VIPER One: Countervalue

They regrouped on the top floor of Government House, in one of the building’s few executive meeting rooms to overlook the wall. En route, Vasco had released his personal drone out of a window like someone surreptitiously disposing of a piece of trash, and it hovered a hundred metres above the building, projecting an undetectable deadzone around Yashego’s office. If the Governor tried to make any further network-wide announcements, they would be rebuffed by the field.

  The executive meeting room was silent; most of the Governorate’s staff had not actually arrived, given the early hour in which the news from Sector Command had been received, and there would not have been many people due anyway. Like most work within the UN, it was undertaken by civic-minded volunteers for extra money and privileges on top of those granted by their Entitlement Deed. As a consequence, the building was largely empty and quiet, the air leaden with anticipation.

  ‘Target Mike One secure,’ Jarle said over the comlink. Minos One—Burrow.

  ‘In one piece?’

  ‘Superficial.’

  ‘But intact?’ Vasco pressed.

  ‘Yes, Captain. Just minor leg injuries. We’ve left him with the Manticore; Jinn is watching him.’

  ‘And you definitely can’t get airborne?’

  Jarle paused. ‘No, Captain, I don’t believe we can. Not without unacceptable mission risk. As it stands, the Manticore is a critical asset. I don’t want to put her in the air until I can be sure she’ll stay in it.’

  Vasco sighed. He would not question Jarle’s initiative. He trusted the man implicitly. And besides, he was right; without the Manticore they would die on Ariadne like everyone else. But he was still human. He wanted off this rock as much as the next person.

  ‘All right. Do what you have to. I trust your judgement.’

  ‘Thank you, Captain. Oh, and sir?

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘I don’t know how hot on comms we’re going to be able to be in the next few hours.’

  ‘OK. Speak to me when you can. We’re not going anywhere, so don’t jeopardize the mission for the sake of an update.’

  ‘Understood. Bravo out.’

  The link terminated. Vasco checked the mission timer, then turned his attentions to the external compound. They had been on-world for two hours already, and the crowd outside was growing, not dissipating. There must have been thousands now, all along Independence Boulevard. The courtyard was littered with improvised missiles. The two guards had retreated inside the building.

  ‘We need to bag and tag Yashego asap,’ Vasco said absently. ‘He’s going to be trouble otherwise. I’ve DZ’d his office for now, and let him think I’m going to leave him alone. Seemed easier than arguing with him.’

  ‘What about the other two?’ Sev asked.

  ‘I think we can keep them conscious for now, unless either of you have any objections?’

  Both Sev and Kgosi shook their heads.

  ‘What did Sarge want? Sir,’ Kgosi added.

  ‘They’ve secured M1 but UNAF Minos has gone sour. Our air is out of action until they can clear the arty.’

  ‘Shit,’ Kgosi muttered.

  ‘Yeah,’ Vasco replied.

  ‘Do we know how bad?’ Sev asked.

  ‘It’s bad,’ Vasco said matter-of-factly. ‘We’re going to be stuck here for the time being.’

  ‘If that’s the case, this crowd is going to be a serious problem,’ Kgosi said, not taking his eyes off it.

  ‘Agreed,’ Vasco murmured.

  ‘And we still need to pick up Sarbin,’ Sev said from the back of the room. ‘He doesn’t know we’re coming for him,’

  ‘Yes, well,’ Vasco said.

  After a short silence, Sev cleared his throat. ‘Captain?’

  ‘Yes, Lukas?’

  ‘Are you thinking of leaving him?’

  Vasco grimaced. He didn’t turn around. He saw Kgosi look over to him out of the corner of his eye.

  ‘We’re not there yet. I’m still considering our options,’ he said. The rogue UNAF forces in Minos had put a pin in his rapid in-out operation. In fact, if VIPER Bravo couldn’t get that Manticore back in the air soon, they could conceivably be stuck on Ariadne for the duration.

  ‘Rogue UNAF in Minos means—’

  ‘Rogue UNAF in Theseus, I know,’ Vasco interrupted. ‘But they have no reason to kill Sarbin.’ He called up the three-dimensional heat signature image of the compound. There were thirty people on site—two of them armed guards, whom they did not trust and would not use. The rest were civilians. They were crowded in one of the building’s common rooms, watching the news.

  Vasco took a deep breath. ‘We need to start planning for the long haul.’ He turned around and transferred the image of the compound to one of the desk-mounted holo generators. ‘There’s an underground shelter which we can put the civilians into.’

  ‘Should we try and let them leave?’ Sev asked. ‘It might reduce potential complications.’

  Vasco shook his head. ‘I don’t want to compromise the perimeter seal. From now on we’re in lockdown. And besides, that mob will tear them to shreds.’

