"Right – everyone give me a status check?" Kai called out.
"All systems green, ready to jam, no sign of detection."
"Hunter, locked and loaded."
"I am prepared. I am Aswon."
"Spirit in position, ready to go."
"Ready." Shimazu spoke quietly, barely above a whisper – but he gave Kai an encouraging nod.
"Ok, all good – let's go, Marius!"
"Lifting off." The engine noise rising slightly as Marius fed power to them, then fading away as the spirit went to work, distorting and concealing the sound. They rose up from the shallow valley, cresting the ridge and turning on the spot to face the prison a few kilometres away. As soon as they were lined up with the target, the engines started to rotate, sending them forward while they continued to climb, rising on a thirty-degree angle of attack.
"Kai. Keep this safe for me." Shimazu handed over his sword and scabbard, making Kai's eyes go wide.
"What? I mean, ok… but aren't you taking that?"
"No. I'll take this instead. Just in case." Shimazu pulled out the small vibro-knife and touched the activation button, sending out a shrill whine that set their teeth on edge. It ceased as soon as he released the button, sliding the knife back into the short scabbard that he'd attached to his armour. "If something does happen, and I lose this, or need to drop it – it doesn't really matter."
"Ok – gotcha." Kai wondered what circumstance Shimazu had come up with that might lead to him dropping or losing his weapon – but then decided he didn't need to know, especially not right now. Perhaps round the dinner table or a campfire one night – but there were more important things to worry about right now.
"I have visual on the prisoners, lining up now." Marius relayed the images to the screens in the passenger compartment, showing the view of the prison courtyards far ahead. The image was distorted – both from the motion of the aircraft as it continued to climb, and also the interference patterns from the mesh fence that surrounded each of the exercise areas, but they could see the green blobs moving around, forming into long rows as the prisoners moved into position. "Drone activity nominal – no signs of detection, no hostile activity. I am picking up movement in the towers."
"Marking them now – I'm gonna take out the north tower first." Hunter had left the co-pilot's seat and was hefting his assault rifle, checking the grenade launcher was primed and ready. "Soon as that one is down, I'll move on to the south – unless you've dealt with it already, Aswon."
"Roger that. Ahhah! I think I have found our target. He has a white halo around him – unsure why… can I… yes, zooming in. I think he's pulled a bedsheet out with him or something, and laid it on the ground. Oh – that's clever, I think. From the ground it won't show up really, not amongst the rows of prisoners. Maybe not even from the towers that much. But from above? Makes him have a white glow around the jumpsuit. He's in the centre courtyard of the three, about a third of the way down from the north edge. Marking him on the sensors now."
"Confirmed – I have him now. Locking on GPS co-ordinates, adjusting flight plan." The Broadsword twitched slightly as Marius adjusted course, continuing to climb sharply as the horizontal distance lowered quickly. "Stand-by. Thirty seconds to drop – secure the cabin." Each of the team-members looked around them quickly, checking for any loose materials that could go shooting around the cabin when they started their assault. Everything seemed to be in place though, with the team members braced in position. Tads was securely strapped in, the safety harness cinched in tight around her and the viewing prism securely strapped to her head, letting her look around the craft astrally. Kai and Shimazu were next to the starboard hatch, with Shimazu already attached to the winch cable, a large spool of material coiled up loose by his feet. Hunter was braced next to the port door and Aswon was in the middle of the cabin, ready to move to support either side as needed.
"Dropping… now!" All of them felt their stomachs float as Marius cut thrust, letting the Broadsword drop abruptly, gathering speed as it plummeted towards the ground. "Opening doors!" Air rushed into the cabins as the doors were cracked open, the stream intensifying as the doors swung open and cleared the hatches, buffeting the team as air cycled through the cabin. "Stand by…stand by… drop!" Shimazu took a step forwards, his knees slightly bent in anticipation, arms out slightly to the side to balance himself, falling along with the Broadsword, rushing through the air in parallel – at least for the first moment. At the end of each wing the engines roared back into life as Marius went to full power, arresting their downward motion and trying to bring them back into a hover. As their descent slowed, Shimazu dropped, the cable snaking out behind him as he rushed down towards the exercise yard.
In the cockpit, Marius was watching his sensor feed carefully, his attention split between the readouts for all four engines, the control surfaces for the aircraft, the ground conditions, wind-speed, the rigger networks broadcasting and the actions of the drones. His attention darted from one reading or system to another, a constant cascade of information sleeting across his conscious mind. He saw the readings change as Shimazu stepped out of the hatch, starting his plummet towards the ground, a part of his mind still boggling at the concept of a man falling the distance of a five-story apartment block and landing on his feet without issue. A routine part of his mind checked the ground location predicted for his landing, ensuring that he was still in position, and that Shimazu would land adjacent to their target.
And as he checked the ground, one of his sensors displayed a faint glimmer, a tiny refraction of light. An anomaly, something that shouldn't be there. His mind snapped to the data, and a sudden feeling of horror cascaded through his soul, a rush of ice-water dumped into his veins. Commands sprang out from his mind though the rigger interface at phenomenal speeds, tuning the sensor array to look for specific, very narrow and focussed readings. Nobody else in the team could have analysed the data so thoroughly, or understood the import as quickly – only his genius level intellect let him string the information together as effectively as he did.
