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the can, "sprayed" himself down into the prison.
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Sten snapped a special figure-8 descender on the thread- it would have cut through any conventional
piece of abseiling gear-and followed. He dropped the last few meters clear, landing beside the
heavy-worlder. Then Sten was up and running down a long, stonewalled corridor.
Through the thick walls they could hear the drumming of booted feet. A door smashed open, a confusion
of men rushed out, firing.
Bullets splattered around them as Sten and Alex opened fire at the same instant. Sten leaped over dead
and dying men and sprinted toward the end of the corridor.
A solid metal door stood between them and Ffillips. Sten slapped a demo pack to the door, thumbed
the button, and ducked. There was an explosion and the door dropped in one molten sheet.
Sten and Alex fired two deadly bursts at a group of Companions behind them and thundered down the
corridor toward the main cells.
The alarms were screaming help... help... help... through the emptying streets.
Ida and Doc waited for help to come up the Avenue of Tombs, either for the armory or the prison
beyond it. Ida had quickly figured out the simple twin-stick controls and Doc had worked out the loading
mechanism of the track's quad cannon.
They shared a bar of protein and, in the eating of the foul stuff, had agreed to not disagree. Then they
heard the rumble of the reinforcements coming. Ida started to fire up the track.
"Wait," Doc advised.
Ida buried an impatient obscenity and waited.
Then, through the acquisition scope, Ida saw the reinforcements coming. The first to spin into the street
were SP tracks identical to the one they rode in. Next came a mass of Companions on foot.
"Now," Doc said.
Ida shoved the track-brakes/throttles forward, and, tracks-clanking, the SP cannon moved out into the
middle of the street. Before the others had time to react, she had begun firing.
The street became a sudden volcano as shell after shell crashed into the oncoming tracks and men.
Doc was a flurry of unending activity as he loaded the guns almost as quickly as Ida could fire. He did
wish, however, that he could take a look through her scope at the gore in the streets.
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Sten shoved the tiny demofinger into the cell door and shielded his eyes. A low glow, then a ping, and
the door swung open.
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Ffillips stepped out and gave Sten a long, steady look. "You took your time coming, Colonel," she said.
"A little close," Sten admitted.
"Excellent. Now we're free. Where are our weapons?"
Sten grabbed her by the arm and led the way. Behind her thronged the other mercenaries.
The mercenaries poured out the gates of the prison. The guards might have been able to handle a break
by convicts. But not by trained, experienced soldiers who armed themselves as they went, from dead
guards.
Once free, they pounded down the street toward the armory. Just beyond it they could see the blazing
track that Doc and Ida were using to hold off the Companions.
Then they were through the tunnel and inside the armory itself. Bet and Otho had already broken open
the arms room and they were passing out weapons, grenades, and belts of ammunition.
It was like candy.
Professional soldiers don't have much use for battlecries, but the time spent in Mathias' dungeons had
made the mercs a little less than cold-bloodedly professional. Shouting and cheering, they spread out
through the gates of Sanctus, always after their ordered goal, but keeping an eye out for humiliations that
had to be repaid:
The tortured men;
The beaten men;
The men who had been condemned for their faithfulness.
Ffillips was the first to spot a small company of Companions. She motioned to a squad of her men, and
quickly, silently, they slipped forward.
And the mercenaries gave the Companions a far easier death than they had planned for the mercenaries.
It was the same across the city, as the mercs fanned out, killing efficiently and coldly. Hunting out the
Companions and swinging their guns aside when civilians stumbled into their sights.
CHAPTER SIXTY-SEVEN
THE COMPANION LUNGED at Alex with a bayoneted rifle. Alex sidestepped the lunge, stopped the
follow-through buttstroke, and took the weapon from the Companion's hands.
Smiling hugely, he took the rifle in both hands and snapped it in two. Then as an afterthought he broke
the bayonet off its mounting and politely handed the weapon's pieces back to the bulging-eyed
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Companion.
And then Alex howled and charged.
The Companion, as well as the flanking members of his squad, broke and ran, pelting through the streets
of the city. Behind them pounded Alex, some of the mercenaries, and a high-speed-limping Ffillips.
The street dead-ended into a large marketplace, lined with barred shops. Only one, the largest mart,
was still open. The Companions dashed toward its entrance but the owner was hastily dropping thick
steel shutters over the shop.
"In the name of Talamein," the lead Companion howled.
"Clot Talamein," the shopkeeper growled, and slammed the last steel shutter in their faces.
And the Companions turned as Alex thundered into them. A few of them had the brains to collapse and
fake death. But most of them died as Alex's meathooks thrashed through the platoon.
There, finally, was only one left. Alex lifted him in one
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hand, started to practice the javelin throw, and then considered. He lowered the man and turned to
Ffillips.
"M'pologies, Major," he said. "Ah thinkit's y'r honor." "Thank you, Sergeant," Ffillips said. "The man is
someone I remember. You"-turning to the Companion-"were the person who thought it humorous to fill
our water supply with drakh, were you not?"
Without waiting for a reply, Ffillips fired. The highpower slugs cartwheeled the Companion into a
blood-red spray of death, then Alex and Ffillips were headed back down the street, toward the Temple
and the fleeing Companions.
Mathias breathed deeply. Find the Peace of Talamein, he told himself. Find the Truth of the Flame, he
reminded, watching as his Companions retreated through the gates of the Temple, far below him.
This is but a challenge. Talamein will not fail you, he thought as the gates crashed closed and he saw the
ragged, limping mercenaries take positions around the walls of the Temple.
Talamein will prove my truth, he told himself, and turned from the window to soothe his panicked
advisors.
Situation:
One temple. A walled, reinforced fortress, built on a ridge. Defended by motivated, fairly skilled
soldiers. Provisioned for centuries and equipped with built-in wells.
A civilian populace outside was desperately trying to stay neutral.
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A small band of soldiers, besieging that fortress, armed only with personal weapons and light armor.
Prog? A classic siege that could go on for decades.
Without the nukes the Eternal Emperor forbade, it should have been.
Sten was determined to break the siege and end the war- and Mathias-within a week.
CHAPTER SIXTY-EIGHT
A GIVEN FOR any port city, and most especially for one on an island continent, is that the watertable
will be quite close to the surface. This makes building anything over three or four stories an interesting
engineering problem, particularly if there's any seismic activity, as there was on Sanctus.
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