The medical teams moved in, several corpsmen to each of the team members, wiping them clean and spraying them down with a variety of medical applicators – first topical steroids, then analgesic creams, sloughing agents, dermal exfoliates, the list went on as they used the available arsenal of chemicals at their disposal to treat them. Shimazu sloped up from his position at the far end of the building and watched as the team was treated, the medics working quietly and intensely to try and stop the spread of the poison.
Another squad of troops clad in their protective NBC gear gathered up the weapons and equipment and started to deal with them, and Shimazu moved over to supervise. Much of the clothing and armour was checked for personal effects and then thrown in a pile – and he could see a squad member checking over the tanks on his flamethrower, so Shimazu had a pretty good idea of what was going to happen there. The weapons were submerged in more of the foamy brown liquid, whatever that was, and then carefully sprayed down – no doubt they'd need to be carefully cleaned properly afterwards to stop them corroding or gunking up, but they should be fine. Aswon's spear and the various knives and other bits of kit were also cleaned in the same way, then set upon plastic sheeting to drain off. With a hand on the hilt of his sword, Shimazu examined the scene astrally, checking that neither the spear nor anything else was under any kind of weird effect or malady.
He was distracted for a moment as Aswon kicked up a fuss about something, the medics struggling to pin him down to the stretcher to continue treating him while he continued to call for a radio. After initially trying to keep him still, they relented and bought a radio over to him in a plastic bag, keeping it safe from whatever chemicals they were using on him. Shimazu listened carefully as Aswon spoke over the radio, advising the engineers on the other end about the nature and type of the anti-tamper measures they'd encountered on their bomb, warning them to be careful if they encountered other devices in the city. Once they heard him talking, Marius and Hunter tried to add their observations and thoughts as well, noting down the construction methods and type of devices and components that had made up the demolition charge. Their speech rambled and a stuttered a little from the effects of the drugs, but they managed to convey they high points and salient facts to the faceless voice at the other end of the radio.
Kai was grabbing another medic by the sleeve, demanding an update on the status of the dam, concerned about the explosion and whether it would trigger some kind of response or early attack from the Yakut forces. Even badly affected by the poison, he was intense enough that the medic ran off to consult with Frunze, passing on Kai's concerns. Frunze in turn checked with his recon team, and found that they had managed to get a satellite scan of the dam, but thermographics showed no anomalies, no extra staff and no troops waiting nearby or on the move already. It was all quiet and serene…
After thirty minutes of being scrubbed, cleansed, poked, sampled and treated, the medics announced that they were reasonably happy with the prognosis and that the team were responding well – but what they needed now was rest. Frunze called in a transport and Shimazu recovered all of the weapons and equipment that could be saved. A few minutes later they were back at the hotel, and were being shown to a couple of rooms that smelt a little musty, but were otherwise functional.
After the tribulations of the day, they were all tired and collapsed into bed, soon falling asleep. Even Aswon, who seemed to manage just fine on three or four hours sleep a night normally slept for nearly six hours – though much to the disgust of the others, he still seemed far more refreshed by this than they did. While the rest of the team didn't stir until nearly nine, Aswon had been up for two hours and had sorted through their gear and checked the weapons over more carefully as soon as it was light.
The traditional firearms all seemed to have survived their dunking without damage, though as suspected they did need a decent clean. The two tasers, though, had reacted badly to something they'd been exposed to – the batteries had expanded and split in the handgrip, bulging out chemicals in a white furry growth that had corroded and etched away at the composite plastic construction. The innards, from what he could see had been similarly affected, and they looked to be beyond salvage.
When the rest of the team started to rouse, Aswon went looking for some food, finding a sentry posted outside their rooms, who told him that breakfast would be sent along to them in a few minutes. First to arrive to the sentry's reports that they were awake, though, was Colonel Frunze – in a fresh uniform and not looking the worse for wear from the previous night's drama.
"Good morning, Aswon. Are you feeling better?"
"Yes thank you – maybe a tiny bit sensitive to the touch on the skin, but on the whole pretty good. The rest of them look ok, too. Please pass on our thanks to the medical teams – we appreciate it. Do you have any news on the water plant?"
"All is well. Although the device detonated, the engineers gained access in sealed suits and reported that the explosion was a well-designed shaped charge – but that it had been moved or redirected enough that the blast cracked open the canister and spread the poison, without breaching the water pipe or damaging the valve. So the water supply is still clean and nobody should be affected. Cleaning the building will be tricky, and until then we have a decontamination station set up there."
"Oh, that is good news. Sorry, we tried our best to disable the device, but it was fairly complex."
