David Drake - Redliners.pdf - David Drake - margozap

Redliners

David Drake

Fout! Onbekende schakeloptie-instructie.

ISBN: 0-671-87733-X

Cover art by Gary Ruddell

First printing, August 1996

Drake, David.

Redliners / David Drake

ISBN 0-671-87733-X (HC)

I. Title

PS3554.R196R43 1996

813'.54—dc20

96-17559

CIP

PROLOGUE

When I entered Category 4 of the Unity civil service thirty-seven

years ago, I gave up my former name and life to become a servant

dedicated to all mankind. There are those who say I ceased to be

human when as part of the process a computer was embedded in my

central nervous system.

I am called John Smith, though my name might as easily have been

Xiang Quo or Krishna Singh or Ali Nasr. I am now Chief of

Administration, the highest permanent official of the Unity. There are

those who say I have the powers of a god and the ruthlessness of an

avalanche.

Since I entered Category 4, my only desire has been the long-term

good of mankind. Since I became Chief of Administration, my will has

been the only will of mankind.

There are those who say I have no more mercy than a surgeon

treating cancer.

There are those who say my planning has been mankind’s only

salvation during these seven years of war with the Kalendru, who

understand the concepts of “master” and “slave” but not of “equals.”

There are those who say that even such as I must retire, as a blade is

retired when grinding use wears it to a sliver—be that sliver ever so

sharp.

They say, they say . . .

And they are all of them correct.

Operation Active Cloak

—1—

Major Arthur Farrell’s bones vibrated to the howls of the generators

braking the captured Kalendru starship to a soft landing in the main

military port of the world Unity planners had labeled Maxus 377. The

engineers hadn’t bothered to jury-rig displays after they gutted the

ship’s hold for the assault force. If the strikers of Company C41

wanted, they could tap visuals from the flight deck onto their helmet

visors and look at the warped-looking Spook structures they would

attack in the next few seconds.

Farrell didn’t bother to watch. Instead he rechecked his stinger. He

wore crossed bandoliers of ammo packs and dangling blast rockets; a

medical kit; two supplementary communication units; two knives—

one of them powered, the other with a shorter fixed blade that could

double as a climbing spike; and a packet of emergency rations. The

integral canteen of Farrell’s back-and-breast armor held two quarts of

water, but he carried an additional three gallons in a backpack. The

weight slowed him and made his armor sag brutally against his

shoulders, but the cost was worth it to him.

When you’re pinned down in the hot sun, thirst is the worst torture.

Worse than the ripping pain of your wound, worse even than the

stench of your friend’s half-burned corpse on the ground beside you.

Art Farrell knew.

The starship quivered, still twenty feet above the ground though she

was nearly in equilibrium with the field her generators had induced in

the magnetic mass on which she was landing. “Wait for it!” ordered

Captain Broz, C41’s executive officer, over the command channel.

Nadia Broz was following standard operating procedure, but on this

mission there wasn’t any risk that a striker would unass early.

Normally C41 inserted aboard a purpose-built landing vessel. The

hatches opened minutes before contact. For Active Cloak camouflage

rather than speed was the requirement. At touchdown the flight crew

would blow explosive bolts to separate the outer bulkheads from the

skeleton of support members, but until then the freighter’s hold was

sealed like a prison cell.

“Hey, I think I changed my mind,” a striker called over the ship

noises. There was brittle laughter.

Kurt Leinsdorf stood stolidly at Farrell’s shoulder as he always did

during an insertion. On C41’s table of organization, Leinsdorf was a

communications specialist. In reality he was Farrell’s bodyguard, a

huge, strong man who carried a single-shot plasma cannon in addition

to his other weapons and equipment.

“I wanna be a Strike Force ranger . . .” sang Horgen, a Third

Platoon striker. “I wanna live a life of danger . . .”

The starship sank the last few feet like a leaking bladder. Wait for it ,

Farrell mouthed, but no sound passed his dry lips.

A locator chart overlaid the upper left quadrant of Farrell’s visor:

seventy-eight green dots, each one a striker. They were crammed too

closely together at the moment for him to count them individually.

Every one was a veteran: not only of combat, but veterans of C41

itself.

Strike Force companies were prefixed B, C, or D depending on their

size. C-class units had a nominal strength of one hundred personnel.

C41 had received eight replacements since the last operation, but

Farrell decided not to bring them along on a mission as rough as

Active Cloak looked like being. The replacements were good people

or they wouldn’t have passed Strike Force screening after they

David Drake - Redliners.pdf

Plik z chomika:

Inne pliki z tego folderu:

Inne foldery tego chomika: