I was about to be killed. That’s what was beginning to rampage through my head. I hadn’t switched modes properly, from commander to attacker, and here I was almost hand-to-hand with the enemy. What in Sam’s Hell was going on?
We had all set our communications on open channel, so we would all know what was going on. Evie was listening, and I needed a rocket. Right through that window across the street. It had to be marked, and the fire had to waver, or I was a goner.
“Major, heavy backup, now, on my marker.”
That would work, if I could mark the source. I focused my eyes on the field of fire that I covered, and immediately pinpointed the tell-tale barrel smoke of the vicious machine-gun fire. The front window of the house directly across the street. If anyone had lived there before, they were probably dead already. Maybe they were lucky. Maybe they’d been on vacation. Yeah.
All the while I was thinking, I’d been firing. By this time, I had put about twelve ‘blow-tip’ rounds through that window, and the splinters were still exploding into the air. Because the shooter had stood back from the window to avoid being targeted, I had to ‘open up the curtains’, so to speak. I’d fired across pattern through the window, forcing the shooter to at least step back, and then rimmed the window for Evie, outlining it for her, hoping she was ready, and that she’d understood me.
There were rounds coming from the house behind me, now. I could feel the pounding of the H&Ks’, at least three shooters’, maybe more. Who?
My rounds had stopped the death-stitch marching across the lawn, barely short of marching right across me. But that wouldn’t last… and then the rocket passed high overhead, moving much faster than the eye could follow, except for the smoke trail. It was running on a down angle, so Evie was in the attic with Wilson. She’d gone for the high ground, making a stand instead of running just yet. Good choice. I hadn’t expected the instantaneous vehemence of the enemy’s attack, but Evie had adjusted.
The sound was weird, like the Jolly Green Giant had bent over, and was whispering ‘Shush’ in my ear. A big sound, that stayed with you. It was straight as an arrow, and then there was no more window, only smoke and fire, and things going up, and out through the air, and I was moving, as fast as I could without my ‘Slow Time’ coming over me.
It was conspicuously absent here, and I had no time to ponder the issue, not if I wanted to live to resolve it.
Just as I reached the side of the house, and the driveway, the first car came rolling by at top speed, wheels screeching on the curve of the crescent street, spraying automatic fire everywhere. The air was so full of bullets that it felt like one deep breath, and I’d inhale one. Then something big, and heavy hit me, shifting me sideways and knocking me off my feet. What the hell… the shock wave from the rocket. What kind of loads is that girl using? The thought went through my mind as I fell. Hard.
The ground leaped up and grabbed me, knocking all my wind out. As I lay there stunned for a second, the car in front of me lifted off the ground in a ball of fire, exploding, then exploded a second time, as it hung suspended in the air.
From my vantage point close to good old terra firma, I saw the whole thing. The bodies in flames blowing through the roof of the car as it lifted off the chassis. The smoke and fire, all over my field of view. I rolled fast, away from the car. One turn.
As soon as my face felt dirt, I dug in. I wanted to be a mole, I wanted my tunnel. I wanted to be a falcon, flying high overhead, watching the action with eyes sharper than a sniper-scope, in amusement and safety. I wanted to be anything and anywhere, but here.
The shock wave rolled over me this time without much ado. My lying prone was a help. The sound was tremendous, I’m sure. I couldn’t hear a thing. The heat from the explosion was searing my lungs, as I tried to stifle the impulse to breathe, unsuccessfully.
I’d been stationary too long, I had to move. No question. I pulled myself out of the imaginary hole I’d dug in the lawn, and turned my head to survey the scene.
There was Evie, standing on the front lawn, fully upright, with a rocket launcher in each arm. She was certifiable, this new Major. But did she look good to my spirit, or what?
The road was filled with smoke and fire, so that you couldn’t even see across the street. The flames were still climbing into the sky from the car, and above the flames and smoke from the street, the plume of smoke from the first blast on the house opposite, was rising in a column at least fifty or sixty feet high. What a scene.
