A motion to his right caught Caine's eye, and he turned to see Lathe similarly sprawled over Quinn and Galway, holding them down as Skyler rolled over to assist him. Breaking his paralysis, Caine got to his feet and hopped over to where Jensen was levering himself to a kneeling position. "Check their pockets for the key to these things," the blackcollar instructed, already searching one of the limp forms himself. Swallowing, shame at his own inaction hot on his cheeks, Caine obeyed.
"Got it," Skyler announced. "Right where you'd expect—didn't trust anyone but yourself with the key, did you, General?"
"Damn—you," Quinn managed, the sound muffled by his own arm pinned across his mouth. "You'll never get off this floor alive."
"Really? I've heard that song before." Releasing his restraints, Skyler freed Lathe and then tossed the keys across to Caine.
"What's going on?" Caine asked, twisting around to pick up the keys and setting to work on Jensen's wrist cuffs. An uncomfortable suspicion was starting to set in. "Is that Mordecai running amok out there?"
"Mordecai and Pittman both," Lathe told him, fastening his former restraints securely around Quinn.
"At least—"
"Pittman?" Caine gasped. Across the room Galway inhaled sharply. "But Quinn said—"
"Oh, come on, Caine," Skyler chided mildly as he fastened Galway's ankles to one of the chairs.
"You know better than to take a collie's word for anything, don't you? How's it look out there, Jensen?"
Jensen had opened the door a crack and was peering out cautiously. "All the activity's around the corner down there, near the elevator. If we hurry, we ought to be able to surprise the collies with a rear-action sortie." Squatting down, he started to strip the uniform from one of the guards.
"Good," Lathe nodded. "Just make sure Mordecai doesn't get you in the process." He turned back to Quinn. "You'll forgive us if we take leave of your hospitality," he said, reaching down to draw the general's paral-dart pistol from its holster. "Pleasant dreams, and better luck next time."
"You won't get out of here alive," Quinn spat, his face contorted with fury... and then the burst of needles caught him in the chest and he slumped in his chair.
"Lathe," Galway said as the comsquare turned to him. "If you're not lying—if Pittman's really on your side—"
"I know," Lathe said. "One way or another, it'll all be over soon."
Galway hissed between clenched teeth, his expression a mirror of emotions too convoluted for Caine to unravel. Then Lathe's pistol cracked and the prefect joined Quinn in helplessness.
A minute later the former prisoners were outside in the hall. "Let's get at them," Lathe said briskly,
"and hope Mordecai got the armory open before they sealed it from downstairs. We'll need what's inside some of the nunchaku if we're going to get out of here."
Caine took a deep breath. "Whatever you've got in mind, I hate it already."
The comsquare almost smiled. "As it happens, Caine, the hard part is actually over. Help me make sure all the cameras and microphones are disabled and I'll tell you all about it."
—
"Well?" Major Eberly O'Dae demanded.
The man at the monitor bank shrugged helplessly. "I'm sorry, Major, but without vision and audio there's no way to tell for sure what's happening up there. All I can say is that there's no more running going on anymore—people are still walking around, but no one's running."
O'Dae cursed under his breath. So the fighting was over—or else had gone to a stalemate siege—and there was no way to tell which side was on top. Though it unfortunately wasn't too hard to make a good guess.
And General Quinn was square in the middle of it.
"You're sure they got into the armory?" he asked, wishing an instant later that he'd kept his mouth shut. It was at least the third time he'd asked that same question, and the others were bound to notice that.
There was a general shuffling of feet around the situation room, and the man at the monitors threw him an odd look before answering. "Yes, sir, quite certain. They haven't been fired yet, but the power-pack readings show several of the laser rifles have definitely been moved from the armory to other parts of the floor."
"The fact the lasers haven't been fired probably means the blackcollars are in control," someone murmured from the side.
"I'd figured that out, thank you," O'Dae growled. When you don't need a senior officer, he thought bitterly, they're always right there on top of you. Colonel Poirot was supposed to be on his way, but until he got here O'Dae was in charge of this mess, and he knew full well he was out of his depth.
"Major! Got something now," the man at the monitor announced abruptly. "Laser fire... about fifteen meters down the hall from—ah-ha." He looked up. "They're trying to burn through the wall by the main elevator bank, the ones that bypass five."
O'Dae felt a flood of relief. "Oh, they are, are they?" he said, and someone else snickered. The steel protecting those elevator shafts was specially reinforced against just this trick; the prisoners could fire all night and most of the next day without breaking through.
Which meant that O'Dae was off the hook. However long it took Poirot to get here, he could now afford to simply sit back and wait until then. The blackcollars weren't going anywhere—
"Major!"
O'Dae turned and looked over the crowd to the man at the audio comm panel. "Yes, what is it?"
"Explosion outside the Central Municipal Building, sir—the night guards there say the door's been blown."
"What?" O'Dae shoved through the others to the panel, stomach churning with fresh tension. The Central Muni held a lot of records, more than a few of them top-classified. Not to mention several pieces of equipment that were well-nigh irreplaceable. "Anyone trying to get in?"
"Not yet—at least they don't think so," the other said, shaking his head. "But they want some backup, fast."
"No kidding. Captain! Get a double squad over there, on the slider."
"Yes, sir." The officer left the situation room at a dead run.
O'Dae took a ragged breath, but he'd barely let it out before the man beside him swore. "Damn it.
Major—another blast, this one near the spotter hangar."
O'Dae stared, hardly believing it. "What the hell—that was near the hangar, Corporal? Not in?"
"Report says near, sir. But it could be just a diversion."
The major grimaced as that thought penetrated the tension surrounding his mind and then split, amoeba-style, into two equally nasty possibilities. A diversion as prelude to an attack on Athena's air power? Or a diversion designed to empty the Security building itself of troops? It could be either...
and the real hell of it was that it didn't matter. He had to send reinforcements to those other buildings, just in case. Which meant he could likely have a skeleton crew available here if the blackcollars tired of their attack on the elevators and tried to simply fight their way out.
And there was only one way he could think of to prevent that. If the blackcollars were indeed relying on allies skulking around Athena to set up their escape for them, the last thing he could afford was to allow them control of the timetable. "Lieutenant Baker, what's the situation with the elevator to five?" he called to the man at the detention monitors.
"Uh... we've got the override set up, Major," the other reported. "The blackcollars can't use it to get down."
"I was thinking more of our using it to get up," O'Dae growled. "Are the spotters up and in place?"
"One hovering in view of each side of the building. They can't see much, though—they're keeping their distance."
Cowards. Still, as long as they prevented anyone from sliding out a window on a rope, it didn't much matter how far back they were. "Still no response from the gas flood system, I take it?"