She reached her own machine, the Harley-Davidson Low Rider Rourke had used in
the trek across the West Texas desert, the machine he'd taken from the brigands
after they had murdered the survivors of the airliner crash. Paul had told her
about it.
"How long ago?" she murmured, thinking of the times they had spent—times of
danger, death—but in a strange way, happier times than she had ever known.
15
She snapped closed the flaps of the Safariland Holsters for the stainless Smith
& Wessons on her hips, then straddled the machine.
She brought the engine to life . . .
John Thomas Rourke studied the panorama before him, focusing the armored
Bushnell 8x30s on the group of six men moving through the field which covered
the valley floor. Camouflage fatigues, crusher hats, M-16s—either Marines or
Army—but forces of U.S. II. Likely an intelligence patrol, he surmised.
He swept the binoculars back, along the defile—poorly concealed men and a few
women perhaps—though the long hair and distance made it difficult for him to
tell. He counted twenty-five brigands at least, and two more further up by the
tree line.
Evading a medium-sized brigand band working the territory would be time
consuming, time he could utilize in making headway to the Retreat to resupply
and link with Paul, time he could use searching for his wife and son and
daughter.
He glanced back through the tubes at the six military personnel. They moved too
openly, as if inviting attack. That thought had crossed Rourke's mind when first
spotting them, but there were no indications there was any large military force
operating in the area, using these six as bait. Rourke had to assume ignorance
the sole motivation of the six men—or possibly just the ignorance of their
commander.
He put down the glasses.
He had replaced the spent cartridges in the twin stainless Detonics pistols,
still had ample ammunition for the CAR-15—several loaded magazines full. The
Metalified Python, of course.
He pushed himself to his feet—he would leave the jet
16
black Harley he rode hidden as it already was, then cross behind the ambushers.
He looked back once, judging the distance between the six troopers and the
waiting brigands.
Two hundred yards—he would have to hurry.
He swung the CAR-15 forward, his right fist locking on the pistol grip, his left
hand earing back the bolt, letting it fly forward and chamber the first round
from the magazine. His right thumb found the safety, working it on—he was
already running.
17
Chapter 2
Rourke edged along the rise through the tree line. The two brigands who sat
above the rest in the shelter of a pile of rocks were within fifty yards of him
now. There were two alternatives—attempting to take out the brigands one at a
time through stealth, or sniper fire. The first possibility—because of the sheer
weight of numbers and the immediacy of the brigands' opening fire on the six
military personnel moving through the valley—was something he decided to rule
out.
Rourke shrugged, flattening himself in a solid prone position along the tree
line with an outcropping of rocks affording cover against returning fire. He
telescoped the CAR-15's stock, settling the metal buttplate against his right
shoulder in the pocket, the Colt scope's reticle settling, too—on the spinal
column of the nearest brigand. One of the two men in the higher rocks had to be
the leader.
His thumb worked the safety to off, the first finger of his right hand touching
the trigger.
"Good-bye," Rourke muttered, then began the squeeze, the rifle recoiling against
He rode it out, the .223's recoil mild enough, the scope showing his work—the
brigand holding the binoculars to his eyes slammed forward, up and over the
rocks behind which he had hidden himself, the body rolling downward.
18
The man who had been beside the first man turned around, his mouth opened as if
to scream. Rourke shot him in the neck, the body toppling back across the rocks
and staying there, the arms flapping up once, then still.
Rourke tucked down, gunfire slamming into the rocks near his position, bullets
biting into the tree trunks, bits of bark spraying him as did chips of rock. He
pulled back. And there was gunfire now from the six men on the valley floor.
Rourke pushed himself up, the rifle swinging onto targets of opportunity among
the brigand band. Two round semi-automatic bursts—one man down. Another
target—male or female. Rourke wasn't sure.
There was more answering fire, automatic weapons chewing whole pine boughs from
the trees surrounding him, pine needles showering him. Rourke pulled back.
Moving along on knees and elbows, he drew away from the rise, then pushed
himself up into a Low, running crouch, starting through the tree line. He
stopped, rising to his full height beside a greater in diameter than normal
pine, shouldering the CAR-15, firing another two round burst. A brigand with
what looked like an M-16 was running up the hill toward him, the brigand's body
lurching backward, doubling up like a jacknife, then seeming to hesitate in
mid-air for an instant, then going down.
Rourke ran on, diving to cover in more of the low rocks as heavy automatic
weapons fire tore into the trees.
