Weep, Moscow, Weep

by Gar Wilson

All eight men wore black rubber diving suits. They exchanged flippers for combat boots from their gear bags. Trent donned his split-toe tabi footgear. They slid into shoulder holster rigs and shoved loaded pistols into leather. James and Manning assembled their assault rifles and screwed foot-long sound suppressors into the threaded muzzles of the weapons. Katz and McCarter also attached silencers to their Uzi and Ingram.

  Trent wrapped his ninja hood and mask around his head. He donned his gi with the hidden pockets for weapons and spare magazines. The American ninja knotted the black obi sash around his waist and thrust the ninja-do sword into the cloth belt. He tucked the manhkigusari at the small of his back and attached a small black ditty bag to his right hip. Finally he removed a small black aluminum bow and a quiver containing six arrows.

  The KGB armed themselves with Makarov pistols and Sterling submachine guns with ammo pouches containing spare magazines for their weapons. Savchenko had also added a bayonet to his weaponry. Encizo donned the same firearms and knives he had carried during the harbor raid. Manning slipped on his backpack of explosives.

  McCarter had brought a Barnett Commando crossbow in addition to his Ingram and Browning. The Commando featured a skeletal steel stock and a cocking mechanism that allowed the bowstring to be pulled back and locked into place more rapidly and easier than that of a conventional crossbow. Phoenix Force and the two KGB agents also clipped grenades to their belts. Trent did not like explosives of any sort and carried only his metsubushi sight removers.

  Calvin James, the unit medic, fastened a first-aid kit to his belt at the small of his back. Katz, Manning, Encizo and Alekseyev carried small one-shot flare guns and all eight men had GI issue "angle head" flashlights that they clipped onto belts or shoulder straps.

  The team was ready for action. They filed out from behind the rocks and headed from the beach. The terrain was rugged. Chou Minchuan had probably purchased Chiwey-Wu cheap. It was a harsh chunk of rock, virtually worthless to anyone interested in tourism, crops or industry. However, the island was isolated and did not appear on most maps, thus it was ideal for TRIO's need for a secret base.

  They soon found the estate. A stone wall surrounded the main house as well as two smaller buildings, which appeared to be a billeting hut and a warehouse. A Bell UD-1 helicopter stood on the parade field. Two guard towers were mounted on the walls. Sentries were posted in the towers. No doubt they were supplied with binoculars and two-way radios to communicate with their comrades inside the compound.

  "Any brilliant ideas about how we're going to get close to that place without being spotted?" Alekseyev whispered to Katz as the strike force huddled behind a cluster of boulders a hundred yards from the compound.

  There was no cover between the boulders and the wall of the stronghold. The Israeli turned to Trent.

  "You said something about becoming invisible by not being where the enemy is looking," he reminded the ninja.

  "Right," Trent said with a nod. "I'll make them look elsewhere. Somebody else will have to take them out, and fast."

  Katz nodded. Trent crept along the length of the boulders, moving away from the others. McCarter placed a bolt in the groove of his crossbow. Manning switched the selector of his FAL rifle to semiautomatic. The Briton and the Canadian waited by the edge of the boulders.

  Trent hurled a metsubushi. The eggshell burst on impact. Flash powder ignited, and a small cloud of black pepper rose from the earth. The TRIO sentries stared at the miniature explosion, wondering what the hell had caused it.

  McCarter and Manning struck immediately. The Briton's Barnett sang a single shrill note as the bowstring snapped forward. Manning's FAL coughed harshly as a 7.62 mm slug hissed from the silencer-equipped barrel. The crossbow bolt struck a sentry in the chest. The steel tip pierced flesh, and the split fiberglass shaft splintered inside the guard. The bolt was loaded with two hundred cubic centimeters of cyanide, and the poison seeped into veins and arteries. The guard tried to yank the quarrel from his chest and opened his mouth to scream, but the powerful poison was already taking effect. He fell to the floor of the "crow's nest," twitched feebly and died.

  His comrade was already dead. The Canadian marksman had hit his target in the bridge of the nose with a semijacketed soft lead slug with a mercury core. It exploded on impact. The top of the guard's skull vanished in a grotesque shower of assorted gore.

