Hammerjack (54 page)

M
ARC
D
.
G
ILLER
wrote his first science-fiction novel at the tender age of sixteen, with the certainty of fame and riches before him. When that plan didn’t work out he went to college, earning a bachelor of science degree in journalism from Texas A&M University.

Never cured of the writing bug, he tried a few other genres—horror, thriller, historical fiction—when a script he wrote for
Star Trek: The Next Generation
earned him a chance to pitch stories for the show.

Though none of those stories aired, that experience made him more determined than ever to keep writing. He fired off a few more novels and screenplays until
Hammerjack
finally caught the attention of Bantam Spectra. This is his first published work.

Over the years, Marc has worked as a photographer, producer, computer trainer, and even had a one-night stint as a television news reporter. For the last five years, he has been manager of information systems for a Tampa law firm.

Marc makes his home in the Tampa Bay area of Florida, where he lives with his wife, two children, and a furry golden retriever.

Think you’ve reached the end?
This is only the beginning . . .
Read on for a special sneak peek at the next thrilling read from Marc D. Giller

PRODIGAL

Coming Summer 2006
From Bantam Spectra

PRODIGAL

on sale summer 2006

Lea Prism took measure of herself the way she always did—in fleeting glimpses, caught by accident, off some reflective surface that obscured her face in shadow. Tonight it was a window, her face flanked by pinpoint stars and glowing LEDs, the flood of virtual monitors elongating her features in a trick of the light. As much as she avoided herself, when caught like this she would always pause to consider the person staring back at her. It was a mission ritual—a sideways glance, just to see how much she had changed since the last time.

Outwardly, there wasn’t much. An
Inru
blade had grazed Lea’s neck some months ago, leaving a thin scar that trailed along her jaw line, but everything else was the same. With her long blond hair pulled back into a ponytail and her green eyes narrowed to a scowl, the scar made her appear harsh—which was why she had decided against having it removed. Inwardly, however, that scar concealed some deeper wounds, not the least of which was the memory of what she had done to the
Inru
bitch who cut her. That day had marked the beginning of the spiral—and Lea’s first realization of how far down she would have to go.

That’s how they get you,
a trusted voice had once warned her.
You just wake up one morning and you’re one of them. After that, you can’t go back.

Worse still, Lea now understood that she didn’t even have the will to try. The life was the only thing that stirred her passions. The job was her only purpose.

And the kill,
she added.
What are you when that’s your only kick?

A spot of turbulence jolted her out of that thought. Lea grabbed the nearest handhold out of reflex, so accustomed was she to the bucking of the deck beneath her feet. It seemed like she had already spent a lifetime in the air—most of it aboard heavy transports like this, sealed within cramped quarters rife with the taste of adrenaline. After more than fifty combat drops, she had developed a serious taste for it.

“CIC,” Lea heard her pilot say, the message conveyed by her earpiece. “We’re crossing the Old Federation border now. Estimate thirty minutes to target.”

“Acknowledged,” she replied. “Keep it dark up there, guys. You know the drill when we’re operating outside of jurisdiction.”

“When are we ever
in
jurisdiction?”

Lea smiled. Even though Russia was technically part of the Incorporated Territories, there were still a lot of military freelancers in the former republics who made sport out of shooting down stray aircraft. “Just do the flying and let me worry about the travel arrangements,” she said gamely.

“Next time, maybe the bad guys will hole up someplace nicer.”

“Roger on that, Skipper.”

Lea closed off the channel, turning around to confront the intense but controlled activity in the Critical Information Center. At one time an empty cargo hold, the space was now crammed with rows of interface consoles, tracking nodes, and communications equipment: everything required to coordinate a complex mobile insertion. Manning the stations was a small crew of men and women wearing the black and gold uniform of Technical Branch. Independent of Corporate Special Services, T-Branch was an elite unit comprised of personnel selected by Lea herself—a hedge against the split loyalties and infighting that plagued other security agencies. That autonomy had also spared her from having to deal with the layers of civilian bureaucracy at CSS—not to mention an entrenched command structure that still viewed her as an enemy.

For that reason, among others, Lea eschewed the uniform, even though she held the commissioned rank of major as a condition of her job. She had always been wary of working with the big guns, based on her own experience with the kind of mercenaries CSS employed; and it had taken her a while to recruit people who fit into her command style, which prized careful thought over blind obedience. In time, though, Lea had come to think of the team as an extension of herself—which included her cunning, her instincts, and sometimes even her rage. It was their work, more than anything, that had assured her reputation as a corporate spook.

You mean your reputation as an
Inru
nightmare
.

Lea studied the glint of her quicksilver blade. A non-regulation weapon, it had saved her life at one time—and since then, she had never entered battle without it. She stowed the blade in the leg compartment of her body armor, then headed toward a rising fracas at the back of the CIC. There, five members of her advance team were engaged in a game of breakneck poker, their voices rising and falling in a familiar chorus as the cards flew around a pile of money that had accumulated on the deck. Epithets seared the air like a volley of pulse fire, back and forth with the turning of each card, while the players fell one by one. Not even their own armor could protect them from the dealer—a skinny kid with fast hands and kinetic eyes, who radiated a confidence that didn’t know when to quit.

“Hey, Pallas,” Lea told him. “Just make sure the house gets ten percent, okay?”

The kid flashed her a knowing grin.

“With this bunch,” Pallas scoffed, “you’ll have to wait until payday.”

