The Arsenal, page 7
Like the knife and his other weapons, he knew that he would have a use for it. He gave a last glance at the empty apartment -- Sarah would be waiting by the tunnel leading out of the city -- and started for the doreway . . .
The German helicopter's rotor blades turned more rapidly as John Rourke took Sarah Rourke into his arms.
"I'll take care of Natalia," she told him.
"Take care of yourself and the baby —for me," and he kissed her hard on the mouth, holding her close.
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Over the whoosh of the rotor blades, he could hear Paul calling, "Everything's aboard, John!"
Rourke looked at Sarah. Her gray-green eyes. Her auburn hair. Her smile. "I really love you," he said quietly, kissed her again— quickly —then caught up his rifle and the Lowe pack and broke into a run for the chopper, keeping his head low as he crossed beneath the whirring blades.
He tossed the Lowe pack through the doorway, then handed up his M-16, Annie taking it.
As he stepped aboard, he looked back. Her left hand clutched gently at her abdomen and the life there, and her right hand waved toward him.
John Rourke blew her a kiss, then slid the door home. "All secure, pilot!"
Rourke eased back into one of the bench seats. There would be time enough to go forward and assume his duties as co-pilot.
For now, as the helicopter—Germans called them machines which screwed themselves into the air — lifted off, snow swirling cyclonically in its wake, he held his daughter's hand and watched the rapidly vanishing figure of his wife.
Sarah still waved.
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CHAPTER TEN
Vassily Mikhailovitch Prokopiev, Major, Commanding, Elite Corps, Committee For State Security of The Soviet, stepped to the open hatchway, the wind tearing at him, the jump light flashing to green. Prokopiev tapped the senior sergeant on the shoulder, the senior sergeant signalling the first man to jump. No static lines, high altitude, low-opening. The light flickered amber, then green again, the next man jumping at the senior sergeant's signal, the flicker of the light again, then the green, the next man out, man after man, full battle gear in place. Prokopiev took his eye off the doorway and looked across the fuselage through the transparent panel in the starboard side door, the other two high altitude capable silenced gunships disgorging their jumpers, the cargo chutes (these would open electronically when altimeter readings were proper).
Prokopiev looked back to the jumpers on his own craft. One more, then the senior sergeant, then himself, the two lieutenants under him assigned one each to the jumpers with the other two gunships. He tugged at his equipment for the last time, all secure.
The senior sergeant, Piotr Yaroslav, glanced at him once, then jumped, Prokopiev stepping into the doorway, watching below as Yaroslav's image vanished into the darkness. Yaroslav — it was likely one of those names assumed during the violent days immediately before the
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1917 Revolution, then merely passed on.
Green light.
Prokopiev jumped, somewhere to the north in the darkness surrounding him, the Second Chinese City waiting . . .
"Herr Doctor?"
John Rourke took his eyes from the control panel he had been studying, Adolph Lintz., the young German lieutenant whose ship the J7-V was, returning to the
cockpit.
"I am able to relieve you now, Herr Doctor. Thank you. It is a long flight." Lintz was tall, thin in the extreme, his face beneath the close cropped blond hair cheerful, however bony.
"But a good rest awaits you at the German facility outside Eden Base," Rourke smiled, the officer seating himself at the pilot's controls. "Somehow, that doesn't seem to cheer you, Lieutenant."
The young* German laughed as he took the yoke and Rourke released simultaneously. "My wife, Olga, is in New Germany— Argentina as you would call it, Herr Doctor. I have not seen her for three months."
"Men have survived longer periods than that," Rourke smiled again, unstrapping, rising from the co-pilot's seat. "But I hope you get to see her soon."
"She is very pretty."
"I noticed the picture," and Rourke gestured toward the photograph wedged between the mounting frame and the landing gear control panel. She was blonde, trim waisted and almost classically large bosomed —and undoubtedly much more pleasant to hold on a cold night than the controls of a J7-V V-Stol fighter bomber.