A moment later, a luminous grid appeared over the top of the exercise yard, as the sensors detected the presence of the passive defences, the system that none of them had spotted or thought to look for previously. A tiny part of his mind kicked himself – this was exactly the sort of thing he should have seen coming, but had not. But – there was no time for that now – not if he was going to salvage the situation.
Over the top of the yard, a mesh of monofilament wire was stretched taut, dividing the air up into a tight grid of interlacing wires. Almost invisible, yet incredibly strong, the mesh would slice into flesh like a cheese wire. And Shimazu was accelerating towards it at 9.8 metres per second squared, with no way to stop his fall.
"ACHTUNG!" he called out, even while his brain seemed to accelerate further, adrenaline spiking his systems as his virtual hands danced over the controls, cutting power to the jets once more, letting the craft sink lower, while at the same time turning the jets and adjusting the control surfaces, struggling to turn the jets inwards and redirect their thrust not just downwards, but towards the centre of the aircraft, trying to focus them onto the spot that Shimazu was going to be dropping through.
He couldn't drop faster than gravity, of course – and there was no time to swing the jets around to help him – neither was that a survivable option. At this low an altitude, there was no way they'd recover in time before slamming into the ground. But as he fell, complex calculations ran through his mind, generating an intercept point.
It was close. Very close. Possibly too close. But the alternative was to see Shimazu be diced into chunks as the monowire ran through him vertically.
Marius paused for another heartbeat, watching on the display as the Broadsword reached the critical height, and then he ran the power up on the engines once more, quickly raising them to one hundred percent power. A mental flick, and the safety systems were disabled, and the power rose, more fuel running into the turbines, and all the systems rising up past the redlines. One hundred and five percent…one hundred and ten… he didn't have an afterburner to engage, but he could throw open a few purge valves, spitting the pressurised contents of the hydraulic system out into the hot exhaust gas, and for a brief fraction of a second, it functioned in much the same way. The exhaust gas rippled as the oil vaporised, and an almost invisible blue flame popped out of the exhaust rings with a loud crack, so sudden and intense that not even the powerful spirit could dampen its signature.
The incandescent gas, rippled down past Shimazu, four blasts of flaming thrust, pulses of pure power that almost rivalled a plasma for a moment, travelling down to meet the mesh. Monofilament wire wasn't actually one molecule thick, of course – even the most exotic materials wouldn't have been strong enough to serve their purpose at that level of fineness. But the marketing team had firmly run with the idea, and that had entered the popular mental zeitgeist, conjuring up images of indestructible wires that could slice through the very world itself. In truth, the wires were very strong, but were made of nanite-woven materials, many molecules wide – but still an order of magnitude smaller than primitive structures like barbed wire or razor wire.
They were tough, strong and resilient – but not resilient enough. The combustion chamber on the jet engines in use on the Broadsword normally ran between 1200 and 1300 Celsius, with the hot gas fed into the rear turbofans and exhaust chambers, going through the heat exchangers and emerging from the rear of the engine at around 750 degrees. Thanks to the abuse thrown at them, and with the purged oil and hydraulic fuel pumped into the chambers, for a brief moment, the jet spat out a ring of hot exhaust gas exceeding 1700 degrees. Four toroid formations of hot gas blasted through the air, striking the mesh a metre below Shimazu's feet.
If they had been thicker wire, there would have been enough thermal mass to have absorbed the heat impulse, wicking away the sudden rise in temperature and dissipating it. But the material was too fine, too slight to do that. Like an arc welder, the temperature rose to a level too high for the material to cope with, and the wire disintegrated under the assault.
Shimazu's reactions had kicked into high gear as the Broadsword had started to descend towards him again, and he felt the waves of heat kicked out by the engines – and the sudden blast of hot air that rose up from underneath him. He'd not spotted the wire, and had no idea what Marius was doing, or why – but he knew that something was wrong, and his whole body tensed up, getting ready to fight whatever foe was coming to assault them.
His eyes widened as the air shimmered in front of him, and for a briefest moment something whipsawed through the air, the sky seeming to twitch. Then to his surprise, the safety harness before him seemed to disintegrate, pieces of it falling away from his body as if someone had swung a sword down past his body and neatly sliced it in two.
The pieces drifted down with him, falling at the same speed, just diverging from his course slowly as air resistance and the wind slowly went to work on them. He suddenly realised that there was no way that he could attach the prisoner to him now – the harness was sliced open, rendered useless. Short tatters of material fluttered uselessly in the wind, and his mind wondered just what had happened.
"Elementals inbound! They're reacting to the spirit!" Tads' cry of alarm startled him out of his thoughts, and a moment later he concentrated on the ground, feeling his feet make contact. He focussed, magic rippling through his limbs as they absorbed and redirected the shock of the impact up through his body, releasing it out into the air above him. He wasn't sure how he did it, but it worked, and he wasn't going to second guess it. All around him fragments of webbing and harness fluttered to the ground around him, and further away there were sudden screams and gurgles, as people were dismembered by some invisible force. Arms or heads seemed to just detach from their bodies as some invisible force snaked outwards from their landing spot, leaving a trail of destruction out from them.
