The Prophet

The Prophet

The Survivalist #7

by Jerry Ahern

Copyright © 1984

by Jerry Ahern

All rights reserved.

The Prophet

A Peanut Press Book

For Jerry Kushnick— a good agent, a good friend...

Any resemblance to persons, governments, businesses, or governmental entities living, dead, or operating or having operated is purely coincidental.

Chapter One

The climb down from the rocks to their base had been hard— hard for Natalia whose skin color was still too pale, arduous for the wounded as well. Rourke again carried Natalia' s M-16, Rubenstein her pack. Cole and his two men had hung back, a rear guard against a further attack by the wildmen, but judging from the primitive quality of their actions, Rourke doubted the wildmen would come nearer the valley— at least not until it was realized that he and the others could travel the valley safely and not die from radiation— Rourke hoped.

Well ahead of them, Paul walked, the wand of the Geiger counter extended ahead of him, his voice occasionally singing back an all clear. The only danger would be a freak combining of isotopes during the small conventional blasts needed to trigger the neutron release— and if Paul Rubenstein did find a hot spot, by the time he had the reading on his Geiger counter it would be too late to save himself, given the lack of availability of any decontamination equipment.

Rourke walked on, Natalia beside him. "Go with Paul," she whispered, interrupting his thoughts.

"You want to be with Paul— in case. I know that. I would, too— go ahead."

He glanced at her, reaching out his right arm, his CAR-15 between their bodies— and he folded his arm about her waist to support her.

"I am all right," she nodded.

"Bullshit," he whispered quietly.

He craned his neck to look over his right shoulder, shouting to Lieutenant O'Neal and the others behind them, "Veer off toward that small canyon over on the left— we can rest there."

"I don't need to rest," she whispered.

"Yes, you do," he told her, then ignored her, calling out to Rubenstein ahead of them, the younger man turning around, "Paul— pull back— head toward that small canyon— get some rest!"

"Gotchya," the younger man called back, starting toward the canyon to intercept them, going at a jog-trot run.

"You want to reach Filmore Air Force Base—"

"I will," he told the Russian woman beside him. "We will— but we'll rest. A few hours off your feet and we should be able to move on. O'Neal can set up a defensive perimeter and stay here with the wounded."

"And Cole? He will come with us?"

"May as well," Rourke said through his teeth, his voice low, the canyon mouth looming closer now.

"I so much enjoy that man's company," she laughed, Rourke looking at her, feeling a smile cross his lips. "Why did you insist on defending me back there before the wildmen attacked— I could have taken care of Cole."

"I know that," Rourke nodded.

"You are the ultimate male chauvinist, John—", He looked at her, squinting against the sun through his dark-lensed glasses, but saying nothing.

He glanced back, to his right, their bodies making long shadows across the purple-tinged ground, the sun a massive red ball on the horizon. He squinted at it, wondering. A few hours' rest had turned into an exhausted night for all, Rourke anxious to reach the base, find the six eightymegaton warheads housed on the experimental missiles, anxious to return to the submarine that had transported them to the new west coast, then get the nuclear submarine's captain, Commander Gundersen, to take them back. He had lost now two weeks in the search for Sarah and the children. Rourke squinted at the rising sun again— how long would it continue to rise?

Natalia and Paul were silent as they walked, Paul only slightly ahead, using the Geiger counter just as a precaution. Captain Cole and his two surviving U.S. II troopers seemed to be talking to Rourke's left— but he couldn't hear the words. They wore navy issue arctic parkas, as did Natalia, only Rourke and Rubenstein wearing their own coats, the weather warmer now than it had been, all trace of snow gone. He judged the sunrise temperature at just below fifty.

They walked on.

Ahead of him, along the perfect road, no cracks in the pavement, no grass growing there yet, Rourke could see the entrance— the main entrance— to Filmore Air Force Base. The fences were wholly intact within the limits of his peripheral vision, and the base itself seemed untouched. There were bomb craters in the far distance beyond the base, craters he could not see now, but that he had seen the previous day with the Bushnell binoculars. As he walked, he theorized the bombing technique. An Air Force Base, it would likely have been hit early— they were not bombs, of course, but ICBMs with neutron warheads. No plane would have gotten this far in the early hours of the Night of The War. That the field itself was untouched was mere chance, no missile guidance system was that precise to drop just outside the base's perimeter and thus leave the base untouched— ready to use again.

"John—" It was Natalia.

"Yeah— I see it," and Rourke looked at her for an instant, then back toward the growing definition of the base itself— a reflection from a water tower not far inside the base fence line. Glass perhaps— glass from a scope. "When I give the word— fan out— fast," he said, loud enough that Cole and his troopers would hear, loud enough that Paul would hear as well. The younger man looked back over his shoulder then, nodded, and glanced toward the field. He had seen the reflection as well, Rourke thought. "Likely a sniper up in the water tower— that's a good sign. If it isn't the wildmen, then it's likely one of Armand Teal's people—"

"Bullets are bullets," Cole snapped without looking back.

Rourke answered nothing. He kept walking, his eyes squinted against the glare from the water tower. He was waiting for it to shift— just slightly— because the nearer they could get to the fence the better their chances would be. The sniper— if it were a sniper and he estimated that it was— would have predetermined fields of fire and ranges. There would be range markers.

As if she read his mind— he wondered if perhaps she could— Natalia rasped, "There is a small pile of rocks by the side of the road twenty yards ahead— the rocks are darker than most of the others here."

He only nodded. The sniper would attempt to hold his fire until they were near the marker. He would have used the Pythagorean Theory to calculate the range, the height of the water tower a known side of the triangle, then paced out distance to the marker, the second known leg. The third side of the triangle would simply be a basic computation then, the scope zeroed for that distance. A good man, under such fixed conditions, using a good rifle— like his own SteyrMannlicher SSG. he thought absently— could use an eyeball as a target and hit it. The bullet drop figures would be memorized, or more efficiently printed out and taped to the stock for instant consultation.

He wished he had the Steyr now— given its near unbelievable accuracy in a production rifle designed specifically for counter-sniper utility, and given his familiarity with the weapon, he could use the glare of the scope in the tower as his target— "I saw it move," Natalia murmured.

"Yeah," he nodded. "So did I." He was counting to himself, trying to pace the man. If he could disperse the potential targets at the precise instant before the man would shoot, that would give them more time to run and seek cover before another aimed round could be fired. Snipers, by their very nature, had to be precise.

His palms sweated.

"Take cover!" He shouted the words, pushing Natalia with his right hand, running left. There was a loud crack— a nonmilitary rifle, he decided. The glare from the scope shifted as Rourke shouted, "Throw some fire up there!"

He could hear the lighter cracks of the M-16s Natalia, Cole, and the two U.S. II troopers carried. Rubenstein wasn't shooting— there wasn't the familiar 9mm burping of the German MP4O. It was a close-range weapon.

Rourke threw himself to the dirt, the CAR-15 snapping up to his right shoulder, his legs spread wide, his left hand ripping away the scope covers, dropping them as the hand settled to the foreend, the first finger of his right hand touching the Colt's trigger, the reticle settled on the glare of the scope. The rifle wasn't built for tack-driving accuracy at two hundred and fifty yards, nor was the scope.

He fired once, twice, a third time, then snatched up his scope covers from the dirt by the side of the road, pushed himself to his feet and started to run again, the heavy-caliber rifle from the water tower firing again.

The fence line was less than fifty yards and he ran toward it, glancing once behind him and to the right— Natalia and the others were running, firing, short bursts aimed at the general direction of the tower, to make the sniper hesitate before firing, to buy an extra second.

A rock near Rourke's right boot exploded, dust and rock chips flying up from it as the crack of the rifle came again. Rourke kept running, the fence now twenty-five yards.

He brought the CAR-15 up, pumping the trigger three more times, at once trying to draw fire toward himself and to pin down the sniper. The sniper rifle cracked again, Rourke feeling a searing pain in his left ear. "Shit!" he snarled, his stride breaking as he stumbled, but he caught his balance, kept running.

Natalia's voice— "John!"

"Okay," he shouted back, running, his breath coming hard now, the fence less than ten yards away. "Gotta go over the fence—"

"Electrified!" Cole was shouting now.

"Bullshit— not enough power— I hope!" He kept running, five yards remaining. "Cole— you and your men, keep that sniper tucked down— Paul and Natalia and I'll go over first."

"Barbed wire, John!" It was Paul.

Rourke didn't answer him, nearing the fence now, shifting his pack off to the ground, the rifle in his right hand shifting to his left so he could turn it around, the safety going on, his right hand grasping the assault rifle backwards, his left hand reaching out for the fence as he threw himself against it, his right boot finding a brace against the chain link, his right hand snapping the rifle up, the butt plate catching on the top line of barbed wire, Rourke hauling himself up, freeing the rifle, heavy assault rifle fire from behind him now, the sound of bullets ricocheting off the metal of the water tower, Rourke slipping his left arm from the leather bomber jacket, grasping the rifle with his left hand, hooking the pistol grip over the wire, holding now by the butt stock.

The sharp crack of the sniper's rifle— a loud pinging sound as he glanced right— the nearest vertical support for the chain link was dimpled and bright. He freed the bomber jacket from his right arm, throwing it inside out over the wire, the heavy leather of it over the barbs. "Paul!"

The younger man shouted something Rourke couldn't hear, but he could feel the fence shaking, hear the rattling sound of the chain links against one another, Rourke throwing his weight down and to the side, further compressing the barbed wire.

Rubenstein went past him, up, over, and dropping. "Shit—"

"Natalia!"

His right hand grasped at the chain links nearest him, his grip on the CAR-15's butt stock slipping a little. He could hear the fence rattle again, the woman going past him, up, over the fence. He followed her with his eyes— she landed as gracefully as a cat after the twelve-foot drop. She was already moving, her M-16 spitting fire, Rubenstein running, limping slightly.

"Cole!"

Rourke's left arm ached— the armpit burning as his muscles screamed at him. The fence shook and rattled again, then Cole was up, past him, dropping, the man after him stopping at the top of the fence, firing a burst from his M-16, more of the assault rifle fire coming from inside the compound now, but not all from Natalia and Cole. There was the lighter rattle of Rubenstein's subgun, a short burst, then another and another.

The second of the U.S. II troopers was coming, up, over the top of the fence.

Rourke threw his body weight left, his right arm reaching out, grasping at the chain links. The heavy crack of the sniper rifle, part of the chain link supporting him peeling back as the bullet sliced it.

Rourke released his grip with his right hand, throwing his hand up and out, catching again at the fence, hauling himself up, leaving the CAR-15, its sling entangled in the broken section of chain link, leaving his bomber jacket as well. He hauled himself to the top, throwing his weight over, sideways, his legs in clear air, his hands releasing their grips. He dropped, hitting the dirt hard, losing his balance, rolling.

He pushed himself up, snatching at the Detonics .45 under his left armpit and then the one under his right. He started to run. The heavy-caliber rifle discharged again, into the concrete near his feet as he hit the road again, more assault rifle fire coming from a squat bunker-like building a hundred yards distant, another heavy-caliber sniper shot, Cole cursing, "Damn— shattered my stock." Rourke didn't bother to look. There was a sentry house fifteen yards to his right and he aimed for it, Natalia and Paul Rubenstein there already, Paul firing up into the water tower with his pistol— seventy-five yards at least and useless— and Natalia pumping neat, three-round bursts from her M-16.

Rourke reached the sentry house, slamming himself against it, Natalia firing again, catching his breath. He looked at her, leaning down as he did, putting his head toward his knees.

"Are you all right— your— your ear—"

Rourke suddenly remembered it, touching at it. "Are you all right— how's your abdomen after going over that fence—"

"I can tell where your suture line from the operation was," she smiled. "But I'm all right— you're a good surgeon. Let me look at your ear—"

"No time— gotta—"

"Let me look at your ear," she ordered, stepping closer to him. "Paul!"

Rubenstein turned toward them, Rourke looking up, Natalia handing Paul her rifle.

"Try this—"

"Right," he nodded, pushing his wire-rimmed glasses back off the bridge of his nose, taking the assault rifle and leaning around the edge of the sentry house. The sniper rifle fired again, the report louder this time.

"Three fifty-seven H&H maybe," she said absently.

Rourke nodded, sucking in his breath hard as she touched at his ear. "Paul— you were limping."

"I'm fine— just gave myself a little twist— worked it out when I ran."

"Good," Rourke nodded, fighting the pain again, gritting his teeth as he felt her probe the wound.

"You should have a scar— you are very lucky. Like they say in your American movies—" her voice was soft, low— a perfect alto. "Just a crease. It really was— a lot of blood, small tear in your flesh on the upper portion of the outer ear."

"The helix," Rourke corrected.

"As a doctor, you call it the helix— as a KGB major with only some first aid training, I'll call it the upper portion of the outer ear, thank you."

"Right," Rourke groaned.

"It's bled enough, I don't think there's risk of infection— medical kit is in your pack?"

"You got it," he nodded.

"I think the bleeding is stopping—"

"Probably start up again when Paul and I head for that water tower," he told her mechanically, then raised his voice, moving away from her, toward the edge of the sentry house. "Cole?"

"Here!" The U.S. II captain's voice came from behind a truck— a two-and-one-half ton— parked just beyond the second gate, the gate swung closed now but nothing locking it as Rourke glanced down the road. "Maybe three or four guys— that low building!"

"Keep 'em pinned down— assume they've got a lot of ammo— so don't worry about burning up yours," Rourke called back.

He looked behind him to Rubenstein. "Give Natalia back the M-16— we both head through the gates, then you to the left and me to the right. Once you're inside twenty-five yards of the tower, find some cover and keep burning sticks into the tower. I'm climbing it—"

"Let me— get you bleedin' again."

