Backshot (28 page)

Bottom line: When it comes to a choice between my life, or the lives of my people, and your life—you die.

Nothing personal, that’s just the way the world works.

“Mr. Gampan, please believe me when I say I’m really sorry I have to do this. But I really have to do it.”

“Bu—” Gampan’s objection was cut off when Daly raised the handgun he still held and shot him in the heart.

Ronson Gampan jerked against his bonds, then slumped and died.

“I am so damn sorry I had to do that to you,” Daly murmured. “Rest in peace.” He placed a hand on the driver’s shoulder for a moment, then stood and walked slowly to the AstroGhost. Nobody said anything about the blood and bone that speckled Daly’s shirt and face.

Launch from Atlas

The chief petty officer who coxswained the AstroGhost took off south, in the direction of the nation-state of South Solanum. Ground sensors detected the AstroGhost, but no aircraft could intercept it before it flew beyond the horizon and out of range. Once past the horizon from their launch point, the coxswain dropped altitude and flew at treetop level until he reached the equator, then turned on every masking device in the AstroGhost’s arsenal and shot east at a high angle. Fifteen minutes later, the shuttle was in the same orbit as the
Admiral Nelson
, which blocked view of it from the Kraken Interstellar Starport in front of her. An hour later, the AstroGhost docked, undetected by anybody in space or planetside, and the wounded Marines were being sped to the starship’s hospital, where surgical teams were standing by.

Mission Objective One of Second Force Recon Platoon’s extraordinarily sensitive mission to Atlas was accomplished.

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

En Route to Ramuncho’s Restaurant, New Granum, Atlas

They spent hardly any time in the hotel. Lance Corporal Dwan rechecked the contents of the oversize bag in which she was going to carry the maser and visited the water closet while Sergeant Gossner checked for new messages from the
Admiral Nelson
. There were no messages. When they left the hotel, they were dressed in the same festively muted garments they wore the second time they entered the vacant building. Gossner didn’t pay any attention to the bag Dwan carried slung over her shoulder; she’d frequently carried it since the shopping trip on which he’d been her pack animal. The bag was bigger than she needed to carry the disassembled maser in, but he took her word when she told him, “A lady needs to carry many things in her handbag”—though he thought calling that thing a “handbag” was stretching matters pretty far—“and the bigger the bag, the more things she’s expected to carry. So if I go out with my handbag mostly empty, people will notice and wonder. Do you want people wondering why I’m carrying an almost-empty handbag?”

Of course, he didn’t, so he stopped concerning himself about the “handbag’s” size and contents. Hey, at least she wasn’t using him as her gun-bearer, which was a big improvement over when she dragged him out on the shopping expedition as her pack animal and he’d had to lug all of her purchases back to the hotel.

As they had twice daily, they sauntered along Center Boulevard, ostensibly window shopping and on occasion briefly stepping into stores. They saw the military staff cars parked in front of Ramuncho’s Restaurant while they were still two blocks away—and the many soldiers posted along the street.

“I knew he’d come here when he said he was going out to eat,” Dwan said excitedly.

“So did I,” Gossner said, controlling his excitement a little better. “Let’s make sure. But let’s be cool, and not go too fast.”

“I’ll try.”

They continued to stop frequently to look in shop windows, but didn’t enter any until they were almost at the intersection before the restaurant. There was a checkpoint on the corner. Nobody was allowed past until ID was checked and parcels searched.

Gossner and Dwan entered a convenient shop before the checkpoint. Gossner blushed and tried to back out when he saw what the shop was; it was an emporium of erotica. Dwan laughed at his discomfort, she’d seen what the store was before she entered it. “Come on, big man,” she said, patting the shoulder of the arm she had hers linked through, “there’s nothing in here neither of us has never seen before.”

“Yeah, but not together,” he muttered. Normally, he wouldn’t have had any problem with entering, even in the company of women. But he’d been having sexual thoughts about Bella Dwan and that just wouldn’t do—he was her immediate superior, after all. And Dwan
was
the Queen of Killers. Dwan laughed again, looking around with bright and curious eyes. “As much as I’d like to dally and maybe even sample, we have a job to do.
There’s
what I’m looking for.” She pointed at an exit sign toward the shop’s rear and gave his arm a tug. Gossner eagerly headed for the exit. Unlike most of the other shops along Center Boulevard, the emporium had a customer entrance at the rear for the convenience of customers who might not want to be seen entering from the front.