Hunter wasn't sure what was going on either – the sudden downward lurch had taken him by surprise as much as anyone else. But once they'd started their second descent, he just adjusted his aim a little, and then sent the firing command to his Smartlink, feeding in the ranging data from his eye-laser as it constantly updated the distance to the middle of the guard tower. He saw the 40mm grenade flying through the air, neatly slotting into the gap between the tower's roof and the reinforced material making up the sides. As the grenade reached the centre of the space inside the tower, it exploded, sending out a blast of roiling flame in all directions. The flame emerging on the same plane as the grenade's flight path escaped out of the side vents – but all the explosive blast in the other directions ran into the structure of the tower, bouncing back on itself and raising the pressure in the centre of the tower to critical levels. The over-pressure wave blasted the tower apart, sending fragments scything outwards in a globe, the roof rising up on a column of flame while a globe of red paste expanded quickly, all that was left of the guards that had been manning the post.
"CHUNKY SALSA!" Hunter whooped, a big grin plastered across his face. With evident glee, he racked charging handle on the grenade launcher, expelling the used base and loading a fresh round.
Tads, meanwhile, picked one of the elementals swarming towards the Broadsword, choosing one at random – then reached out with her power, grasping at the bindings that trapped it here on the material world. It reacted instinctively, seeking out her own aura and grappling with her, trying in turn to weaken her grasp on her magic. It was a fairly powerful spirit, easily a challenge for most mages. A standard corporate security mage or a street level Shadowrunner would have struggled against it, the winner perhaps coming down to luck or fate, or something as seemingly innocuous as which way the wind was blowing. But Tads was neither – she'd learnt her craft over the course of many years, but it had been brutally distilled over the last eighteen months in a demanding crash-course, and her skills were far in excess of the elemental now. She squeezed it, folding the being in on itself, weakening its grip on the world until it broke free of the magical bindings, disappearing back to the planes of magic.
That took time, though, precious time – and while she dealt with the first, the other elementals closed in on the spirit concealing the Broadsword. It was more powerful than them – but they outnumbered it several times over, and it would soon succumb under their combined assault. With a flick of her hand, Tads called the other spirits back from each of the team, then sent them towards the elementals in a howling pack. Each was almost as large and powerful as they were, but were fortified, invoked with a part of her essence and skill to become more durable and powerful than a standard spirit. And more importantly, now they outnumbered their foe, allowing them to start ganging up on the elementals, overwhelming each one in turn and battering them into submission.
Shimazu landed lightly next to the prisoner, who was now completely prone, his jumpsuit blasted by the exhaust from the jets. Thin and emaciated, the man turned his head with a struggle to look up towards him. His complexion was dark, his hair greying noticeably, and one eye was missing, just a dark and ruined mechanical socket looking up at him.
"Bacon?"
"Come with me." Shimazu reached down and helped him to his feet, pulling him to his chest and then wrapping his arms around him, and tugging him back into his own frame. "Step onto my feet." Shimazu wasn't sure if he'd have the ankle strength to keep his feet extended for long, but it would probably help on a psychological level to have him 'standing' on something. "Prisoner secure!" he called out, watching as the slack on the line immediately started to be taken in as Marius threw more power to the engines and the Broadsword started to rise.
"Reeling in!" Kai called, activating the hoist, accelerating the speed with which the slack disappeared. He split his attention between the lift hoist, checking for problems with the rope, and peering out of the door and down to the ground below.
"Hunter – movement at the southern tower. Spinning while we climb – take care of it." The Broadsword was already rotating as Marius slewed them round, bringing the tower around into Hunter's field of vision. His second shot wasn't as accurate as the first, as he tried to compensate for violent movement in all three axis at once, but it was close enough to engulf the tower in a fireball, and that would probably keep the guards pinned down for a few seconds at least.
Tads finished banishing another of the elementals and looked around, just in time to see the last one being mobbed by three of her own spirits and torn to shreds. She called out to one, sending it down to the exposed pair swinging on the end of the lift cable, to conceal them and protect them.
"Heads up – I have movement on the top of the admin buildings." Aswon called out, his rifle raised so he could peer through the powerful scope on top. "Looks like some fairly large drone racks, extended up through the roof. Yeah – elevating now, launching. We've got a drone, correction three… no, make that five drones. Two types. Accelerating towards us now, range twelve hundred metres." He checked the sight marks on his scope and did a quick bit of maths in his head. "Ok, those drones are pretty sizeable – couple of metre wingspan on the smaller ones, over five metres on the bigger one in the middle." He lowered the rifle and shuffled over to the row of seats, wedging his Purdey into the straps there, and recovering the larger 20mm anti-material rifle they'd picked up in Afghanistan. He was pretty sure he could hit the drones – but he wasn't sure a 7.62mm round would get through whatever armour they had, while the 20mm rounds would have no problem at all taking them down.
"Heading up front then – think I'll be better on the bigger guns, too." Hunter called, moving away from the doorway and heading towards the pilots' cabin. The door slid shut smoothly behind him as Marius detected his movements, cutting down on the flow of air through the cabin.
