Jack Be Nimble: A Lion About to Roar Book 4

by Ben English

  Alonzo nearly caught up to the major when a colossal shock and noise flushed underneath, around, and through them. He discovered they were running up a stark silhouette of the giant tree. The sound by itself was so loud it almost killed him.

  He tumbled, ass-over-teakettle, and due to some hilarious quirk of cosmic weirdness found himself somersaulting right back up into a run, and in a position to grab the major by her pack-straps and give her a heave in the general direction of the ridgetop. The world came and went in quick, colorful bursts, and either he was blacking out and waking up rapidly, or the shells were not quite hitting all at the same time.

  They made it to the ridge. Hot, steaming drops of liquid touched him, and he assumed it was blood until the rain started in earnest. The crack and ping of small arms fire began behind them, but their enemies were firing blind through thick smoke. Alonzo almost hurled a grenade back out of sheer pique, but couldn’t remember where his grenades were.

  It dawned on him that he was in shock. The major sank down, pulling him with her, pointing.

  The tree must have been as surprised as they were. It wavered in the wind, leaning first one way and then another, then began its long, slow, final turn towards the ground.

  It was about this time Alonzo realized the sound and vibration of the approaching freight train hadn’t subsided at all, and he fully expected a second series of shells to come looping down at them from out of the darkening sky. But no, the sound was from the other side of the ridge, from the ocean, and as he twisted around to look he was slapped in the face by a large, leafy branch.

  Tree limbs, small rocks, and dust filled the air. The detritus of an entire jungle moved up the slope towards them, a solid wall of it, like nothing he’d ever seen. Coconuts, flying at well past what should have been their terminal velocity, impacted the hillside below. Some exploded, others launched themselves straight up into the air over the ridge before being seized roughly by the wind and hurled forward.

  They’ve found me, he thought drunkenly. All those microbursts the helicopter had dodged on their flight toward the island. They’ve all caught up to me at once.

  Down the ridgeline, Lighthouse Hill was barely visible. Alonzo wondered at Ian and Steve's fate, then promptly forgot them when saw the hurricane’s edge.

  A solid black mass of clouds obscured the beach, right at the level of the water, and as the storm front probed inland, Alonzo watched great masses of sand explode upward to scour the heavens. The front was even more a physical presence than the wind, and trees flattened before it like so much grass. Row after row of them collapsed or spun up into the air, and it was all Alonzo could do to seize the major by her backpack and pull her over onto him as he rolled off the ridge, back toward the muzzle flashes and smoke below.

  A gnarled root ball the size of a Volkswagen Bug bounded over the ridge, launched over them, and cast up a huge divot in the grassy field before spiraling back up into the sky. Men below screamed; Alonzo could not see them.

  He and Allison clung to each other as the great tree, arrested in its fall, rose.

  Over the howl of the wind, they heard it, a great creaking song of wood moving. Every flexion and extension of the tree added a voice. Freed from its tether to the earth, the giant embraced the storm. Each leaf cast outward like a sail, the entire tree continued its spin, increasing speed as several hundred tons of lumber lifted upward and sailed downhill.

  The Major’s hair blew around her forehead, looking almost black in the thick air. “Y’see that?” she said, bewildered. “I’ll be a trog-loving sheep shanker.”

  His understanding of Welsh slang was weak, but Alonzo thought it best to agree.

  Caramel Apple

  The hallway outside the operations center filled with shouting figures. Mercedes didn’t need Jack’s outstretched hand to run for the jagged hole in the wall.

  “Right behind you,” he said as she passed, and turned to survey the room.

  He had no illusions that the destruction of the operations center was any obstacle to Raines’ plans. The real computing power lay elsewhere; this was just a collection of nice display screens. Raines himself was nowhere in sight, damn it. He’d have to settle for the next best thing.

  The next best thing fit into a wide, thin computer bag, which is where he put it before tossing a grenade towards the main doors and following Mercedes. She waited for him just on the other side of the breach, and displayed enough good sense to not ask questions as they ran down the hall.

