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  The orange dot of Wingate’s pointer settled on the walled hotel complex. “As you can see,” he said, “Charlie Company has taken a defensive position in Hotel Wendosa. The Keepers of the One Freedom have yet to attempt a melee assault, so we assume the Spartans are patrolling outside the perimeter, breaking up Jiralhanae formations before they can charge.”

  Wingate circled the pointer around the Hotel Wendosa, as though he feared Murtag wasn’t familiar enough with military parlance to know what “patrolling outside the perimeter” meant.

  “I’m sure you’re correct,” Murtag said. “How long can that continue?”

  “It’s hard to know,” Wingate admitted. “But we’ve been very successful with our resupply drops, even with just the one Falcon left. So our people aren’t short of munitions.”

  “How long, Major?” Murtag repeated. If he didn’t lose Charlie Company, he just might escape Parangosky’s wrath and retain his ONI commission. But if he lost an entire combat company without bringing back the ancilla—or at least something big—he would consider himself lucky to only be drummed out of the service. “And spare me the equivocation. I need to know if they’ll last until the relief column reaches them.”

  Wingate lowered his eyes and gave a reluctant head shake. “I just don’t know.”

  He moved the pointer to the edge of Wendosa, then began to trace a sinuous brown line running along the crest of a jungle ridge. About halfway along, the line dissolved into a series of long dashes, then grew solid again and descended the ridge toward an intersection with a larger road. On the intersection side of the dashes sat a long column of Warthog APCs.

  “This is the only road into Wendosa,” Wingate said. His pointer stopped at the dashes. “And the Committee to Preserve Gao Independence blew it up right here.”

  Murtag’s stomach dropped. “Then that’s as far as the relief column has advanced?”

  “That’s as far as the column advanced yesterday,” Wingate said. “When the APCs couldn’t go any farther, both companies dismounted and continued on foot.”

  Murtag studied the ridge between the blown section of road and Wendosa. “How far is it from the breach to the village?”

  “Ten kilometers,” Wingate said.

  “Only ten?” Murtag frowned, trying to figure out why the relief companies weren’t in Wendosa already. “That’s all?”

  “We’re talking ten kilometers through jungle and rough terrain, Commander.”

  “And they couldn’t circle around the breach on foot and continue along the road,” Murtag surmised. “That would have been too easy.”

  Wingate nodded. “Mined.” He pointed the laser at some of the gaps between dashes. “That’s what happened here. And even if it hadn’t, marching a road through that terrain is a good way to lose your entire column.”

  Murtag sighed and closed his eyes, echoes of Parangosky’s cold fury already ringing in his ears. “These Keepers of the One Freedom aren’t your run-of-the-mill ex-Covenant religious faction, are they?”

  “No, sir,” Wingate replied. “They’re good, they’re organized—and I’m certain they have help.”

  “The independence committee?”

  “No doubt about it,” Wingate said. “My guess is President Aponte himself is behind it. You know how these pro-autonomy Colonials are—they smile and nod, but as soon as your back is turned, the knives come out.”

  That wasn’t the way Aponte struck Murtag, but he saw no purpose in arguing the point. Instead, he asked, “So how close is the relief column?”

  “As of dawn, less than two kilometers from Wendosa,” Wingate replied. “But that last stretch includes a tough climb. It could take two hours or two days.”

  Murtag sighed. “And you really can’t find an escort platoon for me?” He knew the answer even before asking, but he had to try. “The sooner I find the ancilla, the better it’ll be for everyone.”

  “I understand that, Commander,” Wingate said. “We’re stretched too thin already. But after the task force enters orbit, I should be able to give you an entire company.”

  “The task force?” Murtag asked. He was starting to think Wingate wasn’t as smart as his rank suggested. “What makes you think the task force will change anything?”

  Wingate furrowed his brow. “You mean it’s not coming?”

  “Of course it’s coming,” Murtag said. “It’s probably approaching orbit as we speak. But that doesn’t mean much—not if you’re right about Gao itself being behind these attacks.”

