The Sword of God - John Milton #5 (John Milton Thrillers)

by Mark Dawson

  The barrel rolled around on its side, straight down the centre of the cargo bay at him.

  THE BLACK HAWK’s navigator worked off a paper map that he held open over his lap, relaying instructions to the pilot. They flew fast and close to the ground, following the route that Lundquist was most likely to have taken. They started due east on Highway 28, the trunkline that bisected the Upper Peninsula east to west.

  They reached Stannard Township and swung sharply to follow the 28 south.

  Ellie looked down over Bond Falls State Park, the canopy of dense foliage, the road stretching ahead and behind them.

  They rocketed over Watersmeet at three hundred feet above ground level.

  “There!” the navigator said.

  Ellie strained forwards against the restraints that held her in her seat. She craned her neck so she could see through the open door.

  “That it?” Maguire asked her.

  It was the same truck that she had seen earlier. “Yes. That’s it.”

  They drew closer, still staying well back in the event that a blast was triggered.

  The truck started to swing wildly to the left and right, as if Lundquist was trying to throw someone off.

  Milton.

  One of the doors was open, flapping as the truck swerved.

  “Holy crap,” the gunner said.

  They edged a little closer, and she could see him. He was half in and half out of the trailer, grabbing onto a wooden pallet that was wedged against the closed door.

  Her headphones squelched with static, and then she heard the voice of the pilot. “Hotel two-six, Crazy Horse one-eight. Have the target in range. Request permission to engage.”

  The next voice was distant, without the clamour of the turbines, someone in a command post somewhere. “Roger that, Crazy Horse. We have no personnel close to your position; you are free to engage. Over.”

  “Okay, we’ll be engaging.”

  “Hey!” Ellie yelled.

  The gunner covered his throat mike with his hand. “Permission to fire?”

  “Roger, gunner, go ahead. I’m gonna… I can’t see it now. It’s behind those trees.”

  “Hey!” Ellie shouted, louder this time.

  She reached down and started to fumble with the clasps on her belts.

  “Ma’am,” Maguire said.

  “Tell them to hold their fire!”

  “Don’t try to get out of your seat, please.”

  MILTON DUCKED his head as the barrel bounced over the sill at the edge of the truck, spun high into the air, and cleared his trailing legs by a few spare inches.

  He reached with his right arm, slowly hauling himself into the trailer. He assessed it quickly. There was a strong, cloying odour of ammonia and diesel. It was pungent, and Milton quickly felt a headache developing. He would not be able to stay inside the trailer for long. It was forty feet long and two-thirds full. He saw barrels of different colours, hundreds of pounds of explosives marked with TOVEX, and thirty PRIMADET blasting caps. There were an additional twenty fifty-pound bags of fertiliser lashed up against the right-hand wall. Milton knew enough about explosives to know that if those blasting caps were ever detonated, they would trigger a blast strong enough to shake the heavens.

  He started to feel light-headed from the fumes.

  He looked back to the open rear end. The door was still swinging to and fro, given fresh momentum every time the trailer turned through a corner or bounced across an uneven surface. The trailer was twice Milton’s height and the ceiling was a good four feet above him. He went to the nearest barrel and wrapped his arms around it, grunting with exertion as he moved it, inch by inch, towards the rear. When it was close enough to be almost directly beneath the overhang of the ceiling, he clambered atop it, almost losing his balance on more than one occasion, and then reached up to fasten both hands around the edge of the roof. He boosted himself up, scrambling with both feet against the right-hand wall, heaving with every last scrap of strength until he had managed to wedge his torso over the edge, bringing up his right leg and pushing until he was all the way over.

  The wind whipped at him, stinging his eyes, and he had to lay flat and clasp the edge of the trailer to stop himself from being blown off. The trees rushed by on either side, and when he wriggled across to the edge, he looked down to see the asphalt unrolling like a long and unbroken black ribbon.

  He reached forward, grabbed at the edge, and pushed with his legs.

  He reached forward and pushed.

  Again.

  Again.

  LUNDQUIST JERKED the wheel left and right, feeling the huge mass of the trailer as it swung across the road. He knew that he had to be careful, that tipping the rig over would be the end of it all, but by the same token, he couldn’t allow Milton to interfere.

  He had seen him earlier, racing down the road.

  He reached across to the passenger seat and pulled the M16 closer so that he could easily reach the trigger, and yanked the wheel again.

  He thought of what David said to Solomon.

  Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or discouraged, for the Lord God, my God, is with you. He will not fail you or forsake you until all the work for the service of the temple of the Lord is finished.

  He stomped down on the gas and swerved the tractor in the opposite direction.

  “YOU CAN’T FIRE,” Ellie said. “The truck’s loaded with explosives.”

  “And that’s why we have to,” Maguire shouted into his mic. “If we detonate it out here, all we’ll do is knock over some trees and make a mess of the road.”

  “You’ll kill Milton.”

  “We don’t know who he is.”

  “He’s the only reason we’ve got a chance to stop this.”

  “I’ve only got your word for that, Agent. I’ve got clearance to take that truck out at my discretion.”

  “Then use your discretion. Give him a chance.”