  Phoenix Force and company dashed to the wall. The doors of the main gate were closed, probably bolted and possibly equipped with an alarm. Trent removed a pair of shuko from his ditty bag. He strapped the metal bands to his hands, curved thick blades jutting from the palms.

  "Look for wires," Encizo told him. "Especially at the hinges. If you find any, cut 'em. That'll render most alarms useless. It might set the alarm off, depending on how it's wired, but we don't have time to be fancy. Just cut the wires and hope that does it. Okay?"

  "I've got it," Trent assured him.

  The ninja clawed the steel talons against stone. He dug his toes against the wall and pushed. He raised a shuko-clawed hand and hooked it on stone to pull himself higher and then used the other hand, continuing to pull with the talons and push with his toes until he climbed to the summit of the wall.

  He dangled over the edge of the wall on the opposite side. The American ninja hung full length and dropped the remaining four feet to the ground. He moved to the gate. A thick steel bar was bolted across the doors. He searched for alarm wires, but found none. The ninja raised the bar and removed it from the doors, then pulled the gate open.

  "Good work," Katz told Trent as he entered the compound.

  "I try," the ninja replied, unbuckling the shuko from his hands.

  The others filed through the open gate. Manning headed for the Bell chopper. The Canadian slid under the fuselage of the UD-1, a big chopper, capable of carrying fourteen men. The demolitions expert removed a magnetic limpet mine and clamped it to the steel belly of the copter.

  The mine was equipped with a dial for setting the timer to the fuse. Manning used a tiny screwdriver to remove the dial, carefully pressing the detonator to the inside rim of the mine. The Canadian took an aluminum tube from his utility vest and unscrewed the cap. He removed some cotton wadding and gingerly extracted a small capsule.

  Slowly and very carefully, Manning inserted the mercury fulminate capsule into the limpet mine near the detonator. Any violent or sudden movement of the UD-1 would cause friction to the limpet and thus heat the mercury. The capsule would explode, setting off the detonator and the plastic explosives within the mine.

  Manning crawled out from under the chopper and sighed with relief. The Canadian was accustomed to working with explosives, but he did not like handling anything as sensitive as mercury fulminate or liquid nitro. He gathered up his rifle and got to his feet.

  "What did you do?" Savchenko inquired. "You put a booby trap on the helicopter?"

  "Just don't lean on it too hard," Manning replied.

  Katz, James and McCarter moved to the billet. Alekseyev, Encizo, Savchenko, Manning and Trent headed toward the east wing of the main house. Both groups frequently glanced at the windows of the buildings. None of the structures were especially impressive. The billet was a simple wood-and-plaster building with a tile roof. The main house stood two stories high and filled almost an acre. It was made of stone and mortar with thick wooden doors and narrow windows. The house had been constructed to be functional and endure harsh weather. No money or effort had been spent on frills or ornamentation.

  The billet door burst open. Two Asians armed with Type 37 submachine guns — a 9 mm weapon similar to the American M-3A1 greasegun — raised their weapons. McCarter's crossbow fired a bolt. The steel tip pierced the forehead of one of the gunmen. The shaft jutted from the man's skull like the horn of a hideous human unicorn. The Asian's face contorted in horrific agony, an expression that froze on his features in death.

  Yakov Katzenelenbogen's Uzi uttered a sputtering cough as the Israeli fired a three-
round burst through the silenced weapon. Parabellums crashed into the chest of the second gunman. He fell backward as he triggered his greasegun. The Taiwanese subgun roared and spat orange flame into the morning sky.

  Glass shattered from a window, and a gun barrel poked through the frame. Calvin James snap-aimed his M-16 and fired from the hip. A foot-long sound suppressor muffled the report of his assault rifle as a trio of 5.56 mm rounds blasted away the face behind the window.

  "What the hell," McCarter muttered as he yanked the pin from a fragmentation grenade. "They know we're here now."

  The Briton popped the spoon from the grenade, waited two seconds and hurled it through the open doorway. Excited voices cried out in alarm. The three Phoenix commandos dropped to the ground. The M-26 grenade exploded inside the billet. Windows burst, and the building shook from the violent fury within. At least one victim's scream soared above the roar of the explosion.

  "Okay," James rasped as he rose to one knee and readied another grenade. "Have another."

