Fast (46 page)

            Coleman hollered for everything he was worth. ‘King - incoming - six o’clock!’

            The second before the terrorist’s high-speed interception slammed into Vanessa, she planted her foot and hurled the templates forwards. Coleman winced as his ex-wife went down.

            The templates flew up through the air. Reaching the top of their flight path, they brushed through a branch of pine needle and then started coming down.

            Sprinting wildly down the hill, Coleman saw the templates overshooting King. There was nothing Coleman could do. He was still too far away.

            King suddenly leapt straight up. He twisted as he jumped, stretching his long torso straight up into the air. His airborne body was now flying backwards down the slope. His fingers strained upwards and -

            - the templates smacked into his hands.

            King wrenched the templates from the air and hugged them to his chest. Then he came down. At full speed. Facing backwards. On a steep slope.

            On the positive side - Coleman realized as King tumbled head-over-heels backwards with his body wrapped protectively around the templates - he was still moving downhill.

            Vanessa fared worse. Completely committing herself to the throw, she had no time to brace for the terrorist’s slamming side impact.

            The tangled combatants rolled into Coleman’s path.

            Coleman was the only Marine still on his feet. King was somersaulting down the slope. Forest was gaining the upper hand in his fight higher up the slope, but he wasn’t making any downhill progress.

            Vanessa was rolling right into Coleman’s path.

            Before Coleman knew it, Vanessa and the terrorist were tumbling around his boots. The terrorist had two hands around her neck, but with all the wild rolling, his strangle-hold was ineffective. Vanessa was drilling her fist into the terrorist’s face at every opportunity, but the clinging terrorist wasn’t getting the hint.

            Coleman dropped onto the pair as they rolled past.

            All three rolled down the slope, a tangled mess of boots and elbows. Coleman pried the terrorist off Vanessa. Free from the tangle, she caught her momentum on the ferns. Coleman kept rolling.

            The two men tumbled over each other down the slope until, completely unexpected, two crazy things happened.

            First, the ground fell away from Coleman’s back. Second, every inch of air surrounding him filled with motion.

            He took a moment to work out what was happening.

            They had rolled into a depression completely filled with butterflies. Coleman kicked the terrorist away, sending up another cloud of butterflies as the terrorist
whumped
down on the other side of the depression. The ground was sticky. Coleman scrambled to his feet, realizing they had rolled into one of Gould’s brood cavities.

            Coleman peered through the streaking bedlam of fluttering wings.

            Up the slope, Forest had finally opened up a can of whoop-ass on the terrorist. Kneeling over the prone gunman, Forest jack-hammered his right fist into the man’s face. Down the slope, almost at the bottom, King recovered his footing. Up the slope on Coleman’s left, Vanessa ran towards King.

            ‘Go for the compound!’ yelled Coleman a moment before a fist smashed into his face.

The shocking blow knocked him onto his heels. When he recovered, the terrorist had drawn his boot knife and lunged.

            The knife came right for Coleman’s face. Stumbling backwards, he caught the terrorist’s wrist with two hands. As the terrorist stepped forward, trying to drive the knife home, Coleman swept out the man’s leading boot. The terrorist fell forwards. With the knife locked between them, Coleman made a desperate move. This was a technique he would never use normally, but he had no choice. He could only hope the man’s fight with Vanessa had sapped some of his arm strength.

            As they fell, Coleman focused all his energy into twisting the terrorist’s wrist. He felt small bones grind and crack. When the ground smacked up into his back, the knife was pointing towards the terrorist’s unprotected abdomen.

            The terrorist fell straight onto the blade, squawking out a surprised grunt as the knife slid through his flesh and jabbed his spine. Impaled on his own blade, the terrorist rolled away.

            Coleman yanked out the knife and cut the straps securing the terrorist’s P190.

            Another terrorist appeared at the edge of the depression. Coleman threw the knife, burying the blade up to its handle in the man’s throat. As the man fell back, Coleman spotted Forest still in trouble.

            ‘Forest! Move!’ he yelled.

            Forest had only reached halfway down the slope. Three gunmen surrounding Forest closed in like wary predators. The three terrorists, a shrinking triangle around the Marine, had herded him to where the slope dropped steeply into the ferny ravine. Just over the edge, two meters from Forest’s boots, the ravine dropped off twice as steeply as anywhere else.

            Squatting in this precarious position, Forest watched the approaching men.

            Coleman cocked the P190. To save his friend, he would risk attracting the creatures with gunfire. He brought the weapon up to his shoulder, preparing to fire.

