He looked scared. It wasn’t confidence-inspiring.
I glanced at the HK he was holding. “You know how to use that, right?”
“I’ve had the training, yeah.”
Which was another way of saying, but not the experience.
“Okay,” I said. “Remember. Aggressive stance, gorilla grip, front site on the target, press the trigger.”
He gave me a tight grin. “Dox always said you micromanage.”
Damn it, he was right. He was either going to perform or not. Whatever I said to him at this point wasn’t going to make the difference.
“All right,” I said. “Let’s go.” For the benefit of the others, I said, “Kanezaki and I are moving in on the granary now. Should be on target in five minutes.”
We headed north a quarter mile across flat grassland, then west, keeping low and moving quickly. There was a stand of trees between us and our objective, but, other than that, no cover or concealment anywhere. I tried not to think about snipers and what we would look like if one were watching us from that granary. When we reached the trees, we paused. I could see the granary. It was circular, about twenty feet high, but it was crumbling and offered no sniper hides, at least nothing that looked in our direction. Thank God. I couldn’t see around it. There was a truck partly visible next to a pond to the right, which might have been good news, but no sign of people. We were going to be in a hell of a jam if Hort’s intel was wrong, and there was nobody here.
“Children going in the front entrance,” I heard Dox say in the ear-piece. “Lots of ’em. Walking in from the neighborhood and some getting dropped off by their parents. No sign of our shooters.”
“My side’s clear, too,” Larison said.
“Same,” Treven said.
“John, I hope you’re in position,” Dox said. “Our timeline’s getting kind of tight.”
I didn’t want to speak, but I tapped the boom twice with a finger.
“Roger that,” Dox said.
I looked at Kanezaki. He was pale. I hoped he was going to be okay. I inclined my head toward the granary. He nodded once and we moved in, our guns up now. I didn’t know who’d trained him, but I had to admit they’d done a good job. Despite his obvious fear, he had his HK out at high-ready, his head was swiveling to increase his range of vision, and he propelled himself with a nice, smooth shuffle.
We reached the wall of the granary. It smelled of earth and hay and I had the urge to cling to it you always get just before you move out from your last position of decent cover. Still no sign of anyone at the truck.
I signaled left to Kanezaki. He nodded and moved off. I headed right.
At the limit of the structure’s circumference, I crouched and darted my head around and then back. In the instant I’d been exposed I’d seen Gillmor, a tall, wiry Caucasian in hunting fatigues and with a graying high-and-tight. He was standing, facing the road, working the keyboard of what looked like a large laptop suspended at waist level from a strap around his neck.
I stepped around, the HK on him. I checked my flanks quickly, then said in a loud, command voice, “Gillmor. Do not move.”
He started and glanced over at me. But his hands stayed at the controls.
“Get your hands up!” I shouted.
I heard Dox in my ear: “Shooters have arrived. Running at the front entrance. Larison, you win the prescience prize. Engaging them now.”
I heard a soft crack. Another. Then two more.
“Thank you for playing,” Dox said. “Next contestants.”
“Your four shooters are done!” I said, swiveling left and right to check my flanks. “They didn’t even make it inside. Now hands up, or you’re dead right there!”
He raised his hands and turned to look at me.
“Circle him!” I called out to Kanezaki. “Watch the truck, I don’t know if there’s anyone inside it.”
Kanezaki moved out, past Gillmor, his HK up.
Gillmor glanced at him, then back to me. “Who sent you? Was it Horton?”
“Call it back,” I said. “The drone.”
“No.”
“Call it back,” I said, my voice flat-lining. “I won’t ask again. I will shoot you in the head.”
“It doesn’t matter whether I die,” he said, nodding. “The mission will still succeed.”
Okay, I thought, and shot him in the head. The HK kicked, there was a crack about as loud as the thump of a sewing machine, and a hole appeared in his forehead. His body shuddered, his knees buckled, and he folded to the ground on his back.
“Jesus Christ!” Kanezaki shouted. “How are we going to stop the drone now?”
“Check the truck!” I said. “And stay alert.”
I heard Dox chuckle. “Cop’s freakin’ out. He’s wondering, ‘Who were these four guys who were charging me, and why did their heads all suddenly uncork?’”
I rushed to Gillmor’s body and examined the laptop. Two joy sticks, telemetry readouts, a video feed that looked like it was coming from a camera in the drone. I recognized the terrain from the maps we’d been reviewing. The east/west rural highway we’d driven in on from Lincoln. The river just south of it.
Oh shit, he’s programmed it to go straight for-
Gunshots to my right. I spun. Kanezaki was down. I saw movement at the far end of the truck.
I charged for the granary.
No time to think about Kanezaki. I hoped he’d taken the hits in the Dragon Skin, but I didn’t know. “Dox,” I said into the commo boom as I got to cover, “Gillmor’s down, but he’s programmed the drone to go straight to the school. I think he set the Hellfires to go at the last minute and then for the drone to follow them in, or maybe for them to detonate on impact with the drone. It’s coming at you from due east. ETA three, maybe four minutes. Can you take it down?”
“I don’t know. Where are its avionics?”
I darted my head around and back. Three gunshots rang out from the far side of the truck and rounds struck the granary wall. Chunks of dislodged concrete hit me.
“I don’t know, I didn’t design the fucking thing! The nose, I guess.”
“Guess you can’t ask Gillmor?”
Another gunshot, another spray of concrete. I was distantly aware that if the shooter was firing even when I didn’t show myself, he couldn’t be that good.
“Gillmor’s dead!” I said.