across the ground to his left. Before Rankin could do or think anything else, he felt himself being pushed backward as the building exploded. A fireball shot up from the truck that had been used as a launcher, the flames catching the tail of the modified Scud. Even as the missile pulled away from the ground through the hole in the roof, it had begun to veer off course.
Lying on his back, Rankin saw it twist to the right. A black finger curled around the side and then it keeled over, moving sideways through the air like a kid’s balloon that had just gotten a pin it. The warhead exploded with a tremendous thunderclap. The framework of the building was on fire, ignited by the same flame that had run up the fuel line from the train car. Thick black smoke furled out across the yard.
“Guns! Guns!” yelled Rankin. “That was a great idea. Guns!”
“Over here,” said Guns, opposite where Rankin expected him to be. The marine fired a fresh burst at the spot where the machine gun had been, but the Iraqis had retreated as soon as the missile launched and were now running to escape. The AC-130 droned in the distance, an angry bee late to the picnic.
“Guns?” Rankin, hobbled by his wounds, pushed in his direction.
“Down!” yelled Guns, spotting a figure with a pistol. He fired his M4 too late; the other man ducked as he fired.
Rankin went down. The bullet had missed, but the jerk to his knee was too much and he lost his balance. He dropped his gun as he fell. Before he could roll onto his stomach and retrieve it, the other man kicked it away.
It was Vassenka. The Russian extended his pistol slowly. “I hate Americans,” he said, taking aim, “but I love watching them die. Slowly. With great pain. I do this for free.”
A shot rang out from behind Rankin, then another. The bullets hit Vassenka in his chest. Staggering, he looked up, surprised.
James fired twice more. Vassenka sunk to his knees, then fired his own gun, striking James in the chest before collapsing.
Guns ran over and kicked the pistol from Vassenka’s hand. All four of James’s bullets had struck the Russian, but they were.32 caliber, small slugs in a big body. One had hit him close to the neck, and blood pumped steadily from the wound.
There was a chance he might live if someone stopped it from bleeding quickly. Guns took his weapons, stuffed them in his belt, then left him to die.
Rankin crawled over and cradled his friend’s head in his arms. “James?”
“Hey, Stephen. I got tired of waiting, man. I hope you don’t mind that I set the thing on fire. I figured you guys were in trouble.”
Unlike James’s gun, Vassenka’s pistol fired a large, thick slug. Blood was surging from the wound into James’s lungs and chest cavity.
“You saved my life,” Rankin told him.
“You should have thought of that, Stephen. Just set the damn thing on fire. You’re a bright guy. You should’ve thought of it. Not me.”
“I should have thought of it, James. You’re right.”
“I thought it was going to explode.”
“The rocket? It went off course.”
“The grenade,” said James, remembering. “I really thought it would go off.”
“So’d we all.”
“I wanted to die, man. That’s why I went with you guys. I just wanted to be gone. And since that time, so many times, I might have done something worthwhile, but what am I?”
James began coughing.
“You’re a hero. You saved my life,” Rankin told him. “You saved a lot of people’s lives.”
James closed his eyes, slipping away. “I really thought the grenade was going to explode.”
ACT VII
It is done.
1
Ferguson could see the
“You sound disappointed,” said Thera as Ferguson described what he saw.
“Not necessarily,” he told her. “Come up slow. Remember, the guy who owns that tub is an arms dealer. He could have anything short of a nuke aboard. He might even have that.”
“You sure we should go aboard ourselves? Why don’t we just call in backup?”
“Who are we going to call?”
“The navy comes to mind.”
“It’ll be next week before they can spare someone.”
Ferguson picked up his shotgun, deciding to stick with nonlethal bullets as his first choice. But he strapped on the waterproof backpack with the MP5N just in case.
They circled around the
“Let me get off, then you pull away,” Ferguson said. “I’m worried about booby traps.”
“If you’re worried about booby traps, why don’t we just wait for the navy?”
“If we wait and then this turns out to be nothing, how would I show my face at the next bar fight?”
Ferguson went over to the side, watching the yacht. He stepped, up then swung over the side, jumping across to the platform at the fantail. Once on the deck, he looked at the tiedowns to the tarp, trying to find booby traps. He couldn’t see any, nor did the detector find any bugs or radio devices. Ferguson walked up to the bow, then went back along to the cabin area.
“Birk?” he yelled. “Yo, guess who.”
No one answered.
“Hey, you dumb Polack, what are you doing?” Ferguson shouted. “Did you ever hear the joke about the Polish guy and the Irish guy and pig?”
Ferguson stepped down into the galley area and through the enclosed space to the ladder that led down to Birk’s suite of living quarters.
“Birk!”
The door to Birk’s cabin was ajar. Ferguson could see part of Birk’s bed, its covers taut and neat.
He pushed the barrel of his shotgun into the crack and edged the door open. Mildly surprised not to find Birk’s body on the bed, he slipped into the cabin. It looked pretty much exactly as he remembered from the other day.
Back topside, Ferguson took out a knife and hacked off the lines holding down the tarp. The two crates below the plastic were empty.
