—he felt the shot hit—in the ear—a millisecond before he heard it.
—that meant it had come from a long distance away, the slug traveling faster than the speed of sound.
—that meant a sniper rifle.
—it sounded like the rifle he’d heard earlier.
—he threw himself to the ground, rolling, pressing his hand to the side of his head.
—his ear went numb—but his probing fingers reported that the top of it was missing, could feel the warm, slick blood.
—he’d dropped his cell phone.
—the bullet had been fired from the south, probably the inert gas production buildings five hundred and fifty meters away.
—the sniper was a damn good shot to have come so close to a kill from that distance.
Tequila rolled onto all fours and scrambled behind the cannon’s blast wall, pressing his shoulder against it while removing his pack. Wiping the blood from his fingers, he dug out what looked like a black rifle stock and grip, with the rest of the gun missing. In fact, the gun was complete. The barrel, receiver, and magazines were housed inside the hollow butt stock.
This was a Henry US Survival AR-7. Harry McGlade’s version came with two mags, each holding eight rounds of hollow-point .22 LR ammunition. Tequila assembled it within forty-five seconds. Hands shaking with the flood of adrenaline, he fit the receiver onto the butt and tightened it with a screw at the bottom, then screwed on the barrel. He fed in a magazine, pulled back the bolt, and put the spare mag in his pocket.
His opponent was using a larger rifle, probably a 30-06 or a .308, and he probably had a scope. Scopes had some disadvantages in a firefight; namely, they limited the field of vision. Hoping the sniper was focused on either side of the building, waiting for him to stick out his head, Tequila hopped onto an oil barrel and pulled himself up on the flat roof of the cannon house. Flattening his belly to the concrete roof, he cradled the rifle in the crook of his arms and crawled on his elbows until he was half a meter from the edge.
Tequila brought the weapon to bear, then sighted south. He had a slight elevation edge—his only advantage—and Tequila had to use it before the sniper spotted him.
He had to wait for almost a minute before he caught movement, alongside the east wall of the second gas production building. A tall black guy in a black sweater and tan pants, his rifle barrel resting against the structure’s corner.
Moving slowly, Tequila lined up the Henry’s peep sight with the plastic sight on the end of the barrel. He felt the wind on his face and adjusted slightly for its direction, and for bullet drop at this distance. Then he squeezed off two quick rounds.
The black man dropped onto his ass, then immediately began to scramble backward as Tequila adjusted to the rifle’s sights, firing four more times as quickly as he could pull the trigger. He apparently missed, because the sniper managed to get behind the building.
Time to move. Now that the man knew Tequila was on the roof, he’d probably find another vantage point and pick him off. Tequila chanced going forward, rolling off the roof, hanging on with one hand, then dropping to the ground and rolling into the brush.
He immediately flattened his body, spreading his legs wide, pressing his chest to the dirt. His only protection was some buck-thorn twigs. If he’d been spotted, he’d be dead. He waited for the man to appear again.
A moment later, he detected movement, from the same corner the sniper had been in before.
The bullet dug into the ground only half a meter ahead of Tequila, throwing dirt into his face.
He’d gambled he hadn’t been watched, and he’d lost. His hiding spot had been discovered. He had no cover.
The next sniper bullet would surely kill him.
And it would be coming any second.
Chandler
“When you die,” the Instructor said. “That’s the only time you’re allowed to stop fighting.”
I trod water for several minutes, wondering what to do, gunshots echoing throughout the compound.
I studied the fence rimming the reservoir. The steep concrete was impossible to climb, too steep to even cling to for a chance to rest. The reservoir was cold, and now that I was no longer fighting for my life against a human opponent, shivers took hold of my muscles. If I didn’t find a way out, my limbs would grow sluggish and eventually it would be impossible to keep my head above water. Fatigue sucked at my energy reserves. My clothes, my shoes, my pack, they were all were weighing me down.
It seemed as if the entire universe was conspiring to drown me.
