I wish we could use the spook eyes.” “Why can’t we?” Michaels asked.
” “Flashlights will cause cutouts, they shine in our direction.
Safety feature, otherwise it’s like looking into the sun.” “Hostage scenario,” Toni said.
“You have an SOP for this, don’t you?” “Yes, ma’am–only not one set up to cover being in a foreign jungle with enemy troops breathing down our necks and our ride about to take off.
Standard negotiations for hostage situations are based on psychology–and hours or days to work.
We don’t have the time.” Michaels, Toni, and Fernandez were in the bushes fifty yards ahead of the quartet moving toward them.
The rest of Alpha Team was spread out behind the four on the trail.
“What do we do?” Toni whispered.
Fernandez said.
“Look for an opportunity. Push comes to shove, we take the bad guy down and hope for minimal casualties.” “How much danger are Howard and Winthrop in, given the suits they are wearing?” “Some,” Fernandez said.
“They will surely pick up damage, cuts, but the armor will stop most of a low-yield explosive shrapnel. It’s the guy in the PJ’S and the big brown guy who are gonna get shredded for sure.” Toni said, “No great loss–except that Hughes might have left us some electronic bombs of his own. We can’t let him die until we know for sure he didn’t. And if he did, maybe it was Platt who set them up, if there are any. Can we afford to let both of them die? Don’t we need at least one of them alive?” “Yeah,” Michaels said.
“But the clock is ticking. We don’t move, everybody dies.” At that moment his virgil vibrated.
It was Gridley.
“Got “em. Boss. Every last one of them.” “Good work. Jay,” Alex said.
“And just in time.” Disconnecting, he looked around him.
“Jay did it. Get ready to get our people out of there now.” He stood and stepped out of the bushes.
“Alex, don’t–to was Toni began.
Too late.
“Hold it right there, asshole!” Michaels yelled.
Behind him, Fernandez said to Toni, “I’ll flank right. Commander, go left!” The four people moving up the path stopped.
“Who the hell are you?” Platt said.
“Get out here where I can–oh, hello! You’re the Net Force honcho, aint’cha? What you doin” out here in the jungle, desk boy? Come to see how real men play?” Howard made his move–he leaped, grabbed the hand holding the grenade, and squeezed it tight in both of his.
“Shoot, Winthrop, shoot!” Startled, Joanna pointed her pistol and fired, but Platt spun, swung the colonel around one-handed like swinging a small child, and the bullet from Joanna’s pistol sponged! off the colonel’s back armor.
A beat later, another bullet from somewhere boomed and whistled past, not hitting anything Michaels could see.
Jesus! Everybody dancing around wouldn’t leave Fernandez or Toni a clear shot, Michaels knew. And if bullets started bouncing off armor, no telling where they might go–or who might catch one in an unprotected spot.
“Cease fire!” Fernandez yelled. He must have realized the danger too.
Things went into slow motion…. –Platt pulled a knife from his belt even as he danced around in a circle with Howard holding on to his other hand– –Michaels ran toward the two struggling men, moving as if his feet were mired in thick mud– –Platt slashed at Howard’s arm and drew blood– –Michaels got to the wrestling men, saw Platt grin, turn the knife in his direction, and cut at him, forcing Michaels to jump back– –Platt turned back to Howard, raised the knife to Howard’s throat, to a gap in the armor.
Slow, oh, so, slow… “Adios, black boy,” Platt said. He didn’t even raise his voice.
Michaels’s gun was still in its holster; he was the only one close enough to shoot and hit Platt. He pulled it, fired without aiming–he couldn’t miss this close–but Platt saw him reach, spun Howard around, and once again the bullet hit the colonel’s armor-Damn– “John!” –Michaels turned, saw Toni. She had already tossed some thing at Howard– –the kris-Reflexively, Platt batted at the thing he saw twirling in toward him, missed, but that meant his knife was away from Howard’s throat– –Howard let go of the grenade hand, snatched the wavy bladed knife from the air, turned, twisted into Platt, stabbed as Platt stabbed– –Platt snarled as his knife hit Howard’s armor and skidded off– –The kris’s point slipped between Platt’s ribs, the blade sinking in until the hilt almost touched the center of the big man’s chest– Platt moaned, blew out a breath, stabbed again, hit more armor. The knife actually dug in a little–then the blade snapped in half.
