Lash felt both nestari snap their weapons to the ready when his hand went up. Then his last finger was down to form a fist and he was throwing himself forward.
With their weapons ready and their aiming oculi ready to tag anything that moved, the three moved in a tight cluster, knees bent and bodies coiled in readiness to react to anything perceived as a threat. The tactical advance was quick enough that they crossed the square in a matter of seconds. Then a taut knife hand was sending them down the left hand side of the building.
With the worn wall on his right, Lash quickly made his way to the back corner. That's where he snapped up a fist to hold them there. Then he was pulling a small mirror on an extendable wand from a utility pouch. Sticking the butt end of the wand into his mouth, he quickly pulled the mirror out ten or fifteen centimeters. Then it was being carefully eased around the corner to take a look at the back door itself.
A muscle tightened in Lash's jaw when he saw no less than four White Flames in full combat armor, their bodies festooned with weapons of all kinds, standing in easy, long-term vigilance stances. Two each bracketed the door, making taking them all out at the same time difficult.
Yet, that was exactly what they needed to do. And quickly, before any sort of roaming patrol or embedded security camera caught them standing there, at the back corner.
Twisting the mirror slightly to get a good idea of how the enhanced humans were standing, he then drew it back. Then a hand came up with four fingers before two dropped and he signaled two on each side of the door. He tapped his left thigh twice to indicate he would take those two, then reached back to tap Truk's right arm twice to indicate he was responsible for the other two. Then he was carefully drawing a long-bladed combat knife from a sheath on his right hip and gathered himself.
In truth, Lash could probably use the Shanzi's power and speed to cut down all four regardless of their advanced armor. But then his secret weapon would be out in the open for everybody to see. If there were cameras watching them, it would be impossible for them to miss seeing the powerful weapon from the future in action.
So, they were going to go old school. Knives and bullets, and spilt blood on the ground.
Putting the knife into his left hand, Lash gave it a light flip to take hold of the blade tip. Then he was stepping sharply around the corner, his arm already moving toward a whipping release point.
The knife snapped through the air with a hiss before planting deep into the side of the nearest human's neck. Then, as that soldier stiffened and began falling, his right was up with his sidearm and he squeezed off a single shot at the exact same spot. The human, who was starting to turn his head to see what had transpired with his guard partner, jerked as the bullet penetrated the softer armor around the neck and just under the face-shielded tactical helmet. Then he too was falling forward.
Which was exactly the time Truk, while no Vos Qiran operator, was a veteran soldier with decades of service to the Van Tallert family, chose to step around the corner, rifle high. One shot took the next nearest human in the same spot Lash had picked, instantly stiffening the man up. But it took a quick burst of three to cut down the final guard who, last to fall, had managed to swing his own rifle into place to get off a quick burst before his throat was ripped out by Truk's precision shot.
Even before the last body was one the ground, Lash was at the door. Holding his rifle out of the way, he tapped the panel that hid the two access points. It instantly slid to the side to reveal a retinal scanner, a palm print plate and a recessed numerical pad. Lash leaned in, unconsciously holding his breath as he put his eye close enough for the retinal scanner to pick up.
A wash of green light went over his right eye, then the palm plate angled forward. Lash hesitated slightly, then put his hand on it to also be scanned before reaching out and rapidly punching in the command code he used during his last stay here, nearly a decade ago. The whole access point flashed green at that point and, with an audible click, the door to Lash's right, opened.
With his rifle back up, Lash put his shoulder against the door and, with steady pressure, pushed the heavy portal out of the way and eased inside at the same time. And right into the safehouse's eating area. Currently filled to nearly overflowing with modified humans in dark uniforms, the stylized White Flame openly visible on their left shoulders. With the house equipped with thick, stone walls, they hadn't heard enough of the gunfire outside to realize it was gunfire. So they were still sitting or standing in various spots around the kitchen, talking, eating and drinking as they did.
"Is this a bad time?" Lash asked lightly in English as one, the entire room turned their heads to look at him. Then his rifle, on full auto, was opening up to fling burning hot metal into the room.
A heartbeat later seven humans were down, some slumped over the table and others untidily sprawled on the floor, their blood leaking onto the polished stone floor. Then Truk was stepping behind him, his own rifle firing in tight bursts to cut down another trio moving in from the front living area.
