by Ted Bell
The police and security people Dixon could see seemed to be momentarily frozen in place.
He instantly understood their reaction. Maybe it was a truckload of agents racing toward the podium on orders from the Secret Service com center. Maybe someone had spotted a bomb or an armed man in the crowd. It was an impossible situation. No one knew what was going on. How could they?
You couldn’t distinguish the legitmate vehicles from the remote-controlled version. Perhaps this Suburban rolling across the grass really had been ordered into the crowd. It was going to check out a threatening individual. Or perhaps it had been ordered into the crowd to disarm a madman and shield the president? It was impossible to be certain.
At that exact moment, the sun came out from behind a snow-filled cloud. Brilliant beams lit up the Capitol building. In that instant Franklin knew for sure.
He’d seen the sun hit the black Suburban’s mirrored windshield. He was the only man alive in Washington who had seen these windows close up. This one didn’t look right.
The crowd had parted now, leaving a clear path for the vehicle now picking up speed and headed right toward him.
“Officer,” Dixon said to the mounted policeman, “You’ve got to stop that vehicle. Now!”
“Me? I’ve go no authority to—”
“It’s packed with explosives. It’s headed for the Inaugural stand. They mean to kill the president and the whole damn government.”
“Who the hell are you?” the mounted cop shouted at him. He was in high panic, half-listening, half-talking into his radio, trying to make sense of this craziness. He was looking to find somebody with the authority to tell him what to do in this bizarre situation.
Franklin grabbed the horse’s reins and managed to hold on to the man’s gaze an extra second. “I’m nobody. A Texas county sheriff. But I’m telling you the truth, officer. You’ve got to stop that thing right now!”
“How the hell am I supposed to do that?”
“I guess I’d better do it,” Franklin said.
In a second, he’d reached up and grabbed the man’s arm and hauled him down out of the saddle. The surprised cop was on the ground, going for his weapon but suddenly Holly was on top of him, knees on his chest, flashing her State Department I.D. right in his face. Franklin heaved himself up into the saddle, reining in the frightened horse and turning him around.
“Giddyup,” Franklin said, clicking his tongue and touching his boots to the horse’s flanks.
There was open ground between him and the Suburban. Franklin galloped straight toward the oncoming truck. He swerved out of its way at the last moment, then reined the horse sharply left and circled back. The horse was fast enough, and the sheriff caught up with the truck in a hurry. He matched the vehicle’s speed and got the horse right alongside the right hand side of damn thing.
“One shot at this,” he told his horse.
He swung his right leg up and over and jumped.
It was an English saddle, which made getting off a lot easier. He’d timed it pretty good, got one boot down on the running board, and grabbed the handrail on the roof. He could see the mirror inside the glass and knew at least he’d not made a complete fool of himself. He hauled himself up onto the roof and rolled flat onto his stomach. He grabbed one of the satellite dishes and pulled himself forward.
On the truck he’d seen in the garage, he’d noticed the middle light on the light bar was black instead of red like it was supposed to be. That had to be the camera lens.
He grabbed the light bar with his left hand and held on tight. The truck was veering right to left, trying to throw him off maybe. He whipped off his short brim with his right hand and inched forward a little more so that he could do what he had to do. There were agents running alongside him now, guns drawn, all shouting at him and threatening to shoot him, he guessed.
But he had an idea and figured, at this point, it was worth trying.
He held on with his left hand, grabbed his cowboy hat in his right and reached all the way forward. He was just close enough to cover the lens. He stretched all the way forward and slapped his hat in place over the camera.
The damn truck kept going a second, then slowed way down. It made a wobbly left-hand turn, plowing up grass, then a right. Finally it just rolled to a dead stop. Franklin stayed put, keeping the lens covered with his Stetson, blinding whoever it was who wanted to kill his president.
He saw the familiar face of Agent Hecht standing there on the ground with all the other agents, every of them looking up at him and shaking their heads, all with a big smiles on their faces.
