Survivalist - 23 - Call To Battle (3 page)

It would have been a nice thought, in most ways, except for Paul and Natalia, and the wonderful friends his now adult children, Annie and Michael, had become for him. And so many other fine people he had met, such as Jason Darkwood, Sebastian, General Varakov, and some of the other Russians, too.

And, oddly, he thought of Emma Shaw.

She was a marvelous girl.

John Rourke readied himself near the cave entrance, ready to soar like an eagle over the beach or fall flat on his race and die like a turkey with clipped wings.

But life itself, as he’d learned the hard way, was nothing short of a gamble.

John Rourke jumped into the void beyond the ledge. As he glided outward, he pushed his body upward with his hands and arms, securing his feet into the break-away stirrups. In the next instant, he pulled the throttle two thirds back, the bank of miniaturized ramjets which were set in the wedge-shaped wing above him firing. Rourke started to climb after one sickening instant of dropping like a stone. In that instant, he could not help being reminded of the Greek legend of Daedalus and Icarus, and wondering if fate had cast him in the juvenile lead?

But the powered hang glider rose and there was not an ounce of wax in the contraption, to melt as he soared upward and toward the sun. And the sun was obscured by the gathering storm clouds.

He banked slowly, instead, testing, coming to port and out over the beach. The ramjets were silenced and, except for the natural whooshing sound made by his wings as they cut the air, there was no other noise except for a continuous, low-intensity hiss.

His headset rang in his ears, “We’re moving in!” It was Washington’s voice, and Rourke certainly hoped the SEAL Team commander and his men were moving in. It could become very lonely very quickly for four men flying over this beach, set against fully sixty heavily armed enemy personnel. And, he was confident that all of the commandos would be men. Nazis, as well as being racist, were generally by philosophy sexist as well.

There were Tac Team personnel on both sides of John Rourke now and they started a gradual power dive toward the beach. “Fire at will,” Rourke ordered. “Fire at will!” He’d known a man, years ago, who’d always made a joke of that, perennially quipping, “What’s everybody got against Will, anyway?”

Rourke had traded weapons with Paul Rubenstein, swapping the long-range capable HK-91 for the more maneuverable German MP-40 submachinegun and its faster cyclic rate.

Rourke fired as he and three other of the Tac Team personnel soared over the beach. The men below them started to return fire, but Rourke was through the first pass and over the water before any enemy fire could come close to him or to the three other men from the Tac Team. Shooting accurately from the powered hang glider was, he discovered, even more difficult than shooting accurately from a moving horse, and that was next to impossible. But the horse analogy stood him in good stead as he suddenly realized what his tactics should be.

He banked the powered hang glider in a gentle arc to starboard, less than thirty feet over the crests of the waves, more than half a magazineful remaining in Paul’s submachinegun.

Shaw’s men and Paul Rubenstein were roping their way down the cliff face on power descenders, but the swarm of SS commandos on the beach were concentrating their fire toward the men in the powered hang gliders, John Rourke at their center.

Rourke and the three men with him made another pass, and this time Rourke adopted the technique so well perfected by the Confederate cavalrymen of The War Between The States. He waited until he was at almost point-blank range-in this case, perhaps thirty feet-and stabbed his weapon toward the target. This same method-using the handgun at saber range during the Civil War and at close pistol range now-worked. Rourke brought down three of the SS commandos as he throttled back and banked to starboard, just avoiding the rock face of the cliffs.

He began another pass, the submachinegun nearly empty, again waiting until he was close. The enemy on the beach was

trying to hit a moving target, and when holding his fire until he was close, minimizing the inherent difficulties of his firing position, he at least had a stationary target.

The Schmiesser, as Paul called it, was empty at last as John Rourke flew over the waves, banking again, turning on the thermal toward the beach.

From his right, coming in low over the sand, John Rourke saw another group of men flying powered hang gliders, six more, SEAL Team personnel, Lieutenant Commander Washington leading them. The SEALs, despite their demonstrated preference for cartridge arms as handguns, were carrying s»bmachinegun-sized energy weapons, of a type Rourke had never seen before in action.

These guns were in action now.