"So I'm led to believe. The engineers reported as such. Thankfully, it looks to have been the only one in the city, so it appears they concentrated their efforts on a single device, designed to protect their delivery method. If it had not been stopped though, it would have poisoned the water for a significant part of the city including several brigades' worth of troops. There's no way our medical staff could have coped with that, and it would have severely weakened our combat power. Which given what we now suspect, makes a great deal of sense."
"We heard sirens last night – what was that about? We thought the attack had started early or something?"
"Ahh no, that was me." Frunze smiled at Aswon's confusion. "I had no way of knowing what the damage was, so I had to plan for the worst. So I called in an air warning, which immediately stood all forces to alert and to man their stations – and sent all the civilians to their cellars or safe places. In theory, they should have stayed there for some time, which would give us enough time to get the word out if the water was contaminated, before people came out to use it for drinking or washing."
Aswon nodded in understanding as Frunze explained, impressed with his solution. A somewhat tired-looking Shimazu appeared around the bathroom door, approaching them in the same clothes he'd worn the night before – while the rest of the team had only the hospital gowns they'd been given when their clothes were stripped and burned.
"Morning Colonel. Say, the army trooper with us – do you know where he is? Private Vadim?"
"Ahh yes, he has returned with your transport and is waiting at the vehicle. It was made clear to him that he could get a room here with you, but he insisted he had to keep a magical watch on the vehicle. It seemed not to be an issue, so I would imagine he's asleep there…" Frunze's words seemed to be carefully chosen, as if he was aware that this wasn't the entire or complete truth, but had decided not to press into the issue too much.
There was a knock at the door, and then two troopers pushed the doors open and wheeled in two plastic trolleys loaded down with food. It certainly wasn't fresh, nor of great quality – but it looked to be hot and recently prepared, and the smell encouraged the others to finish getting out of bed and join them in the main room of the suite, tucking into the army rations with gusto.
After wolfing down some porridge and grabbing a handful of soy-fruit flakes, Hunter announced that he was off back to the craft to get fresh clothes for everyone. Still chewing on his mouthful of food, he pulled the gown up onto his shoulders as best he could, then strode out of the room, not caring about the gap down the back or the looks he got from the sentry outside as he flashed his buttocks at him.
"I will leave you to your breakfast for the moment, and return to some paperwork and administrative details. Please call when you need me or wish to go anywhere, and I'll return." The Colonel stood and smoothed down his uniform, nodded to them and then smartly turned on his heel, leaving the room and pulling the door closed behind him and leaving them alone. The team ate breakfast, mostly in silence while they worked out the lingering aches in their bodies and thought about the activities of the night before.
Once she'd eaten, Tads gathered her mental energies and started to work around the team, bathing them in golden light and fixing the damage to their bodies as best she could. With the worst of the poison dealt with and the benefit of a good night's sleep, her efforts were much more effective than previously, and by the time she'd worked around them all, they were ready for action – perhaps a lingering twinge here and there, but certainly nothing like the crippling effects they'd suffered from only a few hours ago.
Aswon sniffed at himself, wrinkling his nose at the still pervasive chemical stench that seemed to have soaked into his pores. While grateful not to be in pain or suffering the effects of the poison, he clearly wasn't happy with being so noticeable, especially if they were going to be hunting creatures noted for having superb senses of smell. He opened the door and asked the sentry if he was able to find some odour neutralising sprays in the city – but was told that it was very unlikely. The sentry did offer to try and find some alternatives though, and grabbed for his radio, while Aswon returned to the group.
Hunter returned a few minutes later, dressed in a spare change of clothes and carrying a set of spares for everyone else, along with a few cleaning kits. They gratefully got out of the hospital gowns, into their own clothes, and set to on cleaning kit or refilling their pockets with various odds and ends that Hunter had gathered.
"Oh, I let Vadim into the tilt-wing by the way, Marius. He looked like he'd slept in the cab all night, didn't have the access codes. Still didn't want to come back here though, said he'd be happy enough standing watch on the ship and keeping a lookout for spirits." Marius grunted an acknowledgement to Hunter, then returned to disassembling his pistol and running the cleaning fluid through the barrel.
"We're going to need to go shopping again soon. This is my last suit you know." Aswon moaned, adjusting the sleeves on his Wild Hunt brand jumpsuit. "These are expensive you know. I wonder if we can get a discount on a bulk purchase." He continued to grumble while he made adjustments, getting the fit just right for his lanky frame. He was interrupted by a knock on the door and a trooper entering with an armful of medicated shampoo and body wash, labelled as 'odour free' and an apology that this was the best they could find in the local shop.
