“Yeah.”
Conrad finished punching in the coordinates and hit the Auto-Pilot. The drones took off within a few seconds of each other and proceeded to their preprogrammed coordinates. One headed half a mile southwest, one half a mile southeast, and they both climbed to one thousand feet. It took them just over a minute to get into position. Between their positions and their elevation, they should spot any incoming military vehicles within a mile of the New Center area. The drones would stay on station, using their GPS for positioning, until given new commands or until their batteries died, which shouldn’t be for at least ninety minutes.
Morris pointed at the tablet, which currently showed a splitscreen view of the feeds from both drones. The 1080p image-stabilized cameras had more than enough resolution for their needs. “That’s your job, right there, you’re early warning. Call out anything you see.”
“You think Parker’s going to send more troops? We kicked his fucking ass.”
Morris nodded. With most of the Army’s helicopters and half this initial ground force destroyed, the mission was already a qualified success, but Morris firmly believed in kicking a man when he was down. Besides, even with their immediate losses, the Tabs still had enough armor and men to run the city, and the war wouldn’t be over until the enemy was defeated or destroyed, everywhere. “That’s exactly why he will. And it’s not like he can let us be and give up the only part of this city that doesn’t look like it’s been nuked. But he’s not going to let the next wave of armor get anywhere near buildings that haven’t been cleared. His drones are probably already overhead.”
Conrad shrugged. “We’re in the buildings, which they already knew. So they’ve got to drive in close to drop soldiers off to clear the buildings. Or they drop them off a quarter mile out and they advance on foot. Either way sucks for them if we’re still above them.”
“My guess is they’re going to stand off a quarter mile or so and pound every likely spot in every building around here with grenades and main gun rounds from Toads and belt-feds while the troops advance on foot. It’s what I’d do.”
Conrad looked up at him. “So… time to get away from the windows?” They knew it was likely to happen sooner or later.
“Yeah. Center of the building. Will you still be able to communicate with the drones?”
“They’re programmed to stay on station even if they lose communication with the base.” He grabbed his pack with one hand and carried the combination drone controller/viewscreen with the other, and followed the Lieutenant Colonel down the hallway and into an interior office. “Little static, but not bad.” He pointed at the screen. “Look.” There, on the screen, were two very small figures. Bill and Seattle, exiting the south side of the building and heading southeast.
The endemic military was sure to have at least one drone overhead already. He didn’t feel like pulling out the sheet with the satellite coverage, but most likely there was a camera bird overhead as well. So he had to assume Bill and Seattle had been spotted, but hopefully two men alone wouldn’t merit much attention. Maybe the drone operators would even suspect the two men were bailing from the fight, retreating while they had the chance. As long as they didn’t look too closely at the rifles the men were carrying.
Even though he was supposed to be on the lookout for additional incoming military, Conrad kept one of the drone’s cameras trained on Bill and Seattle as they made their way a quarter mile south, eventually entering a six-story office building on Cass avenue. A minute later, Bill’s panting voice came over the radio. “Almighty, Outlier is in position, over.” Which meant they were on the sixth floor of the building, looking south.
“Almighty is roger on that, Outlier. We’ve got eyes in the sky, but keep us updated. Fireworks are your call.”
“Outlier copies, over.”
Conrad looked up at Morris. “Travelling by those tunnels seemed to work great. I guess now we find out if the combat engineers earned the rest of their money.”
Morris pointed at the drone camera feed. “Swing that one over farther to the west. That freeway there is practically a tunnel and I don’t want to miss any vehicles using it.”
“I thought we had the best seat in the house but all we’ve been doing is sitting out the war,” Brooke growled. From their perch in the New Center One building, all Cambridge West had done was listen to the combat unfolding as the Tab cavalry arrived. Other than the nose of the first IMP destroyed on 2nd Avenue they hadn’t even been able to see any of it. They were in the center of everything, but all the action was happening around the periphery.
“You want to move?” Robbie asked her dubiously. “Where? There’s probably more Tabs coming.”
“You bet your ass there are,” she told him, “but they’re not going to roll up on us here.” Still, she chewed her lip, until the radio lit up again with a breathless voice.
“Cambridge East has Tabs in the building. Cambridge East has Tabs in the building.”
“Let’s go,” Brooke said. She called out to the three men with her, “We’re backing them up, sounds like they’re having problems.” She pointed. “Stairs. Walkway over to the hotel is on the second floor.” The dogsoldiers grabbed their gear and charged for the nearby stairwell. She grabbed her radio. “Cambridge West is on the move to you. Hold on.”
Ed was in the center of the Fisher Building lobby talking to Hannibal. They were standing on the first step down to the lower level, using the marble walls for cover. They’d both heard Brooke’s call out.
“Should we back her up? Send some guys?” Hannibal wondered.
Ed chewed his lip for a bit, then shook his head. “Let’s wait a bit. We bitchslapped them, but there’s still Tabs all around. I don’t want to pull guys out of here just yet.”
“If they push through Cambridge….” Hannibal said warningly.
Ed nodded. “You have at least one guy on the second floor, watching the walkway to New Center One?”
“Yeah. And on the ground floor. And you put one of your guys down below, making sure none of those guys who made it into Skybox are sneaking over through the tunnel?”
“Yeah.”
Hannibal had been in charge of holding the north and east sides of the Fisher Building. So far, his men had done nothing but nervously listen to others fighting. He looked all around the beautiful lobby. “I thought they were going to push harder on this building.”
“Be careful what you wish for.”
“No shit. If they’d come in from the west, like half of us were expecting, this place would be a ruin. But I’m wondering if we should displace to our secondary, or even just call it, all of us, get the fuck out while we can. We did a hell of a lot of damage, kicked their ass harder than it’s been kicked since the start of the war, and whatever they do next, we’re not going to be able to sucker them like we just did.”
There was a shout from the north end of the lobby. Both men turned their heads in time to see the north entrance explode and the men there thrown to the floor in a maelstrom of flying glass and twisted metal. Hannibal took off in a run as shouts and screams filled the air, and the radio. “IMP on the north side, IMP on the north side of Nakatomi!” he was finally able to make out.
One dogsoldier had grabbed one of his fallen comrades and was dragging him to safety when another grenade exploded a few feet inside the entrance and they were flung across the floor.