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His pulse ticked faster as he reached the high-rise. It was of Pre-Siege construction, but it had been modernized, and he paused under the force field roof protecting the front entrance. He wiped rain from his face with just the right gratitude for the respite while Alice and Tom closed up on his heels, and the corner of his eye saw Yance and Pete arriving from the opposite direction. The five of them came together by obvious coincidence, and then all of them turned and stepped through the entrance as one.
There were no security perso
Stevens grunted, jerked the ski mask over his face, and snatched out his own weapon, and the well-drilled quintet raced for the transit shafts.
Graywolf stiffened at the implant signal. Clumsy, he thought with a hungry smile. Obviously their information had been less complete than they'd thought, for they'd missed three separate sensors.
Nine more Security Ministry agents stood as one behind nine closed doors as Graywolf cradled his hyper rifle and moved to the window.
Stevens led his followers from the transit shaft, and they spread out behind him, hugging the walls, weapons poised. His own eyes were fixed on the door at the end of the corridor, yet his attention roamed all about him, acute as a panther's after so many months at the guerrilla's trade.
They were half way down the hall when nine doors opened as one.
"Lay down your weapons!" a voice shouted. "You're all under arr—"
Stevens spun like a cat. He heard Yance's enraged bellow even as he tried to line up on the uniformed woman in the doorway, but his people's reactions didn't match their murderousness, for none were enhanced. His barking automatic blasted a chunk from the wall beside the door, and then a hurricane of grav gun darts blew all five terrorists into bloody meat.
Graywolf heard the thunder and shrugged. They'd had their chance.
He held his own position and watched the getaway flyer slide to a neat halt. It was right on the tick, and he aligned his hyper rifle on the drive housing before he triggered his com.
"Land and step out of the flyer!" he told the pilot.
There was a split-second pause, and then the flyer leapt ahead with blinding acceleration. But unlike Stevens' killers, Graywolf was fully enhanced, and the exploding flyer gouged a fifty-meter trench in the street below as its drive unit vanished into hyper-space.
Lawrence Jefferson completed his report with profound satisfaction.
He'd never really been happy about penetrating security on Birhat. The distance was too great, and any communication with agents there was vulnerable to interception. But that was no longer necessary; his plans had matured to a point at which it no longer mattered what the military did, and he controlled Earth's security forces from his own office.
His lips pursed as he considered his intertwining strategies. His latest ploy should remove Francine from any suspicion. She'd openly become the Church of the Armageddon's leader, but as one who denounced the Sword of God's fanaticism. Her masterful pleas for nonviolence only underscored the Sword's growing ferocity, yet she was emerging as a moderate, and Horus and Ninhursag were obligingly accepting his own "astonished" conclusion that she was someone they could work with against the radicals.
Now his security forces' defeat of the Sword's attempt on her life would make her whiter than snow. He'd wondered if he was being too clever, for it would never have done for any of Stevens' people to be taken alive and disclose the truth about Imperial Terra, but he'd chosen his agents with care. All were utterly loyal to the Imperium... but each had lost friends or family to the Sword. He was certain they'd tried to take the terrorists alive—and equally certain they hadn't tried any harder than they had to. And, of course, he'd known he could trust Stevens' fanatics to resist.
He was just as happy to have that loose end tied, for Ninhursag's decision to flood Earth with ONI agents worried him, especially since he didn't know why she was doing it. Her official explanation might be the truth, for reinforcing Earth Security and opening a double offensive against the Sword made sense. He didn't like it, but it did make sense. Yet he wasn't quite convinced that was her real motive. At first he'd been afraid she was somehow onto him, but five months had passed since she'd started, and if he had, indeed, been her objective, he'd be in custody by now.
Whatever she was up to, it enforced greater circumspection upon him. Since taking over from Gus, Jefferson had found it expedient to make adjustments in certain background investigations, culling his own cadre of fully-enhanced perso
Not that it worried him too much. His plans were in place, centered upon the crown jewels of his subversions: Brigadier Alex Jourdain and Lieutenant Carl Bergren. Jourdain's high position in Earth Security made him invaluable as Jefferson's senior field man and cutout, but Bergren was even more important. That lowly officer was the key, for he was a greedy young man with expensive habits. How Battle Fleet had ever let him into uniform, much less placed him in such a sensitive position, passed Jefferson's understanding, but he supposed even the best screening processes had to fail occasionally. He himself had stumbled upon Bergren almost by accident, and he'd taken pains to conceal Bergren's... indiscretions, for thanks to Lieutenant Bergren, Admiral Ninhursag MacMahan had just over five months to do whatever she was doing before she died.
Senior Fleet Captain Antonio Tattiaglia looked up in surprise, trowel in hand and his newest rose bush half-planted, as Brigadier Hofstader entered his atrium. Hofstader was a small, severe woman, always immaculate in her black-and-silver Marine uniform, and this hasty intrusion was most unlike her.
"Yes, Erika?"
"Sorry to bother you, Sir, but something's come up."
Tattiaglia hid a sigh. Hofstader had commanded Lancelot's Marines for over a year, and she still sounded as if she were on a parade ground. The woman was almost oppressively competent, but he couldn't warm to her.
"What is it?"
"I believe we've just detected a Sword of God strike force en route to its target, Sir," she said crisply, and he forgot all about her ma
"Are you serious?"
"Yes, Sir. The sca
Hofstader had her expression well in hand, but excitement was burning through her professionalism for the first time since he'd known her.
"Have you alerted Earth Security?" he demanded, already trotting towards the transit shaft.
"No, Sir. Fleet Captain Reynaud informed ONI." She moved briskly at his side, and her smile was cold. "ONI has requested that we investigate."
"Hot damn," Tattiaglia whispered. They stepped into the shaft and it hurled them towards Lancelot's bridge. "Do we have something in position?"