The Vengeance of the Tau (39 page)

The manacles were waiting for him, fastened into the far wall of a room that was utterly empty. The Twins were grinning. One led him forward. The other hung back slightly. The closer one removed his leg chains and handcuffs, then locked his feet and hands into the manacles. He was spread-eagled, face against the wall, with no room for maneuvering.

“We’ll be back for you,” they said together, and McCracken heard the door close behind them.

“Soon as you get there,” Pop Keller had instructed just before Johnny set off for Livermore Air Force Base, “call me up on the radio and I’ll start the barrage.” After the big Indian had nodded, Pop’s gaze drifted over his shoulder. “You really fixin’ on bringing these boys with you?”

Johnny turned to look at the men of No Town who were packed again in Blue Thunder. In the driver’s seat, Toothless Jim Jackson was giving the old engine gas to keep it from stalling out.

“I don’t believe I have a choice,” Wareagle replied.

“Yes, you do, friend. Yes, you do,” Pop Keller had said, the last of his words nearly drowned out by the approach of a tank column led by the Sherman and backed up by the M-60A1 with the three others in between. “Figure you could use some close support.”

Johnny had flashed one of his rare smiles.

He drove Pop’s truck at the head of the procession that had Blue Thunder bringing up the rear. The artillery barrage courtesy of NAB’s two 155mm, 105mm, and eight-inch guns would begin as soon as Johnny and his tanks reached the perimeter of the base. His small column was able to maintain a respectable clip of just over fifteen miles per hour straight over land, cutting across roads only when necessary. The Pershing slipped a tread just past the halfway point, and the Patton’s engine overheated with just a quarter-mile to go, leaving the crusty Sherman and the far feistier M-60 prototypes to aid in the assault.

A hundred yards from the main gate of the base, Johnny lifted Pop’s CB to his lips.

“Come in, Pop.”

“Right here, son.”

“I’m ready.”

“So am I.”

McCracken was still trying to figure out a way to slip out of the chains fastening him tight to the wall when the first explosion rocked the building. A second one followed almost immediately, and loosened plaster from the walls showered him. Three more blasts came in rapid succession, and fragments of the ceiling caved in.

Johnny! It had to be Johnny! Not dead at all and outdoing even himself!

The next explosions shook the floor and opened wide fissures in the walls. His manacles, only crudely driven home, showed signs of weakening. Blaine began pulling with all his strength, feeling them begin to give. His right hand came free first, followed by his left. From there, it was a simple matter to pull the manacles binding his legs from the crumbling wall.

It was impossible to open the manacles. While they would be uncomfortable, they would hardly prove a hindrance. With the explosions sounding even more regularly now, Blaine rushed for the door. It had been locked from the outside, but the mechanism was simple and already weakened by the blasts. A quick series of kicks shattered the latch, and McCracken burst into the corridor.

Not all the initial explosions were on the mark, and Johnny called back to Pop to adjust the coordinates slightly. He stepped out of the truck to find Tyrell Loon coming his way, while the rest of Blue Thunder’s passengers distributed Heydan Larroux’s weapons amongst themselves, each searching for the one that best suited his fancy.

“We be ready,” Loon announced.

“Not yet, Sheriff.”

“When?”

“First I have work to do by myself inside.”

Loon wasn’t arguing. “Fine with me. Think even the Old One would understand. Shit, I’m still close enough to bring ya luck, don’t ya think?”

“I do,” Johnny said, turning away.

“How will we know when to follow?”

Johnny looked back at him. “You’ll know.”

Wareagle left the sheriff and his men there outside the fence and gave the tanks the signal to roll straight on. He walked alongside the old Sherman, as the M-60 and M-60A1 plowed right through the base’s security fence.

The explosions in the central area were coming every three or four seconds now. Huge plumes of smoke and debris coughed into the air with each blast. The tanks continued on, crashing through what they could not easily avoid. The Sherman hung back long enough for a path to be cleared for it, but had pulled up even by the time its offspring rolled onto the tarmac. A few of the hundred or so troops rushing about caught sight of the trio of tanks and pointed their way frantically. The tanks stopped and began to fire.

