Part 35 (1/2)
He removed his backpack and took out one of his two Lotus ant.i.tank mines. The disk was a quarter meter across with spikes set along the rim to stabilize it when buried. He set the detonation selector to countdown mode, seven seconds. He then slid around the edge of the column.
He threw the mine with a flick of his wrist. It spun in a wide arc across the temple hall and embedded into the wall just over the entrance archway.
Two seconds until it blew.
John clicked on his COM and said: ”Fire in the hole!”
The Brutes again wheeled around from their cover and leveled their deadly grenade launchers. The Lotus mine detonated-it was a flash and an instant of fire. The temple opening and Brutes vanished, replaced by a cloud of dust and a cascade of stones that fell from the ceiling.
One gray arm remained exposed under the rubble, still flexing.
John moved up. The entrance was sealed. They were safe for a few seconds.
He knelt next to Grace. Her biosigns had flatlined. He tried to roll her upright-but there was no need. The detonations he had heard while wrestling the first Brute had been three of their high-velocity grenades... which had blown Grace's midsection apart.
Fred and Will emerged from their cover. John looked at them and shook his head.
John opened the tiny access panel on Grace's armor power pack and entered the fail-safe code. They still had a mission to finish, which meant they couldn't carry her out; it would slow them down too much. They wouldn't be leaving her for the Covenant either, though. Her armor's tiny fusion reactor would overload and burn everything within a ten-meter radius- Grace's funeral pyre.
”Let's move,” John said. ”Cortana, which way?”
”Proceed into the temple thirty meters. Turn right. There will be a sealed doorway, an access hatch for Engineers. I will open it and lock it behind you. Hurry. I'm encountering increased resistance from the station's AIs. While I have their security COM channels blocked, word of intruders is speeding via private COMs.”
There was a curious echo to her voice. Maybe it was feedback from the Covenant triangulating on their signals. Or maybe there was some other effect at work. What had she warned him about? Unforeseen complications using a copy of a copy of Cortana?
”Roger that,” he said and waved Fred and Will forward. He took one last look at Grace, then marched quickly and silently ahead.
There were no more motion contacts in the temple. The Chief, however, saw Grunts and Jackals, Elites and Hunters in murals painted on the walls. In the shadows and stained-gla.s.s filtered light, those pictures seemed to move. They genuflected to something farther ahead. The Chief wished he had more time to take a full video record.
Blue Team moved thirty meters and turned to face a section of the wall. It parted. The pa.s.sage could have fit two Engineers side by side, but John had to crouch and turn sideways to pa.s.s. Will and Fred followed; Cortana sealed the door behind them.
They continued until the narrow pa.s.sage turned ninety degrees and dropped straight down. Will attached a rope and they rappelled down a hundred meters, landing on a platform.
John overlooked a cavern hewn from rough stone that arched up ninety meters and vanished into the shadows in the distance. Five hundred twelve fusion reactors that looked like flatted spiral seash.e.l.ls filled the s.p.a.ce, stacked in rows and columns eight deep. Each was the size of a Pelican drops.h.i.+p and thrummed with power, casting off waves of wavering heat.
The open areas between the reactors were a tangle of plasma conduits and alive with swarms of thousands of buoyant Engineers as they tended the machinery. Faint wispy borealis comprised of escaped plasma swirled, whipped into a luminous froth by the intense magnetic vortices within the chamber.
It was a tremendous feat of engineering. It was as if the station's builders had hewn this from a seed asteroid and built the rest of the installation around it.
Will pointed across the room to three Jackals who walked along a catwalk. Blue Team held position and didn't move. ”There,” Cortana announced. ”Across the platform is a terminal on the reactor subsystem.”
John held up a hand to Will and Fred, waited for the Jackal guards to pa.s.s, and then sprinted across the platform. He removed Cortana's chip and inserted it into the terminal.
After three seconds, she reported: ”I'm in. Very few Covenant counterintrusion measures in this system. I can accomplish the overload.
”I've found an exit route for Blue Team and uploaded it into your NAV systems,” she continued. ”It should be stealthy enough for you to return to the repair bay undetected. Once there, give me the order and I can begin. It will take ten minutes for the overload to build. There's no stopping once I start this, Chief, so be sure.”