  “I’m not following you,” Wingate said. “If the task force is coming, why wouldn’t they reinforce us? We’re already under attack here.”

  “And Gao is a sovereign planet,” Murtag pointed out. “Admiral Tuwa will threaten and bluff, but she’s not going to risk another Insurrection just to save our hides. In fact, I’m fairly certain Admiral Parangosky gave her orders not to.”

  Wingate’s face went slack, and for a moment, he seemed too stunned to answer. Finally, he seemed to grasp that the UNSC was not playing under wartime rules. “I see. What about Owls?”

  Murtag nodded. “She’ll drop a few of those.” Owls were the stealth version of Pelicans, smaller and more lightly armed and armored, but capable of slipping undetected into most planetary atmospheres. “But she won’t send enough to risk being accused of an invasion. So we’ll get a few platoons at most. Will that be enough to turn things around?”

  “It’s better than nothing,” Wingate said. “But if you’re right about the task force’s orders, our situation is clearly different now. Can you hold off your mission until the Owls—”

  “Excuse me, Major.” Wingate’s aide, a petite captain wearing a comm set over her short red hair, stepped over to the holograph. “But you and Commander Nelson will want to hear this report. It’s from Wendosa, and it will affect your planning.”

  Noting the gleam in the captain’s eyes, Murtag said, “We could use some good news.” He glanced toward the bulky projection unit hanging above the holographic map. “Wendell, let us hear it over the speakers.”

  “Of course, Commander.” Wendell’s voice seemed to emanate from the walls themselves, as he was tapped into the conference room’s state-of-the-art public address system. “Go ahead, Captain Breit. You are now reporting directly to Commander Nelson and Major Wingate.”

  “Copy that.” Breit’s crisp voice was barely audible through a background clatter of small-arms fire. “Sirs, the situation here has improved. Charlie Company is launching a counterattack.”

  Murtag began to feel more optimistic about his future prospects. “Then the relief column has arrived?”

  “Not yet, Commander,” Breit said. “But Fred-104 and his squad came out of the cave and caught the enemy from behind. Between them and the rest of Blue Team, the Spartans have disrupted the attack.”

  “And you intend to counterattack before the enemy has time to regroup,” Wingate said.

  “Affirmative, sir.”

  “Good plan,” Wingate said.

  “Thank you, sir,” Breit replied. “And, Commander Nelson, there’s something else you should know.”

  “I’m listening.”

  “I don’t have all the details,” Breit continued. “But it sounds like Fred and his squad brought a couple of artifacts out of the cave.”

  “That tells me nothing,” Murtag snapped. “Details, Captain. I need details.”

  “All I know is what I heard over the comms,” Breit said. Explosions began to rumble in the background, turning his voice buzzy with static. “It came from Kelly . . . said it looks like Fred found the objective . . . brought back a hero doc and some kind of floating worm-device.”

  “Hero doc?” Murtag’s gaze drifted back to the near edge of the holographic contour map. The Well of Echoes was a lot closer to the Montero Vitality Center than it was Wendosa, but Fred and his squad had been underground for more than two and a half days—plenty of time for a squad of Spartans to travel that far. “Could she have s
aid Huragok?”

  “Sure, why not?” Breit said. “Look, Commander, things are wild here. I’m not even sure Kelly made physical contact with Fred. Her report might be based on something she saw through a scope.”

  “It doesn’t matter, Captain.” Murtag’s stomach was fluttering with excitement. “Fred and those two artifacts are mission critical. You will secure them ASAP. Clear?”

  When the only reply to Murtag’s order was a din-filled pause, Wingate asked, “Captain Breit, is it possible to fulfill Commander Nelson’s request?”

  “Unclear, sir,” Breit replied. “Like I said, it’s pretty wild here.”

  “Then do your best, Captain. I’ll try to get you some support.” Wingate paused, then asked: “Wendell, what’s the status of the Falcon?”

  “The ground crew is preparing it for another supply drop,” Wendell reported. “The cargo is being loaded as we speak. It’s scheduled to be airborne in twenty-two minutes.”

