Timothy Zahn - Blackcollar - The Judas Solution

Lathe nodded. "Caine, go check out our back door."

"Right," Caine said, standing up as he finished pulling on his gloves. He headed toward the archway into the back room, noting that the bar's patrons were making a hasty but orderly retreat away from the center of the upcoming action.

He'd just reached the partition when the front door was flung open and two armored and helmeted figures walked purposefully into the bar. Behind their faceplates Caine could see their eyes darting back and forth, their paral-dart pistols swinging warningly around the room.

They'd made it three steps inside when Lathe and Spadafora lifted their slingshots and sent a pair of yellow pellets squarely into the intruders' faceplates.

No nonexplosive projectile could penetrate that plastic, Caine knew, certainly nothing propelled by human muscle. But unlike the blackcollars' regular slingshot rounds, these pellets weren't designed for destruction. Instead, they burst on impact, splattering the faceplates with a thick, instant-setting paint.

Whatever curses the Security men might have uttered were lost in the double shot they sent blindly in the direction the pellets had come from, one of the paral-dart clusters scattering off the top of Caine's battle-hood as he ducked into a low crouch. Lathe and Spadafora were already out of the line of fire, Spadafora moving to the right with another paint pellet in hand, Lathe moving left and forward and stowing his slingshot in favor of his nunchaku. Caine caught a glimpse of two more Security men crowding in behind their comrades as Lathe swung the flail into one of the blinded men's helmets, sending him staggering, and Spadafora threaded a shot neatly between the two front men into the faceplate of one of the newcomers.

Caine didn't wait to see any more. He slipped around the partition into the back room, his own nunchaku cocked and ready under his arm. The room's chairs were stacked neatly on top of the tables in preparation for cleaning, and the only light showing was a single panel glowing softly in the ceiling.

Senses alert, he made his way between the tables to the rear exit. For a moment he paused there, listening, then eased the door open.

It opened into a deserted alley. Carefully, he leaned out and looked out.

And staggered back into the edge of the door as a cluster of paral-darts slammed into his face, most of them ricocheting from his goggles and hood but a few sinking into the exposed skin of his cheek.

He dropped his nunchaku as his face went instantly numb, his hand grabbing for the tingler on his wrist.

But the drug in his bloodstream was too fast. Even as his fingers dug under the sleeve, both arms went dead. Half a second later his legs folded under him and he sprawled helplessly in the doorway, lying halfway out into the alley.

He'd landed with his face turned uselessly toward the bar's outside wall, but he could hear the running feet coming toward him. The footsteps came to a halt, and he was pulled the rest of the way through the door and turned onto his back. A half dozen hard faces were looking down at him, and out of the corner of his eye he saw a couple pairs of hands unfastening his coat and throwing it open. Other hands attacked the civilian clothing beneath the coat, unfastening it as well and deftly maneuvering the shirt and slacks off his paralyzed limbs and tossing the clothing to someone outside his field of view. They took his nunchaku and slingshot from their respective sheaths, removed the knives from his forearm and calf sheaths and the shuriken from their thigh and belt pouches, and took his tingler from his wrist. Then, clad only in his flexarmor and the undersuit beneath it, he was lifted and hurried down the alley in the direction from which the ambushers had come. There was the muffled sound of a vehicle door opening, and he was shoved unceremoniously into the back of some kind of van.

Waiting for him there was Prefect Jamus Galway.

"Caine," Galway said gravely as the door closed again behind him and the vehicle lurched forward. The prefect's face was strangely somber as he gazed down at his trophy, with no hint of triumph or even satisfaction that Caine could see. "My apologies for all this. If it makes it any easier, let me assure you that we have no intention of killing or even hurting Lathe and the others. They're far too valuable to us as they are."

Too valuable. To us. With his face still paralyzed, Caine couldn't reply. It was, he reflected, probably just as well.

The first Security man staggered and collapsed, the impact of Lathe's nunchaku penetrating his helmet to stun the skull and brain underneath. The comsquare brushed against the second blinded man as he fell, who responded by spinning that direction and firing another blast of paral-darts. Lathe ducked beneath the shot and swung his nunchaku into the back of other's leg, toppling him on top of his friend.

Two more men were charging in behind them. One had already been blinded, and as Lathe swung his nunchaku around in a half circle and cocked it again beneath his arm Spadafora sent a fourth paint pellet past his head to splatter over the other's faceplate. Lathe made a crouching leap over the tangled bodies of the first two attackers and slashed his nunchaku across the third Security man's gun arm, sending his weapon spinning off across the nearby tables, then slammed a kick to his stomach that folded him up and dropped him to the floor.

The fourth Security man was firing off random rounds, clearly in hopes of hitting something, when Lathe's nunchaku slammed across his yellow-coated faceplate with a force that flipped him halfway over before he hit the floor.

Two more Security men were charging through the door, this pair already firing before they'd even made it inside. Lathe spun around to put his back to them, letting the salvos scatter off his flexarmor as he snatched out a pair of shuriken. His spin brought him back around to face them, and he hurled the stars hard into their kneepads.

Their guns wobbled off target as they fought for balance. Ducking beneath the weapons, Lathe took one of them down with his nunchaku and the other with a sweep and a heel-kick as he hit the floor.

He had just delivered a knockout blow with his nunchaku to the last man when his tingler came to life: outside clear. "Let's go," he called back to Spadafora. "Caine?"

There was no answer. "Caine!" Lathe called again, digging for his own tingler. Caine?

Outside, the reply came. Coming around to front.

Acknowledged, Lathe sent as he got to his feet and looked around. Aside from the downed Security men, everyone else in the bar seemed to have been untouched by the brief battle. "Sorry about the trouble," he said, nodding to the bartender and waiter.

There were two unmarked Security cars parked by the front of the building. Spadafora headed directly to the closest and pulled open the door, leaning halfway inside as he studied the interior. Mordecai was standing between the two cars, a shuriken ready in each hand, his head moving back and forth as he watched for trouble. Two more armored men lay sprawled unconscious at his feet. "Where's Caine?"

Lathe asked him.

"Here," the younger man called as he came jogging into sight around the side of the building. "Sorry—I thought we were going out the back."

"Change of plans," Lathe said. "Spadafora?"

"Looks clear," the other called, still leaning into the car. "Not picking up any tracers, and I don't see any booby traps."

"Good enough," Lathe said. "Everyone in."

He got into the front passenger seat, the other two blackcollars climbing into the back, as Caine slid in behind the wheel and started the car. "Where to?" he asked as he pulled out onto the road again.

"Guardrail Tavern," Lathe told him. "Now we can go meet Tactor Shaw."