Ten minutes later, smelling considerably more neutral, Aswon returned from his shower and passed on the bottles to the rest of the team. Kai looked up at him, then gestured to Aswon's gear.
"Your phone buzzed a couple of times – think you got a call or a text." Aswon grabbed his phone and checked, then nodded.
"It was Spook. Wants a chat, if I'm free. Going to go outside and stretch my legs, give her a call back." He wandered out into the corridor, told the sentry he was just stepping outside, then descended the steps two at a time, feeling much more like his usual self after the hot shower. Outside, he hit the dial key and called his friend, smiling as the video synced up and he saw her sitting on the balcony outside her tiny apartment, nursing a coffee and with a book-reader laid on her chest.
"Oh hey Aswon, thanks for calling….hey, you ok? You're looking…well, a bit pink?"
"We had a little adventure last night, got dosed with some poison and ending up having to get some medical treatment."
"Je sou gei duk! Are you ok? I mean, good to talk and everything?"
"Yes, we're fine. We had medical attention pretty promptly, and our team mage has sorted us out this morning. Should be back to one hundred percent in a day or two… so, what's up?"
"Are you sure? Because it looks pretty grim, wherever you are. I can tell that's not a drop in screen. I mean, were you in a city fire?"
"Don't mind the scenery, it's just somewhere we're staying for a day or two, sorting out a problem. But then we're due to move on."
"Good – because I have an opportunity. Someone has been asking after you and your team, looking to employ you. You lot specifically, by the sounds of things. Can't go into too many details of who they are, but I've asked around a bit, and let's just say their rep is pretty solid and they have a name for doing business. But they're looking to arrange a meeting, face to face, to offer the job out."
"Oh, well…. that's good to hear, I think. But we're in the middle of a job and I don't know when we're going to be done. What can you tell me?"
"Like I said, they want a face to face. The job should be low risk, but involves a lot of travel, but also offers a great reward package. But there's some kind of time pressure and they need to get things moving pretty swiftly."
"Well, I can talk to Kai and let him know, but like I said we're mid-job at the moment. Is that all you have for us?"
"Other than they're paying fifty grand for expenses for you to go meet with them, pretty much. I can try and work up some more details if you're interested? But I need some kind of indication if you are interested – like I said, they seemed to be asking after your team specifically. I would guess the job involves travel either to, around or from East Asia, but beyond that I won't say."
"I dunno, Spook. I'll chat with Kai, but I can't commit." Aswon didn't mention that he'd picked up on her choice of language. Not 'couldn't say' – but 'wouldn't say'. So she really did either respect or fear the person brokering the job, and wasn't going to risk aggravating them. Interesting. "I'll get back to you as soon as I can, but if you can get any more details, that would help a lot."
Aswon headed back inside the hotel, climbing the stairs just as quickly as he'd descended them and entered the room, carefully closing the door behind him before he spoke, hoping the sentry didn't have enhanced hearing.
"Kai, everyone – that was Spook. She's got a job offer, apparently we've been asked for as a team. Meeting in somewhere 'East Asia' in a few days, but there's fifty grand just for turning up. Low risk, but lots of travel. I told her we were on a job, but I'd let you know."
"It all depends on the next twenty four hours, I suppose, doesn't it? I mean – whether the invasion goes ahead, or stops – we're probably on our way out of here. If we can deal with that spirit anyway. But we don't want to get caught up in this war."
There were general murmurs of agreement from everyone but Hunter – who was busy already on his datapad and plotting routes towards various points on the east coast – Vladivostok, Korea, Japan, China and Indonesia, then factoring in fuel costs and travel times.
"I don't think we can do it. We've already agreed to too much. We have to deal with the electronics that Nadia is repairing that we got in Iran. Then we agreed to go back to Aden and deal with that temple. I don't think we want to let him down or keep him waiting, do we?" Nobody disagreed with that statement – at least not until Marius opened his mouth to speak, before closing it again. Aswon raised an eyebrow and stared at him, not believing that Marius was seriously contemplating this as a course of action.
"Well, technically Aswon, that's not what we said we'd do…." Marius closed his eyes for a moment, then spoke, casting his mind back to the conversation on the side of the mountain. "When you have dealt with Esprit, you can return here, and we will talk on the history of that spear and what it means…" Marius recited word for word the agreement made with Aden, continuing by describing how Aden had told them to learn more about the Spear before they went to the temple. "So, technically, because we're not doing the Maersk job against Esprit, we haven't dealt with Esprit… so we don't have to go back to him yet…."