  “We let him drive on, we risk him triggering a blast in a town or a city. Can’t take that risk.”

  “He’ll stop him,” Ellie shouted back. “You don’t need to shoot it.”

  The headphones squelched again with the pilot’s voice.

  “Man on the roof of the truck.”

  The gunner looked out. “Okay, confirmed, we got a guy climbing up on the roof.”

  “That’s Milton!” Ellie yelled.

  “I’m gonna fire,” the gunner said. “Okay?”

  “Once you get on, just open up,” the pilot said.

  “Give him a chance!”

  Maguire looked at Ellie. He bit his lip and then said, “No, this is Maguire. Hold on.”

  “Sir?”

  “Get ahead of it and then come around. We’ll see what he’s going to do. Position?”

  “Six miles out of Iron River,” the pilot reported.

  “Get ahead of the truck. If it’s still rolling three miles outside town, take it out.”

  MILTON HAD seen the Black Hawk as it swooped ahead of them a hundred yards to the left. They wouldn’t get too close, just in case the trailer was detonated and the blast caught them, too. It raced away to the south. Milton doubted that they would let them pass into another town.

  He would have jumped and left the chopper to blow the explosives, but the semi was going too fast. He didn’t much like the odds of walking away if he leapt from it onto the road.

  That, and he had made a promise to Lundquist that he meant to keep.

  The wind tore at him as he clambered across the full forty feet of the trailer. He gripped onto the lip of the roof and dropped down onto the catwalk behind the tractor. The handle to release the fifth wheel was an arm’s length beneath the trailer and he didn’t know whether it would be too far for him to reach. He lowered himself to his belly, his head pointing to the back of the trailer, and slid further until he was resting on the wheel guard, almost wedged beneath the tractor and the leading edge of the trailer. He looked over the side: the big Yokohama tyre rumbled just in
ches below him, across asphalt that seemed almost close enough to touch. Spray churned up and over him; he had to blink furiously to clear his eyes and then he had to grip hard with both hands as they turned into a sharp lefthander. The trailer pivoted on the fifth wheel and, for a moment, he thought he was going to be crushed beneath it.

  It brushed his shoulder. The edge pressed into his deltoid, smearing thick black turntable grease, and then it straightened out again. Milton slid further beneath the trailer, the last few extra inches that he could manage, and then reached out his hand until his fingers closed around the locking handle.

  It could only be pulled out at a perpendicular angle to the tractor.

  He yanked it.

  Nothing.

  He had poor leverage.

  Another inch…

  He stretched out further until his muscles were taut.

  He yanked again.

  The handle rattled, and then slid out.

  He backed up, clambered onto the catwalk, and braced himself against the cab.

  Lundquist gave the engine a jolt of gas and the sudden surge separated the king pin from the fifth wheel. The road ascended a shallow rise and the connecting plate that fastened the trailer slipped out.

  It started to fall away.

  The airlines and the electrical cable stretched out, went tight, and then were yanked out of their couplings.

  Without air, the trailer’s spring brakes automatically locked.

  There was a huge crash as the front of the unit slammed down onto the road, sparks flying in a crazy cascade behind it, smoke pouring from the locked tyres.

  It jerked left and right.

  Milton flinched, expecting a blast.

  Nothing came.

  It gouged a track down the middle of the road, somehow staying upright. After fifty feet, it ground to a halt.

  The tractor, shorn of its weight, raced ahead.

  He anchored himself with the broken airlines and stepped onto the side of the tractor. The eight drive tyres turned, the spray flaying him. He reached the corner and stretched out, his fingers fixing around the handle of the storage compartment. He stepped onto the fuel tank, his feet sliding against the bulbous shape of the wet metal, and then he lunged ahead and took the grab handle. The exhaust stack chugged, fumes pouring out into the darkness. He caught sight of himself in the mirror, ducked beneath it, and hopped from the tank to the step.

  He raised himself above the line of the window, looked inside…

  … and saw the M16.

  He let go of the handle, dropped below the line of the window, and swung away.

  The automatic gunfire blew out the window, a sparkling parabola of glass that arced outwards and scattered behind him.

  He held onto the handle of the storage compartment with his right hand, his right foot on the fuel tank, and swung back to the rear of the tractor.

  He didn’t know what to do.

  If Lundquist had spare ammunition, and Milton knew that he would, there would be no way he could get into the tractor cab before being shot.

  He tightened his grip on the airline.

  He was stuck.

  “SIR?”

  The pilot had given them a lead on the semi and then turned back to face it. Ellie had watched with fear and admiration as Milton had uncoupled the trailer. The road ahead was straight for three miles, and they had seen it scrape to a halt. It hadn’t detonated, not that it would have mattered out here.

  Now all that was left to deal with was the tractor.

  Denuded of its trailer, it had raced ahead.

  She had watched Milton clamber around the side of the cab and had seen the muzzle flash and the sparkle of glass as Lundquist had fired at him. She had watched as he held on with one hand and then swung back around the back. She found that she had been holding her breath.

  The tractor was two miles away from them now and it was closing fast.

  “Sir?” the gunner said. “What are your orders?”

  “When it’s in range, shoot it.”