  “Don’t stand too close to me,” he said as they paused before an intersection, and just in time. Three armed guards rounded the corner, in full sprint towards the ops center. At least they weren’t Colombians.

  Jack elbowed the first one in the throat, drove his fist into the windpipe of the second, and covered the mouth of the third with his foot. The corners where the walls intersected looked sharp enough, and he used them to good effect, shoving one man sideways so the edge impacted on his kidneys, and revisiting the second guard long enough to push his forehead against another corner.

  The third guard groped for his submachine gun. Jack stomped on the soft part of his arm and smothered his cry with another kick.

  Quick and dirty, but at least quiet. They wouldn’t be that lucky again next time. He needed to free himself of whatever might slow him down.

  “Mercedes.” She looked stricken, ashamed at what he’d done. There was no time for this. “Take this bag, hurry. Don’t let anything happen to it.”

  “Why me?”

  “When we get into another fight, I’ll need to move faster.” Damned if he was going to have to explain himself every time.

  Most of the lights were off. The halls reminded him eerily of the Illuminatus Tower. Raines probably kept some of the same design elements identical from place to place.

  The mortar rumbled again, somewhere beyond the walls.

  They reached a spot with a deep doorway. Jack pulled Mercedes in behind him, crowded her into the shadows. “Groucho, Groucho, this is Ollie. Talk to me Grouch.”

  Nothing. The line was empty.

  “Grouch, need immediate intel on troop movements. Show me our best way out of here.”

  He forced himself to breath, ran through a quick mental exercise designed to bring focus. Inspiration equals breathing. Breathing equals—she smelled fantastic.

  But that was just part of the tactical landscape. He pushed through it.

  Mercedes rested her palm on his chest, directly over his heart. She took a close look at him. “Jack, you’re exhausted.”

  It had been a mistake to pause for so long. “Don’t worry about me. Ready to move?”

  She was right, he was nearing the fringe of endurance. The close-quarters action in the ops center had taken more out of him than he planned on, and Jack stumbled as they ran. Down one of the side passages, a guard poked out through a doorway. Jack sent bullets into the frame near his head.

  They were near the north side of the building. The stairwell lay before them, but the landing below was already full of guards, taking the stairs upward three at a time. He tossed a grenade at them and emptied a clip from his Glock, firing blindly around the landing’s edge.

  Had to keep Raines’ men cautious, unsure what he would do next. Their fear was more effective than any weapon he could carry. If they came on in a rush, he and the woman were finished.

  Ejecting the clip, he was surprised to find Mercedes’ hand touch the gun. She held a spare clip, slamming it home and pulling the slide. He almost pulled the trigger in shock, then again when the grenade below went off. It was a frag; that meant he had 2 flash-bangs left.

  Going down here was no good; the stairwell was a standoff that couldn’t be won. By now, the Colombian mercenaries would be pouring into the first floor and all over the grounds. Moving further up to Raines’ apartments or the roof was foolishness. The first rule of evasion was to always move down, never up.

  Their possibilities were narrowing.

&nbs
p; She looked at him with such relief. He took another deep breath, and despite inhaling a lungful of cordite, felt his pulse drop off. The entire floorplan unfolded before his mind’s eye, and he saw every nook and cranny between them and the open air. Of course. Sure.

  “You know where we’re going,” Mercedes said. “Don’t even need to ask, do I?”

  He led off down a narrow hall between labs. “Look, I’m as much a sensitive New Millennium-type as the next fellow, but damned if I’m going to stop and ask any of these guys for directions.” This earned him a faint smile.

  The compound was laid out to best accommodate the needs of the techs and lab workers who did the bulk of the labor in Raines’ kingdom. The labs in the main building connected to the employee barracks through a wide, glass-walled walkway, joining the second floors of both buildings. Staff could sleep or eat or work without taking a single step outside into the distracting tropical paradise.

