Desperate Measures Read online

  She spun around the corner to squeeze off a burst and immediately ducked back behind the wall. The torch dragon fired twice and reduced the amount of corner she could hide behind. Jia hissed in pain.

  Erik took his opportunity clearing his own corner to confirm the location of the bot before hurling his grenade and hurrying back behind the wall. A round whizzed by his head; he didn’t want to test the effectiveness of the helmet.

  The hallway lit up with the explosion, but any pride in the attack vanished as the bot fired twice more, once toward Erik and once toward Jia. He ducked around the corner for less than a second to confirm the position and damage to the torch dragon.

  Though there were some scorch marks on the body, the bot had closed in and was otherwise undamaged. Erik didn’t stay exposed long enough to confirm much more.

  “It must be a T903,” Jia muttered as she crouched.

  “Huh?”

  “They’ve got an experimental anti-grenade point-defense system,” she explained ruefully. “So much for taking us alive.”

  “Everything’s got a weakness,” Erik countered. “That thing can’t be perfect.”

  “It’s ironic, actually. It’s got an even more restricted angle of fire than King Sentries and weaker armor on the bottom. If we could get past the cannon and keep mobile, we could probably take it out with sustained AP fire.” Her voice trailed off, her breathing labored.

  “What’s wrong?”

  She pointed to a hole in her vest and a round flattened against her chest. “It didn’t make it through, but it still hurts.”

  “I know the feeling.” Erik replaced his current magazine with AP rounds. “So, we’ve got to charge this bastard and light him up while we’re right next to him.”

  “That cannon isn’t rapid-fire, but it packs a punch.”

  “I know.” Erik grinned. “All we have to do is not die.”

  “Oh. Is it that simple?” Jia commented as she swapped in an AP magazine. “That should be our plan every time.”

  “If I go first, I can take the brunt of it and give you time to close the distance. You’re more agile than me, and you’ve studied the bot.”

  She hissed when her body twitched. “This plan is insane.”

  “As compared to most of our plans?” he asked her.

  “True enough,” she agreed. “Stupid Wednesdays.”

  More torch dragon rounds blasted off chunks of the wall. It was closing the distance, judging by the sound of its pointed legs on the metal floor and its firing.

  “We could try retreating and finding our way out of the building some other way,” Jia suggested.

  Erik shook his head. “Emma’s not going to be able to stop every drone or vehicle that might come to investigate the MX 60 next to the building, and the longer we wait, the more surprises might show up.”

  Jia stood from her crouch and blew out a breath. “You sure about this?”

  As if answering her, two loud thuds echoed from behind them in the distance.

  “Yeah.” Erik nodded. “I’m more sure about this than waiting. Ready?”

  “Ready,” Jia replied.

  “Three, two, one.”

  Erik roared in defiance and jumped around the corner. He didn’t bother firing, instead concentrating on jerky and erratic movement. His efforts paid off, with the first torch dragon shots missing but almost skimming his armor, they were so close.

  Jia emerged from her cover without doing a barbarian impression. She sprinted forward, staying near the wall. The bot ignored her and continued to shoot at Erik.

  Sharp pain suffused his thigh when a round struck his armor there, but he kept up his movements. Fire blazed through his left arm as another shot ripped through the tactical suit and grazed the limb.

  The torch dragon advanced, undulating like a metal wave. Erik continued barreling forward, ignoring the pain. Next time, he was bringing a rocket launcher. Screw this sneaking around.

  Now only a couple of meters away and hugging the wall, Erik escaped the next shot from the torch dragon. The round pierced the wall behind him. The bot turned toward Jia, not that far behind Erik on the opposite side of the wall and fired again, but it was too late.

  It thrashed, its AI understanding it had no clear shot. Jia threw herself to the ground sliding feet-first and pointed her rifle. She didn’t hold the trigger down or scream out a challenge; she aimed, waited, and took careful but quick single shots as she moved down the length of the torch dragon’s body.

