The Soldier: Escape Vector Read online

  “Get on your feet.”

  Simone began shivering. “Please, Mr. Cade, don’t do anything to me. I haven’t done anything to you.”

  He focused on her, admiring her guts but sweeping that aside. He would do whatever it took to save his brothers-in-arms and wife.

  “Simone,” he said the word heavy with threat.

  Simone began sobbing quietly as she climbed to her feet.

  Cade sheathed the boot knife and grabbed one of her elbows. With a hard wrench of his wrist he could break the joint. He would try easy first and applied just enough pressure to make her whimper.

  “Listen to me, Simone. Nod if you understand.”

  She nodded.

  “Stop crying—now.”

  Simone sniffled, hiccupped and swallowed several times in an obviously painful way. But she stopped crying.

  “You sent the other woman to get guards,” Cade said.

  “No!”

  Once more, Cade applied pressure to the elbow.

  Simone twisted in pain, crying out.

  “The guards are coming because you sent for them,” Cade said in a low voice. “You did Mr. Down’s bidding, but the action could cost you your life. Nod if you understand.”

  She nodded miserably.

  “You can survive the day,” Cade said. “But you’re going to have to think. I want my ship, and I want it intact. If I can board it and go, you’ll live. If I have to fight the guards you summoned, you could die in the crossfire. That isn’t my wish, but I don’t really care. You’ve brought this on yourself. Nod if you understand what I’m saying.”

  “Please, Mr. Cade, I can show you how to board your ship. We’ll bypass the guards, I swear.”

  “On your life, Simone?”

  Renewed terror shined in her yes. “Yes,” she whispered.

  Cade believed and almost pitied her. Whatever it takes so you can save your darling Raina. You must get the Descartes for that. “Start talking me through this. And listen, Simone, if you’re smart—and I think you might be—you’re going to survive this just fine.”

  “Mr. Down will hurt me after this is all over.”

  A harsh grin slid onto Cade’s face. “He might not survive to do that.”

  Simone glanced back at him before quickly facing forward. “You’re a maniac, a killer.”

  “I’m a soldier who’s tired of others cheating me. Now start talking before I get angry.”

  Chapter Four

  Simone and Cade hurried through a well-lit underground corridor. She’d used a clearance card to gain access all while he’d kept hold of one of her elbows.

  The big revolver was in his other hand. Every once in a while, they passed a closed door. Cade hadn’t asked her about them. His keen hearing picked up nothing from behind each door. If a hit team had been waiting, he was certain he would have heard something.

  Her comm unit buzzed. Cade took it, inspected the device and did something to it before putting it on the floor, leaving the thing behind. Forgetting about her personal comm unit until this moment had been a mistake on his part. Tarragon’s hit team—or guards—might already know he was down here. Did they know he’d taken her captive?

  His ability to pull this off likely rested on that one point.

  “Simone,” he said.

  She stared back at him in terror.

  “You’re doing well,” he said in a neutral tone. “So far, I’m satisfied with your behavior. Now, however, I want a better weapon than the one I’m carrying.”

  “Excuse me?”

  He holstered the revolver and turned her around to face him. “A better weapon,” he said. “Where’s the armory?”

  “I-I don’t know about anything like that.”

  “Simone,” he warned.

  She turned pale and started shivering. “I can’t tell you. They’ll be there.”

  “No. That’s where they’re not going to be. A machine pistol would be nice. Maybe a suit of body armor, too. Does one of these doors lead to the armory?”

  She nodded.

  “Show me,” he said.

  “And you’ll let me go?”

  He smiled as if to say, “Good try, but no dice.”

  Her shoulders slumped. “Six doors ahead,” she said.

  “It’s time to run,” he said, glancing at her shoes. “Be glad you’re not wearing heels.”

  He pushed her forward. She started to trot. He followed. “Faster, Simone,” he said from behind.

  She ran faster, but it was still pathetically slow.

  “As fast as you can,” he said. “Don’t worry. I’ll keep you from falling.”

