Kill Zone

by Loren D. Estleman

  Macklin said, “Well, there’s plenty of bait aboard.”

  Ackler looked at him closely. “You fish?”

  “I have. But what we’re talking about right now is hunting.”

  “In tandem?”

  “We’re the only hunters here.”

  “You didn’t come aboard looking to recruit me, Macklin.”

  “I didn’t come aboard looking to get jumped. But I don’t see that either of us has a lot of other choices. I can’t speak for you, but I really don’t think I was born to wind up feeding the carp off Sandusky.”

  The young killer fiddled absently with the M-16’s actuating lever. “Say we bag the limit. Then what?”

  “Then I guess we take up where we left off when I boarded.”

  After a moment Ackler straightened and, balancing the rifle along his right forearm, pulled the pistol out of his waistband and handed it to Macklin. The .45’s deep blue finish looked black in the pale light.

  CHAPTER 29

  Charlie as the earliest grunts named the Viet Cong for their radio designation “Victor Charlie,” was fairly far down on the list of enemies to watch out for in the jungle. Clouds of mosquitoes carried diseases that the bacteriologists that sometimes accompanied David Blakeman’s unit hadn’t had a chance to find a name for, and the rust and mold that crept into the squishy actions of the early M-16s almost on the heels of the cleaning rag had left more than a few G.I.s with jammed weapons in the teeth of a Cong charge. That, together with the flower-child mentality of the later draftees who would rather stick a posy into their corroded muzzles than a bayonet into a blood-crazed guerilla’s intestines, had made a lottery of the prospect of getting out of Southeast Asia alive. That one of every two combat soldiers that went in succeeded said something about the poor organization of the North Vietnamese and America’s chances for victory, had a soldier and not a succession of bureaucrats been behind its involvement.

  “Phil, no!”

  Don, lulled into a waking sleep by the murmuring of the all-news station on the boat’s radio and by the subtle motion of the deck beneath his feet, had no idea at what point he had stopped remembering Khe Sanh and started dreaming. In any case he came out of the tropical steam into the Erie cold just as Phil Holliday launched himself from the stool by the starboard entrance to the pilot house, hands grasping for the Luger under the hijacker’s belt. Don drove his forearm across the bridge of the mate’s nose, feeling the bone give, and they wrestled, but the blow had robbed Holliday of his momentum and when Don jammed a knee into the other’s groin he gasped and started to fold. Don placed a hand against Holliday’s chest and shoved. The mate sprawled to the deck. When he raised his mashed face with the blood running out of his nose into his moustache he was looking at the business end of the German automatic.

  “You’re going to get what every real sailor wants, Wyatt,” said Don, cocking the complicated mechanism. “Burial at sea.”

  Captain Fielding, standing at the other end of the chart table, took a step forward. Don backed up to cover them both. “You’ve seen this thing spray,” he warned.

  Cap’n Eddie stopped. “There’s no need to kill him.”

  “Leave him alone,” said Holliday. His voice was thin coming through his smashed nose. “You kept your mouth shut before, I’d be standing there with that gun now.”

  “Then what? You were going to kill the rest of them with that one gun? What happens to the passengers meanwhile?”

  “It’d be a better chance than we’ve got now.”

  “We’re better off riding it out.”

  The mate snickered, or maybe he was crying. A fat red drop splatted to a deck still stained with the wheel man’s blood. “You old fart, we’re on the rocks now.”

  “Listen!”

  All eyes turned to the lookout. He turned up the volume on the radio.

  “… to release the prisoners. A list of the names of the inmates whose sentences the Governor has agreed to commute in response to the terrorists’ demands will follow this.” A commercial for a Cincinnati restaurant replaced the announcer’s stern voice.

  “Find another news station,” Don barked.

  The lookout manipulated the dial. Music came out of the speaker, a litany of baseball scores, more music. He stopped on an expressionless female voice. “Repeating that bulletin, the Office of the Governor of Michigan states that it has agreed to commute the sentences of ten Southern Michigan Penitentiary prisoners as demanded by the revolutionary group holding eight hundred passengers hostage aboard the hijacked Boblo boat. Efforts to locate the captured vessel.…”

  “Well, well.” Don took the Luger off cock. “Well, well.”

