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Something that activated his combat reflexes, instead of the demand to surrender.
Kaczmarczyk's head whipped up as the hissing, supersonic " Crack-crack-crack! " of a firing pulser came from the direction of the ridgeline. His armor's sensors instantly identified it as the product of a M32a5 pulse rifle on full auto, and he swallowed a mental curse. So much for giving the other side a chance to surrender first!
"Hawk— Mike-Alpha!" a voice his armor's HUD tagged as one of First Squad's riflemen came up on his com. "Hawk-Mike-One, Pandora. Pandora! "
Kaczmarczyk's concern about timing and surrender demands disappeared abruptly.
"All Hawks, Hawk-Mike-Alpha!" he snapped. "Pandora! I say again, Pandora! Case Zulu! I say again, Case Zulu is now in force!"
Taluqdar heard the Skipper, but as far as he was concerned, Case Zulu had applied from the instant his conscious thoughts caught up with his reflexes and recognized the weapon mounted on the platform railing as a plasma rifle.
It shouldn't have been there. There shouldn't have been any plasma rifles on Kornati, aside from a very small number held by the System Defense Force, all of which had been positively accounted for. But there it was, and even before the warning had gone out to the rest of the platoon, Taluqdar was placing the breaching charge on the floor of the log platform, which was also the roof of the bunker beneath.
He slapped the shaped ring charge into place, thumbed the detonator, and stepped back as far as the platform would allow. Five seconds later the charge detonated with a loud " Whumpf! " which blew a gaping opening through the heavy logs. Taluqdar tossed a frag grenade through for good measure, waited for it to detonate, and then dropped through feet-first in pursuit.
Aboard the second pi
He knew the Marines hadn't really expected to face modern, off-world weapons any more than he had. But Kaczmarczyk and his people were professionals. They'd allowed for it in their pla
They were no longer there to apprehend; they were there to "neutralize."
To destroy.
Jezic closed his eyes briefly, praying that at least some of the people down there-people who had to be terrorists, if they had off-world weapons, however they'd gotten them-would be fast enough to surrender while they were still alive."
Drazen Divkovic, "Brother Dagger," rolled out of his bunk, clawing his way frantically up out of the depths of sleep. The incredible volume of the surrender demand had penetrated into the warren of underground bunkers and passages which had been built long before the National Reformation Party had been transformed into the Freedom Alliance of Kornati. But he'd only begun to rouse when the first explosions began.
How? How?! If Camp Freedom had been spotted when the off-world weapons were actually landed, it would have been hit then , not three nights later! And how could they have-
"Drazen! Drazen! " It was Jelena Krleza, his second-in-command, screaming through the open door. "We're under attack!" she a
Drazen's heart seemed to stop. Manties? Manticorans?
It couldn't be. It simply could not be! But it was, and he cursed himself for not having set up some sort of self-destruct. But this site had been here so long, been so secure. He hadn't been able to believe it had been compromised, not after they'd landed the weapons and no one had even blinked! Only now-
"Get your weapons!" he bellowed. "Get your weapons! Man your positions!"
He snatched up the belt-fed grenade launcher he'd chosen as his own personal weapon and dashed for the door, wishing with all his heart that he'd had the opportunity to actually practice with it.
Second Squad was in assault configuration. Its regular plasma rifles had been replaced with heavier weapons, which were normally crew-served. Its riflemen had traded in their usual pulse rifles for heavy tribarrels fed from five thousand-round, backpack tanks of alternating HE and armor-piercing ammunition.
Now Second Squad went to Case Zulu, and the plasma rifles fired. The camouflaged door to the underground vehicle ramp was only earth-covered logs, less than a half-meter thick. It simply vanished, and a tornado of tribarrel fire ripped through the opening. Grenades followed, and the squad's first section went in behind them, charging into the inferno of exploding fuel tanks and blazing vehicles, tribarrels ready.
First Squad's second fire team looked for a way to dump the sleeping gas into the ventilation system, but there were no intakes. All they had was the exhaust from the system, and they moved swiftly to their alternate assigned role under Case Zulu, deploying rapidly outward to take over the perimeter while Second Squad broke in through the vehicle entrance. Even as they did, Sergeant Cassidy's team went up the ridge in the long, flying leaps of their jump gear, and more breaching charges thundered as they blew their way in through the sides of the tower/bunker and followed Private Taluqdar down into the bowels of the installation beneath.