Merkiaari Wars: 02 - What Price Honour by Mark E. Cooper Read Free Book Online

base. Looked at another way, the mission was a bust. Destroying the base without killing the rebels was pointless; they would just set up somewhere else. Eric must be sick at the thought of all his work wasted. He had lived here undercover for weeks to learn what he needed to finish the rebels, but now all his work was threatened. No wonder he was pissed at being bad mouthed by this scum of a rebel.
    The rebel screamed again. “God don’t! No more… I’ll talk!”
    “Are you sure?” Eric said with another twist of the bloody stump. “I don’t like lies.”
    “No lies I swear! They’re hitting the parliament building!”
    “When?”
    “ Noon! The President reconvenes parliament at noon!”
    “Good boy.”
    Gina turned away and opened a channel. “Gold One, Eagle One.”
    “Eagle One, Red One. Gold One is out of contact.”
    “Copy, Red One. I have the target, Lieutenant. The rebels are hitting the parliament building at noon today.”
    “Copy noon today,” Lieutenant Strong said. “Stein guessed the target, but we didn’t know exactly when. Well done.”
    “Thanks, Lieutenant. Eagle One clear.”
    “Red One clear.”
    “They’re sending the transport,” Gina said over the all units channel. “Stein guessed the target would be the parliament building. If I know him, he’ll be laying on a reception for them.”
    “We’ll know soon enough,” Eric said, turning to the west and watching the sky.
    Gina tried to find what had caught his attention, but she couldn’t see anything until she used her sensors at max range. A small blip appeared on her HUD marked with the regiment’s IFF signalling its identity. It was a C-120—a Marine armoured transport and probably the same one that had brought them here.
    “As soon as the transport lands, I want you all on board,” she said to her squad.
    “What about the prisoner?” Westfield asked.
    Before Gina had a chance to answer, Eric did it for her with his pulser. One shot, and they no longer had a prisoner. She stared at the smoking hole where the prisoner’s face had been, and then at Eric who was just then flicking the safety back on his weapon.
    “What prisoner?” Eric said ignoring all the pulsers now aimed at him.
    Over the noise of the transport’s landing, Gina ordered her squad to lower their weapons. She glared at Eric, furious with his actions, but she didn’t want to start an argument in front of her squad. She marched a short distance into the darkness knowing Eric would follow and then rounded on him.
    “Don’t ever do that again. Not ever! Marines don’t work that way.”
    “No?” Eric said coldly. “Lucky I’m not a Marine then.”
    Gina stared at him for a long moment, and then turned away to order her people aboard the transport. Minutes later, they were speeding over the jungle toward the city and another fight.
    “He’s a spook,” Westfield said privately to Gina. “What do you expect?”
    Gina shrugged. She knew Eric wasn’t a spook, and that made his actions worse to her mind. Vipers were special. In her opinion, Eric had just dishonoured his unit.
    * * *
     

Chapter 3
     
    The Parliament Building, Planet Thurston
    “I’m no hero,” Eric said to Gina later that day while waiting for the order to open fire. “Get those notions out of your head. I do my duty to the Alliance with every breath I take. My decision was to execute a terrorist last night, and that too was my duty.”
    “Duty? Who decides when duty becomes murder?”
    “I do as a captain in the 501 st .”
    Gina shifted position just a little. She wanted to keep an eye on the elevator doors behind her. Lieutenant Strong was with Stein, and had been for almost an hour. She wished he would hurry back from the briefing. If he didn’t show up soon, she would have to start without him.
    She glanced at Eric and then back outside at the plaza. “You must report to somebody, be held accountable by somebody.”
    “I report to my superiors as you do. General