The gun crew inside the lorry never knew they were dead, but screams of agony and terror rose from the men clustered about it. A human torch shrieked its way into the darkness as if the night could somehow quench its flames, and two more rolled on the ground, fighting to extinguish themselves. Three unwounded hijackers ran for their lives from the inferno, and the leader threw himself under his own vehicle and switched channels frantically.
"Get over here!" he screamed, and two heavily-armed aircraft leapt into the night in reply.
Alicia slid easily through the gap she'd blown in the ring around the shuttle. Three of the six on this side of the ambush remained, but they didn't realize they were alone. They'd made the mistake of staring into the flames, stunned by the carnage, and Alicia looked at their backs in disgust. Idiots. Did they think simply carrying a gun made someone dangerous?
It really wasn't fair. These people were pathetic, so completely out of their class they didn't even know it. But life wasn't fair, and anyone who lent himself to ambush and murder for gain had no kick coming. She found the position she wanted and fired three more short, neat bursts.
The stutter of automatic fire hammered his ears, and he stared out from under the lorry as a white eye flickered beyond the shuttle. Beyond the shuttle! Someone was on the ground out there! It had to be the shuttle pilot, but how? And where were the men he'd posted back there?!
How became immaterial as a lithe, slender shape slid across the very edge of the light with a cobra's speed and blew another of his men apart. It vanished back into the darkness, graceful as a dream, but another deadly burst and a bubbling shriek told him where his men were. Drive turbines began to whine above him as his lorry pilot prepared to pull out, and panic filled him at the thought of being left exposed and naked. He wanted to run, but his body refused to move, and he pounded the dry earth with his fists and prayed for his sting ships to get here in time.
Two heavily-armed aircraft sliced through the sky. One was little more than a transport loaded with weapons, but the leader was military from needle prow to sensor package, and its pilot brought his scanners on line. He saw only confusion and motionless bodies-lots of bodies, lit by a glare of flames-and one target source moving with deadly precision. He swore. One of them. Just one! But he had the bastard dialed in now. A few more seconds and he'd be able to nail the son-of-a-bitch without killing his own-
A night-black piece of sky swooped upon him from above. He had one stunned moment to register it, to begin to realize what it was, and then the Bengal-class assault shuttle tore him into very, very tiny pieces.
His head jerked up in horror, slamming into the bottom of the lorry, as the fireball blossomed. Flaming streamers arced from its heart like some enormous fireworks display, and then there was a second fireball.
He stared at them, watching them fade and fall, then cowered down as a vicious burst of fire lashed the vehicle above him. A chopped-off cry of agony and the sudden stillness of the waking turbines told him his pilot was dead, and he buried his face against the ground and sobbed in terror.
There were no more screams, no more shooting. Only the crackle of flames and the stench of burning bodies, and he whimpered and tried to dig into the baked soil beneath him as feet whispered through short, tough grass.
He raised his head weakly, and saw two polished boots, gleaming in the firelight. His eyes rose higher and froze on the muzzle of a combat rifle eight centimeters from his nose.
"I think you'd better come out of there," a contralto voice, colder than the stars, said softly.
Alicia finished throwing up and wiped her lips. Her mouth tasted as if something had died in it, and her stomach cramped with fresh nausea.
"That's enough of that," she told it sternly, and the cramp eased sullenly. She waited another moment, then sighed and straightened in relief.
"Are you quite through?" Tisiphone inquired.
"Listen, Lady, you don't even have any guts to puke up, so don't get snotty with those of us who do, all right?" The post-tick letdown left her too drained to get much feeling into it, but the Fury subsided.
"God, I hate coming down from that stuff," Alicia muttered, lowering herself to sit against a landing leg. "Still, it does have its uses."
"I wish I had you up here in sickbay," Megarea fretted, and Alicia looked up at the hovering assault boat with a grin.
"Don't sweat it. I've been using Old Speedy for years, and aside from wanting to die when you come down, it doesn't hurt a bit. The Cadre guarantees it."
"Yeah, sure. That and a centicred'll get you a cup of coffee."
Alicia chuckled and wiped her mouth again, then turned to glance at the sole survivor of the hijack force. He sat against another landing leg, manacled to the pad gimbal and watching her with frightened eyes.
"He's waiting for the thumbscrews," she thought to Tisiphone. "Should we tell the poor bastard you already got it all?"
"We should bring out the thumbscrews."
"Now, now. No need to get nasty." Alicia grinned as Tisiphone muttered something about impertinent mortals. Their prisoner was none other than the partner of Yerensky's Ching-Hai contact, and his plan to hijack his own associates' cargo-and murder anyone in his way to cover his tracks-had touched the Fury's vengefulness on the raw.
"You should slay him and be done with it," she said.
"I can't do that. It wouldn't be just," Alicia replied innocently, squinting into the dawn to watch a streamer of dust approach the shuttle. Another part of her watched it through Megarea's assault boat sensors, and her grin grew as Tisiphone spluttered in her brain.
"Just? Just?! You dare to speak of your foolish, useless justice for scum like this?! I have endured much from you, Little One, but-"
"Oh, hush." The Fury slithered to an incandescent stop, and Alicia pressed her advantage. "I told you I believe in justice," she said, rising to her feet. The prisoner's head whipped around as he, too, heard the whine of approaching turbines, and his face went white. "I also told you I believe in punishment. And unless I very much miss my guess, this is the people we were supposed to be meeting." She felt Tisiphone's sudden understanding, and her smile was cold and thin. "In this instance, I think justice can best be served by letting him explain himself to his friends, don't you?"
Chapter Twenty-one
The pages of Colonel McIlheny's latest report lay strewn about the carpet where Governor General Treadwell had flung them. Now the governor, his normally bland face an ugly shade of puce, half stood to lean across the conference table and glare at Rosario Gomez.
"I'm tired of excuses, Admiral," he grated. "If they are excuses and not a cover for something else. I find it remarkable that your units are so persistently elsewhere when these pirates strike!"
Gomez glared back at him with barely restrained fury, and he sneered.
"At best, your complete ineffectualness cost nine million lives on Elysium, and now this." His nostrils quivered as he inhaled harshly. "I suppose we should be grateful that the million-and-ahalf people in Raphael weren't imperial subjects. No doubt you and your people are, at any rate. At least it didn't require you to face the enemy in combat!"
Rosario Gomez rose very slowly and put her own hands on the table. She leaned to meet him, her eyes flint, and her voice was very soft.