One by one their gun turrets snapped backward as shells were expelled. The explosions caught the enemy where they stood. The M-60A1 made a trio of armored personnel carriers its primary targets and blew them apart before any could start into motion. The Sherman and the M-60 focused their fire in any direction where congestions of the enemy could be found. All return volleys were token. The opposition was being blasted from all angles at once, and fear had replaced confidence in their motions.

The gunner in the M-60A1, who had performed the same service in Vietnam for considerably less money, saw the big Indian dart suddenly before his view plate toward the enemy forces. The gunner closed his eyes for an instant, as another shell was expelled. When he gazed back outward, the Indian was gone.

Arnold Rothstein grasped Billy Griggs by the lapels.

“The White Death, you’ve got to save it! Do you hear me? You’ve got to save it!”

Griggs looked at the old man in bewilderment.

“Drive it out of here! Wait until the battle recedes and drive it out of here. The tanker’s armored. You can make it. Get to the backup rendezvous point! I’ll meet you there!”

Billy Boy knew that the old dude was crackers, had known it for some time, but playing along at this point could be his ticket to bigger and better things. Besides, maybe he’d just up and drive that supertanker, three times the capacity of a normal oil truck, full of the White Death wherever he damn well pleased. Use it for his own gains before the old guy was any the wiser, his own plan in shambles.

Griggs headed for the basement and the underground passage that led to the hangar where the tanker was stored.

McCracken knew the White Death would be hidden out of plain sight and well protected. That made one of the hangars the most logical choice, but which one?

Blaine burst out of the base headquarters into the chaos that the explosions had caused. The huge artillery shells continued to carve craters everywhere they hit. The Tau rushed about in all directions. In the confusion, Blaine decided he could safely bypass the hangar the army of the Tau had poured from to catch his commando team in an ambush. Instead, he headed for the one next to it first, worked open the door, and slid inside.

Windows shattered by the numerous explosions provided the only light, but it was enough for Blaine to see dozens of crates spread out everywhere. Weathered and browned, they were obviously the ones that had been pulled from the Nazi storage chamber at the dig site in Ephesus. Closer inspection revealed that the crates were empty. The tanks that had held the White Death were gone.

Glass shattered, and McCracken blamed it first on another explosion until he heard the faint flutter of footsteps. He froze, turned left and then right.

The Twins were approaching him from either side of the hangar. They were bare-chested, massive muscles rippling with each step. Neither showed a weapon. Both were smiling.

“Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh!”

The one in the hangar’s rear rushed at him with a throaty rasp. The burst of speed he managed was incredible, so fast that he never noticed Blaine grasp the lid off one of the worthless crates and slash it forward. The rushing Twin managed to get his hands up, and the lid shattered into splinters over them, catching just enough of his head to daze him. He wobbled on his feet and started to list. Blaine drew his arm overhead for the kill and felt his still-manacled hand jerk backward as it was twisted. The force of the move pitched him through the air, and he collided with yet more of the abandoned crates.

Stunned, Blaine nonetheless regained his feet without even pausing for breath. The smiling Twin who had tossed him effortlessly aside stalked toward him, hands held leisurely near his waist. The wounded Twin was just regaining his senses and joined the approach. Blood dripped from his scalp and soaked his hair.

McCracken backpedaled, feeling his way with his feet. The Twins closed on him from angles that made escape between them impossible. Blaine continued to back up until his shoulders came to rest against the hangar wall, with one of the blast-shattered windows just to his right.

The unbloodied Twin threw himself into a lunge, as Blaine’s hand darted up and to the side. He snapped off a thick shard of glass from the window and thrust it toward the midsection of the lunging Twin. In his mind McCracken pictured the shard slicing through flesh and shredding everything in its path. He was surprised to see the Twin still smiling at him and gazed down.

The Twin had caught the shard and closed his hand around it. Blood oozed from it to the asphalt surface below. Blaine lashed out with his free hand, steel manacle employed as a weapon, but the Twin parried the blow and grabbed hold of the chain dangling from McCracken’s wrist to tie him up. They struggled across the floor, while the other Twin moved warily, choosing his spot, waiting.