"The centre drone, the larger one is for command and control. I have seen the type before, though I am not familiar with the configuration. But it will have more advanced sensors and act as a relay point for the rigger controlling it, providing additional range around it for the smaller hunter-killer drones. They are faster and more manoeuvrable, and look to be armed with machine guns and rocket pods." Marius had one of his sensors slaved to the group, keeping them targeted and locked in, and he gave them a quick assessing glance. "They probably are not going to be an issue for us, unless they can find an unarmoured location to fire at."
"I'm reeling them in now!" Kai called out, realising what Marius was getting at. "About ten metres to go, we'll get the door shut as soon as we can. But we have a new problem! A mage, and a pack of fire elementals have just launched through the roof – they're in astral space, not the physical, but they're starting to move towards us now!"
"Confirmed! I can see the mage, and four elementals – all fire. In astral… and they're tougher than the air-elementals that were on guard."
Aswon paused, craning his head to try and look out of the doorway past Kai, seeing if he could spot the new magical threat. He was pretty sure that Hunter and Marius could deal with the drones, but they wouldn't be able to affect the new threat at all. With a sigh, he pushed the heavy rifle back into the seat and quickly wrapped a strap around the barrel to hold it in place, instead grabbing his spear and freeing that from the restraining straps. He couldn't affect them at range with this – but if they were stupid enough to try and force entry into the plane, they were in for a very rude reception.
"Hunter – take out the centre drone first. That has the highest chance of spotting and tracking us."
"Roger that, Marius."
Shimazu and the prisoner appeared in the doorway, their heads rising up over the sill and drawing level with the aircraft, and Kai quickly hit the stop on the winch. Marius had already transitioned to forward flight, and the pair were being buffeted in the windstream, twisting and turning as the air thundered past. With a grunt of effort, Shimazu extended his arms outwards, pushing the prisoner further forward and towards Kai, standing ready to grab him. As his arms extended fully outwards they trembled slightly with the effort, but his arms held, and with only a little desperate flailing the prisoner's feet found solid purchase just inside the doorway. Kai grabbed hold of him, pulling him inside, and Shimazu could finally release him, then concentrate on swinging himself in, fingertips grasping at the doorway and then clamping down with iron grips. A moment later he was inside too, and could start to swing the hoist inside, pivoting the pole into the cabin to clear the door-frame, and allow the exterior door to close.
As the door started to power shut, Shimazu saw a long burst of auto-fire from the nose turret rip past, and his eyes darted to the right. A kilometre distant, the rounds impacted the larger drone, with the burst from the heavy cannon easily smashing through the light vehicle's armour and smashing through the length of the drone. At least two rounds ripped into the fuel tank, triggering a violent explosion that sent the plane cartwheeling through the sky, taking out the closest of the hunter-killer jet drones with it.
The door closed, and Shimazu turned, finding Kai on his knees pulling open the jumpsuit of the prisoner who was laid on the floor, attaching the diagnostic leads from the medkit. The prisoner seemed happy to lay still, recognising the medical symbols on the side of the device, but his head was moving around, casting his gaze all around the cabin, drinking in details of the strange craft that had plucked him out of hell.
"They're launching a magical attack – stand by!" Tads warned, watching in surprise as the mage fired off a spell towards them. In astral space he could only affect other astral targets – but that included the spirit that was concealing the craft and keeping them safe from harm. She watched the mana build up around him, and threw her own defences on the spirit, protecting it with her shielding. A moment later the magical attack from the enemy splashed harmlessly off her guard, though the enemy mage didn't seem wounded or affected by the attack either. She frowned a little, wondering what to do to try and dissuade him from further assaults.
She wasn't sure if she had a spell that she could launch against him that would work purely in astral space – most of her spells were of a utilitarian nature, and she rarely used her magic for direct combat, and especially not like this. In the absence of anything better, she turned her attention to the closest fire-elemental guarding the mage's form. Fire elementals were not hugely strong, but they were quick and very destructive, and she didn't want them getting any closer than this, so she launched her attempt at the flickering form of the elemental, seeking to banish it. She seemed to catch it at least somewhat by surprise, and ripped a huge hole in its form with her first attempt, then splitting it in two a moment later, the flames fading out as the energy binding it together dissipated into the air.
"Picking up large upsurge in encrypted communications traffic. Jammer is engaged, but will become less effective as we fly away."
"Looking for the comms array… gotta be on the roof, right?"
"Affirmative. That would be the most logical place."
"Ok, think I have it. Southern side of the first building. Keep her steady for a moment….locking on…. Firing!" There was a pause, then the corner of the building exploded a kilometre and a half away from the Broadsword. "Got it!"
"Confirmed. Transmissions have ceased. We are out of here." Marius finished transitioning to forward flight, satisfied with their vertical altitude and they quickly accelerated to the west, closing in on the coastline. "I will keep the jammer active, until the prisoner has been scanned."
"Got it – checking now, the med-comp is just gathering data." Kai grabbed the bug-scanner and started to run it over the prisoner, watching the display carefully. He wasn't anywhere near as proficient as Hunter or Marius were, but he understood the concept ok, and watched for the tell-tale jump in the display if it located a transmitter.