  He threw the second M-26 through the ragged remnants of a window. The explosion blasted an entire wall from the billet. Half the roof caved in. No screams of terror or pain occurred as the rest of the structure collapsed, burying the dead beneath the rubble.

  20

  "We're under attack!" Akira Osato declared as he knotted the obi around his waist. The Japanese gangster charged from his sleeping quarters with a Nambu pistol in one hand and a katana samurai sword in the other. "May the gods curse Temujin! This must be that Mongol dog's fault!"

  "How did they find out about us?" Chou Minchuan wondered aloud. The Chinese hoodlum was wearing silk pajamas and slippers. He held a fireproof steel strongbox under one arm and carried a German-made Walther P-38 in his fist.

  "Temujin!" Osato insisted. His face looked as furious as the anger mask of a samurai warrior. "Khorloin and Yumjaagiyin, his two lieutenants, disappeared last night. Sentries said they took a boat toward Hong Kong. Temujin sent those idiots on a mission of revenge against those commando mercenaries. They must have been captured and forced to tell about the island."

  "You may be right," Chou admitted. Voices shouted throughout the house, speaking Mandarin, Cantonese and a smattering of Japanese. "But there is nothing we can do about that now..."

  "I can find that dog-eating Mongol son of a whore and cut him in half!" Osato declared, his fist tight around the scabbard of his katana.

  "What will that gain us?" Chou replied. "First we must deal with the invaders. Then, later, we will settle with Temujin."

  "Hai," the yakuza subchief said with a curt nod. "The Mongol can wait, but he shall receive no special mercy because his father is Tosha Khan. We should never have accepted those Mongolian barbarians into the organization."

  "We'll try to get our superiors to force out the Mongols in the future," Chou assured him. "For now, we must concentrate on self-preservation and protecting the VL-800 formula..."

  "That damnable formula was what caused this mess in the first place," Osato replied. "That was Tosha Khan's insane notion..."

  "The formula is valuable," the tong gangster insisted. "It is worth a fortune. It is too valuable to TRIO to allow others to claim it. We have lost too many men, too much merchandise and a base of operations because of the formula. That cost is too high to sacrifice the formula now. If that happens, we will have lost everything and gained nothing from this operation."

  "You are right," Osato said, nodding. "We shall lose face if the Occidentals seize the formula."

  "Then we are in agreement," Chou declared. "If we cannot defeat the invaders, we will flee with the formula."

  "What if that doesn't work?" the yakuza boss inquired.

  "Then we will release the VL-800 and all die together," Chou replied. "I'm certain you would favor that to surrender."

  "Indeed," Osato confirmed. He thrust the sword into the sash of his kimono. "Death is better than dishonor."

  "It is certainly permanent," Chou frowned.

  "So is dishonor," Osato told him.

  * * *

  The shots and explosions at the billet had alerted the TRIO forces to danger. Asian gunmen appeared from the door of the main house. Others shattered glass to open fire from windows. Yakov Katzenelenbogen, David McCarter and Calvin James bolted to the cover of the warehouse. A volley of automatic fire ripped into the ground, and geysers of dirt spat up from the earth as the Phoenix trio dashed for shelter.

  "Well," McCarter muttered as he removed the silencer from his Ingram machine pistol, "this is another fine mess you've gotten us into, Yakov."

  "You'd be miserable without Phoenix Force and you know it," Katz replied, also removing the Interarms sound suppressor from his Uzi. Silencers reduced the noise of the report of a firearm, but they also reduced accuracy and velocity of the projectile.

  "True," the Briton confessed. "Anybody got any clever ideas about how we're going to handle this?"

  "Right now the enemy has to come to us if they want us," James commented as he fed a cartridge-style 40 mm grenade into the breech of the M-203 attached to the barrel of his M-16.

  "That's not going to last very long," the Briton replied. "I'm sure they've got grenades. Might even have rocket launchers. Won't take any military genius to realize the easiest way to flush us out will be to blow the hell out of the warehouse we're hiding behind."

  "If I hit them with a grenade first," James remarked, "that might make 'em duck long enough for us to move to another position."

  A tidal wave of bullets raked the building. Glass burst,. and slugs, ricocheting off metal objects whined within the warehouse.

  "Don't hit the house," Katz warned James. "An explosion might hit the room where they've got the VL-800 formula."

