Theodore (22 page)

What has Thomas done?
  Theodore would have snarled,
but that would have been wasting time.  He sprang across the room and hit the
panic button: the entire team would instantly know there was trouble.  He
searched for what he knew
had
to be a comlink when it started
broadcasting on its own.  He scrambled across the room and found the comlink on
the coffee table.

“What happened?” came Bill’s voice with a tinge of fear.

“Thomas sold me out!  They were tracking his phone when he
arrived.”

Theodore would have expected a tirade of expletives from
Bill but instead he was clear and focused, “We're evacuating the ladies now. 
Local DSS is heading your way... I've no response from Lori... she's not
picking up.  Get the heck out of there!  Take the comlink and run!  Do that
armor slam thing or whatever, just get some distance between you and that
building!”

“Caught you the first time, out.”  Theodore tucked the
comlink in his pocket and ran to the nearest window. 
What had happened to
Lori? 
The frosted windows were thick!  Oh well, time to open them the fun
way.  Theodore invoked a small live steel blade and cut a hole in the winodw. 
Laminate of ceramic and plastic of some type, aluminum oxynitride or maybe just
good old alumina.  Either way the composite stack was thick and heavy.  He had
to dodge as the piece fell inward just short of his paws.  He knew they were
very high up from the trips in the repulsar gunship but never paid that much
attention to exactly
how
high or what the exterior of the building
looked like.  His first look outside, however, was interrupted.

High power machine-gun fire raked the opened window just
barely after its opening.  Theodore's armor burst around him, but it was more
his reflexes than the armor that had saved him as he quickly spun clear of his
supposed exit.  They were
only
heavy machine-gun rounds, probably
only
15mm or so... Theodore wasn't worried about soaking one, rather it was the
torrential rain of rounds that made him nervous.  There was a brief pause,
probably to ensure that the barrel wasn't overheating, only to be replaced by
the dramatic burst of fire from a gatling pulse rifle.  The short bursts,
normally comical in their bathroom humor like sound, had lost any attempts at
mirth as 10mm 22 gram projectiles at mach six burst through the open window in
groups of two and three
hundred
.

So much for the window!  Theodore regrouped and bolted for
the security elevator.  As he touched the door his instincts flared and his fur
danced wildly.  He had no idea what was beyond, but “bad” was high on the
list.  Worse so than the window.  That meant... more windows and move faster! 
He sprinted across the penthouse as randomly as he could, carving holes in the
windows as he went.  Things weren't looking good: no matter which face of the
building he went to, there were gunshots there to greet him.  Time.  How long
before the DSS guys arrived?  What type of firefight were they going to have to
fight through?

He should have been moving, not thinking, as a squad of
heavily armed and armored men suddenly burst into the room.  With completely
environmentally enclosed helmets, Theodore knew instantly that this was a
different breed of cat... er person.

Spray rounds of thermite and white phosphorous soon
flooded the room.  They sprayed harmlessly off of his armor but were quickly
turning the room into an inferno.   Air!  They were quickly going to suffocate
him, and if he ran to the windows for air...

Step one: discourage repeat performances by clearing the
gene pool.  Theodore snarled as he charged the squad and invoked a Live Steel
glaive... more of a naginata from a Japanese tradition.  If there were any
surprised or confused looks, the helmets concealed them.  Theodore struck home
on the first target with full power and greater determination.  He kept his
focus on his target, and that was his target's undoing.  He could have guessed
that his opponent wore a smirk as Theodore struck home as he instantly sensed
contact with Live Steel armor.  The smirk certainly vanished as Theodore
followed through, bisecting his opponent, Live Steel armor or not!

That
seemed to have gotten their attention! 
Treasonous Highlanders in a crunchy new shell.  They quickly ditched their
conventional weapons and invoked their own Live Steel weapons.

One down, seven to go...  Theodore closed into the middle
of them; every place he swung was a target!  With practiced form of a thousand
matches with his father, with every sense in his body flailing outward and
soaking in the world, he struck.  Parries meant he reversed the weapon,
seamlessly invoking it in the reversed form.  Stalls meant he shifted to sword
and closed before bringing the long bladed glaive back to dance.  It was a
dance... he started to understand that now.  He was the minstrel and minister
of dance as he spun and whirled in perfect form.  As calm rushed over him, he
could almost
hear
the music playing... playing while the blades danced. 
But soon he was without partners.  Oh well...

With a defiant calm he walked back out the way the squad
had rushed in.  Back out onto the landing zone for the gunships.  Out into
plain sight.  Two light repuslar craft were orbiting the top of the building
while sharpshooters with anti-armor weapons made the presence known as they
fired from nearby roof tops.

The world seemed to slow down and he could see it all,
almost as from a third person perspective.  The arcs of the high power
weapons:  he could sense their arcs back to their origin.  The repulsar craft:
he could all but feel the pilots’ nervous state as he stood in the open and
challenged them all.

