Bolos: The Triumphant Part 22

"Mister Esteban?" The man who spoke wore a colonel's uniform. He was perspiring heavily, though the morning wasn't actually all that warm--not for Santa Cruz, at least--and his palm was wet as Esteban nodded and shook his hand. "I'm Colonel Sanders, Dinochrome Brigade. This is Major Atwell, and these two gentlemen are Lieutenant Gaskins and Lieutenant Deng."

"Nice t'meet you," Esteban murmured, shaking the others' hands in turn, then c.o.c.ked his head at Sanders. "Somethin' wrong with your com, Colonel?"

"I beg your pardon?"

"I asked iffen you had com problems. Didn't hear no landin' hail over th' 'proach circuit. Santa Cruz ain't much, but iffen your s.h.i.+p's got a com glitch, be happy t'see what my 'tronics shop c'n do t'help."

"Oh." Sanders' eyes slid toward Major Atwell for just an instant, but then he gave himself a little shake and smiled. "Sorry, Mister Esteban. We didn't mean to violate field procedure, but since Captain Merrit's dispatches started coming in, Central's realized the actual situation out here. We know you've got responsibilities of your own on your hacienda, and we weren't sure you'd be at the field this early. If you weren't, we didn't want you to go to the bother of coming down just to greet us."

"Mighty thoughtful," Esteban acknowledged with a bob of his head, "but 'tisn't a problem. My place's just over th' hill there. I c'n pop down in four, five minutes, max, by air car. Anyways, now you're here, what c'n I do fer you?"

"Actually, Mister Esteban, we're here to see Captain Merrit. Could you direct us to the Bolo depot and perhaps provide transportation?"

"Well-" Esteban began to explain that Paul was in the middle of a field exercise, then paused, mental antennae quivering, as Sanders' eye curtsied toward Atwell again. The old man couldn't have said exactly why, but that eye movement seemed . . . furtive, somehow. And why should a full colonel be--or seem to be--so worried over what a major thought? Something odd was going on, and his mind flickered back over past conversations with Paul Merrit. Lorenco Esteban hadn't lived seventy years without learning to recognize when someone watched his words carefully, and he'd accepted months ago that Paul was up to something he didn't really want anyone else to know about. That might have worried him, if he hadn't also decided Paul was a man to be trusted. More than that, the younger man had become a friend, someone Esteban both liked and respected, and the sudden, unannounced arrival of four officers of the Dinochrome Brigade looked ominous. If his friend was in some sort of trouble, Lorenco Esteban intended to give him as much warning-and buy him as much time-as he could before it descended upon him.

"Tell you what, Colonel," he said. "I been workin' on a little maintenance problem this mornin', an' it'll prob'ly take me a little while t'scare up somethin' with the kinda bush capability you're gonna need. Why don't you an' your friends come on over t'Admin with me? I'll get cleaned up, an' then see what I c'n do fer you. How's that?"

Sanders glanced at his chrono and a brief spasm seemed to flash across his face, but then he made himself smile.

"Of course, Mister Esteban. Thank you. Ah, our business with the captain is just a bit on the urgent side, however, so if you could, um, expedite our transport. . . ."

"No problem, Colonel. We'll get'cha on your way right smart."

Esteban turned to lead the way to the Admin Building and the four officers fell in behind. He led them inside and waved to chairs in the s.p.a.cious waiting room Santa Cruz hadn't needed in living memory.

"Have a seat, Colonel. Be with you soon's I wash off some'a this grease."

He nodded to his guests and ambled down the hall to the washroom. None of the visitors knew it had a rear door, and he grinned to himself as he kept right on going towards the com room.

Paul Merrit reclined in the depot command center's comfortable chair and smiled as he watched the planetary surveillance display. He wished he were riding with Nike instead of keeping track of her through the satellite net, but the purpose of the exercise was to show what his girl could do in independent mode. Besides, he had a better view of things from here.

