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Molokai Forest Reserve
Sunday, 9 May
1930 Local Time
He had fifteen minutes to cover six feet of jungle, moving slower than growing grass. Pettigrew had traveled less than half the distance to his target. Stumpy trees protected the sentry’s sides as he hunkered between them, all but invisible in the foliage draping the gap. Only the man’s single cough, and a rare crackle of brush, betrayed his position.
Pettigrew gritted his teeth. A direct assault or a long, slow crawl around to the man’s backside? Of the two, he preferred to be in Philadelphia. Circling around from behind would take time he didn’t have, and a bull-rush attack would mean a good chance of getting shot.
The sharp bang of two grenades exploding made his decision for him. He sensed more than saw the sentry twist in surprise, his attention pulled toward the sound of Yeager kicking off the party. Pettigrew coiled his lean muscles and ripped through the brush like a sprinter at the starter’s gun. He lunged at the form between the trees and slammed into a solid body. They fell in a tangle, Pettigrew on top and the sentry sprawled awkwardly, his left arm pinned under him.
The man grunted, and Pettigrew jabbed with his knife. His blade punched through flesh. He felt the brief moment of resistance followed by the meaty feel of a steel parting skin. The sentry reeked of garlicky sweat. Pettigrew held him as close as a lover, feeling the man’s muscles move against him, surprisingly warm and intimate.
Being attacked at close range panicked the most stalwart of men. Pettigrew had seen it many times before. The shock of being stabbed added to the disorientation. Training failed, especially for combat rookies, when they were wrestling for their life at point-blank range of a sharp blade. This soldier was no different. He was younger, stronger, and would have cleaned Pettigrew’s clock in a stand-up fight. But in the animal brawl of it, down in the dirt and leaves of a foreign place, hurt and shocked and scared, he forgot everything he ever knew and scrambled only to get away.
The soldier twisted under Pettigrew and bucked. Pettigrew punched his knife into the man’s body again, striking blind, adding fear as much as seeking something vital. His left hand snaked up and located a sweat-slick throat. The soldier’s hand locked onto his, and bones grated. Pettigrew’s grunts of effort and strain matched those of the younger man. He twisted his hand free and clamped it back at the man’s neck.
Using this left thumb as a place marker, Pettigrew shoved his blade deep into the notch at the base of the sentry’s throat, and the bucking body under him turned to a frenzied, thrashing animal. The blade grated on the hard bone of the man’s spine. Pettigrew shoved harder, capping the palm of his left hand over the knife’s hilt and bearing down with the weight of his shoulders and upper body.
The blade grated on bone and sliced through cartilage with a crackling that Pettigrew felt through the tips of his fingers. The sentry shuddered and voided his bowels. A few brief thumps of the dead man’s feet marked the end.
Pettigrew allowed himself a moment for his shivering muscles to calm. He remained atop the slack body, too tired to move even with the blood stink of death heavy in his nostrils. With the aid of the thin, uneven light from the camp, he could make out the dead man’s features. Canted eyes open. Mouth slack. A pair of brown moles on the boy’s chin—for in truth, he was a boy, probably in his early twenties.
War is best left to old men, Pettigrew thought, as no one should have to bury a child so young.
Osterchuk rumbled up as subtle as a tank. “Hsst! You okay?”
“Yeah,” he whispered.
“C’mon then, hey? We got a lot to do.” Osterchuk hustled away at a crouch.
Pettigrew levered himself up and wiped his knife clean on the dead boy’s uniform—an action he had repeated more than a dozen times in his life when leaving behind another dead son on the field of battle. This young man would join his personal house of horrors in the back of his mind, a place he visited often and stayed in too long.
You’ll be in good company. Lot of boys your age in there. Pettigrew followed Osterchuk toward the camp without a backward glance.
#
MOLOKAI FOREST RESERVE
Sunday, 9 May
1930 Local
Kimo was reaching for the lock on the hostage barracks when the concussive detonation of grenades thudded from the jungle behind him. The sound sent a jolt of momentary paralysis through his body, turning it to stone. Was this it? Had they been discovered? Was an FBI HRT team charging in to take them down?
He forced himself to turn. Small-arms fire chattered along the creek bank. It sounded loud, violent, and urgent... but not like a full-scale assault. No, more likely, the wannabe SEALs had come back for more easy kills and had instead run right into Manu Ho’s squad of professional soldiers, ready and waiting.
Alapai, Kenny, and Hambone were frozen in place, like people playing Simon Says. Kimo read fear and doubt in their eyes... well, except for Hambone, who was too dumb to be afraid of anything. All of them looked at Kimo.