“That’s Sheriff Franklin W. Dixon of Prairie, Texas,” Hecht said to his men. “He’s the one who first found these damn things.”
“Howdy,” Franklin said to them.
“BLOW IT!” Top screamed at the top of his lungs. The Washington controllers staring at their suddenly black screens just looked at him. “Blow that fucking truck up now!”
“There’s no provision for that, sir. We are no longer able to perform that function. All of the modified Chevrolet trucks have been keyed to the main timing device.”
“What?” Top screamed, his face turning bright red. “Who authorized that?”
“Dr. Khan, sir.”
“Why? Why did he do that?” Top was breathing hard, trying to control his raging emotions.
“He said he wanted to eliminate any possibility of human error, sir.”
“Khan did that?”
“Yes, sir.”
Top drew his sidearm and pointed it at the nearest controller. “Put it back. Go to manual override.”
“I’m sorry. I cannot do that, sir.”
He blew the man’s head off.
“Next?” he said, looking around wildly.
84
THE BLACK JUNGLE
M erde! Merde! Merde!”
Froggy felt no need to translate: Shit was shit in any language. His squad had been flanked. Somehow, the bastards had gotten behind them. He couldn’t see them yet, but they were coming. He could hear those fucking mini-tank engines revving as they approached, crashing through the underbrush. And the war cries of Xucuru Indians.
Indians? He thought Stiletto’s firepower had killed most of them upriver. They were determined bastards, he’d grant them that much. They were either on Top’s payroll or simply offended at the idea of uninvited guests in their pristine jungle. He hand-signaled Bassman and Boomer to spread out and get turned around; they needed to get the heavy M-60 machine guns into position for an attack from their rear.
“Hold your fire until my signal,” Froggy said into his lipmike when the squad was set.
It had all started when an arrow, five-feet long and, no doubt poison-tipped, had thunked into a tree a foot above Froggy’s head. He’d just looked down at his map. Now, he had seconds to reposition and fight a rear-guard action. And he needed to warn Stokely who was up in a treehouse a hundred feet above his head.
“Stoke, this is Frogman.”
“Parlez, Froggy.”
“You have the hostage?”
“I’ve got him. He’s alive, barely. Not mobile. I’m going to try and bring him down. We need to evac him to Stiletto pronto.”
“Negative! Negative! We’ve got tangos down here, approaching from the rear. Tanks and Indians.”
“Tanks and Indians?” Stoke said.
“You heard me, goddamn it!”
He let that go, thinking he’d misunderstood, and said, “Hawke’s ten minutes out, Froggy. Brock should be even closer. We need to get a perimeter around this tree and hold it until they get here. I’m coming down alone.”
Froggy waved his men to him with a circular hand signal, and they rapidly formed up around the fifteen-foot wide base of the tree. By the time Stokely stepped onto the platform and began his descent, the first wave of painted warriors was almost upon them in the heavy green stuff.
Froggy’s guys still hadn’t opened up.
Arrows whistled throu
gh the air, many of them aimed at Stokely. He was in plain sight on the slowly descending lift. He also had a perfect field of fire spread out below. He raised his CAR-15 and mowed down eight or nine war-painted archers who were stepping forward out of the thick green wall of undergrowth to launch their arrows.
“Fuck it, fire!” Froggy said, seeing Stokely’s predicament. The M-60s erupted in heavy, thumping fire. Now the indiscriminate barrage of lead ripped up vegetation and flesh with equal ferocity. Backs to the river, every man was unloading ammo on the enemy. But still the warriors came out of the jungle. And now the Trolls approached, four of the lead tanks spitting lead from their rapid-fire machine guns. One of Froggy’s men screamed and went down, cut in half by the vicious fire.
Stoke was halfway down the tree. He still had a good angle on the Trolls. He attached the grenade launcher and aimed at the nearest tank. Fired. Whoosh. A long trail of white smoke and the tank disintegrated in a massive ball of flame. Stoke fixed another RPG on his weapon’s muzzle and took out a second tank. He was down to his last grenade. He heard fire from the river and looked over to see three canoes bearing Harry Brock and his squad of fourteen commandoes. They were firing their weapons at the tangos they could see in the jungle.