  “Too long,” Wingate said. “Hold the rest of the cargo and get that bird aloft now.”

  “But the craft is only at forty-two percent capacity,” Wendell said. “It’s highly inefficient to risk a flight over hostile terrain to deliver half a payload.”

  “Do it anyway,” Murtag said, guessing Wingate’s intent. “Resupply isn’t our priority at the moment.”

  “If you insist,” Wendell said. “But you’re only saving fifteen minutes. The crew still needs to refuel and do a preflight inspection. That Falcon has been making combat runs all night long, and there’s a thirty-two percent chance that a critical system needs service.”

  “Seven minutes will have to do,” Wingate interrupted. “Captain Breit, I know you can’t wait for the air support, but drop some smoke on—”

  A pulsing, ear-piercing screech filled the room, cutting the order short. Fearing it heralded the arrival of a missile or a high-powered artillery shell, Murtag dropped to the floor and covered his head.

  Nothing.

  The screech continued, pulsing through the sound system with a vibrato quiver that seemed oddly familiar. He uncovered his head and looked up to find Wingate still standing next to him, scowling in disapproval. Behind the major, the aide had flung her headset aside and was holding her ear, her face contorted in pain.

  “It’s nothing to be afraid of, Commander!” Wingate had to yell to make himself heard above the din. “Our communications are just being jammed.”

  Murtag wasn’t so sure. As he grew accustomed to the noise, he began to recognize its pulsing rhythm—and the repetitive pattern of its quivering pitch. Heart pounding harder than ever, he jumped to his feet and looked up at the projection unit.

  “Wendell, run a pattern analysis on that signal,” Murtag ordered. “Compare it to the ancilla’s original distress calls—and see if you can identify an origination point.”

  The screech continued unabated, and Wendell did not reply.

  “Wendell?”

  “He can’t answer you, sir,” the aide said. Having pulled a comm tablet off her belt, she was frantically tapping through menus. “We’ve lost control of our communications network.”

  “Which elements?” Wingate demanded. “And who’s doing it?”

  When the aide looked up, her jaw had fallen slack. “All of them, Major,” she said. “And . . . it looks like the hijacking code came from—”

  “Wendosa, of course,” Murtag said. “And it probably originated from a Spartan comm unit.”

  The aide looked at him. “That’s right, sir,” she confirmed. “It came directly from Fred-104. How did you know?”

  “Because that’s the simplest explanation.” Murtag started for the door, gesturing for Wingate to follow. “Major, come with me. I’m probably going to need you.”

  Wingate fell in beside him. “To do what, Commander?”

  “To order that Falcon pilot to make a hot landing in Wendosa,” Murtag said. “I don’t think she’ll do it on my authority alone.”

  “Why the hell would I do that?” They reached the door, and Wingate stopped. “That’s our last Falcon!”

  “I know,” Murtag said. “But we need to evacuate Fred at all costs—and we need to do it now. He’s captured the ancilla.”

  CHAPTER 18

  * * *

  * * *

  0828 hours, July 5, 2553 (military calendar)

  Avelos Avenue, Wendosa Village, Montero Cavern Surface

  Campos Wilderness District, Planet Gao, Cordoba System

  A crisp thud-bang rang out above Wendosa, and Castor looked up between a pair of charred rafters to find a smoky starburst spreading across the sky. Tiny tongues of flame appeared at the end of each arm and began to arc downward, and he feared the UNSC was dropping a pod of shock troopers on the village—or even a packet of weapons of mass destruction.

  Then two cross-shaped slivers entered the same swath of sky. As Castor watched, they drifted together and erupted into a smoky fireball, and he realized it was the humans’ news-gathering drones that had been circling Wendosa, and they were no longer flying an orderly pattern. Instead, the craft were swirling about like gnats, crossing paths and occasionally colliding. Some had drifted so high they were barely visible, while others had dropped so low Castor could see the camera domes hanging beneath their bellies.

  “The Gaos have lost command of their sky-eyes,” said Orsun.

  The grizzled old warrior was standing next to Castor, both of them on the third story of a burned-out guesthouse on Wendosa’s central avenue.