“I was sure there would be prudes in this town,” Dwan murmured when they reached the service alley behind the shop. They turned back in the direction of their hotel, then took the first side street to Ranstead Street and back toward the vacant building they’d scouted twice before.

“Got a problem,” Gossner said when they reached the street before the vacant building. Dwan looked. Two soldiers were at the entrance to the service alley between the buildings on Center Boulevard and those on Ranstead Street.

“Let’s check the other end,” Gossner said.

“It’s probably guarded, too.”

“Maybe security’s a little bit slack,” he said. “Not everybody’s sharp enough to cover all approaches.”

Dwan sniffed. “After yesterday, they’re pretty sharp.”

Gossner grunted. He didn’t hold out any real hope that the other end of the alley wouldn’t likewise be guarded. “If the security detail isn’t smart enough to have the army cover the other entrance to the alley,” he said, “the target and the security chief both deserve to die.”

They reached the other end of the block. Nobody was standing at that end of the service alley. The buildings cast deep shadows in the alley, but it didn’t look like anybody was in it.

“Someone point out the security chief,” Dwan purred. “He’s slacking off on the job. I’ll do two for the price of one.”

They’d only gotten halfway from the service alley to the back of the vacant building when they saw a patrol walking toward them from the guarded end. The patrol carried electric torches, which they shone into the refuse barrels, as well as the shadowy spaces between them.

“This is where we find out how good these clothes really are as camouflage,” Gossner whispered as he hoisted Dwan into a high-sided refuse bin. He followed her into it. Fortunately, the bin was filled with discarded packaging materials, all dry goods. As quietly as they could, they burrowed into it. Just about the time Gossner was convinced they were completely covered, Dwan grabbed him and pulled herself close.

“What are you doing?” he whispered when her hands began jerking at his clothing.

“Just in case they spot us,” she said. “Now shut up and put your arms around me.”

Then they had to stop making noise, the footsteps and voices of the patrol were nearly on them. Gossner tried to ignore what he felt; Dwan’s blouse was pulled out in the back and his hand was on her skin. She’d pulled his shirt open and he felt her bra and belly pressed against his bare front. Somehow, she’d managed to undo the closures on his pants. It felt like she’d also undone the closures on her own.
This is the Queen of Killers here
, he forceably reminded himself. I’m her
team
leader, we can’t be doing this! Still, he had to bite his lip to keep from groaning.
Damn, but who would have thought the
Queen of Killers would feel so good?

The footsteps stopped next to their bin. A growly voice ordered two soldiers to shine their lights behind the bins and for two others to boost another high enough to see into the one the two snipers were hiding in. There was scrabbling on the side of the bin, then a light swept through it, paused, and swept back over them.

“Boost me higher,” a female voice said. There were grunts from outside, then the light seemed brighter. Dwan mashed her mouth against Gossner’s just before a hand reached in and moved some plastic wrapping aside. The light shone directly in their faces; Gossner squinted so his eyes wouldn’t reflect the light as he peered at the silhouetted head above them. The light moved on. “Nothing in here but packing and other trash,” the woman soldier said. The hand and light moved away. “Let me down.”

There was more scrabbling, then the growly voice ordered the patrol to move on. In a few more minutes the footsteps and voices left the alley. Gossner cautiously raised himself up and looked toward the open end. Two soldiers were now stationed there. Neither was a woman, neither was looking into the alley.

“Let’s go,” he whispered. He could have sworn Dwan was smiling when he helped her out of the trash bin. They straightened their clothing as they went. There were no more incidents as they made their way to the rear of the vacant building and climbed through the basement window.

The building was unoccupied, though they saw signs that workers had been there. They went to the second-floor room overlooking Ramuncho’s and found the window pane they’d removed on their previous visit was undisturbed.

“See? I told you nobody would notice,” Dwan murmured. She took a position and peered out. “Got him,” she said. Lavager was sitting with two young women at the table just inside Ramuncho’s front window, the one they’d sat in.

Then she surprised Gossner by stripping down to her undergarments. He tried not to look, but couldn’t help himself, especially after the trash bin, so it took him a moment to realize what she was wearing under her outer clothes; then he was surprised again when he realized she was wearing her Marine-issue skivvies.

He abruptly came to his senses and softly demanded, “Bella, what are you doing?”

She didn’t look at him as she squatted to open her over-sized bag and pulled out—air? No—she pulled out a set of chameleons!

“The CIO is behind this,” she said, “but we got tapped for the job because I’m the best sniper in the Corps. That means I’m making this kill for the Marines. And if I’m making a kill for Mother Corps, I’m doing it as a Marine, not as a common murderer.”