"No," and Rourke turned toward Natalia. "You keep him pinned down— the sniper— keep him down while Paul and I make the run, then give Paul some fire support while I climb. We'll be okay— that scope won't help him at the distance."

"All right," she nodded, her blue eyes wide. "Be careful."

Rourke felt his face seam with a smile. "I always am," he whispered. The Detonics stainless .45s in his fists, he glanced to Rubenstein. "You ready?"

"Aww, sure," Rubenstein smiled. "Nothin' like a good running gun battle to start the day off right."

Natalia laughed. Rourke didn't. "Let's go," he rasped through his teeth.

He started to run.

He hit the gate a half-step ahead of Rubenstein, shoving against it, the gate swinging wide, Rubenstein shouting, "Race ya— I'm younger!"

Rourke laughed then, yelling, "Bullshit!" He bent into a run, his arms at his sides, his fists balled on the black checkered rubber Pachmayr grips, his feet hammering against the concrete road surface, the concussion of each step rattling through his frame, feeling the warm moisture of blood again by the upper portion of his left ear.

Rubenstein wasn't outdistancing him, but was keeping even as Rourke glanced left, the New Yorker with the high forehead pushing his glasses up on his nose again as he ran, his right hand holding the subgun tensioned on its sling away from his body. He was nearing a Jeep.

"Go for it, Paul— watch if he hits the gas tank!"

"Gotchya!"

Rourke kept running, his heart pounding in his chest— he felt himself smile. Rubenstein was younger— Rourke threw himself against the timbers supporting the water tower, hearing the boom of the rifle overhead, hearing the pinging sound as a shot ricocheted off the Jeep behind which Paul had taken cover. There was the rattle of subgun fire, Rourke catching his breath, working his way around to the rear of the water tower. Assault rifle fire hammered into the timbers— from the low blockhouse.

"Cole!" Rourke shouted, not knowing if the U.S. captain could hear him. But did Cole think he really still needed him? They had reached the base— if the missiles were here— but there was still Armand Teal, Rourke's old friend, the base commander— he was still to deal with.

Assault rifle fire from the deuce and a half— the fire aimed toward him by the timbers ebbed.

Rourke upped the safety catches on both Detonics pistols, holstering them in the double Alessi rig, securing the trigger guard breaks. He started up, hand over hand, diagonally, following the pattern of the cross timbers. He laughed at himself. In high school years ago, some of his friends had dared him to climb a water tower, to spray paint the name of the local football team there before the homecoming game. He'd declined it— vandalism. But now he was doing it— instead of with a can of spray paint, with two automatic pistols, a .357 Magnum revolver and a knife.

Irony, he thought. "Irony."

He kept going, more assault rifle fire hammering into the timbers around him, then answering fire from Cole and his men. There was fire from Natalia's position— he relied on her accuracy with his life, climbing under her line of fire to reach the parapet around the water tower where the sniper lay.

He kept going, judging the distance remaining as perhaps thirty feet. The rattle, the chatter of Rubenstein's submachine gun. The boom of the sniper rifle.

Twenty feet to go. Reaching out to a timber above him, the timber gave way, Rourke losing his balance, reaching out with his hands, finding the diagonal reaching support, his feet swinging in midair, then finding a purchase. He started up again.

Fifteen feet to go.

Rourke kept moving, more assault rifle fire coming at him, more answering fire, then the original fire ebbing.

Once the sniper was removed— one way or the other— he thought, they could close with the men in the blockhouse. Ten feet. Five feet.

Rourke swung under the parapet, the boom of the sniper rifle was what he was waiting for.

He heard it, could hear the bolt being speed-cocked, pushed himself up, rolling onto the parapet, squinting against the rising sun as he snatched the Python from the flap holster on his right hip, the six inch, Metalifed and Mag-Na-Ported Colt snaking forward as the sniper turned, the muzzle of his rifle a gaping, black hole.

"John— John? Here?"

The voice. The face— worn, exhausted, oddly smiling.

Rourke lowered the muzzle of the Python. "Armand Teal," he almost whispered. Without another word, Teal shouted at the top of his lungs, "Hold your fire! These are friends! Hold your fire!"

The fire from the blockhouse stopped. The sun was fully up on the horizon now. It was quiet except for the shuffling of feet on the road surface below as the blockhouse began to empty.

Chapter Two

Sarah Rourke had dug the grave, her hands aching from the rough stick she had used to claw at the ground, Michael beside her scooping handfuls of dirt away still. It was shallow, but Millie Jenkins had only been a little girl, and the earth here would be deep enough to hold her, to cover her— forever.

Sarah stared at the yawning grave— her spine tingled with what her husband John had once told her was a type of involuntary paroxysm. She called it terror.

"That's deep enough," she whispered, reaching out and touching her son's shoulder.

He looked up at her, his face and hands dirty from the dirt of the grave. More dirt as he smudged away sweat from his forehead.

"It's deep enough," she repeated slowly.

"I'm gonna kill every one of them."

She turned around when she heard the voice— it was Bill Mulliner. "No, you're not," she whispered. "You have your mother to take care of— us to help take care of."

She took her son's hand in hers, still looking at Bill Mulliner for an instant longer, then looking at Michael's hand. The bleeding had stopped as she removed the bandana handkerchief she'd used as a bandage. "You wash your hands, Michael— it'll hurt. Use soap with the canteen water."

"You, too," he told her, smiling, his eyes not smiling, though. His right hand and her left had been wounded simultaneously as she'd held his hand, the edge of her hand, the fleshy part of his behind the thumb.

"I will," she told him. "After we bury Millie."

"I will, too, then— after we bury Millie."

She only nodded...

Mary Mulliner stood alone, even though Bill was beside her. He didn't reach out to his mother. He clenched his own hands together in prayer. Annie stood beside the grave, staring down into it, at the blanket-wrapped body of the slightly older little girl— a girl Annie had played with on and off since the morning after the Night of The War. Annie looked up at her then, Sarah hearing the words the little girl— her daughter— spoke. "Will the worms eat her— will they eat Millie up?

On television once they talked about this man being buried and the worms ate his—"

Sarah dropped to her knees, loosing Michael's hand, hugging the little girl to her. "Annie—

don't—"

Annie cried, like she used to cry when you told her she had done something wrong, Sarah thought. "Millie isn't here now," Sarah began. "She's gone to—"

Sarah looked up. Bill Mulliner was singing.

"Amazing grace, how sweet the sound—"

His voice was poor, hoarse, choked sounding. Mary Mulliner began to sing as well.

"That saved a wretch like me—"

Sarah made herself join them, her own children silent, crying. "I once was lost—" she murmured...

The grave was covered with rocks Annie and Michael had gathered, rocks of all sizes and colors, quartz types Sarah recognized— she had tried jewelry making once as a hobby— and others she couldn't. Bill Mulliner, an M-16 in his right hand, another slung cross-body across his back, stared away from them, at the grave, Sarah thought.

"Don't know if David Balfry got hisself away," Bill's voice came, still choked sounding. "With Pete Critchfield away and all, though— there should still be a Resistance left, leastways— we'll find him. Find a safe place for you, Mrs. Rourke— and for Mom."

"Yes, Bill," Sarah answered.

"We can find 'em" Bill Mulliner said.

Sarah said nothing— there was no choice with Soviet troops all throughout the countryside. And there was nowhere else to go, anyway. "Yes, Bill," she said again... Chapter Three

The almost cylindrical-shaped coffin emitted a blue light— a ghostly light, Colonel Nehemiah Rozhdestvenskiy thought. He stared at the cylinder, the form inside it, the myriad lights on the console attached with electrical conduit to it. He turned to the man beside him. "When will you know, Dr. Vostov?"

"You realize, colonel," the white-haired, white-coated man beside him began, removing his glasses, gesturing with his pipe, "that testing under field conditions is the only real way to evaluate—"

"You realize, Comrade Doctor, that to test under actual field conditions is totally impossible."

"This has not escaped me, Comrade Colonel." And Vostov looked away.

Rozhdestvenskiy could see his own and the doctor' s reflection in the glass between them and the swirling blue lights of the coffin-like object. "Perhaps if more of the details surrounding this Eden Project affair of the Americans were made available to me—"

"You have been given, Comrade Doctor, as much of the scientific data as concerns the Eden Project as we ourselves have—"

"Then perhaps," and he turned to face the doctor as he saw the doctor's reflected image on the glass, turning to face him, "Comrade Colonel— perhaps you have not the sufficient data yourself," and Vostov's eyebrows raised, the man replacing his glasses. "If the Americans placed such faith in this, this Eden Project, they evidently knew something which we do not, something perhaps we should know in order to achieve the success you so desire—"

"The subject was a volunteer, was he not?"

"The man in there? A volunteer given the choice of participating in the experiment or immediate execution— yes. I suppose he could be called a volunteer, Comrade Colonel."

"His life signs?"

"We do not know what to expect— of course they are not normal. I developed the serum— I have tested the serum— with only some success. Never on such a complex mechanism as the human body."

"His physical condition was perfect, was it not?" Rozhdestvenskiy asked.

Vostov smiled, removing his glasses again, sucking at his pipe, as if phrasing his answer— like a professor before a classroom of dolts, Rozhdestvenskiy thought. "No physical specimen is perfect. Even yourself, colonel. I have seen your medical records, all of the KGB Elite Corps medical records. Your weight and blood pressure and all other factors are perfect for your age, your physical size. You yourself are as close to a perfect physical specimen as one might wish to be."

Rozhdestvenskiy smiled. "But?"

"But— perfect as you are, have you never had a cold? A sudden mysterious and lingering pain, which then vanished? If we understood the human body perfectly, our task would be a simple one. If dormant cancer cells were present in the subject, for example, would the process trigger their activity? And, of course, the obvious question which has so beleaguered our previous research in the Soviet scientific establishment. A living body and a dead brain are useless."

"I asked you— you have not answered me," and Rozhdestvenskiy returned his gaze to the cylinder beyond the glass, the blinking lights, the bluish haze emitting from the transparent upper portion. The cold, blue-seeming face inside. "When will you know?"

"I shall attempt to discover the answer you seek— shortly. Very shortly."

Rozhdestvenskiy sighed. "Shortly. The Womb— work here goes on apace, the weapons and supplies coming in. Should your experiment fail—"

"Then we shall not," Vostov smiled into the glass, the sucking sound of his pipe audible in the otherwise total stillness. "We shall not be able to worry, hmm?"

Rozhdestvenskiy continued to stare at the man inside the cylinder. "Live," he mentally ordered him.

Chapter Four

Teal picked up the rifle, then handed it across to Rourke. Rourke looked at it briefly. A Whitworth Express— Interarms had imported it— and the caliber was as Natalia had guessed,

.357 H&H Magnum. The scope cost more than the rifle— a Kables.

"Odd combination," Rourke smiled, setting the rifle down on the metal conference table.

"Bought the rifle— had it custom stocked— like that barrel bedding. The thing would print minute of angle at two hundred yards with an el cheapo scope on it. Figured the rifle was fine—

needed a better scope. My son was in Germany— he picked up the Kables for me when he was on a leave— that was—" And Teal stopped talking.

Rourke cleared his throat, finding one of his dark tobacco cigars, lighting it in the blue-yellow flame of his Zippo. "I, ahh— I understand a lot of our people survived over there— still fighting the Russians— maybe Retch is still alive."

"Yeah," Teal nodded, licking his lips, looking away. "Yeah— maybe— maybe he is."

Rourke exhaled the smoke, watched it drift upward, then dissipate.

"See— ahh— we don't know much here. Like you said about this new thing— U.S. II. And Sam Chambers being President— last I knew he was filling a new Cabinet post— science and technology."

"He was the only one left."

"How is he— I mean— a— a— a good President?"

"He's got problems— he's trying his best," Rourke told him honestly.

"You sure we can trust her?" Teal asked, looking at Natalia sitting between them, then at Rourke.

"I am Russian— I don't want your people to have any more weapons. But I don't want either side to use any more. I'm his friend. You can trust me until I tell you that you can't," she answered for Rourke.

"Seems fair," Teal shrugged. "Anyway— nothin' top secret about it. See— the Night of The War, like you folks call it— well. Ever heard of EMP?"

Rourke nodded.

"ENP?" It was Rubenstein, from Rourke's left.

"EMP," Teal corrected.

"Electro Magnetic Pulse," Rourke added.

"A detonation sends shock waves through the atmosphere— the bigger the detonation and the higher up it is, the greater the shock-wave effect, roughly," Natalia said, looking past Rourke at Paul.

"Mustn't have been too big or you folks woulda known about it," Teal said, his eyes moving, shifting from Rourke and past Rubenstein toward the other side of the conference table, where Cole sat, his two troopers stationed outside the bunker with the bunker defenders. "Wiped out all our communications— destroyed the printed circuitry in all our aircraft— nothing got off the ground after the first scramble. I don't even wanna think about those guys up there— suddenly, all their electrical systems go out— no communications— they—"

Teal fell silent for a moment. "We got the communications restored after a while— scrounged up all the old vacuum tubes I could find and with Airman Raznewicz we made up a working radio. Couldn't reach too far with it though. Got several of the helicopters and a dozen fighters to where they'd work. Figured we'd at least have something our guys could use when we got help. But, ahh—" Teal lit a cigarette. "Got plenty of these— the BX just sent a shipment in day before it—

it, ahh— happened. Enough for a couple thousand guys hooked like me for a—"

"How did you survive, colonel?" Cole asked, Rourke looking at Cole across the table, then down into his hands.

