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Fifty seven - EARTH (DIVIDED)
Marco took a remote off the worktable, clicked through a series of wall maps, and stopped on the one he wanted. It showed the southern half of Africa. The "hop, skip, and a jump" that Doug Douglas dismissed so lightly spanned the former countries of Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, Zambia, Botswana, plus a healthy chunk of South Africa.
Impossible to make the trip on the ground, given the fact that Luton's forces were out there waiting for them, and iffy by air even with Salom's help. Stupid, really, unless... The officer moved the cursor onto the word "Johannesburg" and clicked. A map of the city appeared. "Do you know where the building is?" Doug Douglas nodded. Marco handed him the remote. "Show me". Doug Douglas directed the cursor to the north, east of Soweto, and clicked on one particular intersection. A shot obtained from an orbital satellite bloomed. The buildings appeared flat and rectangular. The shadows suggested that theyRelated chapters
HALF BREED Fifty eight - EARTH (DIVIDED)
Marco nodded and scanned their faces. The words were Naa. "Welcome to Operation Eaglet. The objective of tonight's mission is to rescue a prisoner, put the resistance effort on the offensive, and kick some mutie ass. That okay with you?"The Naa were thrilled to hear their language. More than two hundred voices replied in unison. "Sir! Yes, sir!"Marco grinned and switched to standard. "I thought you might say that! All right, let's run the missing one last time". He looked at his wrist term. "We load twenty eight from now, and lift at 1800. There are two birds, one for the first and one for the second. Decoys will depart just before we do, scatter in every direction, and lead the fighters away."I'm going with the first. Lieutenant Goddear will command the second. Standard night operations and radio procedures are in force. Check your wrist term for call signs, passwords, and a copy of the technical order."Marco motioned to a technician, said, "Light the tank",
HALF BREED Fifty nine - EARTH (DIVIDED)
Lieutenant Roman put an end to her mental worries. "All units report battle readiness, ma'am".Salom nodded, fought the urge to clutch the arms of her chair, and gave the necessary order. "Phase one, execute".It seemed as though the words were barely out of the officer's mouth when the tiny red dots started to vanish off the display. Those located nearest to the loyalist ships were destroyed first, followed by mid range targets, and a few on the far side of the planet. Spy satellites mostly, mined by tiny self propelled robots and rigged to blow.The response was a little slower than Salom had expected. Were the mutineers napping? Or was their chain of command subject to the same sort of carefreeness that hers was? They had all come up through the same system, so the question was stupid.The naval officer shrugged, ordered her ships to attack, and said a little prayer. It was silent, but Roman read her lips. The "Amen" was hers.* * *The lights we
HALF BREED Sixty - EARTH (DIVIDED)
The rules of engagement were clear: Curtis could open fire if he chose to, but he didn't consider that to be wise. Not without at least one attempt to make contact. He switched to what he hoped was the correct frequency."This is Captain Curtis, commanding officer Security Zone Six, to incoming aircraft. You are in violation of restriction 5890 of the Inspector General code. Identify yourself or be fired upon".A powerful spotlight pinned the transport to the roof, a series of three flares popped high above, and weapons swiveled in that direction. The voice belonged to First Sergeant Hax. His squad was situated on the top of building three. They could see what Curtis couldn't. "Blunder Six to Blunder One. There's no sign of movement. Over".Curtis swore. The transport was a diversion! "Blunder One to team. Hostiles on the ground. Probable contact point north is the perimeter. Waste the transport, and do it now. Get Johannesburg on the horn. I want air support, and I w
HALF BREED Sixy one - EARTH (DIVIDED)
Sergeant Hax was no fool and, that being the case, had detailed one member of the squad to watch their backs. His name was Guta. The soldier heard a noise, looked over the edge, and took a bullet between the eyes. He slumped forward. The waist high wall accepted his weight.Lance Corporal Frayer restored the heavily silences pistol to the specially designed shoulder holster, sent the spider robot up the wall, and watched the climbing rope follow.The machine picked it's way over the wall that circled the roof, drove a bolt down into the substructure, and sent video of what it saw.Frayer eyed the credit card-sized screen, nodded his approval, and dropped the device into a pocket. Swimhard swarmed up the rope first, followed by Shortsleeper and Quickfeet. It was an easy climb.* * *The area between the warehouse was fairly open with some cargo modules, cable reels, and a knee-high divider wall for cover.Marco dove behi
HALF BREED Sixty two - EARTH (DIVIDED)
Huff had known that there was at least one more of the w wastrels hiding behind the air conditioning unit and took his time. Hunting requires many things, patience being one of them.There, finally, some movement. Light spilled from above. Not much, but enough. A head, the glint of an eye, and a little bit of nose.Huff applied the pressure gradually, caressed the trigger, and felt the butt kick his shoulder. The bullet left the muzzle at more than eight hundred fifty feet per second, entered through Curtis' eye, and left through the back of his head. The parson would approve.* * *Smoke belched outward, the doors burst open, and a pair of concussion grenades sailed through the opening. They flashed and went bang. Machine gun fire hosed the interior.Marco and Sparrow charged through the entry, jumped a couple of bodies, saw movement and fired at it.A security officer threw out her arms, crashed into an interior window, and shattered the gla
HALF BREED Sixty three - IN SPACE
Jyro stood naked in front of Pardo's metal shaving mirror, turned, and craved to see his back. There were four pink lines, one for each of the Worgan's claws.The site was hard to reach, and would have been nearly impossible to treat without assistance from the robot, which the prospector had named after the Good Samaritan and called Sam for short.Satisfied with the healing process, the human chose one of his badly soiled jumpsuits, wished he had enough water to wash with, and wondered how he smelled. The answer seemed obvious.Sam, who was oblivious to the prospector's concerns, transformed itself into acrobatic mode, executed a back flip, and sought the praise it was programed to expect. It's linguistic abilities continued to improve. "How about that one, Huwe? Pretty good, huh?""Fabulous", Jyro replied, but bothering to look. Most of the robot's tricks were pretty boring. The machine's real value lay in the company it provided, and the fact
HALF BREED Sixty four - IN SPACE
The streams Sam hoped to find were smaller than that, more like threads - thin, almost insubstantial fibers that wound themselves in and around the big stuff, and went along for the ride. That was were the input from millions of "dumb" sensors flowed, where reports from the maintenance robots stuttered along, and where the quarry might be mentioned.The better part of five minutes passed as the robot clung to its electronic perch, Jyro paced back and forth, and the Hoon talked along themselves.Then, just as one of the Hoon's long, wormlike virus hunters flashed past, braked, and rerouted itself back upstream, Sam "heard" what it had been waiting for.Assuming the reports were true, it sounded as if one of the general purpose units had not only assaulted a lesser entity, but confiscated one of its tools.Sam wanted to learn more, and could have learned more, except that the hunter unit had looped through a side circuit, entered the upstream flow, and was on its w
HALF BREED Sixty five - IN SPACE
Jyro experienced a sudden inspiration, and allowed the words to flow. "Just as computers have no choice but to conform to parameters established by their basic operating systems, we must follow God's instruction and ensure that others do likewise".The machine gave it some thought. Perhaps there was something it could do. "But why?""Go forth", Jyro said, imagining himself at the head of a million robot army, "and convert your brethren, that they too might know the glory of God".The machine considered the human's words. The concept made sense. If God existed, and sought to have all of its creations function harmoniously, then each and every unit aboard the ship had the right - no, the responsibility - to familiarize itself with the plan and work to further it.Or was that logic fallacious, a product of whatever flaw had caused the malfunction in the first place? What if such beliefs were contrary to its basic programming? A quick check revealed no mention of God
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