That was where Richards called a halt and ordered Kawecki to put half the team where they could defend the station, giving the rest of the Sentinels a chance to grab a bite to eat.
While they pulled out their rations, Ralf licked himself and lay down next to a bench, and Richards and Hale followed Spook into the office. The person in charge of Freedom First Chicago awaited them there. He had been a big man once, well over six feet tall, but now he was missing both his legs. He had fuzzy red hair, a craggy brow, and a fist-flattened nose. The wheelchair that supported his torso had clearly seen heavy use, and was fitted with holsters on both sides.
“Welcome!” the rebel leader said cheerfully, and he eyed Hale curiously. “My name is Jacoby. Sam Jacoby. Pardon me if I don’t get up.”
Hale chuckled politely as he went forward to shake hands. It was probably an old joke, one Jacoby likely used to break the ice and put new acquaintances at ease.
“Glad to meet you, sir,” he said as the other man’s fingers nearly crushed his. “My name is Hale.”
Jacoby took in the yellow-gold eyes, raised his bushy eyebrows, but remained silent and turned to Richards.
“It’s good to see you again, Bo. So the lieutenant has been immunized, I see. Do all the people you work with have Chimeran eyes?”
“No,” Richards replied flatly. “Only Hale. But the rest have Hybrid-fast reaction times, they can take more punishment than you or I, and they heal quickly. Very quickly, so long as they don’t take major damage. It comes in handy.”
Jacoby nodded grimly.
“Good. I’m glad to hear that the Grace administration finally did something right. God knows we’re going to need all the help we can get, if we’re going to win this war.”
“Yes,” Richards agreed soberly. “That’s something all of us can agree on.”
“So, why the visit?” Jacoby demanded tactlessly. “As you know, the government hasn’t given us piss-all since they pulled out of Chicago. Present company excepted, of course. So you must be here on a special mission of some sort.”
“That’s true,” Richards admitted reluctantly, as he went on to describe the meeting with Chief of Staff Dentweiler, the government’s case against ex-Secretary of War Henry Walker, and the evidence that pointed toward a trip to Chicago.
“I know you dislike Grace and his administration,” Richards finished, “but Walker plans to open negotiations with the stinks if he can. And that would be bad for everyone—including the members of Freedom First.”
Jacoby nodded slowly, as if still in the process of assimilating what Richards had said.
“You’ve got that right, Bo,” he said deliberately. “But I’m afraid that you made the trip for nothing. Walker sent us a letter, via runner. He said he was on his way to Chicago, carrying something of importance, but he didn’t say what.
“Then, a few days ago, we got word that Twitch, the runner who had agreed to bring the Walkers to Chicago, had been killed. Some people figure the Walkers are dead, too, but others think they got away and are headed for our base in Montana. Personally, I don’t have a clue as to what happened to them. God help them if the Chimera got ahold of them.”
Hale waited for Richards to respond, and when the other officer didn’t, he cleared his throat. “No offense, Mr. Jacoby, but why should we believe you?” he asked, careful to keep his voice as neutral as possible. “Given your dislike of the government, you could be protecting Walker.”
Richards frowned and opened his mouth as if to speak, but Jacoby raised a hand.
“That’s a fair question, son… But suffice it to say that Bo’s correct. If Walker showed up here, and tried to open negotiations with the stinks, I’d shoot him myself!”
Suddenly an Army-style field phone on Jacoby’s desk rang. Jacoby picked it up, held the receiver to his ear, and listened for five seconds before slamming the device down.
He mashed a red button, and a klaxon began to bleat. He had to shout to be heard over the din. “A trainload of stinks broke through the barrier a mile south of here and is headed this way! There isn’t enough time to run, so we’ll have to stay and fight. Welcome to Chicago, gentlemen—and here’s hoping you live long enough to get out again.”
The rebels were well organized for civilians, but the Chimera had the advantage of speed and the element of surprise, so the humans were still taking up defensive positions when the first blocky car appeared. It was going way too fast, as if the Hybrid at the controls hadn’t had much practice driving it, and sparks flew as the brakes were applied and the train came to a shuddering stop.
The cars’ curved roofs came within inches of the arched ceiling and were painted yellow, with black stripes. The stinks had chosen to commandeer one of the work trains normally used for maintenance, rather than a regular commuter train. Dozens of Hybrids emerged and a hellish firefight began. Glass shattered as plasma projectiles fired from a Bullseye sleeted across the office, and everyone hit the floor. Everyone except Jacoby, that is, who sent his wheelchair rolling forward, and drew his .45s.
He fired both pistols in alternating sequence, swearing at the Chimera as he did so, careless of the projectiles that whipped around him.
Hale knelt two feet back of the shattered window, triggered two 40mm grenades from the M5A2, and had the satisfaction of seeing both of them shatter windows and explode inside the second car.
Fortunately for Jacoby and his freedom fighters, the Sentinels were present to absorb the brunt of the initial attack and keep a lot of stinks bottled up on the train as others fell to combined fire from a multitude of sources. The battle was far from one-sided however, as Corporal Vedka took an Auger round right between the eyes, Private Henning died in a ball of flame when a stray projectile struck the fuel canister for his Dragon L11-2, and Private Oshi was struck down by half a dozen spines from a Chimeran Hedgehog grenade.
Serious though the causalities were, they were nothing compared to the slaughter imposed on the stinks who were forced to perform a macabre dance as a hail of bullets jerked, spun, and even lifted them off their feet before throwing them down onto the oily ground. Even the children on the machine gun got into the act by swiveling their weapon around to fire on the enemy.
Hale should have felt jubilant, but as he put half a dozen bullets into one of the Steelheads, he felt as if something was wrong. Nothing specific—just a crawly sensation that caused the hairs on the back of his neck to stand up straight.
But why?
The answer came as a shock as a blast of mental energy hit every human within a thousand feet, killing four of them, including Private Cooper, and bringing the rest to their knees. A few managed to fire anyway, but most were incapacitated, as Hale struggled to stand.
“There’s an Angel on that train!” he croaked. “Kill it!”
Many experts believed that Angels were in charge of lesser Chimera, capable of giving them orders via mental telepathy. If so, the Angel on the train might well have planned the surprise attack based on intelligence gathered by subordinate forms.
Hale’s order went out over the team frequency, but the response was anemic at best, because so many of the Sentinels were incapacitated. As a second flood of stinks poured off the train, he staggered out of the office and onto the body-littered platform. Spook was there, facedown on the concrete, having been rendered unconscious by the mental blast. Ralf had positioned himself next to her body, and growled menacingly as Hale shuffled past.