The command car pulled up alongside the chute, making a half turn so that its bow angled toward the camp proper. Though it was an hour short of sunset and the clouds had cleared, the driver switched on his headlights. In their beams the strands of razor ribbon glittered like jagged icicles. Two troopers with sub-machine guns got out of the vehicle and walked over to the wire.
“Prisoners of Hammer’s Regiment!” a voice boomed through the command car’s loudspeakers. “You will walk in line through the passage at the southeast corner of this camp. As you pass my vehicle—”
The whip antenna on top of the car glowed, becoming a wand of soft red light.
“—you will turn to face it. Then you will walk on to the containers in which you’ll be transported to Midway. There you’ll be released.”
The words were being repeated on the north side of the POW encampment. It wasn’t an echo from the volcano, as Huber thought for a moment. The A Company combat cars were relaying the speech through their public address systems.
“Who’s that in the car?” Deseau said. From the way his eyes were narrowed, he already knew the answer to his question.
“It sounds like Major Steuben,” Huber said. “As you’d expect.”
A full company of Gendarmes stood by the shipping containers. Mauricia Orichos was among them, her hands linked behind her back. Huber had been watching her as Steuben spoke. Orichos hadn’t been best pleased at the words, “Prisoners of Hammer’s Regiment.”
That was tough. She knew she’d been the only member of the Point forces present when Fort Freedom fell. The Slammers had taken these prisoners, and if the Gendarmery wanted to get snooty about it, the Slammers could take the prisoners away from their present guards any time they wanted to.
A prisoner bellowed something toward the car. Though he made a megaphone of his hands, Huber couldn’t catch the word or brief phrase.
Steuben did, however. The loudspeakers boomed, “A gentleman has expressed doubt that you will actually be released. Let me assure you, mesdames and sirs, that if I wished to kill you all I would not bother with play acting. When you get to Midway, you will be told to sin no more and be released.”
The trucks had unloaded their pallets of black-banded gas cylinders. Five of them shut down. The sixth lifted and lumbered past Task Force Sangrela to settle again beside the command car. The driver opened the cab door and stood on his mounting step, looking at the camp. Another squad of White Mice dismounted from the back and walked over to the chute.
“Very well,” the PA system thundered. Amplification softened Steuben’s clipped tones, making his words sound pompous. Huber found the contrast with the real man chilling. “Start coming through. The sooner you get moving, the sooner we can all get on to more congenial tasks.”
A prisoner near the front looked around, then shambled into the chute. One of the White Mice reached an arm over the wire to halt the man in the headlights. His head rose in surprise and sudden fear.
“Keep going!” the amplified voice ordered.
The trooper’s arm dropped; the prisoner jogged the rest of the way to where Gendarmes herded him into the first container. Several more prisoners followed, shuffling forward in a mixture of desperation and apathy.
“I suggest reconsideration on the part of anyone who thinks he’ll remain in the tents,” Steuben continued, the catlike humor of his tone coming through despite mechanical distortion. “We’re going to destroy the entire site, starting at the north side. We can see you through cloth as surely as we’ll be able to see you in the dead of night, so don’t be foolish.”
There was a hollow boop, then a second later a white flash and a shattering crash. A second boop, Wham! followed immediately. Troopers in the combat cars on the north side were firing grenade launchers into the tents.
Thermal viewing would show any holdouts, so there was no need for the grenades. Major Steuben was just making a point, to the Gendarmes as surely as to the captive Volunteers.
“Sierra, this is Flamingo Six-three,” said the A Company signals officer. “Fox Three-six is to report to the command car ASAP. Out.”