again. 'We've got FBI and DEA credentials that're supposed to look good enough to let us talk our way out, but we figured-'
Then the red numerals on the console board changed from a thirty-two to a thirty-one, and Parker started to panic.
'For Christ's sake, man,' he pleaded, 'we've gotta shut this damn thing down. It's gonna blow in thirty-one minutes, and I can't do a goddamn thing to stop it.'
Mike Takahara had already discovered that 'Security/ Destruction' was locked out of the menu. He tried to go in through the operating system and found himself blocked there also.
'What's your access code?' Takahara whispered.
''Sunshine,' but it won't do you any good,' Parker said. 'I already tried. It doesn't work.'
Mike Takahara tried a series of machine language instructions that should have given him access to the back door of the processing chip, but they didn't.
The red numerals changed from thirty-one to twenty-nine.
'How's it wired?' Mike Takahara finally asked.
'It's a dual system,' Parker said. 'First series of explosions takes out the internal cross-support walls, and probably kills everybody inside. The second series goes off fifteen seconds later and basically blows the two main side walls into each other like a couple of fucking bricks.'
Dwight Stoner muttered something under his breath, but Takahara ignored it.
'What's the explosive?' he asked.
'They said C-Four, but I don't know,' Parker said. 'They never showed any of it to me.'
'Come on, Snoopy, how long's it gonna take you to break into this thing?' Dwight Stoner demanded uneasily as he listened to the sound of automatic gunfire in the distance.
'The long, safe way, probably a couple of hours,' Takahara whispered, wincing as he readjusted himself in the chair.
'For Christ's sake, we haven't got a couple of hours!' Roy Parker exploded, and then froze as the shotgun barrel pushed harder against his neck. 'Come on, man,' he pleaded quietly. 'We can't get out of here, because the goddamned doors are blocked off. Do it the fucking short way.'
'Right,' Mike Takahara nodded, groaning in pain as he reached around behind his back and drew out Parker's 9mm Beretta. Then, before Dwight Stoner could say or do anything to stop him, the technical agent fired five 9mm pistol rounds pointblank into the main processing unit of the command-and-control computer.
The handcuffed counterterrorist looked on in horror as every light on the command-and-control console seemed to increase in intensity and the red numeral display went haywire. Then, in the space of a single heartbeat, the console board went dead, the red numerals blinked out, the pulsating alarm was suddenly silent, and the red warning lights stopped flashing.
As Roy Parker and Dwight Stoner turned to stare at Mike Takahara with expressions that ranged from absolute horror to stunned disbelief, the technical agent looked up at the two men and said with the smallest shrug possible, 'I cheat.'
Shaking his head and muttering another heartfelt curse, Stoner hobbled over to where Sergeant Clarence MacDonald had managed to pull himself up into a sitting position. Judging from the stunned expression on the combat instructor's face, Stoner figured that MacDonald was alert enough to realize what Mike Takahara had done.
'Here,' he said as he set the 12-gauge shotgun in MacDonald's lap. 'Far as I'm concerned, you can shoot both of them any time you want.'
Then, drawing the. 45 SIG-Sauer from his shoulder holster, Dwight Stoner started hobbling on his single crutch toward the distant stairwell.
Chapter Forty-Six
'All right!'
'Yes, sir. Way to go, FBI!'
The sight of the man in the FBI raid jacket taking out Gunter Aben in two quick shots brought a rousing cheer from Larry Paxton and the Louisiana wildlife sergeant, the only two, apparently, with enough breath or energy to yell.
After verifying that Carine Mueller and Gunter Aben were dead and that no more ICER counterterrorists were in the immediate area, the raid team pulled together into a defensive position and began to treat their wounded.
As they did so, the pulsing alarm and the flashing-red warning lights suddenly went out, leaving the area illuminated only by the pale yellow glow of the battery- powered emergency lights.
'What the hell's going on now?' Larry Paxton demanded, but Henry Lightstone and the others just shrugged, intent only upon finding Alex Chareaux, the infamous Gerd Maas, and whoever else remained of his counterterrorist team.
Then, as the seemingly impatient blue-jacketed figure followed them from the catwalk above, Henry Lightstone, Larry Paxton, Gary Brickard, and the Louisiana sergeant slowly and cautiously moved forward into the mock forest of the mountain cabin simulation area.
They left behind the remaining Louisiana officer-who had caught a 9mm round in the knee from Gunter Aben's last flurry-to stay with his far more severely wounded buddy and to provide rear-guard support.
Spreading out and moving as carefully and quietly as they could through the amazingly lifelike concrete and plastic trees, brush and rock, the four men never saw Kimiko Osan pop out of the concealed trapdoor, and were aware of her presence only when she opened up on Brickard and the Louisiana sergeant with a burst of 5.56mm rounds from her laser-sighted Colt Commando submachine gun.
Both men went down, and Kimiko Osan was running for her next position when a concussive ka-boom! echoed throughout the cavernous simulation area. The impact of the. 44 round sent the small, young, and incredibly fast counterterrorist tumbling to the floor as her laser-sighted weapon clattered away in the semidarkness.
'Nice shot, buddy,' Gary Brickard, the veteran gunny sergeant muttered, grateful for the overhead cover as he quickly set his M-16 aside and knelt down beside the groaning Louisiana sergeant-vaguely aware of the pain in his lower hip from the one 9mm round that he hadn't absorbed with his vest-and began to apply a field dressing to the wildlife officer's shattered upper thigh.
Ka-boom!
Ka-boom! Ka-boom!
The first. 44 bullet caught Master Gunnery Sergeant Gary Brickard full in the lower throat just above his vest and smashed him back into the trunk of a concrete tree. The second and third bullets exploded chunks of concrete off of an adjoining tree trunk just above Larry Paxton's rapidly ducking head as Henry Lightstone recovered and sent a half-dozen 10mm rounds up at the blue-jacketed figure, who immediately twisted back behind one of the armored glass panels that had been installed to protect observers from an accidently deflected round.
'What the hell?' Larry Paxton screamed…
Ka-boom! Ka-boom! Ka-booml
… and then dove behind a much larger concrete trunk as Paul Saltmann took advantage of his overhead position to come around to the edge of an armored glass panel and send three more. 44 rounds streaking down at the two scrambling figures.
Dumping the expended casings and pulling a heavy speed-loader out of his jacket pocket as he ran forward to the end of the walkway where it extended out over the middle of the 'forested' simulation area, Paul Saltmann quickly reloaded and extended the powerful handgun around the edge of another glass panel in a two-handed grip. He fired two rounds down at the fleeing figure of Gerd Maas, and three more at Henry Lightstone, who was unsuccessfully trying to shoot back up through the armored glass at the silhouette of Paul Saltmann.
The ear protectors that Paul Saltmann wore were more effective than he realized, and it was only the clattering sound of a. 44 brass casing knocked by Dwight Stoner's single crutch that made him spin around and trigger off one more concussive round.
