Crossover (47 page)

But if Kresnov were to get herself killed, and die a hero ... God, she nearly hated herself for thinking it, but it would solve a lot of problems. Not the least of which being that, politically speaking, Kresnov could theoretically expect more support from the right-wing Progress Party than her own Union Party colleagues. And an awful lot of her own party would number themselves among the most seriously dissatisfied. By Christ, it was going to get complicated.

"Let's just get through the next 24 hours, shall we?" she replied finally, with a tired sigh. "It's going to be a nightmare few months ahead, whatever happens."

"Who'd we lose?" asked Petr Shimakov, striding into the plush coffee lounge. People lounged in chairs, weapons on laps, or leaned against the walls. The only light came from several small, shaded lamps. City light gleamed silver through the broad windows that counted for the far wall, towers and traffic. Here on the top level, the street was only six storeys below — disturbingly close, to Shimakov's thinking. But it was the place they had, and it would do.

"Schroeder," said Wong, a tired, cracked voice. Shimakov stared at him, a dark figure, slumped against the wall near the windows. Feeling a cold anger brewing. "Ramesh, Togodo, Pham. All confirmed."

"Fuck," Shimakov pronounced with controlled fury. Deathly silence in the room. "Was it the GI?" The dark shadow that was Wong nodded.

"I don't know what happened. But there was shooting on the roof about twenty seconds before zero-signal. We went early, did the deed with no help from the roof, chased some stragglers up the stairs ... and Togodo got hit. Right through the chest, real accurate. We just started shooting back ..." He shrugged. "Suppose we had more firepower. Skin was already real shot up. We hit him with a T-5 to be sure, finished off the last marks and got the hell out. Guess he bugged out on us. Schroeder said we should have whacked him after the big hit."

Shimakov stood silently in the middle of the room for a long time, unmoving. Thinking that something most certainly did not make sense. Thinking that the Skin just hadn't been smart enough to start a rebellion on his own ... and whatever he thought about GIs, they just didn't do that. They followed orders. Unless they got instructions from elsewhere.

Had they been doublecrossed? Had Dark Star given him different instructions? No damn way, The Skin had been as dangerous as any Skin was likely to get. It'd helped plan a damn good hit on the President's convoy — no way he or any FIA guy could have done the same, unfamiliar with GI capabilities and operating techniques as they were. It wouldn't have waited until such last-minute desperation before pulling a stunt like this — more likely it would have killed them all in their beds, hunted them down, if that had been its instruction. Or jumped out of the moving van and left a grenade behind.

It didn't make sense, that last-minute, foolhardy change of plans. And the Skin being dead did not make him any more comfortable with the situation. Dead or not, he felt edgy.

"I want full guard on this whole damn building," he told them coldly. "If you think you've got it locked tight now, lock it tighter. We're out of here in two hours, people. I've got the cars on the roof, just two more hours and we're headed out of this damn city. Let's not fuck it up now."

Night-tuned eyes watched through the windows as the agents climbed to their weary feet and moved out. Heat silhouettes on the darkened glass, human shaped, multiple shades of red and orange. One figure stood still in the centre of the room. Facing the window, as if seeing the dark, crouched figure who watched him from afar.

Finally, he turned and left the empty room. The eyes zoomed back a touch, scanning the building layout. Small luxury office building. Six storeys, tucked into the pleasant greenery of the Ringold commercial/residential district. Standard fare for Tanusha's multitude of small design and technology firms — specialised, wealthy and flexibly creative. A different style from the mega-conglomerates that populated the mega-rises. In Tanusha one did not need to be big to be successful.

Feelers raced down nearby links, probed security barriers, hightech and sensitive. Probed the layout, vision scanning through light reflective glass, making out shapes, patterns, supports and variations. More links found an architectural display site, open for public viewing ... found the designer name, and the layout in question, and found a near-match. Accounted for custom alterations ... and began to put together a picture.