"Then you know what I mean. It will be good to rest at our facility near Eden Base. But —"And he exhaled long
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and softly. "It is not the same as being with my Olga."
"Here." And John Rourke took his wallet from his jacket where he'd taken to carrying it since The Awakening. Wrapped inside a waterproof plastic bag, he opened the bag, then extracted one of the laminated photographs from inside. "Her name is Sarah." He extended the picture in his hand and Lieutenant Lintz took it.
"She is so pretty, your wife. Very beautiful. You are having a baby, I understand?"
"Sarah isr actually," Rourke nodded. The young fellow was apparently starved for conversation, or naturally curious, or perhaps both. Rourke took back the photograph of his wife, returning it to his wallet, returning the wallet to the bag and then to his pocket as he continued. "She's through the first trimester."
"You must be excited. Olga and I— we want children. If I speak out of turn, Herr Doctor Rourke, please tell me to be quiet. But —your daughter —in there — " And Lintz gestured with a cock of the head toward the compartment just aft of the cockpit.
"She's twenty-eight."
"I have heard the story —I know I am rude — "
Rourke sat back down and buckled in. There was time. "Briefly, after we took the cryogenic sleep as the Great Conflagration began, I awoke early, then awakened my son, Michael, and my daughter, Annie. I stayed with them for five years and returned to the Sleep when I thought they were adequately prepared to function together on their own. I continued in the cryogenic sleep until Annie was nearing the end of her twenty-seventh year. The children had aged to adulthood, while I only aged five years and my wife, Sarah, aged virtually not at all. The same held true or the man who's now her husband, Paul Rubenstein, and, of course, Major Tiemerovna."
"Ahh —she is pretty. Major Tiemerovna. I saw her.
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She has a face a man would die for, I think."
"Yes," John Rourke almost whispered . . .
Weil felt suddenly oppressively warm and began removing his parka. In the night, outside, it had been bone-chillingly cold, the temperatures throughout the period of the last several days dropping almost imperceptibly at first, but now more than a man could bear at night. Would they continue to drop? He longed for the warmth of his native New Germany. But the spirit of the Reich had to be served, and participating in this Dodd's conspiracy was the only available means by which this end could be accomplished. If the Japanese officer and the black woman with him had been unable to reach Herr Rourke's mountain retreat there would have been no need to worry over them. Without one of the hermetically sealed tents, they would have died, regardless of whatever survival training they had been given. Weil sat at the table now, the men from the other teams idling away the night playing cards, reading. Only Horst was still out in it, still scanning the mountain with his vision intensification binoculars, huddled as close as he could get to the field heater, searching for some secret and penetrable entrance into Rourke's Mountain.
Failing that Horst found such an entrance, there was the other alternative. Weil glanced toward the explosives stacked in the far corner of the tent. He lit a cigarette . . .
John Rourke saw to his gear, the Lowe Alpine Systems Loco Pack secure, his leather jacket inside. Snow-shoes or cross country skis might have been useful, he thought, considering the weather. He pulled on the heavy gray woolen sweater, glancing at the Rolex on his
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left wrist. Nearly time. "Paul?"
"All set, John," the younger man called back, kneeling, helping Annie with her boots.
Rourke found himself watching his daughter intently. It was odd seeing her in pants, but even with her decidedly feminine tastes she hadn't said a word when they had discussed the return to Georgia and he—John Rourke — had cited German meteorological reports. The pre-dawn low here was anticipated to reach minus twenty degrees, the windchill factor creating the effect of minus fifty degrees Fahrenheit. Regardless of clothing, however prepared they might be, it would be impossible to remain in these temperatures for long without retreat to some sort of shelter.
For this and a second reason, he had determined that once the J7-V landed, he and Annie and Paul would strike immediately for The Retreat, in order to reach shelter and to ascertain whether or not Kurinami and Elaine Halversen had reached there.
If they had not, there was considerable likelihood they were dead by now. But he would find some means of making Annie stay behind in relative safety at the Retreat and set out with Paul using the truck, looking for them anyway.