Before the last one could hit the floor, Narcist was beside him and together they cut down four more that boiled out of side rooms, including the security closet, handguns up and ready. Despite the two Ventru nestari getting the drop on them, the humans were fast and skilled enough to get off several shots before they were unceremoniously cut down, their bodies tumbling roughly onto the floor.
As the last body stopped moving, there was a silent flash of red light from several recessed LEDs scattered along the roof and the tops of walls.
"That's the breach alarm," Lash said tightly. "Narcist! Get into the closet and first yank out all of the network cabling, then the power from the cabinet. Go! Now!"
As the lithe tech specialist ran into the security closet, Truk and Lash followed at a slightly more leisurely place.
"I get the networking cables, to prevent a wipe command coming in from the dedicated network, but the power cable?" Truk asked.
"Each hard point in the network is wired with its own scramble, encrypt, and wipe protocols to prevent valuable data from falling into the right hands," Lash explained as they stepped into the small room set aside for the house's surveillance hardware. Just in time to watch a determined Narcist yank out the power cable from a dedicated panel, every piece of equipment in the room going dark as she did.
"Hopefully pulling the power will keep the local vault from either encrypting or wiping before we pull what we want out of it," he finished as, with a steadying breath, Narcist leaned back from the now-lifeless equipment.
"Yeah, but if it's dead, Wolf, then how do we access it?"
Lash looked at Truk then he reached into his backpack, pulling out what looked like a solid brick of obsidian. Then he tossed it to Narcist, who caught it, eyes wide.
"A Qos Viran e-ram!" she said in a voice that was barely stronger than a gasp of surprise. "This is protected tech. Only ..." Then she grinned ruefully. "Sorry. Forgot what your real job was for a second there."
"That should power the cabinet enough for us to run a search for what we want," Lash indicated as Narcist opened recessed ports on the brick to draw out plastic cables and connectors. Connectors that she quickly plugged into the cabinet. Then, after the final cable went into her tablet, she leaned back.
"Okay, we're in," she said after examining the symbols dancing across her screen for a brief moment. "And a good thing we have the e-ram. I'm seeing encrypt protocols on the edge of activating and locking the cabinet's database down tighter than the Lord Marshal's lean-lined blast shelter!" Then she was falling silent to furiously work.
That left the two warriors to step back out of the cabinet, their weapons held ready.
"How long before this place is crawling with Hand operatives?" Truk asked in a low voice as they searched each shadow with hard and probing eyes. "Or worse, White Flames?"
"Minutes, perhaps," Lash said with a frown. "The breach alert would've gone network wide. If that means only Galway, then whatever assets weren't involved in that debacle at the bus depot, or in guarding this place, will be on their way here." He looked over at Truk.
"Assuming, of course, the White Flames don't just abandon the Hand to their fate." His eyes tracked to the bodies clogging the hallway and the kitchen. "They're taking losses on this operation. Losses I suspect they didn't anticipate. If they have some sort of long game in play, they won't want to lose so many assets up front in the opening days of a campaign. And the Hand needs the White Flames to continue operating here, not the other way around."
"Copy that," Truk said, shaking his head. "I find myself hoping we don't kill so many of these enhanced humans, they start bountying us out. I don't think we'd fare as well against them as we think we might." He gave the nearest body's foot a nudge with the toe of his boot. "Those nanites, advanced armor, and heavy weaponry are leveling the field uncomfortably fast. If we find ourselves their prey, we'll have so much more to worry about than we do right now!"
"I agree," Lash grimly stated, also examining the bodies close to them. Despite being fairly riddled with bullets from Truk and Narcist's assault, there was almost no blood. In fact, he could see half of their wounds were already closed, likely due to the nanites infesting their blood like parasites. Parasites that kill thirsty vampires.
Without warning the red lights still balefully glowing along the roof, went green before winking out.
"Uh oh," Truk muttered before looking over at an even grimmer Lash, which he didn't even think was possible. "That can't be good."
"It isn't," Lash growled before twisting back towards the security closet. "Narcist! Double time! We have incoming!"
"I need another five minutes," the Ventru tech specialist called back. "Then I'll have everything!"
Truk looked at Lash as the big vampire took a quick count of his remaining magazines.
"Can we hold out five minutes?"
"Against a full company of Hand operatives? Light work. A company of White Flames, on the other hand?" Lash's expression tightened.