"With everybody on alert, I— ahh— I was in the command bunker here. With the intelligence people— you know?" He puffed on the cigarette. "In the intelligence vault. We got hit— no warning at all. The senior airman on vault duty jumped for the door and slammed it shut— he was on the outside. I wrote up a commendation for him— don't know if he has a family left to know about it. He saved our lives, though. For what, I—" Teal looked at his cigarette. "I thought— when we tried our communications— when we didn't get anybody. I thought maybe we were the last ones. All the old frequencies— dead. Lot of Soviet jamming. Didn't know—

only eighteen of us survived the whole thing— most electronic intelligence guys, couple of senior officers.

"There were television security monitors inside— that was before the pulse. We watched the missiles falling— thought we were all— but then people just started dying. You could watch

'em— just dying. Sick— just, ahh—" Teal stopped, stubbing out his cigarette— a Marlboro—

and taking another cigarette— a Winston. "See, I try all the different brands— so do the rest of the guys. So when one brand runs out, it won't be that— hard to take," and Teal sank his face into his hands. Rourke thought he heard a sob, covered up with a cough, then Teal looked up, his eyes wet.

"Thought maybe— well— we were the only Americans left at all— anywhere."

Rourke inhaled hard on his cigar— it had gone out. He took the Zippo and relit it.

"Couldn't bury the guys when we got out," Teal continued. "Just too many of them— thirty-four hundred and twenty-eight. Thirty-four hundred and twenty-eight. Not just guys, women, too. Some wives and kids— my wife—"

Teal stood up, his chair falling backward, slamming and echoing against the concrete floor. He walked away from the table, Rourke watching him, knowing everyone else was watching him, too.

There was nothing to say...

They sat now outside the bunker, the sun strong at nearly midday, Rourke eating a Milky Way from the BX, Natalia smoking from a fresh carton of cigarettes. "This is my brand— my favorite one. I always liked your American cigarettes," she said suddenly.

"We hauled all the bodies," Teal began again suddenly. "Hauled 'em— over there," and Rourke followed with his eyes where Teal gestured— a burnt-out hangar across the field. "Took us—

well— a long time. And the bodies— well. By that time— but we couldn't use a wooden structure— afraid the fire would spread. Had plenty of aircraft fuel though. So we doused all the bodies with it. One of the airmen used to live in Kentucky— worked at a fireworks factory for a while. Said he knew how to blow things up. We let him do it after I— I prayed—"

Natalia dragged hard on the cigarette— a Pall Mall.

Rubenstein visibly swallowed. "We did something like that— John and I did— we were on a plane— the Night of The War— some guys came along. We call 'em Brigands— men and women. They, ahh—"

"A massacre," Rourke finished for him. "What about your position here— I didn't see eighteen men. The wildmen? That why the sniper post?"

"Yeah— that and the Russians if we ever see 'em— guess we aren't important."

Cole laughed.

Rourke looked at him.

"Wildmen— good a name as any," Teal laughed. "See— I'm the only qualified pilot. And I couldn't leave the base— give up my command— maybe there would be something we could do, you know? So I sent out four men— just to get the lay of the land. They had decontamination suits— everything. Should have come back. But they never came back— not at all." Teal lit a cigarette, Rourke watching as he took another bite of the Milky Way. With a medical kit, Natalia had cleaned and bandaged his left ear. He'd taken a painkiller— a mild one— but it had somehow made him hungry.

"See," Teal continued. "We didn't have any idea about the outside world— figured the only way I could tell what to do, if there were anything to do— anything— well, we needed intelligence. Pretty much all we had left here. Intelligence men. I decided to risk three more men— if I could get volunteers. Well," and Teal threw down the cigarette, stubbing it out under the heel of his combat boot. "I got 'em," he sighed. "Only one of 'em returned. But he died right away afterward. He talked about these crazy guys— half-civilized, almost half-animal— like somethin' out of some el cheapo sci-fi movie, ya know?"

Rourke nodded, that he knew.

"Anyway— they killed their victims by burning em on crosses—"

"How did this man escape?" Natalia asked, putting out her cigarette against the concrete steps on which she sat, her M-16 across her knees.

"Cut to pieces with some kind of spear— least that's what he said it was. Thought he was dead and stripped him, then rolled him down a hillside. Came to— freezing, bleeding. Crawled along the bottom of the hill. He could see the crosses burning, hear the other men screaming. He was a tough guy— had the survival training course. Found a stray wildman— killed him with a rock. Took some of his clothes, used the guy's spear like a cane or a staff— he hobbled in, almost dead already." Teal paused, lighting another cigarette, looking up at Rourke standing beside him.

"Fletch's age, John— just a kid. Died in my arms."

Rourke ran his tongue over his lips, nodding.

"That gave me eleven men," Teal said, his voice low. "I wasn't gonna risk anybody else. Figured to wait and see. That was three weeks ago. One of the guys— an officer. He went insane, I guess— shot himself in the mouth with a 45. Another guy— Airman Cummins. Got what we all figured was appendicitis— boy, we could have used you, John. We don't have a doctor. I tried—

got the medical books out— tried. He died."

"If it ruptures and you don't know what to do— the poison spreads pretty quick," Rourke said soberly.

"Yeah— it was kinda quick— I guess. So I got nine men and myself. I got five sleeping right now, one man guarding 'em. Three others— sentry posts around the base with the best excuses for sniper rifles we could come up with. Lotta guys had personal weapons we had logged in and locked up. Picked the best we could find outa those. These aren't so good for long distance stuff," and he tapped the butt stock of the M-16 on Natalia's lap.

"We held the base though," Teal concluded, then fell silent.

"The wildmen," Natalia said, half to herself. "They must think there is still radiation here. That must be why they haven't attacked."

"But with us coming in— they'll probably figure it's safe," Rubenstein added.

"To attack," Rourke almost whispered.

"To attack," Teal nodded.

Cole spoke then. "I came for the missiles you store here— and wildmen crazies or not, I've gotta have 'em, colonel. I've gotta."

Rourke studied Cole. For the first time— "I've gotta have 'em"—he thought Cole had spoken the truth.

Chapter Five

"Russians all over the road," Bill Mulliner whispered hoarsely, sliding down into the rocks beside her.

Sarah looked at him, saying nothing for a moment, then, "What started this?"

"Maybe the supply convoy we hit— bunch of junk. Like they was hoardin' stuff, Mrs. Rourke."

Sarah looked at him. "Like what?" she asked at last.

"Everythin'— M-16s, even old .45s. Pharmaceutical stuff. Medical gear. You name it, they had it— even golf carts."

"Golf carts?"

"Yeah— the battery-operated kind. Don't know why they'd want themselves golf carts. I used to tinker with one of 'em when I was a kid. Never could get the damn thing to run— 'scuse my language, ma'am."

Sarah only nodded, looking away from Bill Mulliner and down below the rocks where the children stayed with Mary, Bill's mother. "Golf carts," she nodded, incredulous. "Guns, drugs, golf carts— that's crazy."

"Yes, ma'am— but they had themselves a ton of guys round 'em. The trucks, I mean. Big fight—

we beat hell out of 'em— there I go again with my language."

"Never mind," and she smiled at him, patting his right hand with her left.

"Had 'em on the run we did— set fire to some of the trucks— carted off some stuff— then more Russians came. Helicopters— shot us all to— well. You know, ma'am."

"Mmm," she nodded, thinking.

"Maybe we can hole up here in the mountains."

"Sure," Sarah laughed. "No food except what you had on you in your pack. Some stuff I had. Enough ammunition maybe for one good ten minute fight. Two children, a sixty-two-year-old woman, you and me— I don't think so," she told him, smiling again, not knowing why she was smiling.

"There's Russians all over like flies on a horse tur—" He looked at her, shook his head at himself as he cut himself off, then looked away. "Ya hang around men all the time— no womenfolk around," he said. "Well— you know, ma'am."

"I know," she nodded. "Can't expect to sound like a saint when you're a soldier," and she hugged his shoulders with her left arm. "Ohh, Bill— I wish—"

"I wish we had about fifty people could fight— we could knock out them Russians down there on the road— steal what we need from em."

"But we don't," Sarah sighed...

Chapter Six

Paul Rubenstein felt almost civilized again, he thought. Riding in a truck cab with someone else doing the driving wasn't exactly a taxi ride in Manhattan— although the bumpiness made for similar moments— but it was a definite improvement over walking out the distance to get Lieutenant O'Neal and the others from the shore party. There were two trucks— Rubenstein looking back in the sideview mirror through the dust cloud— and an ambulance following behind. The driver was Airman Standish— he was black, and Colonel Teal had told Rubenstein Standish was the man who had worked at the fireworks factory in Kentucky, the man who had taken on the grim task of setting fire to the corpses from the Night of The War.

"What's this Dr. Rourke fella like, Mr. Rubenstein?"

"Paul— my first name's Paul."

"Right— mine is Art. So what's he like?"

"Quiet— sometimes you get the feeling there's a lot boiling over inside him, but he never lets it get out. Self-control— that's what it is, I guess. That's what he's like."

"Some of the fellas was talkin'— you know. Sayin' this Rourke was in CIA or somethin'."

"Before The War— lot of clandestine operations in Latin America. Then after some big fiasco down there— he talks about it every once in a while. Figures he was set up by a double agent, maybe. But he got disgusted with it. Freelanced his services in survival and weapons training—

all over the world, really. He wrote a bunch of books on survival, medical aspects of survival training, survival weapons use. Probably the top man in the field. Had everything goin' for him. I read a lot of his books— good writer. Not a half-bad sense of humor— shows up in his writing more than his talking."

"What the hell you guys doin' out here?" And Standish worked the two-and-one-half ton truck's transmission down, the gears grinding loudly, O'Neal and the others in the box canyon less than two hundred yards ahead.

"What are we doin' here? Looking for six missiles."

"The experimental ones?"

"Yeah—"

"They're a long way from here, fella," and Standish laughed, gesturing up toward the high rocks beyond the boundary of the valley. Rubenstein saw what he pointed at— wildmen.

Chapter Seven

Rourke sat in the cockpit of the prototyped FB-111 HX, running the preflight check, Armand Teal on the access ladder beside him, coaching him. Rourke had never flown an F-111-type aircraft, he'd told Teal. "That's your targeting computer— there," Teal gestured, pointing past Rourke.

Rourke nodded. "Where are those missiles Cole wants?"

"About seventy-five miles away from here— past the wildmen, like you call 'em." Teal's voice echoed across the otherwise still hangar. "You're never gonna get 'em out with those crazies out there."

"Maybe you're right," Rourke sighed.

"They've got enough megatonnage to totally blot out a city the size of Moscow— and then some. Maybe that's what U.S. II wants 'em for."

"Never get through their particle beam defenses," Rourke noted absently, studying the fuel management panel in the control console to his left.

"Reconnaissance should tell the story, John— from what I figure and what you and the Russian woman told me— well. Those crazies are all over. We're trapped here unless we get out by air—

and I can't leave this base intact. Goes against everything I was taught, everything I believe. Leave it to fall into enemy hands. Never. The President could even order something like that—

and I wouldn't. Only way to get those missile warheads out is by air. And that means helicoptering 'em here at least. Then put 'em aboard a B-52 and take 'em out."

"The Soviets have to have radar systems going— they could pick off a B-52."

"Fine— then that damn submarine. But you'll still need to use helicopters to get them out to the submarine. The Russian woman flies?"

"Yeah " Rourke nodded, looking at him.

"Well, there's your answer."

"I haven't seen a helicopter anywhere on this base."

"Three of 'em in the last hangar on the end. Army choppers— Bell OH-58A Kiowas. Had 'em flown in here just before the Night of The War. There was a joint services exercise being planned— never got all the details."

"That hangar locked up?" Rourke asked him.

"You're thinkin' of Cole, right? I don't trust him either. And, yeah— it's locked." Rourke looked back to the instrument panels.

He studied the counter-measure warning lights on the upper right. "Counter-measures," he murmured...

Rourke looked behind him, the action awkward feeling in the borrowed pilot's helmet, Natalia sitting there, one more seat in the fighter bomber empty. He heard her voice coming through the headset built into the helmet. "You've been wanting to ask me something." The voice sounded odd— oddly near, yet different because of the radio link.

"I didn't know how to ask you," he told her, working the controls for the television optical unit positioned almost directly beneath where he sat, in the base of the fuselage. "I wasn't certain how I could ask this without somehow making you think I distrusted you— but I don't."

"Is Cole a Russian?"

"Yes," Rourke nodded, saying into his helmet radio. "Yes— that was the question. I think I asked it before."

"And you want to know if anything he might have said, might have done— might have jogged a memory or made me change my mind?"

"Yes."

"He isn't a Russian— I suppose he could be a clever GRU agent, but he isn't KGB— and I do not think he is Russian at all. Not working for my Uncle, or for Colonel Rozhdestvenskiy either—"

"Rozhdestvenskiy," Rourke repeated, watching the television monitor, rolling the name on his tongue. "The man who replaced—"

"Yes," she interrupted.

"Karamatsov."

"Yes."

"Then who the hell is Cole?" Rourke said, exasperated, still watching the monitor. He had the camera set to high-resolution zoom, manipulating the angle now to scan the ground thousands of feet below them. He saw movement, men— women likely, as well. Wildmen. They appeared like ants. He started to bank the fighter bomber, rolling over into a dive to drop his altitude.

"I don't know who he is— not an American officer, I think. I have met many people in your American military— and if he is an officer, he doesn't act like one."

Rourke switched the television optical unit to off as he leveled out, skimming the ground now, consulting the fuel management panel cursorily, then glancing to his right and down, checking the compass control panel. "The signature on those orders," Rourke said finally. "It was Chambers's signature— I've seen it before."

"Yes— so have I."

