Fast (39 page)

            ‘Here,’ said Coleman, indicating a plastic roller door at the rear of the kitchen. A small motor at the top raised and lowered the door.

            Forest quietly slid across the door’s two deadbolts. King disengaged the small motor with his multipliers. Coleman secured his CMAR-17 and drew his colt.

            He pointed to the roller door’s base. ‘Knife.’

            Forest knelt and slid his combat knife under the door. He twisted the handle, lifting the door an inch. When no reaction resulted, Coleman slipped his fingers through the gap and lifted the door another three inches. He pressed his cheek to the floor and spied underneath.

            Beyond stretched the northern section of the pedestrian loop. They crossed this area before, but fleeing after the pool room skirmish, Coleman had absorbed only the barest details. The area beyond the door resembled an open-plan airport VIP lounge. Furniture stretched away for about fifty meters, surrounding a marble fountain. Mostly cane easy chairs and marble coffee tables surrounded the fountain, but a few large couches and solid wood chairs dotted the mix. The furniture was arranged in circles. Or rather, it had been; it lay all over the place now. People had also been breakfasting out there when the evac started.

            Thirty meters to Coleman’s right sat some kind of small motorized vehicle linked to a train of pallets. It resembled a golf buggy towing a row of open-sided dumpsters. The procession had been abandoned.

            It all looked clear.

            Their goal lay across the lounge area.

            Two entrances provided access to the dormitories recessed behind the north wall. Both passageways linked back to the north stairwell.

            Coleman groaned inwardly. It was too much open space to cross. He lifted the roller door halfway open.

            ‘Is there another way?’ asked Forest. ‘It’s pretty exposed.’

            King didn’t comment either way.

            ‘I’m open to suggestions,’ offered Coleman. ‘But we need to move now.’

            There were no options. The upper section of northern stairwell was Fifth Unit’s insertion point and the best place to start tracking them.

            Coleman touched Vanessa’s arm. ‘We’ll cross to the fountain first. I’m up front. You come straight after me.’

            She nodded and took position beside Coleman.

            Coleman waited for King and Forest to get ready. ‘Cover us until we reach the furniture and then start your move.’

            Coleman struck out towards the fountain. After fifteen meters he dodged among the furniture, sidestepping couches and overturned coffee tables. He glanced back to check Vanessa’s progress. Forest and King wove a path behind her, keeping a protective triangle around Vanessa.

            Coleman sensed something amiss.

            He stopped.

            The layout of the furniture ahead appeared wrong. Three cane couches were out of order. Strangely enough, even chaos had a pattern, and this wasn’t it.

            Vanessa bumped into Coleman. ‘What the…?’

            Then it all happened.

            Three gunmen leapt from concealment behind the couches. Arranged in a semi-circle, they had hidden about fifteen feet apart to avoid friendly crossfire. The gunmen hardly straightened before Third Unit reacted.

            Coleman fired his colt. The power of the bullet jerked up his arm, and a fraction of a second after, snapped back the terrorist’s head.

            The bullet collapsed the man’s forehead into the frontal lobe of his brain.

            Forest swung his CMAR-17 to the left and grouped three bullets squarely into his target’s chest. The terrorist hadn’t even raised his weapon before he tumbled backwards into a magazine stand. The entire stand collapsed under the gunman, burying him in periodicals and newspapers.

            King fired on the move. His first round punched through a couch. A puff of yellow stuffing marked where the bullet exited the back of the couch and slammed into the gunman’s hip. The second and third bullet found the man’s solar plexus and right lung.

            The gunman stumbled backwards, but didn’t fall.

            King closed with his target like a higher-order predator. In three steps he leapt over the couch. On his downward flight, still fully in the air, he smashed his CMAR-17 into the terrorist’s face. His full weight carried the blow. The bridge of the gunman’s nose smashed straight back into his sinus cavity. The man collapsed backwards over a marble coffee table.

            Coleman saw King flying through the air, ramming his weapon into the terrorist’s face. The gunman couldn’t recover, but King wasn’t finished. He redefined the word
overkill
.

            King rolled on the ground and found his feet over his collapsed target. He grabbed the gunman’s bloody chin. With a sickening wrench, he snapped the man’s neck.

            The entire violent exchange lasted four seconds. The three terrorists hadn’t gotten off a single shot.

            But even as Forest’s target fell into the magazine stand, as King had launched himself into the air, Coleman knew that these three gunmen weren’t alone. They represented the trigger of a much larger trap.

            Gunmen poured from the northern dormitories. At least nine sprinted towards the pallet train, firing as they ran.

            Forest was immediately hit.

            Turning towards the new attack, Forest was blasted off his feet. He spun in the air and crashed down hard.

