The Impossible Future: Complete set Frank Kennedy (freenovel24 .TXT) 📖

“Will they attack platform?” She said.

“No. They’ll come after the platform a different way. We are all that matters to them. My parents and the Major know what happens if they don’t kill us today.”

“Then we must kill them instead.”

They stared into each other’s eyes, a moment she would trade for nothing. Yet the moment was brief, of necessity.

“You look beautiful in red,” he told her. “It’s time.”

She triggered her helmet and called up the DR29. She saw the Major’s forces stop at Level 9. They did not exit the lifts or move toward the platform, as James predicted. They were scattered over a quarter of a mile, but they blocked all downward exits. No matter.

There would be no retreat for anyone, and no chance to surrender.

58

V ALENTIN GAVE HIMSELF SIXTY SECONDS to bring down the platform’s cascade barrier. He’d done it before, learning how during those times he played on the Level 6 platform. Deck engineers showed him how the controls worked, even allowed him to open it for a cargo ship’s arrival. He studied the manual control diagnostics and went to work. Valentin needed to override the remote blocking no doubt instituted under the Major’s command.

“He’s on his way in,” Ophelia told him as she communicated with the pilot through her amp. “Five hundred meters. He says he won’t come closer than a hundred meters if the barrier doesn’t fall.”

“Not an issue,” Valentin said, watching his program dance to his particular tune. “In five.”

He watched and waited. If he overlooked a step, the barrier would remain, and the pilot would know something was off.

The energy field dissolved on cue.

“All right, here we go,” he told Ophelia. “You follow my lead. We have maybe two minutes before we lose this ship.”

The Passaic Dawn came in for a fast landing, as instructed. The ship was lean – a small liner designed for twenty passengers, with full facilities including private beds and baths. Green nacelles lined the lateral flanks, chasing up and behind into system engines half as long as the ship they powered.

“Do not disengage the nacelles,” she yelled across the amp as they ran to the opening port-side ramp, telling the pilot to abandon normal landing protocol. “Repeat, do not disengage nacelles.”

They raced onboard, through the primary cabin and forward to the command deck. Valentin raised his rifle chest-high as the pilot left his seat. He told the man to return at once.

“What is this?” The pilot was a gray-haired man as old as Valentin’s grandfather, the last time they saw each other. “I was told nothing about a military requisition. I will not …”

“You will,” Valentin said. “Close the entry now and take us out of here. You have five seconds.”

The pilot gulped but did not sit. “No. You will tell me …”

Valentin had enough and pushed the man into the seat. The holographic navigation cylinder wrapped around the pilot.

“There are thirty-five billion people in the Collectorate,” Valentin said. “You are one. Nobody will care you’re gone. Do it!”

That did the trick, but Valentin wasn’t sure they were fast enough. He slipped into the co-pilot’s swivel and allowed the cylinder to fall. His fingers dashed through the diagnostics as the Passaic Dawn reversed course and cleared the platform. He surveyed for traffic proximity.

He extended the search range around the tower. That’s when he saw them. Two Scramjets, in a rush, a kilometer out.

“Just as we thought. They reorganized at Level 6, coalesced all personnel except for navigators. They’re coming for us now.”

The pilot turned pale as he redirected the ship on a new bearing.

“Who’s coming? What are you doing to me?”

“Scramjets. Fully armed.”

“What are you? Some kind of fugitive?”

“Yes.” He turned his rifle on the pilot. “Turn off glidetrax. You’ll need full atmospheric burst.”

“This is a temperate travel zone. If I miscalculate …”

“I know the regs. Do it anyway or I’ll shoot you in the head.”

The pilot glanced at Ophelia, as if she could talk sense to him.

“Do it,” she said. “We have nothing to lose.”

The pilot followed suit; the Passaic Dawn cleared the tower.

Valentin did not breathe a sigh of relief. Timing was everything, and their hopes rested on how well his brother counted minutes.

He looked up at Ophelia. “We’ll know when it’s time.”

59

J AMES STUDIED THE SCHEMATICS of the Bouchet compound and recognized vertical architectural features running through every level. A massive network of beams encircled the Transport Core, like vertebrae around a spinal cord. Buttresses extended outward in a symmetric pattern one hundred meters from the Core. He studied a rosette of beams and small buttresses midway between the Core and the exterior. The key to it all, he deduced, were the girders along the perimeter, each three hundred meters long and laid out equidistant. The tower’s skeleton.

He identified where to take Rayna for their last stand, so they ran.

The Major’s forces spilled out of the lifts on Level 10 and moved toward them. James and Rayna skirted past the closest group of soldiers until reaching one of four energy centrifuges that regulated power in each quadrant. They blasted their way into the facility and took quick stock. James saw the high ground and kissed Rayna.

They climbed up to a maintenance platform above the humming centrifuge and waited, a clear view of both ways into the facility.

Ten minutes passed before the Major’s teams coalesced around their target. From the perch, James watched as soldiers – half in body armor – raced in below, taking positions along the perimeter, each at least fifty meters from their targets. The Jewels trained their rifles on the enemy, standing back-to-back to guard their flanks.

James entered Rayna’s mind.

- They won’t fire yet but be prepared.

- They are frightened. They do