Overfall

by David Dun

  Sam knew it without knowing it. The man from Polynesia, the man whose initial was G, who had killed John Weissman, who was responsible for the death of his son. This man had Anna.

  Sam crawled through the destroyed living room, knowing now why the rockets and the massive assault. It was cover for a desperate man who needed a bargaining chip. What would he do with it? How would he play it?

  Sam made it quickly through the house past the safe room to the other side. It was alternately dark and light with muzzle blasts and explosions punctuating the night. The air was heavy with a smell like hot wires. Smoke curled in columns and hung in clouds. It was a primitive struggle with ghastly killing devices rending flesh and destroying a home. Half the men had to be dead, and the fighting was starting to ebb. Perhaps they had learned that there was no getting at Jason.

  He picked up his radio. “Any word on Anna?”

  “Nothing,” T.J. said. On the back side of the house Sam tried night vision between flashes. Looking off into the blackness all the way to the tree line, he scanned and scanned again. He saw men crawling and crouching, but no one really moving except the occasional man pulling back. His radio clicked.

  “Monsieur Sam.”

  “This is Sam.”

  “If you will look at the trees by the pump house.”

  Sam looked at the pump house and then saw a man step from behind holding someone in camouflage.

  “You have Anna.”

  “Yes. Still wet with your come.”

  He knew it was a psychological jab, and still it worked.

  “What do you want?”

  “I want the two in the concrete box in exchange.”

  “You’re Belle du Jour. You’re Freight Stop. You’re wanted for the murder of Wes King and the theft of his software. You are the lover of Benoit Moreau, the servant of DuShane Chellis.”

  “Of course you know that men like me disappear everyday.”

  “But you’re not sure, are you? Men like you get caught by men like me.”

  “Not before I am through with your woman.”

  “If you want to bargain you’re going to have to go for something I can give you.”

  “Like what?”

  “Like me.”

  “What do I want with you?”

  “You won’t get Jason. You can have Anna Wade, but to you she is just a toy and she can only die once. Kill me and you improve your own chances of survival considerably. I think you know that.”

  “I didn’t come for you.”

  “No, you didn’t. You came for Jason, but it didn’t work because he’s locked in a box with twelve hours of air and the Mounties are on the way. It’s all about timing, and it’s getting late. Of course, even to have a chance of getting in that box you need me dead, don’t you?”

  “You come, she goes.”

  “Anna, come here,” Sam called out.

  Anna started walking with Gaudet’s gun pointed at her.

  Sam walked toward her and the man in black. The shooting had quieted. T.J. had come up close behind him and was following. For some reason Gaudet did not protest. Other men were creeping to the edge of the field. Now there were many guns on Sam and many guns on Devan Gaudet.

  “This is crazy,” T.J. said.

  “Sam, don’t go,” Anna said, now almost even with him.

  “If I don’t go, he and about ten other guys are gonna put bullets in your head.”

  “I don’t care. Don’t go. Tell the men to shoot.”

  “We’ll all be dead. We’re in the open.” Sam walked past her and kept walking toward the man he meant to kill. T.J. fell away, going back with Anna.

  As Sam approached he saw a mustached man wearing night-vision goggles. The man took off his mask and a bright light came on. It was aimed at him so that Gaudet was in a shadow.

  “You are Devan Gaudet.”

  “Some days.”

  “You killed my son.”

  “Now I understand what a triumph that was. I know you have in mind killing me, but before you try you should turn around.”

  Sam looked back. What he saw sickened him. T.J. was holding a gun to Anna’s head. The other men were keeping their places.

  “This is bullshit,” one of Sam’s men called out. “Whose side are you on, T.J.?”

  “The money side. Everybody who wants an easy hundred grand, step up here.”

  None of Sam’s men moved except to point their guns at T.J.

  “What’s the way in?” T.J. called.

  There is no way in. You can kill Anna and me all day long and there is no way in. That thing has twelve hours of air and it isn’t opening a moment sooner, no matter what I do or say. I told them to stay the full twelve hours. Even the cops won’t get them out. You blow it up and you’ll kill them with the concussion.”

