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"Paranoids," Braune murmured. "All of Aegis Mountain to protect them, and they need lasers too."
Caine shook his head. "They're not in Aegis," he said. "At least not in the base proper."
Braune frowned at him. "What do you mean? The outer door is gone—you can see that from here."
"The outer door wouldn't have been that hard to crack," Caine told him. "It's the barriers farther in that would give them trouble. But look at the placement of the lasers down there—they're set up to defend the encampment, not the tu
Alamzad eased up for a second look. "You're right," he agreed, settling back into the group. "Which means what we've got here is nothing more than a task force trying to get into Aegis without destroying it."
"Wonder why they're bothering," Colvin murmured. "Their technology level is essentially the same as ours."
"Probably better—they won the war, after all," was Braune's dry rejoinder. "Maybe there's something specific in there they want."
"Why not? There's apparently something in there we want," Pittman added, cocking an eyebrow at Caine.
"Yes, well, I think we've seen enough," Caine said, evading the other's unvoiced question. A
kilometer from a Ryqril base was no place to discuss their mission. "We know the Ryqril haven't gotten in the front door, and that we're not going to. Let's see if we can round it out as a perfect day by getting out of here without being caught."
The first hundred meters back down the hill were the most nerve-racking—more so than even the approach had been, as the thought of those lasers below added an extra dollop of caution to their crawling technique. But again, they might have been forest deer for all the notice they attracted, and within a few minutes they were heading back down the slopes toward the stream and their car.
The return trip took longer than the approach had. The inexact contours on the map and Caine's attempts to find an easier route conspired to shift them farther to the east than he'd intended, and by the time he realized his error they were already committed to what was becoming a very tricky slope indeed.
"Any idea where we are?" Pittman asked as they began working their way through a patch of small cacti around a steep-sided bluff.
"The road should be that way," Alamzad said before Caine could answer. "No real way we can miss it—it cuts directly across our path. The real question is how far we are from where we left the car."
"Not far at all," Caine told them, tapping the map. "If I'm right, the road is right around the bluff here—"
"And about four hundred meters down?" Colvin put in dryly.
"Something like that," Caine admitted. "But we'll come down right at the mouth of the creek we followed on our way up, if that makes you feel better."
"Shh!" Braune hissed suddenly. "I hear another car."
Not just another car, Caine realized as they all strained their ears, but another car on the stones beside the road... on the stones, and coasting to a halt.
There was no need for orders. Simultaneously, all five spread apart on the steep hillside into a loose stalking pattern, pulling sniper's slingshots from their packs as they did so. Whoever was down there, they'd found the team's car.
—
Five minutes of cautious movement brought them within sight of the scene, and if it wasn't as bad as Caine had feared, it was bad enough. A second car was pulled up to the bushes a dozen meters behind theirs, and three men were busy stripping off the camouflage netting. A fourth man was walking guard around the area, a compact machine pistol of some kind cradled in his arms.
Flechettes or slugs, probably, but either way clearly not one of Security's standard snub-nosed laser rifles. Whoever the intruders were, at least they weren't Security.
The team continued down the mountain, Braune and Pittman in the lead giving information on path and cover to the others via tingler. Below, the intruders had gotten the net off and began a thorough examination of their find. The supplies in the trunk seemed to surprise them, and there were a couple of intense discussions followed by uneasy glances at the surrounding hills. That was fine with Caine; the longer they took to make up their minds as to what they'd stumbled on, the better his chances of making sure they didn't keep it.
The intruders apparently had the same thought, and it took them only a couple of minutes to decide to take their new acquisition and run. But even as one of them twisted pretzel-fashion under the control panel and began the task of bypassing the starter lock, Caine's men reached position, and with only a few seconds' worth of rustling brush to warn them, the strangers were suddenly faced with a backpack-laden hiker strolling into sight.
"Hold it!" the man with the machine pistol snapped, swinging the weapon around to cover the newcomer. "What do you want?"
Caine froze, letting his mouth fall open with apparent shock. "Hey—take it easy, huh?"
One of the others stepped forward. "This your car?" he asked, gesturing toward it.
"No, hell no." Caine shook his head vigorously. "No, I'm just out for a hike. Uh—meeting someone upstream a ways in half an hour.
"Sure you are." The second man glanced back at the two by the car, who'd halted their own activities at Caine's approach. "Move our stuff to his car—it'll be better for the drop. Let's have the keys," he added, turning back to Caine.
"The keys? But I told you, it's not mine."
The other snorted with disgust and strode forward. Stepping behind Caine, he pulled off the backpack—
And with a crack like a stick on a ripe melon, the man with the machine pistol toppled backward, his weapon flying into the grass behind him.
The two at the car gaped... and Caine took a half-step backward to drive his elbow into his frisker's stomach. Two more punches and a kick and the other fell and curled around himself to the ground.
"Don't try it," Caine advised the others, turning back to them. One did anyway; he collapsed from a second slingshot bull's-eye halfway to the machine pistol. "I warned you," Caine said, retrieving the weapon himself and waving it toward the last man. "Now, suppose you tell me just who the hell you are and what you wanted with—"
He broke off as his tingler abruptly signaled: Car approaching from west. He took a step to the side to get a better look—just in time to see the car skid onto the stones beside the road and discharge a half-dozen uniformed Security men. It was so unexpected that Caine was caught completely flatfooted. But his opponent wasn't. "He tried to steal my car!" he shouted to them, jabbing a finger at Caine... and the laser rifles swung up in response.
There was only one thing Caine could do, and he did it without hesitation. The gun in his hands was surprisingly noisy as it drained its clip in the Security men's general direction, scattering them as they dove for the ground. Laser bursts filled the air; dropping the gun, Caine sprinted back toward the mountains and the limited cover of the bushes on the lower slopes. There was a shout from behind him, and a new series of shots scorched at his shirt as he hit the ground and turned around.
The Security men were on their feet again. Or rather, four of the six were, and as Caine watched, two of the four flipped over backward as the snipers on the hillside found them.
Abruptly, the landscape in front of Caine's eyes exploded with light. Twisting around, Caine tucked his head to his chest, letting his back take the brunt of the attack. A shot found him, painfully hot even through the flexarmor—a second brushed his leg—and abruptly, the attack ceased.
Cautiously, he raised his head again. The Security men had joined their companions on the ground—alive or dead, he couldn't tell. Behind him, he could hear the crashing of bushes and tree branches as the rest of his team abandoned stealth for speed. And at their car—