Fire with Fire

Chapter Thirty

TELEMACHUS

The face that looked out the airlock window at him was ill-shaven, eyes indistinct behind a lank forelock of dirty-blond hair. Thank God, he thought. If they’re terrorists, then they’re sloppy ones. Most are highly disciplined, attentive to personal grooming not only by inclination, but by training. Conversely, personal sloppiness usually means operational sloppiness.

As the face backed away from the airlock door, he felt the wind push fitfully against the heavy life support unit on his back. He turned: a rusty-brown expanse of stone and sand was surrendering occasional sheets of dust up to the growing wind. Not good and not expected. The Navy meteorologist had agreed with the civilian service for once: from Syrtis Major to Isidus Planitia, twenty-kph winds, steady from the west, a relatively constant -12 degrees Celsius. By Martian standards, a calm and balmy day. But that’s not how it was shaping up for Trevor Corcoran, and the disguised SEAL officer was not pleased with the discrepancy.

He heard the airlock door squeak and sigh and he turned-to find himself looking down the barrel of a ten-millimeter Sig Sauer caseless handgun. Okay, their equipment isn’t top-shelf, but it’s not all antiques, either.

He raised his hands. The figure-wearing a generic spacesuit that was the same model as his own-gestured him to approach. He did, keeping his hands high. The figure stepped to the left, motioned him past-and slammed him forward against the inner airlock door, the pistol pressed into the side of his helmet. The figure’s free hand roved and snatched at his spacesuit, tugged open the thigh pockets, then pulled him about-face by the shoulder. With the gun now snugged up against his neck, his chest pockets and utility pouches were subjected to the same hasty inspection. Then the spacesuited figure stepped back and, gun steady, reached back with his free hand to pull the outer airlock door closed. A moment later, the hatch autodogged and a rising hiss indicated that atmosphere was being pumped in.

So far, so good. There had always been a chance that they would shoot him down the moment they saw him. But that was one of the many operational hazards that there had been no way to avoid.

The inner airlock door swung open-and he found himself staring into yet another muzzle. This one was an antique: a nine-millimeter parabellum MP-5 machine pistol. Almost a century out of date. Okay, they’re definitely not the A-team.

Pushed roughly from behind, he staggered forward and-knowing that they’d have his helmet off in seconds-reasoned that this was the last moment he could conduct a visual assessment without looking like he was doing just that.

And he liked what he saw. The three in the main room were ethnically diverse. None over twenty-seven. All male. All had tattoos, piercings, long-and in one case, grotesquely unwashed-hair. Complete heterogeneity of weapons. The central table was an overcrowded parking lot for used coffee mugs and pots. Several dozen ration-pack wrappers had been discarded on the floor, as well as other trash and-was that a pair of dirty socks under a chair? One of them-the big, sleepy-looking guy with the greasy hair-clearly had track marks on his left forearm. T-shirts, several sporting the logos of Slaverock bands. In short, nothing to imply or even hint at the kind of discipline imparted by any formal training in operations. Terrorists? He smiled. Or gang-bangers?

The “terrorist” behind him grabbed his helmet, popped the side clamp and ripped it off.

The smell of unwashed bodies and stale air almost made him gag.

“You’ve got five seconds to tell me who you are and why you’re here. You give me an answer I don’t like, and you’re meat.”

“My name is-hell, it isn’t important. Call me Trev. I’m just a guy hired by the girl’s family. And I’ve brought money to pay for her release.”

“What the-what the hell are you talking about?”

“Look: I know you’ve got the girl. And all these guns prove it.”

“Yeah-and you’d better prove you’ve come alone or this conversation is going to end. Real soon.”

“You can send a man out to see. You’ll find a pressurized buggy three hundred meters due east. There’s no one in it. But before you send someone to check it, you might want to pick up the aluminum attache case just outside the door.”

“Why?”

“Because the payment is inside.”

The kidnapper with the machine pistol turned to give an order to the man in the spacesuit. “Scan him.” He turned back. “Now, how do I know you’re not just the inside man for an assault team?”

“Because when you send your man out, you’re going to find that there’s no one in sight-which means by the time anyone could join me here, I’d be dead. Right?”

The one with the machine pistol spent a moment thinking, then his eyes flicked over toward his man with the RF scanner.

Who shrugged. “He’s clean; no signals coming off him.”