In an effort to give the Militia at least some chance, he and Colonel Gonzalez had agreed to isolate Nike from the recon satellites for the first portion of the exercise. That, coupled with complete com silence from the depot, would both deprive her of bird's-eye intelligence and force her to execute all her own planning, strategic as well as tactical. Since that was something the Mark XXIII wasn't supposed to be able to do, her ability to pull it off would underscore her talents for the performance log.

In the meantime, however, the understrength battalion of five-hundred-ton Wolverines had been snorting through the jungle for several hours, moving into position, and Nike didn't know where they were or precisely what they planned. She knew their objective was to reach the depot without being intercepted, yet the way they did it was up to them, and Gonzalez had opted for a multip.r.o.nged advance. She'd divided her fourteen Wolverines into four separate forces, two of three tanks each and two of four each, operating along the same general axis but advancing across a front of almost fifty kilometers. There was a limit to how rapidly even a Bolo could move through a Santa Cruz jungle, and the colonel clearly hoped to sneak at least one force past Nike while the Bolo dealt with the others. If she could get a big enough start once contact was made, it might even work. Splitting her tanks into detachments wouldn't really increase the odds against their survival--all fourteen Wolverines together wouldn't have lasted five minutes against Nike in a stand-up fight--but Nike would have to deal with the separated forces one at a time. It was certainly possible, if not exactly likely, that one of them could outrun her while she swatted its fellows, and- A signal beeped, and he twitched upright in his chair. It beeped again, and he turned his chair to the communications console. The screen flickered to life with Lorenco Esteban's face, and Merrit frowned as he recognized the old man's tense expression.

"Morning, Lorenco. What can I do for you?"

"I think mebbe y'got a little problem over here at th' field, Paul," Esteban said in a low voice. Merrit's left eyebrow rose, and the old man shrugged. "I got me four Dinochrome Brigade officers out here, headed by a colonel name of Sanders, an' they're lookin' fer you, boy."

"Sanders?" Merrit let his chair snap upright and frowned as an icy chill ran through him. "Clifton Sanders?"

"That's him," Esteban nodded, and Merrit's lips shaped a silent curse. He could think of only one thing that would bring the sector's chief Maintenance, Logistics, and Procurement officer to Santa Cruz, but how in h.e.l.l had anyone on Ursula figured out-?

He shook himself, and his mind raced. He could call off the exercise and order Nike back to base, but there was no regulation against a Bolo commander on independent a.s.signment conducting exercises on his own authority. More to the point, having Nike out of the garage when Sanders arrived would buy at least a little time. That might not be as important as he suddenly feared it might, but the fact that Sanders had come in person, without sending even a single information request first--and hadn't commed him from the field after arrival, either--was more than simply ominous. It smacked of sneak inspections and an attempt to catch Merrit violating procedure, and, unfortunately, that was exactly what it was going to do, because Merrit hadn't kept Central "fully informed" of the state of his command as Regs required. He might not have told any actual lies, but he'd certainly done a lot of misleading by omission.

He closed his eyes and thought hard. Sanders himself had a reputation as an administrator, not a technician. He might not realize how far outside parameters Nike was from a cursory examination of her schematics and system specs, but that was probably why he'd brought the others along. Any half-competent Bolo tech would know what he was seeing the moment he pulled up Nike's readouts. Besides, Sanders wouldn't be here in the first place if he didn't already suspect something was out of kilter.

A fist of cold iron squeezed Merrit's heart at what that might mean. But if Nike wasn't here when the MLP men arrived, they'd have to at least talk to him before they could shut her down. In fact, he could force them to hear him out by refusing to call her in until they did. It wouldn't hurt if she'd completed the first phase of the exercise, either. Thin as it might be, his performance log's authentication of her unique abilities was her only real protection. Of course, if he refused to call her in when ordered, especially after what had happened on Sandlot, he was through in the Brigade, but he suddenly realized how little that meant to him beside protecting Nike's life.

He opened his eyes and cleared his throat.

"Thanks, Lorenco," he said softly. "Thanks a lot."

"Son, I don't know what all you been up to out there, an' I don't rightly care. You're a friend. You want I should let these yahoos get themselves lost in th' bush? Reckon it'd take 'em four, five hours t'find you with the directions I c'n give 'em."

