TWENTY-THREE
The Earth beneath his boots was mud. Plain and simple mud. Island 38 was the last island in the chain to be completed, and David Jefferson was certain it held the answers that he was looking for. The lynchpin that, when pulled, would collapse this abomination of wealth and greed.
They had watched it build. They had been there before the plans were approved. Before the deal was struck with Congress to allow its construction. The Rainbow Connection had set sail before the first dredge, and watched as hopper after hopper was dumped, sprayed, and raked into place to form the massive landmass. For years they stood by as nature was manipulated, shifted, and forced into the paradise built by Warren Baxter.
Baxter was a crooked man with a warped vision. His dominance over nature was just the most recent example of his use of power to get what he wanted.
The files were thick. The suspicions were damning and all this time there had been no proof of any misdoings. Jefferson now knew the man intimately. His background. His beliefs. But still the mystery eluded him.
“Sir,” his musings were interrupted by one of his men. Dressed in black he would have been hard to see in the night without the aid of the night vision goggles. But, the brass casings in his hand were easy to identify. He pulled the goggles off and examined them. They were 9mm shells.
“There are plenty more on the western beach.”
“Bag ‘em up.”
David turned pensively to the west wondering what would have caused them to open fire.
In the distance he saw the lights of a ship. Red and green lights on the vessel told him that it was approaching head on.
“What ship is that?”
One of his men answered. “The dredge. One more boatload of dirt. It should be here in about an hour.”
David spat on the ground. “Then we don’t have much time. Find it.”
They worked frantically searching the bare earth. There was nothing on the island save for two Caterpillar bulldozers that were used to push the world around.
Twenty minutes later their search had turned up nothing and the men loaded back into the launch.
“Get in touch with the other teams. I want to know the status on Master Key.”
The radio man went to work contacting the rest of the members. David looked long at the ship that was steaming towards them. There was only one scheduled dredge and dump after this.
They were running out of time.
# # #
Steve and Paul ran down the hall, twisting and turning through the corridors. Frustration built as they realized they were lost, but it included an odd sense of confidence that Savage would have a hard time following them. Baxter was certain to tell Savage of their presence. Savage would be certain to mention that they shot him. And the chase would be on.
Steve worked an escape plan over in his head. If Savage and Baxter were on the same page, then most, if not all, of the guards would be too. And since the Eco-nuts were also trying to shoot them for some reason, there was no one they could turn to for help. The phones were either out of service or never worked to begin with. Most of the boats in the harbor were sailing yachts or short-range craft. The ferry was not likely to pick them up this evening.
Escape seemed like a long shot. Paul led them around another corner and stopped. Steve ran into him and knocked him further around the corner. Paul turned and pushed Steve back, slapping at him as he shoved.
“What?”
Paul clasped a hand over Steve’s mouth and forced him back against the wall. Steve was startled by the action and even more so that Paul was still holding his gun in the hand he had used to push Steve against the wall. His eyes went wide and Paul followed the stare back to the gun in his hand.
Paul lowered the gun and put a finger to his lips. He edged back to the corner and listened.
Steve crept behind him and strained to hear.
He could hear shuffling–like dozens of feet dragging. He laid down on the ground and poked his head slowly around the corner.
At the intersection of two hallways, he saw a large group of people being escorted at gunpoint. The groups moved slowly by and he began to withdraw his head when he saw Katherine. She was grouped with another beautiful woman and two men. One was younger and fit; the other was graying at the temples and had a serious stomach on him. Pit stains disappeared and reappeared with every sway of his arms. He was gripping his left arm and rubbing at it.
The guards weren’t barking orders. As far as Steve could tell they weren’t saying anything. They simply ushered the crowd down the hall. Katherine’s group disappeared from view.
“It’s her.” Steve got to his feet and checked the indicator on his gun to ensure that there was a round chambered. A rocker switch was exposed on the top of the slide; it was loaded.
“Slow down.” Paul sensed his urgency. “I saw men with guns. Big men. Big guns.”
“There were three. Two with the group and a third pulling up the rear.”
Paul chuckled at the word rear, but quickly regained his composure. “We can’t go blazing in there.”
“We have to do something.”
“We don’t even know what’s going on.”
“They’ve got to be Savage’s men.”
“Why would they take hostages? They’ve got a country to run. You don’t even know if they’ve got an anthem yet.”
“It doesn’t make any sense.”
“Well they’ll need something to sing at ball games.”
“The hostages, Paul.” Steve was silent for a moment. “I guess not everyone was in on the whole L.S.A. thing.”
Paul inched the slide back on Savage’s gun slightly. The sheen of the brass on the round assured him that it was loaded. The hammer was down but experiments with the gun earlier told him that pulling the trigger would draw the hammer back.
“Still, why take the hostages?”
“Maybe to ransom for the right to secede?”
“Steve, Katherine’s hot, but no one’s that hot. Besides, the United States doesn’t negotiate with terrorists. Harrison Ford said that.”
“We’ve got to get her.”