More scanning, a fast zoom toward movement through lower windows. Noted the deployment. Noted the pair of large capacity aircars on the rooftop pads. And began summing the accumulation of security measures, their weak and strong points, probing cautiously, careful not to trigger any alarms.

Then, when the framework had been constructed, the whole assembled in a workable form, a new link opened. Communications. Within seconds it was answered.

Ibrahim recognised the signal immediately, and made a fast switch onto the frequency.

"Cassandra, where are you?" Urgently, as the CSA cruiser in which he was riding began its curving descent toward HQ, a short, four-minute flight from the Parliament. Overflew what looked like an open-air concert ablaze with waving spotlights that strobed the night sky and teeming crowds ... past midnight now, and still the city raged. For a moment there was no reply, only the distant, rhythmic thump from below beneath the thrumming whine of engines.

Then, "
I can solve your problem
." A soft, empty voice. Ibrahim stared ahead at the looming side of CSA headquarters. Growing larger, as the engines throbbed on a new, descending note and the horizon gently tilted.

"Cassandra," he tried, "where are you? Which problem?"

"
The problem
."

"Cassandra, why don't you just tell me ..."

"
It's going to happen, authorised or unauthorised. Which do you want
?"

Silence. Ibrahim closed his eyes, attempting calm. Weighing the options. Attempting dispassionate judgment. Uncertain if it was possible. He had been half expecting this call. Half hoping for it. And dreading it all the same. There were no good possibilities, only bad and worse. A balance of horror.

Another man might have questioned his faith and the God who presided over such futility. But Ibrahim knew that it was in such circumstance that Allah's presence could be most keenly felt. If the world were perfect, there would be no need for Paradise. If the world were perfect, there would be no need of Allah himself. Beyond the calming darkness behind his eyelids, Ibrahim thought of the teachings of his parents and grandparents. Of the wisdom of his God. And prayed that he, of humble thought and deed, should make the right decision in this moment of choice.

He thought of Neiland. The wreckage of aircars upon the Parliament wing rooftops. Bodies sprawled, hacked and shattered. Neiland herself nearly killed. Thought of more recent assassinations, of Chenkov Biomedical. Of Kresnov's dead friend. Of Kresnov herself and the horror she had suffered.

He had seen this coming. This decision. Kresnov's actions. If she went without approval, she would be a fugitive. That would hurt Neiland when news of Kresnov hit the media. Having placed trust in a fugitive GI who proved unstable. It was bad politics. As was capturing the FIA infiltrators, only to lose them as soon as the Earth Committee landed, and took them away for Federate justice. There was nothing for Tanusha there. Nothing for Callay. No justice. No satisfaction. No guarantee that it would not happen again. To do what they had done ... not just these individual FIA, but the FIA in entirety ... was unspeakable. It violated law, local and Federal. It violated decency. It violated sanity. For them to get away with it, even to live, and see a Federal jail cell for the rest of their days, would solve nothing. It did not punish the masterminds. They were untouchable, either way. But they needed a message. They needed to know what it cost. For everyone.

Morally, technically and politically, someone needed to pay.

"Do it," he said simply, in a calm, quiet voice.

"
Copy
." A brief, silent pause. "
Give my love to Vanessa
."

Silence again as the link went dead. The aircar cruised lower, locked into close range approach. Ibrahim gazed out at the gleaming blanket of lights and wondered if things had always been this way, in the end. The way of humans. And the way, sadly, of their Gods. For in the battle of good and evil, even Gods were, in the end, victims of circumstance.

CHAPTER 18

Petr Shimakov was bothered. He sat in the dark, surrounded by office equipment and blank display screens, darkly contemplating the night-time view of the city that had been his reluctant home for the past weeks.

As missions went, this one had not gone smoothly. He had lost people. More people than he, or his mission planners, had anticipated. The CSA were good ... he'd been warned so repeatedly in the preparatory briefings. But their abilities should have come to nothing if they were unable to trace the encryptions his team utilised to coordinate their activities about Tanusha. And they
had
been unable. Mostly. But still, with guesswork and ingenuity they had tracked centralised FIA activity to Tetsu Consolidated, had been tipped off to Renaldi's hideout at the Vista Hotel and had somehow found a way to implicate the Governor's Office so as to allow the Supreme Justice to overrule the Governor's assumption of power.