Lea shook her head, barely concealing her affection for him. Alex Pallas was a natural hammerjack: cool and creative, but too cocky to appreciate danger when it was staring him in the face. That he was fleecing five armed commandos was a case in point. It was the same attitude that had gotten him kicked out of MIT, after the board of regents discovered he had been looting the university’s research budget to finance his high-stakes gambling excursions. That Pallas had turned a handsome profit didn’t impress the disciplinary board, but it had impressed Lea. The kid may have been a liar and a thief, but his game was always honest.

Pallas dealt out a quick hand of five-card stud, while Lea heard a baritone voice growling behind her. “One of these days,” it said, “that boy is going to get himself launched ass-first out of the back of this transport.”

Lea looked back to find the last member of the advance team sauntering up to her. Eric Tiernan was pure T-Branch: tall and angular, with a seasoned toughness that telegraphed his rank even more than his lieutenant’s bars. As squad commander, he was in charge of the tactical aspects of the team’s missions. He was also Lea’s executive officer.

“Relax, Tiernan,” she said. “He’s going easy on them.”

Pallas threw down an ace to match the other one he had showing.

“I can see that,” the lieutenant replied.

Lea brushed off Tiernan’s remark, but also took that as her cue. “Stations, people,” she ordered. “Pre-op briefing in one minute.”

The advance team jumped into action, throwing their cards down and scooping up what was left of their money. They then filed over to the weapons lockers, where they loaded up on all the gear Tiernan had speced out—pulse rifles, flash grenades, stun pistols, plus the integrators Lea had designed for this mission. Their rowdy swagger had disappeared, replaced by the cool professionalism of a combat unit.

Pallas, meanwhile, remained sitting on the deck. As Lea looked back at him, she saw his head shaking mournfully.

“You really know how to hurt a guy, boss,” he said.

“You have no idea,” Lea retorted.

She helped Pallas up, and walked with him toward an imaging station at the center of the CIC. Pallas plugged himself into the interface, and within moments a three-dimensional map of Ukraine sublimated out of the hazy mist that hovered over the console. A red line cut a slash across the country, following the transport’s approach from the Black Sea. A blinking graphic showed their current position near the city of Cherkasy, while a blue arrow pointed out their projected course—straight toward the upper bend of the Dnipro River. Their target was a restricted zone near the southern border of Belarus, an area of rolling hills that grew larger on the display as Pallas zoomed in on it.

Lea gave her people a few moments to absorb the image as they gathered. Tiernan assumed his place at her side, while the rest of the advance team formed a circle around the display.

“Patch in latest orbital pass,” she told her hammerjack, who jacked into a satellite feed of the target area and positioned it over the display. High-res images assembled into a mosaic of visual and thermal elements, smeared by the telltale blur of creeping radiation.

“Twelve hours ago,” Lea began, “we received some intel that points to significant
Inru
activity. It seems that after prolonged conflict with our team, their operational cells are starting to get a little desperate.”

That statement brought a wave of approval from her audience. From the start, Lea had been single minded in her dealings with the anti-technology cult—a pursuit that bordered on obsessive. Using a more extreme approach than her predecessor, she had pounded their infrastructure with virtual attacks, drying up their finances and material support. After that, she went after the
Inru
leadership itself, targeting them personally in a series of relentless strikes. In a matter of months, Lea had effectively decapitated the major cells, pushing them even further underground where they could do little but stir up some minor trouble. As for their leaders, most of them were now either dead or rotting in some Collective gulag.

Most,
she reminded herself,
but not all
.

Lea chewed on that thought before continuing. “Analysis based on my information points to an
Inru
summit. Some kind of high-level gathering of the surviving leadership—probably to discuss a new, larger strategy against the Collective. CSS has been wondering when they might pool their remaining resources to mount some kind of counterstrike. If what we’re hearing is true, they could be very close to making that happen.”

“What’s the source of this intel?” one of the commandos asked.

Lea hesitated for a moment before giving her answer.

“Intercepted communications,” she said evasively.

An exchange of muttered comments arose around the table, a familiar reaction on the squad’s part. Lea was always secretive about how she got her information, choosing to compartmentalize intelligence operations to the non-tactical members of her team. She knew it spooked them—not because of her methods, but because she was almost never wrong. In their view, Lea was almost clairvoyant when it came to the enemy.

If they only knew.

“SIGINT has been pretty flaky for a while,” Tiernan pointed out. “The
Inru
have been putting out a lot of false information since they got wind we compromised their networks. What are the chances this is just comm chatter designed to throw us off?”

Lea gave Pallas a nod, and allowed him to go first.

“We picked up some weird inclusions in Axis traffic,” the hammerjack said, seeming to enjoy himself. “Most secure communications are condensed into proprietary tokens, which means you can backtrace them to their source by parsing the routing code. CSS keeps a record of these codes, so they can listen in on pirate traffic, unauthorized exchanges, whatever pisses them off. Lea happened to notice a couple of stray tokens originating from some Port Authority nexus, so she had me check them out. Turns out they’re not stray after all—they’re
repeating
at regular intervals, using some custom algorithm designed make it look random.”

“Burst communications,” Tiernan decided.

“Give the man a cigar,” Pallas said. “The
Inru
were using the North American Pulser Grid as a transmission medium—modulating photons into carrier streams, then encoding their messages with some routing key I’d never seen before.”

“How did you crack the key?”

Pallas tossed a sideways glance at Lea.

“I found it while running some permutations through a CSS computer,” she said—an honest answer, though not even close to the whole story. “After a couple of cycles, it came up with a mathematical constant: the decay rate of heliox emissions.”