  He was reaching behind his back for the portable transceiver on the chart table when a burst of gunfire sounded below. He cursed and depressed the speaker button. “Fay, what now?”

  There was no answer.

  It wasn’t Fay.

  For all the speeches she had made during automatic weapons training about taking as many of the bastards with them as possible if something went wrong, eliminating her had proved absurdly easy. Ackler called her over to the port railing across from where Macklin had boarded, and as she approached from her post in the bow she turned her back protectively to the water. And to Macklin, invisible in his black wet suit in the darkness, standing at the rail holding the knife Ackler had returned to him behind his hip to avoid reflecting light off the shiny blade.

  “This better be damn good,” she snarled. “We both got hoojies need keeping an eye on.”

  Ackler said, “I just wanted to say good-bye.”

  The whites of her eyes showed in an uncomprehending glare. Then she must have heard something behind her, because she started to turn with the M-16 just as Macklin pinioned her with his left arm and drew his right fist across her throat. The razor-edged steel sheared through her vocal cords along with her jugular, silencing her screams just as a fountain of bright orange splattered the wall of the concession stand four feet away. Ackler had stepped out of the way just in time to avoid being doused and wrenched the rifle out of her convulsing grip before she could trip the trigger, breaking three of her fingers in the process. When Macklin let go she sank to her knees and then sagged sideways, twitched and lay still.

  “You’re good,” Ackler said, then indicated the stairs at the rear of the boat.

  “What about the passengers?”

  “Yeah, right.”

  Macklin wiped off both sides of the knife carefully on the dead woman’s skirt. There was a splash and he glanced up quickly to see the young killer holding only one M-16. The one he had taken from Fay was missing.

  “I can’t carry two and it’s no good arming just anyone that happens to come along,” Ackler explained. “I heard you don’t like squirt guns.”

  Macklin nodded. His companion unstrung the portable radio from Fay’s arm and sent it after the gun. Together they went to the bow, where the passengers, musicians, and a gray-haired security guard in uniform were sitting on folding chairs and squatting cross-legged on the deck. An old man with a discolored lump on his bald head exclaimed at the sight of the stranger with the man who had killed the bass player. The others stirred, then settled down as Macklin spoke.

  “We’re the cavalry. Stay where you are and don’t move, no matter what you hear. You’ll only get in the way.”

  “Are you a policeman?” someone asked.

  “I’m as close to one as you’ll see on this boat.”

  “There’s a wounded man on the bridge.”

  Macklin had started to turn. He looked at the young man who had spoken. He was seated on one of the chairs, holding hands with an attractive redhead whose parted lips exposed a slight overbite. She was wearing a man’s sportcoat like a cape over her bare shoulders. One of the young man’s cheeks was swollen and discolored where the flesh had been broken.

  “He’s a crewman Don shot,” he said. “I patched him up. He’s resting in the captain’s quarters below the pil
ot house.”

  “You’re a doctor?”

  “I’m interning at the U of M.”

  “Ted Delano, right? That’s Carol Turnbull with you.”

  The young man pursed his lips on the verge of a question. Macklin cut him off, speaking to the woman. “Your father’s worried about you.” His eyes swept the group. “We’ll have you all back with your families by morning.”

  More questions came all at once. The armed men turned their backs on them and went back the way they had come, stepping around Fay’s body.

  “Her father?” asked Ackler.

  “Clarence Turnbull.”

  “Who’s he?”

  Macklin made the same speech to the hostages in the stern, who listened in silence with alert expressions on their drawn faces. Then the pair turned to the stairs. At the foot Ackler handed Macklin the M-16.

  “Give me the knife.”

  Macklin surrendered the weapon. “Wait here till I call you,” Ackler said, and headed upstairs without waiting for an answer.

