A subtle agency omnibus, p.72
A Subtle Agency Omnibus, page 72
part #1 of The Metaframe War Series
The eight missiles darted forward. He stared at them, willing them to destroy the tank with every fiber of his being.
* * *
The 7.62mm minigun whirred above Anton’s head, its six barrels rotating in a blur, spent shell casings spraying in a wide swathe to its left.
A long tongue of fire gushed from the minigun’s throat as four-thousand rounds per minute of depleted uranium penetrators speared up at the incoming Hellfire missiles. The Commander tank’s onboard AI integrated the available missile tracks, calculating their future paths relative to everything else within reach of its onboard sensor arrays. It discarded two missiles as threats, their paths destined to intercept falling masonry, and other debris. The remaining six it methodically picked off from right to left. The last exploded half a dozen yards from the tank, the thermobaric blast momentarily engulfing the vehicle in bright fire.
Anton rocked in his seat as the ear-splitting explosion of the last Hellfire missile washed over the turret. An armor-integrity counter on the HUD dropped from ninety-eight to seventy-six and shifted from green to yellow.
The Commander tank emerged from the flames, both main guns leveled at the last remaining barrier to the prison - a stone wall. Anton drove forward, the tank crunching over the smoking remains of a fallen building. The 105mm fired, the rail gun cracked, the last barrier fell before the barrage. The way was clear, Anton drove the tank through the last of the wreckage and into an open area before the warehouse that was doubling as a prison.
In moments, he would be through the prison wall.
Alarms beeped, the rail gun was down to five shots, the same with the 105mm. The minigun was at thirty percent and falling as it dealt with the last of a second volley of Hellfire missiles.
The final Hellfire missile in the second volley exploded a yard short of the hull. Anton lurched against his restraints, the tank rocking on its tracks as a wall of flame washed over it. Multiple alarms resounded through the cabin, half the indicators on the heads-up display were solidly in the red, the rest were a sea of yellow warnings with the occasional island of green.
In the ascending chaos, Anton gritted his teeth and pushed forward. The tank’s tracks ripped through grass, soil, and concrete as he lined up on the wall of the prison.
He wasn’t going to survive the next volley. The blackwidows were re-arranging their positions, taking up the points of a square and coming closer to minimize the vulnerable flight time of their missiles.
With the armor-integrity counter dropping to thirty-six percent and solidly red - time had run out.
* * *
Juliette’s eyelids fluttered.
She sat next to Francis in the front Range Rover. Francis brought the vehicle into position to run hard past the Shadowstone base and pick up his team to head north. The second Range Rover with Luther and Chiara in it was a dozen yards behind them.
At least that was the plan they’d cobbled together after Anton had rushed into the Shadowstone base. In her mind palace, everyone was in terrible danger. Anton’s precipitous actions had risked the whole team, and the probability of his own survival was close to zero. Peter would be lost and Anton with him. She dropped out of her mind palace, cut deeply by what she’d seen.
“Mon, Dieu,” she whispered, her eyes wide.
“Juliette?” Francis asked in worried tones.
“Soon my love, soon we must flee.”
Francis’ face was grim beside her, and he whispered harshly, “I had my doubts about Anton back at the safe house. We can’t manage him - he’s too much like his Grandfather.”
“Don’t give up on Anton yet, there is something powerful working through him.”
Francis stared at her. “What have you seen?”
“Not enough, but give him time. He could save us all.”
“Or destroy us all.”
Juliette’s eyelids dropped for a second. “That remains to be seen.”
The future was deeply hidden in shadows, unknowable, wreathed in darkness. Was there any room left for hope? Juliette knew where she would always stand - come what may. She grasped Francis’ hands with her own, squeezed and declared passionately, “We will win through in the end.”
“Will we be alive to see it?” Francis asked, his face betraying sudden doubt.
She looked in his eyes for a long moment, and promised, “Yes, we will.”
