Flashback

The mini-drone turning on a widening gyre a thousand feet above them that was painting the three tanks with its laser beams was vaporized in the first seconds of the blast, but the more distant drones opened their channels and sent images—recorded for later study—of the three mushroom clouds rising and converging into one great mushroom cloud that folded and unfolded and then refolded itself toward the stratosphere.

The tanks were vaporized in an instant. The hundreds of infantrymen and -women, anyone standing within a radius of two kilometers of the three targeted and simultaneously struck tanks, were caught up in the shockwave and blast front of disturbed air and thrown a hundred meters or more through the dust-filled sky. None appeared to have survived.

The riverbank collapsed in on and completely buried the Oshkosh.

“On one hundred percent internal air,” came a computer voice that Nick hadn’t heard before.

The vibrations and tremors were very strong. If it hadn’t been for Sato pressing him against the crash-couch, it was quite possible that he would have rattled around the inside of the truck like a BB in a shaken steel can.

“Holy shit,” whispered Nick when the up-and-down oscillations had stopped and Mutsumi ta had fired up the Oshkosh’s big twin turbines and driven them out of the landslide.

ta guided them up the rough ramp onto the scorched area atop the bank and stopped, engines idling. Daigorou Okada had opened the top turret and clambered back up, carrying heavy magazines for the mini-gun, but there was no firing.

Nick stared at the monitors as more of the mini-drones moved back within range. The scorched area was an almost perfect circle extending across the riverbed and another mile or so to the north and up the river valley cliffs almost two miles to the south.

The doors opened and the driver, Mutsumi ta, and Shinta Ishii had attached their PEAPs and climbed out, heading back down the bank toward the still-burning first Oshkosh.

“Please to lower visor and activate PEAP,” Sato said softly. “The air is very full of particles. We must retrieve Joe’s body from our vehicle. His real name was Genshirou It and though there will not be much left after the fire, we must find what we can. We shall send others back for a more complete job before sending It-san’s ashes back to Nippon for a hero’s burial. We honor our dead.”

Nick nodded and closed his visor with a shaking hand. His hands were too unsteady to activate the PEAP comm, so Sato helped. Then the security chief pushed a button and the big rear door swung out and clanged down. Nick followed Sato down the ramp onto earth so fried that it snapped and crackled under their boots. Not even a blade of grass had survived the flames.

“Nukes?” managed Nick.

“Ahh, no,” said Sato over their personal comm. “A purely hyperkinetic weapon. From orbit, you see. Many hundreds waiting for the call. Six used here. No warheads. No radioactivity, of course. Merely speed turned into energy. Much energy.”

“I didn’t know such things existed,” whispered Nick. They were walking toward the first Oshkosh now. ta and Ishii were using large foam fire extinguishers from the surviving Oshkosh to fight the flames. Behind Sato and Nick, the bubble turret whirred as Daigorou Okada covered them.

“No,” agreed Sato, using his good arm to pull another fire extinguisher from an outside locker and handing it one-handed to Nick before he took another for himself.

“That arm’s in terrible shape,” said Nick. “You’ll need to get airlifted to a surgeon. Soon.”

Sato smiled and shook his head. “Okada-san is a very good medic, as was Genshirou It. There are adequate painkillers and medical materials aboard this Oshkosh for Okada-san to set the worst of the break and to allow me to travel the last three or four hours to Santa Fe in relative comfort.”

Before they went down the bank into the riverbed, Nick looked south and then all around again at the miles of devastation. Ten thousand small fires still burned. It seemed as if the ground were on fire.

“What do you call this weapon?” he asked.

Sato smiled. “The man who came up with the idea for such an enhanced, self-guided kinetic kill weapon—especially designed to penetrate deep bunkers—called them OWL.”

“Owl?” repeated Nick.

“Orbital Warhead Lancet. Very simple. Very useful for such small-unit fighting when regular air support is not available. It is used occasionally in China, not often. It is very expensive.”

“And these six OWLs came from Mr. Nakamura’s private stock.”

“Hai.” Sato grinned, although Nick was certain that the man must be in terrible pain. “We do not call these kinetic weapons OWLs, you see. But, rather, gee-bears.”

Nick remembered hearing the odd word. “ ‘Gee’ as in gravity, high-boost, acceleration, that sort of thing?”

“Yes,” nodded Sato, as if enjoying some private joke. “But also ‘Gee’ as in the first letter of the first name of the American skiffy writer who came up with the idea for this particular technology. We like to honor creators when we can.”