  Erik aimed near the head and fired a burst, hoping to distract the bot. It whipped its rear body at him, slamming him against the wall before rounding on Jia. She fired four more times, and the body thrashed even harder.

  Jia hopped to her feet and reloaded.

  Erik ignored his pain and held down his trigger, emptying his magazine into the nearby head. Sparks and metal flew as his bullets perforated the bot’s barrel.

  Jia circled the trunk, avoiding its legs as it thrashed and again chose careful shots. Erik could see now she was targeting certain leg junctions.

  He avoided a stab from a torch dragon leg with a quick jump to the side and reloaded. He aimed, then raked the side farthest from Jia with bullets while she continued her precision work. The surgeon and the butcher might have different jobs, but they both knew how to handle sharp instruments. The torch dragon collapsed to the ground, dark smoke rising from different spots on its body and pieces of metal littering the hallway.

  Erik didn’t take the time to offer any triumphant observations.

  He hurried forward, heading for the intersection that would take them back to their entrance window. Fiery pain suffused through his side, and blood dripped to the floor with each step. He wasn’t sure when the torch dragon had nailed him, but the bot had managed to get through the suit. At least it was a clean through-and-through.

  Jia followed him, almost shoulder to shoulder. She wasn’t bleeding that he could see, but there were crushed rounds embedded in her suit and at least one hole.

  “Almost there,” Jia offered through clenched teeth. “Assuming no one shot Emma down while we were playing in here.”

  Erik let out a grim chuckle. “Something to look forward to.”

  He let out a shout after they turned the corner. The window was open, and the MX 60 hovered in front. They continued their desperate sprint. The now-familiar sound of torch dragon legs striking the hard floor of the hallway filled the air right behind them.

  “Both of you run along the wall,” Emma transmitted.

  They must have been close enough to beat the jamming, or she was using the laser comm. Erik didn’t care. He was glad to hear her voice and complied with her order.

  The bottom of the MX 60 slid open, the turret dropped, and the weapon roared to life, spewing its heavy, deadly rounds into the narrow hallway.

  Emma swept back and forth until Erik and Jia were at the window. Erik finally spared a glance backward. Another torch dragon lay on the ground smoking and disabled, massive holes riddling its body.

  “Sometimes it’s best to make your point loudly and lethally,” Emma offered, maneuvering the MX 60 next to the window with the doors open. “Even if that means announcing who you are.”

  Erik and Jia jumped into the vehicle, each grimacing from their wounds. The MX 60 pulled away, the turret retracting as Jia pulled off her helmet and readied a medpatch.

  “We didn’t get much time with the rod,” Jia mentioned with a grimace.

  “We didn’t get a huge amount before the jamming,” Malcom replied over the comm. “But at least it wasn’t as bad as Cairo.”

  “Says the guy safe in a hotel room across town,” Erik muttered.

  “At least I’m in town. Someone could come and kill me.”

  Erik took a deep breath as he applied a medpatch to his side wound. “I hope minutes of data-scraping will be enough. There’s no way we’re getting back in there after all this.”

  “Are you going to be okay for the party?” Jia aske
d, her eyes half-closed, and her face pale. “I don’t think I have anything that won’t be under control with medpatches and a couple of days of rest.”

  Erik turned toward her, his brow wrinkled in disbelief. “We just got shot up, and you’re worried about your mom’s dinner party?”

  “We already canceled the last couple of times.” Jia hissed, then let out a deep breath. “She’ll get annoyed and suspicious.”

  Erik laughed, the pain now seeming distant. “Yeah, I should be okay. Let’s drop this stupid rod off tomorrow and get back to Neo SoCal.”

  “I’m excited to get back to Neo SoCal,” Malcolm offered with glee. “Camila’s back in town for a while.”

  Erik put a stop to his sudden excitement. “First, we need to drop it off with the local agent. You’re not going anywhere until we do.”

