Earth Thirst (The Arcadian Conflict) - By Mark Teppo Page 0,113

completely fucked by the flashbang.

There's a man standing next to me, wearing boots and gray pants that are tucked into the tops of the boots. Standard military-style dress. I roll toward him, swinging the case into his knees. He falls, coming down to my level, and I spot the HK MP7 in his hands. I hit him in the face with the case, and take his gun.

More men are coming, pouring out of the back of the armored vehicle that rear-ended us. It's a security truck, the sort used by bank couriers. Secutores, yet again. In an upgraded transport this time. I point my freshly acquired gun and pull the trigger as rapidly as I can, knowing these guys don't default to full auto. Two men go down, and the rest scatter.

I bolt for a nearby pillar as the mercs still upright return fire from cover. The high-pitched noise in my head is no longer a scream; it's a tea kettle whistle echoing down a long metal tube. The scream of a mortar shell falling from its apogee. The distant crump of shells exploding along a trench line. The front, on so many nights during World War I.

Crouching behind my pillar, ignoring both the sudden influx of forgotten memories and the minute vibrations in the pillar that tells me it is being hit by gunfire, I open the aluminum case.

I have both grenades and a handgun. I blink, and I see Phoebe sitting beside me in the car, hands in her lap.

She gave me this case when we came to the elevator. Both grenades and a CZ 75—along with a few spare magazines.

I blink again and yank a grenade free of the foam. Yank the pip, release the spoon, and roll it toward the armored security truck behind our sedan. It bounces a few times, and then explodes near the armored truck. It won't do much to the heavy vehicle, but it'll make them cautious. I have two more grenades, and so I throw another one, trying to put it past the truck to flush out the guys hiding back there. I cram the remaining contents of the case into various pockets as the second grenade goes off.

A Mercedes G-class is coming from the other direction of the roundabout. The faces peering out the windows aren't frightened. More mercs, arriving in more standard Secutores-style transport. I empty the magazine of the gun I stole, killing both men in the front seat, and the Mercedes jerks to the right and slams into a nearby pillar. I drop the empty MP7, switch to the CZ 75, and put two rounds through the back passenger side window, hopefully getting one more of the mercenaries.

More Mercedes are arriving, disgorging armed men. Belfast must be bringing everyone on the payroll. I'm outnumbered and outgunned. But they're not coming in for shock and awe. They're coming in for containment. They're moving efficiently to cut me off, firing to keep me pinned down. They want to secure the sedan.

They want prisoners.

I gauge my options. I could run to my right, back toward the front doors of the hotel, and I might even make it, but that would put me inside the hotel. I'd just be containing myself, making their job easy. I jerk to my left, drawing fire from some of the approaching men, but I don't stop. I make it to the next pillar, and then keep going. I'm running faster than they expect, and in the time it takes them to recalibrate their aim, I've already reached the edge of the building. There's a narrow brick fence that separates the manicured hedges of the hotel entrance from the surrounding parking lot, and I leap over it easily.

I lurch to a stop and crab-walk back to the wall, moving toward the street that runs past the hotel. After a few meters, I press up against the wall and peek over. It takes a few seconds for someone to spot me and start firing, but in those few seconds, I get a pretty good idea of the situation.

There's more than a half-dozen Mercedes in the roundabout now, and Phoebe and Mere are being loaded into separate vehicles. The armored car has been abandoned, and the only reason would be because my grenade had actually done some structural damage or wrecked a tire.

As I creep along the wall, four of the Mercedes peel away from the hotel and accelerate up the street. There's no sense in sticking around