Omega Squad: Targets

GC spaceport terminal building, 1745

  Fi could see what Atin could see and hear what he heard. The squad had switched to the cam output within their helmets, and they were all focused on an unsteady image of folds of fabric and the muffled but audible conversation.

  “Let these people leave,” said Kaim. “You don’t want to harm them.”

  “And no doubt you don’t want to harm ordinary Korunnai, yet your interference does just that.” The view from the cam shifted and Fi could see figures distorted by the wide-angle lens: three men, one in gray, one in dark green, one in light tan, and one in a loose dark brown coat. All had their faces obscured by black scarves. There were figures behind them, two groups of three, also with their heads covered in the same scarves. But they were the hostages, judging by their huddled positions and their clothing: out-of-date fashions from Garqi, a business suit, a customs uniform, a Mon Calamari Senator’s formal robe and a cheaper imitation of it.

  Fine, thought Fi. His helmet was recording. I don’t need to see your faces. I know what you wear, how you move, how you sound, and that’s how I’ll know who you are when I blow your brains out.

  Kaim’s voice was soothing and reasonable. “These people need food and water.”

  “That’s the least of their worries.” The one in gray: Fi noted his voice. The one in light tan turned to look at the Senator and told him to shut up. Green Man was holding his blaster left-handed. Detail. “Take a look at their baggage.”

  Tan Man—Fi now saw the targets as color-coded—grabbed the old Garqian man by his shoulder and dragged him across the polished tiles a little way from the wall on his backside. The old woman’s voice whimpered, terrified. Fi could see now what Gray had meant by baggage: The hostages had small packs strapped to them.

  “Six lives are a price worth paying, Jedi,” said Gray. “We will detonate the charges.”

  “This wins you no sympathy. Mercy will.”

  “We don’t require sympathy. Just your compliance.”

  “Let the old couple go, at least.”

  There was a pause. Fi wasn’t sure where Kaim had managed to place the strip-cam, but Gray’s shrouded face came closer and Fi saw two pale eyes as if he was looking into them personally.

  “Lying Jedi filth! Spy!” Gray hissed, and the sound and image crashed to static and black.

  “Fierfek…” said Atin.

  They heard the screams. They weren’t only from an old woman. Then there was a thud, and shouting—“Shut up! Shut up, or you die now!”—then silence.

  Fi looked to the ARC, rifle aimed at the doors: Darman raised the remote detonators in his glove, a mute request for permission to blow the doors.

  “Hold fire,” said the ARC.

  The twin doors began to part and Fi, Atin and Niner had their Deeces trained on the widening gap. He could see the different views through their scopes in his HUD.

  “I said hold!”

  Something tipped and rolled onto the polished marble and the doors sighed shut again. It was Kaim. Fi and Niner edged forward first and the police closed up behind them. Fi wondered how much the hovercams and broadcast droids could see. Could the gang see them?

  Kaim wasn’t moving. Niner put out a cautious hand to pull back the Jedi’s robe, and Fi saw a flicker of light and heard Niner catch his breath.

  “Booby trap—counting down!”

  Fi didn’t think.

  The police officers were right on top of him, unprotected.

  He flung himself flat on Kaim’s body, eyes tight shut so he wouldn’t see the shattered face, waiting long fractions within fractions of seconds before a shock wave lifted him like a body blow and raw noise filled his helmet. He felt as if he’d been shaken hard in a metal box. For an instant, red light flooded his eyes behind his closed lids.

  How long the next moments took he didn’t know. But he could hear the ARC shouting, “Droid those cams! Do it! Now!”

  He could hear yelling, so he wasn’t dead. That was something.

  Holoflash, 1758:

  A Huruun Kal group holding Senator Tills has killed a Jedi negotiator. All location cams have been disabled in a news blackout, but we’ve just witnessed horrific scenes as the Jedi’s booby-trapped remains exploded in the terminal. It’s thought a member of the elite Republic Commando shielded the blast with his body. Viewers might find the following images distressing.

  “What do you use for brains, Fi?” Skirata hissed, supporting Fi’s shoulders. “You’re a di’kut.”