”This station and the Covenant fleet might jump to Earth in the next ten minutes,” John said. He looked to Fred and Will, and they nodded as if they could read his mind.
”Proceed with the overload now, now, Cortana.” Cortana.”
The light from the reactors s.h.i.+fted; blue plasma tinged white and spread like a poison through the interconnecting conduits. ”Overload commencing,” the copy of Cortana announced. ”I suggest Blue Team move at top speed to the exit.”
A NAV triangle indicated a ladder that ran to the catwalk overhead. John held up two fingers at Will and Fred and then nodded to the patrolling Jackals. Fred and Will knelt, braced, and waited for him to go ahead.
John climbed the ladder. As he neared the top, three shots rang out behind him. The sound was nearly drowned out by the intensifying reverberations from the reactors. He cleared the top of the ladder and saw three dead Jackals on the catwalk. He swept both directions with his rifle and then waved Will and Fred forward.
His countdown timer read 9.47. The heat and light from the reactors grew stronger, and John's s.h.i.+elds flared slightly. Blue Team jogged down the catwalk to an elevator. They got inside, the doors closed, and the car immediately ascended.
When the doors opened again, artificial blue sunlight filled the car-as did the shadows cast by two Elites waiting for the elevator. Blue Team opened fire and cut down the Elites, leaving a spray of blood across the ground.
The Chief edged around the frame of the elevator door and saw a tangle of pipes and fountains and one of the curious spiral waterways that fell up from its center. This was a heat exchange plant for the reactors below. Already the water in the ca.n.a.ls steamed and boiled.
He saw that Covenant Elite and Hunter pairs had converged at the entrance to the temple a hundred meters to his right. Over the temple dozens of Banshee fliers circled the carnage.
A gang of Grunts managed to clear an opening to the temple. There was a flash of light and fire that roiled out in a long plume, burning them as well as their Elite overseers.
”Good-bye, Grace,” John whispered.
The detonation of her power pack would buy them more time while the Covenant forces tried to figure out what just happened- perhaps they'd think Blue Team was still inside the temple. Grace had also taken out a dozen Grunts and four Elites with her last action. That would have pleased her.
John turned toward the far end of the great room and spotted a band of translucent material on the far wall. It led to the repair bays and air locks beyond. That was their exit.
He glanced at his mission timer: 8:42. They'd have to get there fast.
His gaze locked onto the Banshees in the air. He searched for Linda, posted somewhere in the odd geometry of this station. She could be anywhere along several kilometers of cityscape.
John clicked on his COM. ”Linda, do not reply. The Covenant are triangulating on our signals. I'm hoping they do and send a few of those Banshees to reconnoiter. When they get close to the heat-exchange plant, take them out-we'll need their vehicles.”
There was no answer. Did that mean Linda understood and was in a position to help? Or was she dead? As John hoped, three Banshees peeled off the search formation, circling the temple and turning toward them.
John waved Fred and Will out of the elevator and into the forest of steaming pipes. They scattered, took cover, and aimed at the incoming Banshees.
The Banshees spread out, slowed... but then banked, returning to the temple.
John clicked his COM three times.
The Elite pilots immediately wheeled about and accelerated toward their position. One Banshee flier nosed into a cla.s.sic strafing dive. Its plasma cannons warmed and crackled with energy, indicating an imminent discharge.
There was a spray of blood in the flier, then the pilot fell forward and pushed the accelerator to full. The Banshee careened through the air at maximum velocity-cras.h.i.+ng into a water-recovery tower, and wobbled to the ground.
”Linda,” John muttered and tried to spot her. Judging from the blood spray, she'd managed to send a round through the tiny exposed area of the c.o.c.kpit, and inflicted a lethal ricochet. He looked for her position; most likely the shot had come from behind and above. There were numerous catwalks running across the length of the ma.s.sive room. She had to be on one of them.
The two remaining Banshees accelerated toward Blue Team. Their plasma cannons flickered, and they leveled into a flat trajectory.
John, Fred, and Will raised their rifles.