Cobra Strike

Chapter 29

The forest was alive with the stutter of rapid-fire guns and the furious sleet of bullets tearing at leaves and undergrowth and blasting great sprays of splinters from tree trunks all around. Flat on his belly behind the largest tree he could find near his station, Justin hugged the ground and waited for the barrage to ease up or shift direction. It did, and he took a cautious peek around the bole. A hundred meters away six Qasamans were running back toward the convoy from the tree trunk the Cobras had felled across the road. They'd been placing explosives, Pyre had guessed... and even as Justin watched, the barrier erupted with yellow fire. The smoke cleared to show a section of the trunk had disintegrated.

"Barrier down," one of the Cobras reported in Justin's ear. "Convoy starting up again."

The hail of lead intensified, almost covering the sound of car engines, but little of the fire was coming in Justin's direction. "I'm on it," he said into his mike. Twenty meters closer to him was the next of the trees along the road they'd prepared so carefully last night. Raising his hand out of the matted leaves, he targeted carefully and fired.

The rope holding the precut tree snapped; and with a crack of breaking wood audible even over the gun shots it toppled gracefully across the road. "Barrier replaced," he reported.

"Stand by to pull back," Pyre said tersely. "Smoke...?"

In response, the forest on both sides of the road erupted with black smoke.

"Lead team, pull back," Pyre ordered.

Justin began backing away from his tree, balancing the need for speed with the need to remain low. The smoke would block visual and infrared targeting, but there were always lucky shots to worry about. So far the Qasamans' lack of experience with warfare had showed up clearly in their unimaginative tactics; but they more than made up for that with enthusiasm.

He was midway to his new cover, smack in the middle of nowhere, when a new stutter opened up from above. He froze, muffling a curse.

The helicopters were back.

Or at least one of them was. It was off to the east a ways, he estimated from the sound, probably blowing up some of the hundred or so "warm-body" infrared decoys they'd spent the morning setting up. But the machine was drifting closer.

Making a quick decision, Justin leaped to his feet and dashed for cover. The pitch of the helicopter's drone shifted as he did so, and a second later he got a glimpse of the craft through the trees... and a rain of bullets abruptly splattered at his heels.

He put on a burst of speed, and was behind his target tree before the Qasaman gunner could correct his aim. "I'm okay," he called into his mike before anyone had to ask. "But I'm pinned down."

"I'm on it," someone grunted. "Someone give me covering fire?"

"Got it," Pyre said. "On three. One, two, three."

The helicopter had swung around, trying for a clear shot at Justin, and was framed almost perfectly between tree branches as Pyre's antiarmor laser flashed squarely into the cockpit windows.

The craft jerked, nearly destabilizing enough to slide into the treetops bare meters below. But the pilot was good, and within seconds the craft was nearly steady again... and from directly beneath, a figure shot upward through the leafy canopy to grab the helicopter's side door handle. Twisting his legs upward, the Cobra turned himself around his precarious grip to what was in effect a one-armed handstand along the helicopter's side... and with his feet barely a meter from the main rotor hub, his antiarmor laser blazed forth.

The pilot did his best. Almost instantly the craft banked hard to the side, throwing the Cobra off in an action that should have killed him. But with the nanocomputer's cat-landing programming even that small satisfaction would be denied the Qasaman... and as he carefully righted the helicopter the stressed rotor metal gave way. Two seconds later the forest shook with the thunder of the crash.

"Report," Pyre snapped as the explosion died into the dull crackle of burning fuel.

"No problem," the Cobra assured them all. "Watch the branches if any of you have to try that-the damn things scratch like hell."

Justin let out a relieved sigh... and suddenly became aware of the relative silence. "They've stopped shooting-"

"Almo, we've got a Qasaman on the road," one of the others interrupted. "He's alone-well, with a mojo-and he's holding a white flag."

A white flag. Winward had gone out under a white flag the last trip here... and had been shot for his trouble. Justin's jaw tightened as he wondered if Pyre remembered that... wondered what the other's response would be.

"Okay," Pyre said after a moment. "Everyone keep looking sharp-they may be using him as a diversion while they sneak around to encircle us on foot, I'm going to call him over and see what he wants."

