The Eighth Trumpet (The Jared Kimberlain Novels) (42 page)

Lisa’s pursuit of the huge elf was so intense that she hadn’t even noticed the police charge by her. The elf seemed distracted, lost almost, when she reached him at last just beyond 42nd Street. But he twisted like a cat at her touch, and Lisa felt the shudder rush through her even before her eyes locked on a face trapped behind rubber and plastic that wasn’t a face at all. She had seen it before in all its horror, seen it that night on Torelli’s island when she had barely escaped with her life.

The giant glared at her from behind his elf’s mask. His hand came up to strike her, but the crowd closed in and deflected the blow into a glancing one. Lisa reeled, and the crowd absorbed her. Quail raised his hand to strike at her again.

Lisa screamed.

Oblivious to everything but his search for the Dutchman, Winston Peet was sweeping the area beyond Times Square when he heard the scream. It went through him like a knife, and his eyes snapped to its origin.

He picked out Lisa Eiseman instantly. And someone else. An elf about to strike her who suddenly changed his mind and, as Peet watched, turned back into the crowd and headed for the finish line.

Quail!

Peet began to move, from a trot to an all-out sprint down Broadway with his orange clown’s wig ripped off to reveal his bald dome above his made-up white face. The Dutchman gazed back once, and in that moment their eyes met and locked, and in the next moment Quail was through the crowd, charging down the street with Peet following barely a block behind.

The two of them were sprinting just beyond the edges of the parade, seeming a part of it to onlookers, including the police, many of whom were also disguised as participants.

The crowd appeared to think it was all part of the show, a clown chasing an elf, and applauded as Quail and Peet charged by.

Kimberlain reached the subway entrance just ahead of Cathy Nu. Together they bolted down the steps past the mass of people who were emerging, frustrated by the power failure that had stranded them here.

“We’ve got to clear the streets!” he bellowed between heavy breaths.

“No! The panic! People will be trampled, children! We know where the explosives are. We’ll deactivate them. The bomb squad’s already on its way!”

They had reached the turnstiles and hurdled over them with no tokens in hand. Kimberlain didn’t waste the energy of telling Cathy the
plastique
would have been packed in a way to prevent it from being found quickly, much less deactivated. No sense in even looking. The streets had to be cleared, a panic risked … unless the cars could be cleared from the area instead.

The flight of stairs descending to the track level for the Seventh Avenue Express train was crammed with bodies moving toward the streets. Kimberlain and Cathy Nu pushed their way through and rushed to the quickly thinning platform where Captain Donahue was already in conference with a Transit Authority engineer whose nametag listed him as O’Brien.

“I tell ya the power’s out on
all
the tracks, not just the express tracks,” O’Brien was explaining.

“We’ve got to repair it, that’s all,” Donahue insisted.

“Mister, I don’t even know where to start looking. I got maybe fifty thousand people trapped in the middle of hell, and if you ask me—”

“Is there another way to move the stalled cars of the number two?” Kimberlain interrupted.

“What is it about the number two that makes it so much more important than—”

“Just answer the question! Can we move it, shove it forward somehow?”

O’Brien thought briefly. “One of those new trash barges could do it. They’re powered by diesel, not electric. They push instead of pull.”

“Then get one here, damn it, and hurry!”

O’Brien started to raise his walkie-talkie to his lips as floods of police personnel, including members of the bomb squad, rushed onto the scene. He looked back at Kimberlain.

“Look, pal, you’re going to need someone to drive this thing once it gets here, and I just happen to be one of—”

“Don’t worry,” the Ferryman broke in. “I’ve already got a driver lined up.”

Chapter 35

JONES’S MEN ABANDONED
their snowmobiles on his signal to proceed the final three hundred yards on foot toward Outpost 10 through the blizzard. Strange how such a common machine had emerged as the key to his operation, but without it there would have been no way to transverse the rugged gaps in the Transantarctic Mountains from the submarine. Just as the trek itself would have been impossible if not for the space-age “cold” suits provided for them, which utilized heating coils to recirculate the body’s warmth. None of his men would have gotten a mile without them.

