Point of Crisis (36 page)

“Sure. I got all day to deal with fuckers that can’t follow directions,” replied Eli, pulling Joe off the glistening blade and tossing him aside.

He rushed to the front door, not wanting to waste the time backtracking through the church. After throwing a few latches, he wrenched open the right side of the warped door and squeezed onto the concrete steps. The dust-choked air smelled like ammonia and charred wood. He stood there for a moment, searching through the haze for an outline of a vehicle. There was nothing. Several small fires burned brightly near the intersection, bushes and trees ignited by the superheated blast.

He hesitated on the stairs, not keen on rushing into the unknown. The Matvee was designed to withstand roadside bombs, and he couldn’t take the chance that the damn thing flipped over and landed right side up. The dampened sound of distant machine-gun fire reached him, prompting him to abandon caution. Fuck it.
Even if the thing landed on its wheels, nobody inside would be walking a straight line anytime soon.
He ran blindly toward the intersection, activating his radio.

“Griz, bring the car directly to the intersection. Lights on. I need the Molotovs right away. We don’t have much time.”

***

A strong ammonia smell permeated the Matvee’s cabin, competing with the industrial stench of diesel fuel. Alex shook his head and rubbed his eyes, initially confused by the counterintuitive feeling of moving his hands downward to reach his face. Something was different. An intense pressure strained against his shoulders, and one of his legs dangled freely; his Kevlar knee pad was looming inches from his flushed face. He released his hands, surprised when they flopped upward, striking the shattered ROTAC on the roof of the vehicle.

Fuck. We flipped.

He stared at the spiderwebbed windshield, trying to make sense of what had happened. The dark, fragmented view didn’t offer any clues, aside from the very fact that a ballistic window designed to withstand IED fragments and .50-caliber armor-piercing projectiles had been shattered. He grabbed a flashlight from the clutter of gear littering the roof and directed the beam at Lianez.

The corporal’s left forearm was wedged into the steering wheel, his elbow hyperextended at least forty-five degrees. His right hand lay uselessly against the roof, most of his fingers twisted at odd angles. Alex didn’t see any blood, which was a good sign. Busted-up limbs could be fixed. Lianez moved his lips, but Alex didn’t hear anything. He tried to respond, but the words came out as vibration, like the Matvee had been submerged underwater. He couldn’t hear.

The fuel odor intensified, stinging his eyes and spurring him into action. The Matvee wasn’t flame resistant, and he detected a flickering orange glow through the driver’s window. They needed to get out of here immediately
.
He eased his right leg out of the foot well and let it hang in front of him with the other, his feet inches from the roof. Alex triggered the harness buckle and dropped to his knees and elbows.

He gripped the flashlight and turned his attention to the rear compartment. The Marine behind him hung unconscious in his seat harness, suspended with no obvious external injuries. Moving the beam to the right yielded a ghastly sight. PFC Jackson lay crumpled against the roof in the rear cargo compartment, his neck bent at an unnatural angle against the rear hatch. Lifeless eyes stared back into the passenger cabin.

Shit.

Light poured through the driver’s side windows, distracting him. He squeezed along the roof to the window behind Lianez’s seat and peered through the small, ballistic-glass window. An SUV sat in the middle of the road, illuminating the Matvee with its headlights. Alex thought about banging on the door with his flashlight, but quickly abandoned the idea. The vehicle wasn’t there to rescue them.
He grabbed the radio handset dangling between the seats.

“All units, this is Guardian One-Zero. Troops in contact. We’ve been hit by a roadside bomb. Request immediate assistance at the intersection of Route 5 and Route 160.”

In a panicky voice, Alex repeated the call, unsure if anyone responded. He could barely hear his own voice, let alone the digitized, staticky voices often heard over the VHF radio net. When he checked the window again, a face blocked his view of the SUV. He immediately recognized Eli Russell’s grinning, pockmarked face from the DMV photos downloaded to his laptop. The man looked even scarier in person.