He pushed up, snapping off a fast two-round burst with the CAR-15, missing, then
another two-round burst—a man with a shotgun, one of three men racing up the
hill. This time Rourke didn't miss.
He shot a quick glance into the valley—there was fire still coming from the six
military personnel in the valley, but seemingly having little effect.
Rourke pushed himself to his feet, backing off into the
19
trees, spraying a succession of two-round bursts from the hip toward the
advancing brigand fire team, nailing one more of them and dropping him, the
third man going to cover, but spraying automatic weapon fire into the trees. The
tree trunk nearest Rourke erupted with the impact, huge chunks of bark and
slivers of green wood pelting at Rourke's face.
Rourke buttoned out the nearly spent thirty-round magazine, ramming a fresh
magazine from his musette bag into the well, then firing two more two-round
bursts.
He started running laterally again, along the tree line, to give the brigands a
moving target, to give the six men in the valley time to close up toward the
base of the hill. Fire and maneuver—he hoped as he ran that they were thinking
the same thing.
20
Chapter 3
Paul Rubenstein slowed his bike, Natalia slowing hers beside him.
"Must be John," he murmured, working open the bolt of the Schmeisser and giving
the Browning High Power a good luck tug in the ballistic nylon tanker style
shoulder holster across his chest.
Natalia said nothing—Paul watched as she eared back the bolt of her M-16, the
rifle slung cross body, diagonally under her right arm, as
Rourke carried his.
"Let's go—"
"We can split when we reach the battle site—you take the right flank, I'll take
the left," she answered.
"You got it," and Rubenstein revved his machine, punching out, steering the fork
wildly as he dodged tree trunks, feeling the bouncing as he jumped hummocks, his
cowboy-booted feet balancing him as he reached a shallow defile, the bike
jumping over a ridge of earth and coming down, dust flying up around him.
The gunfire was louder now, heavy automatic weapons fire like he'd heard so many
times before in the weeks since he'd known John Rourke, in the weeks since the
Night of The War. The ground evened out, Rubenstein wrestling the Harley hard
right, almost losing it, his left foot dragging the ground as he twisted with
his hands, his forearms aching as he pulled the machine upright. He bent low
now, building RPMs as he sped the machine along the
21
crest of the rise. There was a forested area a hundred yards ahead, the gunfire
coming from just beyond it, heavier even than it had been.
"I'll head through the trees—you go around 'em, Natalia!" Paul shouted.
"Yes, Paul!" he heard her call back, not looking. The idea amused him for an
instant—Natalia, the KGB major, the tough fighter, the martial arts expert, the
female counterpart of Rourke in almost every skill—"yes, Paul." He laughed at
himself.
He was closing the distance into the trees now, jumping the bike over a small
hillock of dirt and gravel-sized rock, dodging the fork hard left to miss a tree
trunk. It was a deer path he was on—Rourke had described them, shown them to
him. He bent lower over the machine, thorns and pine boughs swatting at his face
and exposed hands, slapping against his olive drab field jacket. He saw movement
in the trees to his far left—it wasn't Natalia on her bike. It was a man,
running, firing an assault rifle.
Rubenstein slowed the bike, the rear tire spraying dirt and pine needles, the
bike sliding as Rubenstein balanced it out, letting it drop then, running from
the bike and into the trees.
The man in the woods was turning around, throwing the assault rifle to his
shoulder to fire.
Rubenstein swung the Schmeisser forward on its sling. He wouldn't beat the first
burst. He knew that.
Then suddenly, Rubenstein stopped the upward movement of the German MP-40
subgun's muzzle.
It was John Rourke—the tall, dark-haired, lean-faced man with the assault rifle.
Paul Rubenstein couldn't help himself—he let out a yell.
22
Chapter 4
The counterfeit rebel yell—with a New York accent. Rourke felt his face seaming
with a smile.
"Paul—over here—keep down!"
Rourke wheeled, ducking down himself, a fusillade of automatic weapons fire
pouring toward him, hammering into the trees surrounding him. He pumped the
CAR-15's trigger, edging back into the trees. He saw a flicker of movement at
the base of the hill, along the near edge of the valley. Dark hair blew back
straight from the neck, dark clothes—an M-16 firing.
"Natalia!" Rourke shouted the name, astounding himself that he had. Gunfire was
pouring toward her on the bike now, the bike wheeling hard right toward the base
of the hill, then skidding in the dirt, the woman almost leaping from the
machine to the cover of rocks. He couldn't see her for an instant, then saw the
flash from her rifle, heard the long burst aimed toward the hillside.
