Bear could tell from their expressions they didn’t believe him.
But nobody spoke until Junker Jane interrupted the silence. “I’m going with you.” As if in divine emphasis, a huge explosion rocked the last truck and sent a cloud of black smoke boiling skyward. Everyone ducked out of reflex.
“No, you’re not,” Bear answered. “I need you covering me from the trees.”
“The trees aren’t in range and you know it.”
“Do what I tell you.” His left cheek and jaw burned like they were on fire.
“I do what I want.”
“That goes double for me, buddy,” Artu said. “I’m coming, too.” The rest of them of them agreed.
“No!” He tried not to show the pain from shouting but it was too great. He bent over again and tried not to cough. “I’m doing this alone.” Jane offered her canteen again. “No, thanks,” he said. “None of you are going with me.”
Artu squatted and looked him in the face. “Bad news, Bear. We’re all going with you.”
#
Chapter 34
If I’m to die in my enemy’s sights,
Let vengeance fuel my days
And justice light my nights.
Sergio Velazquez, Living and Dying in a Brutal World
1008 hours, April 16
Bear drove with Jane beside him in the passenger’s seat. The 12.7mm machine gun in the open-topped turret had been destroyed, so Artu stood in the turret and held Bear’s M-16 instead. His own bolt-action hunting rifle he’d given to Bear. The other six crowded into a space made for four.
Fifteen miles separated them from their target. The APC was a Chinese Wolf with four tires, and the left two had partly melted in the extreme heat. Because of that, the vehicle leaned left and Bear had to fight to keep it on the road. Fire-blackened paint bubbled along the left side, roof, and hood. Even driving at reduced speed to avoid the potholes and gaping cracks, it should only have taken them half an hour to get there. Instead, they were only halfway to Beckwourth when Bear spotted a vehicle headed toward them.
“Shit! They must’ve spotted the smoke and come to investigate. Shit, shit, shit…”
“What do you want to do?”
“Nothing. Tell Artu to get down out of sight and let them pass. But get ready in case he needs to take them out.”
Jane leaned into the backseat and tugged Artu’s pant leg. He came down from the turret and she explained what to do. Someone handed him a loaded Carl Gustav.
As much as possible, Bear kept his APC in the right lane, only veering left to avoid dangerous holes. The oncoming Chinese APC strongly resembled an American Humvee painted faded green. A soldier manned a large machine gun sticking out from the roof, much like the Wolf he drove, except it didn’t have any protective shields.
“What are we gonna do?” Jane asked.
“Get down before they see you. There weren’t any blondes in the convoy we hit. I’m hoping they keep going to investigate the smoke.”
“And if they don’t?”
“Then I hope Artu knows how to use that thing.”
The enemy gunner had his gun pointed up and away from Bear’s crew, obviously thinking they were friendly. The oncoming vehicle slowed as they grew closer, as if expecting Bear to fill them in on why his Wolf was bent and blackened, as well as the fate of the rest of the convoy. He didn’t. Instead, Bear held his head down as he passed the now-stopped Chinese APC. Out of his peripheral vision, he saw the other driver leaning out the window and waving for him to stop.
Artu squatted and leaned into the front seat, holding onto a steel strut that supported his platform. “They’re turnin’ around, Bear. You want me to take ’em out?”
“Let ’em get as close as you can first.” He paused a moment, letting the pain in his throat and lungs subside. “And for fuck’s sake, don’t miss!”
#
The turret ring had gaps under the shielding that allowed Artu to see the other APC gaining ground behind them. It couldn’t speed up too much because of the road’s poor condition, but it was enough to close the gap with their crippled Wolf. The gunner had swiveled the twin machine guns level with the ground but not pointed directly at them.
He could see the faces behind the windshield, both young, both Asian. Grim expressions fit the contours of their faces. Getting the Carl Gustav up through the turret ring proved difficult. Several times the tip of the weapon poked into view of their pursuers, but fortunately for Bear and his team, they didn’t open fire.