  Their escorts were waiting below, as it would have been unwise to trust the sagging floor with more weight than necessary.

  “The infidels are jamming their control frequencies,” Orsun continued. “Just as they are jamming our battlenet.”

  “So it appears,” Castor said. “But what is it they hope to hide?”

  “A nuclear strike?”

  “It is possible,” Castor said. “But perhaps a chemical or biological attack would be easier to conceal afterward.”

  Orsun’s lips pulled back from his broken fangs. “They would not dare!”

  “Never underestimate what humans will dare. That has been the death of more than one shipmaster.”

  As Castor spoke, the droning whine of turboprop engines sounded high over the jungle behind him. He turned and saw the thin-waisted silhouette of a UNSC Falcon diving toward Wendosa, its chin gun flashing as it sprayed suppression fire along the village edge. At first it appeared the craft was just making another supply drop, but instead of releasing the usual clutch of ordnance pods, it entered an evasive zigzag and continued to descend.

  A single missile rose out of the jungle, but its approach was nose-to-nose with the Falcon. There was no time to achieve lock-on before they were past each other, and the missile arced out of sight without detonating.

  A heartbeat later, the rest of Castor’s pack opened fire, lacing the air with plasma beams and crystal needles. The sturdy Falcon shrugged off the attacks as though it were a flying kalcoom, then pulled up and flipped its rotors into the horizontal position. Castor was pleased to catch a glimpse of the door gunners hanging dead in their harnesses, then the Falcon dropped out of view.

  He turned toward the front of the ruin and crouched down behind a fist-size shell hole. With any luck at all, the enemy snipers would not notice the change of light as he looked through the spyhole, and he would survive long enough to figure out what the infidels were planning.

  What little Castor could see was not good. The Falcon had landed inside the walled compound of what the Gaos called the Hotel Wendosa, and the infidel marines were advancing up the corpse-strewn street in teams, with one squad racing forward while the other provided cover. As they passed each building, they cleared it swiftly and mercilessly, using launchers to fire grenades through the windows, then stepping inside to finish any survivors with small-arms fire.

  Castor could not actually see any Spartans from his spyhole, but the presence of the armored demons was impossibl
e to deny. Any Kig-Yar or human Keeper of the One Freedom sympathizer who popped up behind a windowsill or peered around a corner was felled by a three-round burst. And whenever a band of Jiralhanae tried to mass for a charge, they were soon disrupted by the arrival of a screaming rocket.

  The only feasible response was to fall back and regroup—and that was exactly what Castor would have done, had he been able to issue the command. But the battlenet was being jammed, and his warriors were spread over a square kilometer of village. There was simply no way to issue the order.

  After a moment, Castor realized the humans were not using their comm systems, either. As the squads advanced, they were signaling to each other with hand gestures and shouted commands. After watching a few moments, he even began to pick out runners relaying messages between the advancing squads and the command post inside the walled compound.

  Castor pulled back from the spyhole. “The infidels are not the ones jamming our battlenet,” he said. “It appears their communications have failed, too.”

  Orsun cocked his head. “You are certain?”

  “You challenge my judgment?”

  Orsun looked away. “Never, Dokab,” he said. “But my understanding fails me. If the infidels are not jamming us, who is?”

  “Indeed.” Castor stepped to the far corner of the room. “Who?”

  He pressed himself tight against the front wall, then peered out through the empty window back toward the jagged oval of the cave entrance. The fountain in the small courtyard continued to spray, jetting a full five meters into the air before splashing down into a pool pink with blood. The cobblestones surrounding the basin were pocked with grenade craters and littered with dead marines and derelict battle rifles, and Castor could not help feeling humbled when he recalled the confidence with which he had led the charge out of the cavern and across those same cobblestones.

  His Keepers had outnumbered the infidels by at least four-to-one, and Castor was certain his victory would be an easy one. But the enemy had fought with discipline and a fierceness he had not expected from humans, and a day later he could not even say how much of his own pack remained—though he knew it was less than half of his original five hundred.