"Target the mojo right away," someone said dryly.

"No kidding. Here goes."

Pyre's voice continued normally in Justin's ear as, bullhorn amplified, the

Qasaman translation echoed among the trees: "Continue forward. Keep your hands visible and your mojo on your shoulder. I'll tell you where to leave the road."

Quiet returned to the forest. Notching up his auditory enhancers, Justin settled down beside his tree to wait.

Telek rubbed her eyes with the heels of both hands, "The problem," she told Pyre wearily, "is the same one we've had ever since the convoy first appeared: namely, we simply don't have enough data yet to pull out."

"What you mean is that you haven't proved yet that the mojos are directly controlling the Qasamans," he retorted.

Probably true, she admitted to herself. "What I mean is that the gleaner-team hasn't finished its agenda."

"It may not get the chance," Pyre growled. "I don't think they're bluffing when they say this is our last chance to pull out before they turn up the fire. And if they don't mind how much it costs them we really aren't going to be able to hold them very long."

And that short reprieve would cost them ten good Cobras-and probably give the

Qasamans reasonably undamaged Cobra equipment to study. "The last thing I want is a full battle with you on the losing end," Telek told him. "But I don't see the hook yet, and past experience tells me there's one somewhere in this offer."

"Maybe there isn't. Maybe Moff just wants to avoid bloodshed."

Telek's lip twitched at the name. Moff. Escort for off-world visitors, sharp-eyed observer who'd pulled the whole thing down on them last time, and now one of the leaders of this thrown-together task force. A man of many talents... and a man of luck, too, to have survived Justin's Purma rampage. She wondered how Justin was feeling about Moff's presence out there, chased the thought irritably from her mind. Moff. What did she know about him that might give her a clue as to what he was up to with this? Did he want to chase the invaders away from the village into an ambush where the Qasamans wouldn't be risking civilian lives? Was there something in the village they didn't want found? Could it really be as simple as an attempt to drag the two cultures back from an otherwise almost inevitable war?

But the gleaner-team needed more time.

"Governor?"

"Still here, Almo," she sighed. "All right, let's try an experiment. Tell them we'll pull out as soon as we've shown a representative that we haven't hurt or killed anyone in the village."

"Will that give outrider-three enough time to bring their bololin herd by the village?"

Telek checked her projections. "It might, if we take things slow enough. But we probably wouldn't have time after the hunt-stress test to remove the neck sensors the gleaner-team's got on the subjects."

"The Council was pretty firm on the point of not leaving any electronics behind," Pyre reminded her.

"I know, I know. Well, if we have to scrap that test, we scrap it, that's all.

Look, just see if they'll buy the idea of a tour. I'll talk to Michael and

McKinley while you do that, see if they have any ideas."

"All right." Pyre hesitated. "If it'll really help... we are prepared to die out here."

Telek blinked away sudden moisture. "I appreciate that," she managed. "But you also qualify as electronics I'd rather not leave behind. Talk to the Qasamans and call me back."

"Yes, I do have an idea," Winward told Telek with grim satisfaction. "I've been thinking about it ever since the psych people first started complaining that we needed to do long-term studies."

"And?"

"And if you can't do the studies themselves, the next best thing is to get the results," he said. "And I think I know just where to find them."

"We want it to be someone in authority, whose word the Qasaman leadership trusts," Pyre warned the messenger, watching his words carefully. "We want to prove our people have acted humanely."

"You invade our world and terrorize an entire village and then expect to earn a reputation as gentlemen?" the Qasaman spat, "You're in no position to make demands of us; but as it happens Moff is willing to accompany your escort to the village. As a gesture of good faith only, of course."

"Of course," Pyre nodded. Winward had called it correctly... and whatever Moff's own reasons for accepting the offer, he would soon be in their hands.

And at that point it would be up to McKinley and Winward. Pyre hoped they could pull it off.