"And you seriously believe that was the INTENT of what he said?" Aswon seemed incredulous.
"No, not for a heartbeat. But that's what he said, and words and their meanings are very important to Dragons, from everything I know about them. He might be really pissed if we do that, but would have to admit that it was exactly what was agreed between us. I mean, come on – you've all heard the stories about people doing deals with Wyrms, and they always come off second best and end up getting hosed. But what's the one thing that's the same in all the stories? Yeah – they get EXACTLY what was agreed upon, it's just not what they thought they were getting or expected."
The discussion started then, with the group appearing somewhat evenly split – Aswon, Tads and Shimazu all thinking they should abide by the intent of the agreement, while Kai, Hunter and Marius thinking the specific words gave them some leeway – albeit with some risk. Aden wasn't noted for his patience, after all.
"Call Spook back, will you, Aswon, and tell her that it's not a yes – but it's not a no. We need at least twenty-four hours to finish off here, but we're considering it. If she can get us more information, that will help us make a decision." Aswon looked a little unimpressed with Kai's decision, but didn't challenge him, instead calling Spook as requested and passing on the message.
Further conversation was stalled by the knock on the door and the return of Colonel Frunze. Before he got a chance to speak, Hunter called out a query.
"So Colonel, the images we got from that Owl last night about the pond and the summoning. How are your guys doing with analysing that information?"
"Efforts have been made overnight, and they believe they have identified the most likely sites – well, based on the information we have, the five most likely locations, based upon the scenes provided. We are attempting to gain access to some satellite or high altitude aircraft resources to obtain further information to narrow down the target area."
"We could do that."
"I'm sorry?" The colonel turned to fact Marius, wondering if he'd heard him correctly.
"We can help with that. Our craft is fast, and pretty stealthy. If you're happy to fuel her up and give us clearance and the locations, we can go looking. And with this lot as well," Marius gestured to half the team, "they can spot magical concealment or illusions that would completely fool your resources."
"I see. And you'd be willing to do this for us?"
"Of course, Colonel! What are friends for?" Kai beamed at him.
"I will go and put this proposal to the General. I anticipate him saying yes, though!" The Colonel swept out of the room, striding up the stairs rapidly towards the third floor while the sentry was left to pull the door closed behind him.
"We should make sure the fuel supply is open-ended then, and do the same as we planned in Iran maybe." Tads offered. "So we can refill as we come back from the mission and be topped off ready to go." Marius nodded emphatically in agreement. "And we need to work out what we're doing with Vadim."
"Oh, we'll take him with us!" Kai waved his hand airily, as if it was not much of a problem. Clearly he didn't foresee any issue with taking a serving member of the military on an excursion out of the country. "Maybe we can drop him off in China, or Japan or somewhere…."
"I think perhaps we should check with Vadim when we're next together, and see what HE wants to do?" Tads countered. Aswon and Shimazu nodded along in agreement, and Marius seemed inclined to agree. Kai shrugged and nodded, not being too bothered either way. One sharp knock on the door and the Colonel re-entered, holding a large tactical radio in his hand.
"The General has approved your mission and thanks you. This has been programmed with today's tactical codes and scramble signal, so you can keep in touch. I need to go and make some calls now for the airfield and arrange for a fire-mission. The GPS co-ordinates for the five sites are loaded into the radio already. We would appreciate any detailed sensor information or scans that you can manage of the sites though, when you survey them." As quickly as he'd arrived, he left again, once more leaving the sentry to pull the door closed behind him.
The team got their gear together and started getting ready to leave the room and head for the tilt-wing. Tads spoke to the sentry, asking if they could get hold of some equipment in case they ran into trouble, and by the time they were packed and down into the lobby of the hotel, a couple of strap on armour vests and a brace of pistols had been arranged. Neither matched the quality of the gear they had lost the night before – but they were better than nothing at all.
The hop over to the airport and refuelling at the helipad was routine and uneventful – though their craft did draw curious eyes from the crews working on the attack and transport helicopters located on the stands. Marius spent just as much time gazing at the attack choppers through, examining the pods of rockets, missiles and smart machine guns on nose turrets that he wished he had access to. It didn't take long to fill the tanks from the lake of aviation fuel stored in the underground tanks at the airfield – pumps designed to fill and turnaround a high speed sub-orbital passenger jet barely got up to speed before they'd filled the tilt-wings fuel tanks.