“Merde diabolique!” he heard Froggy cry in his headphones. “Holy shit!”
“Froggy?” Stoke said, “What’s up?”
“Zee fucking bridge, mon ami! Look over there!”
Armed troops poured out of the jungle compound barracks on the far side of the river. They formed up in a long column, ready to cross the bridge. In front of the troops, advancing slowly toward the bridge was a clanking monstrosity. It was a mechanized vehicle unlike anything Stoke had ever seen outside of a movie theatre.
It was a tank, all right, a ridiculously oversized main battle tank, like an Abrams on major steroids, with what looked like two 120mm cannons. Eight-inch-diameter gun barrels were protruding from two turrets mounted on either side of an upright superstructure bolted to the chassis.
Stoke kept firing with his left hand, got his radio to his ear with his right. “Stiletto! Stiletto! Do you have GPS coordinates on the main bridge here at LZ Alpha? Copy?”
“Affirmative,” Fire Control Officer Dylan Allegria responded.
“I need a missile locked on that target now, copy?”
“Uh, roger that, sir. We, uh, yes. PAM missile is locked on.”
“Don’t fire…I want this thing on the bridge when we blow it.”
“What is the target, sir?”
“War of the Worlds, Dylan. I wish you could see this mechanical monster before you destroy it…ready…Fire now!”
Stoke held his breath. The mammoth war machine was halfway across the bridge now. There were maybe twenty tangos trotting right behind it and more right behind them.
The PAM missile’s laser targeting device kept it on track after firing. It nosed over and hurtled toward the target. It struck a second later and the tank exploded violently. Through the black smoke and flame, Stoke could see the thing was not destroyed but certainly disabled. The men nearby on the bridge had been killed. Others retreated back down the road or melted into the jungle on the far side. Stoke didn’t wait for the platform, he jumped the last few feet.
He opened up on the few remaining jungle warriors who’d managed to survive the withering fire laid down by the two M-60 machine guns. Most of the Xucurus and uniformed troops had fled back into the jungle. Regrouping. They’d be back as soon as they got their shit together for another attack.
“Blue Goose, Blue Goose, where the hell are you, Mick?” Stoke said into his radio.
“Blue Goose, Stokely. What can I do for you, mate?”
“Mick. I’m in a hot LZ with a critically injured hostage. I need to exfil him now and Stiletto is not an option. What’s your location?”
“Five miles due East of the LZ. I can see smoke rising from the bridge.”
“Mick, I know the river here is too narrow for your wingspan. It widens out upriver. But Ambrose won’t survive a jungle trek to the plane.”
“Ambrose is the hostage?”
“Affirmative.”
“Who says it’s too narrow, mate?”
“I do. Can’t you see it? There’s no way, Mick.”
“I’ll do a flyby and take a look.”
“Watch out for bullets.”
“HOLD YOUR FIRE!” Froggy yelled.
At that moment, Stoke saw Alex Hawke swimming rapidly toward shore, then clawing his way up the riverbank. His canoe had been blown into pieces by fire from the opposite shore. The remains now lay floating on the top of the water, drifting with the current downriver. Two of Hawke’s four crewmen were swimming toward shore. Two men were floating face down.
“Stoke!” Hawke cried, running toward the little band at the base of the tree, “Where is he? Where the hell is Ambrose?”
“Up there,” Stoke said, “Climb aboard and watch your step.”
They swiftly rose to the top, Stokely pointing out all the scenic attractions of Top’s jungle compound. Hawke jumped off and raced inside to find his friend.
“Ambrose, it’s me,” Hawke said leaning over him, his face grave and full of worry.
“I’m sorry,” the girl named Caparina said. She could have passed for a man in her camos. But her face was lovely in the dim light.
