“Soon to be President Jakov?”
“With your help. . . . Yes.”
“It is a clever plan,” Orno admitted. “A very clever plan. But why contact me? My duties have nothing to do with Jericho.”
“If you say so,” Wilmot agreed politely. “But, according to the reports I’ve read, you are close friends with Commandant Yama Mutuu. Is that correct?”
Orno didn’t have friends as such, but he did have a wide circle of cronies, some of whom remained loyal in spite of his disgrace. Was Mutuu among them? There was no way to be certain, but yes, Orno thought the odds were fairly good. And, given the old geezer’s delusions of grandeur, he would be easy to manipulate. In fact, assuming Orno provided Mutuu with the right sort of story, the royal would kill Nankool for nothing! Which would allow the fugitive to pocket the entire fee. “It would take money,” the Ramanthian lied. “One million for myself and half a million for Mutuu.”
The price was steep, but well within the amount that Wilmot was authorized to spend, so the assistant undersecretary nodded. “I will give you half up front—and half on proof of death. And not just Nankool. The others must die as well.”
The Ramanthian nodded. “You want all of the witnesses dead.”
“Exactly. . . . And one more thing,” Wilmot said coldly.
“No action is to be taken against our intelligence agent. I want him to witness the executions and report the slaughter to Algeron. Understood?”
“Understood.”
“Good,” Wilmot said cheerfully as she reached out to reclaim her scrambler. “If you would be so kind as to wait in your vehicle, the fi?rst payment will arrive there within the next fi?fteen minutes. Proof of death should be delivered to the address that will be included along with the cash. The second payment will be forthcoming within one standard day. Do you have any questions? No? Well, it has been a pleasure doing business with you.”
“And you,” Orno replied, his heart fi?lled with hope. Because here, in his hour of greatest need, was a way out. With the Egg Orno at his side, and a million-plus credits to grease the way, the two of them could disappear.
“One last question,” Wilmot said coolly, as the Ramanthian rose to leave. “Our intelligence people believe you were the one who planted the bomb on the Friendship. Are they correct?”
There was a long moment of silence as the coconspirators stared into each other’s eyes. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, Orno answered. “Yes,” the Ramanthian replied. “It was my fi?nest moment.” And with that, the ex-ambassador left the room.
ABOARD THE
The jungle foliage was thick. Too thick to see properly. But thanks to the fact that each member of Santana’s platoon was represented by a symbol projected onto the inside surface of his visor, the cavalry offi?cer knew exactly where they were relative to him and the Trooper II he was riding.
There wasn’t anything subtle about the way that the ten-foot-tall cyborg plowed through the jungle, and there couldn’t be given the war form’s size. So Santana bent his knees and sought shelter behind the T-2’s blocky head, as an army of branches and vines tried to rip him off the borg’s back. Could the enemy hear them coming? Absolutely, assuming that the tricky green bastards were somewhere nearby.
But the alternative was to follow one of the alreadywell-established jungle trails north toward the objective. That would be quieter, not to mention faster, but such paths were almost certain to be booby-trapped and kept under constant surveillance by the enemy. So, cutting a new trail through the jungle was the better choice, or so it seemed to Santana.
Of course, the key to implementing that strategy was the use of the Integrated Tactical Command (ITC) system that allowed the aggressor team to “see” each other electronically, even though it was necessary for each cyborg to maintain an interval of at least a hundred yards between themselves and other units so that a single artillery mission wouldn’t be suffi?cient to kill all of them.
So when the ITC suddenly went down, Santana’s unit was not only too spread out to provide each other with line-of-sight fi?re support, but vulnerable in a number of other ways as well. . . . The offi?cer felt something heavy land in the pit of his stomach, and he was just about to issue an order, when Corporal Gomez placed a hand on his shoulder. The unexpected contact caused Santana to jump as his mind was forced to break the connection with the virtual world and reintegrate itself with the real one.
“Sorry to interrupt, sir,” the noncom said. “But it looks like the brass hats want to noodle with you now. One of the Indi’s shuttles is waiting to take you dirtside.”
“Don’t ever do that again,” Santana said, as he pulled the VR helmet up off of his head. “I nearly had a heart attack.”
Gomez tried to look contrite but couldn’t quite pull it off. “Yes, sir, that is no, sir. I won’t do that again. Now, no offense, sir, but we need to board that shuttle.”
Santana put the helmet down, removed the VR gauntlets, and stood. “We?”
“Yes, sir,” Gomez answered evenly. “I took the liberty of having myself assigned to your command. I hope that’s okay.”
The cavalry offi?cer frowned. His father had been an NCO, and he knew from experience that senior enlisted people could pull all sorts of strings if they chose to do so. But Gomez was too junior to have arranged such a posting on her own. “Was Major Lassiter a party to this arrangement by any chance?”
“Sir, yes, sir,” Gomez said expressionlessly. “The major said that we deserve each other. Sir.”
The comment could be taken in a lot of different ways, and Santana was forced to grin. “Okay, Corporal, but you may live to regret that decision. Let’s get our T-1 bags and board that shuttle. I don’t know why the brass are so eager to see us, but it can’t be good.”
*