"And I could see Chambers wanting the missiles as a bargaining tool against your people."

"Yes— so could I."

"But there's just something—"

"He would have needed Chambers's help to get the submarine," he heard her voice saying in his headset. "I mean, Commander Gundersen— he is very nice. He seems just as he should seem."

"Yes," Rourke agreed. "No— if Cole is trying to fool us, he's already fooled Gundersen at least enough to get his help."

"I sometimes get very sick of this— this War. The weather, the color of the sky— I think it all means something. And now this thing— this crazy man sent to obtain four hundred eighty megatons in thermonuclear warheads. All is madness, I think."

"You're thinking in Russian, speaking in English."

He heard her laugh then. "You know me so well— perhaps we two are the ultimate madness, John— aren't we?"

Rourke said nothing.

There was nothing he could say. Beneath them, shaking hands and arms and clubs and spears, were the wildmen— hundreds of them. He started the jet climbing as he saw assault rifles raised skyward, on the off chance a stray shot might hit something vital. As the fighter bomber left a black shadow on the ground beneath them— Rourke watching now through the television optical unit again— he saw more of the wildmen— or whoever they were.

"You talked about madness," he whispered into the radio in his helmet. But Natalia didn't answer.

Chapter Eight

Paul Rubenstein adjusted the power wattage selector, then checked the modulation indicator, Airman Stephensen sitting beside him. "You know," the airman laughed, "for a couple amateurs, we're doin' okay with this old radio."

"The U.S. II frequency for contact is easy to find— but they'll have to contact us after they pick up our signal— if they pick up our signal," Rubenstein told him, trying to fine tune the squelch control.

"Where'd you learn about radios?" Airman Stephensen asked.

"I was gut shot a while back— in the infirmary where I was there were lots of military manuals— I started reading up on radios— only thing I had to do. Then I took it easy for a while at John's Retreat— read about radios there, too— and lots of other stuff."

Rubenstein stood up from the antiquated radio set, pushing the metal folding chair back and walking across the room in the lower level of the bunker, stretching, his hands splayed against his kidneys, the small of his back aching.

"What's this Retreat thing you keep mentioning?" Stephensen asked, turning his chair around, making a scraping noise where the rubber cups on the legs of the chair rubbed against the tile on the floor. Stephensen— tall looking even when seated, carrot-haired and broad-faced— lit a cigarette with a match, flicking the match into the ashtray on the table beside the radio.

"The Retreat," and Rubenstein shrugged. "Well— John planned ahead for a war— or whatever. He was a survivalist for a long time. I guess he was a sharper reader of the times than most people— I don't know. But he's got this place in the mountains— in Georgia. Worked on it for years— comfortable, all the conveniences— must've cost him a fortune—"

What'd Dr. Rourke do before The War— I mean? Just a doctor— like a surgeon or something?"

"No," and Rubenstein realized he was smiling.

"No— he never practiced medicine. He was in the CIA—"

"Central Intelligence—"

"Yeah— but he went out of that. Got into teaching survival training, about weapons, writing books about it— I guess some of the books sold really well. He was in demand all the time. Spent every dime he could get free on the Retreat. He told me once he was always hoping his wife would be able to say, 'I told you so,' and the Retreat wouldn't prove out to be anything except an awful expensive weekend place. Told me once it was the only time in his life, the only thing he did in his life that he wanted to be proved wrong about. Guess he wasn't," Rubenstein added, thinking it sounded lame.

"Yeah— well— I figure the world's gonna end."

"Yeah? Why?"

"Well," and Stephensen raised his eyebrows, smiling, then suddenly looking down into his hands, his high-pitched, Midwestern-sounding voice dropping a little. "Well— God said in the Bible he'd end the earth again— but by fire, you know? And nuclear weapons— they're fire. Probably all of us'll get radiation sickness. If there's any babies born, probably be deformed and all— ya know? I think it's God punishing us for gettin' too smart, maybe. Too smart for our own good— like Adam and Eve did— you got Adam and Eve, don't ya?"

Rubenstein nodded. "Yes— Adam and Eve— Jews have Adam and Eve, too— and Noah like you were talking about with God's promise after the flood. We've got 'em."

"Then you know what I mean," Stephensen nodded, looking up at him.

"Yeah— then I know what you mean," Rubenstein nodded, going back to the radio set, turning his chair around, straddling it, then flicking the switch and staring at the transmit light. "Let's see if this sucker works," he sighed.

Rubenstein turned in the chair, hearing the door opening behind him.

Cole and his two men, the men holding M-16s, Cole holding his .45 automatic. Rubenstein stared at the muzzle of the gun, his right hand by the radio, not near enough to his body to reach the butt of the High Power in the tanker holster across his chest.

He started to speak, his right hand very slowly moving across the receiver to the frequency dial— he would need to feel three clicks right on the dial to be on Rourke's frequency. By moving his left elbow he could jam the push-to-talk button down at the base of the candlestick microphone. He did that, saying, "What do you want, captain?"

"It's what I don't want, Mr. Rubenstein— you and this guy contacting U.S. II headquarters."

Rubenstein felt one click. "Why not?"

"Might be embarrassing— they don't understand."

Two clicks— one more remaining until he reached the frequency for Rourke's fighter bomber.

"Where the hell is Colonel Teal?"

"You came back ahead of the wounded— we were waiting for them. Got 'em all—"

Rubenstein wanted to push up, out of his chair— but he kept his left elbow against the push-totalk button at the base of the microphone— and he felt the third click.

"Where's Armand Teal— you kill him, too, Captain Cole?" He made the question to instantly brief Rourke— if he was listening. He didn't want to hear the answer himself because he knew it would be a death sentence.

Chapter Nine

"Teal's got a bump on the head and his hands tied. We lined up everybody else and shot 'em. And with Teal as a hostage, once Rourke and that Russian bitch land, they won't be able to go after us in a plane— couldn't risk killing Teal. I got the ball and I'm keepin' it now."

Rourke listened, glancing back to Natalia as he already began banking the plane to starboard, then glancing back to his instrument.

He heard Paul's voice and Natalia's voice simultaneously. "He's got Paul—"

"— can't think John'll let you get your grubby hands on those missiles."

"Doesn't bother me if he tries. Once I get to them, they don't go anywhere but up— all away." Rourke' s ears rang, a loud burst of static.

Paul's voice, Rourke checking the altimeter, then glancing to his left and up at the airspeed/mach indicator. "You just— you just shot Airman Stephensen— in cold blood, damn you!" Cole's voice then, "Cold blood, hot blood— what the fuck's the difference." Another noise that made Rourke' s ears ring.

Natalia's voice. "He shot Paul!"

Static, then the sound of a door closing, then more static.

Rourke's right fist bunched on the control stick, his left fist hammering into his left thigh. He squinted into the sunlight through his visor— not the sun, but the tears welling up in his eyes making him do it.

Chapter Ten

He felt something. touching at his shoulder, the voice not part of a dream at all.

"Comrade General— Comrade General!"

He opened his eyes, raising his head, his right hand stuck to a memorandum in an open file folder. He looked up. "What— it— what is it, child?"

"Comrade General," Catherine began. "You have been sleeping— it is late. You should go to bed, Comrade General."

He felt himself smile at her as he sat up fully, shaking loose the memorandum, watching as it fluttered from his hand to the floor, Catherine stooping in her overly long skirt and picking it up.

"You are my secretary, Catherine— you are not my mother. Although I remember my mother having eyes like yours."

He felt himself smile again, Catherine blushing. "What time is it?"

"It is almost eight-thirty, Comrade General."

Varakov nodded to her, looking at his own watch, confirming it. "Yes— has there been any word since I—"

"Since six o'clock there has been no word, Comrade General— neither on Comrade Major Tiemerovna or the American Rourke, or the other American, Rubenstein."

Varakov looked about his office without walls in the far side of the Museum of Natural History, the figures of the mastodons dominating the center of the great hall, the hall mostly in shadow now, only the yellow light on his desk and a light by the guard post just inside the brass doors leading from the outside disturbing the shadowy darkness. The mastodons— he stood, stuffing his feet into his shoes with considerable effort, walking toward them now— seemed somehow more ominous. He could hear the click of Catherine's heels beside him, slightly behind him.

"A man tries, Catherine," he murmured.

"Comrade General?"

"A man tries. I have knowledge— knowledge I wished to share, to save as much of mankind as possible. Now I cannot. There is so little time left. If this Rourke can be found, and my niece still lives— then perhaps a few—"

"I do not understand, Comrade General."

Varakov turned, smiling toward her, watching her face, the uncertainty at the corners of her mouth— her lips thin and pale, cast partially in shadow— raised slightly.

Varakov reached out to her, touching her hands, the steno pad she habitually carried falling to the floor between them, the pencil making a tiny sound as he heard it bounce on the stone floor.

"That you do not understand— count this a blessing, child."

He closed his eyes, still holding her hands, in his mind seeing the mastodons— extinct— more vividly than ever.

Chapter Eleven

Rourke worked the right fuel shutoff handle, continuing the shutting down procedure as Natalia spoke to him. He removed his own helmet to hear her better. "What if Cole is waiting for us—

what if he knew Paul had tuned the radio set to our frequency?"

Rourke flipped his last switch, then began opening the canopy. "He isn't that smart— and in case he is, I'll kill him," he rasped, his voice little over a whisper, the rush of cooler air on his face causing him to suck in his breath. He pushed the release for the safety harness, starting to climb out. "I'll kill him," he said again...

Rourke reached under the armpits of his flight suit, drawing first one, then the second stainless Detonics .45, thumb cocking each pistol as they approached the first hangar, glancing to his left, Natalia beside and slightly behind him, the Metalife Custom L-Frame Smith .357s already drawn in her fists, sunlight dully glinting off the slab-sided barrels and the American eagles there. The flight suit was the smallest man's flight suit that could be found, short for her in the legs, though that was hardly noticeable with her boots, loose-fitting at the waist, yet the outline of her breasts under the upper portion of the flight suit distinct.

He turned away, concentrating on the hangar— if Cole were waiting it would either be on the field in one of the hangars or in the radio room where Paul and the other man had been shot, Rourke realized.

The hangar doors were open.

"You wait here."

"The stitches in my abdomen are fine— I don't have to run a race to shoot a gun anyway— the hell with waiting here," she told him.

Rourke looked at her, smiling. Sometimes he liked that about her— she didn't take orders well.

"Suit yourself," he said noncommittally, then continued walking.

"I can go around back."

"Only three of them," he nodded. "Stick with me." Three of them— with assault rifles at the very least.

He stopped beside the hangar doors, the pistols tight in his hands— he half-wanted Cole to be waiting there, waiting for him. It would give him the excuse.

Natalia looked at him, Rourke nodding, diving through the doorway, Natalia beside him. He went into a crouch, both weapons poised at hip level.

"My God," Natalia whispered.

Rourke didn't look at her. He looked at the bodies along the far wall instead. "I thought good Communists didn't believe in God." He started walking, his eyes scanning across the concrete base of the vaulted-ceilinged metal structure— no sign of Cole.

"If I were a good Communist, I wouldn't be here," he heard her say, hearing the sound of metal against leather, one of her guns being holstered.

He stopped, ten yards from the wall— dead men. The landing party, the survivors of Filmore Air Force base, bodies lurched over one another, the arms and legs in bizarre positions, heads cocked back, eyes wide open, glassy. The blood was on the concrete floor in small puddles, blood spattered over all the victims as well, hands covered with it. Rourke started nearer, watching the hands, the faces— for any sign of movement.

He stopped, beside the nearest edge of the pile of dead men, the bodies heaped upon one another as though those still living but shot had tried shielding their comrades with their bodies— a hand touched gently at the face of another man, the cuticles of the fingernails clotted red-brown.

"That butcher," Natalia's voice murmured.

Rourke looked at her. "Yes— butcher." He looked back at the dead men— his eyes suddenly catching something.

His left thumb hooked behind the tang of the Detonics in his left fist, upping the safety, his right thumb upping the safety of the second pistol, both pistols ramming into his leg pockets on the flight suit as he dropped to his knees in the blood. "Help me."

He shifted at the body weight of a black man— dead, eyes fixed. "Watch your stitches—"

"I will," Natalia answered.

A seaman, shot three times in the chest, then once in the head. An airman, twice in the neck, twice in the abdomen and once in the head. "They came afterward and shot each one in the head."

"Yeah," Rourke rasped.

He moved the last body aside— at the base of the pile, one of the first shot apparently, lay Lieutenant O'Neal. His neck pumped blood. "He's alive."

Natalia was running, Rourke looking back at her. "Must be a first aid kit here!" she shouted back.

Natalia Tiemerovna walked briskly, her stitches itching her, her crotch itching her where the hair was starting to grow back after being shaven for the surgery. She wondered if Rourke had shaved her there— it was his way, not to let someone else see her, perhaps. She didn't have the nerve to ask him, she realized, smiling at her own embarrassment.

He was in the first hangar still, trying to keep Lieutenant O'Neal from bleeding to death.

She walked— an M-16 taken from the hangar in her hands, spare magazines stuffed in the pockets of her flight suit, awkward feeling as she walked. She stopped walking now— the command bunker doors were closed, and on the third level down would be the radio room. And Paul— almost certainly dead...

Fluorescent lights burned in the hallway as she entered it from the stairwell, no living thing in sight. The radio room was at the far end— she had looked at the set before going airborne with Rourke. She sucked in her breath hard— she had been in a hurry, told Paul good-bye. She wished she had kissed him. Rourke was something besides a friend, beyond a friend— but Paul was her friend, a confidant, someone she admired and loved. She felt her throat tightening as she approached the doorway.