* * *
Anton scanned the heads-up display, his eyes intense, his mouth grim.
He used the controller to direct the rail gun, and the 105mm gun at the two blackwidows moving into position in front of him and pulled the triggers.
His guts clenched tight as the third volley of missiles leaped from the hovering gunships at his tank. The minigun above his head whirred into life, its ammo counter descending through the low twenties toward zero percent. The 105mm gun fired first, a great tongue of flame leaping from its barrel as the round speared upward at the first helicopter gunship on the left. The rail gun was next, the kinetic spike flashing faster than an eye could follow at the second blackwidow on the right. Behind Anton, the tank’s heat fins failed catastrophically, overloaded by the nearly continuous firing they blew apart in a brilliant shower of burning fragments.
The rail gun would never fire again.
Incoming Hellfire missiles, the 105mm high-explosive round, and the eleven-pound tungsten kinetic spike all passed each other in mid-air halfway between the Commander tank and the blackwidow gunships.
Above the jagged remains of the heat fins, the minigun spewed fire, ejecting spent shell casings in a wide swathe as it rotated around to cover the incoming missiles. Its barrels were a blur of motion, the onboard AI dedicating every resource to defending the tank. Missile after missile blew apart mid-air as the minigun’s depleted uranium rounds sliced through them.
The blackwidow on the right took the eleven-pound kinetic spike, through its nose. The tungsten slug shot through the cabin, instantly turning the crew into a pink mist. Without any visible loss of momentum, the slug sliced through the right-side engine, clipped the main rotor on the way through and disappeared somewhere into the next county.
The minigun was the first part of the tank to be obliterated when the second last Hellfire missile got through. The exploding warhead evaporated the minigun in a nightmarish thermobaric glare. The rail gun cracked along its spine, and all the tracks on the right side of the tank blew off. Ablative, ceramic armor around the main cabin disintegrated; partially dissipating the force of the Hellfire missile blast away from the crew.
Anton rocked in his seat, a wave of heat washing over him. Sparks flew from shorting equipment. The heads-up display failed. The stench of singed hair filled his nostrils.
The blackwidow on the left took the high-explosive 105mm round in the middle of the cabin, the resultant explosion scattered the gunship across the roof of the prison facility in a cloud of burning fragments.
The last of the Hellfire missiles struck the front of the Commander tank. The thermobaric explosion dislodged the 105mm gun, cracked open the hull and ripped apart the front half of the tank. The turret canted backward at a twenty-degree angle, its ablative ceramic armor stripped away, exposing the bare metal of the cabin shell.
The stricken gunship on the right, its crew vaporized by the kinetic spike, its right engine shooting flames like a giant’s firework, fell like a stone. Diving nose first onto the edge of the prison building, it promptly flipped over toward the ground. It never reached the concrete pathway beneath it, exploding in a huge fireball as the rest of its munitions and fuel detonated in a blinding glare.
The Commander tank stood silently, canted to the right on its shredded tracks. Its 105mm gun barrel sloped crazily away to the left, the rail gun was a useless tangle of steaming metal on the right. Heat waves shimmered off the rear of the tank. Smoke and steam issued in plumes from ragged holes over the engine bay.
A gaping hole in the prison wall, next to the burning wreck of the second gunship, stood directly in front of the tank. Behind the tank lay a long, thick trail of smoking ruins.
The last two blackwidows peeled away, racing toward the front gate and their next engagement with the forces attacking the Shadowstone base.
* * *
Gordon Heathmont watched in horror as two of the blackwidows fell from the sky in flaming ruins.
There was a bright glare next to the prison section as one of the helicopters blew up, a plume of greasy smoke rising high in the air. The roof of the prison section was lit with scattered fires. The surviving blackwidows veered away from the battle and raced toward the front gate.
The Commander tank must have been destroyed, or else the blackwidows would have stayed there to continue the fight.
Gordon fitted a pair of Shadowstone earbud communicators slaved to his smartphone, all his comm links became live.
