They drove slowly up to the truck’s hulk. The burning sedan had been blasted halfway into the ditch. A gentle nudge by the Toyota bumper, and it continued into the shallow depression and left room for Franklin to drive through. They saw six bodies in the wreckage and no survivors. Franklin floored the sedan, and they raced down the road away from the smoking ruins.
“Why all this firepower, these roadblocks?” Franklin asked. He looked at Domingo.
“Do you know where the head man rebel has his headquarters?” Canzoneri asked Domingo.
“Not for sure. It’s a big secret even from most of the rebels. But I’m getting suspicious. He brought the hostages here. He has an ambush set up, then a log across a public road, then a military-type roadblock with rebel soldiers. This could be rebel country. He might own the countryside and the town. He could have his GHQ there in Lebak.”
“If so we’re really fucked,” Franklin said. “How will we get a phone line out to anywhere?”
“We can’t fight our way into town,” Domingo said. “If we need to do that, we’d be stopped short by a larger force. I’ve heard the rebels have bought heavier weapons lately. If it looks like the rebels control the town, we’ll have to recon, and maybe walk in and con somebody who has the phone system, or take over the building or at least one phone line. I’m sure they have phone service over here; maybe it’s microwave or satellite.”
“How big is Lebak?” Canzoneri asked.
“Never been there,” Domingo said. “Don’t see how it could be very big. No industry, no farming, no logging. What, maybe four or five hundred people? A little fishing, maybe.”
“This odometer is in miles and it shows we have done just over seventeen so far,” Franklin said. “If that town is twenty-five to thirty, we have a ways to go.”
“My guess is that with the increased amount of security and guards, the rebel leader’s GHQ must be nearby, but maybe not all the way to town.”
“So, the security should pick up the closer we come to the GHQ, and then once we break through that it would be less on the way into town?”
“That’s what I’m thinking. Why else all this security out here in the wilderness?”
“So our job is to get through the last of the roadblocks and masses of rebels. Then we should be free to roll into Lebak?” Franklin asked.
“We hope,” Domingo said. “Let’s see what new surprises the rebels have for us.”
It came from the rear, and they didn’t know it was there until a machine gun mounted on a jeep chattered a dozen rounds at them, breaking out the rear window and puncturing one tire. Domingo had the Bull Pup up in a second, aimed out the blown-out rear glass, and fired a contact round at the jeep. The round hit the radiator, and exploded on contact, smashing the little rig off the road, rolling it three times, and sending the two live rebels in the vehicle flying through the air.
The Toyota slid across the road and wound up sideways in the wrong lane. Franklin shut it down.
“Casualty report,” Franklin said.
“Got some glass in the back of my head, but nothing serious,” Canzoneri said.
“Fine here,” Domingo said. “I love this twenty-millimeter.”
Franklin jerked open the door and checked the tire.
“Blown to hell,” he said. “Do we have a spare?”
“A car this old damn well better have one,” Canzoneri said. “Usually older cars have lousy rubber.”
They found the spare in the trunk, along with two submachine guns and a box of ammo. It took Franklin twelve minutes to change the tire with the bumper jack.
“I used to have contests changing tires,” he said. “I almost always won.”
Domingo had scraped most of the shattered glass from the rear seat of the car by the time they drove away from the wrecked jeep. They didn’t look for survivors.
At twenty miles from the hostage house, they found roads that went off from the highway every mile or so, usually one into the mountains and then one to the beach. All were plain dirt roads, some that had been graded up, some just tracks in the jungle and coastal grasses.
A few houses began to appear.
“If we don’t find a lot of rebel uniforms in town, how do we play it?” Franklin asked.
“If the rebels don’t control the town, there should be a police station. We’ll start there. If the town is under police control, we’ll have no trouble phoning out. I’ll use their phone.”
“Damn big ‘if,’ ” Franklin said.
Canzoneri, in the front seat, growled. “We have some trouble up ahead. Looks like another roadblock. This one has a truck in the middle of the road and a swing-up bar across the traffic lane.”
“Only two uniforms, they look different,” Franklin said.
“Could be Filipino Army men,” Domingo said. “Let’s ease up and stop and see what the situation is.”
“Too dangerous,” Franklin said. “I’m keeping one of them in my sights. Canzoneri, you aim for the second one. If it isn’t what it seems to be, we blast them and race on through.”
“I’m not sure of those uniforms,” Domingo said. “Not even sure that my Army would post any men out here. And if we did, why a roadblock?”
When the car came to within a hundred yards of the block, one soldier held up a submachine gun in both hands for them to stop. He was on the driver’s side. Another armed man stood on the passenger’s side. Both stood waiting.
Franklin stopped the car five feet from the guards, who swung up their weapons.
“Step out of the car, please,” one guard said in English. The other guard said something in Filipino.
Domingo frowned and said something back in Filipino.
“Not our men,” Domingo shouted. Franklin felt the first round from the guard’s submachine gun hit the Toyota.
20
Franklin jerked his Colt carbine up over the car’s windowsill and slammed three rounds into the chest of the surprised guard, who had fired into the door panel evidently as a warning shot. Domingo had out his .45 pistol, and fired three times so fast they sounded like one round. The rebel on the passenger’s side caught one in the chest, one in his throat, and the third one on his forehead, jolting him backward like he’d been yanked to the rear by a rope.
“Charge!” Canzoneri said, looking out the window for a new target. He found none. The thin pole across the single lane of the roadway that was left open shattered against the front of the Toyota just below the hood ornament and splintered away on both sides.
They were through. There appeared to be no one beside the two guards at the block.
“What the hell next?” Franklin asked. “How far are we from the real town?”
“More buildings along here, looks like some houses too,” Canzoneri said.
“Looks like this could be the start of the town, the old barangay,” Domingo said. “Several families would settle an area together and give it its name. The practice is still around, but often now used in sections of a larger city. This has that feel. Like several of these barangays merge and you have a small town.”