It was an unsettling number of things to have gone wrong. And now this, the fiasco at Centa Research, where the Command GI had abruptly gone nuts and killed his own people. The Centa vulnerability had been neutralised. Ninety-five percent of the listed, traceable vulnerabilities had been cleaned away. The rest, without their support structures, would fade and wither without notice. Overall, a successful mission. An achievement. But still it troubled him.

The CSA getting close was one thing. The GI going nuts was another. Both of them together was just plain unsettling. He couldn't see a connection. And was frustrated, even now, at the utter lack of intelligence they'd had of the CSA's operations ... it was impressive security, far more impressive than their contacts had led him to believe. He'd been promised leaks, insights into CSA investigative initiatives, data-trails. Someone, it seemed, had underestimated the strength of the emergency legislation that had come slamming down after the Parliament strike, and the civilian transparency it had removed from the CSA's operations. And, it seemed, underestimated the iron grip that Director Ibrahim held over the entire organisation.

Damn Ibrahim. His fist clenched against his thigh in frustration. The man had ruthless tendencies, for a civilian. He'd kept the CSA entirely isolated from outside influences and possible security leaks, no easy feat in a city like Tanusha. Now there was no clue as to whether the GI's alarming behaviour was somehow connected to CSA operations, or if they'd been infiltrated, or if it had been a League doublecross ... he just didn't know. He hated not knowing. It was his job to know. Everything.

Calm. He gazed out at the gleaming night and forced himself toward calm. Calm solved everything. Tape-teach, in early operational days, reinforced the fundamental importance of problem solving ... calm, he thought, and the reflexes kicked in, old and familiar, and not entirely his own. An implanted reflex. One learned to trust them, with experience. One learned the disaster of not trusting them and resolved to do better.

The calm helped him to think. And he saw the situation clearly enough. The mission was safe. He'd done a difficult job exceedingly well, as his training dictated. And he was not upset about the mission outcome. More about the losses. And the casualties inflicted. Images in news reports. Devastation at the Parliament, bodies strewn about. At Centa Research. At the homes of several of the lesser contacts — loose ends and security vulnerabilities — bodies still cooling, yet to be reported missing. Civilians all. League-inclined, to be sure. But civilians nonetheless.

And there was no avoiding it. For what they had gained, and what was at stake ... those lives lost seemed trivial by contrast, even his own, if that had been necessary. He sought no thanks for his work. The true heroes, he knew, rarely received the recognition they deserved. For the good of humanity, the Federation had to survive. Survival meant neutralising the GI threat. To neutralise it, one had first to understand it. The knowledge they had gained was now secure. The Tanushan operation would be wound up and operations shifted to regions of greater stability... all hell would assuredly break loose now in Tanusha, and further operations were no longer tenable in such an environment. But that, too, was part of the plan.

Shimakov exhaled hard, and gazed at the floor. His superiors in the Core had plans for everything. Plans within plans. Democracies were unstable. So too civilian societies in general. Tasked with their defence, knowledge and expertise needed security from such volatility. Guidance. The FIA provided such, safe from troublesome political meddlings. The greater good, so often lost in the pointless bickering of populist, localist politics.

If only, he thought, it needn't cost so much.

Home. He wanted to go home. To comfortable offices in Ventura One Station and the grand view of Earth from his living-room windows. To his wife and child, whom he had not seen in months, and had not spoken to of this mission for previous months before. Justine, an A-Level Intel herself, had not questioned. But Cynthia had.

"Why are you going away, Daddy?"

"To make the world a better place, sweetie. A better place for little girls to grow up in. A place where there still
are
little girls, where mechanised monstrosities haven't taken over because a group of people many lightyears away decided that real little girls were suddenly obsolete."