The insulated snow pants already on, Rourke shouldered into his parka, almost instantly stifling in the warmth of the J7-V's fuselage.
Lieutenant Lintz's voice came over the speaker. "Doctor Rourke. We will be touching down in precisely five minutes. Please-prepare to secure for landing."
Rourke checked his pockets, the insulated toque there, the snow goggles as well, the insulated gloves on top of the pack. "All right —Paul! Annie!"
"Right, daddy," Annie called back, sliding onto the bench-like seat, strapping in, Paul beside her. Rourke shoved his pack into a safe corner and sat flanking
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Annie. "I hope we find them."
"And what's going on" Rourke added, securing the seat restraint.
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CHAPTER ELEVEN
Michael Rourke reined back on the Asian horse under him, his eyes squinting against the full brightness of the sun, the stocky little gray bucking slightly, Michael knotting his fists into the coarse black of its mane, almost wrestling the animal into control.
"You look like your father without his sunglasses, your eyes half-closed against the sun like that," Otto Hammerschmidt said half through his teeth, reining in beside him, having more apparent difficulty with his mount than did Michael, The animal's hide ran from chestnut almost through black with every shade between somewhere represented, glistening with sweat at the flanks.
"We will be encountering their roving patrols soon," Han observed, handling his horse better than either Michael or Hammerschmidt. Michael wondered absently if it were just that Han Lu Chen knew better what to expect and, through anticipation, could counter the moves of the ill-tempered little creatures because of that. The other six men of the detail —three Chinese and three German, all enlisted personnel —formed a ragged semicircle around them.
"Better break out the banner, then," Michael Rourke suggested to Han.
"Agreed —although it will have very little effect, I
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think," Han said, his voice even, emotionless, as though he were stating some obvious fact. Han swung out of the saddle easily, handing over his reins to Michael, Michael knotting his left fist more tightly into the gray's mane, Han's animal immediately beginning to squirm, tug at the reins Michael held now in his right.
The pack animal one of the three Chinese soldiers had led at the rear of the column stood docilely enough as Han dug beneath the covering over the pack saddle and produced a neatly rolled length of silk, the backs of embroidered lettering visible here and there. From the side of the pack saddle, Han took a pole some five feet in length, one end of the pole semi-sharp. He took a few paces back from the pack animal and stabbed the pole into the ground with considerable ferocity. But the ground was so hard that the pointed tip barely penetrated beyond, as it appeared from Michael's vantage point, anything more than two or three inches.
As if on cue, a gust of wind crossed the rock strewn gray plain on which they had paused, the deeper, almost purplish gray of the mountains jutting savagely upward in the distance, the mountains white-capped with snow from the approximate mid-point of their elevation. The gust of wind caught up the banner, unfurling it as Han began to affix the top of the banner to the staff. They were Chinese characters, embroidered in a deep blue against the field of pearl-cast white silk.
Michael Rourke could not read them, but knew their meaning nonetheless. The banner proclaimed that the riders came in peace, despite their weapons, in order to speak with the great leader of the Second City concerning a matter of grave importance. His indulgence was begged that they might be allowed to speak with him in an honorable fashion.
And Michael Rourke was beginning to wonder if his father's implication —that this was a fool's errand —
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might not be true. In those mountains lurked the Mongol mercenaries who had been about to rape Maria Leuden, nearly caused Otto Hammerschmidt's death. Beside him, Otto's expression seemed to have deteriorated from serious to grim.
Han handed the banner to one of the Chinese soldiers, then took back the reins of his animal and moved into the saddle.
Michael reached beneath his leather jacket, taking out his gloves.
"We ride to the base of the mountains, Han?" Hammerschmidt asked.
"If we get that far, Captain Hammerschmidt," Han answered, digging in his heels and starting his mount ahead.
Michael grinned at Otto Hammerschmidt. "Well, he sure told you, didn't he?"