She reached her left hand to the knob, the right fist balled on the pistol grip of the M-16— her trigger finger was inside the guard. She turned the door handle, her right foot snapping out, her left hand slapping hard against the front handguard of the M-16 as she stepped through the doorway.

The lights were still on on the radio— Cole was "careless," she murmured. She started across the room, the airman on the floor, the top of his skull blown away and splattered across the far wall, clearly, undeniably dead.

She stopped beside the radio, her left hand going out, blood on her fingers as she touched the head. Her right thumb worked the selector of the M-16 to safe as she set it on the table holding the radio set, both hands touching Paul Rubenstein' s head.

There was much blood. She smudged at it, watching as the eyelids fluttered.

A scalp wound. Despite the blood, she hugged his head against her chest, whispering, "Paul—

thank God." Her own words startled her...

O'Neal would live, the wound to his neck deep and bloody but packed now and the bleeding stopped. But he would be very weak. Rourke studied the man's face, O'Neal still not conscious, but sleeping rather than in a coma. Rourke heard the noise of the Jeep behind him, reaching to the shoulder holsters where he'd transferred the Detonics .45s from the side pockets of his flight suit.

On his knees, he wheeled into a crouch, both pistols coming up, feeling a smile cross his lips as he aborted thumb-cocking the hammer spurs. Natalia drove the Jeep and beside her, hands rubbing his head— "Paul," Rourke whispered. That Natalia had brought his friend back alive, Rourke counted a minor miracle— but Cole was no less culpable. And Cole would die.

"Paul!" This time Rourke shouted the name, the guns suddenly awkward in his hands but no time to reholster them as he ran to meet the oncoming Jeep, Natalia cutting into a slight curve to her right, the Jeep skidding on the concrete hangar flooring with a squeal of brakes, bouncing as it stopped. She jumped from the driver's seat, Rourke handing her his pistols— nothing else to do with them— and stepping up into the Jeep to inspect Paul's wound.

Rourke had encountered something similar once before he remembered as he studied Rubenstein's wound, gingerly pulling back the bandage Natalia had improvised. "You have a hard head, Paul," Rourke told his friend, watching as Rubenstein forced a smile. "There was a case in Chicago years ago of a police officer shooting at a man who was rushing him with a broken bottle or something. Tried the standard things— calling halt, firing a warning shot. Finally he didn't have a choice. He fired, the shot went high and the man with the bottle had a high forehead. The bullet hit the man's forehead and glanced off. It was a .45. The man with the bottle got scared to death and ran and the cop probably died of a heart attack— a headshot with a

.45 not putting a man down. Same thing happened with you— bullet hit the right side of your head— back here," and he touched lightly at the wound, Rubenstein wincing. "Then it just glanced off. What they call a scalp wound in the movies."

"Shit— I— I feel like somebody— somebody hit me with a sledgehammer."

Rourke laughed, still inspecting the wound. "Two hundred thirty-grains of gilding-metaljacketed lead traveling slow and steady isn't something you should expect to feel good. Now tell me all you can about Cole— anything that didn't get on the radio. But wait a minute." Rourke turned and looked behind him, Natalia smiling strangely. "What are you laughing at?"

"Men— you two are like brothers and you tell macho stories to one another and joke when you'd really in your hearts like to hug each other. Crazy."

Rourke swallowed hard, feeling his eyes smiling at her. "Just shut up and get that medical kit."

"Hmm," she smiled.

Rourke closed his eyes, shaking his head...

"So I guess he either got Colonel Teal to tell him where the missiles were or figured he could sweat it out of him."

"You've been reading too many American detective stories, Paul," Natalia said, Rourke watching her smile. " 'Sweat it out of him'— really!"

Rourke rolled the thin, dark tobacco cigar across his teeth to the left corner of his mouth, saying,

"But the fact remains, figures of speech aside, that what Paul said is a pretty accurate description of the situation."

"But this Teal— he seems tough," Natalia began, looking at Rourke, sitting between them on a long, low tool chest at the far side of the hangar. "If I had a complete drug kit and the time, I could get the information out of Teal. But this Cole— he is so inept—"

"So inept that he waited for the optimum chance to strike, got himself transported on faked or stolen orders aboard a nuclear submarine, so inept that we can't go after him or he'll kill Teal, so inept he'll wind up with control of six missiles—"

"Why the hell would somebody make missiles with such big warheads?" Paul chimed in.

"Should I tell him?" Natalia asked, not smiling at all.

Rourke only nodded.

"You see, Paul," she began, patient sounding, as though explaining to a child, Rourke thought,

"you see— for a time it was thought that the larger the warhead, the greater and more formidable a weapon. This was before your country began searching for greater accuracy in delivery systems— like the MX missile, which caused so much controversy. A smaller warhead that could reach to a target with virtual pinpoint accuracy had less residual effect and greater destructive capability on hard targets than something huge and dirty. These were soft-target warheads—"

"Soft target?" Rubenstein, his eyes still pained— seeming, pain-filled, repeated.

"A soft target is a population center," Rourke said emotionlessly. "A hard target is a missile silo, a command bunker— something made to withstand everything except a virtual direct hit."

"And if Captain Cole is so knowledgeable as to be able to take control of these missiles and their eight megaton warheads—"

"Then we must assume," Rourke interrupted her, "that he knows how to fire them and already has targets in mind."

"Why are we sitting here, then?"

"He wouldn't kill Teal until he knew where the warheads were," Natalia added.

"We have to wait," Rourke answered. "Teal told me there were helicopters here, in a locked hangar. After I checked your wound and while I bandaged it, I told Natalia to take a look through the rest of the hangars."

"And one was locked— the windows were shuttered. Helicopters— OH-58A Kiowas. I checked them after I shot off the lock. The choppers had been repaired— their circuitry had been burned out during the electromagnetic pulse, but apparently Teal had repaired it. There were three machines, and two of them would start. The third was partially stripped down. Apparently Teal hadn't completed repairing it."

"So, after Cole gets what he wants out of Teal, he'll keep Teal alive just in case— just in case Teal deceived him or a special access code is needed— just for insurance, and as insurance against Natalia and me— and now you. Jeeps were missing— seventy-five miles cross country, with time out to work over Armand Teal, watching out for the wildmen to attack— sometime tonight he should be there. We go airborne after dark and look for signs of Cole and the others—

then we do whatever the situation allows—"

"Or demands," Natalia interrupted.

"When we were airborne," Rourke said, standing, shifting the stump of burned-out cigar in his teeth, "we saw signs of masses of the wildmen— they're going to attack here." Rourke glanced at the black-faced Rolex on his wrist. "Probably in an hour, maybe an hour and a half. Natalia is going to preflight two of those helicopters— you stay here with Lieutenant O'Neal, Paul. I'm taking a fighter out of here— it's a three-seater. I'm going to strafe the wildmen just to let them know we're interested, kill as many of them as I can since they'll all be so conveniently assembled, then land the thing somewhere nearby with a nearly full fuel load. Fighter bomber really— an FB-111HX. Carry the three of us eventually. Our ticket out of here. Then I'll land, camouflage the plane and get Natalia to pick me up with a chopper. You and O'Neal'll be on your own for a little. She'll fly me back, we'll take both helicopters and search for Cole and the others. Natalia'll show you what to do after she preflights the choppers— so you and O'Neal— he should be awake enough to keep an eye on your back— can sabotage all the remaining aircraft on the field here— don't want those wildmen crazies getting any aircraft going. This base is a loss. When Natalia and I get back, we'll rig the ammo dump and the arsenal to blow—"

"But couldn't we use that stuff ourselves?"

"I'm taking a fighter bomber, Paul— leaving the cargo area completely open. Before I take off, Natalia and I'll load some M-16s, some .223s, maybe some grenades and explosives— some medical supplies, too. Get it all aboard the craft. Just leave room enough for our bikes if we can get 'em back off the submarine."

"That's gotta be one hell of a big airplane," Rubenstein began, starting to try and stand— not making it, slumping back, holding his head.

"You rest for a while longer— but yeah, it is a big one. But not so big I can't land and take off again in a field if I have to. The FB-111HX should be perfect for that."

"I can still help you guys loading," Rubenstein began.

"He's right," Natalia said suddenly. "We can help him over to the plane, get him aboard and he can shift cargo— he won't have to stand for that. Except for the ammo nothing should be cased— and the eight-hundred-round ammo boxes won't be that hard to lift from a sitting or kneeling position."

"Agreed," Rourke nodded. He leaned down to Paul, starting to help the man up. He glanced— as he did— at O'Neal. "Remind me, Natalia— to check 0' Neal in about twenty minutes—"

She nodded, already starting from Paul's other side to help Rourke get the younger man to his feet...

Rourke climbed aboard the fighter bomber. Rubenstein was already back watching 0'Neal and Natalia was already preflighting the first of the two functioning army helicopters. He glanced at the Rolex— an hour had passed, Paul stronger seeming, the moderate exercise having apparently helped him.

Throwing his dead stump of cigar out the cargo door, Rourke inspected what they had liberated. Twenty eight-hundred round metal containers of .223, twenty M-16 A1s, modest quantities of conventional explosives apparently used in war games— no plastique— and first aid and medical supplies. He'd also taken fifty cartons of cigarettes— for Natalia. Most of the conventional explosives had been left behind— to destroy the arsenal and the ammo dump. He had also brought Teal's sniper rifle, personal belongings— clothing, mementos, family photos—

and done this in the hope that he might somehow be able to rescue his old friend still alive. It was a faint hope, but the added gear took little space.

Rourke closed the cargo door, securing it, then starting forward— he was very tired of it all. But life had left him no choice.

He strapped himself into the pilot's seat, starting to turn on the electrical systems.

Calmly— a forced calm— he watched for the oil pressure gauges to start to rise.

Chapter Twelve

He had lastly checked the radio— Natalia would receive him, he hoped. There was a somehow louder-sounding rush as the craft went airborne, Rourke hitting the landing gear retraction switches on the small console to his left, the lowering sun hitting him full face, Rourke squinting behind the dark-tinted visor of his flying helmet. He reached further to his left, adjusting the throttle controls, then the oxygen vent airflow controls— he closed his eyes for an instant, then opened them, reaching to his right, setting the air-conditioning controls to keep the cabin slightly cooler, the systems inside his suit cooler as well— he was tired, could not afford drowsiness. He glanced to his right and forward, satisfied with the fuel quality indicator. He checked the target designate panel to his left, the combat maneuver panel directly before him, feeling the throbbing of the aircraft-imagined because a throb would mean a problem with the airframe— as his right hand gently, easily— he was still feeling the controls of the unfamiliar aircraft— clutched the control stick.

"All right," he whispered into his helmet, the visor fogging slightly as he spoke.

The infrared seeker confirmed what visually he was beginning to detect— crosses with bonfires burning beside them, at the edge of the valley surrounding the base as he swept over at mach point five. He rolled the plane into a steep right bank, pulling up and climbing, arming his weapons systems— Sidewinder missiles and the gun. Leveling out, he switched the seeker system from infrared to television, setting his weapons-control panel off computer and to manual— it was somehow something that would be more personal when done himself, by hand.

He kept his speed down, cutting off his climb, leveling out, then starting to dive, the television camera below him in the fuselage behind the nose on maximum resolution, picking up what appeared to be at least a thousand of the wildmen, perhaps more, massing. There were sticks in their hands— sticks, but at the distance only. They would, close up, be spears, assault rifles—

whatever other weapon the wildmen could find and use.

By feel— he had taught himself that— he released the arming safety switch— ready.

He had flown an open bi-wing once— he imagined now the feel of the rush of wind, wind at this speed that would have ripped and torn at his flesh, cold that would have killed. But the freedom of it. Soaring out of the skies, away from the troubled land. In the far distant east as he swept down toward the valley he could see a purpleness that would be twilight. The sweep of horizon suddenly, profoundly, amazed him— the curvature.

He was reaching down to the earth, penetrating it— with death. He smiled to himself— in his old age— his mid-thirties— he was becoming a poet.

"Go—" his voice was quiet, low, whispered, addressed to the wildmen as his finger poised over the Sidewinder launch button, the steam from his breath fogging his visor again, "to—" the aircraft of which he was a part, which cocooned him, leveled— "hell!" He worked the button.

There was a rush, a roar, a buzzing sound and a contrail of smoke, the Sidewinder from portside at the fuselage rear firing, tracking into the crowd of insane non-humans.

Rourke pulled up the nose, the explosion belching white smoke beneath him. He started the craft to climb, leveling off then and banking into a roll, hearing some of the cargo slightly shift but not move, leveling out, arming the next missile— he started down.

They were running— he could not see faces, and it was just as well, he thought. Their faces were meaningless, an abnegation of sanity, of the thousands of years of civilization that had raised man to a point where he was capable of self-destruction.

He fired the second Sidewinder, rolling the plane, three hundred sixty degrees, almost saluting them on the ground, climbing, arcing back and rolling over, his stomach feeling it, his back aching near his kidneys, the plane leveling off, his machine gun armed, his right hand squeezing against the joystick, working the machine gun's trigger as he swept the valley. The bullets seemed to explode upward from the dirt, men and women running, falling— lost to him as he skimmed the ground low.

He set the lock, disarming his weapons systems as he climbed, another rollover, then leveled off.

He exhaled hard, the helmet visor fogging again. Mentally, Rourke calculated the casualties to the wildmen on the ground— two-thirds losses, minimum. Fuel, his two remaining Sidewinder missiles— all needed to be conserved to get himself, Natalia, and Paul— to get them home. To the Retreat, to find Sarah and the children.

He could allow it for an instant. He closed his eyes, inhaling deeply. He opened them and the television monitor for the seeker unit no longer showed the wildmen— gone.

