It wasn't long in coming. Abruptly, the tingler on his right wrist came to life, tapping the dots and dashes of blackcollar combat code into two sections of skin: attack.

Even through the whistling wind Kanai heard the crack as his lead shot drilled its way deep into the ultrasonic projector. Quickly he set up his second shot as the sounds of other freshly ruined sensors reached him. Ahead, the side door that was their target was suddenly rimmed in red warning lights.

The nighttime sentry chief was right on top of things... for all the good it would do him. Kanai's second shot arced lazily toward the door—slow enough for the antipersonnel motion sensors to pick up—

And the eaves directly above the door exploded into a lethal cloud of flechettes.

The tiny metal darts were still ricocheting off the patio flagstones when the two black-clad men flanking Kanai rose from cover and zigzagged off toward the mansion. On the rooftop a chain gun began to track; an instant later its first salvo went wild as the impact of Kanai's shot knocked it a couple of degrees off target. Beside the door a gunport slid open, and a scatter of flechettes sprayed at the running men. Uselessly, of course, as the few darts that managed to connect were stopped by their flexarmor. One of the attackers windmilled his arms, sending black throwing stars into the gunport. The barrel sagged as the shuriken found a target... and then the runners were at the door, one crouching beside it as the other slapped tiny shaped charges in an X pattern on the nearest window. With luck, Kanai's elimination of some of the door's automatic defenses would delude the mansion's defenders into expecting the main assault there.

The attackers dropped to the ground, and the window exploded with flashes.

It didn't shatter—the glasstic was too strong for that—but when the afterimages faded Kanai could see the honeycomb of cracks there. A few good whacks with a nunchaku would finish the job... and then only the inside defenders would be left.