Flat on his back, he looked up into the sky for a moment. “Are you sure the sun’s really up? Doesn’t look like it to me,” he said to her, his mind racing. He could attempt to drag off the second rider with the rope leading from his wrist, but the ropes on his ankles? What could Han do?
“The sun is up. Good-bye, American.” The woman smiled, her eyes a window to incarnate evil, he thought.
He looked at Han Lu Chen. Then white robed girls stepped away from the horsemen . . .
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Maria Leuden had given up her motorcycle to Otto Hammerschmidt, not even time to adjust the helmet to fit him. Paul had dismounted the field radio from the back of his machine, instructing Maria how to call for the helicopter gunships he had requested be in waiting and to tell them to hurry.
Natalia had already moved up, beside John Rourke. She could not see his face with the helmet that he wore. His parka was off, left with Maria Leuden, his double shoulder holsters exposed over the heavy sweater, the sweater bunched up in front and the Detonics Scoremasters in the waistband of his trousers.
“Time is up —we move out,” John Rourke announced, Natalia hearing his voice through the headset. Her heart was beating rapidly and she felt a lightheadedness. She supposed it was action after all— “Let’s go!” And John Rourke’s jet black Special rocketed ahead, Natalia throttling out, just slightly behind him, Paul and Annie on the left flank, Otto Hammerschmidt on her right.
It was a hastily conceived plan. As they entered the valley, coming down out of the rocks, they began to execute it, Paul and Annie breaking off toward the platform, Otto, Natalia falling in beside him, toward the far side of the open expanse, John Rourke going right up the middle, as he always did .
Michael Rourke’s head screamed at him with pain. He didn’t know what the signal would be, for
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the execution to begin. Michael did nothing—he didn’t want to ruin Han’s plan, if there was one. He could wait no longer, the ropes tensioning slowly outward,
He tugged at the rope that led from his right wrist, the rope Han had, the rope sliding free, Michael shouting, “Han —a knife!”
Han Lu Chen’s animal wheeled, Han riding down on him, Michael reaching for the rope from his left wrist, grabbing at it as the other three horses started to run.
The hammering of hooves, Han’s saber flashing, a rope cut, Michael’s left hand free now, but al-” ready he was being dragged, the rope on his right leg nearly taut as was die one from his left. He heard gunfire, automatic weapons, to his right a jet black motorcycle, coming right toward him.
Han’s saber slashed again, the rope from Michael’s left ankle cut, but now Michael was being dragged, hands and elbows locking around his head and face to protect it, his shirt ripping away from his body, rocks gouging at him. He could see Han, riding in the dust of the one remaining executioner, Han’s pistol firing, the reins to his mount held in his teeth, the rider falling, the horse stumbling. Michael threw himself forward, grabbing at the rope with both hands, heaving it, the animal up, vaulting ahead now, Michael’s arms nearly ripped from the sockets, the rope tensioned between his ankle and his hands, his body torn across the ground.
He saw Han, trying to gain on the animal, saw the jet black motorcycle, one of the Specials, the
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one his father rode, closing, cutting through mounting Mongol horsemen, Maoist soldiers kneeling to fire their rifles.
The horse dragging Michael Rourke ran wildly onward toward the rocks, the hum of the Special louder now, nearly alongside him as Michael struggled to raise his head, his grip going, his hands bleeding where the rope abraded them.
He thought he heard his father’s voice, telling him, “I’m coming, son.”
The jet black Special passed him, dust flying into his face, rock chips spitting up toward him, his father’s left gloved hand moving, a flash of gleaming metal, a handgun, the handgun discharging, then again and again and again, the horse slowing, the handgun still firing, the horse spilling, head first, almost cartwheeling, Michael whipped right into the path of his father’s motorcycle, die Special veering just past him, skidding, his father jumping from the saddle as it spun out. Michael rolled over onto his back, his head . . .