  Which currently appeared to be drowning. A river of fast-moving air keened and wailed around the enclosed walkway, and the impact of the rain on all those yards of glass obscured all but the most blurred view of the world. The sky was indistinguishable from the land. They walked across quickly, Jack swearing he felt a hundred eyes in all the panes of glass over and around them. Last he’d checked , the garden below was full of mercenaries. Wouldn’t take but one of them looking up or—

  The double doors at the end of the glass bridge opened, and Miklos Nasim walked through. He was eating a caramel apple impaled on a steak knife.

  Jack fired first, missing him completely. Miklos’ scrabbled for his holster; it was empty. How was this possible?

  If the look on his face was any indication, Mikos was thinking similar thoughts. He lunged back toward the door—

  It slammed shut, and Marduk’s voice boomed through the passageway, punctuated by the roar of Jack’s gun.

  “Nasim, keep him in the overpass. I’ve locked the doors. Help is on the way.”

  Miklos took one round in the upper arm before throwing the steak knife. Jack blocked it with the thin bag on Mercedes’ arm without thinking, then his gun jammed.

  The taller man abandoned his defensive posture. The blood from his arm was a tiny trickle. He flexed it and took a step forward, undiminished.

  Jack dropped his gun into the bag and handed it to Mercedes. “Don’t let this out of your sight.”

  “I have been waiting,” said Miklos.

  “I am here.”

  They ran at each other. Jack struck first, staggering his combination of punches and open-hand strikes so as to avoid rhythm. Miklos lashed out when he could, hooking his arm around Jack’s defenses to land blows on his head and neck. He favored Muay Thai, and his elbow strikes were devastating. Such force. Jack had to block with both arms, and when he did, Miklos nearly swept his legs out from under him. They grappled, and Jack found the wall as he was defending against knee jabs. Jinking his body out of the hold, he kicked off the wall and landed a solid blow to Miklos’ temple.

  Neither man backed away. Jack spun and turned with the force of the other man’s blows, but Miklos was just so damn fast. Miklos open-palmed him in the chest with both hands, more a shove than anything else, but enough to send Jack sliding back on the tile, knocking the wind out of him. He managed to roll backwards onto his feet, but he couldn’t catch his breath and the other man knew it.

  Men with assault rifles filled the hallway from the direction of the command center. They were behind Miklos; in the melee, the two fighters had reversed positions.

  The newcomers wore motley uniforms of the scavenged, and more than a few were taking aim. Miklos breathed heavily in the center of the bridge, and smiled. Jack kicked the caramel apple at him.

  Mercedes was poised at the door where Miklos had appeared. She’d slipped by them in the fight, perhaps spurred on by the sound of advancing guards. “That door still locked?” he asked, not taking his eyes from his opponent.

  “And there’s another weakness,” Miklos said, blood dripping from his face and scalp. “You know what we are going to do to her once you are dead. You are divided. So much concern for the fate of others, you overextend yourself.”

  He was about to say something else, when a long, low groan knifed at them out of the fury of the storm. It started with a terrific rasp, like a large nail being pulled from a board. Above the solid drumbeat made by the rain, louder than the wind, the groan deepened and doubled in volume. It rolled toward them from the direction of the mountain, rolled down through all the man-made noise of war, and sounded to Jack for all the world like an entire forest was shouting.

  He tore his eyes away from his opponent for only an instant. The instant stretched into a long moment. It took that long for his brain to process what he was looking at, and if not for Mercedes’ warning he might have missed Miklos’ attack.

  Jack blocked and danced, pouring knees and elbows and hands into the other man, actually driving him back, while all the time trying to make sense of what he’d seen. In the reflected light from the buildings it looked like a giant twisting octopus, all its legs completely stiff yet grasping the wind, onrushing.

  Miklos’ enthusiastic devotion to killing him worked in Jack’s favor, happily. He didn’t see the monster’s approach. A few of the men behind him saw it, and gaped openly as it flew at them out of the night.

