Deep Black (9 page)

12

Lia cursed as the bullets began to fly. The idiot Russians didn’t have a clue where they were but were putting so much lead
out that sooner or later they were bound to hit something. She had gotten her knife into one of the dogs as it came at her,
and used the rifle butt on the second, crushing the Doberman’s skull and killing it instantly.

Damn shame to hurt dogs. She felt like shit.

The Russians stopped firing. They had flashlights, and she saw them flickering about ten feet away, near the entrance to the
fenced-in yard where she was. Then they put the lights out.

“You see where they are?” said Karr in her ear.

Something moved very close to her and she froze, not even daring to answer.

“Damn,” Karr cursed in her headset. Obviously he was pinned as well.

Okay, Marine, Lia thought to herself. This is where you show us you can live up to your re´sume´. Get your cute butt in here
and show us you’re more than gray-haired eye candy, Charlie Dean.

13

Dean plunged across the large circles of gray-yellow thrown by the spotlights, running across an access road into a level
field strewn with gravel and weeds. Three or four huts sat at the other end; the fenced yard where Lia and Karr had gone was
just beyond it. At the near-left corner was the truck he’d heard.

What he couldn’t see were people.

So all the high-tech bullshit was just that—bullshit. It was a liability now—if one of the other team members were captured,
the Russians could probably figure out how to use the gear to locate the others.

Like him.

Kneeling, Dean unclipped the mike from the collar of his shirt and put it as low as it would go on his shirt, where he folded
the fabric over to cut down as much as possible on any ambient noise. He’d continue listening over the headset; it might give
clues on what else was going on.

If it came to it, he’d have to take off the pants and their locator device. Stinking high-tech toy crap.

Dean took one of the extra clips from his pocket, holding it in his hand as he moved to his right, flanking the truck and
the small buildings. The perimeter fence stood on his right, near what seemed to be a generator shack; a motor hummed inside
it and there was a faint glow from under the door, as if a night-light were on inside. Beyond this was a lagoon of muck, which
extended beyond a chain-link fence. Inside the chain-link fence sat a row of old cars.

Or not-so-old cars. They looked to be Mercedeses. Dean still didn’t have a good read on where his team members were or who’d
fired the guns. He began edging toward the truck, moving parallel to the fence. Finally he saw something move on the other
side of the truck and he froze.

A man with a rifle.

Short, five-six or -seven. Bulky, maybe because of a vest.

Dean watched the man walk to the front of the truck, scan down the fence line, then walk back. Thinking he might start the
truck and turn on the headlamps, Dean lowered himself to the ground and waited a few moments. When nothing happened, he got
up and strode as quietly but quickly as possible toward the truck, aware that he was exposed to anyone in the huts on his
left.

There’d be at least one other person working with the guy at the truck. Otherwise, he would have left.

About twenty feet from the truck, Dean’s boots splashed into a shallow puddle. He stopped, leveling the AKSU slightly lower
than he’d normally aim, figuring it would ride up when he fired. He was worried, too, about the vest.

But the Russian didn’t hear the noise, or at least didn’t check it. That bothered Dean—maybe the man had moved away from the
truck. Dean stepped through the puddle as quietly as he could, moving into a crouch. He slid the second clip back into the
back of his pants, scanned around to make sure he wasn’t being flanked himself, then edged backward, taking an elliptical
approach to the rear of the truck. When he was less than five feet away, he saw the Russian standing a few feet from the tailgate,
zipping up after taking a leak. The man glanced over his shoulder, then reached into his pocket to light a cigarette. He had
his gun under his arm.

Dean flew forward. He was a step and a half away when the Russian heard him and started to spin around, bringing up his rifle.
The short wooden stock of Dean’s AKSU smacked the Russian in the side of the skull so hard he fell out of Dean’s reach. Dean
jumped after him, hammering the man’s chin with his boot but losing his balance and falling backward on the ground near the
rifle the Russian had dropped. Dean rolled to his side, levering himself up and throwing out his elbow to protect against
the attack, but the sentry lay limp nearby.

Dean waited on one knee, momentarily unsure of his bearings. The sketch from Karr’s handheld had shown an opening along that
side of the fence, but he couldn’t remember how far up it was.

He could hear something.

Feet on gravel. Inside the fence.

Dean moved behind the truck, then circled around. He saw a figure emerge from the fence line about twenty yards up. As he
brought his AKSU up he felt something sting him hard in the side, an errant fastball catching him in the ribs. He spun, catching
a muzzle flash a dozen yards away. The submachine gun on Dean’s hip barked, the recoil easier than he’d thought.

Dean threw himself to the ground as the figure by the fence fired. He touched the glasses, steadying the image. The man he’d
fired at had gone down and didn’t seem to be moving. As Dean twisted his head toward the other Russian, he saw a shadow retreating
away from the fence.