A sharp shot from a 30mm pulse rifle set the tone as
Theodore stepped into the shot and all but plucked the round from the air and
reoriented it back to its sender.   A gentle rain from the 10mm gatling pulse
rifle on the repulsar craft sprinkled lightly against his armor.  The source of
apprehension just moments before was now merely an optical distraction
splashing on his armor.  Like the afternoon back at the university, Theodore
launched an arrow at the offending gnat and it struck home in the craft's
engine, collapsing its lift coils and sending the craft into an emergency
landing to the streets below.

Streets below!
  Suddenly Theodore was nervous, he
didn't want people on the streets below injured because of his actions.  With a
more practiced aim, his second arrow struck the remaining respuslar craft
through the cooling system.  The engine would start to suffer in moments but at
least they could land safely.

“Elegant,” commented a voice behind him.  “Now you get to
pray your father was right,” sneered a voice in the Highland Old Tongue.

Theodore spun to face off against probably the largest
Taik he had ever seen.  He was a mass of muscles, but muscles of form and
power, not of bulk.  It wasn't the muscles that caught his attention; it wasn't
really the wall of blue flame armor either.  The Taik's fur coat shimmered in
color cycling from a tawny and spotted coat to a charcoal gray that matched the
roof.  Theodore was now fighting a Silver!

Silvers learn faster, but ultimately anyone can become
especially good with live steel.  That was what Theodore's father had told him
and others on a multitude of occasions.  Why are you fighting? Defending your
family?  No... this is about just the two of you...  Then why are you fighting?

Theodore grinned as his father's lessons washed over him.  Bill
said to run, and well, who was he to argue with Bill?  Theodore followed Bill's
lead from the space port and performed a mock curtsey.  He then bolted to the
edge of the building and jumped off without hesitation.  His armor was there,
his old friend as he executed an armor slam from a five hundred meter tall
building.  Three hundred, five hundred? eh, all the same: he hit terminal
velocity quickly with his armor being a sparking mass rather than an armored
ball like it had been when jumping from the monorail with the family those
weeks ago.  He hit the ground with a light slap, scarring the sidewalk, but far
from cratering it as he had done in his previous jumps.  That was a nice
change.

Theodore broke into a long sprint as he aimed for the
loading dock of an industrial building.  His pursuer was undoubtedly a big
burly man, but Theodore was light on his feet and had a light heart.  End this
on his terms, with as little loss of life as possible.  Don't get bogged down
in fights.  Fight only when he needed to or to protect those around him. 
Fighting wasn't about ego, it was life and death.  And Theodore?  He was a
college student and soon to be a husband to a simple family back home.  There
were men like Bill, heavy of violence, there to decide who lives and who dies. 
His family was safe, further fighting only favored his opponents.  He chuckled
to himself as he was sure his opponent was hurling all sorts of verbal abuse at
him, but he didn't care.

Subways!
  They used subways to move heavy goods! 
Perfect!  Snagging a ride on a freight shipment, while gauche, was far less
obvious than taking public transportation: his fur coat just stood out a wee
little bit.  Theodore ran long and fast past a series of workers who were more
confused to see a Taik than about a lay person running in a hazardous work
environment.  Oh, yeah.  That was subtle.  If anyone asked they were
certain
to know where he'd gone.  The trick, the
goal
was to move fast enough
through the maze of construction equipment that any pursuers would quickly
become lost as well.  Well, that and to make it to the lower levels.  He
cringed slightly as he invoked his Live Steel to cut a few locks to doors he
had no businesses being beyond.  He gritted his teeth; he'd have to get Tim and
the rest of the DSS to say their sorries for him.  And buy them a few dozen new
locks.

He threaded his way past the heavy equipment and down
below the ground into the belly of the building.  Rumbling!  There it was,
somewhere up ahead was a freight subway.  He twisted and turned going more by
sound and feel than any real plan and was soon rewarded: a freight subway on
the move.  Slow enough to jump onto, but quickly picking up speed!  He ran
alongside the accelerating cars and carefully leaped on board.  He wasn't worried
about landing on anything sharp so much as he was worried about losing his grip
and falling down onto the electrified rails!  This was a freight system, it
didn't have all the safeties that a public transport rail line had.

Theodore soon found himself relaxing in a train car full
of pig iron.  Not the most comfortable of cars, but it was moving at quite a
clip
away
from the old building.  He peered into the darkness as he felt
the wind blast past his face.  He wasn't going to get off with the car load, there
would be people around if he waited that long.  He wanted to be a far distance
away and then take something like a service tunnel out...  How long had he been
in motion?  He glanced down at his watch: it was dead.  He rolled his eyes and
pulled his pocket watch, a gift from his parents his first year to college.  It
was still working!  Ah the joy of mechanical parts and springs over wires and
batteries...

Fifteen minutes later at quite a clip Theodore poked his
head up again and started to look for his exit.  There
were
access
tunnels off to the side, he'd just have to jump and do an armor slam sideways. 
Weird but the orientation shouldn't make any difference.  With a relaxed heart
of practiced form, he jumped and bounced off the edge of the tunnel.  He
rattled around a bit as his Live Steel armor fought for a reference frame; it
was quite weird and silly from his perspective.  A few seconds later he stood
and dusted himself off as he started down the long access tunnel.  Its ever so
faint service lights were meant for humans.  Arguably so faint to be dangerous
for a human's trek, but his eyes were well used to the dark and quite superior
to a human's at night.

