Survivalist - 12 - The Rebellion (20 page)

“I know nothing,” she gasped, tugging at the straps which restrained her wrists and ankles, binding her to the cold stainless steel of the surgical table. The four walls, the ceiling and floor—all seemed made of the same substance. She could not see her feet for the swollen abdomen and the life inside it for which she feared. “If Manfred told you something it was some sort of lie, Herr Goethler—honestly, it was. I do nothing wrong.”

The hand slapped downward and she tried to turn her face away, but when he struck her, her left cheek slammed hard against the table surface and she cried out, tears streaming along her cheeks, her vision blurring with them, the taste of salt against her lips. “Liar!”

«*T »>

1 am—

The hand slapped at her again. And as she turned her face toward the doorway, praying, the door opened. She felt as though her heart skipped a beat.

But it was the face of the leader.

“I leave at once, Herr Goethler. My suspicions concerning a fifth column are confirmed. Armed men and women have invaded the structure. They will never get below the first basement. But I must leave. I have been watching the

interrogation. It does not progress well.” “Mein Fuehrer—I am—”

“I can perhaps offer a suggestion,” and she watched his dark eyes, his nostrils twitching above the comedy brush mustache. His hand reached out to her abdomen and he smiled as she felt the pressure there. “The child is kicking—but perhaps there are twins, hmm?”

Helene Sturm did not know what to answer, what to say that might not provoke him further.

She said nothing.

“There are several possibilities to get you to talk, mein frau. Several. Your three boys—they are in the next room, bound, ready for whatever we should choose. But if we were to take the youngest son—our loyal Manfred told us of your part in this conspiracy. What is the young one’s name? Willy? But if we were to take Willy, perhaps you would only lie. No—I think there is a better way,” and his hand flashed down from her abdomen to her thighs, and she felt it—she could not see—as he bunched up her skirt and reached.

Helene Sturm screamed, “What are you doing, Mein Fuehrerl”

“The unborn within her, Herr Goethler,” his deep voice droned emotionlessly. “You shall have your surgeon prepare to probe the uterus.” And then his face bent over hers, inches from hers and she could smell his breath—sour, somehow evil. “Perhaps, if there are twins, only one of them will be malformed by what is done here. It is your choice.” And he smiled, his teeth yellow.

She closed her eyes—to make him gone.

One of the Scoremasters in each hand, John Rourke dodged past the corner and fired from eye level, emptying the twin adjustable sight full-sized Detonics pistols toward the SS security troops at the far end of the corridor beyond

the stairwell.

“We must retreat,” Wolfgang Mann shouted as Rourke tucked back, beside him. “Before they send troops down the stairwell and we are trapped.”

“Yeah?And what about this Helene Sturm? If they are working on her they’ll be working harder. No.” Rourke had already replaced the magazines, dropping the empties into his musette bag.

The Python—he drew it as he resecured both .45s in his belt.

Natalia was on her knees by the corner of the doorframe, firing her L-Frames, wing-shooting.

She pulled back, automatic weapons fire hammering into the doorframe, chunks of plaster spraying around them, the black of Natalia’s clothes splotched with chalky white.

Sarah reached to Frau Mann’s hands, saying, “Give me that pistol of yours. It’s selective fire, isn’t it?”

Wolfgang Mann answered for her. “Yes—semi or three-shot burst. But the magazine is only eighteen rounds, Frau Rourke.”

“How many spares you got?”

John Rourke felt himself smiling. “One or two of us stays here with her pistol set on burst, covering the others until they cross the opposite side of the corridor. They cover us with the second machine pistol.”

“And I’m the one,” Sarah said calmly. “I never did run worth a damn in heels and a tight skirt.”

John Rourke looked at his wife. “Better way.” More gunfire hammered into the doorframe. “OK,” Rourke rasped. “Sarah and I stay here, Sarah with the space gun here. We cover the rest of you getting across, then Sarah and I go out together. Natalia covers us. Colonel—Wolf— you and your wife go on ahead. As soon as Sarah and I’ve crossed and linked up with Natalia, we’ll be right behind you. Three-way fire and maneuver, sort of.”

“It might work,” Mann nodded, stripping away the pieces of his disguise, chunks of claylike substance shredding at his cheeks and the false gooseflesh of his neck. “The secrecy is lost, I think.”

“Just hope that the way out of this place isn’t lost.” Rourke grinned.