"It is here. Under the clavicle. Fairly shallow." The prisoner motioned to his left shoulder, then pulled open the jumpsuit a little further. Under the fabric was a scrunched up sheet of aluminium foil, carefully layered and folded to make a pad about eight centimetres to a side, that had been jammed in place under the boiler-suit.
"Holy fuck!" Aswon had turned on hearing him speak, getting his first look at the prisoner, and now stood in open-mouthed disbelief. "What the fuck where you doing in there... Colonel?" The team's comms net went quiet as they heard him speak, and Shimazu and Kai both stared at him, wondering what had caused the outburst.
The med-comp beeped, bringing up a screen full of data as the diagnostics finished, snapping Kai out of his distraction.
"Ok, multiple infections, malnutrition, systemic damage to the body inline with general neglect and abuse. Several badly healed fractures and breaks, ribs, tibia, fingers…" he continued to reel off the details while he set up an IV of antibiotics as the first job. The long list of injuries clearly painted a picture of torture and abuse, neglect and inhuman treatment at the hands of his captors. "We need to get that tracker out – I'm just going to numb the area…" The prisoner didn't react with anything other than a brief nod, his eyes continuing to scan around the cabin as Kai injected him with a mix of chloroprocaine and epinephrine before carefully slicing into the flesh and digging around to look for the tracker. He found it easily enough, pulling out the ten millimetre long device and snapping it in half, before sealing the wound up and spraying it down with antiseptic.
Kai twitched as Aswon reached down to tidy away a bunch of the medical materials, clearing space around the man, and dealing with the various packets and boxes that he'd ripped open as he applied the various drugs and treatments, then murmured a quick thanks. Aswon gave him a slightly odd look, then cleared his throat.
"So how come you were there, Colonel?"
"Bad intel. I think our mission got burnt. We were doing a covert insertion, trying to sabotage a facility on the Pakistan side of the border. Things went south very quickly, and we were ambushed – it was clear they knew we were there, and what our exfiltration plans where, and also how we were armed and equipped. They took most of the unit alive, and we were sent to prison for a number of war crimes and trumped up charges." The man seemed remarkably sanguine about the whole affair, his voice sounding as if he'd suffered only a minor inconvenience, perhaps missing a bus and having to wait a few minutes for the next to come along.
Aswon moved away, heading into the second row of seats and squatting down near Tads, out of direct line of sight from Kai, Shimazu and the prisoner.
"Ok, listen up – this is Vikay Patel, a Colonel in the Purbiyas – that's the merc outfit I spoke about in India. The man was… is, a frakking legend. The stories they tell about him? Well, now is not the time, but next time we're on a long trip, I'll tell you all about him. Let's just say that so the stories go, when the Boogeyman goes to bed, he checks under it for Vikay. He's an expert in infiltration, sabotage, assassination, evasion and small unit operations. Written several books, very highly regarded in the merc community – but he's been out of touch for the last few years. Now we know why…"
"So he's a shooter, not a talker?" Hunter asked.
"He's an extremely talented mercenary operative. Sure, he's not going to be quite as smooth as Kai can be when he puts his mind to it – but don't discount his moves. He can probably disguise himself and play a part just as well as any of us could. He's not an inspirational battlefield leader for a large combat formation – but he's the kind of guy that can take a platoon into enemy territory and raise all kinds of hell for six months with them never catching a glimpse of them."
"How come he's in prison if he's that good?" Hunter challenged.
"Because it sounds like someone on his own side betrayed them, and fed information to the enemy – if what he's said was true. No reason to disbelieve him at the moment." Aswon paused for a moment as he caught a twitch of movement out of the corner of his eye, then watched as the door to the cockpit area closed and locked, as Hunter secured the area. "Watch him carefully – there's no reason why he should do anything, but if he thinks we're going to do something bad to him, he's not going to go down easily or without a fight!"
Tads pulled the headset off, blinking as her eyes adjusted to normal distances and sight again, then made her own statement.
"The mage seems to have given up – I think he was worried when his spell bounced off the spirit, and when one of his bodyguards just exploded, he decided not to chance his luck. He can probably report that he tried, but we got away anyway. He doesn't seem to be following." She released her safety harness and moved around to check on Vikay. "Hello, I'm Tadibya. I'd like to use my magic to try and help you, if you're willing. I won't harm you – you have my word."
Vikay looked at her briefly, as if sizing her up, and then nodded. He checked on Kai and Shimazu, his eyes constantly roving around as he took in his surroundings, seeming to catalogue everything he saw. Tads reached down and gently laid a few fingers on his flesh and then concentrated, flowing mana into him and providing life-sustaining nourishment to his body. It wasn't actual food, but she could provide energy in a form that didn't require digestion, and it would nourish and preserve him far better than trying to cram protein and carbs inside him.
"Thank you – that feels. Good. Strange. It is a long time since I have not felt hunger." He spoke with clear diction, his English having just a slight taint of accent that betrayed his culture and heritage.
"We should get you some more intensive treatment in a hospital." Shimazu said quietly. "I think this will take some time – a lot of your bones have been broken, and must be re-set. I'm guessing that life has been quite painful for a while?"