After ten minutes of walking he found an access hatch that
went up.  Up to where?  Well, he didn't know, but he had to hit the surface at
some point and it wasn't like his comlink was going to work down here.  Panic
suddenly washed over him: his watch was dead, was the comlink okay?  Theodore
had never been quite so happy to see a “no signal” light flash.  The comlink
was made of sterner stuff than his wrist watch!  His climb was greeted by a
series of doors upward and outward.  He tried to move carefully, not wanting to
attract attention, but he also knew that if he showed up on security cameras...
well heaven only knew if the local cops could be trusted...  He made his way up
into the service entrance of what appeared to be a mall of some type.  Well,
that meant his comlink would work: there would be repeaters indoors.  That also
meant an
insane
number of people around him.  People who could quickly
become casualties if shooting started again.

Theodore gritted his teeth as he cued the comlink, “Bill? 
You read me?”

There was a long pause before Bill voice came online, “Oh,
crap, there you are!  We had a bunch of people here about ready to turn blue.”

Theodore was confused, “Paint themselves blue?”

Bill laughed, Theodore needed that, “No!  Sorry, face
turning blue from holding one's breath.  Not so obvious with a furry face, eh? 
You okay?  The house was a burning mess when the DSS got there.”

“I'm doing okay.  Had to fight my way out, it was a mess. 
First things first, can we get someone to come pick me up?”

“Bottom of the comlink is a little blue button, press it
for about two seconds.  You should here a short chirp.”

“That broadcasts my location?” asked Theodore as he
flipped it over and pressed the button as instructed.

“Yes, but only your location at that exact moment.”

The utility was obvious: if he had to bolt and they were
being bugged it wouldn't continue to give him away.  “Did it come through?”

Bill laughed, “Hey, we just
came
from that mall. 
If you wanted to go shopping with the ladies...”

“Okay,” grinned Theodore as the irony washed over him. 
“Now, how do we get me out of here?”

“I'm hopping a gunship and we'll be right there.  Which do
you think you can do more easily: get to the roof or make it to the front
entrance?”

“Without being seen?  Neither!”

“Okay, you sit tight.  When we are two minutes out, you
start running for the front door.  We'll meet you in the upper mezzanine.”

“Waiting on your word and then I'll run like the wind.”

Theodore sat and tried to stay calm.  Help was coming and
if they timed it right, no one else would get hurt.  Stay calm...  It felt like
half an hour had passed, but he was certain it was far less than that when he
comlink sprang to life with the simple command: “Go! Go! Go!”

Theodore bolted from his hiding spot in the maintenance
hall way and was quickly into the main hall of the mall.  It was huge!  And
quite pretty, too!  No time to gawk, time to run.  Past long grand halls and
countless surprised shoppers he bolted.  The mall was somewhat disorienting, it
was hard at times to find the front.  Probably a
design
feature: keep
the shoppers trapped longer so they'd loiter and spend more money.  It didn't
matter much to him, he only had about a twenty on him, not much to shop with
even if he had wanted to.  He kept his speed up and was soon rewarded as he
broke into sunlight.  Oh! that felt good on so many levels!  His eyes darted to
the side and he quickly started up the stairs to the prescribed mezzanine.  He
was worried that he had run
too
fast: he really didn't want to be
loitering while waiting for Bill.  His worries quickly vanished as he heard the
sound of repulsar gunship on rapid descent.

His eyes strained as he looked for any sign of Bill
Burges: he
said
he was going to be on the craft.  What he did see first
quite thoroughly surprised him: Shukurae!  And lots of them!  They quickly
disembarked fanning out in a wide perimeter.  Their 15mm pulse rifles were
handguns
for them.  He knew they were only three meters tall, but seeing grumpy
Shukurae made them seem at least another meter taller!

Suddenly, his eyes caught the sight of Bill Burges waving
him forward.  Theodore needed no further encouragement and quickly closed the
gap and ran up the loading ramp into the craft.  Quickly on his heels were the
Shukurae that had briefly formed the perimeter and the whole craft burst back
into the sky.  Theodore grinned broadly at Bill, “What?  No JATO bottles?”

Bill laughed back, “Didn't have time!  There is one on
standby being fitted as we speak.  For someone that just escaped from the top
of a hundred and twenty story
burning
building, you've got your wits and
humor about you.”

“You forgot to mention fighting past eight Highlanders
with flamethrowers.  And then there was this giant of a Taik Silver.  I
declined his offers to be social and ran at that point.”

Bill grinned, “Hey!  I told you to run from the word go! 
Good thing you didn't try the elevator, it was packed with enough explosives to
put you into low orbit with or without your cool armor.”

“It
felt
wrong so I didn't try.”

“Score one for instincts.  Let's get you back to a safe
spot and the nice ladies.”

“Oh, you hear me arguing, now don't you?” laughed
Theodore.