            The couch behind King erupted in clouds of yellow stuffing. Two horizontal lines of submachine gunfire streaked towards him. He dove towards the overturned marble coffee table. Tilted up on one end, the table served as a marble shield. He smacked down on his hands and knees behind the solid square of marble
just
as the bullets pounded across the marble tabletop.

            Coleman threw his full bodyweight into Vanessa, knocking them both sprawling behind the fountain. Bullets filled the air where she had stood gawping seconds before.

            ‘Forest’s down! Forest is down!’ yelled Coleman into his radio. ‘I got nine gunmen running for the pallets!’

            Vanessa scrambled towards the fountain.

            Coleman popped his colt over the first tier of the three-tiered fountain and snapped off two fast shots. It was too dangerous to look over the edge and see if they had done any good.

            Next he heard a terrible sound. It was a Mark 2 submachine gun firing fully automatic
behind
his position. Had they missed a hidden gunman? If so, the gunman now had a clear line of fire on Third Unit’s exposed flank. Coleman spun onto his back and swung his colt around, praying he could drill the new threat from his position behind the fountain.

            But his pistol sights only found King.

            When King dove for cover, he must have landed within reach of the dead terrorist’s dropped gun, because two seconds later he popped up from behind the marble tabletop and opened fire again with the submachine gun back at the terrorists.

            King grimaced as he cut loose. He hosed the entire clip at the running targets. His huge muscles strained to keep the weapon’s recoil on target. He discharged ninety rounds in under three seconds.

            They were three seconds of ear-splitting thunder.

            Coleman saw two terrorists go down under the 5.7 mm rounds. They were the only two who hadn’t reached hard cover behind the pallets. Their legs were blown out from under them. The other seven gunmen including Bora ducked down behind the pallets.

           
Damn! Damn! Damn!
thought Coleman.

            Bora’s intention was clear: he was ensuring Third Unit couldn’t reach the dormitories or retreat back to the cafeteria kitchen. Also, the closer range far better suited the terrorists’ submachine guns.

            As the two wounded terrorists began hauling themselves towards the pallets, Coleman looked back through the furniture for Forest.

            Forest was dragging himself towards the collapsed magazine stand. Beside the stand stood a dispensary counter for returning trays, like at a fast food restaurant. The narrow counter was loaded with cutlery and napkins and empty plastic serving trays. It was mounted on a marble block about the height of two telephone books.

            That’s where Forest was heading.

            Reaching the counter, Forest maneuvered to lay straight out with the marble block between himself and the terrorists. His helmet pressed against a marble block no wider then his shoulders or taller than his helmet. It was only effective cover if he stayed perfectly still. Even then, it was pretty dubious. The wood veneer and aluminum structure on the marble block was effectively invisible to high-velocity rounds.

            Coleman swore. He couldn’t see how badly Forest was injured, but from the way he crawled there was some fight in him yet. From the distance Bora launched the surprise attack, Forest’s body armor could have had stopped some of the damage.

            ‘Forest, don’t move,’ yelled out King.

            ‘Forest, how bad are you hit?’ called Coleman.

            ‘It’s just my arm.’ Forest’s voice was shaky. ‘It’s not too bad. My body armor caught two rounds.’

            Gunfire hammered Forest’s position.

            The light wood veneer splintered above his head. Serving trays crashed down over his legs. A bullet grazed his boot toe and tore off a chunk of rubber sole. Falling knives and forks showered his chest and torso.

            The gunfire stopped.

Shredded paper napkins floated down a second later.

            Keeping his body perfectly still, Forest turned his head until he found Coleman. A bead of sweat ran down his brightly flushed cheek.

            His expression was obvious.
Help me.

            Coleman scanned the area around Forest. No hardcover existed nearby, except the fountain, and Forest would never survive the dash now the gunmen knew his position. He couldn’t even roll over without exposing a shoulder above the marble block.

            A bloodstain spread over a white paper napkin fallen on Forest’s upper arm. The wound might not be life-threatening, but any second now he was going to collect a less treatable injury.

            Coleman peaked over the fountain and studied the pallets. ‘Vanessa, is anything in those pallets volatile?’

            She didn’t even need to check. ‘Definitely not. Nothing like that can be transported through the habitation level. It’s more likely to be rubbish and recycling. It’s all shipped off site.’

            Coleman’s options were limited.

            ‘King, we need to draw that heat off Forest.’

            The terrorists weren’t letting up. They hammered Forest’s position again. The tray counter collapsed. In moments Forest was lying behind the naked marble block, covered in splintered veneer slats and twisted aluminum frame. He shifted his body weight so the counter remains fell to one side.

            ‘Now!’ said Coleman.

            Together, Coleman and King popped their weapons up and fired. Their immediate goal was to draw the terrorists’ gunfire from Forest.