"No. I appreciate the offer, but you'd better stay out of this."

"Huh. Well, how 'bout I waste an hour or so 'fore I find 'em transport? I already set that 'un up."

"If you can do it without being obvious, please do," Merrit said gratefully. "After that, though, you'd better go home and keep as far away from any official involvement as you can."

"Iffen you say so, boy." The old man hesitated a moment, then shook his head. "Gotta tell you, Paul--they's somethin' squirrely goin' on here. Can't put m'finger on it, but I c'n feel it. You watch yerself, hear?"

"I will. Thanks again." Merrit nodded to the pickup and killed the circuit, then leaned back and fidgeted in his chair. He started to key his link to Nike, then sat back and put his hands in his lap. There was no point worrying her, and she was just likely to argue if he told her he wanted her to stay out of sight. He shook his head. No, much better to leave her in blissful ignorance as long as possible.

He sighed and rubbed his face with his hands, and fear fluttered in the pit of his belly.

"I sure hope to h.e.l.l your 'a.s.sociates' have managed to 'deal' with that Bolo, Mister Scully," Colonel Granger muttered.

"Amen," someone muttered from the recesses of the big transport's CIC, and Gerald Osterwelt shrugged.

"You've seen the plan, Colonel," he said mildly. "I can't blame you for worrying, but I certainly wouldn't be here if I didn't expect it to work."

"I can believe that," the colonel muttered to herself, and turned away from the glowing tactical display. The single aspect of the plan she most disliked was the tight timing. They were scheduled to hit the planet within two hours of Colonel Sanders' arrival, and she didn't like it a bit. It would take less than fifteen minutes for an air car to reach the maintenance depot from the field, and Sanders could burn the Bolo's command center in less than ten once he got it shut down, so if all went according to schedule, two hours was an ample cus.h.i.+on. But if things didn't go as scheduled--if they got there too soon, before the Bolo went down, and its commander- She clenched her teeth and commanded herself to stop worrying over what she couldn't change. Besides, Scully was right in at least one respect. The Bolo commander--this Captain Merrit--had to be among the fatalities, because if he wasn't, the fact that someone had fixed the Bolo would be glaringly evident. But the same thing would be true if anyone on the planet happened to com Central--or anyone else off-planet--and casually mention the presence of "Dinochrome Brigade officers" on Santa Cruz at the same moment a "pirate raid" just happened to hit it.

They had to take out the planet's com sat relays as the opening gambit of their attack, anyway, because if there were so much as a single Navy destroyer anywhere within jump range of Santa Cruz and a message got out, it could blow all three of Matucek's Marauders' stars.h.i.+ps to sc.r.a.p. And since they did have to take out Santa Cruz's FTL communications, they might as well do it as quickly as possible after Sanders' arrival to ensure that no word of his presence got out. Besides, they didn't know how thoroughly Merrit had settled in on Santa Cruz, or how much contact he normally had with the locals. If he had friends who knew he was being visited by an off-world deputation, they might well com him to find out how things had gone, and when they didn't get an answer--or if they figured out he was dead--they were almost certain to com Central. All of which made it highly desirable to hit the planet as soon as possible after Sanders did his dirty work.

She understood that, but she still didn't like the timing. The smart move--as she'd told Scully (or whatever the h.e.l.l his real name was) and Matucek repeatedly--would be to wait until Sanders shut down the Bolo and was able to confirm his success. Unfortunately, Scully was calling the shots, and Matucek wasn't about to argue with him.

Well, at least they had confirmation that Sanders had arrived on schedule, courtesy of the s.h.i.+p which carried him, and, as Scully had pointed out, there were two strings to the colonel's bow. If this Captain Merrit argued with him, all that was needed was for Captain Merrit to die a little sooner than scheduled. With him dead, Sanders, as the senior Brigade officer on Santa Cruz, would become the Bolo's legal commander. His access at Sector Central had given him the command authorization phrase he needed to so identify himself to the Bolo, and it was only a Mark XXIII. It wouldn't be bright enough to ask any difficult questions when he ordered it to shut down--not that it would matter. With the command phrase in his possession, Sanders could lobotomize the d.a.m.ned thing even if it proved unresponsive.