Still on his belly, Dean began following. Before he reached the fence, two figures carrying rifles appeared on the other side,
back near the truck. Dean cut them both down, aiming high enough to hit them in the necks or heads above any armor they might
be wearing. As he fired, the man he’d been tracking began to shoot as well. Bullets whizzed in the dust; Dean managed to crawl
into a shallow gully and reload.

He lost track of the gunman for a second as he started to crawl out. Thinking the man had retreated, Dean climbed to his feet.
Almost immediately, two bullets bounced off his vest. They barely hurt, but before he could return fire he lost the man again.
Dean dived back into the ditch.

Most likely the Russian had a nightscope or something similar. Dean thought of the smoke grenades Lia had given him—they’d
work just as well against a night device as they would in daylight. He took one from his pocket, thumbing off the tape. As
he went to toss it, the gunman began firing again, this time with a much heavier weapon.

Adrenaline screamed in Dean’s veins. He curled his body and leaped from the ditch toward the fence. The Russian had moved
to a PKU machine gun a few yards from his original position. The smoke may have blinded him—his shots were wild and high—but
also made it difficult for Dean to see.

Best bet, he thought, was to flank the sucker while he was focused on the smoke. Dean crawled sideways to the fence, rose,
then shouldered the chain links until he got to the opening. As he dashed across, something grabbed him from behind and yanked
him to the ground. In the next second, there was a loud explosion from above.

“About fucking time you got here,” said Lia when the ringing in Dean’s ears stopped.

14

Rockman studied the sensor grid. “They got them all,” he told Telach finally. “Tommy took out the machine gunner with a grenade.
Got him right in the head. Big mess.”

“How’d you miss the dogs?” asked Telach.

“The spread,” he said. “They must have been in the back of the truck sleeping. We just weren’t close enough to hear. We knew
where the people were. They would have stayed in the shed and the truck if the dogs hadn’t gone crazy.”

Telach frowned.

“Got movement on the road,” he told her.

“Tell them.”

“I’m about to.”

15

Lia began trotting toward a pile of wrecked buses farther back in the lot.

“Is Karr hurt?” Dean asked, running to catch up.

“Nah.”

“Where is he?”

“He started circling around to ambush them when you didn’t show up,” she said. “He just took out the machine gun. He’s looking
to see if there’s anybody else our friends in the Art Room missed.”

“Aren’t we going to back him up?” asked Dean, grabbing her arm as they reached the closest bus.

She jerked her arm away. “He can handle it. Just watch my ass, okay?”

“She’s got a cute one,” said Karr in his earphones.

Dean reached to his shirt and undid the muffle, putting his mike back in place. “What happened to you?” he asked.

“I had to go deep. You did a good job, Charlie Dean. Noisy, though.”

“They fired first.”

“I’ve heard that before.” Karr laughed. “Stick on Lia. I’ll come over and play tail gunner. I always like the dirt road.”

Dean walked past a row of Mercedes S sedans. There was a break in the row about ten cars down on his left; he turned up and
walked past another two rows of pickup trucks, these mismatched among Fords, Chevys, and Toyotas. Beyond the second row sat
a decrepit bus. Dean walked to the right and saw that the rest of the yard was laid out with various pieces of machinery and
pipes. He nearly tripped over the bodies of two dogs, then saw a figure working at a piece of metal ten feet away, beyond
a large Y-shaped piece of metal piping. A small blue flame appeared and danced in the air.

“Lia?”

“What?” she snapped without turning around.

“Just making sure it was you.”

“No, it’s Mr. Midas.” She went back to cutting the metal.

Dean, his left hand on the clip of the gun, scanned the area to make sure they were alone. Lia kicked at the metal, removing
a rectangle about twelve inches long. She worked at the remaining piece almost as if she were a sculptor, burning the edge
into a wavy pattern.

“What are you doing?” Dean asked finally.

“Baking a cake,” she said. “I think this is it.”

“Okay, Princess, let’s move,” said Karr.

“Coming.”

“Dean?”

“I can hear you,” he said.

“Grab her and pull her out of there.”

“Fuck you,” said Lia, jumping up and grabbing the piece of metal she had cut off. She kicked the dirt around in what seemed
to Dean a fairly useless attempt to scatter the bits of burnt metal that had fallen off and then cover her tracks. Then, as
Dean moved backward toward the old bus, she started to run full speed toward one of the pickups on the right, tossing something
in the back.

“Come on, Chuckie,” she said, catching up on a dead run.

Dean started to run after her. “What’s up?”

“Two trucks,” announced Karr. “Mile away. Meet me at the perimeter fence where we came in.”

Dean followed Lia out past the buildings, through the marshy field, and back along the alley where he’d originally been posted.
Lia sprinted hard and threw herself about eight feet up the fence, hustling upward seemingly without breaking stride.