Staying afloat with a scissors kick, I unclipped the belt I wore above my holster. As nice as the woven belt looked, I hadn’t donned it to make a fashion statement. It was actually made of fifty feet of paracord, braided until it was compact enough to fit around my waist.
My fingers were numb and clumsy, and it seemed to take forever to unravel the cord, which was no wider than a shoelace. When I had enough to work with, I muscled off my gym bag, looking for something suitable to use as an anchor. Pawing past the stacks of waterlogged cash, my fingers seized the first-aid kit. Too heavy. Inside it were some bandages, syringes, pill bottles. All too light. My Beretta would have been perfect, if I hadn’t lost it in the woods. My Stratofighter would have worked, too, if I hadn’t dropped it. I touched the Ghost Hawk around my neck, but that weighed less than two ounces. Too light for fifteen meters of water-soaked paracord.
A boot?
It was impossible to untie the laces while treading water, so I had to let my head go under while I fought to claw them free. My fingers refused to work right, shaking and stiff with cold. After several tries, I had to admit I’d done nothing except tighten the knots.
A small, completely hysterical laugh escaped my mouth. I was going to die in a reservoir because I couldn’t find something between six ounces and a pound to tie to my paracord.
That’s when I noticed a pair of eyes staring at me.
They were at water level. Small and black, set in a flat green head covered in black spots.
I reached out, grabbing it.
A salamander. Cool, slimy, wiggling—
—weighing about eight ounces.
It was the most beautiful thing I’d ever felt.
I looped the paracord around its tail and cinched it tight.
Giving a few good strong kicks to raise me out of the water, I gripped the cord loosely in my first and second fingers and started spinning the salamander over my head. The water gave the cord weight and I let out more line with each revolution, until it grew to three times the size I’d started with. Judging the correct timing by feel, I released the cord.
The amphibian sailed through the air, narrowly missing a fence post. I jerked back, and the animal spun around the post several times in a blur, winding the cord tight. I gave it a tug, and it went taut.
So far, so good.
I swam close to the wall, pulled the cord around the backs of my knees, then up under my armpits. The cord was too thin to get a good grip on, so I pulled my sleeves up over my hands and struggled to ascend by wrapping the cord around my palms.
No good. The cord held, but I was too weak, my wet clothes too heavy.
I had no choice.
Letting a low whimper escape my lips, I dropped the waterlogged bag. About forty pounds of cash and Harry’s equipment sank immediately, but I was able to get up out of the water.
My movement was slow, my boots wet and slippery. I wound paracord around my fingers, and soon they were screaming from lack of circulation. But inch by excruciating inch I got up that gradual incline, and when I reached the top and hooked my elbow around the fencepost, I couldn’t help emitting another hysterical giggle.
My salamander buddy watched me unwrap the paracord, and I could have sworn his expression was bemused. He didn’t look any the worse for wear from his ordeal, except for a broken tail, bleeding where the cord had dug into it.
“Thanks for the assist,” I said, yanking the Ghost Haw
k from my neck sheath.
I cut off the salamander’s tail just above the knot, quick and surgical. The cute little critter scurried past, beelining for the water, no doubt anxious to share this tale with his friends as a new tail grew back.
I cast a backward glance at the reservoir and the lost cash, lost first-aid kit, lost phone, then pulled up to my feet and went to find Tequila.
More gunshots, from various places in the compound, and I had a sinking feeling that Hammett had finally joined the party.
Just when I thought things couldn’t get bleaker.
I made my way back to the first guard I’d killed and patted down his pockets until I located his keys. I took them and his gun, a Sig Sauer P229 that fit loosely into my hip holster, then I saddled up, checked the magazine on the 5.56 mm rifle mounted to the ATV’s handlebars, and familiarized myself with the controls. It had an automatic transmission, so I put in the keys, hit the start button, released the brake, and was off and running.
I headed southeast along the weed-choked road, then the road veered south, and I found myself facing another ATV several hundred meters ahead. I steered right, hoping to avoid an encounter.
No use.