Granger bared her teeth at her tactical console. She'd read Merrit's record. The man was tough, smart, gutsy, and as good as they came, but it didn't matter how good he was. He knew who Sanders was, so he wouldn't be suspicious of the colonel, and he had absolutely no reason to suspect that the other "Brigade members" with his superior were professional killers. If he proved difficult, it would be a very brief difficulty.

"a.s.sault orbit in ninety-six minutes, ma'am," her ops officer murmured, and she nodded.

"Double-check the fire solution on the com sats. All three of those birds have to go down the instant we enter orbit."

"I'm on it," the ops officer grunted laconically, and Louise Granger sat back in her command chair with an evil smile.

-16 -.

I advance through the jungle, sweeping on an east-west arc at 30.25 kph. As ordered, I have disabled my independent link to the planetary surveillance satellites and all com channels save for that to the emergency contact unit in the maintenance depot. I am operating blind, yet I am confident that I can fulfill my mission, and the challenge is both pleasing of itself and an anodyne to my anxieties over my relations.h.i.+p to my Commander.

It is odd, I reflect while my Battle Center maintains a 360-degree tactical range broad-spectrum pa.s.sive search, but this is the closest I have ever approached to actual combat. I am a warrior, product of eight centuries of evolution in war machine design, and I have existed for eighty-two years, four months, sixteen days, eight hours, twelve minutes, and five seconds, yet I have never seen war. I have never tested myself against the proud record and tradition of the Dinochrome Brigade. Even today's exercises will be but games, and I sense a dichotomy within my emotions. Through my Commander and the words of poets such as Siegfried Sa.s.soon and Wilfred Owen, I have come to appreciate the horrors of war more clearly, perhaps, even than those of my brothers who have actually seen it. I recognize its destructiveness, and the evils which must always accompany even the most just of wars. Yet I am also a Bolo, a unit of the Line. Ultimately, war is my function, the reason for my existence, and deep within me there lives an edge of regret, a longing not for the opportunity to destroy the Enemy but for the opportunity to test myself against him and prove myself worthy.

My sensors detect a faint emissions source at 075 degrees. I am operating in pa.s.sive mode, with no active sensor emissions to betray my presence in reply, and the source is extremely faint, but 0.00256 seconds of signal enhancement and a.n.a.lysis confirm that it is the short-range air-search radar of a Wolverine heavy tank.

I ponder the implications for 1.0362 seconds. Colonel Gonzalez is a clever tactician. Logically, she, even more than I, should be operating under emissions control doctrine, for she knows her objective and needs only to slip past me undetected to attain it. It is possible that she fears I have deployed reconnaissance drones and seeks to detect and destroy them before they can report her actual deployment, but I compute a probability of 89.7003 percent that this is a deception attempt. She wishes me to detect the emissions. She has divided her force and hopes to draw me out of position against the decoy while her true striking force eludes detection.

I alter course to 172 degrees true and engage my tactical modeling program. I now have a bearing to the unit she wishes me to detect, which indicates the direction in which I should not move, and I begin construction of alternative models of her probable deployment from that base datum. In 2.75 minutes, I will, in fact, deploy my first reconnaissance drone, but first I must generate the search pattern it will pursue.

Paul Merrit grimaced as the depot sensors detected an approaching bogey, then grinned as its emissions signature registered. Esteban had done exactly as promised and delayed Sanders' arrival for over an hour, and from that signature, he hadn't exactly given the colonel a luxury sedan, either. The power readings were just about right for one of the old man's air lorry melon haulers, with a maximum speed of barely five hundred kph, less than twelve percent of what Merrit's own recon skimmer could manage.

He watched the blip's approach, and his grin faded. Clunky transport or not, that was--at best--the Sword of Damocles out there. And however politely obstructionist he intended to be once Sanders arrived, there were appearances to preserve in the meantime.

