by Richard Bard
Jake had repositioned gunpowder and boxes of rounds from the reload station next to the double-stacked pallets of gasoline drums. He’d used his knife to pierce the side of one of the upper containers to spill fuel over it all, connecting the makeshift bomb to the fuel leaking under the roll-up door in front of him. He ignited the BIC, touched the flame to the gas, and ran like hell.
As soon as he kneeled into the center position of the canoe, Lucy used her paddle to push them from shore. She steered the boat into the current and they drifted downstream.
Toward Frank’s Last Chance Bar.
They ducked low. Five seconds later an explosion ripped the night apart, like the grand finale of a fireworks display gone wrong. Even from a hundred yards away, the blast wave hit them with the force of a gale, shoving the boat across the water, and instantly bringing beads of sweat to Jake’s skin. Flaming debris flew in every direction, and one of the fifty-gallon drums shot up like a launched rocket. Birds shrieked, monkeys howled, and a thousand bats leaped from the trees to fill the sky with frantic flaps.
“Keep your heads down,” Jake said, as flaming scraps pelted the water around them.
Alex hunkered down in front of him. He was trembling but otherwise seemed okay. Jake turned to see Lucy bent low as well, but still steering with her paddle. She used her chin to brush a piece of glowing chaff off her shoulder.
Tough kid.
She motioned ahead to the left at the river’s bend, where an abundant overhang of trees and plant life created a deep shadow at the shoreline. The vegetation clinging to the hill beyond was so thick that it was impassable, which was why they’d had to trek through the forest on the distant side of the knoll to go from the village to the warehouse dock. It was the same path Frank’s people would have to take, and the success of their plan hinged on them racing along it now toward the explosion.
And away from their seaplane.
Lucy steered under the foliage. As the canoe slowed, she grabbed a low-hanging branch to hold them in place. Behind them the warehouse fire illuminated the river with sparkles, but they were deep in the shadows and well out of sight.
Alex sat up and rubbed his hands through his hair to shake out small bits of soot. When he turned back to Jake, he blew out a long breath and gave a thumbs-up. Jake patted the air with his palm, indicating Alex should remain where he was. Alex nodded. Jake crawled to the back of the canoe to exchange places with Lucy and take hold of the branch to keep them steady.
“You sure about this?” he whispered.
She gave him an expression that he guessed was the native equivalent of rolling her eyes, and kept her voice low. “The dock is just around the bend. Wait for my signal, then come fast.”
She moved to the middle of the boat and removed her pack, arrows, and bow. She studied the dark water as her fingers looped a leather drawstring around the hilt of the sheathed knife at her waist. After a moment, she closed her eyes and her lips spoke silent words. Then she rose to her feet so lightly the canoe barely moved, and a moment later she sliced into the water and disappeared.
Alex shook his head. “What about the piranhas?”
Jake shrugged. He strained to follow her path beneath the murky surface, but the water barely rippled. It frustrated him to just sit and wait while Lucy exposed herself to risk. But when she’d challenged him to suggest a better plan, he’d come up empty.
Three very long minutes passed before they heard Lucy’s double-hoot monkey call. He pushed off immediately and steered into the current, putting his back behind each paddle stroke. The canoe skipped across the water, and when they made the turn, the plane was less than fifty yards away. A dim wall light on the front of Frank’s building provided the only illumination, but it was enough to see at least a dozen more long canoes on the shore than had been there when they first arrived. Trumak’s tribe was here in force. Jake prayed they’d all taken the bait. There was a lot of movement up in the village, but Frank’s place looked deserted and Lucy was nowhere to be seen. Jake paddled harder.
They were less than ten yards from the dock when he spotted the two natives who had been guarding the plane earlier in the day. They stood on shore under the bow of a tree, their backs to the dock as they watched the activity up the hill. Alex pointed at them. Jake let the boat’s momentum carry it the rest of the way, and then used the paddle to steer it alongside the dock. He cringed when wood scraped against wood but the guards didn’t notice. He held the boat in place while Alex grabbed Lucy’s gear, set it on the pier, and clambered up beside it. His son scurried over to the plane.