  Fi could feel bruises forming everywhere he had places. He sat upright with some difficulty. “Thanks for the sympathy, Sarge. I’m fine.”

  “You trust that pretty armor a lot more than I would.” Skirata suddenly shook him fiercely by the shoulder. “Don’t you ever scare me like that again, son. You hear? Let the cops look after themselves.”

  It hadn’t been a big device, just enough to kill or maim a couple of people, but not enough to breach Katarn armor. He’d smothered the blast and the shrapnel that went with it. Fi hadn’t been 100 percent sure at the time that the armor would absorb the energy from the blast, and now that the adrenaline had finished coursing through his veins he felt shaky.

  The ARC stared down at him, fists on hips. Skirata kept calling him Ordo: Skirata insisted men had names, not numbers, whatever the rules said.

  “Nice move,” said Ordo.

  “Nice skirt.” Fi indicated Ordo’s battle-scarred belt-spat, shredded at the hem like a flag that had been left too long on its mast. Fi wiped his armor, trying to forget what was smeared on the plastoid-alloy but the smell kept reminding him. “Really suits you. Handwashable?”

  Ordo’s expression was hidden behind his visor but his tone wasn’t. “It’s a kama,” he said, all ice.

  “Someday, Fi, someone’s going to belt you one,” Atin muttered. “And it’s probably going to be Ordo.”

  He was right. But Fi didn’t know any other way to keep his gut from shaking at times like this. It was how he coped. He was relieved and he was shocked, and now he had to get on with the job. He leaned on his Deece to get to his feet and saw the cams and droids had gone; the illuminated displays in the terminal were black screens and the amber emergency lighting was on.

  So Ordo had deployed an EMP device to knock out the holocams, and taken out all the unshielded equipment around them too. Droiding. A crazy but necessary move, Fi thought, seeing as it might have triggered whatever explosives the gang had rigged. He linked into Niner’s helmet and saw that he was running and rerunning the images of the gang that Kaim had paid for with his life, memorizing the identifying details.

  Rugeyan was looking around the terminal hall, chatting on his comlink, the embodiment of pure calculation. “Okay, so we’ll have to take the news conferences at the Chamber… any more bodies, and they go out via the back… I know, it’s not good seeing Jedi body parts… the grunt was great, right?”

  Ordo and Skirata looked at each other as if some common bond had sprung up from nowhere. Fi wondered if they had some comlink of their own: Skirata occasionally slipped something into his ear and removed it again. Ordo cocked his head but Skirata smiled tightly and without humor. He turned to Rugeyan and put a scarred hand on the sleeve of his nice, sharp tunic.

  “Son,” he said. “I couldn’t help noticing that you called my boys grunts. Don’t do that again, will you?”

  Rugeyan looked down at Skirata as if he’d noticed him for the first time and lowered the comlink. “We want the Senator out now. Nothing else matters.”

  “I’m glad you pointed that out to me.” Fi couldn’t see what Skirata did next, but his arm dropped down and suddenly Rugeyan seemed to be taking a lot of notice of him. His eyes bulged visibly and a small uh noise forced its way past his lips. “Now that I have your attention, may I suggest that you remove yourself from the incident scene and let Captain Ordo and my boys do their jobs?”

  Fi was mesmerized. Darman jogged up to the tableau of frozen pain. “Charges laid, Sarge. Ready to
go.”

  Skirata’s arm fell back to his side again, and Rugeyan inhaled sharply before brushing down his tunic and striding away with somewhat splayed legs.

  “I’ll remember that move,” said Atin approvingly. “Vau never taught us anything like that.”

  But Vau had certainly taught Atin the exacting procedures for storming a building, Fi knew. He just wondered about Ordo. ARCs weren’t team players.

  “Fancy a bit of action for a change, Captain?” asked Fi. “Give your Deece a day out?”

  “Don’t worry, if your luck holds I’ll be right in front of you,” said Ordo, toneless. “If it doesn’t, I’ll be behind you.”

  Fi thought about that for a few moments. Then he started wondering again why Nuriin-Ar and his cronies hadn’t seized hostages on the transport before it landed; it was an easier location to withstand an assault. The fools were facing certain death. They wouldn’t shift the Senate’s position. And they had to be stupid if they didn’t realize that.