  Three minutes later, Macklin heard his name whispered from above. He made sure the safety on the automatic rifle was off and started up cautiously. Ackler was standing at the top, light glistening off the dark stuff slicking the blade in his fist. They traded weapons again and started forward, pausing at the emaciated boy lying on its face in a voluminous sportcoat. Macklin grasped a handful of hair and lifted the man’s narrow features into the light.

  “Delbert?”

  Ackler hesitated. “Yeah. I had to think. We’ve been calling him Ray so long. I got him under the ribs while he was lighting my cigarette.” He crushed out the butt glowing on the deck. “Anyway, that stops the clock. He was the whiz with explosives.”

  “Maybe.”

  “No maybes about it. It was his job to touch ’em off.”

  “I know Blakeman’s file. It isn’t like him to trust that kind of thing to anyone not named David Blakeman. Where are the passengers on this level?”

  “Up front. Don—Blakeman, damn it—had them moved yesterday. Ray wasn’t that good with people and the boss man didn’t want to take a chance on someone jumping him before he could set off the charge.”

  “Who’s up front?”

  “Teddy. His Royal Excellency Captain Philip MacKenzie.” He paused. “This one’ll be noisy. He doesn’t trust anyone.”

  “Okay.”

  They approached the lighted bow along both railings, Ackler port, Macklin starboard. A stony-faced young man with crewcut hair who wore his jacket and tie as if they were part of a uniform, sat with one hip on the rail with the hand holding his .45 pistol resting on his thigh. The passengers were sitting crowded together on the deck without an open space to be seen. The skin of the young hijacker’s face was taut and white and his eyes were ringed purple. He jumped a foot when he saw Macklin striding forward holding the semiautomatic Ackler had given him and raised his own weapon just as Ackler opened up with a short burst from the shadows to his left. Flame stuttered from the muzzle. Teddy bared his teeth in a grimace and slammed into a deck support, barking his elbow and dropping his gun. He slid down into a sitting position, his legs spread and blood leaking down his left side.

  A bearded black man seated with the passengers leaned forward and scooped up the abandoned .45. Both killers drew down on him. “We’re friends!” shouted Macklin. “Dump it overboard.”

  A woman had been screaming since Teddy was shot, drowning out the words. He said it again louder.

  “How come, if we’re such good friends?” The man was holding the gun flat on his palm.

  A black woman sitting next to him touched his arm. “Leon, do like the man says.”

  “I been doing like the man says my whole life.” But he pitched the pistol over the rail.

  “Lot of metal down there tonight,” reflected Ackler.

  “Fay, what now?”

  It was the radio, resting on the deck beside Teddy. Ackler stretched a leg between passengers to pick it up.

  Macklin said, “Leave it.”

  “Fay?” said the radio.

  Teddy groaned. Blood came to his mouth and spilled over his chin. Ackler said, “Shit,” moved the indicator on his rifle to single, and put a slug into the wounded man’s brain. He arched and sagged.

  The woman stopped screaming and started laughing hysterically. Someone shook her. The laughter soared and then receded into rhythmic moans.

  The radio said, “Teddy?”

  Macklin looked at Ackler. “You said Beaver Cleaver and Gidget are on the top deck. That’s John Carlisle and his girl, Melissa What’s-her-name?”

  “Yeah. Larry and Doris.”

  “She’s yours. Wait.” The radio had started up again.

  “Larry, go see what’s going down with Teddy and the others.”

  “Okay.”

  A forward staircase trimmed in elegant brass led up to the top passenger deck. Macklin signaled to Ackler and they took up positions on either side, out of sight of anyone coming down. Ackler returned the indicator on his rifle to full automatic.

  CHAPTER 30

  Larry felt like superman.

  With less than an hour to go before the deadline, he had felt safe in using the last of the cocaine Don had given him and his senses had never seemed so acute. There were a thousand smells in the lake air, each one different, and his ears were so sharp he swore he could hear the engine crew moving around in the hold. He could see in the dark and through the soles of his shoes his toes felt every lump and ripple in the metal deck as if he were barefoot. When he started down the echoing steps to the second deck, the heavy semiautomatic pistol felt as light as something carved out of driftwood in his hand. It was a shame not to be spending some of this energy on Doris.