Or, at least, he'd wanted to say that. Security wouldn't allow it. But he believed it all the same, and believed it with a passion. His little Cynthia was waiting for him. He'd helped to make her future a brighter one. In just a few hours he was going home to see her again, and neither FIA nor League betrayals nor crazy, murderous GIs were going to stop him. He tapped his headset mike into life.

"Liu. Status." Static crackle — the connection was down. Damn com-gear, it'd been shorting out the last few days ... but it was necessary. With the CSA making progress with Tetsu encryption, network communication wasn't always safe any more. He switched frequencies. "Perez, Liu's com's down again. Go check it for him."

Nothing. "Perez?" The room was suddenly cold. An endless second seemed to linger into eternity, his mind abruptly racing, hand reaching unthinkingly for his rifle as he rose from the chair. Crazy GIs. Ambushes. Things that would make a GI turn. GI loyalty being lock solid and almost mechanical, he'd been assured so frequently in preparation ... and he knew, with a sudden, horrifying jolt, that he'd missed something, something right under his nose ...

"
Alarm Red!
" he yelled into the mike on general freq. "Everyone get the fuck up here
now
...!" A burst of gunfire from the floor above, shuddering impacts and the sound of things breaking. Return fire, multiple, abrupt bursts, voices yelling over the intercom as he bashed through the office door and onto the main office floor, multiple layers of glass working partitions across a broad space of desks and work terminals ... an explosion, and everything rattled.

"Top floor!" Shimakov roared into the pickup, rushing to a firing crouch behind a partition as an explosion shook the floor and rattled partition windows. "Get up here! Situation!"

"Sir," came a panicky voice back over the speakers, "I think it's just one person, it's come in from the roof..." indistinct scrabbling, "... that grenade might have got him, hang on ..." Silence for a short, heart-pounding moment. Shimakov knelt, braced his snub-rifle on the work desk, scanning through the maze of partitions, glass sheeting and office doorways.

"
Fu
—!" Explosion of shots and static, somewhere across the partitions, cutting off the horrified scream before it had even begun. N'Dulu fired, approximate targeting, fire ripping through temporary walls ...

"
Cease fire!
" Shimakov yelled, and N'Dulu paused, eyes wide and trembling. "No firing unless you have a clear target! Wong!"

"Coming across! People, crossfire, stagger your shots, he'll come through this way ..." Thunder of footsteps across the office space, figures moving fast, weapons ready.

"Who's in the way?!"

"Have we got clear fire?! Where's Andre ..." Roar of gunfire, partitions disintegrating.

"Movement at C-3, check your grids!" Shimakov braced and tracked, linkups illuminating the spot, flashing colour ... someone else fired,
spak! spak!
of bullets ripping soft surfaces and things breaking.

"Do you see him?" Shimakov shouted, no need for com-gear now, everyone on line of sight past the partitions and office gear ... more movement from behind as people arrived from downstairs ...

"There!" someone shouted, then a hail of fire, entire partition sections disintegrating, splinters and smoke clouding the air ... grenade explosion, entire desks flew skyward, fire and smoke blinded, and shots from a different angle through the smoke, fast, controlled bursts. Screams of agony and terror, a dark flash of movement that dove at impossible speed through the burning chaos, like a trick of the light... a body smacked through partitions in a hail of bloody fire, another cartwheeling in a spray of blood and tissue, limbs flailing.

Shimakov fired at the shadow's vicinity, as gunfire ripped and screamed all about and the orderly nature of things disintegrated like a haystack in a tornado. Teurez was beside him at one moment, firing madly, then collapsing like a bloody rag as an impossible, horrible precision found her from the middle of that killing hell and ripped her open. A body that might have been Wong's spun abruptly backward across a desktop and vanished from sight. N'Dulu thudded backward into a partition, slid bloodily down as something fast and dark, somewhere in that destructive madness, picked them off, one at a time in rapid succession. Someone ran and dove for new cover, another leapt a partition through the smoke and debris, people dodged and fought as best they could, trying desperately to survive the death that advanced upon them ... Another flash of movement across the floor, and then another scream, and voices yelling and screaming in total panic amid the ear-shredding racket of gunfire.