As I took it all in, a second car burst through the curtain of fire and smoke in the street, headed straight at the house. And at me, as I was standing on the front lawn like a pink flamingo, and just about as easy a target, too.
I was slowing down for some reason, and I was having trouble thinking straight. My forty fives were down to about three shells per clip, and there was no time. The front passenger side of the car and the back drivers side each had a suited maniac hanging out of the respective windows, with machine pistols blazing. I was about to become instantly overweight, the kind of weight you don’t shed so easily. The Major stood her ground, waiting for what, I didn’t know, while the car bore down on us and lead zipped through the air like an attack of African killer bees.
I finally got the message through to my body, Dive!, and I threw myself sideways again, in the general direction of the ground. Just as I did, a small series of starred holes appeared in the windshield of the car. In a circle about one inch across. Right about where the driver’s face had been. About two micro-seconds after that, the car hit the curb, lost control and started to flip over onto the flagstone walkway leading to the front door of the house. The nose was dug into the edge of the concrete sidewalk, and the rear was taking the point position. I hit the ground before it did. Hard.
Out of the corner of my eye I saw two tell-tale smoke trails headed towards the body of the car. It never got a chance to land on the house property. The dual explosion was strong enough to counter the inertia of the vehicle, and it literally reversed direction, in a slow spin of fire and flying bits of twisted metal, and things that weren’t. Then it landed in the street about fifteen feet from the first one. What was left of it.
I was trying to dig in deeper when I felt someone pulling me up from both shoulders. I tried to roll into position with my hand canons breathing fire. The best I got out was a squirm and a grunt. I think I grunted. I was fairly deaf in both ears at the moment, and just realizing it. The hands managed to roll me over. Evie and Loretta were pulling me to my feet. There was blood coming from somewhere, lots of it, and they both looked pretty healthy. Considering that I was the only other person around at the moment… this was not a good sign for yours truly.
The ‘Vette was pulling up alongside me and I was unceremoniously tossed into the back of the car, along with some bags of what looked to be materiel, and probably belonged to Evie. Loretta quickly switched places with Casey, who was behind the wheel of the Audi. He jumped right into the back seat with the Colonel, who was still out cold.
It seemed someone had taken a dislike to the rear window in the Audi, because it no longer resided within its frame. He was monitoring Ronnie’s BP with one eye & hand, while monitoring the rear-view with the other eye and a particularly wicked looking assault weapon of some kind in the other. I hadn’t seen that one yet. It looked like the kind that was probably outlawed by both of the official sets of good guys and bad guys. That left the grey zone. Interesting.
Therese had grabbed the steering wheel of the ‘Vette, and the back tires were definitely smoking. I still couldn’t hear worth a damn, but my nose was working, and the burning rubber was coming through clear as my next ‘Official Dressing Down’. They happened frequently when I’d been in action.
The next thing I knew, Evie was sitting on me. Sort of. The passenger seat had Ted in the small cubicle formed from its being thrown forward and left there. Therese had already brought us through the fires from both of the Citroens, or what was left of them, and was acc
elerating down the street at top speed. We had stopped being flung from side to side every half-second like it was the latest ‘Action Ride’ at Belmont Park, and it was occurring to me that the Crescent Drive would be a trap for us just as it would have been for the Grey Men if the Paris Police & Anti-Terrorist Units got to block them off before we broke free. Therese and Evie were yelling back & forth at each other, but I wasn’t getting any of it. Suddenly I realized that that wasn’t necessarily a good thing. I was hurt. Shit.
Evie quickly turned to me and used a disposable needle. I didn’t feel it. I noticed that there was a lot of blood on Evie’s hands, but I think it must have been mine, because she wasn’t acting like herself at all. Then I didn’t feel anything. Then I didn’t see anything either, there was just the cottony white passing my eyes as I tumbled down the slopes of whatever particular hole I’d stumbled into. Bloody ‘White Rabbit’ syndrome. Then nothing.
~
Chapter Forty
I
was spared the high-tension get-away, being in la-la land and all, but when I woke up I had a headache the size of Ronnie’s ego. Or Texas. Take your pick.