The Twin McCracken was locked up with succeeded in driving the glass shard backward. Now it was Blaine’s hand that began to spill blood. Before he could reroute the motion, the Twin had somehow twisted the shard from his grasp and sent it slashing upward behind his own momentum. Blaine tried to deflect it with the manacle that the Twin still held, but the shard sliced a thin gash diagonally across his stomach and chest. The Twin followed with a downward swipe that McCracken managed to block with his other manacle. He fixed his arm on that side into an elbow strike and slammed it into the Twin’s face.

Blaine felt teeth crunch on impact. The Twin recoiled, and McCracken realized that he had lost track of the other just in time to spin to the side. As a result, the second Twin’s blow caught him in the hard part of the skull instead of the temple. The blow stunned him and it was all he could do to deflect the blinding flurry of blows that followed.

His motions brought him right back into the range of the Twin whose front teeth were now missing. A fist slammed into Blaine’s kidney, and then his knee was kicked out. McCracken never hit the floor, though, because the Twin who still had his teeth caught him and drove him headfirst into the wall. Stars exploded before Blaine’s eyes, and he flailed out wildly. He managed to rake the Twin’s face with his manacle, but the bastard caught his next blow at its weakest, and McCracken felt his own momentum joined and used against him.

Blaine had time to actually record the fact that he was airborne and flying toward the hangar’s entrance. It was like diving off the high board, but the surface he was heading for was not nearly as hospitable. He managed to get his hands out, and the manacles clanged against the floor on impact. His chin took the brunt of the rest. He could feel it split and the blood stream outward. He tried to push off with his hands, but his arms were numb and wouldn’t support him. He realized that he was looking at a pair of brown boots that had somehow materialized before him. He feared that one of the Twins had circled round for the kill.

Except that he recalled that the boots the Twins were wearing had been black. McCracken turned his gaze higher.

And Johnny Wareagle looked down at him.

The most glorious, wonderful, perfect sight McCracken had ever seen!

Johnny smiled at Blaine and stepped past him, placing his frame between McCracken and the Twins.

The Twins hesitated briefly before coming at Wareagle. When they attacked, closing from opposite sides, their moves were perfect reflections of each other.

At the last possible instant, in a motion that defied the eye, Johnny twisted from their path. The Twins’ blows slammed into each other. Wareagle grabbed hold of the one with ruined teeth, and this Twin made the mistake of trying to match strength with him. The Indian didn’t give at all. A fist pushed into the muscles layered over the Twin’s solar plexus. His gasp sounded like air pouring out of a spiked tire. The Indian slammed a second blow into his face, and blood exploded from the remnants of his nose.

The second Twin spun toward Johnny and actually leapt over the body of his crumpling brother. Wareagle stretched out his arms and pushed him farther through the air. He landed near McCracken and dropped his hand toward a pistol stowed in a leather ankle holster.

Blaine grabbed the hand before he could reach it.

“Not today,” he said, and twisted the hand sharply to the right, snapping the wrist.

The Twin grasped for the gun with his other hand, and McCracken slammed a blow up under his chin and then rammed his knuckles into the Twin’s strung-out throat. Cartilage crackled. His Adam’s apple snapped free on impact. The Twin keeled over, heaving for air as he fell dying.

The other Twin had gone for his gun as well, managing to free it with an enraged scream as he saw his brother die. Wareagle stopped its progress before the final Twin could aim. A harmless shot flew skyward as the Indian clamped a knee against the man’s elbow and jerked his wrist.

The snap sounded like a door slamming. Johnny looped his free hand around the Twin’s head and twisted it violently. The body stiffened, then crumpled to the floor.

“Blainey,” Wareagle said, turning.

“ ’Bout time you showed up, Indian.”

The monstrous tanker truck had been armored from front to back. Billy Boy Griggs pulled himself into the cab and realized that his biggest problem might be the fact that he could barely see over the dashboard. He placed his pistol on the seat right next to him and propped himself up as high as he could. The tanker was facing the hangar’s front, but there was enough room inside for him to turn it all the way around and slam his way out through the back. Outside the battle was receding, the explosions far less numerous now. The invaders had come with tanks, and there was no way one of those was going to catch up with this baby. If he played his cards right, they might not even notice his departure through the rear of the base until it was too late. The cover of buildings would shield him well enough to ensure his escape.