Paul shifted his weight and checked behind them. The hallway they had traveled was still clear. “Look, why don’t we follow them for a while? Maybe there’ll be a better opportunity to jump the guards.”
Steve sighed and agreed. His temper raged at the sight of Katherine at gunpoint, but trying to attack the guards was suicide. He had only ever killed one person in his life. And apparently that person wasn’t even dead.
Steve shook his head, “It scares me that you’ve become the sensible one.”
Paul placed his hand on Steve’s shoulder. “It scares me too.”
Steve risked a quick glance around the corner. It was clear. He motioned for Paul to follow and they crept down the corridor.
# # #
The older man next to Katherine wheezed louder. She looked at him and for the first time noticed the grip he had on his left arm – he was having a heart attack. He began to breathe heavier, stroked his arm vigorously, groaned and collapsed. Katherine dropped to her knees in panic. She wanted to help the man but didn’t know where to start. She ripped open his shirt. She had seen them do that on TV. That was as far as she got.
Brittany, the wreck of a hostage, snapped into action. Years of lifeguard duty and countless refreshers in Red Cross safety clicked in. She checked the man’s pulse. There wasn’t one. His breathing became shallow and stopped. She began compressions.
She weighed nothing; but her training gave her the weight to press on the man’s chest.
The guards did not act to help save the man’s life. They did not react at all. They kept their distance, but their attention was focused on the little girl pounding away at the dying man’s chest.
Vinnie backed a step away from the group. The rest of the hostages and their captors had moved around another bend in the maze that was the convention center’s corridors. Vinnie moved into the
group that was gathered around the dying man.
Katherine didn’t know what to do. Brittany was handling the compressions and the rescue breathing. She felt helpless; she stroked the older man’s hair and whispered to him that it was going to be okay. The words were so slight that she didn’t even hear herself speak them.
Brittany applied another series of breaths. She pinched the man’s nose and locked her lips on his. She jumped as breath came back at her. Brittany pulled away and stopped the CPR.
The gray-templed man drew a breath and sputtered. The pain of breath showed on his face; cracked ribs from the compressions had already made themselves known. He groaned in agony, but agony meant life.
Katherine shed a tear of relief. Even the guards seemed to relax a little. Maybe they weren’t intent on hurting anyone.
A shot blasted through the sense of relief, and a guard slammed against the wall.
Everything slowed. In a brief moment, no more than a fraction of second, Katherine’s eyes darted to assess the situation. Vinnie was crouched next to the older man. In his hand was a short-barreled revolver. He had pulled it from his ankle, fired the shot, and then turned to his right.
Another round sounded; the report was amplified in the confined hallway. The guard that had been trailing the column grasped his shoulder as it erupted into a mess of blood and sinew. He fell to the ground and began to scream.
The remaining guard reacted. His reflexes drew the trigger and he started to fire before he could aim. Brittany and Katherine lunged back trying to avoid the stream of bullets.
Katherine cleared the stream. Brittany was grazed by a round. A streak of crimson quickly ran down the side of her calf. The heart attack victim was not so lucky. The fire from the submachine gun perforated his chest. He coughed briefly; dark red spittle sprayed from his lips as his lungs filled with blood. He was dead a moment later, and, this time, no amount of CPR would bring him back.
Vinnie continued his turn and fired three more shots. Three struck him back: one hit his hip, another his stomach. The third tore the gun from his hand.
Brittany screamed as the guard took careful aim at Vinnie. Suddenly, the guard arched his back, wrenching in pain. Two more reports sounded and he fell.
The first guard, who had been struck in the shoulder, regained his footing and his weapon just in time to also fall victim to a well-placed shot. He collapsed. Behind him, at the end of the hall, Steve Bennett and Paul Nelson crouched. Each held a gun.
Katherine smiled, the horror of the moment before was replaced with elation. “Steve.”
“Stay down!”
Two guards had responded to the shootout.
Paul saw them first, and fired a quick round to the end of the hallway to keep them behind the corner.
“Come on!” Steve yelled over the sporadic fire.
Katherine grabbed Brittany by the arm and forced her towards the two friends. Brittany pulled her arm free and scrambled to the bleeding body of Vinnie Carlito. “Vinnie,” She started to cry. It was obvious that he was dying.
He seized in pain and strained to talk. “Get to the rainbow.” With a great deal of pain, he rolled onto his seeping stomach. Supporting himself with his right arm, he reached out with his left and grabbed the weapon off of the fallen guard.
Another shot sounded and the pursuing guards ducked back behind the shelter of the plastered wall.
“Go!” Vinnie screamed in agony as he pointed the gun down the hall.
Brittany hesitated.
“Britt,” Katherine screamed and reached out for her hand.
Brittany lurched to her feet, and ran to Steve and Paul. Together the four ran from the firefight. The reports continued behind them; but only for a moment. The din of the shootout was replaced with the scramble of guards as Vincent Carlito collapsed.
TWENTY-FOUR
Steve held Katherine by the wrist and kept the gun trained behind them. They ran back through the hallways. Steve knew it was only a matter of one more twist or one more turn before they came face to face with Savage and his crimson-anger eyebrow.