Evie debriefed me while I was recuperating. It didn’t help much. I was pretty out of it for most of the time and asleep for the rest.
My room was small, white, and rectangular. No window, one table, two chairs, one regulation fold-out cot, one door. It had a stucco-like finish to the ceiling, and the walls were smooth.
Every time I tried to get out of bed on my own, two things happened. First, I started to pass out, slowly but surely. Second, Evie would show up within three minutes, or Casey, presuming Evie wasn’t available. Either way I’d end up back in bed with the lights fading fast. Either I wasn’t well or somebody was feeding me some grade ‘A’ pharmaceuticals. Or Both.
I don’t know for sure how long I was in this condition before my mind came back to me full-power, but when it did, it came with a body shaking rush. I’d been hurt, pretty bad maybe. My left arm was stitched solidly closed. I’d guess about two hundred all-in-all. Apparently as I’d dived through the front door on my clever little ‘diversionary’ tactic, I’d dived into a rain of 5.6 mm machine pistol or 7.2 mm automatic fire.
The fact that my left arm was the only part of me that got ‘rained on’, was nothing short of a miracle. I’d taken a few then, and I’d taken a few more out on the front lawn. Same arm, same general location. That had been what had gone wrong with my play from that point on. The fact that I was still here at all was due to team-work. Which meant that the whole damn Swiss mess had had its up side because it had succeeded in created the ‘Team’.
Where I was, I was being monitored twenty-four hours a day. Evie still had come & go privileges, that was good.
I thought back to my debriefings with Evie, and realized that I hadn’t been told anything, really. That was bad.
I was in white ‘Jammies’ with a soft white terry cloth bathrobe. That was bad.
No one had told me about Ronnie or Therese or George. That was bad too.
I kept my eyes closed and thought about how I was getting fed up with the ‘bad’ column, and so far, I wasn’t very impressed with the ‘good’ column. Time for a change. I lay there for about two and a half hours, counting off the time properly, and communicating with every part of my body that would talk back. Things were starting to fall back into place.
Somewhere in the room there was a camera. In a pinch, at best, I would have three minutes, at the worst, less than the time it takes a guard to open the door to the room. There was no way of knowing yet. Evie hadn’t done anything but help me back to bed, where I’d needed to be, apparently. That had just changed radically, but since I hadn’t opened my eyes since it had, I could be pretty damn sure that I was the only one who knew that.
I made a show of waking, and making my way to the chair at the table next to the bed, and nearest the door, and then I started counting.
Within less than two minutes Evie showed up at the door, opening it a crack, just enough to stick her head in and ask permission to enter. So, she thought that I was feeling better. How much better, I wonder?
I motioned to the other chair at the table. She entered the room and started walking across to me. It was all of four steps. She had no sidearm, and had left the door open an inch when she entered. I didn’t know what was going on, but I wasn’t going for it with a ‘happy camper’ attitude.
Evie pulled out the chair and sat down, letting out a load of tension with that simple action. I guessed that she could sense that I was back.
I’d determined that we were on a ship while I was lying waiting with my eyes closed, trying to take in as much information as I could while building up to this moment. A big ship. There was a gentle swelling motion going on though, that couldn’t be disguised by the most protected ports in the world. Or the largest craft built. The sea will tell you it is the sea, if you’re lucky, it tells you nicely.
I looked her right in the eyes and asked the dreaded question. “Are we still in charge?”
There was a slight hesitation, and then she squared her shoulders and told me the truth. I could tell it was the truth by the way she looked me in the eye when she didn’t have to.
“We could be, but Ronnie’s got to get it together, she needs help pronto. She insists that she has everything in hand, but she’s being heavily debriefed, and our movements are severely curtailed, sir, I’m not sure what to think except to trust to instinct and Ronnie’s word.
The digital camera is over my left shoulder, above the door, and the room is not wired for sound. The guard’s taken a few minutes’ latrine break. Don’t answer in any way that could be used against us, they could lip-read if they needed to. We need to get Ronnie out of the debriefing ASAP, and meet her up with you. From there it’s up to the two of you. It doesn’t look very good right now if we don’t pull Ronnie out of the debriefing and get a plan together. So far, it’s been all by the regs, and if we could put a stop to it… well maybe we’d have a chance.”