“Has he spoken? Stokely asked her.
“You have to give him a minute,” Caparina said, “He’s coming around.”
She was holding Ambrose’s hand to her bosom, gazing at the old fellow. “I gave him something to counteract the truth drugs. Ten minutes ago. It should be—”
“Are you a doctor?” Hawke asked her.
“Just a night nurse from Manaus.”
“Will he be in much pain?”
“I’m afraid he will.”
“Alex,” Ambrose said, his eyelids fluttering.
“I’m here. Come to take you home.”
“Home,” he sighed. His eyelids closed again.
“Ambrose. Please. You have to stay awake for a few minutes.”
“So tired.”
“The code, Ambrose. Remember the code. When and where?”
“Top’s attack.”
“Yes. Where is Top going to attack?”
“Washington.”
“When?”
“The president. All of them. The government.”
“When, Ambrose?”
“January the…twentieth”
“That’s today,” the beautiful girl said. “Holy Mother of Mary.”
“Ambrose, listen carefully,” Hawke said, “What time is the attack? Do you know?”
“Swear on the bible. Don’t let him,” Ambrose croaked.
Hawke looked at Stokely and said, “Swear on a bible? The Inauguration. They’re going to attack the Amercian government on the steps of the Capitol. What time is it?”
“Almost noon, boss. I don’t’ know how much time we’ve got.”
Hawke shook his head and put a gentle hand on Congreve’s shoulder. “Ambrose. The code, what is it?”
“The code.”
“Yes. What is the code? Those numbers we worked so hard on? That bloody book?”
Ambrose smiled weakly, “The da Zimmermann code?”
“Yes, Ambrose. That’s it.”
“Numbers make letters, Alex. Will of Allah. Da Vinci.”
“What?” Hawke said, his mind racing, looking at Stoke for help.
“Will of Allah,” Stoke said, “That sounds like a password. So what’s Da Vinci?”
Ambrose nodded.
“He shouldn’t talk anymore,” Caparina said, looking at Hawke.
Stoke grabbed Hawke’s arm. “We got to go, boss. Caparina will take good care of him till we get back. Let’s go.”
“I want him out of here. Now. Stiletto’s not even close! Where the hell is that seaplane?”
Stoke shook his head and handed Hawke his radio.
“Mick! It’s Ha
wke. Copy?”
“Copy, Hawke.”
“Can you land that bloody thing? Here? Now? I’m about to lose him!”
“No worries, sir. I’ll splash sideways.”
“Sideways?”
“Little trick I learned in the bush. I’m coming in now.”
Hawke looked at Caparina. “You stay with him. Someone’s coming.”
HAWKE AND STOKELY stepped onto the platform and began their descent. For the moment, Froggy’s men seemed to have staunched the flow of troops. A few were still using the bridge, climbing over the blown tank. There’d been a brief effort to maneuver sponson pontoons across the river, but the M-60s were discouraging a lot of that kind of activity.
They heard a loud engine roar to the right, just above the bridge. The Blue Goose swept in low through the thick black smoke, just a few feet above the smoldering tank hulk on the bridge. Mick Hocking’s wingtips were catching clumps of foliage on either side of the river. For a moment, both men thought he’d surely catch a wing and go down.
He mangaged to keep the the Goose on course, God alone knew how, and flared up for a landing. At the last possible moment, Mick lowered one flap and spun the big plane a few degrees on its axis. The slight angle was enough to clear the heavily wooded banks. The Blue Goose splashed down on the river.
It came to a very quick stop. Mick opened the door and climbed down onto the pontoon, a machine gun cradled in one arm. He swung an anchor, tossed an anchor line into the trees, and started hauling the airplane close to the bank.
“Cover that seaplane!” Stoke shouted in his radio. “Form up! Don’t let anyone near it.” Hawke was reassured by the sight of two men with M-60 heavy machine guns racing along the bank, headed for the waiting seaplane. There was sporadic gunfire from the bridge and the M-60s opened up, silencing it.