            Then he noted Forest’s expression.

            It was a nasty smirk.

            Forest wasn’t the one trapped.

            It was the terrorists who were walking into Forest’s trap.

            Coleman saw that Forest’s fatigues were drenched with water. His surroundings glistened wetly. The reserve’s watering system had not long shut down on that side of the slope. The ravine was a natural drain.

            One terrorist slipped. His left boot shot away. He dropped to his hands and knees. It was the man negotiating closest to the ravine. It was the mistake that Forest was waiting for.

            He sprung at the unbalanced man.

            In three steps Forest reached the man and slammed his knee into the terrorist’s chest. The kneeling terrorist saw the attack coming and wrapped his arms tightly around Forest’s waist.

            Twisting, locked together, they tumbled headfirst over the edge.

            The two men slid straight down the ravine.

            Underneath the terrorist, Forest’s body acted like a sled. The terrorist clung to the Marine as they sluiced over the ferns, rapidly accelerating. Forest twisted his body to look backwards, searching for the reason he hadn’t jumped down the ravine in the first place.

            At the bottom of the slope waited a massive moss-covered boulder.

            The two men slid straight towards it, head-first at breakneck speed.

            Forest hooked the terrorist under his arms.
Just
before they crashed into the boulder, Forest dug his heels into ground. He applied the brakes on his sled.

            The terrorist had nothing to slow his motion, and Forest jerked the man up by his arms, imparting even more deadly momentum.

            The last-second maneuver completely altered the dynamics of the collision. The terrorist’s body hit first, absorbing Forest’s impact like a fleshy airbag. After a heart-stopping moment, Coleman saw Forest disengaged himself from the broken man and wobble to his feet.

            Coleman took a second to locate everyone else. Forest’s roller-coaster ride had placed him beyond the line of terrorists. King was out in the open. Vanessa ran the last few meters down the slope to reach him. ‘There’s more coming. It’s Bora.’

            ‘I know,’ said Coleman. ‘Run for compound! Go!’

            Third Unit ran through the compound’s collapsed rear fence. Forest limped as he ran, dazed from his impact with the boulder.

            Coleman glanced back and saw the terrorists reach the bottom of the slope. Breaking through the line of terrorists was just the start of any escape for Third Unit. The recreational reserve had two exits. At this very moment, Cameron Cairns would have men racing to cover both.

            There was no way out of the reserve.

            No way on foot, at least.

            Coleman’s eyes locked on the collection of crazy vehicles parked in the compound.

#

Bora dropped from the suspended walking platform.

            Smirking, he studied the fleeing Marines. The Marines had punched through Cairns’s line of gunmen. They were racing over the rear fence of the caretakers compound.

           
No surprises there
, thought Bora.
They weren’t going to be caught that easily.

            In a way, Bora found himself slightly pleased at the Marines’ escape.

            I want to be the one who catches them. I want to be the one that kills him.

            Up until his near-death in the cinema, this had been just another operation for Bora. More was at stake, yes, but otherwise there was nothing personal invested in the outcome.

            Things had changed when the black Marine threw the chair. Bora should have seen it coming. Understanding vibrations was his specialty. He should have acted first.

            He outsmarted me at my own game. I sensed the trap in the elevator, but I didn’t foresee that stunt with the chair.

            Bora scanned the four running men. He spotted the one he was after.

            There he is. There’s the big bastard that almost finished me.

            The huge Marine was worthy prey. It wasn’t that the Marine had almost killed Bora, it was the
way
he had done it. He had stood and pointed Bora out, then made a cutthroat motion with his hand. That chair, that attack, had been directed personally at Bora. And it wasn’t an empty threat. It had very nearly been realized.

            Bora no longer cared about the templates. He just wanted to get that one man alone.

            Face to face.

           
Where are you going now?
Bora asked under his breath, watching the Marine run.
We’re covering all the exits, but you must already realize that.

            He knew perfectly well that the Marines would find something. They seemed extremely adaptable. It was becoming amusing to predict how they would improvise their way out of the next situation….

            ‘The trucks!’ Bora radioed. He was starting to see exactly how they thought. ‘Stop them reaching the trucks.’

            Before Cairns could ask any questions, Bora switched off his radio and sprinted down the slope.

#

Coleman jumped into the nearest truck. It was the tray-back loaded with river stones. The stones were covered in the tray by orange rope webbing.

            The cab was a snug two-seater.

            Forest and King raced to the next vehicle. As Vanessa jumped into Coleman’s passenger seat, Forest and King piled into the scorpion-shaped truck.