Chapter Thirteen

Nehemiah Rozhdestvenskiy walked, cold slightly in the mountain chill, alone now.

He had never faced death before. There had been danger, sometimes mortal peril. But never certain death. Times locked in combat with superior enemies, times in dangerous lands with men and women he did not trust— but never such a certainty.

He looked skyward, feeling his jaw set. "No!" He screamed it, hearing it echo in the hills and gorges, in the mountains, on the chill air.

The volunteer— the man inside the coffin-like machine with the blue cloud of swirling gas and light. He had done worse than to die. His body lived. His mind did not.

The Americans had the answer— it was a foregone conclusion they had possessed it on the Night of The War. Otherwise, what they had done would have been not even a gesture of fatalism. Karamatsoy, his friend— he had known the Americans had the answer. He had searched for it.

Rozhdestvenskiy stopped walking, standing overlooking a valley, not seeing the mountain beside him that was to be the Womb.

One ingredient was lacking— the vital ingredient. He had taught himself to live— without the company of a woman to love, but rather with many women. Without the security of a position where responsibility was not demanded— but rather one of ultimate responsibility. He had labored.

He stared at Heaven. If God was there, Rozhdestvenskiy now wanted Him to hear. "I will not die!"

Chapter Fourteen

"That's Rourke— or Major Tiemerovna, Cole— only ones who could fly— and they'll be after you."

Cole turned to face Armand Teal, backhanding him across the nose and mouth, blood spurting from beneath Cole's knuckles as Teal's upper lip cracked and the nose broke.

"You fuckin' bastard," Teal snarled, his words sounding thick, mispronounced.

Cole laughed. "Yeah— well, colonel— you tell me what I want to know or you'll learn what a bastard I can really be."

Cole watched Teal struggling against the military issue handcuffs on his wrists, locking his wrists behind him around the trunk of the pine tree. Cole heard an insect buzz, swatted at it and looked over his left shoulder to find the source of the annoyance.

He heard Teal laugh. Loud.

"Maybe I'm not gonna get out of this— but neither are you, captain—"

Cole didn't turn his head, still staring, saying, trying to control the tension he could feel, he could hear in his voice—"Armitage— shut up the colonel there— ram your fist into his mouth if you gotta."

Cole didn't look back, facing the rise behind them.

Wildmen, standing almost shoulder to shoulder. Mentally, he began counting them— he stopped when he reached fifty, estimating the remaining numbers combined with these to equal at least two hundred.

As he watched, the sun low, the insect still buzzing him but not daring to move his hands lest it provoke the wildmen into attack, he saw a cross, then another and another and another— four in all. They were being erected on the rise.

He heard Teal laugh, realized he was losing his control, wheeled and rammed the butt of the M16 he held into Teal's abdomen, Teal doubling forward against the tension of his arms, stumbling to his knees, his face white, vomit spurting through his cracked, bleeding lips.

Captain Cole turned away, staring toward the rise, a bonfire being lit, a chant beginning—

strange sounding— deadly sounding. He felt a chill, a paroxysm race along his spine.

Cole licked his lips. "I wish to speak with your leader—"

"Take me to your leader— bullshit." It was Teal's voice, laughter tingeing it, as well as pain.

Cole began again, shouting louder this time. "I want to see your leader. I can offer him power—

immense power. More than he's ever dreamed of. Nuclear power— the power of life and death—

power!"

The bonfire began to crackle, audibly, as he heard his voice echo back. No one answered, no one called back to him from the rise. But there was no attack. The sun setting, he stood watching, hearing the light breeze, the moans of Armand Teal as pain began to take over bravado, and the buzz of the insect.

His palms sweated as he held his M-16.

Chapter Fifteen

The camouflage nets had been difficult to get into place, on his own, but as he stepped back now from the aircraft, he was satisfied. If any of the wildmen or anyone else approached to within twenty-five yards of the craft— in daylight— it would be noticeable. But from the air, or from a greater distance than twenty-five yards on the ground, it would never have been seen. The small hand axe in the pilot's survival kit had been adequate but arduous in chopping away saplings and large branches. Leaves, dead grass— he had heaped it artistically in place. He found himself smiling—"artistically." His wife— she was an artist— a good one, her children's' book illustrations were prize-winning. He wondered if she still lived, if the children lived.

When the business with Cole was done— he froze, hearing the sound of helicopter rotors slicing the air, the thrumming growing louder as he turned. An army helicopter— it would be Natalia, answering the radio signal. His flight suit and helmet packed aboard the plane as were the flight suits and helmets for Natalia and for Paul, he reached to the ground, snatching up his brown leather bomber jacket— a few added scrapes and scratches in the leather from crossing the barbed wire fence when he'd first reached Filmore Air Force base, but no rips or tears. He shrugged into it, grabbing up the flap holster with his Python and the CAR-15. Not bothering to buckle the holster to his waist, he started to run further into the clearing. The draft from the helicopter's rotor blades could disrupt his camouflage job— he couldn't let that happen...

Rourke opened his eyes, shaking his head, looking at Natalia at the controls of the helicopter, saying into his headset microphone, "How long have I been asleep?"

"About twenty minutes, John— have you ever listened to a man snore to you through a headset radio?"

He laughed, saying, "As a matter of fact, I have— sorry."

"We'll be touching down in about ten minutes— I have some good news for you. If I'd told you earlier, you wouldn't have slept— you'd have been too busy planning."

"What's the good news?" he asked, stretching, trying to get comfortable in the seat. "The Soviet Union surrendered?"

"I would hardly call that good news, John."

"Sorry— couldn't pass it up."

"We do still have our ideological differences, don't we?"

"They seem to matter less and less, though."

She looked at him and he watched her smile, her eyes in the small dome light and the dull green light of the instrument panel gauges looking so deep a blue that he wanted in that instant to drown in them. "That's right," she smiled. "They do matter less and less."

"So— what's the good news?" he said, cutting her off.

"I used my skills and saved us a great deal of time— I decoded some dispatches from the security vault safe. They alluded to periodic maintenance for the missile silos and then I backtracked to earlier dispatches, and then I found the coordinates."

"You've been busy."

"Colonel Teal had apparently preflighted these before— after repairing them. It was easier than I'd thought it would be. And Paul, I discovered, has a natural talent for sabotage. I showed him how to set explosives for the ammo dump and the armory as well— and you should see the very neat way he crosswired the master generator control panels and landing gear panels in those aircraft. We could have used him in the KGB."

"Wonderful— wonderful for him," Rourke nodded, laughing. He couldn't quite see Paul in the KGB— nor Natalia, either, as he considered it.

"By the time we get on the ground, Paul should be through. Sabotaging was something I took a course in," she laughed.

Rourke looked at her— he said nothing. And he loved her...

Chapter Sixteen

O'Neal moved slowly, weakly, Rourke doing what he felt to be the logical thing— leave Paul with O'Neal, using the disadvantage of Paul's head injury, headache still bothering him, as an advantage to shepherd the submarine officer.

Natalia beside him now, the bomber jacket zipped against the cold of the evening, his right fist holding the CAR-15 by the pistol grip, Rourke started toward the bunker.

"There would have been a crew here— wouldn't there?" Natalia almost whispered.

Rourke didn't look at her, peering into the darkness as he walked. "No— these missiles were off line as far as I could tell— which is why they're still here and not in a billion pieces somewhere inside the Soviet Union. Cover the right."

"Yes," he heard her answer.

He heard her feet stop on the dirt and rocks across which they walked. Now he looked at her, looking at him. "You realize— I worked with Vladmir in an attempt to steal the plans for these missiles once. We learned something about them, John. The warheads cannot be dismounted from the missile bodies without totally disarming the warheads— totally. Do you know how complicated that is?"

"When I was in Latin America," he rasped. "I controlled an agent who was smuggling information on Soviet missiles out of Cuba— I know."

In the moonlight— there was always moonlight when it wasn't needed, wasn't wanted— he saw her eyes sparkle, her mouth upcurve with laughter.

He smiled at her, then turned away, walking— slowly, steadily, toward the bunker.

Rourke glanced behind him once— Paul with the Schmeisser and O'Neal carrying his .45

Government Model— were bringing up the rear.

Rourke stopped at the steel door of the bunker.

Natalia's voice: "There should be a conventional locking arrangement, then a second door inside with a double combination lock."

"Can you work the combinations— I did poorly at that in spy school."

She laughed. "On the other hand, I was very good at it— a woman has a naturally more sensitive touch— I can, but it would take perhaps a few hours without mechanical assistance— I don't think the stethoscope from your medical kit would help a great deal with the types of doors they have."

"You're well-informed," Rourke told her.

"Yes," she called back.

"Yes," he murmured, mimicking her. He turned around, shouting, "Paul— if these locks will keep us out, they'll keep anyone else out except Cole— or Teal. You and Lieutenant O'Neal— I want you—"

"John!" Natalia screamed, Rourke wheeling, from the top of the bunker where it was partially mounded over with earth, one of the wildmen lunging for him, a double-headed axe, the handle cut to hand-axe size.

Rourke took a half step back, hearing the shots from Natalia's M-16, the wildman spinning out in midair, crashing down, Rourke starting to raise his CAR-15, something hammering at him from behind. He stumbled forward under its weight, the Car-15 falling from his shoulder. He twisted his face right, jerking his head left, a Bowie pattern knife— long-bladed, cheap looking but deadly enough, he decided— hammering, stabbing, biting into the ground beside his face. Rourke jabbed his right elbow, the arm already extended, back, the elbow connecting with something solid, Rourke feeling the weight sag from his back, rolling, snatching the Detonics .45

from under his left armpit, jacking back the hammer, firing at the face three feet away from his hand. The wildman's head exploded, blood spattering upward. Rourke pushed himself back, up, getting to his feet from a crouch, wheeling, still crouched, pumping the trigger of the Detonics

.45 simultaneously with hearing a burst from Natalia's M-16 and Rubenstein's Schmeisser, the wildman running from the top of the mound twitching, twisting, falling, tumbling to the ground. Rourke started to reach down for his fallen Colt assault rifle.

Another burst of gunfire from the M-16, a long ragged burst from the German MP-40.

Rourke wheeled toward the sound of the subgun, wildmen rushing toward Paul and O'Neal. Rourke extended his right hand, his fist balled tight on the Pachmayr gripped butt of the Detonics. He squeezed the trigger once, then once again, two of the wildmen going down, one of them at least-clutching at his throat— dead.

Rourke started to look back toward Natalia, something hammering at him as he did.

A wildman, the man nearly twice his size, he judged as they hit the ground, Rourke's right fist opening involuntarily as his elbow smacked against a small rock. The feeling in his right hand—

it was gone for an instant.

His left hand hammered up, finding the fleshy gut of the man on top of him. Nothing happened as Rourke hammered his fist in hard.

On his back, Rourke snapped his left knee up, hammering it against bone, then snapping it up again, feeling the squish of testicles, hearing the scream of pain, feeling the rush of air from the man's lungs against his face, the breath foul-smelling. The man had the beginnings of diabetes, Rourke diagnosed, hammering his knee up again, another scream and another rush of the fetidsmelling breath. Rourke rolled half right, jabbing his left elbow back into the side of the wildman's face.

He could see Natalia, the M-16 on the ground, two of the wildmen backing her against the bunker, her pistols in her hands. "Look out— Natalia!"

She started to turn, a wildman from the mound on top of the bunker jumping for her, one of the men nearest to her reaching for her, both pistols discharging, the body falling against her.

He lost sight of her for a moment as he tried crawling from underneath the screaming man half covering his chest. Then Rourke saw her, the pistols gone from her hands, her left hand brushing a thick lock of her almost black hair back from her forehead, in her right hand the Bali-Song knife flashing open, her body seeming to form itself, shape itself into a duelist's stance, the knife flashing out hard, coming back, then stabbing outward again, snapping back, one of the two wildmen she still fought screaming and toppling forward across the man she'd shot.

The still standing wildman had a machete— he was advancing toward her.

Rourke crawled— the hands of the wildman on top of him still clawing at him, the feeling coming back into Rourke's right hand, his left arm pinned under the wildman, his right hip with the Python under him, the holster slipped back on the belt and too far behind him for him to reach.

The first Detonics— two shots should still remain, he told himself.

Another burst of subgun fire— Paul and 0'Neal, a burst of gunfire from an M-16 as well, a scream of pain, a curse.

The Detonics was inches only from the tips of Rourke's fingers as he clawed the ground, feeling the wildman on top of him digging his teeth into his thigh. Rourke moved his left hand—

slightly. He couldn't get it free to reach for the Detonics under his right arm. He started to grab for the handle of the Sting IA black chrome.

He clawed outward with his right hand— the Detonics was too far.

He twisted his right hand back, trying to get it under his bomber jacket to the second Detonics under his right arm, his left unable to reach it. But his left hand had the handle of the Sting IA. He wrenched it free of the leather, ramming it back, feeling it drag as it bit flesh, hearing the scream, the pressure of the teeth on his left thigh easing, his right fist closing on the butt of the Detonics under his right armpit, tearing at the holster to break the gun free of the trigger guard break.

He heard it, felt it, the snap opening. He pulled the second Detonics out, thumbed back the hammer and jabbed the muzzle around toward the head of the wildman, the muzzle less than two inches from the head. He averted his eyes— blood would spray, and so would razor-sharp bone fragments— and pulled the trigger once, then once again, the body rocking over him.

The man had to weigh close to four hundred pounds, Rourke figured, the head split wide and all but dissolved at the rear of the skull, but the body— in death— still pinned him.