She dressed with Gossner gaping at her. How had she managed to sneak a set of chameleons past the security checks they’d gone through on their way to Atlas? How had she managed to keep them hidden from him in their hotel room? They were effectively invisible, sure, but just as surely, a customs inspector could have stuck his or her hands into her luggage and noticed they felt something they couldn’t see. Of course, chameleons weren’t really invisible, they picked up the color and pattern of whatever they were closest to. Depending on how she packed them, her chameleons might have looked like other clothing in her luggage, and felt the same as well. He shook his head sharply. Bella Dwan had shown him aspects of herself he’d never guessed at, that she was smarter and more resourceful than anybody gave her credit for. He decided simply to accept there were things she could do and let it go at that. Dwan’s chameleons didn’t include a helmet. “I couldn’t figure out how to sneak a helmet through customs,” she said when she was dressed again and saw Gossner staring at her. “But this will do.”

Her head bobbed down. Had she been in normal clothing, he would have seen her bending over her bag. He watched as the components of her maser rose and assembled themselves. Then, except for its sights, the weapon vanished from his view. Dwan turned her floating face to him and smiled. “I draped chameleon cloth over it.” She stepped to where she would have a clear line of sight to the target and her head shifted to a position that told Gossner she was sighting it.

“Damn!” she swore. “Where’d he go?”

Gossner held out a hand to locate her body and looked over her shoulder. He saw the table with the two girls, but the target was no longer there.

“He’ll be back,” he murmured into Dwan’s ear, “just relax.” The muscles of her shoulders shifted under his hand and he knew she was lowering the maser.

“I hate firing from the offhand position,” she muttered. Gossner didn’t reply. The standing position was the least stable, and the hardest in which to hold a lock on the target. But given the angle of the shot from the second-floor room, the only alternative to standing back and firing offhand was for her to rest her maser on the window ledge and fire kneeling behind it. But doing that presented the danger that someone below might look up and see the weapon, or its chameleoned form against the sky.

Ramuncho’s Restaurant, in Front of the Windows

“The dalmans were magnificent as always,” Jorge Liberec Lavager said to Ramuncho when he and his two dates had finished their entrées, “and your chef outdid himself with the bokspring á la maize.”

“Thank you, Mr. President,” Ramuncho said, bowing magnificently. “Might I interest you in real Colombian coffee from Earth with your dessert? Complimentary, of course.”

“You certainly may, my good sir. But first there is something I must do, someone I must see for a moment.” Lavager stood and bowed to Candace and Gina. “With your leave, ladies?”

Sixteen-year-old Gina glanced wide-eyed at Candace—the
President
was asking her permission to leave the table! Candace saw the look from the corner of her eye and nodded solemnly at her father, who looked to Gina for her permission to leave. Still wide-eyed, she mimicked Candace’s nod, and Lavager strode from the table toward the rear of the restaurant. The girls looked at each other, leaned close together, and burst into a fit of giggles. Several people at nearby tables looked at them, saw Ramuncho beaming at them avuncularly, and returned their attention to their own companions. Lavager was gone for the length of time it normally takes a man to visit the facilities and was almost back to the table when he noticed Franklin al-Rashid standing by the maître d’s lectern, looking at him. Lavager stopped with his back to the table where his daughter and her new friend awaited his return and looked a question at al-Rashid, who gave a barely perceptable shake of his head, but came toward him anyway.

“How’s your arm, Franklin?” Lavager asked with a pointed look at al-Rashid’s sling when his security chief was close enough. “I know you won’t obey the doctors when they say you need to be in the hospital. But should you be standing?”

“I’m fine, sir. I’ve been hurt worse than this and stayed on the job.”

Lavager shook his head. Some people just wouldn’t relax their vigilance—or else they let their loyalty overrule their common sense.

“Anything to report?” he asked.

Al-Rashid shook his head. “It’s just another business day out there,” he said just as softly as Lavager had spoken. “I’ve had army patrols and my own people everywhere within a three-block radius. Nobody has detected anything out of the ordinary.”

“See, Franklin? I told you there was nothing to be concerned about. Now, since you won’t stop working long enough to let your arm and other wounds heal, I want you at least to find someplace comfortable to sit and rest while you mother hen me. I promise not to go running off and make you stress yourself by chasing me. Really,” he added when he saw al-Rashid’s skeptical look, “I promise. My daughter’s worried, and I don’t want to upset her any more than she already . . .”