  "I guess they don't keep it in this warehouse," McCarter commented, listening to bullets snarl within the building. A ricochet smashed a windowpane near the commandos' position.

  "Christ, I hope not," James muttered.

  "TRIO might be a lot of things," Katz remarked. "But they've never struck me as being particularly suicidal. Which means it's unlikely they'll use explosives if we can get closer to the main house."

  "That's a nice theory anyway," the Briton muttered.

  "Let's see if it works," James remarked, aiming his M-16 carefully and inserting his trigger finger in the M-203 attachment.

  The black warrior triggered the grenade launcher. The recoil of the weapon rode into the M-16 it was mounted on. The 40 mm projectile sailed over the roof of the warehouse and descended into the parade field. The grenade exploded near two adventurous TRIO gunmen. The blast shredded the pair and splattered their remains across the front of the house.

  The gory debris startled and disoriented other TRIO hoodlums. Katz, James and McCarter suddenly broke cover. The Israeli's Uzi sprayed a salvo of 9 mm rounds at the first-story windows. A gun-wielding TRIO goon dropped his M-3 greasegun and clamped both hands to his bloodied face. Since a parabellum slug had split a cheekbone and drilled upward into his brain, there was only one thing the man could do. He died.

  Two more gunmen appeared at the door. McCarter's M-10 snarled, raking the pair with a salvo of Ingram lead. One Asian hit man caught three parabellums in the chest. The guy fell, blood splashing his shirt front while his partner retreated into the house, suddenly less than eager to trade shots with the three commandos.

  The Phoenix warriors darted to the side of the main house. An enthusiastic TRIO triggerman leaned over the sill of a second-story window and aimed a Chinese Tokarev pistol at the fleeing figures. Calvin James spotted the gunman. He pointed his M-16 and fired a three-round burst. The 5.56 mm projectiles slammed into the TRIO hoodlum. He screamed as the impact yanked him over the lip of the window ledge. The man broke his right collarbone when he hit the ground. Since both lungs had been punctured by James's bullets, broken bones were the least of his worries.

  The three Phoenix commandos reached their objective, although a burst of automatic fire chased the trio
and chipped stone from the corner of the building. James opened the breech of his M-203 and inserted a fresh cartridge grenade. Katz removed the magazine from his Uzi. Only two rounds remained. He shoved a fresh mag into the weapon.

  "There's another door over here..." McCarter announced, pointing with the muzzle of his M-10.

  Suddenly the door opened, and two Chinese killers stepped outside. A small man armed with a Type 68 assault rifle swung his weapon toward McCarter. A large, powerful thug stood behind the rifleman. The big man cursed softly as he tried to clear the jammed breech of a Type 59 pistol — a Red Chinese version of the Soviet Makarov.

  McCarter's Ingram nailed the first Chinese with a trio of 9 mm rounds. The Asian's heart exploded when all three slugs burrowed into it. The force of the multiple bullets drove his body back into the big Asian. A parabellum punched through the smaller man's torso and raked the forearm of his muscular companion.

  The big man cried out as he dropped his T-59 pistol. However, he reacted swiftly and shoved his slain comrade forward as he charged McCarter. The thug hurled the smaller man's body into the Briton, knocking the Ingram from McCarter's hands. The TRIO goon slashed the side of his hand at McCarter's skull, aiming the stroke at the Phoenix fighter's temple.

  McCarter ducked under the hood's whirling arm. The Briton drove a fist into the man's abdomen. He felt as if he had punched a bag of cement. McCarter's other hand thrust a heel-of-the-palm stroke at the Asian's jaw. The big man's head hardly moved.

  The Asian hulk slammed the edge of his hand into McCarter's collarbone. The blow drove McCarter to his knees. The TRIO goon prepared to strike again, but he found himself staring into the muzzle of Katzenelenbogen's Uzi. The Chinese froze and started to raise his hands.

  Suddenly he uttered a wheezing gasp and doubled up in agony. David McCarter had driven an uppercut between his opponent's legs. The Briton leaped up from the ground and swung a left hook at the side of the Asian's head. The Chinese brute fell against the wall. McCarter swung a boot at the man's lower abdomen and clasped his hands together to slam a powerful blow to the base of the Asian's neck.