Paul was thinking the same thing. He and Brittany had taken the lead.
“In here.” Paul grabbed for a stairwell door. The group darted inside and Paul closed the door quickly and quietly behind him.
The stairs led up. Only up. With weary legs driven by adrenaline, they climbed. The girls took the lead. The two friends stayed behind, both to cover their escape and to try and not look so tired.
“That’s it. I’m getting a Stairmaster. I’m going to use it. And I will never be this tired again.” Paul took the stairs two at a time but found his toes falling short of the ascent. He tripped. He managed to catch himself with his hands instead of landing on his chin, but the jar set off the gun.
The shot ricocheted around the cement stairwell. Everyone ducked. Everyone shrieked. The bullet bounced harmlessly back down toward the door.
Paul laid on the ground and looked at a divot in the floor mere inches from his face. “Yep, that should tell them where we went.”
He leapt back to his feet. His face was now flush with exertion and embarrassment.
Paul noted the stenciled “6” on the concrete wall. “This place only has seven floors. And we’re running out of them. Do you have any idea where we’re headed?”
“The roof.”
“Oh, man. I hope they’ve got a fire pole.”
They reached the roof access door. Steve kicked it open and leveled the weapon. There were no guards on the roof.
There was a helicopter.
# # #
David sat and stared at the dash of the launch. He felt as the black shipped look. The riddled boat was slowly sinking. Jefferson was mired in the outcome of the raid. The men in the Zodiacs had found nothing on the lush island where they had retrieved their fallen friend.
His team had found nothing amid the mud on 38, still, everything cried out to David that Baxter was dirty; his henchman, Savage, was equally suspect. The chief of security had military records in every despicable army in the third world. He had sold his murderous skills to the better funded army in conflicts around the world; their cause didn’t seem to matter. Savage had run guns, fired guns, and killed for every opportunist in any unstable nation. His presence here was no soft job; the gunfight had proven that. They were protecting something, and once Savage dried off, if he wasn’t dead, he would be coming for the Rainbow Connection.
Jefferson’s forces were regrouping there now. The mission, the five-year mission, would have to be scrubbed. The best they could hope for was to still get out with their cover intact and hope that ImagiNation’s shareholders still truly believed that they had been there to protect the coral. David spat over the launch’s side as his radio man approached.
“Vinnie didn’t check in sir.”
David stared back.
“He missed his last two reports.”
“Turn toward Master Key. I’m not losing another man.”
# # #
“Okay, I’m getting a Stairmaster and helicopter pilot lessons.” Paul moaned at the uselessness of the private helicopter before them. It was their salvation, if only one of them could fly it. None of them could. Steve had never even seen one up close.
They had barred the doors to the roof with potted palm trees. It had taken all four of them to move the towering plants, but they felt confident that it would buy them some time.
“The radio.” Steve pointed back to the helicopter.
Paul threw open the door and jumped into the seat. He didn’t even know whether it was the pilot’s seat or not. The number of gauges, dials, levers, and buttons amazed him, but after a brief search, he was able to find the radio.
“What’s the emergency channel? Anyone?”
Katherine told him. It had been a part of their training.
He quickly dialed it in and put the headset on. After a few moments he found the switch for the headset.
“Mayday, mayday... “
/> Steve slapped him on the shoulder. Paul looked at him, shocked. “What?”
“We’re not in a sinking boat.”
“It means ‘come help me.’ From venez m’aider. Fredrick Stanley “Big Johnson” Mockford coined the phrase in 1923.”
Steve stared back at him. “You were searching Big Johnson on the internet, weren’t you?”
“I was looking for a new nickname.”
Steve blinked.
“S.O.S?” Paul asked.
Steve shrugged. Paul turned his attention back to the radio. “Help, fucking, help! We are being shot at – a lot – and we can’t get off of this shitty island. We’re in the retarded land of ImagiNation and people are trying to kill us. We are on Master Key... “
Gunfire cut him short. The palm tree held. But several shots had pierced the door and shattered the pot that held it fast.
“Get here quick. Over.” Paul threw the headset off and hopped back to the ground.
Everyone in the group searched the roof looking for an escape.
It dawned on them both at the same time. “The statues.”
They raced to the edge of the roof. The girls followed. Katherine looked over the edge and cringed at their obvious thought. “No.”
# # #
Baxter’s oratory concluded to thunderous applause. The new citizens celebrated as if this was their naturalization ceremony – their personal swearing in.
Baxter smiled, waved, and stepped down from the dais. Savage stood waiting impatiently. Baxter frowned. He could tell Savage was furious. The scar above his eye blared a deep red. He knew that this warning light had been the result of a serious head wound in the mercenary’s past that left a scar whose skin was thinner than the surrounding area. When flushed with rage, the anger showed through.
He had asked his security chief about the accident. Savage dodged the question, leading Baxter to believe that it had little to do with his military career and more with a possible tragic tricycle accident as a child.
Tortugas Rising Page 13
