Sporadic fire came from the sniper as the companions used the rest of the grens to maintain the dust cloud. Resting the flat tire against his spine as protection from incoming rounds, J.B. hastily attached the new tire, using only half the nuts. But he wasted a few precious seconds making sure those were solid and tight.
“Done, go!” he shouted.
At the wheel, Mildred, the sole occupant of the wag, started the engine and rolled away, crumpling the jack still attached at the frame of the military vehicle. She cut a fast turn, throwing more clouds of dirt into the air with the spinning tires, then charged headlong into the trees and vanished among the foliage.
As if the sniper deduced their plan, another LAW streaked through the dust to violently detonate a scant yard away from where the Hummer had been parked.
“Now!” Ryan ordered, and he charged into the trees at a full run, the rest of the companions only steps behind.
Moving fast through the pine trees, Ryan curved across the sloped side of the valley, rising slowly alongside the sniper. Raising a fist, he pointed directions, and the others split into teams to converge on the sniper from different directions.
A Kalashnikov constantly chattered at the trees, the noise guiding the companions to the location of the hidden gunner. Minutes later, they found him.
The blue shirt was sitting on a hunter’s box, just a few planks nailed to branches, giving him a stable platform to hide in as he waited for prey to come into view. The upper branches of the tree shook as spent brass arched from the hot breech of his blaster. Soft curses sounded, and the shooting stopped.
Creeping closer, Ryan saw the sec man rummaging frantically in a duffel bag. Then he pulled another LAW into view with a satisfied cry.
“Don’t!” Ryan barked, standing and working the bolt on the Steyr. The weapon was already loaded, but the noise would drive home the point that he was armed.
The sec man registered shock, then rage and dropped the LAW, going for his longblaster. Without a qualm, Ryan fired, hitting the man in the chest, the 7.62 mm round slamming him backward into the tree trunk. Then J.B. added the fury of his Uzi, and the corpse tumbled from the trees to land on a rock with a sickening crunch. Rivulets of blood began dripping onto the ground from his hidden face.
“Doc, Dean, sweep the area for any more,” Ryan ordered, approaching the corpse. There was a map sticking out of his back pocket.
But before he could reach the document, the bushes parted and two more blue shirts walked out, firing their Kalashnikovs. Diving for cover, Ryan shot the closer man in the belly with his Steyr. The other blue fired his longblaster, but then a knife sprouted from his throat. Gagging on his own blood, the sec man fell to his knees, still triggering the AK-47, shooting in every direction. Then Krysty stepped from behind a tree and fired her hand blaster into his face, finishing the job.
“Perimeter sweep, twenty yards!” Ryan ordered, rising from the ground.
Krysty, Doc and Dean moved into the forest as J.B. climbed up the crude ladder. On the platform, he stayed crouched, studying the forest around them. When satisfied, he whistled an all-clear signal and climbed back down with the duffel bag and the dead man’s AK-47.
Ryan got the map as the Armorer checked the contents of the duffel. “Dark night, he had two more LAWs, and an implo gren that could have reduced the Hummer to a soup can!”
“If he got close enough,” Ryan agreed, looking over the plastic paper. It was the same as the other, just a map of Tennessee. Nothing more.
A long whistle came from the forest, and Ryan answered with two short ones. The rest of the companions stepped into sight from several locations.
“Nobody that we can find,” Krysty reported, holstering her revolver. “Find anything useful?”
“Nothing so far,” Ryan said, turning the map over. Nothing was circled or highlighted as with the last one they had found, but there was a notation scrawled at the bottom with indelible ink. Ryan looked twice at the map to make sure he was reading it correctly.