The skimobiles had been left for him months before in a specially designed Quonset hut built to blend in with the scenery. Even with the coordinates, Jones had barely been able to locate it. Inside, in addition to the small machines, were a pair of Snowcats outfitted to carry cargo—in this case the twenty-eight warheads that had been removed from the Jupiter missiles on board the
Rhode Island
. Only one Snowcat was needed, with the other serving as backup. The Snowcat traveled at roughly one-third the speed of the skimobiles, which meant it would probably pull into Outpost 10 not long after Jones and his men had the complex secured. He had placed Barlow in the Snowcat as well, under the watchful eye of four of his men, so that the commander could provide the final element of his plan without delay.

Outpost 10 was about to be overtaken. Jones tightened his goggles and gave the signal to move out.

The half-dozen Marines of Outpost 10 were garbed in white that made them one with the landscape. They rushed from the warm indoors of the station into the raging storm as the enemy forces approached after abandoning their snowmobiles. The storm winds had switched from north to south, an advantage for the Marines, since their eyes would steer with the winds now, while the enemy would be forced to look straight into it.

“I should have figured this,” Danielle was saying to Farraday. “I should have known snowmobiles were the only way they could reach us fast enough.”

“We should be pleased,” Farraday told her. “After all, they’ll be hard-pressed to carry their warheads with them this way.”

“You’re missing the point. There’s no way they could have loaded the snowmobiles on board the sub in the wake of taking it over. That means the machines were left somewhere near the Ross Ice Shelf for them, along with whatever other equipment they required.”

“Christ,” Farraday realized, “a Snowcat—”

“To bring the warheads in. Probably making its way here now at about a third the speed of the skimobiles.”

“Shit.”

It took several minutes for the Marines to use tow lines to find their way to positions carved out of snow mounds for them and to insert their M-16s into the tailored slots provided. By this time the drivers of the three massive loaders were trembling from the cold inside their cabs and perhaps the fear of being entombed in the darkness forever. From the observation deck on the third floor of the central building, Danielle and Farraday could see nothing; everything beyond was a white blur. Even knowing where the Marines and the loaders had been placed didn’t help them. They took this as a good sign, for if they couldn’t find the initial two lines of defense they had laid in the storm, then certainly the approaching enemy wouldn’t be able to either.

“Front line leader, do you read me?” Farraday asked the head Marine.

“I read you, Commander.”

“Can you see them yet?”

“No, sir. Storm’s too powerful to make anything out at a comfortable distance. The best we’re gonna get is motion through it to fire at, and even then we’re gonna have to wait till they’re up real close and personal.”

“You know the plan. Once they begin to scatter, pull back to the outpost and leave the rest for the loaders.”

“Will do, Commander.”

“Fire at will, Sergeant.”

“Roger.”

Danielle could see that now, for the first time, Farraday was tense because it would be up to him to tell the loaders when to move. If he was an instant late in picking up the white-clad enemy forces who survived the gunfire barrage from the Marines, his men’s lives could be in jeopardy. He needed visibility to properly command his engineers-turned-soldiers, but visibility was at a premium.

Farraday lifted the binoculars to his eyes and gazed off into the distance. Danielle watched him stiffen.

“Christ, here they come. Dozens, and well packed to boot.” He lowered the binoculars deliberately. “Even after all we did, part of me wouldn’t believe what you said until I could see it for myself.”

“But you acted, Commander. Every man and woman who survives here today owes their life to you.”

“Commander, this is front line leader.”

“Go ahead, Sergeant.”

“They’re a hundred yards from the perimeter and closing. Their pattern’s a little more spread out than I was hoping for. I’m gonna have to wait longer to give the fire order.”

“It’s your call, Sergeant.”

“Thank you, sir. I’ll wait until the fifty-yard mark.”