  “All right. Then we’ll put a rocket into that thing and kill them.”

  “Have at it.”

  “T.J. is a little small-minded,” Gaudet sneered. “I have a pneumatic drill and several diamond-tipped bits. They will go through anything.”

  “Slowly,” Sam said, suddenly feeling a chill.

  “As you said, if I’ve got you, I’ve got time. Granted there will be a few dead Mounties, but that’s no problem.”

  Sam was ten feet from Gaudet and slightly to the side. Gaudet had a pistol aimed at his head, as did three other men. Too many men. Too many angles. It was impossible.

  Grandfather.

  Sam could think of nothing.

  Without the sun the great horned owl lays waste the eagle’s nest.

  “Maybe now you’d like to drop the gun before we begin killing your sweet Anna.”

  Sam sensed that there would be no later chance and therefore any risk was acceptable.

  Sam kicked both feet for the sky and as he fell shot a blast at the light.

  Black. Men fired shots across the field and there was instant war. Sam rolled even as he was knocked three feet over the ground by a bullet.

  Searing-hot pain shot through his ribs but he kept rolling. The bullet had hit the steel of the chest plate in his flak jacket. There was the excruciating pain of cracked ribs but nothing else. Beside Sam a man fell, shot. Sam took his weapon and hunkered behind him. Five bullets, at least, hit the body. Pulling his goggles down, Sam saw Gaudet step behind a tree, still blind without his night vision. With his chest aching like a grapefruit-sized tooth cavity, Sam ran for the tree, figuring to end Gaudet.

  As he ran he caught a glimpse of T.J., dragging Anna back into the house.

  “This is the Canadian Mounted Police,” came booming over a loudspeaker.

  A rocket streaked across the field and a car exploded in liquid fire.

  So much for the police, Sam thought.

  Standing against the large tree, an oak several feet in diameter, he tried to imagine what Gaudet might do. A noise came from above; he looked straight up, fired a single shot. A body fell. Not Gaudet.

  Whirling around the tree, he saw nothing. Gaudet was gone, his men pulling back to a sandbag bunker. Maybe Gaudet was with them. Firing erupted and Sam pulled back as well.

  Someone had prepared. Of course ... as soon as T.J. had arrived he told them where to come. Along the way he no doubt had given them information. Even the travel was made easy.

  “Sam, we are going to kill your Anna.” It was Gaudet’s French accent over a loudspeaker.

  “Listen up,” Sam said into the quiet of his radio. “Converge on the house. Anybody gets any kind of a shot at T.J. just take it. They’ll kill any hostages anyway.”

  Sam ran straight to the house, taking only slight cover when he could. Incredibly he had drawn no fire by the time he made it to what had been a side porch.

  He wondered about T.J. actually killing Anna. Maybe, maybe not. But Gaudet would certainly kill her if he could get into the house.

  Once inside, Sam moved quickly to the hall around the corner from the safe room. Paintings worth thousands caked with dust hung on the wall or rest
ed on the floor. One depicted red-coated gentry and hounds and the bloody plight of the fox they sought.

  “Grady, I’m gonna take Anna’s hand off one finger at a time until you come out.” T.J. was talking into the intercom box.

  “Save your breath,” Sam said. “I disconnected it. They’re not coming out.”

  “I’ll kill Anna. So help me God.”

  “No payday for that, I’d imagine. Better get your drill.”

  Sam could hear T.J. retreating down the hall to the utility room that housed the safe room. Anna was struggling against him. Sam retreated around a corner and waited. From behind him he saw a shadow. Maybe Gaudet.

  “I have her now, Sam.” It was Gaudet’s voice. But not from where he had seen the shadow. Sam’s skin chilled and tightened. How did Gaudet get into the house and to the safe room that fast? Maybe it was a bluff.

  “How shall I kill her, Sam? You know me. I will find a way to enjoy it.”

  “You’re a tough guy, I know.”

  A motor started—the sound of a heavy drill.

  “We’ll be in within an hour,” Gaudet called to Sam. “Perhaps a half hour. Come on in. Watch Anna as she gets the treatment.”