Kimo filled his lungs with air and bellowed, “Get your weapons! Drop what you’re doing, and get your guns.”
He spun on a heel and jogged toward his small hut, where he’d left his gear. Kimo sent repeated looks over his shoulder toward the south side of the camp. Automatic weapons rattled and spat in staccato bursts. During his few short weeks in Marine boot camp, Kimo had heard weapons fire—on the range. This was the second time he’d had live rounds flying in his direction, the first being earlier that day. He found himself running in a crouch without thinking about it. He bashed into his hut’s door and fumbled with the knob. His hands were slick with sweat.
Kimo pushed inside and closed the hut’s door. He tried to shrug off the sudden tightness in his chest. Ho and his people could smash a pair of bugs like these two, given a seven-to-one advantage. The two weekend heroes would find they’d grabbed a chainsaw by attempting a direct hit on the camp. Kimo could easily wait it out and not have to lift a finger.
They were probably already dead. And speaking of death, the stink of it lay heavy in the enclosed space. The blond woman had soiled the bed when he’d shot her. Kimo’s nose wrinkled. Damn woman, you ain’t pretty anymore. He grinned, feeling his tension dissipate. Killing hostages was his priority now, anyway. Ho didn’t need his help, and they were on a schedule.
Kimo shrugged into his ammo harness and clipped a pistol in a clamshell holster to his belt. He felt much calmer knowing what he had to do. Murder had never been a problem for him.
#
MOLOKAI FOREST RESERVE
Sunday, 9 May
1930 Local
The pain in Charlie’s hand had settled to a low-level scream when explosions thumped the wooden building and a hurricane of shooting kicked off. Nearly every hostage in the barracks had crammed onto cots to try to peer through the high windows. Migliozzi’s cot toppled, and he fell with a clatter and curses.
“Them walls are too thin to stop a bullet,” Ed Collins advised. He, Charlie, and the Drapers had stayed down, along with Betty Pyle and Austin. All of them huddled in a small group near the rear of the barracks. Betty held Austin and rocked him as a mother would an injured child, crooning into his ear. Since his wife’s abduction, Austin had not spoken a word. He wore the look of a man whose soul had been blasted away.
Charlie cradled her right arm at the elbow, trying to keep pressure off her broken hand. Whenever her swollen fingers brushed against anything, however slight, electric-blue pain knifed up her arm. She’d considered several suggestions from her fellow hostages, including using a bra as a sling or wrapping the hand with a spare T-shirt. She’d turned them all down, and not because their ideas didn’t have merit. She just didn’t see the point.
Kong would be back. She’d seen the promise in his eyes. And when he came, no wrap or sling would save her from the same fate suffered by Lu Kim and Melissa. An incredible lethargy had settled over her. All she wanted to do was sleep.
Then came the bangs and the rat-a-tat of gunfire. Charlie cocked her head as though tuning in to hear a radio station. “It’s from the south. The gunfire.”
“Do you think it’s the army?” Montelle asked.
Dave Draper shook his head. “Probably the FBI.”
“But it means we’re saved, right?” The hopeful expression on Montelle’s face was reflected by several others in their small group. Clearly, the other hostages believed rescue was imminent. Several were bouncing on their toes, chattering back and forth. The two Japanese, Haru and Goru, hugged each other and beamed.
Draper and Collins exchanged looks. Draper finally said, “The FBI would have hit this place with helicopters and lights and about a hundred guys. This doesn’t sound like that.”
“Abel,” Charlie said into the quiet that followed. “It’s Abel and the guys.”
Betty looked up and met her eyes. She nodded. “I think you’re right.”
Dominic Migliozzi had given up trying to chin himself up to the window. “Everything’s happening out front. Can’t see a thing.”
“What are you saying?” A female hostage from the Lanai resorts, a woman in her fifties wearing garish designer clothes twenty years too young for her, had approached the group. Charlie thought her name was Kristen. “Your husband is attacking these people by himself?”
“Along with some Marines from our cruise ship. Her husband, for one.” Charlie nodded to Betty.
“What are they thinking?” Kristen demanded. “They’re going to get us killed!”
Charlie’s jaw dropped. “You think we’re getting out of this alive any other way?”
“The police—”
“On Molokai?” Draper laughed. “They can muster a couple dozen guys at best. They don’t have any Steve McGarritts out here, for real.”
“Then, like you said, the FBI.” Kristen’s cheeks and neck had turned turkey-wattle red. “Someone who knows what they’re doing.”