Natalia Tiemerovna wheeled her machine toward John Rourke, the Mongol riding up on him throwing away his astrakhan hat. It was Han. But from behind him, a dozen riders were bearing down toward John and Michael. Natalia worked the firing mechanism on both machineguns, their roar barely audible because of the protection afforded by the helmet, men and horses tumbling to the ground.
To her left, Otto Hammerschmidt was driving into a knot of foot soldiers, his machineguns blazing. To her right, what seemed like an endless stream of
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soldiers were pouring from the gates of the Second City.
She turned the motorcycle in an almost too fast arc, activating the high explosive grenades in the rear weapons pods, launching, explosions rippling over the ground before the entrance. She arced the machine again, activating the second pod, firing the mixed smoke and gas, holding her breath as she drove through the flames where bodies burned from the high explosives, her machineguns blazing toward more riders coming down on John and Michael.
She could see Annie and Paul, Paul’s machine rocking across the steps leading onto the platform, guns blazing, white robed women there fleeing, Mongols dying. Annie was right behind him. They were going after the Russian officer, she realized.
She thought she caught sight of Paul getting the man onto Annie’s machine, then remounting. But she had to turn her machine, cutting a wedge now between a platoon strength-sized group of uniformed soldiers and where John and Han helped Michael onto the back of John’s Special.
She read the digital counter for rounds remaining, both machineguns nearly emptied now. She fired a second volley from the gas and smoke package, cutting a narrow arc, balancing out her machine with her feet as she turned it quickly, accelerating past them again, activating the second package in the high explosives pod, the mini-grenades plowing across the ground as they exploded in series on impact, making the dirt and rocks between her and the soldiers rise momentarily like a wave.
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She turned her bike, her heart beating so rapidly in her chest that she could feel it pounding against her left breast, her mouth so dry she could not swallow, pain behind her eyes.
“I love you John” she said into her helmet radio. “I always will, love you, John. John! John!”
Her mind, she knew, was working on two levels, on one she was rationally aware of turning her Special right and firing into a pack of Mongols on foot, but on the other level —”John . . . I’m so lonely without you, John . . . John —hold me . . . Please hold me again. Ohh please.”
“Natalia —what’s the matter,” his voice came back to her. His machine was moving again.
She could hear Maria Leuden’s voice. “The chief of the helicopter pilots has radioed back, Doctor Rourke. He and the other two pilots encountered a massive Soviet force closing on the Second City. Two helicopters already shot down, his on fire and out of control. We have no help coming.”
“Stay concealed in those rocks.”
“Daddy—we’ve got the Russian officer. He’s more dead than alive, I think.”
“Head out of here.”
“John —please love me.” More of the Maoist foot soldiers, firing at her, bullets bouncing off her fairing. Natalia fired out her machineguns and the counters readout empty.
She stopped her machine, slinging her M-16 forward. “I don’t — ohh, John, I hurt — Her chest was tightening and her head ached beyond any pain she had ever known as she opened fire, the M-16 to her shoulder.
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“Natalia— get outta there —we’re clear. Get outta there!”
‘John — ” she kept firing, one of the M-16s empty. She let it drop on the sling to her side taking up the one on her left side, firing it from the hip.
Terror seized her and she was crying and the rifle fell from her hands and she fell from the saddle. “John!”
She was two people, the one who watched and the one who cried . . .
John Rourke was listening to Natalia losing her mind. “Natalia!” But she no longer answered him.
He slowed his Special, Otto Hammerschmidt · to his far left, but no helmet radio through which Hammerschmidt could be contacted.
Rourke veered toward the German commando captain, pushing up the visors on his helmet, shouting now into the wind, “Hammerschmidt! Take Michael! Hammerschmidt! I’m going back for Natalia! Hammerschmidt! Hammerschmidt!” And Hammerschmidt’s borrowed Special started to turn, Rourke’s machine intersecting with it, Hammerschmidt stopping, Rourke’s machine stopping. “Take Michael!”