  He felt movement to his left and stopped and said, “Teddy?”

  There was no answer and he felt a tingle of unease. Then a platinum head moved into his line of vision. He smiled in relief. “Sol, what—?”

  Something shoved him hard from behind emptying his lungs and throwing him against the brass banister but his senses were clicking and he swung around with his momentum his shirt getting wet against his back and squeezed the trigger of the .45 blindly and nothing happened and then flame splatted in front of him and this time he didn’t feel the blow the stairs came up …

  The echo of the big pistol’s report pressed Macklin’s eardrums, dulling the screams and crying from the passengers while bitter gray smoke curled over the young man sprawled face down over the stairs. Ackler moved in quickly to retrieve Larry’s gun, smiling tightly as he looked at it before shoving it under his belt. “Someone should’ve told him they don’t work when they’re not cocked.”

  “Johnny!”

  It was a shriek. Macklin spun with his own .45 in time to see a slight figure with long blond hair in a pale dress standing at the top of the stairs before the night shattered into pieces of blinding light and more noise hammered at his thickened eardrums and something hot burned his right hip. He returned fire, the pistol throbbing in his hand. He was deaf now. From the corner of his eye he saw the muzzle of Ackler’s M-16 flash in sputtering silence as in a film without sound, but by that time the girl was gone. They hit the stairs running.

  Macklin skidded on something slippery at the top, looked down and saw the dark spots on the deck. His hearing was blinking back, on and off like bad radio reception, and shrieks and shouts from among the passengers on that level led him to the stern, where the blood trail broadened and vanished into a milling crowd of hostages. Ackler followed him. As they approached on the trot, people got out of the way, and Macklin shouted and threw himself sideways just as a fresh burst splintered the air where he’d been standing. He didn’t look back to see if Ackler had been hit. His ribs were throbbing from the running and his right leg was soaked to the knee with something thick and warm.

  The girl was at the rear of the boat with her skirt hiked up to her thighs and one leg hitched over the rail, trying to balance the M-16
in one hand while with the other she sought to staunch the dark flow from just under her left breast. Her face was a smear of white against the darkness behind her. Her mouth worked. “Johnny, Johnny.”

  Macklin, lying on his stomach, stretched his right arm along the deck and sighted down it to the end of the pistol. He fired just as Ackler’s rifle clattered behind him and to his left. The girl perched on the rail jerked several times and a black hole opened in the center of the white smear of her face and she lifted a stained palm as if to grasp at a deck support and then she was gone. Something bumped the side of the boat. Water splashed.

  “Macklin!”

  The shout was Ackler’s. Macklin reacted without thinking, rolling inward toward the shelter of the wall of the enclosed section rising out of the center of the deck. There was a noise like a string of firecrackers going off and a dazed passenger who was standing near where he had been lying howled and grabbed his leg and fell. He rolled back and forth, grasping his knee and moaning. Macklin looked up over his left shoulder and saw a man’s silhouette moving along the roof of the crew quarters near the smokestack. Twisting painfully, he rested the .45 on the corner of his shoulder and pressed the trigger. The figure ducked behind the stack.

  “Is he hit?” Macklin called.

  Ackler, crouched near the rail, shook his head. “I couldn’t see. I saw some kind of movement near the bridge just before he fired. He’s got a Luger converted to full auto. I think he’s got a spare clip.”

  “Keep him busy.”

  “I’m knocking on empty now.” He patted the M-16.

  “You’ve got MacKenzie’s .45.”

  Hugging the wall of the enclosed section and dividing his attention between the skyline and the deck in front of him, Macklin crept forward. His right leg was growing numb and he was thankful for that. He didn’t have time to worry if the bullet was still in his hip or if he’d just been grazed, or if any major artery had been clipped. It was just like him to get shot by the one member of the band least likely to hit him. But he was still better off than the innocent wretch sobbing over his shattered kneecap on the deck.