Instinct made him dive for the cover of the antenna before he even heard the gunfire. The smell of cordite and superheated metal washed over him as pieces of the uplink sprayed over him, bullets slamming into a mechanism that seemed much too small now.
Gideon faced a quandary now. The guard was at the edge of the barn, and he couldn't return fire without risking a bullet through the wall where it could take out one of the scientists, or Ruth.
The guard didn't keep firing steadily. He was a pro, conserving ammunition, only allowing the occasional bark of some covering fire to keep Gideon pinned down.
Gideon moved slowly around the uplink antenna, putting it between him and the whole barn. He did it in time; he heard the door open and more guards spill out. Gideon turned around and fired the Kalishnikov into the roof, hoping to keep them from moving forward, trying to flank him. The butt of the weapon pressed into his shoulder, igniting the ache of his freshly healed arm.
Someone's voice called to him. Gideon recognized it as Volynskji. 'What the fuck are you trying to do here, Malcolm? Toss the gun out.'
Gideon looked madly around, watching for guards trying to circle him. He had cover from the barn, but this shed was open to the whole outdoors. He was exposed on every side. The only cover between him and the rest of the world was a pair of flimsy two-by-fours.
Volynskji called again. 'This is crazy. You know that we have people surrounding this property. There's no way you can make it out of here. Toss the gun out.'
Gideon stared at the two-by-fours holding up the shed's roof. The roof was old, half-rotten, and ran the length of this side of the barn. Moonlight was streaming in the bullet holes he had made in the wood above.
Gideon had a crazy idea.
He braced the weapon better this time as he aimed the gun at the juncture where one of the two-by-fours met the roof. Volynskji was starting to say something again, but his voice was drowned out by the jackhammer of the Kalishnikov firing on full auto. Two of a half-dozen shots splintered the top of the roof's support. Gideon didn't stop firing, he just swung the rifle across to another support. Three bullets clipped it before the Kalishnikov was emptied.
When the firing was over, his ear were numbed, but he could still hear the snap as the first two-by-four went, then the air was filled with the sound of splintering wood.
Gideon threw himself on the ground, tossing away the empty rifle and rolling away from the uplink. The roof of the shed bowed, and then collapsed, its weight too much for the remaining two-by-fours.
Gideon rolled just far enough to clear the roof as it crashed down on the uplink and—more importantly—the guards. When the wood slammed down behind him, Gideon got to his feet and started
running. He needed to find some cover, fast. He felt as if he wore a target on his back as he ran unevenly through the carpet of snow.
Volynskji was right. There was no way for him to get off the property with the way they had this place guarded. He was thinking furiously. First off, he needed cover.
He had two possible destinations. There was the old Victorian house, and sitting in the pasture adjoining the barn there was the shadowy form of a helicopter.
Gideon jumped the rail fence and started running as best as he could to the helicopter. He had no illusions about flying the thing, but it would have a radio on board. He could contact someone outside this place. At this point it didn't matter if it was the CIA, the Highway Patrol, or the Coast Guard. He needed to get word to someone so D'Arcy couldn't summarily disappear this whole operation, him, Ruth—and Julia for that matter.
He was halfway there when he heard the bark of a Kalishnikov behind him. He half-dove, half-tripped over something in the snow. The snow cushioned his fall as his ankle twisted on something half-buried.
The Kalishnikov barked a few more times, but the shots didn't come near him. Gideon wiped the snow out of his face and had to bend to untangle his foot. That was when he saw what had tripped him. His foot was caught in the shoulder strap of another Kalishnikov.
Gideon felt a cold that didn't seem completely from the snow. He half-kicked, half-pulled the Kalishnikov loose from his foot and looked around from his prone position. He couldn't see very far, but he could see a mound in the snow, about two yards from him. The snow there seemed darker, black in the moonlight. Gideon got on his stomach and moved toward it until he could make out the corpse's glassy eyes staring out at him.
The man's throat had been blown apart by a gunshot wound.
Gideon looked around and saw footprints in the snow. One set walked around the helicopter a number of times, ending at the corpse. The other set led straight from a corner of the helicopter to where the body lay, and Gideon thought he could see the tracks leading back toward the woods.
'Shit,' Gideon whispered. He realized that he didn't need to get the call out to the CIA anymore.
They were already here.
He looked up at the helicopter, barely ten yards away from him, and he noticed a set of shadowy lumps that marred the smooth lines of the helicopter's silhouette. They were rectangular, bricklike forms, that clung to vital sections of the helicopter's anatomy.
Gideon's gut froze for a moment, then he rolled behind the only cover that existed out here—the corpse.
He lay there, his arms over his head, and his face buried in the ground, long enough that he began to suspect that he was wrong.
He wasn't.
Volynskji had led the way, pushing aside the debris of the collapsed roof and leading four of his men, all the ones immediately available from the barn. Once they were clear of the wreckage, they started toward the pasture where he could see Gideon running toward D'Arcy's helicopter.
Volynskji shouldered his weapon and fired a burst, aiming to clear the helicopter. Gideon dropped into the snow.
Volynskji smiled. That was it, they had him now. He was prone, unarmed, in an open field. All they had to do was close on him. He directed the other men to circle around so they would cut off all the lines of escape.
'Bastard must have the balls of a bull elephant to try and pull this off,' Volynskji muttered to himself.
They'd taken a few steps into the pasture, and Volynskji realized there was something wrong. The guard on the helicopter should have made an appearance. At first Volynskji had thought that the man had been on the far side of the helicopter, but he couldn't have been oblivious to the gunshots this long.
Volynskji hoped that the man had decided to abandon his post to take a leak amidst the trees. But that hope was fading as they closed on the helicopter and Gideon.
Volynskji could see a lump in the snow that had to be Gideon. That one was Gideon because he was still moving. Volynskji had a fear that the lump next to him was the guard posted to the helicopter.
Then, with little warning, Gideon moved, putting the guard's body between him and the helicopter. It took a moment for the significance of the act to sink in. Volynskji yelled at everyone, 'Take cover!'
3.08 Fri. Mar. 26
RUTH faded back into the crowd of scientists and technicians who were gravitating toward her end of the barn. No one seemed to know what to make of Gideon's escape. Ruth didn't know what to expect herself. She made way with the others as Volynskji pushed toward the rear door with three of the guards.
They paid no attention to her.
Moments later, the gunfire started, and all the technicians scrambled away from the door, back into the barn. The crowd pushed Ruth back, forcing her to take cover in one of the office cubicles. The gunfire continued, and Ruth could hear the sound of splintering wood.
She ducked, afraid that a gunshot would cut her down any moment.
After several bursts of gunfire, a disturbing quiet filled the barn around her. Ruth stood, and—at first— thought that the barn had emptied completely. The only sound was the rumble of the generators. The scientists and technicians all appeared to have retreated out the front door, probably toward the perceived safety of the farmhouse.
