“Damn, they must’ve slipped past us when all of the teams were heading out,” she said. “No one noticed. I remember the dog barking like crazy, but everything was really hectic.”
As they watched, the mercenary commander turned toward the girl and beckoned her. Chloe and Sniffy both froze, but Elna could see the dog’s mouth moving. He was barking with all his might.
“Where’s Miriam?” Elna asked. “Where is the little girl’s mother? Didn’t she notice her daughter was missing?”
“I don’t know,” Cat replied. “That lady doesn’t say much. She’s always just sort of lurking in a corner somewhere.”
The commander moved toward Chloe and Sniffy. The dog immediately jumped in front of the girl, lowering his head as if preparing to charge, but when the commander continued to advance, Sniffy finally turned and fled. Chloe followed him as they ran toward the trees beside the back road. They had no chance. The commander caught up to them in three strides, grabbed the little girl’s left arm in his free hand, and swung her around. Sniffy came running back, dodging and weaving, as if torn between wanting to rescue the little girl and wanting to escape. After a couple seconds of this, the commander kicked the dog, and he went tumbling off toward the trees.
“We have to get up there and help them,” Elna said.
“Yeah, but we can’t let the commander find the bunker door,” Cat said. “There’s too much at stake.”
Suddenly, a fourth figure appeared on screen, also coming from the direction of the western shore. She was stumbling along, clearly out of breath, her hands pressed against her belly. She wore an oversized Marine uniform that was clearly two sizes too big for her. Miriam, the little girl’s mother. Sniffy had recovered from the kick but ran off out of frame as the commander hoisted Chloe up and tucked her under his arm. She was like a little doll next to the massive mercenary.
“Miriam must’ve realized her daughter was missing and went looking for her,” Cat said. “I was guarding the door. There’s no way they got past me. They must’ve slipped outside when everyone else was leaving.”
“What do we do?” Elna asked. No one seemed to have an answer for this.
Miriam dropped to her knees in front of the mercenary commander, clasping her hands and raising them above her head, as if pleading with the man. The commander set the rocket launcher on the ground beside him and began gesturing with his hand, even as Chloe thrashed in his grip.
“Where are Spence and Mac?” Cat muttered, smacking the back of the chair again. “They have the perfect opportunity to take this guy out right now.”
Suddenly, Miriam rose to her feet and pointed in the direction of the fence. Then she made some kind of motions with her hands: a circle, a line through the circle, a door opening.
“She’s ratting us out,” Cat said. “Can you believe it? After all we did for her.”
The commander thrust the girl at Miriam, and she grabbed her daughter. Then the two of them ran off again toward the western shore, soon disappearing out of frame in the direction of Sniffy. The commander picked up the rocket launcher and headed for the fence. Elna watched in disbelief as he passed through the fence and slipped into the gap behind the barracks building. Indeed, it seemed Miriam had just given him the location of the bunker in exchange for her daughter.
“You rescue some poor civilian, and this is how she repays you,” Cat said.
They lost sight of the commander for a second but located him again in another monitor. He was standing outside of the cave entrance, kneeling, bringing the RPG up to his shoulder.
“What do we do?” Elna asked.
Cat flung the door open and rushed out of the room. However, Elna watched, frozen in horror, as the commander took aim, pointing the rocket toward the cave entrance. There was a sudden burst of smoke, and he lurched slightly, as he fired the weapon toward the bunker door.
30
Elna felt the rocket hit as a kind of shudder, like a brief, low-strength earthquake, going through the walls and floor. Dust rained down, and she heard another ceiling panel crashing down from somewhere distantly in the bunker.
“What the hell is going on out there?” Prig shouted from the control room.
Elna watched the mercenary commander drop a small backpack on the ground at his feet, stoop down, and shove his hand into the large pocket. After a moment, he produced another rocket and began fitting it into the launcher. Smoke was gushing out of the cave entrance.
“Is he just trying to bring the whole cave down?” Malin said.
Elna pressed her hands against the edge of the console and slowly pushed herself, wincing all the way, to her feet. “I assume Miriam gave him only general directions to the bunker. It’s not as if she drew him a map. He knows it’s hidden in the cave, so maybe he wants to draw us out of hiding.”
The commander had socketed the second rocket, but he turned and aimed in a different direction. Elna had to triangulate between a couple of screens before she realized he was aiming at the lighthouse building. He fired, and the rocket cut a smoky arc, hitting the building just above the door. It blew a sizeable hole in the side. Elna felt the vibration of it. The walls around her shuddered, and something crashed down in another part of the bunker.
“If he knocks down the lighthouse, there goes our signal,” Malin muttered.
For a few seconds, everything around the lighthouse was obscured by smoke. Gradually, the smoke dispersed, and Elna saw the lighthouse still standing. Most of the building beside it was gone, collapsed to the foundation.
“He’s going to bring it all down,” she said, “and maybe bury us alive down here in the process.”
She pushed off