Their cyclic rate, if that were the proper terminology for an action containing no moving parts in the conventional sense, was slow. But as Rourke witnessed while the wedge of SEAL Team personnel fanned out across the beach, their firepower was devastating. And these men, well-practiced it seemed in firing from their moving platforms, used a similar technique to his own.

Rourke changed to a spare magazine, then throttled forward and left, swooping down nearer the beach.

As he started to pick a target, the volume of fire heavy now from the commandos, at the far left edge of his peripheral vision, he saw Ed Shaw hhnself take a series of energy bursts to the hang glider wings, the wings catching fire, their ram jets immediately flaming out, Shaw spiraled downward toward the sand.

In the next instant, as Ed Shaw lay sprawled there stunned, unconscious or dead, a half-dozen of the SS men swarmed over him. Firing into them, if Shaw were somehow still alive, would ensure the Tac Team leader’s death.

Rourke banked the powered hang glider steeply to port, throttling back, then radically forward on the joy stick, climbing, then descending, swooping over the beach, low, with the butt of Paul’s German MP-40 racking one of the SS commandos across the jaw, shooting another with a short burst in the chest and neck.

He was nearly over the six commandos who fell upon Ed Shaw, Rourke’s left hand poised over the emergency release for the glider harness, the submachinegun hanging at his side on its sling.

It was imperative to gauge the distance as accurately as possible, so the momentum of his body would carry him into the knot of men, but he would be clear of the powered glider.

He hit the release lever, his shoulders wrenching, the sensation like that of the sudden deployment of a parachute after uncontrolled free fall. His body twisted, his arms reaching out.

His body slammed into and over three of the men, the SS men stumbling, falling, Rourke rolling onto one, kicking another in the face.

The powered hang glider was soaring upward as Rourke caught sight of it for an instant; then, it veered sharply downward, crashing against the cliff face, the synth-fuel exploding, a fireball rjelching upward.

Rourke was up, to his feet, his right hand on the pistol grip of the submachinegun, arcing the weapon upward on its sling. Rourke rammed the Schmiesser’s muzzle into the throat of a third one of the commandos.

Rourke wheeled toward the remaining three.

Shaw was alive, his clothing partially consumed with flames, his hands on the arm of one of the commandos, the commando’s wetsuit aflame as well. Shaw and the SS man-both of them were on fire-grappled over a knife.

John Rourke wheeled half left, and with his right foot snapped a double Tae-Kwon-Do kick to the SS commando’s left rib cage. The force of Rourke’s kicks sent the man hurtling over Shaw and into the sand. As the man rolled, the flames consuming his wetsuit extinguished. John Rourke moved toward Ed Shaw, but Shaw was to his feet, starting to run, panicked, Rourke realized.

John Rourke had seen other good and brave men lose it when their clothing was aflame, and Shaw had lost it. John

Rourke dodged past the two remaining SS commandos, throwing a body block against Ed Shaw, knocking the Tac Team leader into the sand, rolling him over onto the flames, then rolling him over again. Rourke scooped up handfuls of sand, hurtling them over the still burning portions of Shaw’s clothing.

There was a blur of movement, Rourke dodging right as the buttstock of an Eden assault rifle smashed downward, glancing off Rourke’s left shoulder.

Rourke turned half around, punching Paul’s submachinegun forward, jerking back the trigger, spraying out half the magazine, killing the man, then emptying the Schmiesser into the sixth man.

Rourke stepped back, letting the submachinegun fall to his side on its sling as he drew both full-sized Scoremasters from his waistband, thumbing back the hammers. From near the cliff face, he heard Paul Rubenstein shouting to him, “Trigger control!”

Rourke called back to his friend, “Touche!”

When he’d taught Paul how to use firearms in the immediate aftermath of the aircrash which united them on The Night of The War, he taught the phrase-trigger control-to Paul as a mantralike watchword against spraying an automatic weapon empty, as Rourke himself had just done.

Shaw was to his knees, grumbling, Tm all right.”

Rourke took Ed Shaw at his word, then started forward, joining the Tac Team and SEAL Team personnel who battled the SS commandos here on the beach amid the foaming surf.

Rourke’s eyes squinted against the light, but rolling in fast over the water were the dark thunderheads. Rourke advanced along the beach, the Detonics Servicemaster in his right fist bucking once, a shot into the throat of one of the SS men who stood over the body of one of the SEALs. The Nazi was about to finish the Navy man with a diving knife.