Jake was on deck an instant later, and that’s when he saw Lucy. She was in the water at the front of the plane’s dockside pontoon, using her knife to work on a chain that was looped around the plane’s strut and secured to the dock with a padlock.
Crap.
Alex climbed inside the plane, leaving the door cracked open like he was supposed to. Jake stepped onto the pontoon and skirted past it as he rushed to help Lucy. It was a rusty anchor chain. One of the rings was open a fraction, and the tip of her knife was bent from her efforts. She hissed through clenched teeth. “It won’t open.”
Jake turned to survey the lock securing the dock cleat, causing the assault rifle slung on his shoulder to clip the pontoon’s strut. Lucy’s eyes went wide at the sound. She yanked her knife free and vanished into the water.
Both guards spun around in a crouch. A half beat later, one rushed toward Jake while the other faced up the hill and let out a fierce cry. War cries answered from the distance.
Jake leaped onto the dock. The first fighter raced full bore toward him, gripping a hatchet. His partner was behind him, wielding a machete. Either of them could’ve easily pierced Jake with an arrow from where they’d stood, but they’d discarded their bows. The tribe must’ve been under orders from Frank to take Jake alive. As he tapped energy from the mini, he knew he’d use no such restriction. Shadows were charging down the hill, and he’d kill them all if he had to.
He took a knee, aimed the assault rifle, and time slowed.
The first native was ten paces way. He wore a shiny key around his neck. It had to be the key to the padlock. Jake adjusted his aim to the right side of the man’s chest so that he’d fall to the dock, not in the water. He squeezed the trigger.
Click.
The weapon didn’t fire. Jake dropped the rifle and unholstered his pistol, bringing it to bear when the man was three paces away. He squeezed the trigger.
Click.
Chapter 9
IN SLOW MOTION, Jake recalled the snicker on Frank’s face when he’d pointed the pistol at the man earlier. It was the gun Frank had given Jake as a trade for the SIG that was out of ammo. Frank had known the pistol posed no threat, because he must have removed the firing pin from it and the assault rifle. From the sneer on the charging warrior’s face, the man already knew that. He was two steps from launching into Jake.
Jake dropped the pistol, coiled his muscles, and locked his focus on the man, ignoring the unexpected sound of the plane’s engine turning over beside him. The engine coughed, and stopped.
The air whistled at his ear, and an arrow buried itself in the warrior’s throat. The hatchet fell, the man clasped the protruding bolt, and his momentum carried him crashing into the water.
Along with the key.
Another arrow whisked past Jake. The second runner dodged it. He spun and ran toward shore. Jake looked back to see a dripping wet Lucy charging another arrow.
“Forget about it!” he shouted. “Get in the plane. Now!” Alex was kneeling on the pilot’s seat, reaching forward. The engine coughed twice, then settled into idling.
Jake had no time to contemplate how the hell Alex knew how to start the plane. When he spun back around, a dozen more warriors were spilling from the trees and racing toward the dock. They’d be on Jake in thirty seconds, and they all had bows.
He unslung the AA-12 shotgun, flipped off the safety, shouldered it, and fired a sp
urt of three rounds toward the shoreline. The recoil was much less than he’d expected. He’d aimed high, thinking the rounds would arc down into the line of combatants charging down the hill forty yards from him. Instead, the ground well behind them exploded in a burst of dirt and debris. They all stopped in their tracks. He remembered Tony telling him, Every enemy hates facing a shotgun. A single bullet is one thing, but an expanding blast of lead is another. Apparently the Amazonian natives were no exception. A few charged their bows, but the warrior leading them uttered something and they lowered their weapons.
Jake glanced at Alex, who looked back at him from the cockpit. Lucy, who was sitting in the back of the plane, stared at the two of them like they were crazy.
“We’re not safe yet,” she shouted. Her eyes went wide. “Move!”