  In the end, though, their intelligence levels wouldn’t matter. He checked his Deece, rehearsing rapid changes between modes and aware that Ordo kept looking his way.

  Holonews Update, 1830:

  The Haruun Kal government has denied knowledge of Nuriin-Ar, leader of the group that’s holding six hostages at Galactic City spaceport. But in an unusually robust statement, the Korunnai ambassador says she “fully understands the group’s frustrations” and has urged the Republic to cease interfering in her planet’s affairs.

  One of the CSF officers brought a tray of caf in flimsi cups and handed Fi one first. A camaraderie had sprung up: Fi rather liked it. The cops actually seemed in awe of what he’d done, and he began to realize that it felt good to be held in that kind of regard.

  “No cookies?” said Skirata, and took a cup.

  The squad took their helmets off to drink. The officer seemed distracted for a moment, staring at their faces. “I’ll see what I can do,” he said.

  “Don’t wait for a tip,” said Skirata. Fi smiled to himself.

  Obrim and Dovel were observing a few paces away, and the group stared at the hologram of the terminal layout that Ordo projected into the space between them.

  “It’s an oblong room,” said Skirata, and slurped his caf. “No scope for anything clever. It’s just going to be a matter of speed, force, and knowing who you’re going to drop as soon as you’re in there.”

  “But how are you going to stop them setting off the devices?” asked Dovel.

  “By slotting them before they can move,” said Niner. “We’ve done this more than 100 times, and we know how each other thinks. This is probably their first time.”

  “And their last.” Ordo dipped the finger of his glove through the shimmering virtual roof space of the customs hall. “I’ll take the roof and keep the hostages still until we get bomb disposal in there to deal with the devices.”

  “All the hostages?” said Obrim.

  “I realize the Senator is a priority.”

  Dovel chewed his lip thoughtfully, clearly a man who no longer wanted primacy in this incident. Fi thought that was a smart change of heart. If anything went wrong, he knew who would get the blame now.

  Ordo got up and tidied his rappel line before fastening it to his belt. “I’ll get in position,” he said. “And I’m switching to the general comlink channel. We go in at 1915. Darman counts us down, and Obrim’s men kill all the lights, okay?”

  Dovel’s communicator chirped. He answered it and adopted that middle-distance stare that people have when they are trying to concentrate on something that they aren’t expecting to hear.

  “It’s Nuriin-Ar,” he said. “He’s asking for buckets, food, and water.”

  “Ah, the power of the need for a ’fresher,” said Obrim. “Looks like our hard men are softening.”

  “Even people who plan to kill engage in displacement activity,” said Skirata. “I’ll take the stuff in for you.”

  “I think I should be doing that, Sergeant,” said Ordo.

  “Yeah, like they’d succumb to your natural charm.” Skirata began checking the pockets in his rumpled jacket. He extracted something that looked like a hearing enhancer—no, it was a hearing enhancer. Fi had always doubted Skirata’s hearing was perfect, and now he knew. “Atin, can you pick up my enhancer’s signal? I hate this thing. But it does come in handy.”

  “It’ll do,” said Atin, stabbing his finger into a small receiver in his palm. “Are you really deaf?”

  “A bit deaf. Just like you’d be if you hung around live-fire ranges without a helmet for too long.”

  “With respect, you’ll just add another complication,” said Ordo.

  Skirata sipped his caf without looking up. “If you mean that my boys will have to worry about shooting me by accident, then it’s simple. They won’t worry about it. Acceptable losses.”

  There was a complete silence in all their helmet comlinks for a telling and brief moment: no breath, no swallowing, no lick of the lips. Fi had a sudden mental image so awful that he didn’t want to deal with it, not then.

  Now it was all down to a well-rehearsed procedure. The charges would detonate, and they would lob in a few flash-bangs so close together that it would feel like the same split second and plunge into reactions so automatic that they wouldn’t pause to think what to do next or even know how much time had elapsed.

  It was drilled deep, unthinking second nature. Fi longed for the moment instinct and training took him over again.

