LITMIR.BIZ

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okay, Mom!” the teenager said, pulling down her gag. “They’re the U.S. Marines.”

      “Really?” the older woman squeaked, having trouble breathing.

      “United States’ Special Forces,” Lyons corrected with a brief grin. “Now, y’all follow me outside. Quick, now.”

      With joyful tears on her cheeks, the teenager nodded agreement and slipped an arm under the other woman to leverage her off the floor.

      “My husband…” the mother started.

      Not having found anybody else alive, Lyons looked at the woman and said nothing for a long moment that seemed to last forever. The middle-aged lady went a little pale, then nodded in understanding.

      “What about my daddy?” the teen asked, a quaver in her voice.

      The mother touched her daughter on the shoulder. “Let’s go,” she said in a calm tone. “Now, dear, no time to waste.”

      Going to the door, Lyons whistled sharply. There came an answering whistle and he led the way outside. Schwarz and Blancanales were standing guard near the stairs to the beach, both of them with handkerchiefs tied around their faces.

      “Thank you, all,” the mature woman gasped, the cloth strip that had been used as a gag hanging around her throat.

      “You’re welcome,” Blancanales said. “Now get!” Turning, he fired a burst at the open sea.

      Livid, the two women jerked at the noise, turned and took off at a run. Soon they lost their high heels and continued barefoot much faster.

      “Alone?” Schwarz asked, glancing sideways.

      Lyons pulled down his mask. “Husband.”

      “Damn.”

      “Let’s finish this,” Blancanales stated, starting toward the stairs that led to the outside exhibit.

      But then he paused. The cannons were no longer visible rising from behind the museum, and just then the floor shook as heavy machinery buried below the ground came to life.

      Without a word, Able Team charged. They still had a hundred feet of open ground to cover to reach the guns.

      “WHAT IS HAPPENING, comrade?” the mechanic asked, both hands busy in the guts of the hydraulic pump. New lines were attached to the feed and snaked out the door to the middle cannon. More Red Star agents were installing the new firing pin into the weapon, and off by himself, the Beijing technician was unpacking a single artillery shell from a lead-lined picnic cooler.

      “Nothing that concerns you,” the colonel snapped, sweeping the sand dunes with a pair of powerful binoculars. “Get back to work.”

      “Yes, Commander.”

      The colonel knew that everything was going well, but was still unhappy. The parking lot had been cleared of civilians and the museum taken without losing a single man of his cell. The telephones were all disconnected in case they had missed somebody hiding somewhere, and the repairs on the guns were nearly completely. All well and good. But the colonel didn’t like the fact that there was smoke rising from several locations. However, that might have been done to hide the police taking defensive positions, rather than to offer cover for advancing troops. It was highly unlikely that any of the American Special Forces could have arrived yet. This whole mission had been accelerated to lightning speed. Never pause, never rest, go fast, and the lazy Americans would trip over the red tape of their own government.

      “Done,” the mechanic said, laying down his wrench and throwing a freshly greased lever.

      A light flashed, there was a snap of electricity, and the motor room concrete bunker shook slightly as a pair of ancient motors rumbled into life. The meters on the housing flickered alive, and the guns began to move as the hydraulic pressure reached functional status.

      “Excellent.” The colonel smiled. “Well done, Comrade.” Then, drawing a pistol, he shot the startled man in the heart. The body limply collapsed onto the hydraulic hoses, the red blood pumping to spread along the lines between the tiles of the floor.

      The colonel gave the corpse a salute, then holstered the pistol. At least the mechanic died well, from an honest Chinese bullet, rather than vomiting his intestines like the fools at the United Nations would soon be doing. The death of that many hundreds of diplomats would throw the world into chaos, and China had carefully laid out plans to take every advantage of the political turmoil. Every member of his cell knew this was to be a suicide assignment. There was no hope of returning home. Glory would be only earned if they accomplished the mission, so they would succeed or die trying.

      By now, a man at the cannon was frantically turning guiding wheels to alter the elevation, while a second checked a compass in his hand.

      “Left twelve degrees!” he commanded. “Hold! Now, up ten degrees! Hold!” He turned. “We’re on target, Comrade.”

      Smiling, the colonel stuck his thumbs in his belt. “Load the shell!” he ordered.

      Slowly the technician from Beijing stood, holding the artillery shell as if it were a priceless artifact.

      A burly Red Star agent worked the latch and swung aside the breech to make ready. But there came an odd rattling noise from the cannon, as if something had broken loose and was moving freely.

      Furious, the colonel advanced closer as three grenades rolled out of the open end of the cannon and landed on the sandy ground.

      “Run!” a man screamed, turning to flee when the grenades exploded.

      Thundering flame and hot shrapnel filled the area, teeth and broken limbs flying into the air as the hydraulic lines ruptured and pressurized red oil rose like blood from a cut artery. Not yet locked into position, the cannon impotently lowered its muzzle until pointing at the empty beach.

      The colonel barely had time to react when the men of Able Team arrived, firing as they climbed over the seawall at different points. The last few Red Star agents collapsed, trying to fire their AK-47 assault rifles in response, but only getting off a few short bursts before falling on top of their weapons.

      Pulling his pistol, the colonel shot the Beijing technician before he was torn apart by the incoming American lead, the hardball ammo going through the man to ricochet off the wall behind. As the technician dropped, he let go of the shell and it rolled across the sandy platform to bounce down a sand dune and come to a stop on the beach near some driftwood.

      DROPPING A SPENT CLIP, Schwarz reloaded while the others stood guard. Then Blancanales replaced his exhausted clip as Lyons shouldered the empty autoshotgun and drew a .357 Colt Python from his belt. Moving to the edge of the gunnery bastion, Schwarz hopped down to the beach and walked over to the Chinese artillery shell lying near the water line.

      “Clear?” Blancanales asked, looking around.

      “Clear,” Lyons confirmed.

      “Oh, shit,” Schwarz cursed, sitting on the piece of driftwood. “We’re in trouble.”

      Weapons out, Blancanales and Lyons rushed over. By the time they arrived, Schwarz had already ripped open a Velcro pouch at his side and was placing electrical tools on the damp sand.

      “What’s wrong?” Lyons asked. “That thing can’t possibly be live.”

      “Oh yeah, the shell is live,” Schwarz said in a flat monotone. “The damn thing is designed to arm itself after a set number of revolutions after it spirals out a cannon.”

      “Rolling down the sand dune did the same thing?”

      “Apparently so.”

      “Shit!”

      “My word exactly.”

      “What can we do?” Blancanales said, leveling his M-16 at the shell. It was standard U.S. Army procedure that in case of a nuclear emergency, shoot the bomb. Once the uranium sphere was distorted,

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