Farraday gritted his teeth and went to the binoculars again, lifting them from his lap. In the distance beyond the snow mounds he registered the approaching enemy as motion amidst the white blur. That was all; no distinct forms or shapes, just objects that were noticeable only for their movement. Farraday did not envy the Marines for the shots they would have to take. If the approaching forces numbered sixty or more, how many would the initial defense line have to fell if they were to have any chance at all? And if the remaining lines of defense left too large a complement of the enemy alive, how could the complex defend itself from a direct charge?

Farraday shoved the questions aside and returned to his binoculars.

The brief walk had been treacherous, and Jones found himself exceedingly glad it was drawing to an end. Two hundred yards back, Outpost 10 had risen from the snow and storm. It seemed to beckon them onward.

Jones turned his attention to the detailed schema his mind held of the complex, specifically the pump room, where miles of insulated piping wound about, connected to the huge pumps that pushed oil through the vast pipeline and into the various storage dumps. Place his missiles in front of the plugs designed to clear the lines and they would be sent hurtling into the continent, to be detonated on a timer designed to give him and his crew enough time to return to the
Rhode Island
and dive deep beneath the blast’s far-reaching effects.

Closer to Outpost 10 now, Jones had the sensation it was abandoned, deserted. The storm swallowed everything, left nothing with which to form impressions. The base looked like a toy castle piled amidst the whiteness. So quiet. So alone.

They were just over two hundred yards from the complex of buildings when a man three over from Jones slipped and fell. The next man joined him, and Jones’s first impression was that they had wandered into an ice field with semicomical results. It was the puff of snow bursting upward into his face from ground level that made him realize the men weren’t slipping, they were being shot!

He swung into a dive, already going for his walkie-talkie, when more snow bursts erupted around him. Everywhere, on both flanks, his men were going down, too many of those left standing locked as they were, unsure what to do next. And behind this first line others simply kept approaching, the storm disguising the reality of what was happening. Jones grabbed for his rifle and fired a series of shots into the air after the walkie-talkie had proven useless to get the signal out. His men swung immediately toward the sound of his echoing gunshots. Another pair were projected backward, one with his chest ruptured and another flailing for the remnants of his skull as death claimed him.

Jones continued to watch helplessly as everywhere around him his men continued to drop, how many to safety and how many to the bullets fired from the invisible guns ahead he didn’t know.

“How many, Sergeant? How many?” Farraday demanded.

“Can’t be sure, Commander. We let them get right up close.” The sergeant reflected on the blessing the storm had become by totally obscuring the sounds of their rifle fire. “I’d say fifteen down. As many as twenty.”

“Pull back, Sergeant.”

“We’ve still got clear shots, Commander.”

“Pull back!”

Jones had pinned the gunmen’s positions to the last series of muzzle flashes that came before the remainder of his men dropped into the snow for cover. He locked his eyes on those spots and searched for motion. When it came in the form of five or six shapes darting back into the thick of the storm, he lunged to his feet screaming, “They’re pulling back! We’re going in!”

He heard his own words repeated in various tones and levels a dozen times as word was passed on. By design and training his men took on a wide perimeter sweep, spreading out as they rushed forward through the snow, firing as they ran. The idea was to create a line of fire that would make flight for anyone caught within it impossible.

As of yet he had confronted only the evident realities of the situation. The fact that they were being fired upon now led him to consider that their presence had been expected and that the element of surprise was gone. This changed the rules for the encounter substantially. Instead of simply taking over the outpost, they were now in for a bloody battle.

No matter. Jones’s men were prepared either way.

The Marine sergeant watched two of his men go down and then a third. He caught up with the final two and body-tackled them to the ground.

“Stay low,” he whispered, “and dig yourself into the snow.”

The men did so as he groped desperately for his walkie-talkie.

“We’re pinned down, Commander. Three dead.”

“Damn,” came Farraday’s reply.

“Our position is thirty degrees west of the loaders. Say twenty-five yards in front of the second defense line.”

Danielle found them in her lenses and steered Farraday’s vision. What looked to be forty or more enemy troops were converging on the area in a semicircle three rows deep and well spread out.