

"Apparently not," Paul told him.

[Such equipment, it is not usually moveable,] Warrior put in. [A situation like this, one does not often encounter it.]

"Warrior agrees," Paul translated. "They're going to have to physically take the grav lifts off."

Harli snorted. "Pretty stupid design for a warship, if you ask me."

"You wouldn't think that if you'd seen how they took over the streets of Capitalia," Lorne said grimly. "They're exactly the right design for dropping into the middle of city intersections as mobile command posts."

"Well, they don't make much sense
here
," Harli said. "The point is that right now we've got the advantage, but only until they get that first ship back up again. Any ideas?"

"There's a hatch on the upper hull near the stern," Jin said. "Any chance the Cobras in Stronghold can get to it?"

"Maybe, but it would be damn costly," Harli said. "Like I said, they've put out a ring of armored trucks and soldiers, including the part that's sticking into Stronghold. I don't doubt the other ship has most of its weapons tasked for defense, too."

"More than that, we've already lost over a third of Stronghold's Cobras," Kemp added. "Sending the rest in an open attack against a target everyone knows is obvious would be a pretty sure form of suicide."

"He's right," Harli said. "I won't order it except as an absolute last resort. Even then only if you can convince me it has a real chance of success."

"Why do you ask about that particular hatch?" a Cobra named Matigo asked. "Is it more vulnerable than any of the others?"

"I don't know," Jin said. "But that's the one I got a look at, and I know how the catches and seals are positioned. I also got a quick look at the room below it. If we can get a small group of Cobras inside they should be able to take that area and hold it."

A ripple ran though the group. "You saw
inside
one of their ships?" Kemp asked.

"Briefly, yes," Jin said. "Unfortunately, we didn't have the time or the manpower necessary to do anything more."

"Pity," Harli said. "But like I say, the downed ship is being watched like a sticker's nest, which is why I want us to find a way to hit the other one. If the Trofts have any brains at all, they won't be expecting our attack there."

"What about Caelian itself?" Siraj spoke up. "Even from our few hours here we've seen how dangerous and persistent its wildlife can be. Can we allow that wildlife to deal with the invaders?"

"Personally, I think it would be a rollin' kick to sit back and watch how badly a bunch of inexperienced Trofts do against Wonderland," Harli said. "Unfortunately, we can't afford the time. The floating organics and insects have started being trouble for them, but so far the big predators haven't seemed interested."

"Speaking of which, you're all going to need to shave your heads if you don't want your hair turning green," Matigo warned, gesturing toward the newcomers. "You'll have to learn how to scrape your clothes, too."

"That can wait," Harli said. "But the predator idea is still worth pursuing, even if only as a distraction. We've got a few men in the woods right now, collecting plants that should attract some of the bigger animals. That other friend of Jody's, Geoff Boulton, is helping fine-tune the selection."

"The problem being that we've already pulled that trick once," Paul put in. "Having now seen it, the Trofts will undoubtedly be watching for us to try it again."

"Those bow hatches will be tricky anyway," Lorne told him. "They've got troops sitting just inside waiting to shoot at anything non-Troft that barges in."

"What,
you
got to see inside one of their ships, too?" Matigo asked.

"I didn't see the guard spots themselves," Lorne said. "I was inside one of the stairways that run along the sides of the ship in that area. But I could hear the troops through the door."

"Wait a second," Paul said, frowning. "You got
inside
one of their ships?"

"For a few minutes, yes," Lorne said. "I hitched a ride underneath one of their armored trucks."

"You didn't tell us anything about that," Croi said, staring in disbelief at him. "No wonder the Trofts were so serious about hunting you down afterward."

"Oh, I don't think they ever knew I was there," Lorne assured him. "I only went in to try and find out how sophisticated their drones were."

"How sophisticated were they?" Paul asked.

"Near as I could tell, they were only running visual and large-engine heat signatures," Lorne said. "That means they shouldn't be able to distinguish us from any of the large predators out here. The shipboard sensors are probably better, though."

"They are," Harli said grimly. "Trust me. Did you happen to find a way to disable those trucks while you were hitching that ride, by the way?"

"A few arcthrower shots into the engine from underneath seemed to do the trick," Lorne said. "But I suspect the topside armor is more resilient."

"The soldiers themselves are tricky, too," Jin said. "The armor is pretty thick, and those faceplates blacken if you fire a fingertip laser at them, which blocks the shot. But sonics can still stun them, and antiarmors and arcthrowers still work, too. The lower-power stunner that most of you have will also get through the armor, though you have to be pretty close to use it."

"If we ever decide we just want to wound them, we'll let you know," Harli said sourly. He shifted his attention to the three gray-suited Qasamans. "What about you? Any special weapons in those--what did you say they were? krissjaw hide?--those krissjaw-hide suits?"