  She did as ordered, moving in a stumbling run and soon gasping for air. She tripped over her own feet and would have fallen if he hadn’t grabbed an arm and held her up. Finally, she panted red-eyed before a door.

  Cade stepped to the door, putting an ear against it. “Give me your card.”

  “It won’t work on this door.”

  He almost believed her until her right eye twitched slightly. “Let’s give it a try anyway,” he said, continuing to admire her guts. Many men would have already broken down at this point.

  Reluctantly, she handed him the card.

  He put it in a slot, and nothing happened.

  “See?” she whispered.

  He turned the card the other way and tried again. A light blinked green and the door snicked. Cade pulled it open, peering down a short corridor.

  Cade glanced at her. She shrank back with pleading in her eyes. Cade drew the WAK .55 Magnum and charged silently down the corridor. He held her card in his other hand. He turned a corner and raced into a workroom with a fridge and cabinets. There were two other doors. He chose one and kicked it open.

  The other room was vacant and held monitor screens with chairs. He stepped in and put a palm on each chair seat. None of them was warm. Had the watchers joined the hit team or guards? That seemed likely.

  Cade went to the other door, breaking in, and found weapons. He picked a slick-looking machine pistol, grabbing loaded magazines for it. He inserted a magazine, racked it and pulled the trigger to test it, firing three bullets into a wall and nearly deafening himself in the process. He stuffed the extra magazines into a carrying pouch, dropped in some stun grenades and scanned the room. There were torso vests. He chose the biggest and buckled it into place over his jacket. Then he ran back to the main corridor.

  Simone was gone, of course. He heard the patter of feet, recognized the noise as her running and stumbling back the way they had come.

  Cade had deliberately left her behind so she would do just that. She would likely pick up her comm unit, but that wouldn’t help her, as he’d removed the tiny power unit. He’d let her go in case he didn’t kill Tarragon Down today. This way, Tarragon might not kill her later for helping him.

  The soldier’s nostrils flared. He faced the other direction and began to sprint. He had surprise, and now was the time to use it. Surprise was a force multiplier. Even though he was better at this than anyone else on the planet, he was still just one man and could use some multiplication on his side.

  ***

  Simone had verbally gone over the route three times with him. Cade remembered the briefing as he charged up some stairs. He climbed wall rungs next, and then threw open a heavy trapdoor, poking his head into open air. He stared at a stretch of tarmac with four hangers. He focused on the one with a huge “C” painted on the side. He did not spy anyone waiting to ambush him.

  Climbing out of the trapdoor, closing it behind him, Cade walked briskly across the taxiway toward Hangar “C.” There was a dome over the entire area and stars shining above. Every living area on the water moon had a dome. He forced himself to walk to avoid drawing attention to himself.

  A siren began to blare from behind.

  Cade turned around. About a kilometer away, he spied half a dozen black-clad people jumping into two motorized carts. That would the hit team or guards. They’d spotted him, but they
were nearly a kilometer away.

  With a savage laugh, Cade broke into a sprint. They had revealed themselves. He didn’t think there were more gunmen on the premises.

  He raced into the open hangar and saw the Descartes, the ex-Concord Patrol scout. It was long, with stubby short wings for atmospheric maneuvering. The scout had four crew quarters, a piloting, science and exercise room and a large back engine compartment. It stood on four legs or struts.

  A side hatch was open up there on the side near a wing, with a ladder to scale it.

  All the cables and equipment the repair people had used were gone. The scout was prepped and would be ready for takeoff once he started the engine. It had a full tank of deuterium fuel, new armaments and specialty equipment.

  Cade raced for the ladder, reaching it and scrambling up into home base. One thing it did lack—the Gyroc and shells, the payment for the work.

  Cade shrugged as he turned, flipping inner bulkhead switches. The ladder retracted, and the outer hatch closed smoothly. Yeah, baby, the electrical system was working properly again.

  He hurried down a short ship corridor for the piloting chamber.