Ten yards back of their wobbling Wolf, the gunner in their pursuer spread his arms in a what’s going on gesture. He cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted, but Artu didn’t hear him. Instead he hauled the Carl Gustav into view and aimed it at the driver.
Too late the gunner realized his danger and reached for the heavy machine guns. Too late the driver saw the rocket launcher aimed at him and tried to swerve. Too late the passenger opened his door to jump out of the speeding APC. Artu took an extra second to make sure of his aim, but still had one second left before the gunner could open fire or the APC could turn. One second was enough for Artu to squeeze the trigger.
The slipstream over the Wolf pushed the blast of the Carl Gustav back at Artu and he fell into the turret tube, but by then the rocket had struck the APC square in the middle of the windshield and blown it thirty feet in the air. Forward momentum flipped it several times before it landed top down on the pavement, with flames boiling skyward and ammunition blasting off in all directions.
#
As they continued driving, Bear struggled to get enough air into his damaged lungs and his breathing became more like wheezing gulps. He sensed her studying his face. “Stop looking at me that way. You’re churnin’ my butter.”
“You’re hurt worse than you’re telling us. Drive this heap into the desert as far as it’ll go and then let’s get back into the hills, where we can treat you.”
He shook his head. “That’s not going to happen, Jane. If we don’t stop them now…” He swallowed and took three shallow breaths. “…they’ll get those tanks and nobody will be safe. We’ll never have a better chance.”
“We’ve only got two rounds left for the Carl Gustavs! That’s not gonna kill all that Chinese armor.”
“Trust me,” he said with a smile. He could see in her eyes how badly his skin must be blistered. Strangely, it felt warm but no longer hurt. “I’ve got a plan.”
#
Finally Bear pulled over. The Chinese encampment lay astride the highway less than two miles ahead. He left the Wolf running while he and his team got out, and he filled them in on his plan. There were a few protests that it wouldn’t work, but in the end, everyone agreed. Jane could tell from their eyes that nobody expected to live.
“Let’s not keep the devil waiting,” Bear said as they again drove off.
#
Jane held on as Bear pushed the Wolf beyond its safe speed. Leaning at nearly a thirty-degree angle now, it vibrated so hard she could feel her cheeks shaking. Bear fought to hold it steady as they hit hole after hole.
Ahead the Chinese lay spread out across the highway, with the three tanker trucks protected by a Type 96 tank on either flank and two APCs both front and rear. Dozens of other vehicles were scattered about while hundreds of troops either stood guard on the perimeter or huddled near the small tent city in the desert south of the highway.
Jane saw Bear grit his teeth as the Wolf thump-thump-thumped its way past 40 miles per hour. She sensed that the ruined flesh of his left cheek and jaw had begun to hurt with a pain so intense it made his eyes water, yet he didn’t complain. Instead, at three hundred yards from the Chinese camp, he yelled to Jane over the sound of the vehicle’s death rattles. “Do me a favor.”
“Anything!”
Without looking her way, he said the last thing he ever said to her. “Remember me for a while.”
#
Like a dying horse that collapses after bringing its rider safely h
ome, when Bear stomped on the brakes and halted the battered APC, the engine died as it rolled to a stop. Curious Chinese sentries stared at the wrecked Wolf while others sprinted towards it, presumably to help any wounded. Bullets cut them down as they ran.
Jane bailed out on the left side followed by two others, both girls. Their job was to draw fire away from Bear and Artu. Once clear of the Wolf they knelt, raised their rifles, and fired at the Chinese running toward them. Then they jumped up and dove into a shallow ravine that paralleled the highway.
For a brief moment the stunned Chinese didn’t return fire but that didn’t last long. Bullets hissed overhead and kicked up dirt around the edges of the ditch. One of the girls rose to shoot and immediately fell backward with a red hole in her forehead. More slugs ripped into her body, shaking it like a dog with a rope.
“I’m scared!” the surviving girl said, staring wide-eyed at her mutilated friend.