“And none will. Take his helmet off. Check for a backup radio. Take his gloves off, too.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

Trev looked around while they spoke. The interior was exactly what he’d expected from the schematic: large primary dome, centered on the “storm room”-a shielded core that provided refuge during solar flares and other radiological anomalies. There was one opening off to the right that led to the installation’s single reinforced corridor, which was the spine to which all the other, smaller expansion domes were attached. No change from the original layout-and no sign of the meteorological and geological monitoring teams that were supposedly stationed here. The last was not a good sign-but, sadly, not a surprise, either.

The one in the spacesuit was finished, handed Trev’s gloves back to him. “He’s clean.”

“Fine. Tape him up.”

Trevor’s hands were pulled out in front of him and wound with four wraps of three-inch reflective duct tape. Standard, even amongst amateurs.

The terrorist with the machine pistol waved him over to one of the three chairs at the room’s only table, then waved one of his flunkies toward the storm room.

Who asked: “Whaddya want me to do?”

“Just-check her. See if she’s-I dunno: expecting something, or someone. Christ, do I have to think of everything?”

Back to Trevor: “So you’re here to give me money. That’s very nice of you-and I’ll check into that right away,”-he waved the spacesuited one back outside-“but there’s just one thing that still puzzles me.”

“What’s that?”

“I didn’t ask for any money. As a matter of fact, no one should even know I’m here. So you’d better start shedding some light on your arrival, or I’ll be looking at daylight through the holes I put in you.”

Lines straight from the late-late show. You’re too into the role to remember that you’re just doing a job, huh? Bad for you; good for me.

Trevor made sure to never maintain eye contact very long, to appear moderately nervous. “I figured you were here-”

“You figured?”

“Yes-because when the family called me and reported her missing, I started looking for anything strange outside of Syrtis City.”

“Oh? Why outside?”

“For the reason I’m guessing you left. Pressurized cities-they’re too tight: behind every wall, there’s another room, a corridor, a ventilation shaft. There’s no safe ground. And there’s too much surveillance: the cameras you can see, the fiber-optic peekers that you can’t. You could think you’re safe and sound and well-hidden-and the next thing you know, a SWAT team is blowing a hole in the wall right behind you.”

“Smart boy. Go on.”

“So I figured you’d be heading out-getting distance. You’d want something small, easy to grab, easy to control. Something without a lot of traffic. So I started checking the science outposts-and sure enough, this one was overdue for its commo check. But, since no one else knows the girl is missing, no one knew to think that might mean something more than a malfunction or a downed antenna.”

“But you knew. Because the family called about their pretty, pretty-but not too young-baby.”

“Uh-yeah.”

“And who are you?”

“I do-jobs-for people.”

“Oh?” The gun came up. “What kind of jobs?”

“Please, don’t-no, not those kinds of jobs. Not with guns. But rich families get in trouble sometimes-more than most people realize. And I–I take care of those problems for them.”

The gun went down. “They must be paying you a lot to come out here on your own, not knowing if we were gonna let you in or let you have it.”

“Well-” Careful now: just the way you rehearsed it. Use as much truth as possible: that’s how you’ll get away with the lies.

“Yeah?”

“I know this family. I’ve worked for them before.” True. “And now the father’s dead and the mother’s back on Earth and they didn’t have anyone else to turn to.” Also true. And now the lie. “And yeah, the money’s good.”

“Good enough to risk your life?”

“Good enough that I’ll never have to risk it again.”

The kidnapper with the machine pistol became thoughtful, only looking up when his partner returned from outside, carrying an aluminum briefcase. “How’s it look?”

The other put the briefcase down, popped his helmet. “As advertised. All clear, as far as I can tell.”

“What the hell does that mean, ‘as far as I can tell’?”

“Look, man, you wanted me back quick, right? Well, that means I can’t go wandering around behind every hill and big rock within five klicks. But the buggy’s where he said it is, and empty.”

The one with the machine pistol was about to open the case, halted, thought a moment, reached out and put it on Trevor’s lap. Then he walked behind Trevor, his arms coming around from behind to prepare to undo the clasps.

“You mind being a human shield?”

Trevor shrugged. “Fine by me.”

The clasps snapped, and the briefcase opened without incident. “Good: we’re off to a promising start. No tricks.”

Trevor nodded, thought: No tricks that you can see. But the concentrated CO² canister in the false bottom has started dumping its contents-which will trigger the atmosphere alarms soon enough.

The kidnapper had pawed through the bills in the attache case. “One hundred K?”

Trevor nodded.

“Light, man; way too light.”

“Don’t worry: there’s plenty more where that came from. This is just a taste.”

“Just a taste, huh? Well, I’m ready for the full meal. But how do I get it? You don’t get to leave until she does-and I’m not going to let in any more visitors.”

