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He reached the trees as the armored car rolled over the metal manhole cover. When he got to the fence line, he saw Nuri and the others standing near the car, staring at the sewer grate.
Da
He had just reached the top when the armored car heaved upward a good two or three feet. It fell to the right, bouncing on its springs and rolling away from the tu
Da
“There’s another! There’s another!” yelled Da
Nuri, pistol out, reached down gingerly to the dead man and pulled an automatic rifle from beneath his body.
“Get ready!” yelled Da
The truck started to back up. The gu
“What the hell is going on?” asked Nuri.
“We have to close off that entrance,” said Da
“Did that guy just lift that car off?” demanded Nuri.
“Get the gu
“Did that guy lift the cover off with the truck on it?” repeated Nuri.
“Yes—get the gu
“He can’t—they don’t have shells.”
“Get some explosive and blow it closed!” Da
“He is returning to Building B.”
Da
“But—”
“Just do it!”
“All right. We’ll figure it out.”
Tiny felt himself being carried through the house like a sack of potatoes. There were two of them—one holding him on his back, another nearby.
They were on the third floor, in the room he had come in through.
Tiny tried to move his legs but the man’s grip on them was too strong. His side pulsed with pain.
He felt himself being lifted, then thrown upward, tossed into the attic like a child’s doll. He clawed at the ground, desperate to get away, but it was useless; within seconds he was scooped up and once more flung over the back of one of the men.
The other was grunting something. It was too dark to see—Tiny’s night vision goggles had fallen off.
He heard a swinging sound, and realized the other man had grabbed an ax. They were going to chop their way out of the roof.
God, thought Tiny, I hope Bean doesn’t shoot me when he shoots them.
Bean felt the wood being smacked a few feet away. He took a step back, sliding along the peak of the roof. Da
“Flash—I got somebody trying to chop their way out up here,” he said over the radio. “Is it our guys?”
“Two of the Wolves—they have Tiny.”
“Tiny’s with these guys?”
“Yeah.”
The axe blade came up through the shingles six feet away. Bean fired at the blade, striking it point-blank. It disappeared back below.
Bean got up and ran to the hole that the axe had just made. He kicked at it with his heel, then pulled one of the tear gas canisters from his belt and dropped it through.
“Where are they?” he asked Flash.
“They look like they’re going for the stairs.”
He retreated to the edge of the roof, pulling on his gas mask. But he stopped at the edge. It didn’t make sense to go in there with them; they’d just use Tiny as a shield.
Da
Three Whiplash team members had been hurt, one seriously wounded in the leg by gunfire, the other two merely nicked by shrapnel. No one had been killed.
Yet.
There were only two Wolves still moving around in the house, but they had Tiny with them on the top floor.
There was an explosion on the other side of the fence. The tu
Da
“The knockout gas didn’t affect any of them,” said Flash. “Bean just tossed a tear gas canister into the attic. They’re still up there. I don’t think it bothered them at all.”
“Where are our guys?”
“They’re on floor three, covering the hole into the attic.”
“American!” The radio crackled with an unfamiliar voice. One of the Wolves had taken Tiny’s headset off. “We have your people.”
“Let him go and I’ll let you live,” Da
The man replied in what Da
“You will see his legs torn off!”
Tiny was still wearing the gas mask over his nose and mouth, but without the goggles his eyes had no protection, and they began stinging as soon as the canister exploded. Tears streamed from his eyes.
It was the final indignity, he thought. It was bad enough that he had to die, but now it was going to look as if he had gone out as a coward.
47
Over the Atlantic Ocean
Turk put his hand on the throttle, nudging his power up slightly to maintain his optimal cruise speed as the tailwind shifted.
It was a bit of u
But where was the fun in that? What good would airplanes be, he thought, if you couldn’t fly them?
They’d be the Sabres, still seen by the brass as the real cutting-edge answer to aviation warfare.
Wallace didn’t think so. But he’d probably retire in a year. Then no one would be talking about “ma
The hell with the future, Turk thought, marveling at the stars in his viewer. I’m flying in the here and now.
48
Northeastern Moldova
Da