Marius took off carefully, and flew north, heading along the route cleared for him and identified on his map from the data that Hunter had input. A quick glance showed his transponder squawking the rotating and heavily encrypted signal, identifying him as a 'friendly', and he kept to the centre of the dog-leg corridor that was excluded from the anti-air batteries engagement zone. Once north of the city, he lowered the power and stared to zip along just above tree height, using the terrain to mask his movement as much as possible and cutting back on the craft's systems to reduce noise as far as possible.
It was somewhat surreal – there was no real sign of entering enemy territory, only thirty kilometres north of the city. There wasn't even a dug in line of soldiers or defence teams to mark the border – it was just an arbitrary line on the map. Yet for all that, the tension increased noticeably as they crossed the line on the map, and Shimazu was glued to the fibre optics – scanning around them for any sign that they had been spotted magically or were being pursued by an astral spirit. The others hunched over by the starboard door or the rear ramp, both cracked open just enough to let them look out at the area without turning the inside of the craft into a wind tunnel. It was all quiet though, no sign of pursuit or patrol through the air, and they continued to fly north, heading towards the first location.
The first two sites were busts – though the terrain matched in general, the ponds had dried up as a result of the hot summer, and were just slightly moist bogs set in a depression. Marius flew them around the sites carefully, swinging the sensors to bear to get a good read on them and making sure that the location was always on their right, so they could peer out of the warded doorway as they passed.
The third site got a warning cry from Shimazu as they approached – he could sense some kind of power or astral activity, and Marius dropped down even lower, orbiting the site at range and having to take readings as they flashed between trees and hills. Slowly he circled inwards as the team continued to call out negative readings, until they got to a fairly direct overflight. It looked like the site had been used for something in the past – there was certainly a strong astral taint there as if some powerful ritual had been carried out. The echoes created in astral space felt odd and alien, much like the free spirits they had encountered, but also somewhat distant in time.
They continued on to the fourth site, and struck gold. Marius picked up a heat signature on his long range scanners, and immediately veered off, dropping power as much as he dared and using every trick he knew to mask their approach, slowing the tilt-wing and trying to strike a balance between keeping them out of sight and actually being able to survey the area. Shimazu confirmed that he could see the results of active magic there, ripples in astral space that told of recent summonings of magical spirits. Aswon was peering through binoculars, and caught sight of a dog sunning itself by the side of a pond, then a moment later a flurry of movement as a small pack of watcher spirits congregated nearby. Looking again, he concentrated on the dog, seeing through its attempts to mask its true nature and recognised it as another shapeshifter.
Hunter listed as one after another the team called in the sightings – first Marius with the thermal scans, then both Shimazu and Aswon with magical readings. He checked, then double checked the position, confirmed the sensor readings and then reached for the tactical radio…
"Base, this is recon one. Authentication code is Papa Zulu Three Five Nine."
"Recon one, authentication accepted. Welcome to the net."
"I have a fire mission target. Location fiver two point six eight five three eight, by one zero four point three niner niner seven three. Multiple hostiles, ground based. Fire for immediate effect, over."
"Stand by recon one. Plotting. Confirm location fiver two point six eight five three eight, by one zero four point three niner niner seven three."
"Confirmed." A broad grin formed on Hunter's mouth. "Send the music."
"Say again, Recon one?"
"Fire, fire, fire." Hunter shook his head. They definitely needed to learn to loosen up a bit. He quickly stuffed the radio into a pocket and squeezed down to the tail ramp, then pulled out his camera. "This….this is going to be interesting if it's anything like that mortar fire." After a moment's thought, he wedged himself against the ribs on the side of the craft and called Marius. "Incoming fire from the south. Egress west, buddy."
South of the airport in Irkutsk, a battalion of Russian artillery was laid out, limbers spread and crews standing by. The range to the target was forty eight kilometres – about the limit of the guns, at least until they swapped to rocket-assisted rounds. But, it was just in range, and the guns had been warned by Frunze of the target locations even as the team were lifting off. They knew all five locations to two decimal places already, and the crews had had plenty of time to work out their firing solutions.
Now with the more precise data from Hunter, they refined the solutions down, and each of the crews made an adjustment – one quarter of a turn of the azimuth wheel one way, one eighth of a turn of elevation. All down the line, white gloved hands shot up, signifying to the commander that the gun was laid in and ready to fire. Crew jumped to the sides of the massive armoured chassis, bent into a crouch, covered their ears and opened their mouths.