  Jack took two heavy blows on his forearms (not bad, considering they were intended for his windpipe) and kept Miklos’s attention focused by jabbing at his eyes. All the while, Jack counted seconds and measured position. Distance was tricky in this light. Just before the glass shattered, he turned and dove toward Mercedes, almost totally supine and reaching for the safety of the—

  It turned out to be a massive tree, sweeping along a collection of smaller timbers, loose dirt, and clotted vines and vegetation. The accumulated mass obliterated the walkway. He never even heard screams. Glass fragments glittered like jewels, falling, amidst tiles ripped from roofs by the wind of and the tree’s spinning branches. At the edge of the avalanche, Jack felt the momentum of everything sweep around him and tear at his clothes. The deluge blocked his view of Mercedes. Just as he began to fall he touched her hand.

  For Want of a Nail

  His wrist hurt like hell where Flynn had used it to break his computer. Marduk wiggled his fingers and found himself outrageously grateful he hadn’t originally insisted they build the machines out of titanium.

  He was also celebrating the fact that he was still alive. Flynn had moved through the guards in the op center like they were barely there; it wouldn’t have taken much more to kill each of them. Did they owe their lives to karma, Flynn’s mercy—or was he just in a hurry?

  And if you believed in mercy (Marduk did not, as a rule, but he was getting closer) or karma (which he invoked purely for comedic purpose), what kind of cosmic debt of evil was Jack Flynn working off when the giant banyan tree took out the glass bridge and everyone on it? These sorts of thoughts occupied a corner of his mind as he worked at one of the desktop computers in a lab just off the operations center.

  Marduk sent a physical engineering team to seal the doors at the walkway, to keep the storm out. A medical/relief team would start combing the grounds for survivors as soon as they were done attending to Raines (who was honestly fine but not above engaging in dramatics in order to deal with the sudden stress of having your operations center wrecked all to hell and your security perimeter pierced by a ghost).

  No such thing as ghosts, Marduk reminded himself. He quick-reviewed surveillance video and logs from thermal imaging and motion detection sensors, and found no evidence that Jack Flynn had physically defeated their security while they were on high alert status. The external cameras were mostly useless during the storm, but he was willing to bet there were no footprints where “Flynn” had landed at the base of the wall. If he had to hazard a guess, Flynn was already in the operations center before the camera showed him strolling down the ridge. Probably in disguise
.

  Marduk was in the process of scrutinizing each of the technicians around him for signs of spirit gum, false eyelashes, and wiggery, when Raines entered the room at a brisk pace.

  “All right, everyone, we’re moving to the secured labs at the geothermal plant. You’ll continue your work from there, but the servers here will still be at your disposal. Quickly now, tempus fugit.”

  Raines was unruffled, apparently completely recovered from having his personal guards hurl him out of the operations center as it was blowing up. He looked better than unruffled. He looked, as always, immortal and commanding.

  As soon as the last of the techs left the room, Marduk brought him up to speed on events. The PATRIA mortar battery had gotten off a complete multiple-round burst at one of the targets on the ridgeline before the hurricane hit, and the other attackers were already zeroed in. It was unlikely they’d move much during the heavy weather, but if so, the enhanced camera system would find them just as quickly as it did earlier. They’d get rid of the pesky snipers first.

  Then he told Raines about the giant tree. “We’re trying to confirm if Miklos and the other men are dead. This might take awhile, we have to do it using manpower.”

  “Why?”

  “The storm has brought the wireless down; we’re stuck with the hardline network for now. Simply too much dirty electromagnetic in the air. Walkie-talkies won’t even work.”

  Raines waved dismissively. “Let Miklos find himself. The Colombians have priority. Put your resources toward sheltering them from the weather.” He smiled. “Rather than return to their living quarters, have them take shelter with our guests from the airplane. Put some of them on patrol duty in the gardens and outer areas, but don’t let them near the geothermal plant. We still have a sufficient number of the original security team to guard the sensitive areas, don’t we?”

  Before Marduk could answer he pressed on. “I want two groups looking for Mercedes. Colombians here on the grounds and outer buildings, and our men in the access tunnels. We need to get her back.”