Major Quiver’s voice came over the tactical link, “Sir, our overhead drone has identified three intruders near the main gate, I am vectoring the remaining blackwidows onto their position.”
“Get the MRU in motion. The base is without power. It’s indefensible. Get the prisoner to Coningsby airbase. We have an A400 transport inbound, I will re-purpose it to this mission. We can airlift the prisoner out of the country and out of range of this Order of Thoth team. It’s imperative the prisoner gets to the airbase alive. Ensure the blackwidows guard the MRU.”
“What of the three Order operatives at the gate.”
“Kill them if the opportunity presents itself, otherwise ignore them - three can’t make a difference. The MRU and the prisoner are your sole concern now.”
“Yes, Sir,” Major Quiver growled. “… The order has been given. The MRU is in motion.”
“Keep me in the loop. I’m evacuating this base with my security detail.”
“Roger, that.”
“Good man - now protect the prisoner.”
“Yes, Sir.”
The line muted. Gordon climbed into the back of his dark-blue Jaguar sedan. Three members of his security detail came with him. The rest boarded a pair of four-wheeled, armored Humvee-sized MRAP vehicles armed with 7.62mm M240 machine guns on their roofs. He would follow the MRU and ensure it made it onboard the A400 transport aircraft. He would fly out with the prisoner. Where would they go? Saudi Arabia was always helpful, but shockingly hot in the middle of August. He frowned, unfortunately, the kingdom would have to do; they had one key advantage, they could always be trusted to turn a blind eye and see the bigger picture.
Once on the plane and safely in the air, he would phone ahead, making sure the local Shadowstone cells were active and positioned to deal with the prisoner. He was sure Peter Lamb would eventually break and would be a treasure trove of information on Shadowstone’s enemies.
The information inside the Order of Thoth agent’s head was of primary value. Just about anything could be sacrificed to keep it within his reach.
Gordon stared through the car window and ignored what was outside the vehicle. The next hour would be the most important in his life. It would be pivotal in determining the future of the secret war between Shadowstone and the Order of Thoth.
Of that he was sure.
* * *
Anton surfaced into agony, the darkness ebbing away.
A terrible ringing was clawing at his ears. Half-dazed, Anton shook his head and then swore mightily, his hands rising to cover his face. Moving his head had been a mistake.
He wriggled his fingers and toes - everything hurt like hell, but everything also moved.
The interior of the tank felt like a sauna on overdrive. A dull red light, running off emergency battery power filled the cabin. The air was thick with smoke, Anton wheezed and coughed, tasting blood in his mouth.
He reached up, punching a button next to the top hatch. Explosive bolts fired, the top door of the Commander tank promptly blowing off. Grabbing the Blue Dragon and his H&K MP5, he jumped up onto the top edge of the tank. His boots sizzled on the hot metal, and he immediately leaped onto the ground.
He fell to his knees, coughing hard again, spots of blood appearing on the torn-up ground in front of him.
“That’s not a good sign,” he observed, pushing himself up onto one knee.
Juliette’s voice sounded in his ears – a precognitive whisper, “Peter’s being moved.” Her voice firmed. “Everyone, head for the main gate; they’re taking him from the site. We’ll pick you up, exfil now!”
Anton had fought his way to a standstill to reach the prison, and now he had to go all the way back. He stood up, blinking his eyes, gritting his teeth and sucking air in through his nose. He started jogging back along the trail of devastation left by the tank. His ribs hurt abominably with every breath. He grimaced in pain, whatever was necessary - he’d get the job done.
Peter wasn’t free yet.
The ringing in his ears was dropping away, and his lungs started to clear. He fell into silence and managed to Ramp. In moments, he was blurring over the rubble of the base back toward the entrance.
* * *
A turbine ignited and began spooling up with a steadily increasing whine.
“This thing’s jet-powered?” Peter asked incredulously. He put his hands on his face, then jerked them away. His face was still painfully tender after the ministrations of Shadowstone’s torture techs.