  “Can anybody see the generator?” Sam whispered into his radio.

  “They’re all dead, Sam,” Gaudet said.

  Sam tried to ignore him, waiting for a response. “Anybody, come back.”

  “A lot of wounded. We’re pinned down. So are they.”

  “It doesn’t sound good, does it?” Gaudet’s voice came through the radio.

  “Let’s bargain.” It was T.J.

  “No deal.” Gaudet. It was obvious he had no regard for T.J.

  “They must have used lightweight concrete. Probably shorted the cement. It is going faster than I hoped,” Gaudet said.

  Sam could hear the drill grinding. Above him the ceiling had been blown out and holes ripped through the walls. He tried to think, searching for a way to get Anna.

  “Soon we’ll be at the steel. Maybe they used cheap steel too.”

  The sound of a large helicopter shook the night air. It was far off but coming closer. An explosion reverberated through the atmosphere.

  “The Canadian government just discovered we have missile launchers on top of the mountain.”

  “Victoria’s not far. Neither is Vancouver. They’ll have more.”

  “Yes. And we will shoot them down at five thousand meters. Then, Sam—they’ll be cautious. We will have ample time, I assure you. One thing I’ve been wanting to do is give Anna a good shot of the Nervous Flyer formula. I think I’ll take her with me. She can screw me for the oil antidote. Where we’re taking her they’ll appreciate that.”

  Sam tried to clear his mind of anger and frustration. Anna was weeping.

  Suddenly Anna screamed an incredible shriek. Sweat poured down Sam. His body shook, his mind threatened to betray him. Still he didn’t move. With Gaudet using Anna as a shield, he couldn’t even sacrifice himself to kill them. Grandfather had given his life. Gaudet would not give him that chance. Grandfather was fond of saying that a man’s ideas were more deadly than his arrows. More than bullets, Sam needed something completely unexpected.

  A new plan brought him energy. Running out the back of the house with near-reckless abandon, he made his way through a rapid stream of bullets to the tree line. Three rounds grazed him as he dived into the forest. The shooting came from men skirmishing from various haphazard bunkers or corners of the house. He found Yodo, wounded in both arms but alive and functional.

  “We have to take the bunker in the trees.”

  Yodo nodded.

  “I need one rocket.”

  Gaudet would have been talking to thin air as Sam ran, and any second it would start to worry him.

  “You’ve left us, Sam. I may have to kill her after all.”

  “I’m here,” Sam said into the radio.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Getting ready to catch you when you escape. I’ve already lost Anna.”

  Sam didn’t listen to the response; he ran with Yodo, making a big arc. Nobody would be expecting an attack on this bunker from the ground. It was too far from the house. They went into the trees and passed through gaping holes in the chain-link fence. They used night vision, but made no effort to be quiet and still drew no fire. Sam wondered if Gaudet’s men were deserting, or more likely dead or wounded.

  Twenty yards from the sandbags they stopped.

  “We go in shooting,” Sam said.

  “For Shohei,” Yodo said, and with one hand on his automatic he charged the bunker, Sam immediately behind.

  As they neared the sandbags they heard a radioed voice in the bunker—Sam thought it Gaudet’s. After a clipped response the man rose to shoot, his outline green and ghostly through Sam’s goggles. Sam and Yodo both fired, and the man’s body jerked as the rounds worked their way up his torso.

  Sam vaulted the sandbags and hoisted a rocket launcher, nodded at Yodo, and left as quickly as they’d entered.

  “What are you doing, Sam? I’d whittle on Anna’s face but I have a lot of men that want her.”

  “Me too,” Sam said.

  Gaudet laughed.

  “Getting back to the house might not be easy,” Sam said to Yodo.

  “I go first,” Yodo said.

  Yodo ran and Sam followed. They both shot at muzzle blasts on the way in. Yodo went down, hit after about twenty yards. Sam dropped and crawled to him, the rocket launcher slung on his back. Yodo was trying to use his belt to tie off his leg, but it was a struggle with his already injured arms and hands.

  “You go,” Yodo said. “I cover.”

  Yodo shot and reloaded as Sam crawled frantically for the side porch.

