Survivalist - 17 - The Ordeal (14 page)

disposable magazines, the cartridges either bulleted as a conventional hardball military round—she had picked up a great deal of her husband’s and son’s weaponry argot since the Awakening—or the same round bulleted with impact-detonated high explosives. Beneath the primary barrel was a secondary barrel, this vented for diffusion of gas, the barrel itself fed with lock-in disposable plastic magazines utilizing self-contained, single-shot, manually operated bolt actions, the magazine carrying ten rounds of 40mm grenade-like projectiles, available projectiles at this early phase of the weapon’s introduction into service only high-explosive and tear gas.

From her limited theoretical understanding of firearms— hers was only a practical understanding begat by necessity since the Night of the War—the new German weapon, labeled the STG-101, was “hot stuff.” Somehow she knew her husband, despite his traditionalism, would appreciate it.

Sarah Rourke moved ahead, the STG-101’s heavily checkered pistol grip tight in her right fist, the checkering so deep (yet non-abrasive) that she could feel it subtly through the black leather gloves she had been given to wear.

The STG-101’s carrying handle was fitted with fully adjustable military-style sights, of the type she was used to with the centuries-old M-16s, but within the handle itself was a scope, three-power she had been told, and by utilizing a hollow cavity within the synthetic straight-line buttstock, the STG-101’s scope could be battery powered, as was hers, for use as a vision-intensification scope.

But she hoped the new guns would not have to be used here, because even with the flash-suppressor, which Mann had told her was very effective, discharging of a single round would betray the firer’s position.

Her radio headset was newest German field issue as well, powered by galvanic skin response, sound traveling from the set along the bones to her inner ear, voice transmitted by bone as well to the set which then transmitted to the receiving set.

Her eyes shifted from Colonel Mann’s broad-set shoulders to

the robot-operated viewers ahead, fitted with miniaturized video transmitters, one of the commandoes on a steady mount suspended from his chest and shoulders monitoring the video output, like a director in a television studio punching up different shots, in complete control of the robot-operated cameras. There were two of them, neck-like appendages on the robots extending several feet upward or outward, ungainly looking, like huge sheet cakes, no more than a foot high at the base, but three feet square and mounted on miniaturized tank treads.

One of the robots was behaving oddly, if behavior were indeed the way to describe the actions of a machine. It was cutting a zig-zag pattern well ahead of the second machine, its camera tentacles—the lenses incorporated in the tentacles— extending at bizarre angles.

On the comm line she heard the video operator’s voice. “Herr Colonel. Unit Two has something.”

Sarah Rourke stopped, joining the cluster of men around the video operator, looking over his left forearm toward the screen on his left front. Colonel Mann was speaking, and it was an odd effect, hearing his real voice and his voice transmitted as well. “There—in the shadowy area to the right of the screen. I saw it again.”

“A man?” She spoke without thinking, and all the others turned toward her.

“Yes, Frau Rourke,” Colonel Mann agreed. “But who? You will stay here—”

“No,” she said, “I can carry my weight.” And she thought of her swelling abdomen. Her weight was getting more considerable all the time.

“Very well. You two will come with us. You will keep the video monitors trained on us at all times. Shall we?” And Colonel Mann turned toward her and then nodded his head forward along the tunnel.

She fell in step beside him, the STG-101 tight in her hands, one of the grenade magazines in place, one of the standard

7.5mm-ball rounds chambered. With the availability of the grenades, she had explosives if need be.

She heard Mann’s voice whispering through the bones in her ear. “We must be as silent as possible, Frau Rourke.”

“Call me by my first name, please. You’re making me feel like I’m a thousand years old instead of just five hundred.” Why was she trying to make a joke, she asked herself? A little fear, yes.

“Sarah. Follow my lead. Schmidt, Mueller, take the opposite side of the tunnel. Knives if possible.” And as he spoke she looked at him, Mann drawing a knife of comparatively modest size from a sheath at his right hip; by comparison to the Jack Crain knife her husband had begun carrying, had had made for him five centuries ago, any knife was modest in size.