"Not a chance."
The big vampire pointed at the front door.
"Access panel is there, on the left," he directed and Truk began walking in that direction. "Pop it open and key in four eights in quick succession. That's the lockdown code. It'll seal the windows and doors, forcing whoever is now coming for us, to blow through them if they want us." Then he turned and quickly strode in the opposite direction towards the back door.
As he reached it, his sharp vampire hearing could already pick out the scuffle of combat boots on the square's cobblestone just beyond the safehouse. They had seconds before the assault began. Putting his shoulder against the heavy portal, he pushed it closed. At the same time he reached out with his left hand to flip open the access panel and key in the lockdown code.
As soon as the door was back in frame, he heard the lockdown bolts hammer into place with metallic 'thunks'. Just in time; even as the last one settled, the door thudded as several bodies hit it in an attempt to push it back open before the lockdown engaged.
"I've got bodies trying to push through the door here," Truk reported from the front.
"Same, back here," Lash reported, carefully stepping back to give the window to the right a quick look. He almost smiled when it groaned first against an attempt to hurtle a body through it. Then it was snapping with the impacts as several weapons opened up on it at close range.
"They should be testing the windows about now," he called out.
"Right on schedule," Truk confirmed. "I hear them now. I give them another thirty seconds or so before they break out the heavy duty stuff and try blowing the door."
"I say ten."
Lash had managed to get to seven before, with a loud report, one of the front-facing windows was screaming with the effort to keep out a rocket-propelled grenade round.
"How many can the window take?" Truk said, retreating back from the front door to take position at the front end of the hallway, a position Lash mirrored on the back end of the short passageway.
"Grenade rounds? Maybe four, five, if we're lucky," Lash said, pulling several of his spare magazines out of his pack to tuck them into his belt. Still wearing the human civilian clothes they had taken from the cache at the airport in an effort to blend in with the local populace, he found himself missing his combat utility vest with its bandoliers and utility pouches. They made it so much easier to have ammo ready and nearby during a firefight.
And there was no mistaking it: they were about to be involved in one of the fiercest firefights they had fought so far during this operation. More frantic than the ambush at the depot, and more furious than the running fight they fought at Magnar's estate. And that wasn't even considering what they would be forced to do, to cut themselves free of this place with their prize and escape.
"As Qos Viran, you've been in this kind of situation before, right?" Truk said, a trickle of nervous perspiration oozing out of his hairline as the second grenade round went off against the window in the front of the building. At the same time, a grenade round pounded into the only window in the back, alerting them to the fact their enemies intended on attacking from both directions.
Despite the situation, a thin smile made its way onto Lash's face at that thought. At least they wouldn't run out of targets to shoot at! What did the humans call it? A target-rich environment?
"Once or twice," he admitted, stuffing pieces of his shirt into his ears. "Stay frosty. We'll get through this!"
Then his attention was being jerked to the front of the building as, with a roar, the targeted window blew inwards, a victim of the fourth grenade fired into it.
"Tight bursts at the neck, Truk," he tautly directed as dust and smoke billowed over them. "They're bottle-necked by needing to climb in through a less than man-sized window!"
"Copy that," Truk hissed. Then he was firing in quick, tight bursts as dimly seen figures began scrambling in through the blown-out window.
A heartbeat later the window in the back also blew in, sending a gout of flame-licked smoke rushing into the kitchen and hallway. Instead of bodies following close after, however, Lash's eyes narrowed as several narrow cylinders were tossed in through the blasted open window instead.
Flash bang grenades; he just barely managed to get his eyes closed and his head twisted to the side before they went off, sending shockwaves and bright light strobing through the smoke. Protected from their effects in some part, thanks to the cloth he stuffed into his ears and turning away at the right time, Lash quickly shook off the percussive effects and was able to put a bullet into the earhole of the first figure that jumped into the window in the grenades' shadow.
And grimaced when the round caromed off the armored helmet, the human smart enough to come in helmet first and shoulders hunched to protect its neck.
"Kadasa," Lash snarled. Then he reached over and jerked Truk's combat knife out of its sheath on the nestari's waist. So occupied was he with the humans trying to coming in the front window, the Ventru warrior didn't even react to losing his knife, choosing instead to increase his firing rate in an attempt to hold the armored humans back.