Grenades lobbed and the entire neighbouring section of office space exploded, the shockwave crushing everything that was not already smashed and desks and chairs flew through the air like missiles, crashing down like rain. Shimakov raised up ... and saw, in brain dazed slow-motion, a dark, human shape that ran through the burning fires, and hurdled the shattered wreckage, and fired with right-armed precision as it came on, one burst and Yelenova died, another burst and Chan punched backward ... it came on, eyes like fire, killing as it came, hair astrew and dark against a background wall of flame. Like a vision of hell.

Shimakov spun and ran so fast he was past the next partition and flying down the corridor before he even knew he'd gone. Half crashed into Aziz running in from an adjoining corridor, grabbed him and staggered onward toward the stairwell.

"Get the fuck out of here!" he screamed at Aziz, who saw the wild terror in his eyes and followed. Pelted full speed up the stairs and onto the roof, then sprinting across the pad, Shimakov fumbling at his belt control as the car doors swung upward and the control lights activated. Near the building's rear he saw a body ... Levarche, the first dead, before Perez and Liu ... the names assailed him, all dead, all dead so fast and so horribly, all his people ...

He hit the driver's seat so hard it hurt, hit the startup and prepped navcomp as the engines began their familiar building whine and Aziz hit the passenger seat, the doors beginning to close, so, so slowly...

"Come on!" he yelled at the car, at the numerics that flashed on the displays, green, stupid and uncomprehending of the mortal threat that loomed.

"Look!" shouted Aziz, pointing back across the pad, and Shimakov fumbled for his rifle, discovering in horror that he'd left it behind, forgotten in his mad escape. He looked through the side window and saw a figure coming toward them across the pad ... limping, he realised in gasping relief. One of theirs.

"Come on!" yelled Aziz. The figure limped on, trying desperately for speed as the engines approached operational volume, halfway across now and getting nearer ... going to make it, Shimakov thought desperately, wanting to wait for others but knowing it was impossible ...

Stutter of gunfire beyond the windows, the limping figure collapsed like a bundle of wet rags, and Aziz cried out in anguish. Beyond, at the top of the stairwell, a chilling dark figure stood, weapon pointed their way. Shimakov stared, waiting for the hail of bullets that would rip through the cabin and kill them both ... but nothing came. No violent death. Lights blinked green as the engines throbbed. The killer was out of ammo.

Shimakov hauled back on the controls, a throbbing whine as the lifters kicked in, and the cruiser began to rise. Aziz shouted warning, and from the corner of his eye, Shimakov saw a black streak headed their way, moving impossibly fast ... braced his arms and
thump!
, hit their side and the cruiser rocked. A crash from the rear, a fist smashing through the reinforced window, the cruiser losing altitude as it rocked, another crash and the rear door caved in. In the seat alongside, Aziz hauled his rifle about to angle behind Shimakov's seat.

Fired a long, thunderous burst through the wrecked door, the car shuddering as bullets tore through the side, earsplitting within the enclosed space ... Shimakov caught a glimpse in the rearview of the killer swinging away one-handed, avoiding the worst of the fire as Aziz dared not shoot near the rear engine mountings ... he renewed his efforts at the controls and then they were rising again.

Aziz ran out of ammunition and did a fast reload. Crash and lurch as another blow ripped through the door, and there was suddenly a hole. Weight tipped slightly as the killer reached in ... Aziz finished loading and fired again, point-blank. Thunder of impacts and the car rocked ... and free, suddenly, Aziz howling triumph, the killer nowhere to be seen, knocked flying by that final burst. The cruiser climbed higher and Shimakov spared a fast look around, searching for any trace of the death that stalked them. Saw nothing. No trace. Only an innocent, small, dark-metal object lying in the middle of the rear seat, and his exclamation of relief died a fast death upon his lips.