He shrugged and keyed the com.

"Unknown aircraft, unknown aircraft. You are approaching restricted Navy airs.p.a.ce. Identify."

He waited a moment, and an eyebrow quirked when he received no response. He gave them another twenty seconds, then keyed the com again.

"Unknown aircraft, you have now entered restricted airs.p.a.ce. Be advised this is a high-security area and that I am authorized to employ deadly force against intruders. Identify at once."

"Bolo depot," a voice came back at last, "this is Colonel Clifton Sanders, Dinochrome Brigade, on official business."

"Colonel Sanders?" Merrit was rather pleased by the genuineness of the surprise he managed to put into his voice.

"That's correct, Captain Merrit. I'm afraid this . . . vehicle has no visual capabilities or proper transponder, but I trust you recognize my voice?"

"Of course, sir."

"Good. My present ETA is six minutes."

"Very good, sir. I'll be waiting."

"d.a.m.n that old fart!" the man introduced to Esteban as Major Atwell hissed from the pa.s.senger compartment in the rear of the lorry's cab. "We're way behind schedule!"

"I don't understand what your problem is," Sanders said petulantly over his shoulder. "You heard Merrit. He doesn't suspect a thing. Everything's going to plan as far as I can see."

Atwell's lips curled in a silent snarl at the colonel's back, but he bit off his savage retort. Sanders had been antsy enough from the moment he figured out they were going to have to kill Merrit. He'd p.i.s.s himself if he even suspected the real reason for this entire operation--especially if it occurred to him that he was about to become a liability to GalCorp, as well. He had no idea his severance pay was riding in the holster on Atwell's hip, but, by the same token, he didn't know Matucek was scheduled to hit the planet in less than thirty minutes, either.

"Let's just get in and get this over with," the bogus major said finally. "The faster we get off-planet, the less exposure we've got."

"All right. All right!" Sanders shrugged irritably. "I don't know why you're so worried. I'm the only one that old dodderer can identify by name!"

"Don't worry, Colonel," Atwell soothed. "We'll take care of Esteban on the way out. No one will ever know you've been here, I promise."

Clifton Sanders s.h.i.+vered at how easily his "a.s.sociate" p.r.o.nounced yet another death sentence, but he said nothing. There was nothing he could say now. All he could do was obey his orders and pray that somehow GalCorp could protect him from the consequences of carrying out its instructions.

Lorenco Esteban eased himself into one of the veranda chairs and grimaced. The more he thought about it, the more convinced he became that something unpleasant was in the wind for Paul, and he wished there'd been more he could do for his friend. But Paul was right. If the idiots back at Central had decided to come down on him, getting involved in it wouldn't do Lorenco any good, either.

He tipped his chair back with a sigh. Good luck, boy, he thought. You're a better man than that fool-colonel any day.

"I've got a drone, ma'am!" The sensor tech in Consuela Gonzalez' command tank bent closer to her panel. "Coming up at zero-three-zero relative, alt.i.tude three thousand, heading two-niner-seven true. Speed three hundred kph. Range . . . three-six point five klicks and closing!"

"d.a.m.n!" Gonzalez shook her head. So much for misdirection! From the drone's point of origin, the Bolo must be well out on her left flank, but its recon drone was sweeping almost directly perpendicular to her line of advance, as if the machine knew exactly where to look.

"Kill it!" she barked.

"Firing," the Wolverine's air defense tech replied, and a laser turret swiveled. A beam of coherent light sizzled through the humid air, and the drone blew up instantly.

"There goes seven or eight hundred credits of taxpayer's money!" the tech chortled.

"Well, it's seven or eight hundred credits your great-great-grandma paid, not us," Gonzalez said with a grin. d.a.m.n, that felt good! She and Merrit had agreed to a hard-limit of five kilometers; any drones or recon remotes beyond that range from her tanks or the Bolo could be engaged with live fire, and she hadn't counted on how much fun that would be.

