Glen Shepard soon pushed open the fire door, and was startled when he saw the boys there. His shotgun jerked up instinctively. He relaxed when he recognized them. 'Ready to go?'
They nodded. 'We got everything we need,' Chris said as they descended the stairs.
They approached the fire door to the lobby. The hotel's timer-controlled lights were on. Glen gave instructions. 'Act like rough-tough Outlaws, walk straight through.'
They carried their weapons casually and crossed the bright lobby. Beyond the windows, the streetlights lit Crescent to daylight brilliance. They stepped through the service door and continued to the alley behind the hotel.
In the alley's darkness, Glen spoke to the youths once more: 'All you two need to do is drive. Wait for my signal, then drive. We'll need a big truck and a fast car.'
'How will you get into the Casino?'
'I'll go up Chimes Tower Road, then cut across the hills. When I'm ready to start down the hill, I'll signal you. You wait fifteen minutes, then drive for the Casino. Fire a few shots out the window to get their attention. They'll shoot at you.
'Two hundred yards from the Casino, wreck the truck so it blocks the road. Hit it with a molotov cocktail, run back to the car and split.
'Go up Marilla to Vieudelou, as if you're taking the road out of town. But turn onto La Mesa and park. Just like one of the neighborhood cars. They won't catch you, and I'll be in the Casino.'
'You're just going to walk in?' Chris asked.
'Look at me! Outlaw jacket, dirty jeans, shotgun, two days' beard on my face, and I stink. I know I'll get in.'
'What if...'
'What if nothing. It's the only way I can think of that any of us has any chance to do something and still live. Once I'm in, I'll do what I can.'
Glen went to the alley mouth and looked up and down the side street. He whispered to the cousins. 'Let's get in gear. We got to steal the truck and the car for you both. And a flashlight for me, a big one.'
'Mr. Shepard, wait.' Chris pulled Glen into a shadowy doorway. The teenager's eyes scanned the street for Outlaws. 'Are you sure you don't want to wait for the police? Because... because you're going to die. I know you are.'
Twisting away, Glen walked into the street. He glanced at the shop signs, started toward a hardware store. The cousins ran to catch up with him. Passing a mailbox, he pointed. The teenagers dropped in letters, then followed Glen Shepard through the dark, deserted street.
'Outlaws!' Gadgets hissed.
Stepping through the door of the ManBird Hang-Glider shop, lock-pick still in his hand, Lyons froze. Gadgets eased up his Uzi. Blancanales pushed the Uzi down, slipped out the silent Beretta.
Across the street, three Outlaws — two of them carrying shotguns, the third an M-14 rifle — crept up to a one-ton delivery truck. One Outlaw scanned the street, sawed-off riot shotgun in his hands, then tried the truck's door. Locked.
Glass shattered. On the curb side, an Outlaw opened the door, then slid across to the driver's seat. The truck's hood popped open.
Slow and silent as a shadow, Blancanales stepped back into the hang-glider shop's doorway. Taking a marksman stance, he held the Beretta in both hands and sighted on the third Outlaw. Blancanales flicked the burst selector down to single-shot.
The biker stepped behind the truck, spoke with the Outlaw sitting in the cab. The Outlaw carrying the riot shotgun slung the weapon over his shoulder and reached under the hood of the truck. The Outlaw in the driver's seat got out, closed the truck door softly, glanced toward the beach.
Blancanales pointed the Beretta at the center of this biker's forehead. He looked past the biker. He would fire when the third Outlaw was in the open. He would kill all three before they knew what hit them.
It was then that he realized that this Outlaw was only a teenager. Shaved, wearing a clean shirt under his Outlaw jacket, the boy wore filthy Levi's that bagged around his slim legs. He also wore clean tennis shoes.
'Kill them,' Gadgets whispered.
The teenage Outlaw was crossing the street. He went to a curbside tree only two steps from Blancanales. The teenager leaned back against the truck and watched the street. His back was to the doorway where Able Team hid.
Silently, Blancanales stepped up behind the teenager, cupped his left hand over the boy's mouth, put the Beretta's suppressor behind his ear. Blancanales whispered to the boy: 'I'm the police. Are you an Outlaw?'
The boy shook his head, no. Blancanales took his hand off the teenager's mouth, then grabbed the M-14 he held.
'Are they Outlaws?'
'No,' Chris Davis gulped.
Turning, Chris found himself face to face with what looked like a hard-eyed biker. 'Glen! Roger!' Chris screamed as he punched the biker again and again. The biker locked an arm around Chris' throat. Blancanales thought, I'm getting too old for these fun and games. He held the teenager tight as the boy struggled and called out: 'Run! Run for it! They got...'
Throwing himself behind a parked car, Glen jerked the riot shotgun from his shoulder and pointed it at the shadows and dark doorways across the street. Blancanales commanded: 'Don't shoot! We're police! We got Outlaw jackets just like you. Nobody shoot!'
He stepped from the darkness, his arm locked around Chris' neck. He went to the center of the street, then released Chris. He returned the M-14 to Chris and, slipping a long-barreled automatic into his belt, removed his Outlaws jacket.
He wore a roll-necked black nylon uniform that was criss-crossed with equipment belts and magazine bandoliers. This man had no badge and Glen had never seen the uniform before, but whoever he was, he was official. Glen put the shotgun down on the sidewalk and shook hands with the black-clad officer: 'Thank God you're here. What took you so long?'
Shoving through the massed citizens of Avalon, Max Stevens assembled his resistance workers. He jerked a man away from his wife and teenage children. 'Go to the other side, we're meeting. It's an emergency!' He didn't stop to answer the man's questions.
Stumbling over a sleeping mother, Max grabbed the arm of a worker gossiping with one of her spies. 'Forget that, it's too late! Go to the meeting...' He pointed across the crowd, then hurried on to the next worker and the next and next. He saw Mike Carst and called out: 'Mr. Carst! Join us please. This is imperative.'
Limping into the center of the assembled group, Max raised his hands for quiet.
'This morning, we agreed we would be in great danger if we attempted to escape. We agreed we would wait until the police attacked. But things have changed. Regardless of what we do now, we are at all times in great danger. Whether or not the ransom is paid, they plan to kill us all right here.'
A hundred voices questioned him simultaneously. He shouted: 'Quiet! Quiet! We have no choice now. We must act. We must rush those doors, or else we all die. They have filled the emergency fire sprinklers with gasoline — this entire building is a bomb. We are the explosive. They're going to hose us down and ignite us. The building, us — we all blow together — biggest bomb ever...'
Max had noticed that the man next to Mike Carst was the one he'd seen murder the Secret Service agent. That was the man who'd spoken by radio with the Outlaws, who did not care too much about the 'petty bourgeoisie' of Catalina. Max decided to channel the fury of his fellow citizens toward the traitor, to distract them.
'He's a spy of the Outlaws!' he yelled, pointing at the startled individual. 'He has a radio in his pocket. Grab him. Make him tell us what the Outlaws plan to do! Grab him!'
John Severine struggled to escape. But thirty men and women had seized him. He punched at them and kicked. But they were hammering him with fists, and they knocked him to the floor and held him down.
'Here's the radio! He was a spy!'