He had taken the bait-which all but proved that they weren’t from a group of religious or political fanatics. And they’re not seasoned professionals or they’d have already debriefed-and then greased-me. That’s the problem when you don’t use professional operatives; always the greed factor.

“Getting the rest of your money is easy. It’s on my bomb-rigged buggy.”

“Bomb-rigged? How did you get explosives? Even the black market is tighter than nun-pussy on those.”

Tighter than nun-pussy? If you took a course on how to talk like a tough guy, you should get a refund. Out loud: “The family has some clout. But you know that already.”

“Yeah,”-he was a bad actor-“I guess I do.”

No, you really don’t. Someone sketched out the basics, but didn’t fill you in on the reasons for taking the hostage. You’re just hired muscle, following orders. Good for me now; bad for the follow-up investigation. Because when the authorities start checking into these guys, it’ll be a dead end: they’re on the outside of the operation. Way outside.

“So, now you give us the information on how to disarm the bomb.”

“No, because the second I do that, you put a bullet in my head.”

The wiseguy considered for a moment, then waved listlessly with the machine pistol. “Ah-you’re right. So how do we do this dance?”

“You get a spacesuit for the girl, we all walk-”

“Nope. Not happening, hero. She stays here.”

“Until?”

The wiseguy frowned, got agitated. “Until I say so, asshole. Listen, I call the shots here.”

No, you don’t. You were told to sit on her and await further orders. Kill her if someone tries a rescue op. And you’re starting to realize that that may have been your employer’s plan all along: they want her dead, and you dead, and a lot of chaos and worry in the bargain. It’s only a matter of time until someone comes looking, you start shooting, and it all goes to hell.

“The way I see it, you might need the buggy as much as the money. More.”

“Yeah? And why the hell do you think that, asshole?”

“Because whoever hired you to do this hasn’t told you how the whole show ends, has he? And the radio he gave you is quiet-and he didn’t tell you how to signal him, did he? ‘Don’t call me; I’ll call you’?”

The wiry man’s face became very red and he stuck the gun straight out, quivering, the muzzle half a foot from Trevor’s forehead. “Listen, asshole-”

Trevor waited. The gun trembled, wavered, was yanked away.

“Shit! Shit, shit!” The wiseguy put his other hand to his own forehead, as if trying to still it.

The big sleepy-eyed one crooned, “Hey, Mingo, man-we just need to wait. We just need-”

“Shut up-just shut up! And don’t use my name-not even my street name.”

“Okay-but listen, man. He’s just messin’ wif you. We got a deal we can trust, a deal-”

“Yeah? We do? Why? ’Cause they said they want to keep her anyway? That’s bullshit, man-and we were bullshit to believe it. We were doing too much ice, man: they messed us up, messed up our heads so we wouldn’t think it all the way through. Shit, man-” And then he spun back toward Trevor, gun up and steady. “You. Hero. Why are you here? You lie, you die.”

As if you’d know whether I was lying. “I’m here to get the girl. The family was smart enough to know that if they went to the cops, they were as good as killing their daughter themselves: by the time a rescue team got to her, you’d have killed her.”

“Damn skippy on that, hero. Okay, so you’ve got a buggy, and we’ve got the girl. How do we do this?”

“We all go to the buggy together.”

“How big is it?”

There’s an open door for me to gather some tactical intel. “How big does it need to be?”

“I got eight-and her.”

“And me.”

“You can ride on the outside, hero.”

“Okay. And you’ll need to put one other out there. I’ve got six seats, room for two more as cargo.”

“Fine. So we’re at the buggy. Then what?”

“We drive to another outpost-I know you won’t accept going back to Syrtis City.”

“No shit, genius. So we’re at another outpost.”

“She walks away. You have the money and the buggy. And me.”

“And then?”

“When she’s safe, then I disarm the bomb. And you drive away.”

He brought up the gun quickly; Trevor let himself flinch a little.

The wiseguy smiled. “Not so brave after all, huh, Mr. Hero? So tell me, how do you know I won’t grease you as soon as you’ve pulled the plug on the bomb? And how do I know you haven’t bugged the vehicle-a hidden radio, a transponder?”

“You’ll know the vehicle isn’t wired the same way you knew I wasn’t-your friend’s RF signal detector. And as for shooting me-you might, but right now, she’s just an unreported missing person. And she can stay that way. And you don’t have to be accused as kidnappers. But you shoot me, and now there’s a crime that can’t be ignored or unreported: the law gets involved. And you don’t want any news getting out of how you got away, do you? Because if your employer finds you, that will be worse than the police. Right?”