  “What more can he do?” Ellie protested.

  “We don’t know if that maniac has explosives in there with him. Can’t take the chance. If your friend has got any sense in him, he’ll jump and get clear.”

  The tractor kept rolling.

  “Jump? He’ll kill himself.”

  “Give him a warning,” Maguire said.

  The gunner settled in behind the M-60 and squeezed the trigger. A dozen rounds tore through the darkness, the tracer describing a diagonal trajectory that blew up the road twenty feet in front of the speeding tractor.

  Lundquist kept coming, the tractor rushing over the fresh potholes and through the cloud of pulverised asphalt.

  Maguire looked at Ellie, his expression apologetic, then at the gunner.

  “Do it.”

  Chapter 50

  MORTEN LUNDQUIST looked at the Black Hawk. The chopper was hovering above the road two hundred yards away, directly ahead of him.

  He didn’t know how he had done it, but Milton had decoupled the trailer. The airlines must have been torn out. Every time he touched the brakes he would be depleting the air tanks, and, when they were empty, the spring brakes would stop the tractor, too.

  So he didn’t brake.

  He accelerated.

  Sixty.

  Sixty-five.

  The chopper waited for him.

  He closed.

  One hundred and fifty yards.

  One hundred yards.

  It was no good.

  The game was up.

  He had been mistaken.

  Maybe he hadn’t been listening.

  God's word?

  It wasn’t what he had thought it was.

  He had a different plan for him.

  Thy will be done.

  He could see it now, everything that he had done wrong. He had let Milton distract him. He had allowed him to fill his thoughts, his voice drowning out God’s voice.

  It was obvious, now.

  Milton was an agent of Satan.

  And Lundquist needed to stop him.

  Perhaps that was what God had always wanted him to do.

  He looked up at the helicopter as its powerful searchlight swung across the road and raced towards him, filling the cab with its blinding glow. He blinked, taking his hand off the wheel and shielding his eyes with it just as the muzzle of the big machine gun sparked a vicious starburst.

  The rounds detonated into the asphalt and then reached up into the chassis of the truck, shredding the hood, pulverising the radiator and the engine. Flames leapt out, and then a thick pall of black smoke started to rise up.

  Lundquist yanked the wheel to the left.

  The disabled tractor was doing sixty as it left the road.

  ELLIE GRIPPED the side of the chair as the rattle of the machine gun overlaid the roar of the turbines.

  “Shit!” the gunner cursed.

  The tractor passed out of sight.

  “Pull up,” Maguire said. “We need a better view.”

  They gained altitude, opening up the dark vista of the woods. The forest around here was crisscrossed with the same access roads and firebreaks, and it was one of these into which the tractor had plunged. She could see the glow of its headlamps pulsing orange through the trunks of the trees. The pilot kept the chopper behind the tractor, and they watched as it gradually decelerated before it smashed a path through the trees that fringed the road and came to a sudden stop.

  “I can’t set down there, Colonel,” the pilot reported. “There’s nowhere to land.”

  “Keep us on station and call in our position. How far away are the units on the ground?”

  “Ten klicks.”

  “How long can we stay here?”

  The pilot checked his dials. “We’ve got a quarter tank. Fifteen minutes if we want to get back again.”

  The searchlight shone into the darkened trees. The operator trained it on the wreck of the tractor and then gave out a shout
of surprise. “There he is!”

  Ellie squinted down.

  The figure of a man. Bulky, moving slowly, awkwardly. The spotlight tracked him, moving in a northeasterly direction as he struggled through the undergrowth away from the wreck.

  “Is that Lundquist or Milton?”

  “Lundquist,” she said.

  “Fire at will.”

  The gunner fired a barrage, and as he did, the searchlight lost the man. “Dammit.”

  Maguire gritted his teeth. “He’s going to get away.”

  Ellie looked back at the tractor.

  Where was Milton?

  THE TRACTOR had bounced and leapt, crashing through the smaller trees and tearing the scrub up by the roots. The firebreak was just barely wide enough for it, and then it had turned away and the tractor had kept going in a straight line, slicing through a stand of newly planted fir. The windscreen had shattered as the tractor splashed through a stream. It had eventually slammed to a dead stop against the trunk of an ancient oak.

  Lundquist had been thrown around the cab like a puppet, and the final impact had crashed his head against the wheel. The jolt had made him bite clean through his lip, and now blood was running into his mouth and pouring down his chin. The seat belt had cut into the fleshy parts of his neck, and he could feel the bruises forming on his sternum, chest, and pelvis.

  He had taken the M16 and kicked the door open. His foot slipped on the step and sent him crashing into a bush bristling with thorns.

  He took a pause to catch his breath.

  The tractor’s shattered engine ticked, its heat gradually dissipating.

  Shards of glass fell like teeth from the broken maw of the window frame.

  He looked up as the tremendous clatter of the Black Hawk came from directly overhead.

  He ran.

  The big machine gun opened up and rounds tore through the canopy overhead, stitching jagged holes in the sodden greensward. He tumbled out of the way, the splashing, muddy impacts stretching away from him and terminating in the trunk of another oak, sending a storm of splinters in all directions.