Rourke felt himself smiling—a Russian major leaping to the defense of six U.S.
military personnel. "Paul—we're heading down—into the valley."
"Gotchya, John!"
Rourke glanced behind him once, the younger man nearly up alongside him as
Rourke rammed a fresh thirty-round magazine up the CAR-15's well. Then he
started to run, shouting to Rubenstein, "Paul—give that counterfeit rebel yell
of yours!"
23
He heard it, laughing as he ran, heard the younger man almost scream, "Yahoo!"
The brigands dotting the hillside were starting to shift from their positions
now, getting up, running, trapped in a three-way crossfire as Rourke opened up,
hearing the rattle of Rubenstein's subgun behind him and to his right, Natalia's
M-16 pouring into them, and at last the six men in the valley maneuvering
forward, their M-16s blazing.
The nearest of the brigands was perhaps thirty yards away now, Rourke firing out
the CAR-15 into the smaller subgroup, the semi-automatic assault rifle coming up
empty. He snatched the twin stainless Detonics pistols from the shoulder rig
under his jacket, letting the CAR-15 drop to his side on its sling, his thumbs
working back the pistols' hammers. He fired both .45s simultaneously, the
185-grain JHPs thudding into the face of the nearest brigand, the body hurtling
back, the head seeming to explode, blood—almost like a cloud—momentarily filling
the air around it.
The military personnel from the valley were closing now, the brigands who
remained alive trapped—and because of that, Rourke realized, more dangerous than
before.
Two brigands came at him in a rush, the nearer of the two making to fire an
M-16, the one behind him already discharging a revolver. Rourke threw himself
down, firing at an upward angle toward the man with the assault rifle, the body
doubling over, toppling forward, the 5.56 mms spraying a steady stream into the
ground at the already dead, still falling man's feet. Rourke rolled, trying to
acquire the target with the revolver. He heard a burst of automatic weapons
fire, the man's body spinning, the revolver roaring fire and the body falling,
the gun sagging from the limp hand and into the dirt.
Rourke glanced to his right—Paul Rubenstein with the Schmeisser,
24
Rourke shouted, "Paul—thanks!"
But Rubenstein didn't hear him, Rourke realized, the younger man's subgun
already firing again.
Rourke was up now, reaching down for the M-16 locked in the dead man's fist.
Rourke tugged at the rifle, the fingers locked on it. Rourke stepped on the
hand, crushing the bones, then ripped the rifle from the fingers. Loaded
magazines for the assault rifle were stuffed behind the man's belt, Rourke
reaching down, grabbing up the three that he saw, buttoning out the empty and
ramming a loaded twenty up the well. He preferred thirty-rounders himself, the
twenty-round magazines not enough firepower and the forties he had always
suspected of putting too much weight into the magazine well.
The M-16's selector was still on auto and Rourke shifted the muzzle toward the
brigands, now locked in gunfire with Rubenstein, Natalia and the advancing
military. Rourke shouldered the rifle, firing three-round bursts across the
sights, shifting the muzzle from target to target, gunfire starting toward him
again as bodies fell and the few still surviving brigands turned their fire
against him.
The M-16 emptied on a short burst—only two rounds—and Rourke dumped the
magazine, ramming the second twenty up the well, then with the rifle at his hip,
started to advance, cutting short b
ursts of two or three rounds into the still
remaining brigands. Natalia's gleaming custom revolvers belched bright bursts of
fire, men falling before her, Paul with the Schmeisser in his right hand and the
battered blue Browning High Power in his left.
Rourke stopped shooting, the last of the brigand bodies twitching on the ground
less than five yards from his feet. Natalia stood, her arms sagged along her
thighs, the matched Smiths limp in her hands.
Rourke noticed Paul Rubenstein, the slide locked back,
25
on the emptied Browning, his right hand emptied of the subgun, the Schmeisser
dangling at his side. His right hand held his glasses, and his eyes were closed.
Rourke let out a long, hard breath—a sigh. There was a cigar in his pocket and
he took it out, setting down the M-16. He lit the thin, dark tobacco in the
blue-yellow flame of the Zippo which bore his initials. For some reason, he
momentarily studied the initials—J.T.R. The thought—ridiculous—occurred to him.
What if he had been someone else, besides John Thomas Rourke? He smiled as he
inhaled the smoke deep into his lungs—had he been a man unskilled at fighting he
would have been dead, perhaps even since the Night of The War.