He twisted his left hand free, shoving at the chest, then moved his right hand against the wildman's left shoulder, the muzzle of the Detonics nearly flush against it. He pumped the trigger twice, fast, his wrist aching with the pressure, the body lurching over him, his left hand pushing up against it, the body rolling clear.

Rourke staggered up to his feet, reaching for the first Detonics.

The wildman with the machete was making a lunge for Natalia, her Bali-Song flashing out and catching the glint of moonlight, the machete dropping from the man's right hand as did two of the fingers.

But a revolver was coming up in the left hand.

Both pistols in Rourke's fist, he fired, the pistol in his left hand— the first gun— barking twice, the one in his right barking two times as well, the slides locking back, the pistols empty, the wildman with the revolver in his left hand and blood gushing from the severed fingers of his right falling back, sprawling onto the ground.

Rourke wheeled, buttoning out the magazines in his pistols and letting them drop, ramming the pistol from his left hand into his belt, snatching at a fresh magazine then with his left hand, driving it up the beveled well of the stainless .45, his right thumb dropping the slide stop, the gun leaving his hand, sailing cross— body into his left, his right moving down for the Metalifed and Mag-Na-Ported Colt Python .357 at his hip. His fingers closed over the butt as he popped away the flap, his hand rolling the gun over and around on his trigger finger as he broke it from the leather. He wheeled half-right. "Natalia!"

He set the pistol sailing across the air space separating them, the woman making the Bali-Song slide from her right to her left hand, catching the Python in midair, her fist grasping around the cylinder, then the gun seeming to fly up, spin, settling into her right fist. She half-turned, the Python's six-inch barrel snaking forward, dully gleaming in the moonlight, a tongue of orange fire licking from the muzzle, another wildman rushing her, dropping.

Rourke turned, starting to run toward Rubenstein and O'Neal, the two men pinned down by gunfire coming from the rocks above.

Rourke dove toward the shelter of a rock outcropping, snapping off two shots into the rocks. He heard the boom of the Python again, then silence, then suddenly the crack of three-shot bursts from an M-16.

He looked behind him as he reloaded his second pistol. Natalia— an M-16 spitting fire in her hands— was running toward him.

Rourke thumbed down the slide stop of the pistol in his left hand, sliding his thumb back around the tang, gripping the pistol, then pumping a fast two-round semiautomatic burst up into the rocks.

He still couldn't see Rubenstein and O'Neal, both men pinned by a heavy concentration of assault rifle fire. He heard Natalia's M-16 again, then her voice, breathless, beside him.

"How many do you think?"

"Two or three or they would have made a rush— remember, they're crazies."

"Here," and she stuffed the Python back into the flap holster on his right hip. He heard the snap of the flap closing shut. "Two rounds left in it if you started with a full six."

"Yeah," he nodded, realizing that he too was breathless.

"There could be more of them in the valley, going for the helicopter."

"To destroy it— yeah," he nodded, watching her face for an instant in the moonlight, in the instant forgetting where he was, what he was doing— she was incredibly, unreally beautiful, he thought.

Another burst of assault rifle fire from the rocks. "Gotta nail those suckers," he rasped, finding one of his thin, dark tobacco cigars, biting off the end and clamping it between his teeth.

"I've never seen you do that before."

"Usually trim the ends with a knife at the beginning of the day," he told her. "You keep 'em pinned down— don't try getting over in the rocks to Paul and O'Neal— I'll get up there after those suckers." He reached his left hand to his musette bag, reaching inside, removing four AR15 thirties. "Here," and he looked at her for an instant as he handed her the magazines.

"I love you, too," she smiled.

"Shut up," he whispered, leaning across in the rocks, kissing her forehead.

Rourke pushed himself to his feet, starting to run— there were three men still to kill, he judged.

Chapter Seventeen

Rourke worked his way through the rocks, the partially spent magazines in the twin stainless Detonics pistols replaced with full ones, giving him seven rounds now in each gun, the full magazine plus the round chambered. He had emptied the Python of the two remaining rounds, worked one of the Safariland speedloaders against the ejector star and loaded six into the cylinder, the Python nestled in the flap holster on his right hip.

There were sporadic bursts of gunfire from the rocks, poorly controlled bursts that ate up large quantities of ammo and had little effect on a target except by accident.

There were occasional bursts from the rocks below as well— Natalia's M-16, three-round bursts which made sparks as they hit the rocks pinning down the wildmen. Bursts from Rubenstein's sub-gun too, neat bursts— two or three rounds each, long bursts— accurate but too long— from O'Neal. Rourke kept moving, seeing the three wildmen clearly now.

There was no other way for it.

He holstered the cocked and locked Detonics pistols and secured the guns in the leather, working the trigger guard breaks closed with the thumb and first finger of the opposite hand.

He reached to the Python.

He carried it for one reason only— long-range accuracy.

There were no custom parts in the gun— with some fitting he had taught himself to do, he could replace anything. It was one of the very few out of the box revolvers which could be used perfectly well without action tuning. The action was sometimes criticized as being too sensitive, too prone to fouling with dirt or debris. He had never found it so. And the strength of construction made it perhaps the most solid of .357 Magnum double actions.

He thumbed back the hammer as he extended the pistol in both clenched fists, resting his forearms on the rock in front of him but not the gun itself.

He sighted on the furthest of the three heads, then barely touched the trigger, launching the 158grain semi-jacketed soft point load, the gun barely moving in his hands, his right thumb cocking back the hammer, the other two wildmen starting to turn.

Rourke fired again, taking out the man to his left, the man's face seeming to disintegrate in the moonlight.

The third man, the last of the wildmen there, was raising the muzzle of the assault rifle.

No time for a single action shot, Rourke double-actioned the smooth trigger. The third headshot made, he waited quietly in the rocks— just in case there were others of the wildmen he had not detected.

He had a Python in storage for his son— one of the newer, stainless steel Pythons. He had a Detonics stainless for him as well. He wondered if he would ever see Michael Rourke again.

"John— are you all right?" It was Natalia— John Rourke took what he judged a full five seconds before answering her.

Chapter Eighteen

Lieutenant O'Neal had originally been a missile officer— before the complement of missiles from Commander Gundersen's nuclear submarine had been fired out on the Night of The War. His was the cause of his being with the shore party to begin with, and of his eventual sole survival despite his wounding.

Rourke thought of that as O'Neal, still weak but seemingly invigorated from the fighting, waxed eloquent over their predicament. "She's right— Major Tiemerovna, that is. What she described from the homework she did on this system— assuming all her facts were straight—"

"We had a very highly placed source," Natalia smiled. "But he's dead now anyway— I think."

"Yes— but assuming everything he gave you about the missiles was true, you're right, major. Disarming these would be very tricky— impossible once they were armed. You always get intelligence stuff on a need to know basis, but you pick things up, things you aren't supposed to know. This irretrievable system— The No— Recall was what they called it. Once they were armed, the only thing you could do was fire them."

Rubenstein, leaning against the steel doors of the bunker, pushed himself away from the doors, saying, "That's stupid!"

"Yeah— a lot of us thought so, Mr. Rubenstein," O'Neal nodded, shifting his position on the ground, obviously uncomfortable. "Nobody asked us, though. It was—" and O'Neal looked up at Natalia, standing opposite him, beside Rourke. "I ahh— it was to guard against Soviet sabotage of our missile systems—"

"Don't apologize to me— I'm still an enemy agent," she told him, her voice a warm alto, contrasting sharply, Rourke thought, with her words.

"Well, then— what'll we do—"

Rourke looked at Paul. "You and O'Neal hold the position— against Cole. Three of them, two of you— shouldn't be that difficult. Natalia and I fly back to the submarine with the two helicopters— bring back reinforcements. Shouldn't be more than two hours— three tops. Those wildmen we killed were foragers, I guess. Either that or something like a patrol. These doors are bombproof, so they weren't trying to get into the bunker— you can see from these scorch marks where somebody tried it— likely some of these guys, and they learned they couldn't. If I'm wrong and there's a big concentration of wildmen coming, get out— we'll pick you up— fire a flare from that H-K flare pistol of mine—"

"There are flare guns in the helicopters—"

Rourke glanced at Natalia. "Better still. So, either way," Rourke said, taking his rifle from where it leaned against the bunker doors, "it shouldn't be rough duty. Stay up in those rocks— Cole comes, keep him away from the bunker. The wildmen come, beat it out of here— and they'll keep Cole away. Then we can try to do something about getting inside— that may be where you come in," Rourke said, looking at Natalia.

She laughed.

"What's so funny, major?" O'Neal asked, his face wearing a strange expression.

"A KGB major being aided in breaking into an air force missile bunker by the United States Navy—"

Rubenstein said it. "She's right— that's funny—"

Chapter Nineteen

Cole's palms still sweated on the M-16 he held, the bonfires glowing now, the wildmen unmoved since they had first encircled him, his two men and his prisoner.

"Armitage," he called. "Yeah, captain—"

"If anything happens— shoot Colonel Teal in the head— a coupla times—"

"Yes, sir," Armitage nodded.

Cole looked at the man— the casual way he had answered. He had known Armitage for three years. They had trained together in Alabama at the camp there. They had played the war games together, listened to the speeches together. He had been with Armitage the time they had fire bombed the car of the black television reporter.

Cole studied the flaming cross— it amused him. That he should be intimidated by a flaming cross.

"Armitage," he called out.

"Yeah, captain?"

"You and Kelsoe— get ya some tree limbs— make us a cross, too— you remember how?"

Armitage said nothing for a moment, Cole watching him, then watching as the face lit with a smile, the firelight of the bonfire surrounding them, making his face glow red, almost diabolical looking.

"And light it, Captain?"

"Yeah— and light it, Armitage."

"Yes, sir!"

Cole watched as Armitage ran over to Kelsoe, Kelsoe producing a hand axe from his belt.

"Show you bastards how it's done," Cole murmured, looking again at the wildmen.

Chapter Twenty

Sarah Rourke walked through the darkness, Bill Mulliner opposite her and slightly ahead on her right, Michael walking with Annie and Bill's mother, Mary Mulliner. Michael would alert her, she knew, so she concentrated her attention, focused her senses ahead of them— there had been noises, telltale noises only. There were people at the base of the funnel-like defile. But there were Russian troops on the road and staying on the high ground would have meant capture. For this reason only, Bill— Sarah realizing she had coached him— had decided to lead them down into the defile.

Brigands possibly, or more Russians— but possibly more Resistance. They were gambling.

She had come to understand herself more as a woman, she thought, trying to force her attention away from her thoughts and to the task at hand— but unable to.

She had come to understand what she could do— the power she had. Bill— a boy really, little older than Michael— was a man. He was the natural leader. But she had weathered more combat than he had, endured more, had a greater depth of judgment and perception than his years allowed him. She knew that— he knew that.

So she advised rather than attempting to lead, implied rather than ordered.

The same result was achieved— yet Bill had his self respect as a man.

She considered herself lucky to be a woman— there were fewer problems with ego where practical matters were concerned. She was content to respectfully follow his orders— so long as they were orders that followed her own directives, however subtly given.

She understood too some of the things that had caused the tension in her relationship with her husband. He would not be implied to, be coached, be nudged along. He had never once refused to listen to a direct suggestion, an idea. But he had refused oblique direction— and it was unconscious with him, she thought.

They were incompatible— had always been. But had always loved each other.

They stopped as they reached the base of the defile. Sarah Rourke wondered if she would ever see John Rourke again, ever feel his hands on her skin— ever argue with him again.

"Bill—" she almost hissed the name, keeping her voice low.

"This way," he nodded.

She realized suddenly she had been pointing the muzzle of her rifle in the same direction he had picked— had he read it, realized she had wanted them to go that way because the ground was more even— seeming in the starlight and would be easier to traverse at a dead run if necessary?

She shuddered slightly— power.

Chapter Twenty-One

They had walked along the natural path in the woods for more than a half-hour, she judged, glancing at the watch carried in her jeans pocket. She would have to improvise a band for the Tudor so she could wear it on her wrist. That could come later, she thought— if there were one, a later.

For the last two minutes she had heard the telltale noises again. She had left Michael and Annie with Mary Mulliner, being practical and giving Michael her M-16— Mary was the worst shot Sarah had ever seen. She laughed at herself— before the Night of The War, she herself was the worst shot she had ever seen, would never have touched a gun except to move it out of the way when she dusted the house, would never have left her young son with a loaded gun in his hands.

The Trapper .45 felt good in her hand, her right fist clenched around it. She carried it cocked, her right thumb poised over the locked safety. She ducked under a low-hanging tree branch, the branch snagging at the blue and white bandana handkerchief covering her hair.

"Shit," she murmured. Bill turned, looking back at her, and she shook her head to signify nothing was wrong. Saying a word like that— she would rarely if ever have said it before the Night of The War. It was the people she had associated with since then, she thought— they swore sometimes. And now she did, too.

She kept moving, watching Bill Mulliner as much as she watched the trail and the shadows beyond it where the meager starlight didn't penetrate.

Sarah heard something— she wheeled, something hammering at her, driving her down.

Her thumb depressed the upped safety, the muzzle of the .45 searching a target as though it had become independent of conscious thought.

She found flesh, the pistol rammed against it, her first finger touching at the trigger.

"Sarah!"

The voice was low, a whisper, whiskey-tinged. The breath smelled of cheap cigars— "Sarah—

it's me—"

She edged her trigger finger out of the guard, finding the safety before she moved anymore. She sank her head against the man's chest. She had never thought she'd be so happy to see the Resistance leader, Pete Critchfleld.

"Pete." She said the name once and quietly— he was more competent than she. She needed that now.

Chapter Twenty-Two

The wood crackled as the cross burned and Cole felt somehow safer— He watched the wildmen, watching him now, puzzled that he too had ordered a cross erected, but only to burn it.