"Two... one... mark." Dan Rostin flipped the aircar's huge electromagnet off as, in perfect synch, Parker swung the little craft into the air. Just in time: the flankers of the bololin herd thundering by grazed the aircar's underside with their dorsal quills. Parker grabbed some more altitude and blew a drop of sweat from the tip of his nose. "Outrider-three to Telek," he called toward the long-range mike. "Last course change complete. Can you confirm the direction is right?"

"Telek here," the governor's voice came back promptly. "Just a second-we're getting a reading from the Dewdrop." There was a short pause. "Yes; confirmed.

Have they picked up speed for some reason?"

"They sure have," Parker told her. "I think all these direction changes and field strength fluctuations are starting to get to them. If they keep it up they'll pass the village in about fifty minutes."

"Dewdrop gives us essentially the same number. All right, I'll let gleaner-team know. I hope it doesn't ruin their schedule."

"So do I," Parker snorted. "There's no way we're going to slow them down, that's for sure."

Telek sighed. "Yeah. Well... get back here, preferably without drawing attention to yourselves. Don't worry about making good speed; it doesn't look like we'll be moving from here for quite some time."

Moff drove his car through the open village gate and then said his first words since leaving the Cobras' blockade: "Where now?"

"The mayoral building," Justin told him. "It's ahead down the street and to the left."

The other nodded, and Justin sent a sidelong look at the Qasaman's face. Moff hadn't seemed surprised to have Justin assigned as his escort; but then, little ever seemed to surprise him. Even now, entering an enemy-held village, his face was impassive, only his darting eyes giving any indication of concern or worry.

"Where are all the villagers?"

Justin glanced around. Except for a Cobra at each end of the block they were approaching, the streets were indeed deserted. He put the question via communicator to Winward. "They're all outside in the north and central parts of town," he relayed the answer.

"I'd like to see them before I speak to your leaders."

Justin shrugged, striving for unconcern. They were on a tight schedule, but he couldn't tell Moff that. "Okay with me," he said. "Just don't take too long. I want the talks to get underway before anyone starts shooting out there again."

"Our people won't start more fighting if yours don't."

Justin shrugged again and settled back to endure the detour. He was supposed to try and get an inkling of what Moff was up to, but aside from spotting a likely recording device built into the Qasaman's mojo perch he hadn't seen any sort of equipment that could give him any hints. The thought of the bacteriological attack on Cerenkov and Rynstadt on the last trip made his skin creep, despite the assurances by Telek and Winward that Moff was unlikely to risk his own life with such stuff when safer delivery methods existed. The Aventinians' logic, he kept remembering, was required by no law of nature to be the same as the

Qasamans'.

Moff drove them around a couple of corners-and there, indeed, were the villagers.

It looked like a giant in-town picnic, to Justin's eyes, with most of the adults sitting around in small groups while children played games around and among them. At the edges of the square Cobras stood on guard.

"The remainder are through the archway there?" Moff asked, pointing.

"I think so, yes."

Without asking permission the Qasaman turned a corner and headed that way. The rest of the villagers were in a smaller open area a couple of blocks further north, and Moff stopped as they came within sight of the crowd. For a moment he looked them over, as if searching for mistreatment, and Justin noticed his shoulders turning slowly as he gave the recorder in his epaulet a sweep of the area. Allowing the troops back at the blockade to see the villagers were all right, if the recorder was transmitting a live picture-

Justin felt his body stiffen. No, not the villagers. He watched the other's eyes, noted where they paused. Moff was looking at the guards.

He was counting the Cobras.

Of course. It was the same trick, turned inside-out, that he'd used to view the

Dewdrop's interior when Joshua and York were allowed back inside. Of the thirty

Cobras in the village, Justin guessed about twenty were guarding the two groups of civilians-an absurdly small number for three thousand people, even given

Cobra abilities. Moff had surely noticed that, and would just as surely conclude that the total number of Cobras wasn't much higher than the number visible.

Or, in other words, that the gleaner-team was a sitting target. Which implied... what?

Justin didn't know; but the others needed this information right away. Pressing his mike surreptitiously against his lips, he began to whisper.

York shook his head, eyes hard on the display before him. "No helicopter movement I can see," he told Telek. "You sure Moff's gadget isn't just recording?"