  “I’ll give you as many clues as I can, so listen hard,” said Skirata. He fidgeted with the enhancer, making the same irritated clicks that Niner had. “And if I’m in the way when you come in, it’s too bad, okay? You drop ’em all, straight through me if need be.”

  “Will do, Sarge,” said Fi, and knew he would never do anything of the kind.

  Galactic City terminal, 1855

  The doors parted. Fi, standing well back, stared down the scope of the Deece, not planning to take a shot, but ready anyway. Skirata walked forward a few steps.

  “Grilled food board,” he said, arms held away from his sides, a picture of subservience. “And… umm… facilities.”

  Fi could see past him into the enclosed corridor: the hostages were still split into two groups. One of the targets stepped up to Skirata and placed the muzzle of his blaster against his forehead. Green Man, Fi thought, and made a mental note of the target’s gait. It was a clean shot he couldn’t take right then. The sound signal was fuzzy but audible enough.

  “Put the buckets down and back off.”

  Skirata—short, wiry, forgettable, dragging his left leg—looked like a janitor. Fi knew Green wouldn’t see what was really there.

  “What about the old couple?” said Skirata. “Don’t you think they’ve had enough? Why not let ’em go? Take me instead.”

  Go on. Go on, let him in…

  Green paused and then gestured Skirata inside with the blaster. “You can keep them company,” he said. “You’re too altruistic for a delivery boy. We better search you.”

  The doors closed. “Stand by,” said Niner.

  They took up positions either side of the doors, Fi and Niner to the left, Atin and Darman to the right. They could hear Skirata’s breathing—remarkably controlled under the circumstances—and the occasional rustle of fabric. They were searching him. The enhancer didn’t seem to get their attention; the device was too obvious.

  “You okay, missus?” said Skirata’s voice. There was a mumbled reply, probably from the elderly Garqi woman. “Lie down. You’ll feel better.”

  “Shut up,” said a voice, a new one. Tan Man, thought Fi. He’d know that voice the next time he heard it. You’ll get yours. Nothing personal, just business.

  They heard Skirata and the targets again. Fi paused. Every word counted: Skirata was probably risking death or at least a smack in the mouth with a blaster butt to speak at all.

  “Here, son, let me have a look at that chrono.… wow,
that must have cost you something… what kind of business you in, then? Where you from? Mayro, eh? What’s your name?”

  “Quiet.”

  “Mayro. Never been there… you’re N’zaet Nir, eh?”

  “Shut up.” Tan Man again.

  “Okay, keep your hair on. I’ll just sit here with Joz and Cira… you okay, sweetheart? Don’t worry…”

  “Shut up.” Thwack.

  There were indistinct sounds of fabric rumpling and occasional breathy sobs in different voices. Fi tried not to think what the thwack was. But at least they had a name for the last hostage. It might matter.

  He closed his eyes for a second and visualized the layout. Skirata probably had three hostages right next to him, then. That left Senator Till’s position unaccounted for as well as his aide. But it was better than nothing.

  “Why was he repeating Mayro?” asked Darman. “Where’s Mayro?”

  Niner’s voice filled his skull. “It’s Corporate Sector. Ordo, you ready?”

  Fi took a deep breath. He activated his helmet spot-lamp and checked the chrono on his forearm plate. When the doors blew and Niner lobbed in the flash-bang—bright and loud enough to stun most species for several vital seconds—he would swing 270 degrees to his left, step in, and aim, ready to take down the first recognizable target he saw. He’d done it time after time.

  “Roof team ready,” said Ordo. “Darman?”

  “Ready.” Darman raised his gloved fist. “In three. Two. Go.”

  Boom.

  Light exploded out of the shattered doors and Fi ran into it, Deece raised. Time slowed into a sequence of freeze frames. A man in a green tunic, stunned, squinting against the helmet spot-lamp, shouting “No!” in a voice Fi had memorized as target, struggled to raise his blaster, and Fi put a single bolt through his chest. Spot-lamp beams crisscrossed the room. Debris rained down from the ceiling as Ordo crashed down a couple of meters from Fi. Atin dropped Gray with two shots.

  A second of utter silence. Then someone in dark brown got up from the floor and Darman and Niner both fired at once.