"It has certainly not been comfortable, no. But what can one do?"
"Well, Mr. Vikay – we're not going to tell you who hired us to get you out, but we're taking you to Hyderabad, and apparently dropping you off with some friendly forces there, who were involved in the breakout. We're going to have to fly evasive for a bit to get away from the Pakistan Airforce – so it's going to be a while, but relax, and hopefully in one to two hours, you're going to be back amongst friends."
"That is good. I mean, you have all the guns, of course, so I cannot exactly tell you that is not acceptable – but that seems reassuring. Assuming, of course, that things in Hyderabad have not changed much recently. We don't exactly get to watch the news."
"It's still in Indian control, forming part of the front lines over the contested territory – though firmly on your side." Kai thought about what Aswon had said, and made a small guess, putting on a reassuring smile. "As far as we're aware there is a sizeable unit of Purbiyas stationed there, and that's who we're turning you over to. They're going to get you some decent medical care – longer term stuff than what we're able to do now."
"That is good. Thank you." Vikay seemed to relax, and then to Kai's surprise, handed over a scalpel blade, a small syringe of drugs and a length of wire. None of the team had seen him gather them or had suspected anything – except perhaps Aswon. Even he blinked in surprise as his fears were proven true. Vikay didn't mention it at all, but just shifted slightly in place, adjusting his position to be more comfortable.
"By the way - If you want to contact anyone, we can do that - we weren't told or even advised that you should be out of contact, or that you couldn't speak to anyone." Kai said, wondering what kind of response he'd get to the offer.
"If you're taking me to whoever paid for this - that's fine."
In the cockpit, Marius picked up a contact to the south, a chopper or possibly tilt-wing, heading from the location of the airbase towards the prison. He watched for a moment, then relaxed slightly.
"I have spotted an airborne target, from the airfield to the south, heading for the prison. However, it is barely doing two hundred kilometres per hour, and is flying solo – I estimate it is investigating the situation, perhaps because of the jammed communications. But it should not be an issue – by the time they get in range to communicate with short-range sets, we will be far away. In fact, we are only two minutes from the shore – stand by."
"No worries, Marius – how far out are we going? And do you have an ETA?"
"I plan on heading out at least fifty kilometres, well out into international waters, then turning south and running parallel to the coast, until we hit the Indian shoreline, then turning in and crossing back onto land, then heading north. Estimated distance is seven hundred kilometres, estimated time ninety-two minutes."
"Ok, guess we'll get comfortable then…" Kai turned back to their guest. "Don't know if you caught any of that – but we're looking at about ninety minutes to the drop-off point. I'll call the contact in a moment to advise, but do you want a hand up, and we'll get you into one of the seats?"
"Thank you." As Kai and Shimazu helped Vikay up from the floor, they both felt the tremors in his arms, a constant set of seizures and spasms that seemed to permeate his whole body. "They decided to deactivate my cyberware when I was captured – but they were not exactly careful with it." He gestured up to the eye socket and the gaping hole. "Some items they just ripped out entirely. Some they connected up to a power source and fried the controllers, burning out components. It was cheaper than surgery…" He sighed, then flopped down into one of the padded chairs, letting his head sink back into the cushioned surface.
"Do you want to talk about what happened?" Aswon asked. "If you don't – I understand."
"No, no… it's fine. We were originally tasked with doing a deep penetration raid to strike at a command bunker, responsible for organising the air-defence and surveillance assets for the southern region, you see…" he started off, his one good eye making contact with Aswon. Over the next ten minutes he described his mission and objectives, and how his unit had been covertly inserted over the border and were making their way to the target, when they were suddenly ambushed by Pakistani military forces. If it had been infantry or regular guards, they might have been able to fight their way out and go to ground – but when the ambush had struck they'd been up against light and medium armour, and a couple of attack choppers that circled them like vultures.
The weight of firepower had been overwhelming, and Vikay described the sinking sensation as he realised they couldn't even scratch most of their opponents, let alone destroy them – but also that he'd been called upon by name to surrender, indicating that their operation had been thoroughly compromised. They'd wanted them alive, it seemed, to find out who from the Pakistani side had been leaking information that had allowed them to plan the mission – but Vikay had refused to give up the sources, and had languished in prison since, while he was tortured and abused to see if he would crack.
Shimazu listened intently to the story, studying Vikay as he told it, his astral senses reaching out to study the aura of the merc, watching for subtle changes and hidden motives. He could feel the suppressed anger and rage over what had happened to his men, and the coldness that entered his mind when he talked about finding out who had betrayed them, the rage distilled down to a burning white-hot essence that was reserved for the architect of his downfall.
[All sounds real. Aura checks out.] He sent over the team network, and then gave a little grin as he realised something else, adding it onto the message. [I wouldn't want this guy pissed at me!] Vikay wasn't a big man, and certainly didn't look intimidating. Shorter and more slender than Marius, he looked like Tads would give him a good fight – yet despite that, there was an air of almost frightening competence about him, and his self-control seemed to be absolute. Shimazu suspected that he had that rare quality that was so sought after by elite forces around the world, a truly indomitable spirit that would let him push past pain, misery and discomfort to a point that other humans couldn't comprehend.