I heard the sound of the guard’s boots on the deck as he headed back our way to his post. Having the door an inch open gave me at least ten more seconds. Evie was learning well, Ronnie was our number one priority. I quickly tapped out gently on her hand in Morse Code, “Get comms.” Her body shielded the exchange from the camera.
I thought of the shape I’d left Ronnie in the last time I’d seen her, and I wondered where she’d pulled the strength to stand up to any debriefing at all.
“Fine. How long has she been in debriefing, whose ship is this and where are we moored?”
“This is the Canadian Battlegroup, no mission code-name so far, as there is no official mission, for the moment. We’re on the good Her Majesty’s Ship Montréal, Frigate Class. Commander Frederick Brightwell running the bridge. No favours or connections there. Battle Group commanded by Admiral George ‘The Leopard’ Periwitcz. I don’t know about any favours or connections there either. Ronnie might, but she’s incommunicado about six hours a day, and well ‘accompanied’ the rest of the time. This is day three, hour…” she made that quick movement with her arm that slides your shirt cuff off of your watch-face, “two”. She folded her arm back onto the other one. “As far as ‘Unsubstantiated Rumour’, I’ve heard that we’re docked somewhere in Holland, and that there’s a ‘Recall with Prejudice’ outstanding for our entire team. Now you know what I do. Sir.”
She sat there and looked at me, as if to say “What are you going to do about this one Mr. Fixer-Upper Guy?” I had to agree with her obvious assessment. At first glance, it didn’t look too damn good for the white hats. Not too damn good at all.
I thought about it some more as my mind started to come back on line. Holland. That was good. Canadian Battle Group. That was Okay. Ronnie being debriefed for even ten minutes, that was bad. I needed a comm link with Ronnie, ASAP.
Evie started to stand up from the table.
“You’d better get some rest now, sir. I’ll be back
later today.” As she stood up she slipped one of our micro comm units into my open hand. I closed it fast. She walked out of the room, and closed the door. I could hear the lock being engaged this time. Well, at least my ears were coming back to me.
It seemed as if the new Major had anticipated my request, and if all was well, when Ronnie got out of the debriefing, I’d find that she had a micro-comm too. Whether or not they would work on this tub of steel, we’d have to wait and see.
I slowly rose from the table and limped back to bed, which was mostly for the camera. I felt like getting dressed and charging around the ship, but that’s not how it works in the Navy. You have permission, or you don’t. Simple. I didn’t. Yet.
Despite my rapidly returning strength, it didn’t take long for me to drop off into a light doze.
Before I did, I rolled over on the cot, facing the wall and slipped the comm unit into place in my ear against the pillow. Once properly installed, you’d have to be about two inches from me to see it. That was definitely deep within my private space, and wouldn’t be invaded unless I was in bigger trouble than it appeared I was. Which seemed to be big enough. Time passed. I slept lightly.
All of a sudden the comm unit came on line. There was plenty of static, but it was Ronnie alright. Something was starting to go right.
“Jeffry, come back.”
I was on it like a bear on honey, but I never moved a muscle.
“Ronnie, I’m here. Are you OK?”
“Never better, thanks, and you?”
“I finally woke up, that’s a good sign, I figure.”
“Right. Now business.”
“I’m all ears.”
“OK. We’re going to get one more shot, but if we screw this one up, I’m going to spend the best part of my life on prison latrine duty. I need you to hold it up for me now, Jeffry. I can’t do it alone. I’ve pulled in a favour from ‘The Leopard’. Don’t ask. Evie’s going to be coming for you in about ten minutes. Your guard won’t be on the door at the time she comes. We’ll have about five minutes to abandon ship. Civvies get left behind, except for Collette. Our gear has been dropped on the dock for us, and the ‘special materiel’s’ are still ours. Be ready. I’ll see you dockside. Copy?”
The Diamond Dust on Dragonfly Wings: A Jeffry Claxton Mystery Novel Page 93