Free Merkiaari Wars: 01 - Hard Duty by Mark E. Cooper Page A

thought.
    It was history and tradition that made Vipers command the other branches of the military on the battlefield, not rank or regulations, and Eric was careful never to abuse that. All of them were. They were feared and respected, but that respect never quite dulled the fear. No one in the regiment wanted to make that worse. Eric had to wonder how well that would work if they began recruiting again. He shrugged. It wasn’t his problem.
    Eric wandered his rooms as if bored, allowing his sensors to map the surveillance grid newly installed by unknown persons. It wasn’t Stein, he decided as he traced more and more emissions. The gear was good tech, a little too good for the regular military. That was no insult to the marines. The marines wanted rugged gear, able to do the job and take abuse without failing on the battlefield, and military budgets also preferred it that way. A score of good solid units could be had for the price of a single highly sensitive and temperamental unit meant for true espionage. The tech in use here was not regular military issue, neither was it the absolute cutting edge, but it was spy stuff. The kind of thing a government agency would employ.
    Eric frowned as another grid appeared on sensors. What the hell? Two surveillance grids in one place made no sense unless... he nodded and smiled in amusement. The high end gear probably was government. Thurston was up and coming, its agencies would need to keep pace. Unemployed mercs would surely be on the watch list especially considering recent events. Eric tagged that net as Thurston InSec for now and left it alone. It was active but passive in that the sensors had no offensive capabilities. The same couldn’t be said for the other grid.
    This one he tagged as Freedom Movement and hostile because it did in fact have offensive capability in the form of sonics and neurotoxin dispensers. Eric immediately hacked the net and disabled the weapon circuits but left the passives alone. No one would realise what he had done unless trying to trigger an attack. It was good but not high end tech; exactly what he had come to expect from terrorist organisations with off world backing, something he was seeing more and more as the decades rolled by. Maybe Burgton was right about that too. Burgton’s theory of growth over stagnation within the Alliance was something the regiment often debated. They had the time and vision to see long-term trends—very long term. Their unique perspective and ability to collate data and statistics from all over the place gave Burgton an unparalleled ability to predict events.
    After a moment’s thought, Eric inserted a little subroutine into the hostile net that would warn him if someone sent a signal to attack. His hack would prevent the attack, but it would be good to know if one were attempted. Looking over his work, he carefully withdrew from the net, satisfied he was once again secure.
    Nine days. That delay gave him some idea of the terrorist’s capabilities he realised. Zhang must have handed the crystal to his friends that day; probably to his brother, but there was no proof of that. Didn’t matter who; it was the timing that interested him. A day to get the data to someone with the authority to evaluate it, and maybe another day to decide to use it. Add to that a week to gather personnel and supplies to launch the op. Not bad, but not great. Probably supply issues rather than personnel. It was usually that way around.
    They had proven his data sample was good with the attack last night. He could expect contact any time now. Fine then. He would step out for one final day of exploring. With the thought fresh in mind, he left the room and locked his door before making his way down.
    He didn’t have a destination in mind, so when the taxi driver asked him, he said to tour the city a while. The driver nodded and off they went. Eric had Ashfield mapped and in his database, so he simply let the man have his head and let the