Only a hundred meters separated them from the greenhouses, but nausea was draining their energy. They were as tough as any fighting men in the world, but they were combating space sickness in tandem with an alien environment. Leuchenko knew he could count on them to go far beyond their limits of endurance. But if they didn't force their way into the safe atmosphere of the colony within the next hour, there was little chance of them making it back to their landing craft before their life-support systems gave out. He gave them a minute to rest while he made another examination of the ground ahead.
Leuchenko was an old hand at sniffing out traps. He had come within a hair of being killed on three different patrols in ambushes laid by the Afghan rebels, and he had learned the fine art of scenting danger the hard way.
It wasn't what his eyes could see, it was what they couldn't see that rang a warning bell in his head. The two shots didn't fit a wild pattern. They struck him as deliberately placed. A crude warning? No, it had to mean something else, he speculated. A signal perhaps?
The confining pressure suit and helmet irritated him. He longed for his comfortable and efficient combat gear, but fully realizing they could not protect his body from the frying heat and the cosmic rays. For at least the fourth time the bile rose in his throat and he gagged as he forced himself to swallow it.
The situation was hellish, he thought angrily. Nothing was to his liking. His men were exposed in the open. He'd been given no intelligence on the Americans' weapons except the reported rocket launcher. Now they were under attack by small-arms fire. Leuchenko's only consolation was that the colonists seemed to be using a rifle or maybe even a pistol. If they possessed a full automatic firearm, they could have cut down the Soviets a hundred meters back. And the rocket launcher. Why hadn't they tried it before now? What were they waiting for?
What bothered him most was the total lack of movement by the colonists. The greenhouses, equipment, and small laboratory modules sitting around the entrance to the cave appeared deserted.
"Unless you see a target," he ordered, "hold your fire until we reach cover. Then we'll regroup and storm the main quarters inside the hill."
Leuchenko waited until each of his four men acknowledged and then he motioned them on.
Corporal Mikhail Yushchuk was about thirty meters behind and to one side of the man on his left. He stood and began running in a crouching position. He had taken only a few steps when he felt a stinging sensation in his kidney. Then the sudden thrust of pain was repeated. He reached around and grasped the small of his back just below his support system pack. His vision began to blur and his breath came in gasps as his pressurized suit began to leak. He sank to his knees and stared dumbly at his hand. The glove was drenched in blood that was already steaming and coagulating under the roasting heat from the sun.
Yushchuk tried to warn Leuchenko, but his voice failed. He crumbled into the gray dust, his eyes dimly recognizing a figure in a strange space suit standing over him with a knife. Then his world went black.
Steinmetz witnessed Yushchuk's death from his vantage point and issued a series of sharp commands into his helmet's transmitter. "Okay, Dawson, your man is ten feet left and eight feet ahead of you. Gallagher, he's twenty feet to your right and moving forward. Steady, steady, he's cutting right into Dawson. Okay, nail him."
He watched two of the colonists materialize as if by magic and attack one of the Soviets who was lagging slightly behind his comrades.
"Two down, three to go," Steinmetz muttered softly to himself.
"I've got my sights set on the point man," said Shea. "But I can't promise a clean hit unless he freezes for a second."
"Lay another shot, only closer this time to get them on the ground again. Then stay on him. If he gets wise, he could cut our guys down before they could close on him. Blast his ass if he so much as turns his head."
Shea silently aimed his M-14 and pulled off another shot, which struck less than three feet in front of the lead man's boots.
"Cooper! Snyder!" Steinmetz barked. "Your man is flat on the ground twenty feet ahead and to your left. Take him, now!" He paused to scan the position of the second remaining Russian. "Same goes for Russell and Perry, thirty feet directly in front. Go!"
The third member of the Soviet combat team never knew what hit him. He died while hugging the ground for cover. Eight of the colonists were now closing the pincers from the rear of the Russians, whose concentration was focused on the colony.
Suddenly Steinmetz froze. The man behind the leader swung around just as Russell and Perry leaped at him like offensive tackles charging a quarterback.
Lieutenant Petrov spotted the converging shadows as he rose to his feet for the final dash to the greenhouses. He instinctively twisted around in an abrupt corkscrew motion as Russell and Perry crashed into him. A cold professional, he should have fired and brought them down. But he hesitated a split second too long out of astonishment. It was as if the Americans had risen up out of the moon's surface like spectral demons. He managed to snap off a shot that drilled one of his assailant's upper arms. Then a knife flashed.
Leuchenko's eyes were trained toward the colony ahead. He was unaware of the slaughter going on behind him until he heard Petrov gasp out a warning. He spun around and stood rooted in shocked awe.
His four men were stretched out in a lifeless sprawl on the lunar gravel. Eight American colonists had appeared out of nowhere and were rapidly encircling him. Sudden hatred burst within him, and he thrust his weapon into firing position.
A bullet thumped into his thigh and he tilted sideways. Tensed in sudden pain, he squeezed off twenty rounds. Most of them flew wide into the lunar desert, but two found their mark. One of the colonists fell backward and another dropped to his knees clutching his shoulder.
Then another bullet tore into his neck. He held on to the trigger, spewing rounds until the clip ran dry, his shots flying wild.
He cursed as he crumpled limply to the ground. "Damn the Americans!" he shouted inside his helmet. He thought of them as devils who didn't play the game according to the rules. He lay on his back, staring up at the faceless forms standing above him.
They parted as another member of the colonists approached and knelt down beside Leuchenko.
"Steinmetz?" Leuchenko asked weakly. "Can you hear me?"
"Yes, I'm on your frequency," answered Steinmetz. "I can hear you."
"Your secret weapon. . . how did you make your people appear from nothing?"
Steinmetz knew he would be talking to a dead man within seconds.
"An ordinary shovel," he replied. "Since we all have to wear pressurized lunar suits with self-contained life supports, it was a simple matter to bury the men in the soft soil."
"They were marked by the orange rocks?"
"Yes, from a hidden platform on the crater's side I could direct when and where to attack you from the rear."
"I do not wish to be buried here," Leuchenko murmured. "Tell my nation. . . tell them to bring us home someday."
It was close, but Steinmetz got it in. "You'll all go home," he said. "That's a promise."
In Russia a grim-faced Yasenin turned to President Antonov. "You heard," he said through clenched lips. "They're gone."
"They're gone," Antonov repeated mechanically. "It was as though Leuchenko's last words came from across the room."