  Chapter Five

  Cade’s lips drew back as he concentrated. He was in the piloting chamber, strapped into the pilot’s seat, and had left the repair-yard dome, exiting through a hole he’d blasted. He’d used the twin .50-caliber guns, one on each wing, to make the illegal opening. Afterward, he raced across frozen water-moon tundra, heading for—

  On the piloting viewer before him a red symbol began to flash. Tarragon had an armaments factory on the water moon—his favorite site, according to Simone. Cade had learned the factory produced prohibited weaponry—prohibited on Sestos III, in any case. The flashing symbol indicated that the factory defensive systems had sensor-lock on the speeding scout.

  Had Simone contacted Tarragon, warning him? That seemed likely. Would Ember’s orbital defenses come to Tarragon’s aid because Cade had blown an opening in the repair-yard dome? That seemed quite possible. Surprise and speed: those were Cade’s twin tickets to pulling this off. Tarragon would have heavy political pull. To win—to escape the Sestos System—Cade was relying upon his combat skills and brazen action.

  The scout zoomed over low frozen hills. The armament’s factory dome glittered in the distance, with a vast frozen lake behind it.

  The flashing on the controls—the sensor-lock on his craft—Cade pressed a switch. On the underbelly of the Descartes, two sleek missiles detached, their rocket engines igniting.

  The soldier watched through the polarized window as both missiles streaked away, using the defensive sensor-lock as a guiding beam to target. The missiles were Tarragon Armaments’ highest-selling export items.

  Cade clicked another switch. A decoy-beacon ejected from the scout, sailing high but falling behind. Afterward, to make sure he broke their lock, he took the scout lower, skimming a bare few meters over the icy surface, making the spacecraft shake.

  Two enemy missiles had left outer dome launchers. They zoomed fast and flashed by above the scout. One of them smashed against the decoy-beacon, already a distance behind the scout. The missile’s warhead detonated, obliterating itself and the decoy. The second warhead also detonated, likely because of proximity to the blast of the first.

  Cade laughed, with his blue eyes agleam like cold sapphires. No more missiles lofted from the nearing factory launchers. The reason was obvious as black smoke billowed from them, struck by Cade’s counter-sensor missiles.

  Cade took the scout up, the huge factory dome shimmering in the starlight. The soldier activated the two .50-calibers, slowed down hard so he was thrust against his straps, and engaged the gravity dampeners. Soon, the scout hovered in place before the upper dome. He hammered it with explosive rounds. After the twelfth round, and just like at the repair-yard dome, an area of reinforced material cracked. With the impact of more shells, the cracking lines grew. The seventeenth shell achieved breakthrough. Heavy inner dome atmosphere expelled at hurricane force, causing more pieces to fly outward.

  Engaging a targeting device, the soldier launched three hunter-bombs, sending the high explosives against a separate area of the interior arms-manufacturing plant.

  According to what Cade knew, there were no people inside the targeted buildings, as most of this factory was automated.

  The bombs struck and detonated, and factory walls and equipment blew apart, rising in a geyser before raining back down. No fires burned, as the hurricane shriek blew them out as they started.

  Cade flew the Descartes through the hole in the dome, using the gravity units to float downward. The escaping atmosphere shook the vessel, but that lessened as the majority of the heavier air escaped. He acquired new targets as drones started lifting from an interior silo. Cade let the .50-calibers speak for him. Soon, no more drones appeared, the pieces of the others scattered on the ground.

  Cade took the Descartes all the way down, landing light as a feather, as the interior atmosphere had settled to the water moon’s thin norm. He unhooked from his seat, grabbed the machine pistol and ammo pouch and raced for the scout’s exit.

  He donned a breather, slapped a switch and watched the hatch open. He walked onto a wing and jumped, landing with a grunt.

  He ran for a building, a smaller one, opening a door, shoving inward against escaping atmosphere. Once inside, he shut the door and removed the breather, as there was still normal air in here. With a handheld unit, he zeroed in on Halifax’s location and started sprinting through the complex.