Mann’s wife was searching her purse, Natalia taking the double column magazines from it as Frau Mann found them—Rourke counted three. “That is all I have,” Frau Mann barely whispered, her skin pale, her eyes seeming somehow sunken. Fear. Rourke knew the look.

“Good luck—to you both.” Natalia smiled, handing the magazines to Sarah who proceeded to stuff them into the side seam pockets of her dress.

“It ruins the look of things.” Sarah smiled.

“This is the position for burst control,” Mann pointed out—it was a two-position safety, slide mounted.

“Right—put it here, all the way down into the lower notch.”

“That is correct, Frau Rourke.”

“Move it then—when Sarah says go,” Rourke advised. The Python was in both fists, muzzle raised to snap it around the corner of the shot-up doorframe. Sarah held the Waltherlike German pistol, her right hand at the pistol grip, her left at the folded-down forward support—the gun on auto mode reminded Rourke of the Beretta 93R.

“Ready,” Sarah hissed.

Natalia ran first, her high heeled shoes stuffed one into each side pocket of her dress, the L-Frames, one in each fist, spitting fire.

Rourke snapped the Python’s muzzle down and out, double actioning toward what he had pegged as the greatest concentration of the SS security force, Sarah crouched beside him, the German machine pistol spitting three-round bursts, Mann was running now, pushing his frightened barefoot wife ahead of him, his pistol firing toward

the SS position as well.

The Python empty, Rourke dropped it in the leather at his side and drew both Scoremasters from his belt, firing double taps with both pistols simultaneously as Sarah reloaded.

Two of the SS men—their uniforms charcoal-gray BDUs with lightning bolt collar tabs and swastika arm bands— dodged from cover, to get into better position to fire at Natalia as she dove behind cover on the opposite side halfway along the corridor. Rourke fired out both pistols, the bodies of the two assault-rifle-armed SS men almost dancing as they took the torso hits, then crumpled downward, their automatic weapons firing into the corridor ceiling, chunks of plaster and ceiling tiles spraying down like hailstones.

The Scoremasters were empty. Rourke rammed them into his belt, the slides still locked open, Sarah beside him again, the German machine pistol firing three-round blasts.

Two bursts cut into three of the SS security force, two of the men going down dead as they ran for cover, a third’s left leg going out from under him as he sprawled forward.

The twin stainless Detonics Combat Masters were in Rourke’s fists now, firing.

Natalia’s revolvers—fresh loaded—tongues of flame licked from them at the midpoint of the corridor as more of the SS security force broke cover.

Sarah was ramming a fresh magazine into the German service pistol. “One more after this, John,” she shouted over the roar of the gunfire.

The twin stainless Detonics .45s were empty in his hands.

Rourke dumped the magazines, pocketed the empties, ramming fresh spares up the magazine wells from the Milt Sparks Six Pack at his belt.

“Run for it—now—I’m with ya,” and he shoved Sarah

forward into the corridor, his pistols blazing as he ran beside her, blocking her body with his as best he could.

He could hear the phut-phut sounds of Natalia’s silenced Walther now, firing.

The sharp cracks of Wolfgang Mann’s Walther P-38, in his left hand, the service pistol in his right hand.

The roar of assault rifle fire.

The three-round bursts at high cyclic rate of Sarah’s borrowed machine pistol.

Screams, groans, curses—SS security personnel were going down.

Rourke shoved his wife ahead, the pistol in his right hand empty now, Natalia stepping from cover to draw fire toward her, the revolvers reloaded, at hip level, spitting death.

Rourke fired out the Detonics pistol in his left fist, one of the SS men hurtling himself toward him. Rourke backhanded the little stainless .45 across the man’s face, teeth and blood spraying outward, the SS man’s face seeming to compress as the body sagged downward.

Rourke threw himself forward, hitting the floor, skidding along on knees and elbows into cover, both pistols empty in his hands as he rolled onto his back, Natalia screaming, “John!”

He was up, to his feet, Sarah emptying the German machine pistol as the remaining SS security personnel—ten of them by rough count—closed.

The Bali-Song flashed into Natalia’s right hand. A spray of blood appeared as an artery in the neck of the nearest SS security man ripped.

Rourke threw himself toward her, the big Gerber in his right fist now, hacking outward, an assault rifle’s butt coming toward his head. The Gerber’s blade bit first upward, thrusting into the crotch of the rifleman.