  ‘Their own people?’

  ‘Anyone who works here is UN. Doesn’t matter if it’s Mrs Civilian from down the street; she may as well have “UN” carved into her forehead.’

  ‘Putting them underground is a death sentence,’ Kgosi said matter-of-factly.

  ‘Right now, K, just existing on Ariadne is a death sentence. And that includes us.’

  There was a pause. ‘Fine.’

  Vasco studied the holo. ‘Those walls will keep civilians out, but they’re just concrete. There’s no reinforcement that I can see. If on-world forces come for us, it’s going to be a long night.’

  ‘The building itself has carbon polymer reinforcement and some diamond composite plating,’ Kgosi said, reading through the history of the building as provided by the VI. ‘It’ll stop most small arms. The wall was a later addition. Cheap, locally made. Basic deterrent.’

  ‘We could use the civilians as human shields,’ Sev suggested. The man had such a mild, reasonable manner that it was sometimes easy to forget he’d been a member of Special Warfare Division—and done all of the unspeakable things that that usually entailed.

  ‘Just leave your SPECWAR tactics where they belong,’ Vasco said, more aggressively than he’d intended. ‘We’ll do this by the numbers.’

  Sev shrugged, unperturbed. ‘Just a suggestion.’

  Vasco returned to the holo. ‘K, set up the RRG here.’ He indicted a bay window on the top floor, located directly above the pillared façade of the entrance. ‘How much ammo did we get?’

  Kgosi’s face crumpled up in frustration. ‘It’s only good for about a thousand rounds. Didn’t bring any spare hoppers.’

  Vasco sighed. A thousand rounds for the RRG gave them about twenty seconds of fire. He shrugged. ‘It’ll have to do.’

  ‘Where do you want me, Chief?’ Sev asked.

  Vasco studied the building. ‘I think we put Brock, Rhodes and Yashego on the first floor, and seal it. That’s one floor clear of the ground, and one floor clear of us, since we’ll be attracting the most fire if UNAF shows up. We’ll keep the ground floor clear, and set up traps on any access points. Plant the plasma explosives on some of the structural supports, too, in case we need to permanently seal it off. I’ll leave that to you two.’

  ‘Banking on a rooftop extraction?’ Sev asked.

  Vasco nodded. ‘If that Manticore isn’t up and running inside a day, it won’t matter what we do. We’ll all die here.’ He manipulated the map. ‘I think you and I should run a mobile defence across the top floor. Actually, we should check access to the roof, too. Try and keep as mobile as possible in line with tactical doctrine.’

  ‘What about Sarbin?’ Kgosi asked. ‘Assuming we make it out.’

  Vasco nodded. The holo zoomed out of the compound. The building which Sarbin was in was an old townhouse, a selection of luxurious ex-UNDM diplomatic
apartments converted in a more optimistic age when it was anticipated that Ariadne would play a much greater part in Ascendancy relations than it had. They had been mothballed for the best part of a decade before being dusted off for the arrival of Sarbin and his trade delegates. According to papers lodged with Ariadne’s civil aviation VI, the alien had been due to leave in three days; but the Ascendancy War had kicked off and the planet had been in a state of permanent lockdown for nearly a month. So far as Vasco could tell from his briefing, Sarbin had yet to leave, but no-one could get through to him.

  ‘He hasn’t exactly been talkative,’ Vasco said.

  ‘Then we should make contact and tell him to prepare,’ Kgosi said, reading the reluctance on Vasco’s face. ‘The mission briefing gave equal weight to all of the targets.’

  ‘Believe me, K, I would take ten Sarbins over one Yashego,’ Vasco replied. ‘But our current situation is in the red end of the mission spectrum and it’s about to tick over into the blackest of the blacks. If I can get Yashego, Brock, Rhodes and the three from Minos off world, I’ll take it. Even our own tolerances allow for a thirty percent loss for mission success.’

  Sev cut in before Kgosi became insubordinate. ‘We could use drones to contact him. Prepare him for extraction. If the Manticore is going to take us off the roof, it wouldn’t be too much of a stretch to take Sarbin off his roof.’ He manipulated the holo as he spoke.

  Vasco shook his head. ‘Assuming we get unfriendly UNAF forces in the area, that’s doubling the amount of dead air time for our only method of extraction.’

  ‘Can’t we at least try?’ Kgosi said, suddenly forceful. ‘Can’t we give him a chance?’

  Vasco took a deep breath. He contemplated for a second. ‘All right. Once we’ve got this place locked down, you can try and contact him with your drone. Get him prepped. But if I have to leave him sitting on that roof, I will.’