Jane tried to remember her name… Susan? No, Suzanne. “Look at me, Suzanne!” she said. “Look at me! I’m scared, too. But we’ve got to keep their attention off of Bear.” Machine gun bullets ripped along the top of the ditch. “Here’s what we do. Keep low and let’s crawl down a ways. Then we shoot, duck, and move again. Okay?”
Suzanne nodded.
They rose to their knees and Jane caught one soldier running in the open. She dropped him with two three-round bursts. Crawling on their stomachs, they moved ten feet and did it again. But the third time they tried it, a bullet struck Suzanne in the throat. She dropped into the ditch. Blood poured from her ruptured neck and out her mouth. Jane crawled to her side but it was obvious the wound was fatal. Suzanne tried to speak but only gurgled up more blood. Tears poured out of her eyes and she grabbed Jane’s arm, but then went into a spasm of violent shaking. That lasted ten seconds, and then she stopped forever.
With a roar, Jane came to her knees, spraying bullets until she ran out of ammo. One stocky man thirty feet away flew backward after his chest exploded from a storm of 5.56mm rounds. She threw herself back under cover as AK-47s chewed up the sand around her. Lying in the ditch and staring up at the blue sky, Jane loaded her last magazine and felt hot tears rolling down her cheeks. Bullets zipped by overhead and bits of dirt fell on her. Then the shooting stopped.
It had all taken less than a minute. Only in the silence, when she and her enemies were busy reloading, did Jane hear the explosions across the highway, or the other gunfire. Then a shadow fell across her, and the face of an angry man with a gun pointed at her blotted out the sky.
#
Half a second after Jane jumped out of the Wolf to the left, Artu did the same on the right, holding one of the last two Gustavs. Two men with rifles followed him to give covering fire. At the edge of the highway, he knelt, brought the missile launcher to his shoulder, and lined up the sights on the rear of the tank 200 yards away. The flankers knelt to either side and began firing.
Artu squeezed the trigger and heard the characteristic crack-whoosh of the round firing. Minimal recoil pushed his shoulder backward. One of the men behind him screamed and rolled on the asphalt. He’d been too near the back-blast and caught it on his neck and face, scorching both. Screaming, he rose and staggered away, hands to his face, until Chinese bullets cut him in half.
The high-explosive rocket struck the tank in the rear. The initial blast rocked the tank and smoke shot out from gaps in the hull. Then larger explosions rocked it as ammunition blew up. Three seconds after the rocket struck, a gigantic blast erupted and lifted the turret partway in the air. External fuel drums stood nearby and the last explosion set those off in a huge mushroom of flame and smoke. It was so violent that steel splinters cut down anyone within a hundred-yard range, buying Artu precious seconds to arm himself.
He picked up the dead man’s rifle and emptied the magazine at two Chinese soldiers running for cover behind an armored car. Both fell and rolled in the dirt. Artu removed the magazine and looked around for another one, but when he glanced at the armored car, he saw its twin guns pointed straight at him. His mind told his body to leap for the ground and flatten out, and his body began to respond. Halfway through the move, 12.7mm slugs ripped into him and he flopped backward like a fish in a skiff. He died instantly, as did his flanking rifleman, but the armored car kept firing as their corpses disintegrated in sprays of bone and blood.
#
Chapter 35
Enemies surround me, lusting for the blood
That pours from all my wounds and turns the dust to mud.
Sergio Velazquez, unpublished fragment
Clio, CA
1115 hours, April 16
With his last two gunmen on either side, Bear ran for the tanker trucks a hundred yards ahead. In his left hand he carried the last high explosive multi-purpose round and the recoilless rifle itself was slung over his shoulder. Between him and his target were two APCs, at about the halfway point.
They’d raced twenty yards when firing broke out. His flankers stopped and shot back and dust kicked up around him, but he wasn’t hit.
Breathing came in hard gulps. His lungs felt raw and pain shot through his neck into his jaws. Then he was between the armored cars, which served as temporary cover. Their turrets rotated to try finding him, but couldn’t shoot without hitting each other. Bear unslung the Gustav, opened the chamber by pushing the end of the tube up, loaded the rocket and closed it, ready to fire. He took aim at the middle tanker and stroked the trigger.
