“Don’t have ropes,” said Fashona. “I got no crew, remember?”
“Fuck me.”
“I’d love to, honey, but you’re not my style.”
“Shit. I don’t trust this roof. Can you land in front of the building?”
“Yeah, if Lia can stop playing with the stinking cannon.”
The helicopter whipped around about twenty feet from them, tilting on its axis as the cannon on the right side of the fuselage roared. A truck at the far end of the compound caught fire.
“All right, I’m going to send Martin down. I’ll cover him from here, then go and get Dean.”
“We’ll cover him,” said Lia. “Get Dean and let’s get the hell out of here.”
Karr whirled around to Martin. “You gotta go back down the ladder. Helicopter’s coming for you.
“I–I can’t.”
“Yeah, man, you go now,” said Karr. He spotted a car moving down the road from the area of the SAMs. “Go! I’ll worry about the car.”
“What car?”
“Go,” said Karr. He pushed him toward the ladder, then burned the entire magazine — more than eighty bullets were left — tearing through the front end of the vehicle. By the time he was done, the remains would have fit in a coffee can.
He pulled out his handheld to look for Dean as he slammed in a new ammo box. Karr hit the Bagel’s control screen, pushing the small UAV closer toward the base. Then he went back out to the view screen and from there directed the computer to find the image he’d earlier associated with Dean. It took several long seconds; finally, the screen popped into map mode and a white box outlined three figures running toward the main gate.
The Hind swept in from behind him, shooting its cannon as it did.
“Lia! Watch out for Dean!” yelled Karr. “Don’t fire at the gate.”
“Where is he? I’m not getting a feed with the locator system.”
“He’s near the gate.”
As Karr looked down to update the position, the screen went blank.
49
The three bullets the Russian fired hit Dean almost square in the chest. It was a good thing — the NSA body armor not only kept them from penetrating but absorbed some of the impact as well, spreading it through its high- tech cells. Still, his breath drained from him and Dean curled with the pain, just on the edge of consciousness. Two of his ribs felt like they were broken, and when the Russians jerked him to his feet he stood there paralyzed, nearly in shock.
One of the Marines finally pushed him toward the gate. Dean stumbled forward, his head off-kilter. Though he knew it couldn’t be true, it seemed like six or seven helicopters were flying overhead, supporting a company of ground troops attacking from all sides. A dozen Russian Marines scattered in small knots on the other side of the fence, firing toward the surrounding tundra and nearby town, though Dean knew there wasn’t anything there.
Soon, very soon, the Russians were going to decide he was the cause of all this misery and take a little revenge. Dean tried to slide his hand in beneath his vest to get one of his hideaway guns, but his ribs screamed with pain. One of the Russians put his hand on Dean’s back and shoved. As he did, the Hind loomed above, a dark, angry cloud of gunfire. Smoke and dust whipped into the air. The fence, only a few yards away, erupted. The metal seemed to jump into the air. Dirt, rocks, cement chips, metal, gunpowder — the air became thick with debris. Dean dived to the ground. In the swirling tornado he grabbed his calf, fishing for the small Glock strapped there. By the time he found it, he was choking and couldn’t see. He rolled to his hands and knees and started crawling toward the helicopter.
He’d gone about five yards when he realized it wasn’t the helicopter, which was now somewhere overhead and firing again. Something moved on the ground to Dean’s left and he rolled again. An assault rifle started firing a few feet away from him — he could hear it but couldn’t see the muzzle flash.
Turning onto his left side, he began pushing himself through the dirt, away from the gun. By turns the night became green, then red, then yellow and purple. Shadows furled into immense balls of blackness, then disintegrated. The helicopter came back, skimming in toward what remained of the gate. Dean saw Karr running toward it. As Dean started to follow, he realized it wasn’t Karr but one of the Russians.
The Glock made a soft popping sound in his hand, and the recoil was so sweet he wasn’t entirely sure in the chaos that he had actually fired. He pressed the trigger again, and the man turned.
Dean threw himself to the ground, but the Russian didn’t fire at him. Dean pushed forward, swimming more than crawling. His hip burned; something had hit him there. He shook his head, trying to wave off the pain. He’d suffered far, far worse.
He had to get out of here soon, or the next thing that hit him would take his head off. But now where was the Hind?
The thing to do, the only thing to do, was get to a clear open space and wait. They would come and get him. They would.
They were kids, but they would come and get him.
Shit. What he really needed was a company of Marines.
He’d settle for a squad. Shit, one guy, Bill Wiley maybe, humping over the fence.
Thirty years ago, maybe. Not now, not here. This wasn’t a Marine show. For better or worse, this was the kids’ game.
For worse, definitely worse. They were blowing it big-time. Them and their high-tech bullshit toys.
But wasn’t it his fault for going ahead with a bullshit plan? He knew it was bullshit and had said so.
Like Vietnam.
Either everybody around him was dead or they were pretending to be. Dean reached as gingerly as he could beneath his vest for the other Glock. Holding one in each hand, he started walking toward the main road, trying to sort out the battlefield. The buildings were almost dead ahead, the SAMs and flak dealers up to the right, out of view, though he assumed they were the source of the flames and black smoke curling through the flare-lit haze. Behind him were the barracks. He could hear vehicles coming from that direction, or at least thought he did.
Maybe get to the buildings, out on the roof, above all of this shit where they could see him.
So what happened to the stinking locator thing, huh? Where’s my beacon to beam me back aboard the mother ship?
As he started across the road toward the buildings, Dean felt the ground rumble. He looked to his left and saw something crashing through what was left of the main gate.
It was a BMP, a tracked armored personnel carrier with a cannon and a machine gun, one of the vehicles that had left earlier to check out the diversions. One of the guns atop the vehicle began firing. Dean dived into the dirt, diving, diving, diving, swimming down, and cursing himself for being a fool, for being a hero, for being here at all.
Then the ground spit him up. A volcano erupted where the gun had been. Tossed in the air by an explosion, Dean found himself diving into the dirt near the building where he’d originally been captured.
“All this time, you haven’t moved like two feet,” shouted a voice in his ears.
Where?
“Up! Up!”
Dean looked up and saw the ladder at the side of the building. He grabbed it, started to climb.
“They’re coming.”
Four loud explosions pushed him upward. Dean knew it was Karr, knew the explosions must be the NSA op’s A-2 firing, but couldn’t see anything except the suddenly grimy night in front of him. One of his eyes had welded itself shut, and the other was half-blinded by the flash from the BMP’s explosion. He climbed as best he could, diving onto the roof and belatedly realizing he ought to make sure it was still there.
It was. He got up and went back to help Karr. But the NSA op didn’t need any help — he kicked his feet over the top of the roof, saw Dean, and grinned. Then he whirled back and worked his A-2 like a drill hammer, smacking