"When the hell somethin' gonna happen, captain?" It was Kelsoe, crouched beside him, Armitage sitting on the ground near where Teal was handcuffed to the pine tree.

"Soon, Kelsoe— real soon."

"Soon— they're gonna come down here and cut us up into little pieces, captain."

"Maybe," Cole nodded— he looked up at the wildmen on the ridge. "If they haven't yet— well, maybe they are gettin'—"

"Cole—"

It was Armand Teal. Cole turned, facing him, shifting his position on the ground, his legs stiff from squatting beside the burning cross. "Yes, colonel?"

"What the hell you plan to offer those lunatics— power. What power?"

Cole stood up, his legs unable to take it anymore, cramping. "Well— I guess you could call it the ultimate power. The power of the sun. The power to destroy—"

"You're gonna give them a goddamn missile?" Cole shrugged and turned away. There was movement now on the rise, the lines of gaping wildmen separating, forming almost a wedge as Cole watched, a new group of wildmen coming from the center of the wedge— they seemed better armed as best he could judge in the firelight and the light from the torches they carried.

"Throw down your weapons!" It was a voice, loud, powerful-sounding, coming from the opening in the wedge.

"No," Cole shouted back. "I come to offer you power— not to surrender myself and be killed!" He was gambling— he knew it.

"Throw down your weapons!" The voice sounded again, as if whoever spoke had not heard him.

"The ultimate power is what I offer— power undreamed of for your leader!"

A man stepped forward then. He held no torch. He held no rifle. What looked like a fur pelt— at the distance Cole could not tell if it was the skin of a dog or a bear— was draped around his shoulders. He seemed short, or perhaps only by comparison to the well-armed men with torches who flanked him. His body seemed thick— but it could have been the animal skin he wore like a robe.

The voice was not the one that had called for Cole to lay down his weapons.

It was higher-pitched, almost amused-sounding.

"An audacious man— there are hundreds of us. Four of you and one is apparently your prisoner. You offer me power— undreamed of, ultimate power? I like a sense of humor. My followers, I'm afraid, are relatively humorless types, as you might imagine. So— tell me. What's this ultimate power you offer me?"

Cole paused for a moment, then shouted back, "An eighty-megaton thermonuclear warhead mounted on an intercontinental ballistic missile, which I can arm and target."

The man on the ridge said nothing for a moment, then, "I am called Otis— who knows, we may become great friends."

Cole's palms stopped sweating and he wiped them, one at a time, along the sides of his fatigue clad thighs.

Chapter Twenty-Three

Sarah sat in the darkness at the base of an oak tree, Bill Mulliner beside her, the children and Bill's mother further along in the woods with some of Critchfleld's men. Pete Critchfield sat opposite her, cross-legged, Indian fashion, shielding one of his foul-smelling cigars with his hand— she knew why. So the glow from the cigar's tip wouldn't show light. She wondered if it had ever occurred to Critchfleld that an enemy could track him simply by the smell.

"We can't wait none for the Resistance leadership— with David dead or captured—"

"God bless him," Sarah whispered.

"Amen to that," Bill Mulliner intoned.

"Yeah— Amen, but with him out of the picture now, we gotta act. There's a big supply base the Commies are runnin' out of Nashville— been hoardin' stuff there for the last few days. Even more stuff than they had—"

"For what?" Bill asked him.

"Beats the hell outa me, Bill— but they got stuff we need. Medical supplies for openers— I got three men with bad gunshot wounds back in the woods there— no ampicillin or nothin', and no painkiller. The one guy's so bad, got two fellas sittin' with him to keep his mouth shut if he starts screamin'— been pourin' whiskey into him—"

"It's not a stomach wound, is it?"

"No, ma'am— legs."

"You should be careful— alcohol's a depressant— depressants act funny with blood loss," she told him.

"Well, Sarah— I guess I jes' started a-callin' ya that, ma'am—"

"That's fine— Sarah's my name."

"Well, Sarah— seems to me we could use you helpin' out in two ways— lessen' you got yourself somewheres to go—"

She laughed. "Well, I had a dinner engagement—"

"I'd offer y'all some food, Sarah— but we ain't—"

"I ate this morning," she told him.

"They got food there too at that supply base. If n you could keep an eye on the wounded, tend to

'em maybe— well, you're pretty good with a gun, too, ma 'am. I seen ya, Sarah. You could do that, maybe get your kids to help a might— that'd free up Bill and me and the men to hit that supply depot. We got two trucks stashed out in the woods. We can get to Nashville and be back soon enough—"

"If you come back," she said candidly.

"Well— ain't no arguin' that with ya, Sarah— that's a true fact."

"I'll play nurse," she nodded.

Sometimes, on the other hand, she reflected, being a woman, despite the lack of ego problems, was not such a good thing. "I'll play nurse," she said again.

Chapter Twenty-Four

He sat on the ground opposite Otis— the ground was the only place to sit and Otis seemed well at home sitting there, Cole thought.

"You must have a great number of questions."

"Who the hell are you people?" Cole began.

"We are the people who control the entire Pacific Northwest. Anyone who is obviously a stranger here is killed. Those who live here when they are encountered are taken prisoner, given the choice of joining, or dying. Most join. Some die."

"I don't know how many guys you got, Otis— but no way you'd be able to take on a real army."

"That could be a problem someday, I suppose." Cole watched Otis's eyes in the firelight. They were a light brown color, lighter in shading than Cole had ever imagined a human being's eyes could be. "Someday, you and I maybe'll be enemies, Otis— but now we can be allies. There are six missiles."

"So you have said."

"I need five only— you can have the sixth."

"But Captain Cole— why don't I just kill you and take the missiles?"

"A bomb blast with any conventional explosive you name won't get through those doors into the bunker. Use something too big and you'll destroy the launching equipment inside. And you don't know how to arm the missiles or how to target them. I do, only I do."

"I can have you taken prisoner and tortured, then," Otis smiled. "You see, before the war— I assume it was a war, wasn't it?"

"The United States and Russia— yeah. It was a war."

"Well— before the war, I was arrested and tried for a multiple homicide. I was acquitted— lack of evidence. But I became a cult figure. I was guilty, of course. There were people who wanted to follow me. We came up here, into the mountains, and I was able to live like a tribal chieftain. You see, I studied social anthropology and group dynamics and comparative religions— all that. I made my own religion. This was before the trial. During the trial, the publicity generated caused my star to rise, so to speak. After this— this war, well— it was natural for me to provide order where there was chaos—"

"A religion?"

"More or less— all that is foreign is corrupt, evil. Other races are to be despised— from the cross you burn, I can see you may have heard of such an ideology—"

"The truth is universal," Cole told him.

"Truth? Hardly. But," Otis smiled, "if my followers believe it, I suppose there's no reason you shouldn't too. You see, I ran what the police might call a religious scam— a cult that took money from people for things like prayer shawls, incense, promised miracle cures— we collected many thousands of dollars in money left to us by the faithful. A black gentleman— quite rich— came to me, partook of our prayers and curses— he left his entire fortune to us. A sizable fortune. I broke into his home with two of my— my followers— and I killed him. His whole family, as well, so no one could contest his will. Unfortunately, a neighbor heard the screaming and police arrested us. My two followers committed suicide as I'd ordered them to. The papers were full of racial remarks attributed to me, ideals of racial superiority and a master race— all that drivel. After the acquittals well— certain types of people were drawn to me. Then this war thing and—

well— here we are, aren't we. I mean, I can certainly have you tortured."

"To tell you stuff, yeah," Cole nodded. "But not to make me actually arm and target the missiles. You could never know if I did it right, could you?"

"I suppose not," Otis laughed. "A man after my own heart. And what do you propose to do with your five missiles?" Otis laughed again. "I mean, if that isn't prying, of course?"

"The Russians occupy much of the East Coast and Midwest— what they didn't bomb out of existence."

"Really— hmmph."

"They use Chicago as their headquarters—"

"A lovely city, Chicago."

"Five eighty-ton warheads will obliterate the entire Soviet High Command in the United States, and tons of supplies, thousands of troops— the land war they're fighting with China is already draining them— they'd never be able to reinvade America and they wouldn't waste their missiles on us— they used most of them during the Night of The War—"

"Is that what you call it?" Otis asked. "Very nice ring to it— the Night of The War. Yes— I like that— I'll incorporate that in my ritual, if you don't object."

"We'd be free again, Otis— kill the fuckin' Commies, then track down the Jews and the niggers that helped 'em along, got them the footholds they needed— make this a country for Americans again."

"Wouldn't many of your Americans— I mean the white, Christian ones— wouldn't they die during this missile strike you propose?"

"Not more than a couple hundred thousand— a million or so at the most— and they'd willingly give their lives if I told them, explained it to them— they would."

"Would they? I wonder."

"They would," Cole told him, trying to reason with him. "First the Commies, then the scum that helped them come to power— get the United States back, build up a supply of warheads again while the Commies fight each other in China— then launch on China and Russia— kill 'em all. Make the world a decent place to live in again. Give our children a world where they can grow up safe— where white girls don't have to—"

"I don't doubt the sincerity of your convictions, captain— but isn't four hundred megatons a bit much for one city?"

"No— we've gotta be sure."

"Yes— we would be sure that way."

"You talked about torture— that man there, the air force colonel— he knows where the bunker is located. If you could—"

"I know where the bunker is located— I always wondered what they kept there. But as to the torture part, well— why don't we give him to my people— they've been so patient. We can let them amuse themselves with him while we discuss some of the fine points of our agreement."

"Then you'll help me to fight for America?"

Cole didn't like Otis— he couldn't understand why the man simply sat there, saying nothing.

Chapter Twenty-Five

Rourke watched the bonfires below him and far to port. It would be the wildmen— perhaps they had trapped Cole, he thought. He heard the voice coming through his headset.

"John— do you see those fires?"

"The wildmen."

"Should we go in?"

Rourke didn't answer her for a moment. Teal could be down there. But if Cole were still in control of his small party of men— and of Teal— Teal would be alive until the missile silos and the control bunker were reached, penetrated. If a stray shot from the wildmen disabled one of these two last functional helicopters, bringing back a full, heavily armed landing party from the submarine would be impossible.

"No, Natalia— we keep going to the coast," he said finally into the small microphone just in front of his lips, a cigar clenched— unlit— in the left corner of his mouth.

"All right," he heard her voice come back. "You are a strange man," her voice sounded in his ear after a moment.

"Why is that?"

"I would have expected you to storm in there— like that story Paul tells about you riding your Harley into the Brigand camp in the desert and killing the leader, then—"

Rourke thought back— it seemed so long ago. He remembered Paul then— like two different people in terms of skills and abilities. He studied the lights on the instrument panels. "That served a purpose," he told her.

"Revenge?"

"Yes."

"And now the purpose is—" She let the question hang.

"Keep Cole from launching those missiles— it's the only thing he can be planning. The only thing. Millions of lives maybe— against one life."

He wondered if Armand Teal would understand. Rourke smiled to himself— he wondered if he himself understood it.

Chapter Twenty-Six

It felt primitive— that was the word, Cole thought. "Primitive," and he verbalized it, watching Teal, tied to one of the crosses, a large man using a knife whose blade gleamed orange in the firelight near the foot of the cross, slicing skin in narrow strips from Armand Teal's legs.

Teal had stopped screaming, only moaning incoherently now as the knife edged slowly upward.

"It's an art— like everything done with skill," Otis explained, standing beside him. "To torture without inducing total unconsciousness or death is a precision craft. My man Forrester does it with such consummate grace— I rarely tire of watching him. He seems always to find a new and more subtle variation— oh, there— watch!"

Otis was gesturing now, enthused for the first time since Cole had seen him.

Cole watched, too.

Forrester was holding the naked Teal's testicles, using a different knife now— small-seeming.

"That's as sharp as a razor— as they say," Otis whispered conspiratorially and smiled. "What he's doing I've only seen him do once before— it's wonderful."

Cole thought Otis was insane— but he watched anyway, almost compelled to. The man with the knife— the one Otis had called Forrester— was seemingly shaving Teal's testicles.

"He's removing the upper layer of skin— but so slowly and patiently as to prevent most bleeding. Then— after that, he'll move to the—"

"I don't wanna—"

"Ohh— but it's exquisite. One of the women will come up to him— arouse him— and— well, he bleeds to death, captain—"

Cole turned his face away— he threw up across the top of his combat boots.

"Really, captain— for a man who wishes to slaughter so many— well, I hardly see where this should be—"

Cole turned and looked at Otis, the gleam in his light brown eyes. He did not look at Armand Teal.

He closed his eyes, hearing a woman's voice, hearing Teal moaning— then hearing a scream after a very long time.

There was something half a chant, half a cheer coming from the self-imposed darkness around him.

Otis' voice sounded in a whisper at his ear. He could feel the man's breath— it smelled like marijuana. "It's over now, captain— you can open your eyes."

Cole opened his eyes. Otis had lied. It wasn't over. And he heard Otis laugh.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Rourke hung back, his complement of the shore party boarded on his chopper, Natalia— her craft landed on the missile deck of the submarine— still loading. Gundersen spoke to him through his headset. "You get these men back, Rourke— otherwise I won't have enough manpower to run my little boat."

Rourke laughed into the microphone. "Little boat?"

"Well— you got me straight, though?"

"I understand," Rourke said into his microphone. The sea was rough, a wind blowing in off the mainland now, a wind that would make headwinds he'd have to fight in returning to Paul and Lieutenant O'Neal. The sea itself was gray, whitecaps dotting it like freckles on a child's face.

"You got any idea what the weather is looking like, commander?"

"Negative on that— at least beyond the fact that it looks crappy from here."