The pilot of Landers’ CV-22 pulled the trigger on his control stick to the first detent, which activated the gun camera and slaved both the tilt-rotor aircraft’s Hughes Chain Gun and the thermal sight in the CV-22’s nose to the pilot’s line-of-sight — the forward-looking infrared sight followed the pilot’s head movements, and the Chain Gun slaved itself to the aiming crosshairs superimposed on a clear glass reticle in front of the pilot’s right eye. When the crosshairs settled on a spot just a few feet in front of the motorcycle’s tires, the pilot pulled the trigger to the second detent. A fifty-round burst of cannon fire that sounded like a chain-saw blade cutting through the aircraft’s aluminum skin rattled through the PAVE HAMMER aircraft.
The motorcycle rider obviously saw the Chain Gun’s muzzle flash, because he veered hard left as soon as the cannon fired. The motorcycle skidded on the slippery grass, and the rider threw himself clear as he went down. The motorcycle skidded straight ahead and was instantly turned into scrap metal by cannon fire.
The CV-22 pilot swooped lower. The rider rolled along the ground for several feet before coming to rest in a halfsitting, half-prone position, shaking cobwebs out of his head. He was wearing a dark skin-tight suit with a mask— Harley or Landers couldn’t recognize him. “Turn facedown and spread your arms and legs,” Landers shouted over the PA speaker when they hit the rider with the spotlight. To the pilots, Landers said, “Hover right over him, guys. We’ll fastrope right over him and haul him up with the rescue winch. We’d just better hope he’s not laying right on top of a mine or we’ll—”
“He’s moving… damn it!” the pilot swore. He was distracted enough to lose sight of him as the rider got up and ran underneath the PAVE HAMMER. “Aft gunners, keep an eye out for—”
There was a loud bang! and the CV-22 heeled sharply over to the left. The pilot corrected for the shove, gained a little altitude, and experimentally swung the tilt-rotor aircraft’s tail around so they were facing the forest. No caution lights illuminated, and the aircraft responded normally. “What happened?” he called on interphone. “Someone sing out.”
“Land mine,” one of the aft gunners called out. “The suspect had just reached the edge of the trees when he tripped it. He exploded like a rotten tomato.”
“Well, we know the land mines have been activated again,” Landers said. “Pretty sophisticated — a fucking remote-controlled perimeter defense system. Any doubt we got the right house?”
The guard named Tommy watched the whole thing— watched the motorcycle rider zoom away from the house toward the forest, watched the huge helicopter open up on him, watched the rider do a triple-flip through the air, then watched as he was blown into a hundred pieces by one of the land mines. The big boxy-looking twin-rotor helicopter with airplane wings was now hovering at the edge of the clearing, pointing not quite at the front door but a little off to the right, as if deciding what to do. Tommy had traded his semiautomatic AR-15 for a full-automatic M-16 with a fifty-round magazine and an M206 40-millimeter grenade launcher, and had taken his position at one of the bulletproof polycarbonate front windows inside the mansion.
Suddenly the big chopper’s blinding searchlights swung around and hit the house full force. Tommy lowered his night-vision goggles — they were useless with so much light. A voice came over the chopper’s PA. “Come out of the house with your hands in the air! This is your last warning!”
“Two more of those things, surrounding the house,” someone radioed.
“Did the boss make it?”
“I don’t think so.”
“What do we do?” Tommy shouted back over his shoulder. “They got a damned big gun on that thing!”
“Sit tight,” the security supervisor said. “Everyone hold your fire. They won’t use the heavy stuff unless we—”
“What are you doing?” a female voice behind Tommy shouted. Tommy whirled around, pointing the M-16. It was “the witch,” as everyone called her — Cazaux’s squeeze, the crazy woman who lived upstairs. She was wearing a silky red robe. Her long dark hair like a lion’s mane was around her shoulders. The robe was not tied, and her breasts and crotch were exposed. “Why aren’t you attacking?”
“Shut up and get out of here,” Tommy said, pausing to get a good look at the witch’s body. Pretty nice rack, he thought, but she had to be as crazy as they come to be walking around half-naked like that in the middle of a fire- fight. “Go downstairs in the wine cellar until this is over.”
Jo Ann Vega saw the gunsel’s eyes roving over her body before turning back toward the window. Another typical male, she thought angrily. “Listen, you little son of a bitch, get out there and kill them. Avenge Henri.”
“Those are U.S. Marshals out there, and they got heavy stuff. We’ll wait them out until we know the boss is safe.” “Henri is already dead,” the witch said. “I saw him get hit out there.” Tommy swallowed, finding it hard to believe that Henri Cazaux was dead, but he stayed at his position. “You've got to avenge him,” the witch shrieked. “Get out there and kill those federals, now! ”
“I said, shut up, take your big tits downstairs and take cover, lady.”
That did it — the male pig deserved it now. Jo Ann Vega raised her Lorcin .380 automatic and fired three shots into the back of the man’s head from two feet away. There were a few other shots as other gunners nervously fired a few rounds. Vega reached down, pulled the M-16 out of the dead man’s arms, walked quickly to the front door, and swung it open.
“I’ll take care of them for you, Henri, my love,” Vega said aloud. “God how I loathe weak men.” She stepped outside, her robe flying open in the wind. As she emerged out from under the breezeway in front of the house, she leveled the M-16 at the searchlights on the big aircraft on the other side of the expansive lawn and pulled the trigger. Her first shot came the closest, missing the searchlights by only a few feet, but the other shots went high and to the right.
She had fired almost the entire magazine, most of it almost straight up in the air, and was trying to figure out how to launch one of the inch-and-a-half-diameter grenades from the launcher slung under the rifle when the marshals’ aircraft’s cannon opened fire. Three 12.7-millimeter shells hit, one in the head and two in the torso, and Jo Ann Vega was split apart as easily as a hammer hitting a banana. The cannon then sprayed the rest of the front of the house, hitting each and every window with a gunner in it. Then, a long cylindrical pod on the left side of the PAVE HAMMER aircraft popped out of the left sponson, and three rockets ripple-fired into the front of the house, blowing out the front door and creating two more man-sized flaming holes.
Skidding to the left to shield the right side of the aircraft from the gunners in the front of the house, the CV-22 flew toward it. A few shots of automatic gunfire from the upper floors were immediately answered by Chain Gun fire. The Chain Gun then fired a path into the front lawn toward the house, creating a terrific explosion as one of the shells found a land mine close to the house. Two more rockets blasted into the house near the front door, the CV-22 stopped about twenty yards from the front of the house with its nose high in the air, hovered for a few seconds, then veered sharply to the left and climbed over the house.
Leading six U.S. Marshals, Deborah Harley and William Landers jumped off the back cargo ramp of the PAVE HAMMER. Following the chewed-up path created by the Chain Gun, they were safe from land mines. Firing into the windows, most of which were ablaze, Harley and the seven Marshals burst into the house.
The ground floor was decimated. The walls were blackened by smoke and fire, furniture was upended and smashed, and smoking, crumpled bodies lay everywhere. Harley, wearing a gas mask, shot one armed guard running toward the stairs from the kitchen, then ran upstairs. She tossed two tear gas grenades upstairs, then, with more agents behind her, started clearing rooms. She shot two more gunsels stupid enough to have guns in their hand and turned over six more blinded and choking guards to the Marshals.