“If you shoot, she dies!” somebody yelled. “Did you hear me? Put it down or I fuck her up!”
Bear didn’t move. The Chinese APCs blocked his line of sight to either side, and he could only wonder which she they meant. Standing up meant giving them a target, until he heard scraping behind him and knew there were guns pointed at his back. So he stood, slowly, fighting down the pain in his chest and face. As he did so, he kept the Carl Gustav pointed at the middle tanker trucker, only fifty yards away. He wasn’t worried about dying, that was inevitable now, and both he and the Chinese knew it. The only question was whether he destroyed the tankers.
“If you shoot me, I’ll still be able to pull the trigger before I die!”
“Nobody’s going to shoot you,” the voice replied. “We just want to resolve this without further unnecessary bloodshed.”
“There’s no resolving this!”
“My name is Captain Chen, commanding the Third Attack Battalion North. It’s my men you’ve been killing today.”
Water pooled in Bear’s wounded left eye and trickled through the blisters on his cheek and jaw, dripping from his chin. He blinked to clear the vision in that eye, but without success. Finally he closed it and focused on staring down the sights with his right eye. “It’s too bad we didn’t kill them all! What do you think you can offer me to keep me from pulling this trigger?”
“This woman’s life in exchange for you surrendering without firing.”
“She knew the risk!” Bear said, but in truth Chen’s offer had struck a nerve when he’d used the word woman. Those he’d brought with him from the Enclave were all younger, in their late teens and twenties. The only one of the team who might be called a woman, with the inflection Chen had put into his voice, was Junker Jane. But he’d told her about a deep ravine right off the road where she might be able to escape to the hill called Sugar Loaf. He prayed the Chinese hadn’t captured her alive. “What woman are you talking about?”
“This one!” He heard the Chinese officer commanding someone several times to speak.
Finally he heard the voice he dreaded hearing. “Stop that, you son of a bitch!”
“Jane, is that you?”
“Yeah, it’s me, but fuck this asshole, Bear! Blow up… ow!”
“If you hurt her, your precious fuel trucks go up in flames!”
“Bear?” Chen said, with a quizzical tone. “Not the famous Bam Bam Bear we’ve been hunting for years? Now I understand how so few of you have caused so much trouble. And you called this w
oman Jane, which means she must be the scraper we’ve heard so much about, the one called Junker Jane.”
“If you know who I am, then you know I’m serious about what I say,” Bear said. The strain on his one good eye made it start watering. “Let her go and I’ll put this launcher down without firing it.”
“No!” Jane screamed. “You can’t do that!”
“Listen to me! I know what I’m doing, Jane. Here’s the deal, Chen… you give her back her weapon, loaded. She hightails it into those mountains to the north. Once she fires the signal to show she’s safe, I’ll hand over this launcher without firing it.”
“What’s the signal?” Chen replied.
“She knows it,” Bear said, praying Jane would play along as if there really were such a signal.
She did. “Don’t do this, Bear!”
“Do we have a deal, Chen? My finger’s cramping on this trigger.”
“How do I know you’ll keep your promise?”
“I’m not the lyin’ type, Captain. Ask any of my friends, except they’re probably all dead now. But if you let Jane go free, you can do whatever you want to me. I swear by my child’s life.” The life you stole.
Chen fell silent, but Bear knew he really had no choice except to agree. Losing the fuel was the only thing that could delay them from taking the army depot, and they both knew it. Chen had to save it, and he had to take any chance to accomplish that goal.
“If you’re lying, we will find your child and we will kill it. I make you that promise.”
“If I’m lying, I give you my permission to do just that.”
“Very well, you have a bargain. But time is precious, so I give the woman fifteen minutes before I send my men in pursuit. Do you hear me? Fifteen minutes and not one second more.”
“Done!”
“Bear, no—”
Standing at the Edge Page 17