A thought crossed his mind – a sudden wondering about the nature of magic. He knew that he, and Kai and Aswon were all physical adepts, able to perform 'superhuman' feats with their internal control of magic. They couldn't sling spells like Tads, but they could do other wondrous things – such as leaping from twenty metres to the ground without injury. The world was still learning about magic, even five decades after it had returned to the world, still finding out how it worked and just what was possible – but he suddenly wondered if perhaps there were other kinds of magical powers, that were not so obvious. Mental adepts, rather than physical – the people who made up the ranks of the French Foreign Legion, the SAS, and other elite units around the world – maybe even before magic had been recognised as returning. Rumours abounded about the century ferret, a magical creature that had appeared before the awakening, displaying a preview of the magical changes to come – and he found himself wondering if those elite warriors were perhaps the precursors to adepts like him, but operating in a world where nobody knew what to look for…
"Are you happy to share with me our current location? I understand if you do not wish to… but I may have something that I can offer you?"
"I don't see a problem with that. Hunter – can you get us a map?"
"Sure thing, boss. Coming right up." The screens in the back flashed to life, displaying their current position out over the Arabian Sea, heading southwards.
"Thank you… interesting. I may have some friends around here that I could introduce you to. My own personal show of gratitude, for your part in my freedom. If you wish?"
"Certainly – what kind of friends are they?" Kai responded somewhat cagily.
"They work in a port, and have been known to assist smugglers, from time to time. Certainly they could provide assistance with fuelling and simple repairs, to travellers who lacked the proper passes, let us say."
"Interesting. Though why you'd think we would need such things?"
"Of course – I am sure you are fine upstanding members of the mercenary community, just contracted to do a job. You certainly never transfer cargo around across borders, or talk so casually about crossing over nation state perimeters. I'm sure everything is above board." Vikay gave a little smile, his expression seeming to indicate that he found the conversation a little amusing. "However, let me pass on the communication code and some pass-phrases, and you can contact them if you wish. Or don't. It is of course up to you. But I hope that my introduction to them would assist you in the future…
"Well, I'm sure we'd be happy to take the information. Purely for academic purposes, of course…" Kai returned his little smile. He wasn't sure why Vikay wanted to play a game like this, but he was happy to humour him – and he was more than a little impressed that he'd put together the fact that they were smugglers primarily and not mercenaries from the little information he'd seen.
Vikay read out the commcode numbers and a number of recognition phrases, and gave some more precise information on their location – letting Hunter zoom in the map to display the Port Muhammad Bin Qasim facility, located thirty-five kilometres away from Karachi. The port seemed to deal in large bulk goods – grains and other foodstuffs, and raw fuels – rather than the more general port facilities at Karachi. The port was located in what looked like a swampy delta, with shifting islands and congested waterways, that were no doubt ideal for smugglers to arrange clandestine drop-off and pickup points in.
Kai decided to call the number, listening as the comm unit beeped over and over again, until he felt for sure that nobody would answer and the call would fail. Just as he was about to hang up, though, the call went through, and a very hesitant-sounding man spoke.
"Hello? Who is this?"
"Hi there. I'm a friend of a mutual friend. He advised that I should get in touch with you, and introduce ourselves, just in case we needed to visit in the future. Many rare fish are found in the sea, but none so rare as an honest man." Kai said the code phrase, then waited for nearly ten seconds, wondering if there was going to be a response.
"I… am very glad to hear that. We have not heard from our friend for quite some time." The voice whoever it was, sounded a little emotional.
"Well, there have been some recent developments. Hopefully our mutual friend will be back in touch soon. He needs to have some time to relax from his travels, but I think the future will be interesting for him."
"We would like to see our friend again, very much so. We hope it is sooner, rather than later. We will stand by, on this number, for his call."
"Next time we're in the area, we may call as well then, and introduce ourselves face to face."
"I think we would like that. Until then – please pass on our regards to our mutual friend?"
"I will do. Bye for now." Kai broke the call, then passed on the message to Vikay, watching as his smile broadened.
As they flew on, Aswon started to talk about mercenary operations and things he'd heard, chatting away with Vikay enthusiastically. The older merc responded, talking about some of the things he'd done – dispelling some myths and explaining how the story had been corrupted in the retelling, though the true versions of events still often seemed to be fairly remarkable. More impressive though were his confirmations of some other tales, adding in details and retelling the story from a first-person perspective, which only made the deeds even more outrageous. Shimazu listened in, carefully assessing him and realised that he seemed to be speaking truthfully, realising that Vikay really was as good as Aswon had intimated.
Shimazu also found it amusing, and somewhat refreshing to watch Aswon, who was clearly having a mild case of hero-worship at meeting the Colonel, his glee and awe bubbling to the surface of his normally calm demeanour, and being slightly infectious.
They closed in on their destination – a large factory on the eastern side of Hyderabad, located near the river, arriving a little after 15:00. Marius slowed and drifted up the river, scanning the area ahead for ambushes or signs of activity.
"I have a single vehicle waiting in a large clear area, looks to be an ambulance of some kind. No other vehicles active in this immediate vicinity, though other parts of the factory are running as normal. No signs of ambush, or heavy weaponry."
