looked like a traffic light changing signals. He most certainly did believe this ogre disguised as a woman as she fixed her gold-flecked eyes on his. 'Shshsh… shot, Tanabu- san,' he stammered in reaction. 'I am sorry. I did not understand.'
Chifune began to feel almost sorry for the man. He had been assigned to her to learn, after all, and one had to start somewhere. On the other hand, you did not need formal training to acquire common sense. Mama and Papa Noda had slipped up somewhere. These days no one should be tossed out of the family nest into the police force, of all institutions, without being equipped with some street smarts. Even in lower-crime Tokyo. Low crime, after all, was relative.
'It would appear that you were not properly briefed, Sub-Inspector- san,' said Chifune in a mollifying tone. She could feel Oga radiating approval beside her. The sub-inspector's face was being saved. The integrity of the group was being preserved. She was not quite sure how long she could maintain this. She was aware that she had the most unfortunate talent for slipping in a sting at the tail end of a conversation. It was most un-Japanese. Fitzduane had enjoyed it. She missed that man.
'Inspector Oga will fill you in,' she said.
Oga was normally a man of few words. This was a longer speech than most, but it was right to the point.
'The senior-agent- san and I are due to meet two members of the Yaibo terrorist group in an apartment about two blocks away in fifteen minutes. They say they want to give themselves up. They have had enough. They think we are staff members of a radio station acting as honest brokers. They say they don't trust the security forces. In this kind of delicate situation, you don't want a highly visible cordon around the block. You leave it to us, but half a dozen of you, heavily armed and in plain clothes, should stay close and we will be in radio contact.
'If things go wrong, it will be surprise, speed, and firepower that will make the difference. And three busloads of uniformed Kidotai do not constitute surprise. Understand?'
Sub-Inspector Kanji Noda snapped to attention. ' Hai! Inspectorsan,' he replied. His right hand vibrated, but he did not actually salute. There was hope for this young man, Oga thought benevolently. His own sons were growing. Soon enough they would be Noda's age, and Oga hoped they, too, would enter the police force.
There was the slightly muffled whump of an exploding rocket-propelled grenade and then the first bus in the parked Kidotai convoy blew up. Burning fuel and debris showered the narrow street.
A second bus caught fire from the explosion of the first and then sprouted lines of holes as automatic fire swept the narrow street.
An armor-piercing rocket hit Noda's body armor on the left side, plowed right through his body on the diagonal, and exploded just before it exited.
The sub-inspector came apart, as if made from a kit like some medical teaching aid designed to show you what was inside the human body down to the entrails.
' Kuso shite shine! ' cursed Oga as he leaped for cover in a doorway. The expletive literally meant ‘shit and then die’ and it came to him with some force that he was not even going to have time for the former if they did not suppress the incoming fire.
He saw Chifune flat on the ground behind their parked car. She would be out of the direct line of fire, he thought with some relief, and then he saw her arm com up and flame spurt from her automatic pistol as she fired half a clip into the lock of the trunk.
The retaining latch blasted away, the trunk flew open, and Chifune jumped to her feet and removed one of the long cases from inside.
She was just turning to throw the case to Oga when another rocket hit the front of the car and blew it backward, hitting her below the waist and knocking her to the ground.
Oga ran for the rifle case, grabbed it, and rolled for the protection of the opposite door. Chifune lay with her legs under the rear of the car, motionless. There was blood coming out of the side of her head.
The weapons case had been designed by Chifune and Oga to protect the weapon inside, but to allow it, when required, to be brought into action as fast as possible. A hundred-round C-Mag was already loaded. Forty-millimeter grenades were tucked into the retaining pouches of a load-bearing belt.
Oga clipped on the belt, slid a grenade into the under-barrel launcher, and closed the breech. He pulled back the cocking handle and an SS109 5.56mm round slid into the chamber.
Chifune was still lying there. As he looked and was about to run out to her, she raised her head and one arm and made a negative sign and pointed upward. He understood immediately.
Two Kidotai came crashing through he doorway, submachine guns in their hands. They had discarded their helmets and leg armor to move faster. Both looked resolute and experienced. A rookie officer did not, fortunately, mean untrained men.
'Sergeant Tomoto reporting, sir,' said one man. 'The unit have pulled back out of the line of fire. The men are breaking out heavier weapons and then fanning out to encircle these fucks. Reinforcements are on the way. It shouldn't take long.'
'Follow me,' said Oga, and he was already running up the stairs as he finished speaking. Chifune's tactical sense was almost always sound. They could see very little from ground level with fire being poured down on them. From a flat roof it should be a different story.
But they had to move fast. He knew them. The terrorists would not stick around. By the time the police cordon in place, they would be gone. Ambush and run. Kill and hide. Mankind had been doing it since time began, because it worked. The only solution was to react very, very fast and then lay down some serious counterfire.
The roof was not flat.
Oga swore but did not hesitate. The two Kidotai threw him up into the crawl space and he smashed a hole in the tiles. One of the policemen made it up beside him. The second Kidotai, whose cupped hands had propelled up his colleague, headed off to find a window.
Oga, peering out from between smashed tiles, could see nothing from where he stood. He had thought he was pointing in the right direction, but running up flight after flight of stairs was disorienting.
Automatic fire smashed into the tiles and the Kidotai looking through a hole to his left careered backward. He had taken an entire burst in his head.
Oga thought fast. The Kidotai sergeant's hole in the roof was facing the right way, but looking through it risked receiving exactly the same treatment. That was not the object of the exercise.
He smashed out more tiles and then hauled himself out through the enlarged hole onto the roof. Then he looked down, which was a mistake. There was a nominal parapet at the base of the sloped section in case he slipped, but despite the earthquake regulations, it did not look strong enough to stop a Japanese detective inspector. Even one who had considerable interest in continuing to live.
The tiles were nailed onto a matrix of wooden supports. Most of the thin lateral slats were too light to hold his weight, but every two feet or so there was a stronger beam that looked more reassuring.
He thought of ducking back in and making some foot holes, but then realized there was not time. The people he was after would be gone.
He raised his automatic rifle and fired a burst into the tiles just above where he estimated the top lateral beam ran. The tiles shattered and Oga slung his rifle and levered himself up so that he was supported by the beam but able to look over the ridge. In truth, he was too high. He pulled back and lay at an angle so only what was absolutely necessary was exposed. Unfortunately, that was his head.
He felt scared and vulnerable and was just beginning to regret his enthusiasm when he suddenly saw a figure on a flat roof only two blocks away rise to aim a shoulder-fired RPG over the parapet wall.
The terrorist seemed close enough to touch. Oga felt that the man must notice him any second. They were monitoring the roofline, he knew from the burst of fire that had killed Sergeant Tomoto.
The terrorist with the launcher was intent on lining up his target below. The sergeant had been killed with automatic-weapons fire, so that meant that almost certainly there was at least one other terrorist armed with an automatic weapon on the roof. Or an adjoining roof. Or moving around.
Oga ducked down and unslung his weapon. It came to him that Chifune was lying there helpless below, and then he moved without hesitation, straightening up so that his weight was fully supported on the bar and then bringing the automatic rifle up to his shoulder and firing as soon as the red laser dot came to bear.
Rounds hammered from the flash guard of the Howa and smashed the arm steadying the launcher before hitting home just below the terrorist's throat. He fell backward, already dead, and as he hit the ground his finger
