UNIVERSAL TURBULENT

LVII - INDEPENDENT EARTH

Marco took a remote off the worktable, clicked through a series of wall maps, and stopped on the one he wanted. It showed the southern half of Africa. The "hop, skip, and a jump" that Doug Douglas dismissed so lightly spanned the former countries of Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, Zambia, Botswana, plus a healthy chunk of South Africa.

Impossible to make the trip on the ground, given the fact that Luton's forces were out there waiting for them, and iffy by air even with Salom's help. Stupid, really, unless...

The officer moved the cursor onto the word "Johannesburg" and clicked. A map of the city appeared. "Do you know where the building is?"

Doug Douglas nodded.

Marco handed him the remote. "Show me".

Doug Douglas directed the cursor to the north, east of Soweto, and clicked on one particular intersection. A shot obtained from an orbital satellite bloomed. The buildings appeared flat and rectangular. The shadows suggested that they were three or four stories tall.

The industrialist chose the one to the southeast and used the arrow to circle it. "This is the building where Marco is being held".

Marco frowned. "An office building?"

"No, a warehouse".

The officer nodded. A firefight inside an office building could produce a lot of civilian casualties. He had no desire to turn one tragedy into many. "What, if anything, have we got on the building? Security systems? Number of guards? Anything would help".

Doug Douglas felt a sudden surge of hope and hurried to offer a second disk. "Not everything, but quite a bit".

Marco summoned Captain Lucy, Lieutenant Goodear, and First Sergeant Neverlaugh. They discussed tragedy, timing, logistics, and more; long into the night.

Later, while lying awake in his room, Marco wondered about his motives. Why had he agreed to go? Because Sophie Doug Douglas could help the resistance effort? Or because of her eyes? They haunted his dreams.

* * *

The sun was little more than a quickly fading orange red smear by the time the fly form deposited Marco, Sparrow, Goodear, and the Special Recon Squadron's 2nd platoon at Bajoti's airport. The 1st platoon had already arrived.

There was a thump as the shids touched down. Marco released the safety harness, stood, and pulled his gear out of a rack.

Lieutenant Barr had ferried Marco across the gulf what seemed like years before. She spoke via the PA system. "Good luck, Colonel. Sorry I can't take you all the way".

Though large, and well suited for carrying heavy loads over relatively short distances, the insectoid fly forms didn't have sufficient range to cover the nearly six thousand mile round trip without a stop to refuel. The fact that the cyborg had a top speed of only five hundred mph didn't help either.

Marco offered a thumbs up to the nearest camera. "That makes two of us, Lieutenant... Watch your six".

Barr didn't have eyes, not anymore, but she had feelings, and the fact that Marco knew who she was, and had taken a moment to speak with her, meant a great deal. She said, "Roger that, sir", wished she could say more, and bit a non existent lip.

A security team had spent most of the previous day sweeping the airport for electronic surveillance devices. They vacuumed up no less than four thousands of the tiny machines, all left by Luton's forces.

The next step was to turn the cyborgs by feeding false input into their CPUs. The stratagem wouldn't work forever, the mutineers were too smart for that, but the entire mission, travel time included, was slated for ten hours, or twelve, if things got hairy.

Additional security had been provided by Captain NY, who, along with a force of carefully reconditioned Trooper IIs, patrolled the airport's perimeter. They had orders to kill anything that moved, and, judging from the occasional rattle of machine g*n fire, they took the responsibility seriously.

That made for lots of dead snakes, rodents, and anything else that might conceal, harbor, or actually be an enemy surveillance device. Servos whined, sensors probed, and the scent of ozone tinged the warm night air.

Marco made his way down the roll up stairs, felt the heat push its way up through the soles of his boots, and started to walk.

The 2nd platoon jogged past as Marco made his way toward the hanger where the final briefing was scheduled to take place. The Naa ran double time, or one hundred twenty paces to the minute, and sang verse three of Le Boudin:

Our forebearers knew how to die

For the glory of the Legion;

We shall all know how to perish,

Following tradition.

The officer looked up into the quickly darkening sky. Had the first blow been struck? He certainly hoped so, because of the newly named Rear Admiral Salom failed to provide the necessary air support the raid was doomed from the start.

The mutineers had spy sats, plenty of them, many of which could and did monitor his activities. They were up there right now, watching the airport, feeding data to Luton. Salom's job was to take them out not just some, the ones that could report on Africa, but all of them works wide. It would be a major blow if the admiral could pull it off.

The suggestion to enlarge the scope of the mission to include strategic objectives had originated with Doug Douglas. That was proof of the industrialist's experience and long range purpose, all of which made Marco feel better about the older man's motives.

The troops were assembled and waiting by the time Marco passed under the hanger's lights. Not ideal prior to a night mission, but there would be time for their eyes to adjust. The legionnaires stood in a semicircle, their backs to an old bush beater, the smell of fuel hanging in the air.

Sparrow had gone to some lengths in order to beat his commanding officer into the hangar, and looked sharp enough for inspection. He shouted "Ten hut!" and the entire squadron crashed to attention.