Jake dodged to one side, and a dart whizzed past him. It came from the trees fronting Frank’s bar. Jake turned and fired two rounds into the shadows. Tree bark exploded, a man shouted, and Jake ducked as another dart zipped from a different copse of trees. Instead of returning fire, he aimed the shotgun at the padlocked dock cleat in front of him, turned his head away, and fired twice.
The dock shuddered, and a hundred bees stung Jake’s neck, scalp, and hands. When he looked back, there was a huge chunk of dock missing where the cleat had been, and the seaplane was drifting away.
He was about to leap for the pontoon when three natives broke cover and raised their blowguns. He twisted to one side as two more darts whistled past, and a third plinked off one of the useless assault rifle mags tucked into his tactical vest. When he turned back, the plane was twenty feet away.
Between the current and the idling props, the plane moved farther away from him with every beat. The natives had gathered their courage. They spread out and converged on the dock, each holding a blowgun. Even if he blasted them all with the shotgun, there were two dozen more sprinting down the hill. Instead, he raced toward the end of the dock at mini-fueled top speed, stripping off his pack and vest faster than Clark Kent prepping to take flight as Superman. He refused to leave the shotgun behind, so he slung it over his shoulder just before he leaped headlong into the water.
His arms and legs churned the water, but as fast as he was, he was having trouble catching up to the plane. The soggy clothes, boots, and shotgun weighed him down, and he started to feel lightheaded. He glanced back to see several six-man canoes chasing him, the natives’ paddles digging into the water in a practiced dance he couldn’t compete against.
But then the plane’s engine revved and it started to turn around.
Blood pumped faster through his body. He kicked and stroked with every ounce of his strength. The plane completed its turn and the engine revved again. This time it was headed straight for him and the distance was closing fast.
Too fast.
He slowed his strokes, trying to recoup the strength he’d need to yank himself aboard the fast-moving pontoon. The rear passenger door opened, and Lucy held it open with a bloody foot. She raised her bow and loosed an arrow toward the lead canoe less than thirty yards behind him. The arrow missed, and the paddles dug deeper.
“Don’t slow down!” he shouted as he noticed the chunk of dock floating along the other side of the seaplane. The chain was still looped around the strut. The free end with the padlocked cleat—and the thick plank of wood it was attached to—danced on the water. He kicked hard, angling toward that side of the plane. For a moment he thought he wouldn’t make it. He wasn’t moving fast enough, and the aircraft was headed straight for him. He saw Alex’s shocked expression as his son realized it, too. Then Alex ducked from sight and the plane veered to Jake’s left, the pontoon gliding past him. He used a final spurt of energy to grab the chain and yank himself up. Unsecured, the pilot-side door swung back and forth as the plane bounced on the rippling water. Jake saw Alex bracing himself on the seat as he stretched his short legs to push on the rudder pedal. Jake pulled himself onto the seat and grabbed the controls.
“I got it,” he said. Alex scrambled over the console to the passenger seat. Jake jammed the throttle forward. Lucy let go another arrow, and the canoes were so close now she couldn’t miss. A native fell into the water. Darts plinked off Alex’s door. With the bend in the river up ahead, there wasn’t enough distance to lift off, but Jake didn’t slow until the natives were well behind them. When they passed Frank’s place, Jake turned to set up for a downriver takeoff.
“Oh, no!” Alex shouted, rushing into the backseat. “Lucy’s hit.”
Jake turned to see her stretched out on the seat, her legs riddled with tiny, bloody bites. A school of piranhas must have feasted on her while she’d wrestled to open the dock chain. But it wasn’t the bites that clutched at his heart. It was the red-shafted poison dart protruding from her shoulder. Her eyes were closed, her face was white, and her chest wasn’t moving.
Jake turned back around and choked back a swell of sadness as yet another innocent lost her life because of him. The canoes were adjusting their positions in front of him, hoping to block his path. It was a smart move, because even though the speeding plane would crash through the boats, it couldn’t do so without destroying the pontoons and the seaplane would nose into the water. That wasn’t about to stop him, though. His blood boiled at the loss of the girl with the warrior spirit, and he wasn’t going to let her death go unanswered.
