Cris scanned the track, and quickly spotted the Texaco tanker parked about two hundred yards east of them, five hundred yards from the approaching White Train.
"Gas car… gotta be the ignition package," he said out loud, then started running across the tracks toward the tanker. His feet stumbled on the gravel-filled, uneven surface. Suddenly, as he ran, he had a strong sense of Kennidi's presence. She was somehow with him, giving him strength, urging him on. He could see her courageous smile, and her swollen forehead; the memory of her painful death made him run even faster. He could now see the unnatural shape of something underneath the tanker car.
The remaining members of the Choir watched Cris running toward the Texaco tanker from the roof of the F. A. A. building. It had been easy to break the lock to the fire door and take the concrete stairs to the roof. Fannon Kincaid seemed to have lost all interest. He was sitting on a roof air-conditioning unit, its hot exhaust fluttering his pant cuffs.
"Blow the damn charge!" R. V. yelled from the edge of the roof as he watched the man run across the tracks and dive under the tanker. The man started to fiddle with the shaped charge.
"No, you can't blow it! Not yet!" Gas Can Man answered, grabbing the detonator from Robert Vail. "The Train's still too far away. It's gotta be inside two hundred yards."
They watched in silence as the White Train moved closer. Far away on the tracks below, the man underneath the gas tanker suddenly started kicking at the bracket that held the shaped charge to the bottom of the car.
The White Train was now four hundred yards from the tanker.
Then it was only three hundred.
"White Angel, we've got a bogie," the Air One pilot said from his leading Bell Jet Ranger. "Some guy just ran under that sided gas tanker up ahead."
"Roger," Major Flynn said. He jumped up and looked out the side window of the troop car. His angle was too acute, and he couldn't see far enough forward to spot the tanker, or the man. "Slow to five miles an hour," Flynn said to the engineer over the headset mike. Then he instructed his air cover: "Air One, make a pass. Take a look at what he's doing. Air Two, hold position."
"Wilco," the chopper pilot said, and he peeled off. The White Train slowed, but still it crept closer. It was now only 250 yards away from the tanker.
Cris was desperately trying to kick loose the shaped charge from the bottom of the gas tanker. The one-inch metal screws that held the metal package to the bottom of car were wiggling, but they refused to break free. As he lunged several more times, trying to dislodge it, he looked up the tracks from under the car and saw the White Train moving slowly toward him. One of the black Bell Jet Rangers had passed the Train and was flying low along the track, directly at him.
Cris had been under chopper attack before, and knew that the gunship was not flying at attack angle. If any rounds were fired at him from its current attitude, they would go high. He continued to kick at the shaped charge as the White Train rumbled slowly toward him. It was now only two hundred yards away.
"Stay back, dammit!" he screamed helplessly into the rumbling of helicopter and train-engine noise enveloping him.
"He's gonna knock the charge off!" R. V. screamed.
"We can't do it yet," Gas Can Man said. "Gotta get a little closer. Wait till it's opposite that wall. Them casket cars is tough. Gotta shred 'em to put all that sarin and anthrax high into the air where the winds'll carry it."
R. V. was looking down at the man under the tanker car, still kicking futilely at the package.
"Just shoot the motherfucker," Fannon muttered, stating the obvious. They turned to see that the dazed Reverend had moved off the air-conditioner housing and was now standing beside them looking down at the section of track.
It surprised R. V. that in the heat of it, so simple a solution had not occurred to any of them. Three members of the Choir now aimed their automatic weapons at Cris and started firing.
R. V. watched as the bullets starred the ground all around the tanker. One of the bullets hit the man under the car, knocking him clear around. R. V. could see the man's small white face looking back up at them.
"Gunfire coming from the roof of the F. A. A. building," the pilot of the leading Bell Jet Ranger said. "Condition Red. Cover me, I'm going in." He peeled away from the tanker and flew toward the roof of the huge building.
Kincaid and the Christian Choir saw the chopper coming at them and pulled their aim off of Cris to target the approaching gunship. Ten automatic rifles opened up from the roof. The noise of rapid-fire weapons filled the air, mixed with the ringing jingle of hot brass ejecting out of their gunports and bouncing on the hard cement roof.
Cris was jolted by the nine-millimeter round as it tore into him and shattered the bone in his right shoulder. It blew him around, so he was suddenly looking up at the roof of the F. A. A. building. He could see Fannon's men up there firing at him. Bullets continued to spark off the metal rails and tear up the ground around him. Then their line of fire was blocked by the black helicopter, which had pulled off him and was streaking toward the roof.
Cris couldn't move his right shoulder or arm, but he finally got swiveled around again under the tanker; on his back, with his shoulder oozing heavy arterial blood, he once again took aim at the loosened shaped charge. He positioned himself for another try. He was getting weaker. He knew he had only one good kick left in him. Using every ounce of strength that remained, he launched his foot forward…
The shaped charge flew off the belly of the tanker, but it landed ten feet away, right in the middle of the center rail that the White Train was heading down.
As the Bell Jet Ranger climbed toward the roof of the F. A. A. building, it began taking withering machine-gun fire from the F. T. R. A. S. Suddenly its gas tank ignited, and the black chopper exploded, raining hot pieces of metal and plastic all over the men on the roof of the building. The main fuselage and rotor were blown forward, then fell in two fiery pieces on top of the adjoining four-story parking structure.
The engineer of the White Train saw his "security" gunship explode, and he panicked. He decided, without orders, to get the hell out of there and make a run for it. He pushed the throttle down, but didn't see the shaped charge that had just landed directly on the track, forty yards in front of him.
Cris saw the chopper crash, then heard the White Train speeding up. He got to his feet, with maddening slowness, and began to stumble toward the shaped charge lying on the track. His right arm was limp and his destroyed right shoulder was pouring out blood.
The White Train was gaining on him. Suddenly, his vision began swimming. He felt as if he were moving in a dream. His legs were like lead, and everything was happening in slow motion. "No!" he yelled at the closing train. He knew if the White Train ran over the charge, it was still close enough to explode the tanker and blow everything to bits. But he could not keep moving forward. He stumbled, then fell.
Somebody ran past him, moving so fast that he felt the rush of air against his face. He struggled to look up, and saw Stacy reach the track a few feet away and grab the shaped charge. She started running away from the rails, carrying the package in both her hands, moving as fast as she could. She was almost to the wall.