“Separation,” she hissed as she hit the top and twirled over.

“Screw separation,” said Dean, starting up after her as the headlights of the approaching truck swung across the far side
of the fence.

“Charlie, take the blankets and clips with you,” said Karr. “Don’t forget them.”

Dean had trouble with one of the clips, and the blanket on the razor wire was hooked on the inside of the fence. He tugged
and almost lost it over the side, which would have meant going back in. Finally he got it and, barely holding his grip with
his left hand, managed to drop it below. Just as he started down, gunfire erupted beyond the lot where they had left the van.
Within thirty seconds, Kalashnikovs were roaring all along the fence line. Dean couldn’t tell from where he was what was going
on, and he didn’t stop to observe, dropping the last eight feet from the fence, grabbing the blanket and tucking it beneath
into his pants as he ran. A flare shot up from the access roadway, lighting the night. As Dean squared his AKSU in the direction
of the gunfire, he heard a loud hush, the sort of sound a vacuum might make in a sewer system. It was followed by a crinkling
explosion and then a loud rumble; one of the trucks had been hit by a small antitank missile, which ignited its fuel tank
and a store of ammunition.

A second later, the compound they’d just left erupted with a series of explosions. The loudest came from the pipe area Karr
had told him earlier to ignore—the underground tank exploded, spewing fire into the air.

Dean stared at it for a second, then realized the van was starting to move. He ran to it, grabbing at the rear door as the
truck veered suddenly to the left. Somehow he managed to throw his weapon and then himself inside. One of the AKSUs fired
from the front cab and then a grenade exploded nearby. Smoke and the acrid smell of burning metal filled the back. The van
slammed to a stop and then quickly began backing up at high speed. Both Lia and Karr were shooting now—Dean fished for his
gun but lost it as the truck tipped hard to the right, wheeled around, and sped erratically over the field, bouncing wildly
over ruts and through a ditch.

And then it was over. The gunfire stopped, the ride smoothed out; they were on the highway. Dean couldn’t even see the glow
of the burning flares through the window.

“How you doing back there, baby-sitter?” snarled Lia from the front. She was in the driver’s seat. “Pee your pants yet?”

“I thought he did pretty well,” said Karr. “Sorry about the big bangs at the end, Charlie. That was mostly for effect.”

Dean looked up at the top of the truck. Several rounds had come through the walls.

“Some effect,” he said.

“The problem with dealing with the Russians is that you have to act like the Russians,” said Karr. “You have to be as totally
obnoxious about things as they would be. Otherwise they get suspicious.”

The agent explained that they had made the operation look like a rival
mafiya
gang had hit the storehouse of another, blowing up most of their vehicles with a Russian version of C-4. Hitting the trucks
on the way out was necessary, since a rival gang would not have missed such an easy opportunity.

“Plus we wanted to get rid of the part from our airplane,” added Karr.

“Was it your airplane?” Dean asked.

“Looks like it.”

“Now what do we do?”

“See, they found the wreckage and scavenged the engines,” Karr explained. “But they also brought along a little piece of the
tail with some Russian serial numbers. The Art Room will check it out, but in the meantime we’re going to go to the place
where they found it and see if anything else is left.”

“Why didn’t we go there in the first place?” Dean asked.

“Not my call,” said Karr. “But I assume they had it under surveillance, saw that these guys took something, and wanted to
find out what it was. It was the motors, right, Lia? I mean, you do know the difference between motors and wings.”

“Oh, har-har.”

“If you hadn’t taken out the guards, we might have just snuck out,” Karr told Dean. “But that kind of committed us. Better
to blow all the shit up anyway. Plus I can’t resist using the Russian bazooka. What’d you think of the pyro shit at the gas
tanks? Wasn’t that cool?”

“If I hadn’t taken them out they would have killed you,” said Dean.

“Water over the dam now.”

“Wait a second. You’re criticizing me for bailing you out? I saved your butts.”

“I’m not criticizing you, Charlie,” said Karr. He sounded almost hurt.

“We almost got killed. Your high-tech gear isn’t worth shit,” said Dean. He began surveying his body to see if any of the
various aches and pains he felt were serious wounds. “And your plan sucked.”

“Oh, please,” said Lia.

“Well, the support team didn’t cover itself with glory,” said Karr. “I’ll give you that. But we weren’t almost killed.”

“You got ambushed. If I wasn’t there, you’d be dead.”

“If you weren’t there, we would’ve done it differently.”

“I suppose the Marines have a better way,” said Lia.

“A Marine operation would have had more people.”

“And less dogs,” said Karr brightly.

“Yeah. Your high-tech gizmos were outsmarted by dogs,” said Dean. “Shit.”

“Nobody in the Art Room has pets. That’s the problem,” said Karr, stepping on the accelerator.