Rourke let go of the knife, snatching the assault rifle from the SS man as the body lurched backward, Rourke’s

right foot hammering up and out into the right arm to break the arm at the elbow and free the sling.

He swung the German assault rifle downward, no time to fire, the butt snapping forward and up in a long arc, the butt stroke contacting jawbone. Rourke drew the rifle back in a straight line, a vertical butt stroke to the face of another SS man.

Natalia’s knife—Rourke caught a flash of gleaming steel in the ceiling fixture’s light, then felt a spray of blood on the right side of his face as another of the SS men went down.

Rourke had the rifle on line now, his right first finger touching the trigger, the assault rifle burping a three-round burst, then another and another.

The German pistol in Sarah’s hands—Rourke could hear it firing. She was blowing the third spare magazine— but there was no choice and some of the fallen SS security personnel wore side arms.

Rourke fired out the assault rifle.

Empty.

Three of the SS personnel were still standing, one of them firing as Sarah interposed herself between the SS man and John Rourke—the assault rifle spoke, and so did the machine pistol in her hands. Sarah’s body slammed hard against him.

The SS man was down.

The sharp cracks of Mann’s Walther P-38. A scream as Natalia’s knife slashed flesh, Rourke catching his wife in his arms, sheltering her with his own body as Natalia’s body seemed to leap over them, a flash of thigh, a blur in black—a shout of agony.

Rourke glanced toward her. She stood over one of the SS men, her knife imbedded in his chest, her left bare foot crushing his Adam’s apple, the assault rifle still clutched in his twitching hands.

Rourke looked to his wife—blood.

Her left forearm. He pulled up her sleeve. “I’ve never been—ooh, Jesus, he hurt me,” she whispered.

“Flesh wound,” Rourke whispered, feeling the arm for any broken bone, with his left hand reaching to the musette bag for a field dressing.

Natalia hissed, “I’ll do it, John,” dropping to her knees beside him.

“I’m fine. Hurts like the—but I’m OK.” Sarah nodded, trying to get to her feet.

“Rest a moment,” Natalia advised. “Let me get this dressing secure.”

Rourke stood, Natalia attending his wife’s arm, Frau Mann cradling Sarah’s head in her lap. Mann was going over the bodies of the dead, scrounging weapons and magazines.

Rourke, ramming fresh magazines up the butts of his pistols, working the slides forward, almost whispered, “Clean wound—bullet just made a heavy crease.”

Rourke took two steps forward, dropping to one knee, his left hand bracing against the body of one of the SS men, his right hand twisting free his Gerber.

He stood, then returned to his wife and Natalia, Natalia taking one of the aerosol sprays Doctor Munchen had sent with them. Munchen had explained it not only promoted significantly more rapid healing, but served as a disinfectant as well.

“Almost ready.” Natalia smiled, looking up, her Bali-Song on the floor beside where she knelt, the Wee-Hawk pattern blade still glinting red with wet blood.

Rourke dropped to his knees beside Natalia, reaching out with his left hand, the right one still holding the knife. He touched his left hand to his wife’s forehead. “You know, you’ve gotten pretty damned good in a fight.”

“You’re not bad yourself.” Sarah smiled.

Rourke bent over his wife and kissed her lightly on the

lips. “You gonna be all right? We’ve gotta get moving— hmm?”

“Fine. It just took me by surprise.”

“Bullets always do,” Rourke whispered.

“I’ll stay with her,” Natalia whispered.

Rourke looked at Natalia—there were things he wanted to say to Natalia, to Sarah.

Mann’s voice interrupted his thoughts. “I have five more of the machine pistols as you call them, two assault rifles for each of us, more additional magazines than we can carry.”

“I can carry quite a lot.” Rourke smiled, getting to his feet.

Rourke bent over one of the fallen SS men, wiping the blade of the Gerber clean of blood against the uniform front, then sheathing it. He took two of the assault rifles, checked their condition of readiness and slung them crossbody—he preferred his own weapons. He looked to his wife. Natalia was just finishing securing the dressing. “Sarah—you still handle one of these?”

Natalia drew back for a moment, Sarah flexing her left arm. “Yes, don’t ask me to do it tomorrow though.” And Natalia continued securing the dressing. Mann, murmuring something Rourke didn’t catch, crouched beside Sarah and began dropping spare magazines for the German pistol into her purse.