  * * *

  July 8, 2230, Wales, Cardiff, Red Dragon Inn

  The face of the dark-haired woman standing in front of the door contorted with displeasure. Erik already knew what the ID agent was going to say, but he’d long since learned letting angry people vent made the conversation go faster.

  He sat on the edge of his bed, shirt off, exposing the medpatches applied to his wounds. Jia watched the new arrival, her eyes narrowed in anticipatory irritation. Malcolm sat in a chair in front of his desk, eyes averted.

  Erik gestured to the data rod in her hand. “Like we said, not a full dump, but between the direct interface and what Emma yanked, it wasn’t like we didn’t get anything, Agent Davies.”

  “You weren’t supposed to make any damned noise,” the agent snarled. “Instead, you’ve riled up half the damned city. I had to fake a terrorist incident to keep the police from showing up.”

  “Oh, that was you? Nice. Thanks.”

  “I wondered if I was being too paranoid, but I wasn’t paranoid enough. I’ll have to do a lot of cleanup to bury the incident.” Agent Davies waved her hand dismissively. “Was there really no other way you could have done this, other than being loud?”

  Erik offered her a slight grin. “I think Alina hired us because we’re loud.”

  Agent Davies scoffed. “You know that even with ID help, you’re not always going to get away cleanly. Sometimes things will catch up with you, like your enemies.”

  Jia stepped toward the woman. “What did you expect us to do? Die?”

  She quieted at a slight shake of the head from Erik.

  “I expected you to be more professional,” Agent Davies replied.

  Erik shrugged. “This is how we do things. We tried to keep it quiet. It didn’t happen. As for our enemies, if they want to come looking for us, that’s a good thing.”

  She asked, “How is that a good thing?”

  “Because it saves us the trouble of looking for them,” Erik offered in a low, threatening tone.

  Agent Davies wrinkled her nose and tucked the rod into her pocket. “You’re going to get yourselves killed. You know that?”

  “Not before we take down the conspiracy.”

  Agent Davies opened the door and turned around. “I sincerely hope never to see you again.”

  She stepped through and closed the door.

  Malcolm clapped once. “I don’t think she likes you.”

  “You figure?” Erik snickered.

  Chapter Five

  Julia lightly stepped across the loading platform leading from the floor of the hangar to the top deck of the Beidou. She’d considered a larger ship, but that brought complications. Something smaller was easier to land in most environments and situations.

  Flexibility was its own strength.

  It didn’t matter now. She needed to leave Earth. She’d been foolish to linger, even more so after she’d gone out of her way to warn Shoji. A woman who didn’t take the advice she offered others moved past mere foolishness to outright stupidity.

  The issue went beyond her life. Necessity was a relative consideration, often shaped by arrogance rather than truth. If she died on Earth, the future would be imperiled. Gambling with her future because she wasn’t prepared to trust all her underlings was, in a word, pathetic.

  Micromanagement, arguably, was her one true weakness. The Last Soldier and the Warrior Princess—if they knew who she was, they would have already blasted through her villas and mansions or be chasing her through space like bloodhounds.

  They’d learned too much. Technically, and so had the Intelligence Directorate. She’d lost a half-dozen agents to the ID in the last two months, and though the other members of the Core wouldn’t admit it, she knew they’d lost people as well. Their control over key portions of the government was slipping.

  New strategies were needed.

  Julia entered the open airlock and nodded to one of her uniformed crew members, a pilot. He bowed his head in reverence.

  “Is everything prepared?” she asked.

  “Yes, Miss Caldo,” the pilot replied. “All supplies are loaded, and we’ve plotted an HTP schedule that will get us to New Pacifica at maximum speed. We’re doing our final security sweeps per your instructions, but I anticipate we will take off in less than twenty minutes.”

  “Good.” Julia offered him a quick nod before moving into an adjoining passageway.

  There was no point in telling him to hurry, given she had wasted days already. The only thing she could not understand was why no one else was taking this as seriously. Shoji was a fool. With the latest ID raid on Pwyll Tower, it was more important than ever for members of the Core to shift to a defensive posture.