"Thanks, Marius – take us in, please." Kai turned towards Vikay. "Looks like we're here, and your friends are waiting for you. It was a pleasure to meet you." He offered his hand, shaking it firmly and ignoring the persistent tremors he felt from the merc. He called up the contact number on his commlink, then sent a message through.
[Landing in 30 seconds]
The Broadsword came down gently, landing with little fanfare – not even any dustplumes or jetwash betraying their arrival, concealed as they were by the powerful spirit.
"I've got the guns manned, just in case," Hunter announced. "Got the ambulance dialled in. Engine is hot according to the sensors."
[We're here.] Kai sent, then moved to the port side door, getting ready to open it. On the screens he could see the ambulance doors open, with four people getting out – two dressed in plain combat fatigues and carrying themselves with the air of combat veterans, their eyes scanning the area while their hands remained close to the holstered pistols at their waists. The other two were dressed as ambulance technicians, and had moved around to the rear of the vehicle to unload a gurney, pushing it round to meet back up with the two armed men, bringing along large bags of medical gear balanced on the trolley.
"Those guys are wearing Purbiya's combat flashes on their shoulders. Looks legit." Aswon said, zooming in on the sensor feed to examine them. Kai nodded, then cracked the hatch and lowered the stairs, emerging from the concealment of the spirit to appear in the middle of the large empty area. Shimazu came down the stairs next, helping steady Vikay, while Aswon and Tads followed along behind, ensuring he didn't slip. The four men waiting spotted them almost immediately, and started to approach.
"The two techs are nervous. Two armed men are excited… pleased, perhaps more accurate. Happy to see us. Or Vikay, more specifically. No signs of alarm though." Shimazu murmured after assensing the approaching group.
As they met up, Kai received a very crisp salute from the two armed men, before their faces split into broad grins and they moved to envelop Vikay in excited hugs – though their smiles faded as they took in his ravaged state and the abuse he'd received. The two technicians moved the gurney around to behind him, and then removed the medical supplies, getting stuff out to start immediate treatment.
Kai was about to greet the other mercs, but Shimazu beat him to it.
"We've already applied some first-aid treatment, including one litre of broad-spectrum antibiotics. Unfortunately we had to do some minor surgery to extract hostile equipment, but the area was fully sterilised. We have the full med-workup and a detailed list of treatment and administered drugs if that will help.
"Yes! Yes, please, that will help a great deal!" Shimazu pulled out his link and started to interface it with the ambulance techs gear, squirting over the information on what they'd already done and all the medical data gathered since the rescue, providing expert observations for the receiving team. Meanwhile Kai turned back to the mercs to deal with the business side of things.
"Extraction went as planned, and the tracking device was removed from the Colonel. No signs of pursuit, and we don't believe we left much in the way of forensic evidence or a trail. No pursuit once we got outside a kilometre from the prison." He tried to keep it short, sharp and brief, expecting the mercs to favour that kind of report. Instead, he was surprised as one of them launched into a somewhat flowery and very poetic speech, thanking the team for their efforts and the job they had performed. His English seemed to have a very strong accent that reminded Kai of the Druids they'd met – a very prim and proper, posh kind of English that was markedly different to how Hunter spoke.
After the speech was concluded, though, they seemed to relax a little, taking Kai's card and passing over their own contact details in return. More importantly they passed over a cred-stick to Kai, which he pocketed without checking, just giving them a nod of thanks.
"We'd like to get the patient to hospital, as soon as possible. There is extensive long-term damage, and we need better facilities than we have here. Though his treatment so far has been exceptionally good!" The technician added quickly, perhaps aware that everyone around them was armed, and that the patient had come out of some invisible kind of transport and clearly they didn't want to anger or annoy anyone. It did prompt the two mercs into moving though, encouraging Vikay to just relax on the gurney and let the techs push him to the ambulance. They were just about to turn away themselves when Aswon coughed discreetly.
"I believe there was to be arrangements made for fuel, as part of the payment for the extraction?"
"Of course – yes. Let us signal the driver now." One of them tapped away at his own commlink, then looked up at Aswon. "The tanker will be here in thirty minutes or less. Please wait here, and remain visible."
The team shared a few glances at being asked to wait for half an hour, but the two men seemed to be on the level, and nobody was getting bad vibes from them. They waved them farewell, watching as they all climbed into the ambulance which turned and headed into the city.
Sure enough, twenty-seven minutes later a tanker appeared, a large blue articulated rig marked up with the 'ELF' logo. Marius came down from the cockpit and waved the tanker into place, ensuring that he didn't get too close to the concealed aircraft, and handled the actual fuel port – the driver seemed to understand that things were going on that was above his paygrade, and quite happily stayed by the tanker, watching the gauges with fierce concentration while thousands of litres of fuel disappeared into apparently thin air.
Soon enough the Broadsword was refuelled, and the spare barrels had been topped off as well – the team seeing no reason not to fill up as much as they could from the tanker. Once he'd been directed away, the team clambered back aboard the jet, sealing up the hatches.
"Right then – let's see… where are we going next?" Kai gave a little wave, and opened up the floor for discussion.