'HAARRK, HAARRK, HAARRK, HAARRK, HAARRK'. The klaxon was high pitched, designed to cut through the ear protection worn by the crew, and made it abundantly clear that shit was – as they say – about to get very real. Everyone nearby was hunkered down now, and as the last blast from the klaxon sounded, the battery commander raised a red flag. Even in this age of ultra-fast digital systems, integrated cyberware and the modern matrix – sometimes the most ancient of methods still proved to be the best. The flag dropped, and almost as one eighteen gunners pulled sharply on the long cords attached to their massive guns.
The SO-203 Maka self-propelled guns were based on a T-15 main tank chassis, and weighed nearly fifty tons each. Each had a pair of pneumatic dozer rams deployed behind them and dug into the earth to provide some recoil dampening. Despite that, as they each fired the one metre high, hundred and ten kilo shells, the chassis rocked back hard enough to go airborne at the front, before settling back down with a crash. A burst of flame nearly as long again as the ten and a half metre barrel light up the sky despite the bright sunshine, and the apocalyptic noise gave each gun a blast pattern as the air was compressed by the shockwave. Around each gun loose debris and earth was blasted into the air, hanging for a moment before falling like rain. Already the crew were swinging into action, loading the second of the four shells carried on board, massive hydraulic claws ponderously swinging around while the four loaders carefully swung the next shell into position.
As the rumble died away, the last echoes reverberating through the houses and streets nearby, the radio operator flicked the cutout off and spoke into his microphone.
"Shots out. Thirty five seconds."
The shells made a sound like ripping fabric as they sliced through the air. Eighteen shells rose up in a parabolic curve, before nosing over and starting to descend. As a military force, Russia had many issues – its conscript army made up with numbers what it lacked in skill in many areas, and the poor funding often caused operational issues. But, for hundreds of years, it had been acknowledged that Russia made or did some things exceptionally well. Helicopter gunships, mortars – and artillery – were top of that list.
With the advance notice and the precise co-ordinates supplied, none of the artillery missed its landing point by more than three metres, even over the forty eight thousand metres of travel. Not that it mattered, as each shell had a lethal blast radius of over fifty metres, and a serious injury area another fifty beyond that. Four of the guns had been laid down on the centre spot of the targeted area, allowing for potential misses or shell failures. The twelve remaining shots were distributed around the central point at a range of fifty metres, evenly spread in thirty degree arcs, like the hours on a clock face.
Hunter had been expecting something – but even he was hushed into silence by the blast. He thought he'd known what was coming from having witnessed the mortars firing back at Samara. The shells here were bigger, and far more accurate, though. Shockwaves smashed into each other, and the earth was pounded so hard that trees were ripped up and thrown into the air before being rent to pieces, water vaporised from the pond and formed a visible blast sphere that rode out for a millisecond, before being compressed back in again by the surrounding detonations and being forced upwards into a mushroom cloud over the central strike point.
"Target destroyed. Cease fire." Hunter looked around at the others, nodding in satisfaction. They were mostly too shocked to respond. He almost thought about asking them to check for life signs, but he'd picked up enough by now to know that none of the astrally active team members would want to look at that area for a while.
They headed towards the fifth site as they left the blast behind them, and Shimazu called out a warning. A pack of watcher spirits were in pursuit – perhaps the ones that had just been summoned. He pulled off the viewing goggles and passed them to Tads, pointing to the rear and shouting over the comms to her.
"Spirit pack inbound! All close together!" Tads nodded, took a moment to orient the goggles over her face and then threw a ball of energy at them, focussing through the fibre optic pathways and the rear-facing camera. A moment later, the pack of six watchers was no more, and the skies were clear.
Marius flew on towards the last location, checking it out quickly, before turning back towards Irkutsk when they found nothing of note, and they flew back into the city through another of the cleared routes, heading for the airport to land and refuel. When they came in to the landing pad, Frunze was waiting for them again, standing by a UAZ until the engines cycled down and the ground crew swarmed towards them with the fuelling hoses.
"Permission to come aboard?"
"Granted, Colonel." Marius' voice came over the loud speakers, before anyone else could react.
"I take it from the call for fire that you found your target, then?"
"We did indeed. Here, I've got a chip with some sensor footage of each of the sites, and a scan of the fourth one after the impact. The images aren't as good, as we were leaving at high speed. I'm given to understand that incoming fire has right of way…" Hunter's attempt at humour seemed to wash over Frunze, who reached for the chip and slotted it into his datapad to have a quick look at the raw footage.
"Excellent work."
"So, are there any signs of attack? Anything moving or causing issues?" Kai enquired.
"No, nothing so far. All forces are on high alert, and we have detailed patrols all up and down both shorelines of the river, with monitoring units stationed on the bridges."
"No signs of any insurgent activity?"