"We've found the transmission band it's using," she said tightly. "What about other aircraft? You said some fixed-wing craft had appeared on the Sollas airfield."

"They're still there. Almo still says no trouble at outrider-one's blockade?"

"Not unless they're sneaking troops in a wide circle around the area to head south on foot." Telek's image shook its head. "You think they're just waiting until we're clear of the village?"

York opened his mouth... and paused as a new thought struck him. "Tell me, does

Moff seem to know his way around the village?"

"I'm sure they've got maps of the place in Sollas, yes," she said dryly.

"Right. Now tell me where there's enough room in the village for a landing shuttle."

"Why-" Telek broke off. "The area by the gate, and the two areas where we've got the villagers."

"And Moff's seen all three," York nodded grimly. "So he's now just confirmed what the helicopters last night probably reported: the gleaner-team has no ship standing close enough for a quick escape."

Telek let out a long, shuddering breath. "Damn. Damn, and damn again. No wonder he's not in any hurry to attack. He wants another crack at a starship, and he wants his task force in reasonable combat shape when it shows up. Hence the cease-fire. Captain, what's our best possible time to the village?"

"From here, no less than thirty minutes," Shepherd's voice came on. "The ship's not designed for extended high-speed atmospheric flight."

"Half an hour," York snorted. "We could drop down and reach them faster than that."

"Except that there's no way you could stuff the fifty people from gleaner and outrider-one aboard and still lift," Telek growled. "Well, gentlemen, we'd better figure something out, and fast. Our best chance at a diversion's due to hit the village in just under forty minutes now. Gleaner-team has to get out then."

Or, York added silently, they might not get out at all. Gnawing at the inside of his cheek, he stared at the display and tried to think.

The Cobra at the mayoral building's entrance stepped aside as Moff and Justin came up. "They're waiting in the first office on your left," he said, pulling open the door for them. Out of Moff's sight as the Qasaman passed, his hand made a quick brushing motion: the code sign for stay back. Justin nodded and drifted an extra half step behind Moff as they went to the office the guard had indicated. The door was open, and as they walked in Justin saw there were two men waiting for them: Winward and gleaner-team's head psychologist, Dr.

McKinley. Both were standing in front of the room's low desk, and both looked vaguely tense.

"Good day, Moff," Winward nodded. "We've never actually met, but I've heard a great deal about you."

"And I you," Moff replied coolly. "You're the demon warrior who couldn't be killed. Or so it's said."

"Not by treachery, at any rate," Winward said, his tone chilling to match

Moff's. "You'll note we treated your flag of truce more honorably."

"You speak of honor-"

"I speak of many things," Winward cut him off. "But before I do, I'd like to ask you to put your mojo in the next room."

Moff's back stiffened visibly. "So that I'll be totally defenseless before you?"

"Don't be ridiculous. If I wanted to harm you, both you and your damned bird would be stretched out on the floor there. You know that as well as I do. I'll ask you only once more."

"My mojo stays with me."

Winward sighed. "All right, have it your way." Reaching to the desk behind him, he scooped up a short-barreled, stockless rifle lying there and brought it to bear. With a screech the mojo leaped-

And shrieked again as the flash net caught it square across the beak.

"Here, Justin, put these in the next office," Winward said tiredly, handing the younger Cobra the immobilized bird and the net gun. "They don't show much capacity for learning, do they?" he remarked to Moff.

Moff's reply was lost to Justin as he deposited his charges next door; but by the time he returned Winward was speaking again. "Well, no matter. We have a pretty good idea of what the mojos do for you, and it's clear enough that if it comes to a full-fledged war we'll win easily."

"Because you cannot die?" Moff snorted. "Some may believe that; I don't. No demon protects you-or splits one mind into two men-" he added, throwing a baleful glare at Justin. "Your magic is simply science we have forgotten, and it will work as well for us when we've learned how it's done."

"Possibly," Winward shrugged. "But it's rather academic, because to learn how our magic works you'll need to kill some of us... and I doubt very much that your mojos will let you fight us face to face anymore."