"We have small lasers in the gloves," Siraj said, indicating the slender tube running beneath the little finger of each of his glove. "They are similar to yours."

"Only more powerful," Jin added. "Theirs
can
punch straight through the Troft faceplates and kill them."

"We also have a version of your sonic stunner," Siraj continued, "though from what I've seen it is less versatile than yours. As far as I know, it was never directly used on the Trofts during their invasion of Qasama, so I do not know how effective it would be against them."

"Each of us also carries three small gas canisters with a quick-acting sleeping gas," Zoshak said, tapping his belt. "The same gas as was used in the Lodestar Hospital," he added, looking at Jin.

"How quick-acting was it?" Paul asked.

"Very," Jin confirmed. "As far as I know, the Trofts in the building went down without ever firing a shot." She grimaced. "Unfortunately, it affects humans just as fast as it does Trofts."

"We have special filters permanently implanted in our nostrils to protect us," Zoshak said. "Unfortunately, we have nothing similar to offer you."

"Well, gas is a moot point until we're inside the ship, anyway," Paul said. "What about the Trofts' ground tactics? You have any insights to offer?"

"They're about what you'd expect," Jin told him. "They use their heavy weapons freely in fending off attacks and supporting their troops, but they do still seem reluctant to engage in mass killings, at least of civilians. The troops themselves sometimes have a tendency to bunch up, which helps protect the ones in back who then shoot over the shoulders of the ones in front. One way to take down that kind of formation is to first hit them with a sonic, then jump or run into the middle of the group and start taking them out with arcthrowers, antiarmors, or fists and feet."

"Is that last one theory, or did you actually do it?" Kemp asked.

"She actually did it," Zoshak said, an edge to his voice. "On top of one of those ships, in fact."

Kemp inclined his head. "I'm impressed," he said, and to Lorne's ears he sounded like he genuinely meant it.

"My grandfather was Jonny Moreau," Jin reminded him. "We've been fighting Trofts off and on for a long time."

"So it sounds like our best bet is to put the Djinn in near the front of any attack, where their glove lasers can nail the first line of soldiers," Paul said thoughtfully. "Supported by a full line of Cobras, of course."

"Maybe some of them up in trees where they can bring their antiarmors more fully into the fight," Jin added.

"Good idea," Paul said, nodding. "Possibly with some flash-bang or smoke grenades going off, too, if we can rig up something like that."

"None of which will make a shred of difference once they open up with those shipboard lasers," Harli said heavily. "We're going to need some way to either shield ourselves from them or else get them tied up shooting in some other direction."

"Why not just blind them?" Lorne suggested. "The cameras are right there on the wings along with the weapons. They ought to be easy enough to take out."

"How do you know about the cameras?" Matigo asked, frowning.

"I told you--I was in the ship's monitor room," Lorne said. "From the images I could see on the displays, it was pretty clear that's where the cameras were."

"I'll be damned," Harli murmured. "You were right, Broom. They didn't kill Buckley just to send a message. They really
were
reacting to a real, genuine threat."

"When was this?" Jin asked.

"When we were trying to evaluate their targeting capabilities by shooting at the weapons clusters," Paul said.

"You know, in that case we may just have a plan here," Harli said, the first hint of cautious excitement slipping into his voice. "We disable the cameras, and then hit them as hard and as fast as we can."

"I don't know," Matigo said doubtfully. "They're not going to just sit around being blind, you know. They have to have some backup system available."

"Of course they do," Harli said with a tight smile. "They've got those flying drones." He leveled a finger at Matigo. "Only the minute they open the hatches to send them out, we'll lob in a few bombs. Maybe some of the Qasamans' gas canisters, too."

"Won't do any good," Lorne told him. "The monitor room is part of the drone bay, but it's separated from that end by a big divider, glass or plastic, I'm not sure which. A bomb going off inside the hatch might damage a drone or two, but it'll be a pretty isolated effect. And gas won't do any good at all."

Harli swore under his breath. "But damn it all, the thing's a
hatch
," he growled. "A hatch they're going to just open up for us. There has to be a way to turn that to our advantage."

"Of course there is," Siraj said.

Everyone looked at him. "And?" Harli prompted.

"A bomb or a canister will not work," Siraj said calmly. "We must therefore send a man."

"That's a nice thought," Harli said. "Unfortunately, our spookers won't go that high, and it's too far for even Cobras to jump."

"Not so fast," Paul said, looking up at the trees towering over them. "What if we started the jump from halfway up a tree?"

"Too unstable a launch position," Matigo said. "Besides, any tree close enough to have a clear shot at the hatch will be visible from the ground. We'd never get high enough before we were spotted and shot."