Down on the incline, one of the brushwooders manning the mortar yelped and went down clutching his thigh.
Ryan crept back to the prisoners, staying low, and stopped in front of Hoyle. Bernsen kept his arms wrapped over his head and mewled piteously. Doc kept cautious watch with his Le Mat blaster.
“The cave,” Ryan prompted. “That’s where you were headed.”
Hoyle hesitated, his lower lip pinched tight against his teeth.
“They’ve got another one away,” J.B. called.
Before the words trailed off, a second explosion rocked the vicinity, throwing up a fresh shower of pebbles and stone splinters. The detonation caused momentary deafness.
“Getting closer,” J.B. warned. “Another round or two the way they’re improving, they’ll put one right on top of us.”
“Talk,” Ryan grated. “Either way it goes, we got no choice but that cave. If you hold back on me, I’ll dangle you over the edge of this rock and drop you down to those brushwooders. If you get lucky, mebbe you’ll connect with a mortar round before you hit bottom.”
“We were going to the cave,” Hoyle admitted grudgingly. “There’s a river down below. Runs underground for a time.”
“Then why try to chill us?”
“We checked earlier. River was too high to try. We were waiting for it to go down. We got a raft down there.”
Ryan glanced at the rest of his group. “Jak, Krysty.”
Ryan said, “you two take point. Double yellow. I didn’t hear anything, but that doesn’t mean it’s clear. Doc, give me a hand with the prisoners.” He grabbed the shoulder of Hoyle’s jacket and hoisted the man to his feet. “J.B., Mildred, you’ve got our backs.”
Together the group moved toward the cave. Before they reached it, another mortar round impacted against the chimney rock nearly a dozen feet above their heads. A great tumble of split stone came slithering free, scattering across the rocky shelf under their feet, nearly knocking them to the ground.
“Get up and move,” Ryan growled, yanking his prisoner to his feet. Hoyle had taken a stone ricochet to the side of his head. Streamers of twisting crimson ran down his temple and jaw, tracking across his neck before being staunched in his shirt collar.
Jak and Krysty vanished into the gaping maw of the cave. Bullets pocked the sides of the opening, spitting small shards that bit at Ryan’s face. He hustled Hoyle inside the cave, moving the man forcibly. A blur of movement triggered instinctive reflex action on Ryan’s part.
He shifted hands with the Steyr, then cleared leather with the SIG-Sauer. Snap-firing, he aimed the 9 mm blaster at the four men who’d climbed the trail up the side of the chimney rock and pulled off successive rounds as quickly as he could. He wasn’t sure if he hit anything, but the bullets sent most of the brushwooders scurrying for cover.
One of the men leaned forward with a scattergun. Ryan lifted the SIG-Sauer, tracking on to his attacker. A heartbeat before his finger pulled through the trigger, bloody mist evacuated the side of the brushwooder’s head, sucking away chunks of his skull and blobs of brain matter.
Ryan put another round through the man’s left eye, yanking the head around almost 180 degrees. When he glanced to the side, he saw Mildred standing there, the Czech target weapon held securely in both her hands.
J.B. drew his lover into the crook of one arm and started her toward the cave. Bullets beat a deadly tattoo against the rock surfaces in their wake.
As the Armorer and Mildred raced across the open space, Ryan triggered a fusillade of bullets that ripped across the tops of the rocks the brushwooders were using for cover. Foul oaths cracked the air over the din of the blaster as the men ducked into hiding and remained there.
J.B. unbuckled the Smith amp; Wesson M-4000 scattergun from his back and tossed it to Ryan. “Close quarters like this, if those brushwooders try shoving into the cave, it’ll be just like a gren going off in their faces.”
Ryan readied the weapon and raked his vision across the dark inner recesses of the cave until he spotted Hoyle. Doc was moving Bernsen along at a fair clip. “Go,” Ryan ordered.