But most of the Weasels in the universe would be gone as well. . . .
The door of the limousine opened. Bradley keyed the general-frequency override in his commo helmet and ordered, “Five-six to all Headhunter elements. Mount up, troops, it’s time to go play marine.” His voice was hoarse.
As Bradley spoke, his fingers checked combat gear with feather-light touches. His shotgun was slung muzzle-up for boarding the vehicle. The weapon’s chamber was empty, but he would charge it from the box magazine as soon as the trucks were airborne.
Bandoliers of shotgun ammo crossed his back-and-breast armor. From each bandolier hung a container of ring-airfoil grenades which Bradley could launch from around the shotgun’s barrel for long range and a high-explosive wallop.
Hand-flung grenade clusters were stuffed into the cargo pockets of either pant’s-leg. Some gas grenades; some explosive, some incendiary, some to generate fluorescent smoke for marking. You never knew what you were going to need. You only knew that you were going to need more of something than you carried. . . .
A portable medicomp to diagnose, dispense drugs, and patch the screaming wounded. If you could reach them. If they weren’t out there in the darkness being tortured by one Khalian while the rest of a Weasel platoon waited in ambush; and you still had to go, because she was your Marine and it didn’t matter, you had to bring back whatever the Weasels had left of her.
Sergeant Bradley lifted the rim of his commo helmet with one hand and knuckled the pink scar tissue that covered his scalp. He didn’t carry a fighting knife, but a powered metal-cutter dangled from his left hip where it balanced his canteen. He’d killed seven Weasels with the cutting bar one night.
Bradley was twenty-eight standard years old. His eyes were the age of the planet’s molten core.
“Come on, Top,” Sienkiewicz said, putting her big hand over the tension-mottled fingers with which the field first gripped his helmet. Major Kowacs sprinted toward them as the limousine accelerated out of the equipment yard. “We got a taxi to catch.”
“Right,” said Bradley in a husky voice. “Right, we gotta do that.”
He prayed that the Headhunters would be redeployed fast to some planet where there weren’t thousands of Weasels running around in Fleet uniforms. . . .
* * *
Sergeant Custis, a squad leader with three years service in the Headhunters, pulled Kowacs aboard the truck while Sie and Bradley hooked themselves onto seats on the opposite side of the vehicle’s center spine.
“Cap’n?” said Custis as his head swung close to his commanding officer’s helmet. “Is it true the Weasels are going to blow up their whole planet if we don’t deactivate the mines first? Ah, I mean, Major?”
Kowacs grimaced. One of the problems with latrine rumors was that they were only half right.
He checked to see that the flat box was secured firmly to his equipment belt. He’d clipped it there as soon as he received the device in the limousine.
Another problem with latrine rumors was that they were half right.
“Don’t sweat it, Buck,” Corporal Sienkiewicz offered from the bench seat on which she sat with her back against Custis’ back. “It’s gonna be a milk run this time.”
The lead truck was out of the gate with 1st Platoon aboard. A lowboy followed the Marines; the truck with Weapons Platoon and Kowacs’ command team lifted into the number three slot.
There was enough cross-wind to make the vehicles skittish. At least that prevented the gritty yellow dust which the fans lifted from coating everybody behind the leaders.
The Marine transporters had enough direct lift capacity to fly rather than skimming over a cushion of air the way the mining equipment had to do, but for this mission Kowacs had told the drivers to stay on the deck. After all, the Headhunters were supposed to be escorting the excavating machinery . . . or something.
“Six to all Headhunter elements,” Kowacs said, letting the artificial intelligence in his helmet cut through the conversations buzzing through the company. Everybody was nervous. “Here’s all the poop I know.”
But not quite everything he was afraid of. He instinctively touched the special communicator attached to his belt. . . .