“Eric, keep the ear going at full power.”
“Done and done,” the man replied over the speakers.
“Think Gaza is going to try and jack the whole convoy?” Roberto asked, adding a pair of binocs and an Uzi to his load. “Mighty ambitious for the baron.”
“He jacked a ville once,” she reminded him. “Why not a convoy?”
Stuffing some spare ammo clips into his pockets, Roberto took an Aussie digger hat hanging from the rear of his chair at the .50-cal.
“Fair enough,” he rumbled, heading for the door. “Be back in a few.”
“Stay razor,” Trader directed as the armed guard lowered the curved section of the hull to the sandy ground outside. Instantly, a warm breeze blew into the control room of the rig. “Radio when you can.”
“If we can, sure,” he told her, descending the metal steps, wisps of smoke coming through the open hatchway carrying the smell of wood and some kind of meat. Whatever the frag that could possibly be she had no damn idea.
Watching the rear vid screens, Kate saw Roberto and five other troopers haul down the motorcycles from the side mounted racks of War Wag Two and check the engines and fuel tanks.
“Prime the missiles in the main pod,” the Trader commanded, “We may have to provide some cover for the riders.”
“Already on it, Chief,” Jessica replied, both hands throwing switches and turning dials. “We’re loaded and ready.”
“Not yet. Turn off the heat seekers, or the damn rockets will just arch down after the fire.”
“But we’ll be shooting blind without them,” Jake said, his hands playing over the controls like a musician. “Might ace our own people!”
Resuming her chair, Kate grunted at that possibility. “Lock the first one on the metal thing,” she said.
“Alert, I have blasterfire,” Eric reported over the ceiling speaker.
“Shitfire, gimme a location!” the Trader demanded, leaning toward the front window of the war wag.
“Inconclusive,” he reported slowly. “Almost sounds like two different spots at the same time.”
“Are they near each other?” Kate demanded. “We got some sort of a firefight going on down there?”
The ceiling speaker crackled for a few seconds. “Negative on that, Chief,” Eric said at last. “The blasters are much too far apart to be shooting at each other.”
“Probably just old ammo cooking off from the heat,” Fat Pete said, chewing on a piece of jerky. The man had both hands on the grips of the port side .50-cal, and was nervously shuffling his boots on the corrugated floor.
“Yeah?” Kate muttered angrily. “Mix ‘probable’ with ‘always’ and you get aced constantly.”
The man had no response to that and lowered his head as if to block her from his sight.
“Stay loose,” the Trader ordered in a softer tone. “Gaza is the one to be worried if he’s here.”
Fat Pete granted in reply but took on a more normal stance.
“And what if it’s Ryan?” Jessica asked.
“Ain’t decided on him yet,” Kate replied honestly.
Just then, the darkening clouds overhead rumbled with thunder, and the wind slightly increased, kicking up more loose salt and sand until it was almost a visible river of motion. As each bolt of lightning lit up the fiery clouds, there was a faint crackle of static from the speakers, and several of the meters flicked, the radar screen went out of focus and the compass spun wildly.
Pulling the half clip from her Ingram, Kate placed it aside for reloading later on, and inserted a full mag into the blaster, working the bolt to chamber a round and clicking off the safety.
A blaster fight, or old ammo? Gaza or Ryan, or something else entirely? There was no way of telling, but something down deep in her bones told the woman that, one way or the other, there was a hell of a storm coming.
ON THE FAR SIDE of the sinkhole, masked by the raging fires filling the city, the second sec hunter droid finally responded to the radio beacon of its smashed brother. The damaged droid began to remove bits and pieces of the destroyed machine, replacing weapons, servo-mechanisms, solenoids, eyes and power packs. The work steadily progressed with the motions of the buzzards eating the dead almost perfectly duplicating the utilitarian mechanical salvaging.