***

Eli stopped short of the intersection and gawked at the damage done by McCulver’s largest IED. A jagged, three-foot-deep crater, centered on the gravel shoulder, extended several feet into the asphalt road. Wide, gaping cracks continued beyond the hole, reaching the far side of the blacktop surface. The asphalt fissures closest to the crater’s epicenter hissed and crackled from superheated bitumen, the petroleum-binding product used to shape modern roads. All that remained of the telephone pole that stood behind the roadside bomb was a splintered stump just outside the crater; the remainder of the pole and the wires it suspended were nowhere in sight. He’d never seen anything like this. The devastation was perfect.

He jogged south along the road until he found the second crater. Long fractures reached into the southbound lane, connected to a sizzling hole half the size of its sister IED.

He muttered obscenities until he spotted the tactical vehicle upside down in a thick cluster of bushes next to a used car lot. The truck had flattened a path through the brush, rolling from the road to its resting site. He eyed the lush undergrowth surrounding the vehicle.

That’ll burn nicely.

Skirting the massive crater, he crossed the road and examined the wreckage in the dancing light cast by the small fires. Every external feature had been blasted off by the explosion or crushed by the rolling motion of the vehicle. A strong diesel smell hit his nose, competing with the ammonia, telling him that the monster’s fuel tank had been ruptured. All the better.
Beams of light cut through the dust to his right as the SUV slowly navigated the intersection. Eli motioned for Grizzly to bring the vehicle forward and point its headlights at the vehicle.

“Watch for anyone crawling around the sides. I’m gonna light this thing up like the Fourth of July,” he said, hurrying around to the rear lift gate.

He pulled a plastic milk crate filled with Molotov cocktails out of the cargo compartment and shuffled toward the overturned vehicle. A light flickered through the compact door window, causing him to instinctively stop halfway between the road and the charred armor hull. If one of the occupants opened the door, he’d be caught in the open. He sprinted past the windows and kneeled next to the armor junction behind the rear driver’s side door, breathing heavily. The SUV eased over the shoulder of the road and poured its high beams over the wreckage.

He dropped the crate of clinking bottles behind him and crawled along the side of the steel hull until he reached the rear driver’s side window. A face appeared in the window, disappearing moments later. Eli centered his face on the window and watched a Marine fumble with something on his vest. The marine’s lips moved rapidly, and Eli realized he was calling for help.

He needed to get this over with. The machine-gun fire north of here had stopped just as quickly as it started, which meant Liberty Two was finished. He checked his watch. One minute and they needed to be on the road
.
Just as he was about to pull away from the window, the Marine turned his head and they locked eyes. A flash of recognition passed over the marine’s face, replaced by rage.

Fletcher.

Eli grinned and winked.

“Cover that door!” he yelled over his shoulder to Grizzly, who kneeled behind the driver’s door and leveled his rifle at the vehicle.

Shaking with excitement, he returned to the crate and removed two Molotov cocktails. McCulver had conveniently stuck a camping lighter in the crate, which he used to light the kerosene-soaked cloth wicks on both bottles. He scurried around the other side of the vehicle just in time to see the rear passenger door open.

“Burn, motherfucker!” he screamed, heaving one of the bottles at the rear-facing door.

The bottle hit the armored hatch squarely, engulfing the door in flames when the gas and motor oil mixture ignited. Eli hurled the second bottle at the flat armor above the hatch, showering fire between the door and open interior. The hatch slammed shut, cutting off a scream of agony, and the dense bushes next to the door burst into flames.

He pulled out three more bottles from the crate and returned to the burning side of the vehicle. The mixture still burned against the armor, the thickened concoction sticking in place like napalm. He lit the wicks and walked along the vehicle, smashing two of the Molotov cocktails against the front door and throwing one under the hood against the partially buried, cracked windshield. Thirty seconds later, he had expended every bottle in the crate, completely enshrouding the armored vehicle in flames.

“Get the next crate!” he yelled, jogging up to the shoulder of the road.

He met Grizzly in front of the SUV, yanking bottle after bottle out of the tray and tossing them in an arc toward the burning vehicle. Each bottle exploded, adding to the inferno until the hull nearly disappeared behind a wall of flames. He pulled the last bottle, stepping next to his driver.

“Griz, I saved the last one for you,” he said, cocking his arm back.