The shots peppered the asphalt in front of me. I laid on the throttle and spun in a 180, heading off road behind a clump of bushes, east toward the oleum plant. Automatic weapon fire continued to kick up behind me, and I questioned the intelligence of front-mounting a machine gun on a four-wheeler. I supposed the only reason for guards to have guns was to chase people, and it made some sense to have a weapon pointed at the person you were chasing. But when you were being followed, as I was now, it was a big bowl of fail.
I zigzagged, trying to use the terrain to protect myself, ducking behind hills and slaloming between trees, but eventually I ran up to a creek that was too wide to traverse. I followed alongside, head down, until I came to a small railroad bridge. I’d crossed and was racing for the building in the distance when gunfire blew out one of my right rear tires.
The vehicle shuddered and slipped beneath me, and I turned into the skid, hitting the brakes. But nothing I could do worked. It flipped and sent me rolling across the prairie like craps dice thrown by a spastic hand.
When the world stopped cartwheeling around me, I took quick inventory of my injuries. I’d scraped my right knee, banged my left elbow, and gotten a good-sized knot on the back of my skull.
I slapped at my holster.
Empty. The gun had fallen out.
That’s when I saw the Latino man in a sharkskin suit staring down at me, pointing a Glock in my face, and realized with absolute certainty that I was going to be shot in the head.
Hammett
“The secret to winning a war,” the Instructor said, “is to not be on the side that loses.”
Hammett fought annoyance.
The buffalo-horn attack formation, as developed by the legendary Zulu warrior king, Shaka, was still practiced in modern combat. Its effectiveness was the reason Hammett chose to use it.
She, along with Jersey and Speed, would be the chest of the buffalo, leading a direct assault on the prison, which was located under the water filtration plant. Santiago would bring up the rear, watching for any attack from behind. Isaiah and Javier would be the horns, and come in on either side of the prison, trapping any guards on the perimeter.
But moments ago Isaiah had called, claiming he’d been shot in the leg by a sniper. Not a serious wound—a graze from what he suspected was a .22 long rifle—but enough to keep him rooted until he finished up.
Javier, the other horn, also radioed to say he was chasing a guard on an ATV, and thus out of position.
So Hammett’s buffalo currently had no horns. And the longer she waited, the more frustrated she became.
She had one arm around Speed’s waist, holding on as he steered the ATV. This annoyed her as well. Hammett disliked riding bitch, even though it freed up her hand to shoot if the need arose. Years ago, Hammett had actually visited a psychiatrist because she thought she might have control issues. But she disliked the doctor constantly telling her what to do, so she killed him.
Speed brought the four-wheeler to a gradual stop, then pointed northwest, toward a blocky white two-story structure at the end of the road. The water filtration plant. Hammett raised her binoculars and watched four men run out of the building, sidearms in hands.
“Rush them,” she ordered. “Shoot to kill.”
Speed hit the throttle. Hammett let the binocs hang around her neck and drew her Supergrade. When they closed within two hundred meters, Speed cut loose with the handlebar-mounted machine gun. Two men dropped in a mélange of bullets and blood. One ran west, and Hammett clamped onto Speed’s butt with her knees, brought up her other hand to steady her firearm, and double-tapped the guy into early retirement. The other wisely fled back into the building, slamming a door behind him.
Hammett ordered Speed to stop twenty meters away.
“Guard the entrance. Kill anyone who isn’t friendly.”
She climbed off the seat and slowly ran her eyes over the building, scanning for cameras. There were two, one on the roof and one above the door. Hammett shot them both. Jersey and Santiago pulled up alongside her and parked.
“Get the door open,” Hammett ordered the explosives expert.
While he huffed it over to the entrance, Hammett pointed at Santiago, pointed east, and then made a circle with her finger, signaling him to search the perimeter. She took the west, modifying her buffalo horn in the absence of Javier and Isaiah.
To her left, more rifle shots, a reminder to stay low. She moved in a quick crouch, navigating the outside of the building, avoiding the thick brush that had grown around its foundation. Hammett found another roof camera, dispatched it with a squeeze of the trigger. The building was attached to a concrete retaining wall that extended back a hundred meters, enclosing the four coagulation pools.