She remembered the fight that had caused, oddly now. And yet he had saved his own life with it, Natalia had killed Karamatsov with it. “What do you need a knife that size for, John? It’s the size of a sword, for God’s sake.”

“There are two schools of thought with knives, basically,” he had begun and she had known it was going to be one of his weapons lectures and she hated them because she didn’t understand them and, in those days, had thought that mere possession of weapons was tantamount to insanity. Sure, a shotgun in the house because they lived far from town, but what else did anyone need? And John had to carry a gun because of what he did for a living. But did he need all of those guns? “Some people,” he’d gone on, “believe that a long-bladed knife is for showboating. You can accomplish almost any task with a knife with a blade six inches or less, seven at the outside. But a larger knife can accomplish those same tasks, usually with greater efficiency. And its formidable appearance aids in its use as a weapon if need be, not to mention the possibility of being stranded in the field with a firearm that is for some reason or another non-functional. There’s the question of dangerous predators to consider,
etc.
But it really boils down to versatility. A large knife is more versatile than a

small knife. This will be good for Michael someday.”

“Why would Michael need it? Answer me that. Why would Michael need half the things you’ve put away for him?”

“Someday,” he continued, patiently, “the mere possession of a weapon of any sort or anything that can be construed as a weapon may be so filled with legal pitfalls and restrictions that the wealth of fine firearms and edged weapons available today may be a thing of the past. If a situation arises for which a high-quality firearm or knife is the only remedy, then what? It pays to plan ahead.”

He always said that. Always had.

And sometimes, when she was alone, she would think of her naivete, realize that if he had not planned ahead, they would all be dead now, dead like the millions of others who had died as a result of the insanity they so blandly called “the Night of the War.”

Wolfgang Mann’s hand touched her forearm and invaded her thoughts and suddenly she realized they were even with the video-probe robots, equidistant between them.

She normally would have carried one of the Gerber MK II knives that were all but standard equipment for the Rourke family, but she had only brought her pistol in a purse, going out to meet Colonel Mann as part of a diplomatic party, not gearing up for war.

She had never been a knife-fighter anyway. She whispered as softly as she could and yet be heard, “I’ll back you up.”

“Yes.” And he edged forward, his body in a crouch, the knife in what she knew was called a rapier hold.

She tagged after him, her thumb beside the rifle’s selector, ready to move it into the burstfire mode.

Wolfgang Mann stopped.

Sarah Rourke stopped.

Movement.The voice of the video operator in the bones of her ear. “I have that figure again, Herr Colonel. It is withdrawing, but slowly. I do not think the figure has vision-intensification capabilities.”

There was no response.

The voice again. “I see what appears to be a weapon, Herr Colonel. But, Herr Colonel, I am not sure.”

They kept moving, Sarah dogging Wolfgang Mann’s heels.

She saw it now, too, someone moving perhaps twenty-five yards ahead of them. A Russian? Or was it one of the Chinese sent to meet them and he’d only gotten his signals crossed? She guessed the same thoughts filled Wolfgang Mann’s mind as well.

Maybe it was being pregnant, but sometimes the most ridiculous thoughts came to her mind—if Colonel Mann were going to begin calling her by her given name, then what should she call him? Wolfey? She almost giggled just at the thought of calling him that and she had never been a giggler; but pregnancy did weird things with hormones.

Mann moved ahead quickly now and Sarah picked her way after him.

He broke into a noiseless run. She ran, too, the new German assault rifle suddenly heavy in her hands, her palms sweating inside the gloves through which she held it.

Mann dodged right, into the center of the tunnel, and the mysterious figure started to run. The voice of the remote video operator came again. “That is a weapon. The profile looks Russian. Be careful, Herr Colonel!”

There was a blinding flash but only for an instant, the vision-intensification goggles self-compensating, she had been told. She had already squinted her eyes shut against the flash as she heard the concussion of the shot, ringing in the confined area of the tunnel, reverberating off the tunnel walls and floor and ceiling.

As she opened her eyes, Colonel Mann was tackling the figure with the gun, the gun discharging again, but in a different direction, the flash less blindingly bright, Sarah throwing the STG-101 to her shoulder, shouting now, “Colonel—Wolfgang!”