"No, nothing. It's like the quiet before the storm." Frunze frowned a little, then plucked the chip from his pad, and held it aloft. "Please excuse me, I must get this back to the analysis teams. I'll see you back at headquarters shortly?" They nodded, and Frunze climbed back down out of the tilt wing and strode over to the UAZ quickly, his driver spinning the four wheel drive around and taking off at speed.
The team refuelled and Marius lifted off again for the short hop back towards the sports stadium, landing in the same spot as before. The squad of troops appeared to have used the time to have a nap, and were roused by either the engine noise, or the size twelve boots of their sergeant – it was hard to say which, but they soon fell into position again to keep a watch on the tilt-wing as the team climbed down and headed for the hotel, leaving Vadim on guard again.
Without having anything specific to do, and not wanting to invite themselves to the command centre and risk annoying the general, they returned to the suite they'd slept in. A few minutes later, and a soldier knocked on the door again, before pushing in another cart full of food. Once again it was from ration packs, but probably cooked in the hotel kitchen rather than over a camp stove, and they suspected there was more than one person's worth each. Still, it was hot, actually surprisingly tasty and stuffed full of energy designed to keep an infantryman going through combat.
As they were eating, Aswon got another message from Spook, with a few scant details. He read them out to the team, in-between mouthfuls of black bread and soy-stew.
"The meeting is confirmed as paying fifty kay just for turning up. The meeting is at midnight though, and apparently has to take place at that time for reasons that aren't available to us. And it's a few kilometres west of Tokyo that we'd need to get to. And for the record, I still don't think this is a great idea…"
The team chatted as they ate lunch, bouncing ideas back and forth as they speculated on what the job could be, who it might be for and why someone was asking for them by name. There was a knock on the door again, and they looked up, pushing away plates and expecting to see the colonel coming in, or some of the troops delivering something or to take away the food. Instead, the door remained closed. Seconds stretched out, and then there was another knock, quieter and more hesitant. Kai rolled up out of his chair and crossed to the door, then pulled it open, revealing a slender Russian officer standing on the other side. She had pale skin and clear blue eyes, framed by slightly curly brown hair. Despite wearing the rank tabs of a junior officer, she seemed very nervous, and her eyes flitted from Kai to the rest of the team and back before she hesitantly spoke.
"Excuse me. Are you the 'specialist' team that has been bought in to provide support?" Kai tried not to smile as he heard the emphasis she placed on the word specialist.
"That depends. Are they in trouble?"
"Sorry, excuse me? In trouble? I don't think so?" She seemed confused and thrown horribly off balance by Kai's response, and he took pity on her.
"That's ok, then. Come in, why don't you?" He moved to the side and gestured her into the room, closing the door behind him. She stepped forwards a few paces and then stood at parade rest, waiting for him to be seated or give some indication to her that she was to speak. Unfortunately, Kai not being a military man, that took some time before he realised, and gave her a broad smile. "So Miss? How can we help?"
"I am Junior Lieutenant Yahontov. And I've noticed something very odd that is wrong. Very wrong. And I've told my superiors, but they don't think it's important. But with the alert we got last night, and the news that is around the city this morning, I think it is. But I can't get them to listen to me." Her face screwed up with barely supressed emotions, and they could see that she was distraught. Almost by reflex several of the team were scanning her astrally, checking her aura for signs of deception or subterfuge, but they found none – just worry, anxiety and a certain sense of dread.
"So, what do you do, Lieutenant, and why do you think we can help?"
"I work in the meteorology command as a weather analyst. We provide predictions for the next week to help monitor the situation and plan operations, provide updates on weather systems and so forth. But part of my job is to monitor the Lake and check the conditions there. It's such a large body of water it has a profound effect on the local environment, and I'm one of the local troops. I grew up around the lake, and I've studied it for years. And what it's doing is wrong. It shouldn't be happening. It can't be happening!"
"I'm not sure what to make of this, so why don't you tell us. Assume we know nothing, and explain from the beginning." Kai encouraged her with another smile, and then flopped back down in his seat, grabbing a drink with both hands and then altered his body position to make it clear to her that he was now listening attentively.
In turn, she pulled out a small data pad, checked some notes and then started to talk, describing the normal activity on the lake and trying to show them the wave patterns and weather conditions normally found. The screen was far too small for them to see well, but Hunter pulled out the big rollout display, and keyed it on, then helped her get the two systems connected. With the bigger one metre picture, they could see the data more clearly – not that it helped most of them.