Charlie snorted and let her body sag against the back wall. She tuned out the conversation as Betty and the others tried to explain the facts of life to a woman who wouldn’t listen and wouldn’t learn. Secretly, deep in her heart, a worm of doubt had crept in. It had expanded and spread through her nervous system and metastasized to a cancerous malaise. Abel was no doubt a capable warrior—he had survived countless battles and overcome some stiff odds in the past to prove it. But he was one man, teamed up with a trio of geriatrics who should be breathing oxygen from tanks instead of breathing hot gun smoke. The guards would overwhelm the Marines by sheer numbers. And even if by some miracle they killed all the guards, Kong remained. The brutal Samoan seemed more Terminator than human.
Not too long back, she and Abel had sat together, watching an action flick on DVD. Abel laughed himself silly when the hero of the movie chose to face the evil leader of the opposition by tossing away his weapons and fighting him bare-knuckled. “If I saw this guy coming,” he’d said, “I’d shoot him with everything I had then go find a bazooka and shoot him some more. A grease spot would have more life after I got done.”
I hope you brought a bazooka, Abel Yeager.
When the wall at her back jolted as though struck by a heavy object, Charlie yipped and jerked upright then regretted it when her hand screamed in pain.
Draper cocked an eyebrow. “What was that?”
A voice, muffled, came from the other side. “Hey, this is the US Marines. We’re here to get you out.”
#
MOLOKAI FOREST RESERVE
Sunday, 9 May
1936 Local
Gomer had thrown his grenade and frozen.
Yeager had said Hit hard and then retreat, but Gomer Pyle could no more skedaddle than he could flap his arms and fly to Pluto. Gomer Pyle was frozen up. Ice cubes were less frozen than Gomer. He knew he was catatonic. He perceived everything—sight, sounds, smells—and his brain screamed at his muscles to aim the rifle, squeeze the trigger, jump up, and run away.
Nothing happened. He could feel the air whistling through his nostrils, the thud-thud-thud of his pounding heart, and the cool moisture of the ground under his belly. The iron bar of the rifle’s collapsible stock pressed his cheek, the hard metal imprinting a groove there.
A faint scent of gun oil reached his nostrils. Automatic weapons blistered the night from the other side of the creek. Bright yellow flickering tongues of fire sparkled against the black backdrop of jungle foliage. It was almost... pretty.
He had a great view of the creek. His position was upstream of the ford where the trail to the camp crossed the water—low down, near the water’s edge, with a view through a gap in the brush. The position reminded him of a duck blind. He guessed the buildings of the camp were on his ten o’clock, a good hundred or more yards away.
And he still couldn’t move.
Yeager was somewhere far to the right, judging by the concentration of enemy muzzle flashes. Gomer should have gone with him. Fire and maneuver. Fire and maneuver. Staying in one place was a death sentence.
The firing slacked off. Yeager must have pulled back, hoping to draw the defenders away from the camp. If it worked, the enemy would soon begin crossing the creek. When they did, the odds were good they would move right past the marble Gomer statue in his duck blind. Movement attracted the eye. Firing would bring return fire. If he did neither, they would probably overlook him.
How aggressive was the enemy commander? Would he commit troops to the pursuit of the attackers? Yeager had said he thought the guy would be pretty pissed at losing his men and also would want to neutralize the continuing threat. He would send guys across the stream in a counterassault, which was why Gomer wanted to stick and move, just like the VC of the olden days.
Gomer concurred. Great idea. Too bad he couldn’t move.
He knew they were coming when suppressive fire broke out all along the bank. The enemy commander had reacted to the assault by shifting resources to the point of attack, which was just what Yeager wanted—to relieve some of the pressure on the rescue effort and focus everybody’s attention in the other direction. Gomer estimated four to six firing positions, all laying down heavy streams of copper-jacketed oh shit designed to keep the opposition from standing up and firing back. Under this hail of lead, a gaggle of three, then four, then a total of six black forms broke out of cover and entered the stream. Some crossed at the ford. Others flanked out and splashed into deeper water, disappearing up to their waists. Given the night, the jungle, and their black uniforms, the men could have easily been VC crossing any unnamed river in Vietnam.
Gomer could nail two, easy as breathing. That would concentrate all the enemy fire on his position, but at that point, he didn’t give a shit. He would be doing his part. Yeager and the rest were counting on him. Betty was counting on him. All he had to do was pull the trigger.
He closed his eyes and concentrated all his willpower on a one-eighth-inch strip of skin pressing against the curved metal trigger. Sweat broke out, wriggled across his eyebrow, and circled down past his eye. Through the cocoon of silence that normally wrapped him, Gomer could hear the slosh of water the VC made as they crossed the river. They were coming. He had seconds to act. Half seconds, maybe.
Just pull... the damn... TRIGGER!