State of War

know about.

He stopped and listened.

Nothing.

He tried to reassure himself. The filter was wonky, or the warning system was. It had to be. It certainly made much more sense.

Maybe. But he was not going to start taking chances now. He’d check everything out, carefully, and if there was any sign at all that he wasn’t alone, he’d run. Simple as that.

He felt better.

Then he turned a corner and saw the soldier with the submachine gun coming toward him—

“Target!” Julio said.

No sooner was that word out of his mouth than the target opened up with a weapon. Howard couldn’t see either the man or the gun, and the helmet’s sound suppressors damped the noise, but it sounded like a handgun. Three quick shots—bam-bam-bam! — fired almost as one.

Instinctively, Howard moved to the wall, seeking cover.

Julio, four meters ahead on point, returned fire with his subgun, a pair of three-round bursts.

Behind Howard, Michaels hit the floor and went prone. Reaves and Holder crouched, weapons seeking targets.

“He’s gone!” Julio yelled.

“You hit?”

“Negative, sir.”

“You hit him?”

“I don’t think so. He boogied awful fast.”

They moved up, but the corridor was indeed empty. There wasn’t any blood on the floor.

“Okay, he knows we’re here. Move in. Crank up that heat sensor, see if we can spot him that way. Commander, you bring up the rear.”

Michaels didn’t argue. He was smart enough to know what he didn’t know.

The five of them moved, Julio clearing the way, waving a little handheld device that should be able to pick up a man’s body heat.

Ames was not immediately evident.

“Easy does it, Lieutenant.”

“Always, General Howard, sir.”

* * *

Ames clutched his pistol, his hands sweaty on the wood and steel. He had some kind of assault team, military guys, right here with him! What was he going to do?

Who were they?

He didn’t even have a spare magazine for his gun. How many rounds had he fired? Two? Three?

Panic flowed in him.

The voice of reason tried to rise through the surge: What are you doing, fool?! Put the gun down and raise your hands! Let them arrest you! You’re a brilliant attorney, for God’s sake! They can’t have anything on you that will hold up in court! And once in court, you’ll have them outnumbered and outgunned.

Ames forced himself to take a deep breath. Yes. That was true. But — What if they hadn’t come to arrest him? What if this was some kind of black op deal? What if they were assassins?

They sure weren’t ordinary cops. Nobody had yelled, “Police, freeze!” or anything like that. Yes, he had shot at them, but they shot back in a hurry, and nobody had said a thing.

They had gone to great lengths to track him here — extraordinary measures, really, just to sneak up on him. They had blown up a truck to cover themselves breaking in. And they were armed to the teeth.

Who were they? How could he get past them to the escape hatch?

Would there be others aboveground, waiting for him?

Giving up was the smart thing, right?

But if he put down his gun and raised his hands, what if they just smiled and then cut him to bloody pieces? He’d be dead, and he’d never even know who had killed him, or why…

He shook his head. No, he couldn’t just surrender. Not yet. He had to find out more about them, make sure it was safe first.

And to do that, he had to stay alive.

* * *

Michaels held his pistol pointed at the floor, standing fifty feet behind the last of the others. His breathing was fast, but he found he wasn’t afraid. Nervous, yes, and excited, but not frightened.

The place was a maze of corridors and doorways, and they moved carefully through it, Fernandez and Howard slipping into rooms along the way to check them out while Michaels stayed in the hall.

It was a big place, a lot of spots where a man could hide. Even with the sensors, they might miss him. And wouldn’t that be a snafu. It was good that he was thinking of retiring, because they would surely fire him if this didn’t end well.

* * *

Ames didn’t know how many of them there were, could be ten, could be fifty. He couldn’t shoot it out with them. They were obviously better armed, and however many of them there were, he was outnumbered. If he wasn’t going to give himself up, then the only other option was to hide and wait for an opportunity to escape.

After that? Well, he’d worry about that if he got that far.

His advantage was that he knew the place better than they possibly could, even if they had the floor plans. They couldn’t know where stuff was stacked, where he had put supplies, rearranged furniture, like that. If he could hide somewhere they wouldn’t immediately look, get behind them, go down one of the other halls or levels, he could maybe slip by. It was his best chance.

The main kitchen was a good place. Lots of bins, coolers, pantries. If they did find him, he could still try to surrender. If they were law enforcement of some kind, they ought not shoot him if he surrendered.

It was a chance, anyway, and right now it looked like the only one he had.

* * *

“Got a hot spot in there,” Julio said. He pointed to an open doorway. “Looks like a kitchen.”

Howard moved up. “Clear the left, I’ll take the right. Reaves, watch the door, Holder, cover that next hallway, just ahead. Commander, if you would stay right there and make sure he doesn’t somehow get behind us?”

Michaels nodded. “Got it.”

“Okay, Julio, on three. One… two… three!”

Julio went in first, low and to the left, and Howard was right behind him, higher, and covering the other half of the large room.

It was a kitchen, sure enough. A big one, with three stoves, refrigerators, sinks, tables, and institutional- sized food trays and bins.

Julio nodded at the stoves. The two of them edged that way, guns ready.

Julio put one hand on the stove. “There’s the heat source. He must have had a late supper.”

“Sensor getting anything else?”

“Negative.”

“Okay. Get Reaves and Holder in here, let them search. We’ll move on.”

* * *

Ames heard the voices, and even though they were muffled because of his hiding place in the walk-in fridge, he recognized one of them.

It was John Howard, the leader of Net Force’s military arm.

Ah. That made sense, sort of. Somehow, they had connected him to Junior. Maybe he hadn’t died right away when he’d been shot. Ames grinned. Maybe Junior wasn’t even dead at all. It could be some kind of misinformation campaign. Maybe Junior was alive and well and singing like a flock of canaries…

The fact that it was Net Force changed things. In his lawsuit, he claimed that all the Net Force personnel were violence-prone, trigger-happy vigilantes who went out of their way to find trouble and used deadly force