Rourke turned to his left, firing point-blank into the chest of another of the SS men, this one charging toward Rourke, assault rifle spraying into the sand. Original eight-round Detonics extension magazines were up the well of each Scoremaster, giving Rourke nine rounds per gun with the chambers loaded, one round now spent from each. Rourke kept moving.

Rain began, not falling, but driving in icy wind-driven sheets which rolled savagely over the beach. Rourke was immediately drenched, his clothes plastered to his body. He fired both pistols at two of the SS men running for the cover of one of the black volcanic rocks-most were of enormous proportions-strewn about the higher ground of the beach. Rourke dropped one of the men. The second man hurled a grenade, Rourke shouting the alert, “Grenade!” Then Rourke threw himself down to the sand.

The explosion came and went, Rourke’s ears ringing with it, a shower of sand assaulting his body amid the torrent of rain.

Rourke looked up, wiping his left forearm across his face to clear his eyes. He fired both pistols simultaneously, killing the man who’d thrown the grenade.

Within the explosion’s kill radius, several men lay dead or dying, at least half of them from among the SS commando party.

Rourke was to his feet, thumbing up the safeties on both Scoremasters, grabbing up a weapon from the sand, one of the German assault rifles.

Rourke stabbed it toward a knot of the SS men, firing a controlled burst, then another and another, then another still, putting five of the SS commandos down dead. A man charged toward Rourke from his left and Rourke wheeled toward him, fired, killing him, the assault rifle empty.

Two men came at Rourke now from the rocks.

Rourke spun toward them, stabbing one of the men in the face with the assault rifle’s flash hider. Simultaneously, Rourke’s left hand freed the Crain Life Support System X knife from its sheath. Rourke raked twelve inches of steel across the chest and throat of the second man.

John Rourke was all but surrounded now.

He hammered the buttstock of the rifle into the face of one man, rammed the LS-X knife into the chest of another. Rourke

hurled the empty assault rifle at still a third. Rourke’s right hand reached out, catching a fourth man at the side of the head, by the left ear, then slamming the man’s head downward as Rourke’s right knee smashed upward. Rourke wrenched the knife clear of the man he’d just stabbed, hacked it across the shoulder of the man he’d kneed in the face and severed the sling of the assault rifle the man carried. Rourke had it now, scooping it up from the sand, firing it as he rose to his full height, killing three more of the commandos.

Two of the powered hang gliders swept through the rain, skimmed the surf, their pilots firing into a group of fifteen SS commandos trying to escape the beach. From the far left edge of Rourke’s peripheral vision, he could see Paul, rallying some of the Tac Team men, cutting off the rest of the commando force.

Rourke discarded the emptied Eden assault rifle, slicing the sling of another free from the dead man to whose body it was still attached. Clamping the rifle’s buttstock against his side to steady it, Rourke advanced, closing in from the rear of the commandos who were in flight.

There was nothing left but killing.

In more than six centuries, John Rourke was inured to it; but he prayed he would never come to like it, no matter how long he lived.

Emma Shaw, changed into a man’s sized extra-large pink T-shirt which came down to her knees and nothing but her panties on underneath, sat cross-legged on the old-fashioned overstuffed sectional sofa. These days, so much furniture was air filled, but she’d grown up with furniture like this and liked it still. Her eyes were focused on the video panel set into the wall of her little house in the mountains. She was rarely off duty enough these days to use the place, but she had a lot of leave time coming and decided to use a few days and get away, to take advantage of what would probably be the short lull before a long war. She needed to think.

Snow lay soft and white on the giant pear-shaped leaves of the magnolias outside her front windows, beyond the small porch. In the days Before The Night of The War, some actual cold weather training exercises were run in the Hawaiian Islands by the Marine Corps, but the weather was nothing like this. Of course, it was rarely cold enough in the Islands for snow to stick to roadways (it did not now), but often cold enough in the higher elevations for the snow to form a beautiful icing on the magnolias, the pines, the palms and the rest of the lush vegetation here. The pineapple growers always groused about it, but there was never a hard enough freeze to cause them more than some anxiety.