“I know, buddy, it’s not good. We’ll do what we can, but we need to help you first.”
“No!” shouts Abers, grabbing my rig and pulling me close. “No. You gotta help the worst hurt first. Easy’s hurt bad, man.”
He looks over at his friend and breaks, talking through a racking sob. “He’s messed up.”
I’m a big guy, and I could handle Abers, but he’s hyped up right now with enough adrenaline that it wouldn’t be easy. Or productive. He’s bleeding from somewhere behind his vest, I can see that much. How bad, I don’t know. But the loss of blood will translate to a—“Whoa!”
Abers has both hands on me, one grabbing my vest, the other around my neck, choking me. He’s screaming at me now, spittle flying from his mouth.
“Help him! Why the kel won’t you help him, damn you?”
And then, just as quickly, his fingers go limp and his hands seem to wash away from me. My immediate thought is that he just up and died, but then I gather my senses and see Lana with a dermo still in her hand, its powerful narcotic plunged into Abers.
“You okay?” she asks.
“Fine. What about him?”
She’s already checking when I ask. “Would have liked to find that out before giving him the pain meds, but this is better than waiting for him to crash. Let me work.”
“Copy,” I say, and then get up to rejoin the fight. I don’t look at Easy again. Don’t think I can.
“Carter!”
I turn in the direction of the voice and see one of Hopper’s guys—Van Dop—coming my way. He looks like he’s been through hell, but his posture tells me the worst of it is over. He’s moving quickly, but not they’re-shooting-right-at-us quickly.
“You and your team saved our asses.”
I ignore the compliment beyond a fractional nod. “What’s the situation?”
“Situation is we’re all jacked up. But the koobs are on the run. I still got snipers in that building—” he points to a nearby structure. “They say the koobs ain’t stopping. Running straight for the spaceport. I think they’re bugging out. Like, all the way out.”
“Where’s Hopper?”
“Dunno. He was first man down. Got him and the early wounded out the way we came in before they encircled us.”
“Oba, why the hell didn’t you all get out?”
Van Dop looks down. “Surber made it clear that wasn’t an option.”
I spit, despite my mouth feeling dry. “Yeah.”
There’s still gunfire in the city. Particularly from the ZQ and near the spaceport. I don’t have any orders to assume command, but with Hopper down, I take the initiative.
“CCP inside the museum?” I ask, taking a guess.
Van Dop nods.
“Gather up what effectives you can. Have them get the wounded to the CCP after we’ve reset our perimeters. I have a feeling that what we’re hearing from the donks in the ZQ is gonna get close again.”
“Sket.”
“Just a feeling. But do it in case I’m not wrong.”
“Roger. I’ll get on it.”
“Good. I’ll call in to Command and see what I can find out.”
We’ve been standing in the street jawing with no trouble. I look around and don’t see any hostiles. The shooting in our section has gone to zero. We have control of the field.
I take a step to return to the museum when a bullet smacks into the duracrete at my feet and bounces. I can feel it graze across my leg, causing me to jump. But when I land, I feel all right. No limp.
The repeating blasters on the museum roof instantly roar back to life, sending torrents of fire into the shattered picture windows of some reading room slash wine bar across the street. A pair of Black Leaf men advance on the building and toss in fraggers. It takes all of thirty seconds to take down the Republic Army loyalist who decided to play hide and snipe.
I climb the steps to where Lana is. She’s doing triage, telling Black Leaf men who bring her the wounded where to place them inside the museum. I don’t see Abers, but Lash is there. He’s got a big skinpack on his arm, covering most of the shoulder and part of the bicep.
“You all right?”
“I’m good.” Lash looks down at my torn pants. There’s a little bit of blood on my boot. “You?”
“Scratch.”
Lana stoops down, cuts more of the pant leg away, then flicks the fabric away, no longer interested. “That’s exactly what it is. Put a strip of skinpack on it and take one of the yellow pills to keep the parasites away. This is still Kublar, even if the city doesn’t look like it.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
I see that Lash has picked up one of those new weapons. He’s inspecting it like an arms dealer, doing everything short of fieldstripping it. I want to ask him about it, but I need to reach Command.
Somewhere from the ZQ—an explosion.
“Command, this is Carter. Museum is secure, over.”
Brisco replies, sounding more pro than I’ve ever heard him. “Copy that, Carter. Museum has been secured. Stand by for Mr. Nilo.”
Another explosion from the ZQ. I look over and see a fireball billowing up into the sky.
“Carter,” Nilo says, his voice filled with relief. “Thank you. Sincerely.”
“Uh… no problem, Mr. Nilo. Site is secure and we’re awaiting orders. We could use reinforcements if the fighting spills out from the ZQ or spaceport. Sounds thick over there.”
“Reinforcements are on the way, we have our allied Kublaren armies coming in by truck. Vanguard is arriving now; the rest of the force’s ETA is two hours. They’re cleaning up nomadic zhee in the desert.”
I nod, calculating the likelihood of us holding out for another two hours should a second assault come our way.
“But you’re not going to need them.”
“Sir?”
“I’ve brokered a deal with the old House of Reason government. They’ve been granted permission to leave through the spaceport. The fighting you hear is