Moff's mouth opened, but whatever he'd been planning to say apparently died on his lips. "What do you mean, won't let us fight?" he asked cautiously.

McKinley shook his head. "It's no use pretending, Moff. We've been taking data for less than two days and we already know how the mojos dangle you around like puppets. You've had three hundred years to study them-surely you know at least as much as we do."

"Puppets, you say." Moff's lip curled. "You understand nothing."

"Oh?" Winward said. "Then enlighten us."

Moff glared at him but remained silent. "The details don't matter," McKinley shrugged. "What matters is that the mojos have a vested interest in keeping their hunters-that's you-alive, and that they possess enough telepathic ability to back up their wishes. If they think you don't have a chance against us, they won't let you fight." He waved a hand. "The reactions toward us here in the village are all the proof we need."

"Oh, are they?" Moff spat. He seemed to be rapidly losing control, Justin noted uneasily. Were McKinley's assertions really so hard for him to take? Or was this perhaps simply the first waking moment Moff had had in years without a mojo by his side? A mojo keeping his human aggression under control.... "Then what do you say about the fighters waiting to sweep down on you twenty kilometers north of here? Are they unable to fight?" He jabbed a finger at McKinley. "The villagers have a fear of you based on superstition-our fighters aren't so handicapped. And once we've proved you can be beaten-as we will within hours-the fear the mojos sense and are paralyzing them with will be gone. The next time you return, you'll find a world united to oppose you."

"You don't think the mojos will try and save your lives?" McKinley asked.

Moff smiled thinly. "They will protect us, certainly-by tearing the flesh from your bones in battle. This conversation is at an end."

Winward and McKinley exchanged glances, and the latter nodded fractionally. "All right, if that's the way you want it," Winward said. "We'll be out of your way within those few hours you mentioned; and if we're lucky, we won't have to come back."

"It doesn't matter if you do or not," Moff said quietly... and to Justin his voice had the feel of an open grave about it. "We will rediscover the secret of star travel someday. And we will then come and find you."

Winward's lips compressed and his eyes sought Justin's. "Return his mojo and escort him outside. He can stay with the rest of the villagers until we're ready to leave."

Justin nodded and indicated the door. Wordlessly, Moff strode past him and out into the hall, where he waited until Justin had brought him his mojo, still entangled in its net. "Just unwrap it carefully and the bird won't be hurt," he told the Qasaman, handing the creature into the other's arms.

Moff nodded, once, and stalked to the door. Justin watched him walk down the street toward the civilian holding area, then returned to the office. "He's on his way to the square," he told Winward.

The older Cobra nodded, his attention clearly elsewhere. "...All right. If you're ready, so are we," he said toward his pendant. "You'll get outrider-one moving?...Good. Justin's here; I'll just go ahead and take charge of him. ETAs?

...Fifteen and twenty; got it. Good luck."

"Well?" McKinley asked.

"The Dewdrop's on its way," Winward said tightly. "It'll drop into the central square in about fifteen minutes."

"The Dewdrop?" Justin frowned. "Why's it coming down?"

"Because the Menssana would take longer to get here and be subject to attack the whole way." Winward turned to McKinley. "All the sensor collars off?"

"And packed for loading, along with the rest of the gear." The other picked up a small box that had been resting on the low table. "This is the last of it right here."

"Okay. Get your people to the square." Winward tapped his pendant as McKinley headed for the door. "Dorjay? It's a go.... Right; fifteen minutes. Get the people out and set up a perimeter to protect it. Watch out for Moff particularly-he's not nearly as impressed as the rest of them, and there are guns lying around he might pick up.... Good. Diversion's due in just under twenty-we'll need to be ready to go then.... Okay. Out."

Dropping his hand, he looked at Justin. "Let's get moving-you and I are going to be part of the helicopter defense, and we need to be at the wall when they figure out what's going on."

"And then what?" Justin asked quietly. "The Dewdrop can't possibly carry all of us."

Winward gave him a tight smile. "That's sometimes what rearguards are for, you know: to stay behind. Come on, let's hit the wall and find some good positions to shoot from."

"Okay, start easing back," Pyre murmured into his mike. "No noise, and be sure you're out of sight of the Qasamans before hitting the road."