Within three minutes of her starting her speech, it was clear that she was either a fantastic con-artist (which would have surprised them all given the magical reads they had of her), or she was a gifted and experienced scientist with a wealth of practical experience to back her up. She was showing data about wave amplitudes, propagation rates and water displacement values that included some fairly deep and complex maths. Marius and Hunter were nodding along, being the only two that had the scientific backgrounds to stand a chance of understanding her, and from what they could see her equations and data checked out. But that didn't explain the series of three to four metre waves travelling south down the lake, at high speed and with no natural cause at all…
During the course of her presentation, her voice had become stronger and more self-assured, and as she discussed her specialist subject her nerves steadied entirely. All of that vanished as Kai announced that he thought it was time to call the colonel in on this discussion, and they watched as her complexion blanched.
Two minutes later the Colonel arrived, summoned by the sentry outside after a word from Kai. The Lieutenant sprang to attention, her eyes fixed on a spot on the wall with laser-like focus. Colonel Frunze examined her for a moment without comment, then turned to Kai.
"Mr. Kai. You have additional information?"
Kai explained what had happened, then asked Yahontov to explain again. Her nerves returned, and she stuttered and stammered through the opening of her presentation while Frunze watched her. Kai asked questions though, getting her to repeat some points and present the data in a slightly different way or explain a term she used, and drew her focus away from the Colonel, helping to ground and settle her a little. When she'd finished her second run through, Kai made a point of obviously looking over towards Hunter and Marius.
"So, as far as we can work out, the maths and the data is right, correct, guys?" They nodded, seeing where he was going with this. "So I think this is something we need to look into. A good part of the lake is well inside enemy territory, and they have far better magical control of the environment. I don't understand what it is they're doing, but I think we have to look at this."
"Indeed. That seems to be a sensible course of action. Though tell me, Lieutenant? Did you in fact raise this information through the chain of command via your superior officer?" Yahontov nodded spasmodically, her lips dry and her voice faltering under his scrutiny. "I see."
"Colonel. I believe that she's on to something, and from what she said, her superior doesn't. But now we know, we can do something to investigate the issue. I believe she's made the right call in bringing it to our attention." If the Colonel was annoyed with Kai for undermining him, he didn't show it. Instead he continued to stare at the young Lieutenant, as if weighing up possibilities in his mind.
"So Kai. You believe that it's possible these conditions have something to do with the forthcoming attack?"
"I believe it's a possibility, and something that should be looked at seriously. It may prove not to be true, but if it is and you ignore it, it could be devastating."
"Very well. Lieutenant. Return to your post, and be ready to assist these people if approached. Do not discuss where you have been with anyone else, without my express instruction. Dismissed." Yahontov saluted sharply and turned quickly, so quickly she almost lost her balance. She crossed the floor quickly, and clawed at the handle of the door, trying to get out of the room as quickly as possible.
"Colonel. Do you have any naval presence on the Lake? Any forces you can call upon?"
"Alas no, Kai. There are some patrol boats, fairly small ones, that monitor the water – but they fall under Naval Command, not the Army. Gaining access to them will require us to go via the Defence Ministry at Moscow." An edge of genuine contempt crept into his voice for a moment before he calmed himself again. "I'm not sure that we have enough to bother the General with on this, and without his influence, our options to cut through the bureaucracy are limited. And if you are in fact correct, we may not have that time."
"I'm guessing you don't have access to things like depth charges then, either. What about your artillery and rockets and stuff. Can that be used against water-borne targets?" Hunter enquired.
"No, we have no access to naval equipment. And if we can hit a target on the water, then the weapons will be of great effect. But I am unsure we have the required accuracy against moving targets, and a shell hitting water at over 900 metres per second is like hitting solid concrete. Depending on the fusing, the shell could break apart, detonate prematurely or sink without a trace."
"For the moment though, I will go and clarify where Lieutenant Yahontov reports, and check on her senior officer. I will return shortly." The colonel nodded to them abruptly, then turned on his heel, marching to the door. It was a study in character – though his movements mirrored Yahontov's, the level of control and confidence he exuded where like night and day compared to her jerky and terrified marching.
When he was gone and the door closed safely behind him, Kai asked for Tads to tell them all about the types and powers of spirits of the rivers and lakes, explaining a little about what they could and couldn't do. She explained as best she could – detailing how her spirits might be a little weaker as Elk was a land-based totem, not one associated with water, though the spirits should answer her call as long as she was respectful.
Aswon checked his phone, watching as the time ticked over to 13:00.
"Well, if Tads' mind probe was right, we've got about twelve hours, then life is going to get very interesting around here."
