In the old armory, Marty skipped in a circle, celebrating his triumphant destruction of the nuclear missile that would have killed millions of Americans.]on watched his joy for a few seconds, still absorbing the great news himself, while outside on the landing, occasional bursts of gunfire told him that Peter, Randi, and Therese were holding on, defending the tower from being overrun by the Legionnaires.
But they could not stop them forever. They were badly outnumbered. Now that the missile threat was over, they needed to escape.
Marty stopped to face Jon. His voice was breathy and filled with relief, as if he could hardly believe it himself. 'America's safe, Jon. America's safe!'
'But we're not, Marty.' Jon ran to the door to check on the activity on the landing. 'Can you restore all the satellite communications?'
'Of course.'
'Do it.'
Marty swung back to the computer and resumed work.
Jon leaned out to where Peter, Randi, and Therese guarded the stairs. They were kneeling and lying flat, finding cover where they could in the large, shadowy space.
'Can you hold them a few more minutes?' he asked.
'Make it damned few,' Randi warned, her face worried.
He nodded and rushed back to Marty. 'How much longer?'
'Wait there!' Marty grinned up at him. 'Compared to stopping the missile, this was a stroll on the beach. The communications are clear.'
'Good. Send this.' Jon rattled off a series of numbers, a code that guaranteed his message would reach Fred Klein. 'Then add: La Porte, Normandy, Chateau la Rouge, now.'
Marty's fingers flew. He was bouncing in his chair, still excited, radiating optimism. 'Done. What next?'
'Next we run.'
Marty looked shocked. He frowned and shook his head. 'No, Jon. We can't just leave the computer. We'll dismantle it. That way we can take it with us.'
'Wrong,' Jon snapped. He had tried that already, and the firing outside the armory was growing louder. 'We don't have time.'
Marty wailed, 'But, Jon, we have to take the prototype. What if General La Porte's people recapture it?'
'They won't,' Jon grabbed the protesting genius and dragged him toward the door.
'Let go, Jon,' Marty said huffily. 'I can walk by myself.'
'Run.'
On the landing, Peter, Randi, and Therese had beaten the renegade Legionnaires back down the steps once more. Therese had ripped up her last remaining sleeve and used it to bind a bloody flesh wound on Peter's thigh. Randi had been hit in the upper arm, the bullet going clean through without any major damage. A tight bandage stemmed the bleeding.
'What happened?' Randi asked. 'Did you stop the strike?'
'You bet,' Jon assured them. 'Marty did it again.'
'Took you bloody long enough,' Peter grumbled, but his leathery face was spread in a large smile as he continued to watch the stairwell.
Jon crouched beside Peter. 'Give me a grenade.'
Peter, old soldier that he was, asked no questions. He removed a hand grenade from his backpack and passed it over to Jon without a word.
'I'll be right back.'
Jon ran back into the armory, laid the grenade on top of the tray of gel packs, and pulled the pin. He hurtled away as if all the hounds of Hades were on his heels.
As he burst back out onto the landing, he shouted, 'Everyone down!'
They fell flat onto the stone floor. The grenade exploded behind them, sending steel fragments and wood splinters flying past in a deadly hail. At the top of the stairs, a Legionnaire cried out, blood spurting from his face where shards cut him. He fell back down out of sight.
'What in hell did you do that for, Jon?' Randi demanded.
'The gel packs,' Jon explained. 'They're the key to the molecular computer. They contain the DNA sequence that Chambord created. Any scientist near his level of expertise could've used just one of them to reproduce Chambord's work.'
Marty nodded, his expression miserable. 'They wouldn't have needed even a full gel pack. All anyone had to do was scrape up some residue to get a sample.'
Jon said, 'The gel packs had to be completely destroyed in case they fell into the wrong hands.'
They stopped talking as the sound of booted feet making another charge up the stairs echoed toward them. Peter, Randi, and Jon ran to the stairwell and fired down. No Legionnaires were in sight. The bullets ricocheted below, and they heard angry curses and the noises of a retreating scramble.
Marty had been looking around the tower landing, beginning to grasp the desperate struggle out here, while he had been at work inside the armory on the DNA computer. He gazed at them and swallowed hard. He tried to make his voice cheerful.
'Isis this a 'grand' battle, Peter?'
'Grand,' Peter said, 'but probably short. Those stairs down, I fear, are the only way out of the tower. And the Legionnaires don't seem willing to give us safe passage.'
'We're trapped?' Marty's face stretched in terror.
'Unless we figure something else out,' Randi agreed.
As if to echo the dire pronouncements, General La Porte's booming voice shouted up in French, 'You must surrender, Colonel Smith! We outnumber you three to one, and more of my men arrive every minute.
You can't escape past us.'
Randi said, 'The general isn't going to be in a forgiving mood when he learns we blew his scheme.'
'Not to mention that he can't leave any of us alive if he plans to get away clean,' Peter pointed out.
Randi said, 'That's probably why he shot Dr. Chambord, and I don't hear Captain Bonnard's voice down there. Do any of you?'
Heavy gunfire interrupted her. It sounded as if it were coming from the floor below. They readied themselves, but this time there was no charge up the stairwell. Instead, the firing moved farther away, growing louder and more intense. They heard shouts in Arabic, Pashto, and other languages.
'The Crescent Shield's very near,' Therese realized.
'They're attacking La Porte's group from the rear,' Peter decided. 'And while dying for one's country may have its points, let's hope our Islamic friends have made that option less necessary for us.'
Marty had been watching Jon, who had been studying the stairwell, his weapon grasped at the ready. 'You have a plan, Jon, I hope?'
'No reason to go down,' he decided. 'We'll go up into the tower. With Randy's climbing gear, Peter's plastique, and a few more grenades, it's our best chance.'
'And there's that pleasant little chopper sitting out there on the barbican we spotted when we arrived,' Peter reminded them.
'Stupendous!' Marty started up the stairs in his awkward gait. 'The race is to the swift, o paladins. Let us be very swift.'
As the others raced after Marty, Peter and Jon sent a final long volley down the stairs.
'Two stories, I should think,' Peter said as he turned and ran upward.
But a sudden draft of heat made Jon stop. He stepped back onto the landing. Smoke rolled out from the armory door, and then flames. All that old, oversized wood furniture that La Porte favored must have caught fire from the grenade explosion.
He hurried up the stone stairs, remembering the crates of ammo he had also seen in the armory, stacked in the back. The boots of La Porte's men hammered behind him, closing in. Jon caught up with the others, and he and Peter grabbed the wobbling Marty by each arm and propelled him along between them.
Therese had pulled out ahead, running like a gazelle, while Randi dropped back to cover the rear. She turned frequently to slow the pursuit with bursts of her MP5K.