“You should be the one to—”

The petroleum-filled wine bottle swung in an arc, shattering over his head. Grizzly stumbled forward, clawing at his eyes and screaming curses. Eli kicked him in the back, sending him in an uncontrolled fall toward the burning vehicle. He rolled to the edge of the firestorm and had started to get up when his head and torso burst into flames, turning him into a human torch. Eli watched with depraved satisfaction while Grizzly twisted and flailed, disappearing inside the inferno. The fire caught in the trees and spread through the bushes.

The temperature inside Fletcher’s sealed metal coffin would soon reach intolerable levels, forcing the Marines to abandon their bulletproof cocoon and venture into the fire, but he didn’t have time to savor the glory of shooting them down in person. He’d far overstayed his welcome in Limerick. In the end, it didn’t matter; Eli had a better way to make Fletcher suffer.

Chapter 38

EVENT +21 Days

Limerick, Maine

Alex lunged at the door, pounding the heavy armor plating after Eli’s face disappeared. He considered opening the door, but decided to lock it instead. He had no idea where Eli had gone.

Crawling under Corporal Ragan’s unconscious body, he drew the Heckler & Koch P30 compact pistol from his drop holster and gripped the rear passenger door handle. He opened the door with his left hand, pointing the pistol toward the front of the vehicle with his right.

Clear.

Before Alex could check the back of the vehicle through the window, flames consumed his arms. He screamed and dropped the pistol inside the vehicle, as fire rained into the vehicle compartment.

Without thinking, he slammed the door shut, locking it to prevent Eli from tossing an incendiary bomb inside. Within milliseconds of the door closing, the Automatic Fire Extinguishing System (AFES) activated, instantly saturating the enclosed space with a dry chemical that extinguished the fire before it burned through his uniform. Alex lunged through the cloud of chemical dust to lock the two front doors. He didn’t feel like testing the AFES against the full contents of a Molotov cocktail.

While locking the front passenger door, flames erupted beyond the ballistic window. Seconds later, a bright yellow flash consumed the windshield. He slid into the empty back seat and studied the SUV through the window, calculating his chances of breaking out and killing Eli. Beyond the powerful headlights, a lone figure crouched behind the open driver’s side door, no doubt covering the Matvee with a rifle. Before he could further analyze the situation, flames obscured his view.

This fucking lunatic is trying to burn us alive!

Thick black smoke started to seep into the cabin from the open turret. Alex reached down and tried to raise the hatch, but extensive damage to the turret structure trapped the metal hatch in place. Alex had no idea how long they could stay inside the vehicle, but he knew it wasn’t long. Beyond the caustic smoke, which had no way to escape, the temperature had risen at least twenty degrees since the first Molotov exploded. They were sitting inside an oven.

“Lianez! Can you hear me?” he said, squeezing into the space next to the corporal.

The corporal’s words came out slurred. “I hear you, sir. I think I’m all fucked up!”

“You’re fine, but I have to move you!” he said, studying Lianez’s hyperextended arm. “First I need to untangle that arm!”

“Hold on, sir! Let’s think about this for a—”

Without warning, Alex straightened the marine’s arm and pulled it clear of the steering wheel at the same time, extracting a prolonged, expletives-filled scream.

“Sorry I had to do that! No time to fuck around! Ready for round two?”

“What?”

“Keep your left arm straight!”

“What? No!”

Alex grabbed the top of Lianez’s tactical rig and released his harness. He pulled the Marine onto his right side as the buckle detached, keeping his head from hitting the roof and snapping his neck. Unfortunately, there was no way to prevent his mangled arm from bouncing off the steering wheel and hitting the door. With Lianez cursing and screaming, he dragged the Marine into the cargo compartment, sliding him next to Jackson’s lifeless body in front of the rear hatch.

He’d forgotten about this egress point earlier, which allowed them to exit the vehicle without exposing himself to the shooter next to the SUV. He’d still have to worry about Eli, or anyone else that arrived in his entourage, but at least he didn’t face a guaranteed firing squad. It was their best chance at this point, and they needed to get out. He could barely see through the smoke.