There were answering murmurs in his ear, and Pyre shifted his attention to the knot of troops facing him twenty meters away. He'd agreed to stay within sight as a sort of exchange hostage while Moff was in the village... which meant that when the timer ran down on this one he would have to be gone before the Qasamans decided to start shooting. Activating his auditory enhancers, he tried to listen for the excited voices that would mean the Dewdrop had been spotted.

The shouts, centered on the Qasamans' lead car, erupted barely two minutes later; and Pyre was racing through the trees before anyone thought to take a shot at him. With the need for stealth gone, he made straight for the road, where better footing would let him use his leg servos to best advantage. From behind came an explosion as the Qasamans destroyed the tree that blocked their path. Slowing as he passed the last of their prepared trees, Pyre sent it crashing down behind him, a move that should put the ground troops out of the game for good. Pushing his pace to the limit, he watched the sky for both the descending Dewdrop and the Qasamans' inevitable aerial response.

From his vantage point the events occurred simultaneously. Far ahead the glittering shape of the small starship dropped rapidly against the blue sky as, overhead, three small helicopters screamed southward to the attack. A hard lump rose into Pyre's throat as He watched them disappear behind the tree-tops. They were, as York had predicted, modified civilian craft... but the Cobras' brief tangle with them had showed them well worth taking seriously.

He kept running. Far ahead the roar of the helicopters' engines changed pitch as they reached the village. Small explosions came faintly over the wind in his ears and, once, the sort of blast he remembered from the helicopter they'd shot down over the barricade. He wondered who had pulled it off this time, and whether the Cobra had lived through it. Blinking the tears from his eyes, he squinted against the wind and kept going.

And suddenly it was all over. A great roiling pillar of black smoke rose above the trees; and seconds later the Dewdrop shot out of it like a missile from its launcher. The two remaining helicopters climbed after it, but their weapons weren't designed to fire straight up and the Dewdrop's gravity lifts were more than adequate to maintain the starship's lead. The three craft became points of reflected light in the sky... and then were just two spots.

The Dewdrop, gleaner-team's scientists aboard, had escaped. Leaving the Cobras behind.

Ahead, someone stepped from the trees along the road and gave Pyre a quick wave before retreating to cover again. Pyre slowed and joined him. "Any trouble?" the other Cobra asked.

Pyre shook his head. "They're at least ten minutes behind me. Any sign of our escort yet?"

The other grinned. "Sure. Just listen."

Pyre notched up his enhancers. In the distance he could hear a low rumble, accompanied by a well-remembered snuffling. "Right on schedule. Everyone ready?"

"This end is, anyway. I presume gleaner-team's Cobras made it out while everyone was blinded by the smokescreen."

"And were all busy assuming the Cobras were going inward instead of outward,"

Pyre nodded. This would be a whole lot easier if the Qasamans thought everyone had escaped in the Dewdrop.

The rumbling was getting closer....

And then, across the road, they burst out of the woods: a bololin herd, running for all it was worth. A big herd, Pyre saw, the far end of its leading edge lost beyond a curve in the road and the dust of its own passage. Maybe a thousand animals in all... and among all those warm bodies, hidden from sight by all that dust, forty Cobras would hardly be noticeable. Even if someone thought to look.

The leading edge had passed, the herd's flanks perhaps twenty meters away.

Turning, Pyre and the other Cobra began to pace them, drifting closer to the herd as they ran until they were perhaps four meters away. Glances ahead and behind showed the rest of outrider-one joining the flow. At the herd's opposite flank, if all had gone well, the gleaner-team Cobras were doing likewise.

And for the next few hours, they should all be reasonably safe. After that-

After that, the Menssana lay three hundred kilometers almost dead ahead, presumably still unnoticed by the planetary authorities. If it could stay that way for the next six hours, the Cobras would be aboard and the ship in orbit long before any aircraft could be scrambled to intercept it.

Theoretically, anyway. Pyre settled his legs into a rhythmic pace, letting his servos take as much of the load as possible. Personally, he would be happy if things even came close.

And in this case, they did.