  For the first time in decades, their enemies were ahead of them. The Core needed time to gather their forces and split the opposition, military, intelligence, and freelance. It was time to revisit some of their earlier strategies.

  To bring unity, first they would need to sow disunity.

  However, before anything else, strategic repositioning was necessary. While they didn’t know enough about the limitations of the jump drive, putting ten light-years between her and her worst enemies was a comfortable cushion.

  Making her way down the passages of the ship toward her main cabin, Julia focused on the different plans she needed to manage. It wasn’t impossible to operate a personal empire remotely, just more complicated. Add to that a need for secrecy, and it went from child's play to something one needed to focus on.

  It might be decades off, but the future where she could rule openly would be a relief. The effortless efficiency would be glorious.

  Part of her wondered if leaving on the ship would make her more vulnerable. Shoji might be less a fool than a pragmatist. Sophia would not have been killed if she’d remained in her villa. All the power and influence of a member of the Core didn’t mean much if they couldn’t fly with a battlefleet to protect them in space.

  Their greatest advances had been taken from the Hunters, but the ancient aliens were as absent as the Navigators they’d purged from the galaxy.

  No, she had learned from Sophia’s mistake.

  Her ship was well-armed for its size, and she was being accompanied by other ships piloted by some of her most trusted people. All of them together would not easily fall to a surprise attack by anyone.

  Besides, the Last Soldier and the Warrior Princess would need to know where she was going to finish her off, and for all their skill, fortune, and damnable luck, there was no evidence they did.

  Julia stopped in front of her main cabin, frowning at a slight smudge on the access panel. It was always disappointing when staff didn’t pay attention to details. Punishing them severely at the start of the trip would be bad for morale, but she wouldn’t let it pass if this type of lapse continued.

  Julia opened the door with a press of her hand against the panel. The vast cabin was almost identical to one of her favorite rooms on Earth. Sprawling holographic displays along the walls gave the impression it was perched atop a bluff overlooking the Atlantic Ocean. The setting sun painted the simulated sky orange, red, and pink—beautiful, if fake.

  Som
e might say the same thing about her.

  Long trips required the human mind to be anchored to where they’d come from. It didn’t matter if she was far more than human. The scenes calmed what was left of her.

  Despite the size of the room, it was close to empty, other than her magnificent bed in the corner and a small obsidian desk near the bed.

  A desk she’d had custom-made from obsidian formed during the last eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 2144. Everyone in her place would need a reminder of how weak one was before the power of Mother Nature.

  The Core was on the precipice of conquering life and death. To win that fight would be the beginning of controlling all of nature. Humanity had tried to slay their gods, confident in their science, so new ones would be born from ancient technology far beyond them.

  Julia headed toward the desk but stopped at the sound of a light knock. She turned, one eyebrow raised. “Come in.”

  The door slid open, and a young man stepped through with a smile. His uniform marked him as one of her stewards, but she didn’t recognize him. That was unusual for crew aboard the ship, but she had allowed more recent autonomy in personal promotion and reassignment.

  Julia frowned. Despite those allowances, she’d made it clear that only her most trusted crew were supposed to accompany her on this particular trip. Autonomy didn’t justify flagrant violations of her orders.

  “What?” Julia barked. She didn’t know who was responsible, so she would take it out on the closest target.

  “Did you want a meal after we take off, ma’am?” the man asked, closing the door behind him.

  “No. I’m fine.” Julia kept slight venom in her tone to test the man. “What’s your name?”

  “Jamieson, ma’am. I was transferred to the yacht yesterday.” He smiled brightly. “I’m very excited about the opportunity to see New Pacifica.”

  Julia narrowed her eyes. “You are?”

  “I’ve never left the Solar System. This is my first time going into space. I thank you for the opportunity to serve you during this fascinating time.”

  Everyone on board knew they were taking a long trip, but only the pilots knew their destination. Jamieson might have overheard, but her loyal pilots had been with her for years, and unlike some of her subordinates, they understood respecting her orders.