My drone has been destroyed, but I have plotted the coordinates of two Aggressor forces in addition to the decoy emissions source. I consider a simulated missile launch against them, but the Wolverine's computer-commanded point defense systems are efficient. Nuclear warheads have not been specified for this scenario, and the PK with conventional warheads against a force of three Wolverines is only 28.653 percent. It will be necessary to engage with direct-fire weapons.

A source count indicates the presence of ten of Colonel Gonzalez' fourteen tanks in the known detachments. This leaves four unaccounted for, but the locations of the known forces allow me to refine my hypothetical models of her deployment. A further 0.00017 seconds of a.n.a.lysis indicate that the unlocated units are her extreme right flank force and reduce their possible coordinates to three locations. I call up my terrain maps and plot those loci and continuous updates of their maximum possible advance while I consider the launch of a second drone to confirm my deduction. I reject the option after 0.00311 seconds of consideration. I will reach Hill 0709-A in 9.3221 minutes, plus or minus 56.274 seconds From its summit, I will have direct observation--and fire capability--to each of the three possible locations. I will advance and destroy this force, then sweep back to the southwest at an angle which will permit me to encounter and destroy each of the known forces in succession. In the meantime, the absence of a second drone launch may leave Colonel Gonzalez off balance, uncertain of the tactical data actually in my possession.

The air lorry landed, and Merrit came to attention on the landing ap.r.o.n. Two of Colonel Sanders' companions accompanied the colonel to the bunker entrance, and Merrit felt a slight spasm of surprise at the sloppiness with which they returned his salute. All of them wore MLP shoulder flashes, which should indicate they spent most of their time back at Central, and somebody who kept stumbling over senior officers should get lots of practice at saluting.

He shook the thought aside as Sanders held out his hand.

"Welcome to Santa Cruz, Colonel."

"Thank you, Captain." Sanders' handshake was damp and clammy, and Merrit resisted a temptation to scrub his palm on his trouser leg when the colonel released it. "I a.s.sume you know why I'm here," Sanders went on briskly, and Merrit shook his head.

"No, sir, I'm afraid not. No one told me you were coming."

"What?" Sanders c.o.c.ked his eyebrows, but the surprise in his voice struck a false note, somehow. He shook his head. "Central was supposed to have informed you last week, Captain."

"Informed me of what, sir?" Merrit asked politely.

"Of the policy change concerning Santa Cruz. We've been conducting a sector-wide cost a.n.a.lysis since your arrival here, Captain Merrit. Naturally, we were startled to discover the nature and extent of the Santa Cruz installations--we had no idea we'd misplaced a Bolo for eighty years, heh, heh!--but given their age and the sector's general readiness states, it's hard to see any point in maintaining them on active status. Frontier sectors always face tighter fiscal constraints than the core sectors, you know, so it's been decided--purely as a cost-cutting measure, you understand--to deactivate your Bolo and rea.s.sign you."

"A cost-cutting measure, sir?" Merrit asked. He was careful to keep his tone casual and just a bit confused, but alarm bells began to sound in the back of his brain. He'd expected Sanders to come in breathing fire and smoke over his blatant disregard for regulations, yet his initial relief at the lack of fireworks was fading fast. Sanders was babbling. He was also sweating harder than even Santa Cruz's climate called for, and Paul Merrit had seen too much combat in his forty-one years not to have developed a survivor's instincts. Now those instincts shouted that something was very, very wrong.

"Yes, a cost-cutting measure," Sanders replied. "You know how expensive a Bolo is, Captain. Each of them we maintain on active duty takes its own bite out of our total maintenance funding posture, and without a threat to the planet to justify the expense, well-"

He shrugged, and Merrit nodded slowly, expression calm despite a sinking sensation as he noticed that both of Sanders' companions were armed. Of course, the jungle had all sorts of nasty fauna, and all Santa Cruzans went armed whenever they ventured into the bush on foot, but they tended to pack weapons heavy enough to knock even lizard cats on their posteriors. These men wore standard military-issue three-millimeter needlers, efficient enough man-killers but not much use against a lizard cat or one of the pseudo-rhinos.