Hammerschmidt lit a cigarette in the cup he formed with his gloved hands, saying as he exhaled, "I was ordered to do this. Why are you here? Hmm? Who's the stupid one?" And Hammerschmidt laughed loudly as he signaled the six enlisted men, then spurred his mount after Han Lu Chen.
Michael held his animal back, watching after all of them for a moment. Han was by now a considerable distance ahead of the column composed of Hammerschmidt and his German/Chinese force, the banner suing for peace and diplomacy held high in the wind.
Michael's horse started to rear, Michael twisting the animal violently into obedience. His right hand drifted to the saddle scabbard and the M-16 there.
The man they went to see called himself Mao, after the iron-fisted totalitarian who ruled post World War Two Communist China. As Michael Rourke's hand lingered on the butt of the M-16, he recalled something Mao Tse Tung was credited with saying: "All power
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comes out of the barrel of a gun."
Michael Rourke dug in his heels, his animal coming instantly to a gallop, like a coiled spring released.
Mao's words made for sobering thoughts.
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CHAPTER TWELVE
The J7-V hovered over the ice-packed, wind-hardened snow crust. The cloud of falling snow from the growing blizzard and tiny specks of loose ice swirled so densely around the machine and the three people who jumped from it that visibility extended barely beyond the length of John Rourke's reach.
His eyes were goggled, his face toqued, his head hooded, his hands gloved, but still the shock of cold penetrated almost to the bone as he reached out for Annie, Paul already having her by one arm, Rourke taking her by the other, both men leaning their bodies into the swirling snow and ice and wind and propelling her forward, the J7-V banking and slipping as it climbed, the ice and snow driving down on them now like microscopic daggers.
Rourke dragged his daughter ahead, Paul pushing her forward, Annie making some sort of barely intelligible sound, scream-like, but perhaps only the sound of labored breathing. Rourke's own breath came in cold gasps. He looked upward, his goggles almost instantly covered with a thin coating of snow and ice, the ice impacts against the plastic of the goggle lenses like a suddenly deafening cacophony which he felt through the bones in his face rather than heard; but the J7-V was banked nearly away. Rourke gathered his daughter in his arms, further attempts at movement pointless until the aircraft's cyclonic downdraft was abated.
Paul's hands protected her, face and head. Rourke
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embraced her closely. It had been a mistake to bring her here, but a mistake she had pushed for, beyond volunteering, insisted upon. They had been exposed for less than a minute. And bitterly, Rourke thought, if Kurinami and Halversen were out in this, they would be dead.
The downdraft from the German V-Stol aircraft was suddenly gone, Rourke shouting now over the keening of the wind, "We have to get moving! Annie? Will you be all right?"
"If everyone stops suffocating me by trying to protect me!"
He touched his covered-over lips to the hood of her parka and let her go, Paul shouting, "We have to get inside and out of this. The wind!"
Rourke nodded vigorously, not only for agreement's sake, but that his gesture be understood. He had shot a last minute azimuth on his compass before the aircraft had touched down, and he oriented himself now toward the ground and gestured and shouted, "Follow me!"
It was the wind, howling at gale force, which heightened the cold, made it penetrate despite the heaviest of outer garments. And his plotted course would soon take them into a defile. They would have to labor along its sides because of the depth of the snow —it was impossible to tell exactly how high because of the downdraft of the machine —but in the defile they would be out of the wind.
Paul began feeding out rope, Rourke using a carabi-ner clip to secure the leading end to his equipment, Annie six feet down its length and between them, then Paul clamping on, the remainder of the climbing rope coiled over his right shoulder.
Already, John Rourke was moving, his body leaning into the wind, he hoped shielding even marginally the effect of the wind on his daughter. He kept moving.
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The drastic qualities of the weather here only deepened his concerns, developing over the last several weeks, that the climate was somehow eroding, as some had predicted it might. German high altitude observation craft had monitored band upon band of disturbances swiping toward the North American continent and toward Europe, Asia somehow shielded from the flow. But what was coming?