  Instinct caused him to slow as he heard a sound. He put away the locator unit, listening as he tiptoed through a corridor. There, he heard the noise again—

  His eyebrows shot up.

  Two men appeared—the bionic bodyguards he’d seen before with Tarragon. They rolled a portable flamer—a hot plasma ejector—ahead of them.

  Cade drove into a side room as a boiling clot of plasma flew through the corridor. Fires started at its heated passage, and with a whoosh of burning fire it slammed into a back wall.

  “We’ll kill you, Cade,” a bionic bodyguard shouted. “You’re finished.”

  From the side room, Cade rolled into the burning corridor. From the floor, he fired the machine pistol. He didn’t aim at the armored guards, as there would be no point, but at their recharging flamer. The bullets hammered—

  The two bodyguards split, running in different directions as they shouted in alarm.

  The bullets broke through the flamer. The portable cannon erupted with a blast of plasma and shards of raining metal. Like flamethrower-packs of a distant era, portable flamers could be dangerous to their handlers.

  After shards rained over Cade as he hugged the floor, he crawled through the side door. Plasma fire blocked the route ahead. He jumped up and began searching for another way to reach Halifax’s location.

  Soon, he found a different corridor and ran into a large room.

  A man popped up from behind stacked crates, firing at him. Two slugs whined off Cade’s torso protector. He fired from the hip, the man’s head shattering under a hail of bullets. Dashing to other crates, Cade looked around, scanning the rest of the storage room. He didn’t see anyone else, but he heard creaks and a man subtly charging a weapon. Cade hurled a stun grenade. Crates exploded. Cade zigzagged through the room to the spot and found a guard lying on the floor bleeding to death.

  This was taking too long. The water moon’s orbital defenses would surely be on high alert by now. Tarragon would have heard of the attack and must be trying to marshal more forces.

  Cade ran out of the storage area and down a new corridor. His machine pistol chattered five more times, killing three more defenders. His torso protector absorbed another shot that would have otherwise slain him. He panted, saw from the locator that Halifax was behind a nearby door, and decided he had to go in gun blazing. Increasing speed, Cade used a flying mule kick. With his considerable weight, he smashed the door off its hinges so both he
and the door landed in a brightly lit large room.

  Three men fired at him. One bullet struck his thigh, another his armor, and another sliced through his bristly hair without touching the skull.

  Cade killed them with return machine-pistol bursts. He limped toward a torture table underneath blinding lights, with Dr. Halifax strapped prone onto it. Cade’s thigh hurt, but the bullet hadn’t shattered the bone, missing it completely. Digging in his pocket, Cade’s fingers curled around a stim capsule. He popped it into his mouth and bit down, releasing the quick-acting drug cocktail.

  From where Halifax lay, he wearily raised his head, his bloodshot eyes showing that he’d had a hard time already. “Cade,” Halifax whispered. Wires were attached to the doctor’s bare torso.

  Cade ripped them off, using his boot knife to saw though the man’s bonds. “Can you walk?”

  “They broke my feet,” Halifax said, with tear in his eyes.

  Cade saw a heavy metal rod and other grisly equipment on a plate like in a dentist’s office.

  “I’ll carry you,” the soldier said.

  Halifax nodded.

  Testing his wounded thigh, feeling little because the stims were already working, Cade hoisted the doctor from the table and settled the slender man over his left shoulder. Then, with the machine pistol in his right fist, the soldier exited the room.

  They made it back without incident onto the waiting Descartes. Cade took Halifax to the piloting chamber, setting him on the sensor station seat and securing him with restraints.

  “Thanks for coming,” Halifax whispered. “They nabbed me from a massage parlor, the bastards.”

  Cade didn’t answer. His thigh hurt, throbbing now. He’d have to extract the bullet and use some quick-heal. They had a bottle of it in the ship. Without quick-heal—Cade shook his head. He had to concentrate. They weren’t out of it yet.

  He hobbled to the pilot seat and ran through a swift checklist, lifting off afterward. He aimed the ship upward at the hole in the dome and applied thrust.