There was another gunshot—Santiago, on the opposite side of the plant—and then more shooting from the east, Javier. Hammett followed the length of the wall until she reached the end, and met Santiago at the midpoint.
“One camera,” he said, smiling at her. His lips were wet, and he was slightly out of breath. There was something about the guy that Hammett found absolutely repulsive. Certain people had chemistry together. This was the polar opposite of chemistry. Santiago evoked the same reaction as seeing a spider or a poisonous snake.
“You’ve got some mud on your face,” he said.
Santiago slowly reached his free hand up and rubbed his thumb across Hammett’s cheek. He had soft, almost feminine, hands, and she fought not to recoil in disgust. In that moment, Hammett almost felt sorry for Fleming; she wouldn’t want to be on the receiving end of this nutjob’s full attention.
“Thanks,” she managed. “You can take your thumb away now.”
He did, then ran his tongue across his lower lip. Yuck.
The explosion echoed out over the compound, and Hammett felt it in the soles of her feet. It was followed by gunfire. She led Santiago back to the front, jogging, and when they arrived there was a charred, black space in the frame where the front door used to be.
“Better too much than too little,” Jersey said, grinning.
Hammett cleared the doorway, Santiago backing her up. The guard who’d run inside earlier was there. Or rather, parts of him were. She showed Speed her palm, indicating he stay there, and then led her men into the black site, careful not to step in any blood.
At first glance, the building seemed to be abandoned and neglected, the decor a hodgepodge of dust, broken furniture, and stripped lighting fixtures. But Hammett noticed fresh mud on the floor, boot marks, and didn’t need Santiago to tell her where the secret entrance to the prison was. She followed the trail down a hallway and into a room where, as if in some 1940s black-and-white comedy, the footprints disappeared into a solid wall. Hammett saw the overhead camera, mounted in the ceiling corner. Rather than waste a bullet, sh
e jumped up and smashed the lens with the butt of her Supergrade.
Santiago strolled over to a phone on a table. It was one of those old Princess models, olive green, the receiver gone. He pressed a sequence of five numbers on the phone’s keypad. When nothing happened, he tried it again.
“They changed the code.”
“Open it,” she told Jersey, who already had his hands in his pack.
Hammett checked her tablet PC. Fleming was beyond this wall, only a few dozen meters away. The guards hadn’t been problematic, which was lucky but also a bit puzzling; she’d expected more resistance.
But it didn’t matter. Soon they’d have what they came for. Perhaps with enough time left over to settle things with Chandler, whose blip showed her to be still in Baraboo.
Hammett allowed herself a small grin. For the first time today, things were going her way. Hopefully the trend would continue.
Tequila
Tequila fired twice, feinted rolling left, then rolled right.
The bullet kicked up dirt to his left, where he would have been.
In the two seconds it took the sniper to work the bolt and aim again, Tequila was on his feet and running.
He knew about leading a target. So he became a target that couldn’t be led. Muscle memory kicked in, a routine from decades ago. Tequila clutched the AR-7 to his chest and, sprinting, jumped into the air, doing a one-handed spring off the ground, following it with a forward flip and a tack roll. He somersaulted alongside his backpack and phone, both of which he grabbed as another shot missed him, and then he bellied down into the tall weeds, hidden from view.
Moving slowly, he elbow-crawled past the kennel, casting a watchful eye toward the dogs. They sat by the open gate, tongues lolling, waiting for his next command. He was tempted to send them out after the sniper, but knew several would get shot or killed during the attack, so he let them be.
He punched in a quick text to Chandler, asking where she was, then focused on the open hatch, ten meters away. The problem was that the area right near the entrance was devoid of cover. If Tequila sprinted for it, he’d be out in the open—and easy to lead—for several seconds.
Flee, Spree, Three (Codename: Chandler Trilogy - Three Complete Novels) Page 40