The truck started moving, rolling smoothly forward over the concrete floor of the prison section. The engine was a low rumble, the mobile rendition unit had been built for speed and protection, it would be hard to stop.
He needed to get out of this mobile prison, the longer he stayed in, the worse his chances of survival were. He reached up to the wheel lock on the overhead hatch. With the ceiling only about eight feet off the floor, the arms of the spinlock could be grabbed by a reasonably tall man standing on the floor - someone like Peter Lamb. But with his arms extended over his head, he had virtually zero leverage.
The spinlock on the overhead latch was half the size of the one on the rear door. Peter grinned; it might be within his ability to literally tear it apart. He needed to solve his lack of leverage. He crunched hard, pivoting upward, planting his big boots to either side of the hatch in the ceiling. Crouched upside down from the ceiling, his big hands wrapped around the chrome handles of the spinlock, he plunged deep into silence. The Ramp flowered within, power flowed along muscles and nerves already configured for extraordinary strength. His muscles bulged; his veins popped - the wheel didn’t budge.
He strained for another ten seconds, then dropped back down to the floor.
Wiping perspiration from his brow with his forearm, he declared with a measure of respect, “Damn, they built that tough.”
The truck turned hard to the right, the wheels began running over a rougher surface and started to pick up speed. There were no windows but it was clear the MRU was outside the building, and on a road, before long it would be off the base.
“I need a lever.”
Peter started looking for something within the chamber he could use to break the spinlock on the top hatch. Then an idea struck him, and he smiled broadly.
He dashed to the back of the chamber to check the larger spinlock. If the spinlocks were built the same way, he might have a way out.
* * *
The two MRAPs burned on the right side of the road, seventy yards inside the base. Half a dozen black-armored troopers lay scattered around them.
Yvette hunkered down under cover of the smoking hulk of one of the armored personnel carriers. She pushed the last of her reloads into the Milkor MGL and glanced over to Jay and Li sheltering next to the second APC on the other side of the road. They’d completed their ammunition reloads and were ready for the next attack. A pair of Shadowstone troopers - the faster than normal ones - were hiding behind their wrecked vehicles waiting for reinforcements.
Jay, Li and Yvette’s position was indefensible. They had to break contact with the enemy and make an escape as soon as possible. The sound of approaching gunship helicopters screamed it might be too late. A single hellfire missile fired at their position would wipe them all out.
Juliette’s voice came over the comms link, “I’ve hacked their drone. Two blackwidows are inbound. They’re providing top cover for a convoy approaching your position. There is a lead vehicle, looks like an armored version of a semi-trailer rig with an armored trailer - it’s a mobile rendition unit. There are two APCs and four MRAPs following it. Prepare for immediate exfil.”
Yvette risked a quick glance around the edge of the APC. The convoy was passing the destroyed buildings on the edge of the main base, where Anton had driven the Commander tank on his quest to rescue Peter. She pulled herself back, a three-round burst from an assault rifle pinging off the armor of the APC. The two surviving troopers near the burning MRAPs had her position under their crosshairs.
“I’m on, I’m on,” Anton shouted across the comms link.
“Where are you?” Francis growled.
“I’m on top of the MRU. Peter’s inside, this is what they’re using to transport him.”
“… Agreed,” Juliette observed. “It’s the most likely way they would move him.”
“You’re mad!” Luther declared. “… Not you Juliette, I mean Slayne.”
Francis demanded, “Anton, what do you hope to achieve?”
“This truck has to stop sometime, and I’ll be waiting to get Peter out.”
“Don’t try and do this by yourself,” Li warned.
Yvette looked across the road at Li, her face was creased with growing desperation. Too many of her friends were at risk. Yvette glanced knowingly back at Jay, a decision passing between them in an instant. Anton would not be left to fight this battle alone.
The specially designed armored truck slowed to turn the corner facing onto the road beside the destroyed gatehouse.