  He climbed through the ruined doorway and ran down the hall without incident.

  Anna was crying.

  “Here I am,” he said on the radio.

  “Good. The drill is going through the steel quickly. Would you like to know how we’re going to get them out?”

  Sam looked up at the holes in the ceiling. “I imagine you’ll tell me.”

  Huge pockmarks in the walls would make climbing easy. Keeping the rocket launcher tied over his back, he began climbing. He hauled himself up through the hole and into the second story.

  “We have a special form of mustard gas we will drip in through the hole a bit at a time. It sticks to the skin and peels it like you might peel an orange. They’ll be out in no time. What do you think, Sam?”

  “Hell of a plan.”

  A bathroom stood above the safe room. The floor consisted of bare marble and carpet over marble.

  “The beauty is that even while it doesn’t kill them, nobody could stand to remain inside. Look, we are almost through the steel. This was a real cheap installation. The owner should seek a refund.”

  “I’ll make a note of that.”

  “Tell me, do you prefer Anna’s breasts or her thighs? I want to know what to leave you.”

  “Frankly I was always partial to her smile.”

  Sam knew that in the end he would have to guess. Right now he wanted so much to believe in magic. Outside he heard a flurry of shots and the occasional rocket concussion.

  “Sam, I am warning you, you need to be careful about charging in here. With the gas canisters out, you could have us all with no skin. Anna has beautiful skin—I don’t think she’d like that.”

  Sam suspected that the gas wasn’t in the safe room yet. Maybe it didn’t exist at all. Something about the tone of Gaudet’s voice told him. Now he heard Gaudet talking on his radio, but couldn’t discern the words.

  Sam closed his eyes and leaned against a wall near the tub. He had to know the unknowable. He concentrated on the safe and the utility room below him, remembering every detail. The top of the safe extended up between the floors; its rear wall lay directly against the utility room’s. But there had to be two or three meters of space between the safe’s sides and the utility room�
�s side walls.

  Given that those walls were reinforced, a blast at the back of the room would funnel both shock waves and debris around the sides of the safe and toward the hallway door, following the path of least resistance.

  Gaudet would have his men arranged to provide the greatest cover from a conventional attack. Anna would be in the utility room’s doorway, facing the hall and farthest from the safe—a human shield against any hallway assault. Between her and the safe would stand T.J., Gaudet, and the others, with T.J. and Gaudet nearest Anna. This meant that Anna would be partially shielded from the blast by her captors’ bodies—perhaps enough to save her life, perhaps not.

  A direct hit to the top of the safe could kill Grady and Jason inside, so Sam would fire the rocket to strike a glancing blow at the top of the box. He could scarcely believe he was considering doing this. But what else could he do?

  His feet moved silently across the floor. Keeping the first-floor layout in his mind, he stepped into the bathtub and aimed the rocket at an angle to the floor toward the rear wall, the point of entry where the carpet met marble. It was a huge risk for Anna, but Sam did not expect to be around to see the result.

  “Are you still there?” asked Gaudet over the radio.

  “Guess.”

  Sam pulled the trigger, launching the rocket.

  Forty-one

  Sam awoke in the bathtub. He had no idea how much time had passed. Probably only a minute or two. His arm felt broken and was clearly bloody. Likewise his shoulder was torn up, but probably not broken. Hardly any floor remained in the bathroom; the wall next to the bathtub was mostly gone and the tub itself rested next to a giant hole where the rocket had blown away a series of floor joists.

  Below him he saw Clint bending over a bloodied Anna, who lay facedown on the floor, the blast having come from behind her. Clint was telling her not to move—that the medics would come. T.J. looked to have been broken in the back since he V’d the wrong direction. His body had sheltered Anna’s from the blast, as had the three other men lying motionless on the floor. None at first glance appeared to be Gaudet.

  Gaudet had left a calling card. Sanford was hanging, tied to the hot water heater. His face had been mutilated and rags stuffed in his mouth. Gaudet had cut a small hole in Sanford’s belly and pulled out his entrails. That would explain Anna’s hysterical screaming. Gaudet had kept Anna unblemished but still had genuine sound effects.