“Fuck,” Platt said. He fell to his knees, dragging Howard down with him, pulling the kris from Howard’s grasp.
Hughes screamed, “Jesus, Jesus, don’t shoot me! Don’t shoot me! Please!” Platt toppled to the side, and when he did, he let go of the grenade.
–The grenade-Michaels dropped the gun, dived, rolled, came up with the bomb, and threw it into the trees to his left. He hoped like hell none of the troops had circled back into that area, or that it didn’t hit a tree and bounce right back– “Down!” he yelled.
“Down, down–” He dropped.
Howard was still on his feet, staring at Platt.
One… two… three… Boom!
The grenade went off, and metal sleeted through the trees and bushes, punching holes in leaves and bark.
Something burned along Michaels’s arm. He frowned.
What–to A long time passed, a couple of thousand years, Michaels figured. Toni grabbed him, and he realized he was still alive.
His ears rang.
He hugged her with his good arm, and watched his other arm bleed from the shrapnel gash on it. It didn’t hurt, but it was putting out what seemed a goodly amount of red.
“Don’t shoot!” Hughes said. He started to blubber, big tears streaming.
“Shut up,” Howard said quietly.
Hughes shut up.
Howard moved to stand next to Michaels, holding his own arm, which was also bleeding.
“Commander. You okay?” “Yep. You, Colonel?” “Better, now. Nice of you to drop by.” “We were in the neighborhood.” They looked down at Platt, who was still breathing.
Platt said, “Damn. I can’t believe it. A nigrah…” Howard didn’t say anything.
Platt stared at Howard.
“I hate this fuckin’ country,” he said.
“Kilt by a goddamned nigrah–” Platt’s last breath escaped and he collapsed.
Howard stared off into the forest.
“He was right about the Germans.” “Excuse me?” Michaels said.
“I’ll tell you about it later. Commander.” Behind them, Joanna Winthrop and Julio Fernandez were locked in a tight embrace.
“Well,” Michaels said, “I hate to break this party up, but it would be a good idea for us to take our leave now.” “Amen, Commander. Amen.” Michaels bent, and with some difficulty, pulled the kris from Platt. He wiped it off on the man’s shirt, then gave it back to Toni.
“I think you are right, Toni. This is definitely a lucky thing to have around.” “Let’s go, people! We got a helicopter to catch!” They went.
EPILOGUE.
Saturday, January 22nd, 8 a.m.
Washington, D.c.
In his own bed, Michaels woke up slowly and rolled from his right side onto his back. The left arm was still a little sore, but the medic had used skin stat glue and bonded the six-inch-long gash into a thin line they said would leave minimal scarring.
A nice conversation piece at informal parties, they’d told him.
Not everybody nearly gets blown up by an antique hand grenade.
The ride back from Guinea-Bissau had been relatively uneventful.
The locals had never gotten around to finding the helicopters, at least not until after they were in the air. The flight from Banjul couldn’t have been smoother. True, the director hadn’t been thrilled with the operation, but nobody in Guinea-Bissau was going to complain about it, given that their President had received a hundred million dollars in stolen money. They might even let him keep it, the director had said, because maybe it was better that he was beholden to the U.s. government, given the unstable political situations over there.
Better he felt as if he owed them a favor, should they need to collect it. But that was up to State, of course.
All in all, the director wasn’t too upset. And everybody in be the regular FBI and Net Force was happy to hear the great silence from the offices of Senator Robert White after his chief of staff was indicted for all those horrible crimes.
White was too rich to have been involved in Hughes’s little scheme, but there would be a little tar from that brush on his nice suit.
Maybe he might even get unelected next time around. There was a nice thought.
Colonel Howard’s arm needed a little work, but it would heal almost as good as new, so he was told. And apparently the colonel had picked up some kind of rare bacterial infection bar a while back that had been sapping his strength lately. It had been missed during his initial exam, but picked up while the knife wound was being treated. Once it was diagnosed, the be medics were able to start Howard on antibiotics, and he’d been delighted to find out that- the disease would be cured in a couple of weeks and he’d feel a lot perkier. Not that Michaels thought the colonel particularly needed that–he’d looked pretty damned perky when he’d been wrestling with the sociopathic racist body builder.