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as a light defense force.
It s bluff, Kieran assured him. They want me and a couple of other people
they think are down there. They won t just come roaring in with guns blazing.
So what do you need us for? If you re not there, they ll go away again.
A show of force on the ground so those goons don t take it into their heads
to start slapping any scientists around.
Everit still didn t seem happy. I don t like asking my men to face odds like
that. If we had firepower to offset that gunship . . .
There s the
Guardian Angel
, Leppo said from the seat behind, where he and Casey were listening.
What s the
Guardian Angel
? Everit asked.
Kieran turned his head abruptly, wondering why he hadn t thought of it. Sol
and Casey s flymo,
he said to Everit.
Flymo? The major started to scoff, but Leppo defended their creation
indignantly.
More than a just flymo, Major. Man, it s got lock-on autocannon, rear-firing
laser or radar homing missiles, target acquisition and incoming tracking radar
. . .
Not fully tested ye Casey started to blurt, but Leppo kicked his foot
beneath the seat.
Mil D-spec countermeasures package . . .
Where is this machine? Everit asked.
Right under the roof at the Cherbourg skylock, Leppo said. We could be
there in minutes.
Fight bluff with counterbluff, Kieran said. Put there by Providence. You
said that was what you needed. Okay, let s go for it. You can drop us off at
Cherbourg and then carry straight on to
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Tharsis. We ll follow as soon as we get the
Angel airborne.
Everit was looking dazed. You ll get used to it, Mahom told him, grinning.
Things kind of happen when the Knight s around.
Alter course for Cherbourg, Everit told the pilot resignedly.
The pilot entered a code into the navcomp, which flashed a request to
Cherbourg Local Area
Traffic Control for an inbound slot in the skylock schedule. A few seconds
later the associated comscreen responded:
CONFIRMED AND HOLDING. ESTIMATED COMPLETION 6 MINUTES
.
Consternation had broken out in the partitioned office at the rear of the
warehouse at Stony Flats, where Lee Mullen and the Firm s local team had been
updating the two expediters who just arrived via Phobos to take charge. A call
had come in reporting that Leppo and his partner had been hijacked en route by
an unidentified military unit that came down out of the sky. The guy who
seemed to be in charge of the grab wore a red suit and had a brown face. There
was even a picture that one of the guards had managed to snap with his phone
as the rescuers and their two charges were embarking.
The mention of a brown face triggered Mr. Black s recollection of the brief
encounter in the hotel elevator. Let me see him, he demanded. An enlarged
version of the face in the helmet appeared on one of the screens. Black
studied it intently. Lighten it a bit, he said to the graphics tech who was
with the group. Make the color normal. . . . Now take the gray out of the
hair.
How do you want it?
Dark . . . No, say, maybe more brown. Mr. Black watched the transformation.
The result was still a little on the old side, but he no longer had any
doubts. That s him! he pronounced. It s the guy who was at the Zodiac Bank
with his twin brother. He pointed at Sarda, who was standing with
Balmer. The one who said he was the lawyer.
Sarda stepped forward for a closer look. He s right. That s who stopped me on
the street when I
was on my way there. He s the guy with the dog!
I saw him at the Oasis, Black told everyone. I
knew
I d seen him somewhere.
He met Leppo there, Mullen said. Dressed up like a genie. Looks like he
came back into town
for the wedding party.
Balmer looked at the two arrivals from Phobos. They were both tanned,
unsmiling, athletically built, and expensively dressed in dark suits with
white shirts. The syndicate upper hierarchy was picky about appearances
conforming to position. Only the topmost levels sported lighter shades, some
individuality in adornment and style, and an allowance of color. Well, that s
over with now, he said. They ll be going back to Tharsis.
That s where Elaine and the other Sarda will be too . . .
and the key to finding your quarter-billion dollars.
The two expediters conferred briefly, then spoke to the leader of the backup
force. Board your men and let s get out there, the one who was in charge
said.
Meanwhile, in the upper atmosphere, the vessel from Asgard began its braking
maneuver to descend from orbit. It was of a fast, robust design capable of
landing on the Martian surface, making it unnecessary to transfer to a shuttle
at Phobos. Aboard, in the forward lounge, Hamilton and
Achilles Gilder, Thornton Velte, Mervyn Quinn, and Slessor Lomax stared
woodenly with greening, blotchy countenances at the wall screen showing a view
of the surface. Marissa sat anxiously with the others who had accompanied
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them. There would be no fooling around with the doctors at Lowell, who had
accomplished nothing. The only person to show any understanding of the
affliction and demonstrate a successful cure had been the Khal, but the Khal
had since vanished. But there was another who had tried to warn them: the
eccentric but seemingly equally capable Keziah Turle, with
Professor Hashikar s scientific group at Tharsis. Very well, Hamilton had
decided. Then they would descend directly to Tharsis.
24
At Cherbourg, Kieran and Mahom disembarked from the APC with Leppo and Casey
just inside the lock. While the APC shunted across to the outbound lane to
gain immediate exit with the next lock cycle, they took an elevator down a
level and hurried to where the
Guardian Angel was parked.
Within minutes, Leppo and Casey had the
Angel up to flight readiness. They taxied back up, left after a short wait,
and were soon climbing into the strange, pink-blushed Martian sky with the
Cherbourg plateau and its spaceport, and below it, Lowell nestled in the folds
of the Valles Marineris canyons, shrinking amid an expanding vista of
wilderness.
Sure handles smooth and easy, Mahom complimented, giving Leppo an approving
nod. Solid on the drive, too. Seems like maybe you did pick up a few useful
things after all.
These are gonna be big one day, Leppo promised him. You sound like maybe
you re angling for a share of the action.
I ll take whatever s going, Mahom said unabashedly with a shrug.
It seemed that Leppo had decided he was back in the security business again.
A call from Trevany confirmed that Everit and his force had arrived and were
preparing positions around the expedition s camp. Chas Ryan s crew was digging
slit trenches away from the vehicles as a precaution. So far there had been no
hostile appearance. Trevany had barely finished saying this, however, when
Harry Quong interrupted to say that three blips had appeared on the
Juggernaut s radar, heading their way one leading, and two close together
following a few miles behind.
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