He glanced back. Tears were streaming down Alex’s face. Lucy’s foot dangled partway outside the airplane, preventing the door from closing. Alex saw it, too. “I’ll get it, Dad.”
The shotgun was digging into Jake’s back. He unslung it and rested it on his lap. He eased the throttle forward and steered toward the left shoreline. The line of canoes stretched from one side of the river to the other, the natives paddling to hold them in position. They must have thought his move toward the shoreline was a feint to get around them, because they adjusted to prevent it.
Perfect.
As he passed Frank’s bar, he spotted a group of villagers carting something up the hill. He guessed it was Mandu and her friends hauling the bastard away.
“You go, girl,” he whispered. “While I avenge your daughter.”
He goosed the throttle and aimed the plane at the leftmost boat in the line. The natives got twitchy. As the plane rocketed forward as if it would crash into them, one man dove into the water. At the last second, Jake eased the throttle and spun the aircraft to make it parallel to the line of canoes. He kicked his door open, held it in place with his foot, and as soon as he was alongside the first boat, he fired a burst from the shotgun.
The canoe exploded in a shower of blood and shrapnel. The plane continued its track along the line of boats. He opened fire on the second, and the third, screaming his rage. By then the rest of the canoes were scattered like droplets of oil on a flaming skillet.
When it was over, Jake had to take several breaths to calm himself. Glancing in the rearview mirror, he was grateful to see Alex had buried his face in his hands. Pushing out a long breath, he turned the plane downriver, lowered the flaps, and pushed the throttle to its limit.
Chapter 10
JAKE BANKED THE PLANE to the southwest, putting the glow from the burning warehouse behind them. He was glad to be done with it—and Frank—but suspected far worse lay ahead. Water dripped from his soggy clothes as he steered to a heading that would take them to the spot in the visions. The need to answer the call wouldn’t stop pulling at him. Pulling at us, he thought, glancing at Alex. His son’s eyes were puffy. Alex had climbed back into the passenger seat and pulled Jake’s shotgun onto his lap.
It bothered Jake that his boy held on to the weapon as if it gave him comfort, but he didn’t want to ask his son to place it on the backseat. Neither of them wanted to look back there, where Lucy’s body lay.
He leveled the plane off at five thousand feet and scanned the horizon. Stars peeked through the partly cloudy night sky, providing enough illumination for him to see that the flat terrain ga
ve way to a more rugged area ahead. It was pitch-black where they were going. He performed a couple of clearing turns to check his periphery, and when he banked to the right, he spotted a trio of distant twinkling lights off his wing. There were no roads down there, which meant the lights had to be coming from boats.
“It’s the first group of mercenaries,” Alex said. “They’ll be at Frank’s in less than thirty minutes.”
Jake was glad Alex had broken the silence. He’d been worried the trauma of what had happened would shut down his son. He banked in the opposite direction. Sure enough, more lights were converging from the east. “The party’s about to start,” he said, hoping to keep Alex talking.
“They’re going to be mad.”
“You’ve got that right.”
“And they’re going to come after us.”
“Without a doubt.” Alex caressed the stock of the shotgun. It was pointed away from both of them and the safety was on. Still… “Be careful with that.”
“Did you know the AA-12 fully automatic shotgun is considered one of the most potent force multipliers ever designed?”
The question surprised Jake but he went with it. “I do know. Three against fifty, and we still came out on top.” He thought about Lucy and regretted the words immediately.
But Alex pressed on, taking comfort in details he’d memorized at some point. “The high-explosive rounds feature a fin-stabilized warhead that allows it to travel nearly 200 meters with accuracy. That’s the length of two football fields. Low recoil. Lethal, unleashing a deadly spray of shrapnel with every strike. If you’d have kept your finger on the trigger, you would’ve emptied this thirty-two-round drum magazine in 2.13 seconds. But because you used short bursts, there are still ten rounds left.”
“I see you were counting, too.”
“Can’t help it.”
“Yeah. Me neither.”