He hooked a left turn, onto the broad avenue that paralleled the front of the Palais and the crowd of soldiers assembled there. Several vehicles were already starting to move, their guns flashing. Red tracer rounds were zipping across his path like laser bolts from a science fiction movie.
“King, that will take you right into the lion’s den.”
“Yeah, kinda figured that.”
There was a whooshing sound in his head as Deep Blue gave a resigned sigh, then: “Hard right, now!”
There wasn’t a road, but King saw a vast open plaza with an enormous brick courtyard and a central structure that looked like a UFO trying to break free from the grasp of several enormous concrete hands. King hauled the steering wheel to the right and angled onto the sidewalk between the courtyard and the weird monument. The Tigr jounced over low barriers and other pedestrian obstacles. King swerved to avoid a large bronze statue of a lion. Asya let loose a torrent of Russian profanity that was almost as lethal as the 12.7 mm rounds from the DShk, and sank down out of the turret. She finished with a sharp, “Who taught you how to drive?”
“Watch your language. She’s your mother, too,” King said. She frequently forgot he was fluent in Russian since his passage through the ages. “Now, stay down.”
He was relieved that she was back in the relative safety of the Tigr’s interior, but he knew the chaotic ride was almost certainly aggravating her injuries. If this kept up, he was likely to kill her before he could save her.
“Keep going straight,” Deep Blue said. “There’s a road directly in front of you. Straight shot to Mabuki’s location.”
“Do me a favor and let him know we’re coming in hot.”
“Already done.”
The vehicle suddenly rocked under the impact of a barrage of machine gun fire. A small convoy of Tigrs and tracked APCs tore across the plaza in pursuit. The high caliber rounds punched through the armor with a shriek of tortured metal and continued right through the windshield, scant inches from King’s head. He ducked, but knew that if the next burst hit a little lower, the seat back wouldn’t do much to slow the bullets down, and if the rounds hit something critical, like a fuel tank or the tires, they were equally screwed.
“Straight shot is a no-go!” He lifted up just enough to scan the road ahead, spied a cross street and took the turn, slipping into an urban canyon between two modern looking buildings. The assault stopped, but King knew the reprieve would be short.
“You’re still in the neighborhood,” Deep Blue advised. “There’s a right turn coming up in a hundred yards. Take it.”
A network of glowing lines appeared in King’s glasses, guiding him to the next approaching cross street, which was at an angle slightly sharper than ninety degrees and already a lot closer than a hundred yards. King hauled the Tigr into the turn, clipped the corner and bounced over the curb.
Asya howled another curse as the vehicle slammed down on the road surface, but quickly added, “I’m all right. Keep going.”
King doubted that she was all right, but he also knew that moving forward was the only option. This road was also a straight shot, and before long he saw the headlights of the pursuit rounding the corner. King’s Tigr was probably a good two hundred yards ahead of the soldiers, which wasn’t nearly far enough. The effective range of a DShK was over a mile.
“Right turn, coming up.”
Tracers streaked past, and King decided they wouldn’t make it to the turn. He turned sharply to the right, blasting through a low concrete barrier. Beyond was a bare dirt field that might have been a parking lot for the nearby building. The Tigr’s wheels threw up enormous clots of mud as it fishtailed across the open area, but for the moment they were once more out of the line of fire.
“There’s an exit at your two o’clock. A left will put you back on the straightaway.”
King saw it, and a metal gate blocking it.
What’s one more dent?
The Tigr hit the gate, tearing it off its hinges. In the instant of impact, and too late to do anything about it, King saw something else looming out of the darkness. A seven-ton truck drove into view, blocking his path. He tried to brake and turn away from it, but he was already beyond the event horizon. The left front tire of the heavy truck crashed into the front end of the Tigr and annihilated it.
King was thrown out of his seat and across the interior of the vehicle. He slammed hard against the passenger side door, which crumpled like an empty beer can beneath the truck’s big tires. Locked together in a death embrace, the two vehicles continued forward, shuddering and smoking as momentum fought friction. Friction ultimately won.
Disoriented, King fumbled for his Uzi then remembered that he was not the Tigr’s only occupant. “Asya!”
She lay pressed against the right side, unmoving. He squirmed around, crawled between the seats and into the rear compartment. There was blood everywhere, too much blood…
A burst from a heavy gun startled him, and he twisted around, raising the Uzi. More reports followed — a chaotic orchestra of several automatic rifles and more than one machine gun. A few rounds struck the exterior, but nothing penetrated. He could see movement outside, soldiers swarming out of the transport, surrounding the wrecked Tigr, shooting…
The shooting stopped. A silhouette appeared, framed in the viewport hole. The door handle rattled as someone worked the latch from the outside, and King took aim with the Uzi, ready to fire the moment the door opened.
“Ceasefire!” Deep Blue shouted, and then he repeated the phrase again and again until King safed the weapon and lowered it.
The door swung open and King saw the smiling face of General Mabuki. “That is twice I have arrived in the nick of time to save you. I think I must be your guardian angel.”
King didn’t acknowledge the comment, but instead turned to Asya, pulling her toward him as gently as his urgency would permit. “Help me. She’s hurt.”
The general snapped into action, calling to his men for a medic. “Help is on the way,” he said. “We will save her.”
King checked Asya. Her dressing was still in place, but saturated. One trouser leg was soaked with blood that had run down from the wound. Her skin was unnaturally pale, but she was still taking shallow breaths.
Two soldiers ran up with an old school litter — canvass stretched between two poles — and King gently laid her in the tattered olive drab fabric while another soldier with a red cross armband began assessing her injuries. King watched the medic work for several minutes to make sure he knew what he was doing. Once satisfied, he took a step back to let the man work.
As his focus gradually pulled back, it occurred to him to ask Mabuki what had happened.
“The rebellion has been quashed,” the general said. “When they realized that their leaders had fled aboard a helicopter, the soldiers lost the will to keep fighting.”
King didn’t quite share Mabuki’s excitement. The rebellion in Kinshasa might have been put down, but General Velle still held the eastern part of the country, and Monique Favreau still had a tactical nuclear weapon, not to mention two hostages — one of whom was a US lawmaker. Still, a victory was a victory. He clapped Mabuki on the shoulder. “There’s still a lot of work to do, but at least we got President Mulamba his house back.”
Then King heard Deep Blue’s voice again. “King, I’m afraid I’ve got some bad news.”
33
Felice awoke to the sound of screaming.
It was her second rude awakening in less than twenty-four hours. The nightmare reality that greeted her on this occasion was not the frantic chaos of an attack, but instead something far more terrifying: the ominous darkness of the primeval jungle, filled with an inhuman howl of pain.