But there was no clear shot as Mann bulldogged the figure to

the tunnel floor, more shots discharging into the ceiling, the whining of the ricochets maddeningly loud.

Sarah ran, stumbled, almost fell, caught herself.

Mann was on his knees, and she realized both Mann and the figure who had fired were wrestling over Mann’s knife.

The two commandoes, Schmidt and Mueller, were running up to aid their commanding officer, but she was closest.

The figure with whom Colonel Mann struggled was too big to be Chinese, she told herself—had to be Russian.

She summoned up images of every John Wayne movie she’d ever seen as she inverted the still-safed battle rifle in her hands, grasping it where the front stock ended. She swung, the rifle seeming to hesitate in mid-swing for an instant, a loud cracking sound then and the Russian or whoever it was fell back, groaning in pain, rolling about on the tunnel floor, hands clasped over his face.

Colonel Mann was on him, fists hammering across the lower jaw. And then Colonel Mann sagged back on his haunches, brushing dust from his uniform.

He looked up at her, smiling like some sort of little boy fresh from a schoolyard scuffle. “You saved my life—Sarah. He was stronger than I, this fellow. Let us see who he is, shall we?”

She was still holding onto the rifle as if it were a broom.

How far she’d come from when she wouldn’t have known the way to hold a rifle at all, Sarah Rourke thought…

When Akiro Kurinami finally shrugged into the coat, he was freezing from drying sweat. But it was the first moment he had been able to stop, on a headlong lunge along the canyon wall, even hiding impossible, just running since his aircraft had been shot down and his doorgunner killed. A brave young man. And if he made it out alive, Kurinami promised himself, he would let the young man’s family know just how brave. But even now, despite the coat and the time since he had donned it, Akiro Kurinami was still chilled to the marrow.

The air over the battle scene had been thick with Soviet gunships one instant, then nothing the next as they had pursued the remaining gunships of his force. But such’a serious blow had been struck the Soviet armada, he doubted seriously that another attack against Eden Base and the German base near it could be launched without heavy reinforcement.

The Soviet gunships were gone, but the canyon walls surrounding and the ground above which the gunship battle had taken place were all but crawling with Soviet personnel, many of them commandoes of the Elite Corps.

Midway along the canyon floor, exhaustion had finally taken over, Kurinami’s lungs burning with it, and he had searched the canyon’s sides for some place that would afford a modicum of concealment from aerial or ground observation.

It was a wide cleft in tall rocks on which he finally settled, one of the rocks, perhaps centuries ago, pushed over by some enormous force, and now reclining against the other, forming a natural roof over him.

A quick assessment of the items rescued from the about-to-explode aircraft included one Beretta 92F military pistol (U.S. M-9), two spare fifteen-round magazines, one German survival knife with about an eight-inch blade shaped more like a machete than a knife blade, one first aid kit, complete, one tube shelter with pressure-activated warming bands running through it in circular bands which would activate as soon as the shelter was opened, one liquid-filled compass, two chemical lightsticks, three packets of rations, enough to keep a man going on a light diet for three days if he did not mind what food looked like; Kurinami had seen the contents of these food packets only once and that had been enough.

There were various little gimmick items but, other than these, the only other truly useful items were a plastic cannister of survival matches, a magnesium stick to be used for shavings when fire-making materials might be damp and a plastic signal mirror.

He secured the survival kit in with his own gear, his maps, his manuals. He was tempted to burn the pilot’s manuals rather than let them fall into Soviet hands, but a fire, aside from alerting the Russians to his presence, would have consumed precious matches, and to dig a hole in the rocky ground deep enough in which to bury the manuals would have been impossible.

It was time to move, to try to make it back toward friendly lines.

“Try” was the operative word.

Michael Rourke, Maria Leuden, Han Lu Chen and the Soviet officer who was the new operations head of the KGB Elite Corps, Vassily Prokopiev, approached the natural rock chimney, the wind howling almost more loudly up from the chimney than around it, despite the hour the sky dark with the heavy, snowladen gray clouds.