"Second Squad,withdraw,"Tylordered.He felt as if his load of gear had halved in weight when the eyes of the rioters, orange flecks lighted by the fires of their violence, turned away from him and his men to stare at the City Offices.
Tyl jumped back down the steps and put his left arm—the submachine-gun was under his right armpit—around the sergeant major's chest. Scratchard weighed over a hundred kilos, only a little of it in the gut that had expanded with his desk job. Tyl's blood jumped with so much adrenalin that he noticed only Scratchard's inertia—not his weight.
"Lemme go!" Scratchard rasped in a voice tight with the ache in his knees.
"Shut the hell up!" Tyl snarled back. The laser communicator was crushed between them,biting both men's thighs. If he'd had a hand free,he'd have thrown the cursed thing against the concrete levee.
The mob's chanted "Freedom!" gave way suddenly to a long bellow, loud and growing like a peal of thunder. Tyl's back was to the City Offices, and the rolling triumph had started on the far side anyway, where the jail entrance opened onto the parking area. He knew what was happening, though.
And he knew, even before the shouts turned to"Kill them! Kill them!"that this mob wasn't going to be satisfied with freeing their fellows.
Likely the police trapped inside the building had known that too; but they didn't have any better choices either.
"You, give us a hand!" Tyl ordered as he and Scratchard stumbled toward the railing across the walkway. He pointed to the nearest trooper with the gun that filled his right hand. She jumped to her feet and took the sergeant major's other arm while Tyl boomed over the radio,"First Squad,withdraw.Kekkonan,make sure you've got us covered."
The river here was half a kilometer wide between the levees, but with night sights and powerguns, trained men could sweep the far walkway clear if some of the rioters decided it'd be safe to pursue.
The river had fallen more than a meter since Tyl viewed it six hours before. The barges still floated a safe jump beneath the inner walkway of the levee—but not safe for Jack Scratchard with a load of gear.
"Gimme my arms free," the sergeant major ordered.
Tyl nodded and stepped away with the trooper on the other side. Scratchard gripped the railing with both hands and swung himself over. He crouched on the narrow lip, choosing his support, and lowered himself onto the hogsheads with which the barge was loaded. The troopers waiting to help the senior noncom had the sense to get out of the way.
"I'm fine now," Scratchard grunted. "Let's move!"
The barges were moored close, but there was enough necessary slack in the lines that some of them were over a meter apart while their rubber bumpers squealed against those of the vessel on the opposite flank. Tyl hadn't thought the problem through, but Kekkonan or one of the other sergeants had stationed pairs of troopers at every significant gap. They were ready to guide and help lift later-comers over the danger.
"Thank the Lord," Tyl muttered as four strong arms boosted him from the first barge to the next in line. He wasn't sure whether he meant for the help or for the realization that the men he commanded were as good as anybody could pray.
Chapter Twelve
Charles Desoix wore a commo helmet to keep in touch with his unit, but he was looking out over Bamberg City with a handheld image intensifier instead of using the integral optics of the helmet's face shield. The separate unit gave him better illumination, crisper details. He held the imager steady by resting his elbows on the rail of the porch outside the Consistory Room, overlooking the courtyard and beyond—
The railing jiggled as someone else leaned against it, bouncing Desoix's forty-magnification image of a window in the City Office building off his screen.
"Lord cur—" Desoix snarled as he spun. He wasn't the sort to slap the clumsy popinjay whom he assumed had disturbed him, but he was willing to give the contrary impression at the moment.
Anne McGill was at the rail beside him.
"They told me—" Desoix blurted.
"Yes,but I couldn't—"Anne said,both of them trying to cover the angry outburst that would disappear from reality if they pretended it hadn't occurred.
She'd closed the clear doors behind her, but Desoix could see into the Consistory Room. Enough light fell onto the porch to illuminate them for anyone looking in their direction.
He put his arms around Anne anyway,being careful not to gouge her back with a corner of the imaging unit. She didn't protest as he thought she might—but she gasped in surprise as her breasts flattened against her lover.
"Ah," Desoix said. "Yeah, I thought I'd wear my armor while I was out . . . Ah, maybe we ought to go inside."
"No," Anne said, squeezing him tighter. "Just hold me."
Desoix stroked her back with his free hand while the breeze brought screams and the smell of smoke from across the river.
His helmet hissed with the sound of a Situation Report. He'd programmed Control to call for a sitrep every fifteen minutes during the night. That was the only way you could be sure an outlying unit hadn't been wiped out before they could sound an alarm . . . .
That wasn't a way Charles Desoix liked to think."Just a second,love,"he muttered, blanking his mind of what the woman with her arms around him had started to say.
"Two to Control, all clear," a human voice said. "Over."
Gun Two was north of the city on a bluff overlooking the river. It had a magnificent field of fire—and there was very little development in the vicinity, which made it fairly safe in the present circumstances.
"Control to Three," said the emotionless artificial intelligence in the Palace basement. "Report, over."
The hollow sound of gasoline bombs igniting, deadened by the pillow of intervening air, accompanied the gush of fresh orange flames from across the river. One side of the City Offices was covered with crawling fire.
"Three t' Control," came the voice of Sergeant Blaney.
There was a whining noise behind the words,barely audible through the commo link. It nagged at Desoix's consciousness, but he couldn't quite remember . . . .
"It's all right here," the human voice continued, "but there's a lot of traffic in and out of the plaza. There's fires north of us, and there's shots all round."
The sergeant paused. He wasn't speaking to Control but rather in the hope that Borodin or Desoix were listening even without an alert—and that they'd do something about the situation.
"Nothing aimed at us, s' far as we can tell," Blaney concluded. "Over."
The mechanical whining had stopped some seconds before.
Men,lighted by petroleum flares in both directions,were headed from the City Offices to the adjacent levee. Desoix couldn't make out who they were without the imaging unit, but he had a pretty good idea.
His left hand massaged Anne McGill's shoulders, to calm her and calm himself as well. He reached for his helmet's commo key with his right hand, careful not to clash the two pieces of sophisticated hardware together, and said, "Blue to Three. Give me an azimuth on your gun, Blaney. Over."
Major Borodin was Red. With luck, he wasn't monitoring the channel just now.