Dick Stivers - Into the Maze

Lyons keyed his hand-radio. He clicked only the transmit. One click to identify himself, three clicks as a coded "no." He repeated the one click, then three clicks, hoping Gadgets and Blancanales would understand.

Three clicks followed by three more clicks answered. Three clicks meant Gadgets. Then Gadgets repeated the code. Lyons waited. Gadgets would need time to walk away from the others so he could speak.

A flurry of clicks came. Voices and sounds came from the hand-radio. Lyons heard fists striking flesh. Then a voice came on.

"Okay, what is it?"

But the voice had a Spanish accent. Again the voice spoke, trying to get Lyons to answer.

"Okay, tell me what..."

The International had taken his partners.

In the underground garage, General Mendez positioned his men in a line behind concrete pillars and parked cars. Each gunman carried an FN FAL rifle. When the Ochoas descended the ramp from the avenida , they would drive directly into the ambush. The thin sheet metal of the Ochoa truck would not even slow the 7.62 NATO slugs fired by the FN FAL rifles.

An officer ran to the general. "Commander, urgent messages!"

"What?"

"Colonel Larde has the two other Americans. The Mexicans escaped, but he brings the gringos."

"Good. What is the other?"

"A problem, commander. The captain of the squads escorting the Ochoas waits to speak with you."

The general went to the four-door Dodge containing his secure-frequency radio. He took the microphone. "This is your commander."

"The Ochoas have Colonel Gunther."

"Where is he? Send him to me immediately. Is he wounded?"

"He is in the truck of the Ochoas. The truck that carries the American prisoner."

"What! Why did you allow that?"

"It happened too quickly, General. They stopped. Men transferred the colonel from a car to the truck. Then the truck started again."

"Are you sure it was Colonel Gunther?"

"We saw him in the lights of cars. I know the colonel. I am sure it was him."

"This changes everything. Radio the other cars! When the Ochoas' truck enters the garage, all your cars will follow. Do you understand? No one fires until we free Colonel Gunther. No one fires until he is clear."

"I understand," the unit leader answered. "I will brief all the others."

General Mendez switched off the transmitter and rushed to the waiting gunmen. He had to cancel the ambush.

As the panel truck sped through the evening traffic, escorted by the unmarked police cars, Lyons and the Ochoa gunmen prepared for the surprise attack on the International. Lyons pushed aside the unconscious Gunther to clear a space on the panel truck's floor. Then he field-checked his weapons, beginning with the silenced Colt Government Model. He worked the action and tested the seating of the suppressor. He loaded a 10-round extended magazine. An Ochoa gunman gave him a handful of .45-caliber hardball cartridges to reload his spare magazines. Those mags went into Lyons's left-hand coat pocket.

Then he checked his backup Python.

The Ochoas also provided 12-gauge double-ought cartridges to top off his Atchisson mag.

The Ochoas carried an assortment of weapons. Coral, the oldest and most heavily armed, had two revolvers, one in a shoulder holster, another in an ankle rig. He had a pistol-grip double-barreled shotgun sawed off to six inches that went into a coat pocket. And he carried an old Thompson .45 with two 30-round magazines taped end to end.

Knowing what they would face when they attacked the International, the other three gunmen carried high-cyclic-rate assault weapons. One man had a standard Uzi and a Mini-Uzi. Another man had a .45-caliber Ingram. The third man carried an Uzi and a pistol-grip Remington 1100. And all the Ochoa men wore bulletproof vests.

On the wide Paseo de la Reforma, only seconds away from the meeting with the commander of the International, Coral turned to Lyons. "We must make you our prisoner again. That shotgun, that Uzi..." he pointed to the two weapons in Lyons's hands "...have them near, but..."

"Yeah, yeah. I understand." Lyons found the ropes that had bound his wrists. He put his hands behind his back and one of the Ochoa men wrapped the rope around his wrists. Lyons held both ends of the unknotted rope in his fists. Another length of rope went around his ankles. The gunman tied the rope with a slipknot, then tucked the slipknot into Lyons's sock.

"Be ready," Coral told his men.

The line of escort cars slowed. Weaving through traffic, an unmarked police car sped ahead. Coral looked out to see the car pass. For an instant, he saw into its interior. Then the car swerved in front of the first unmarked police car and raced down the ramp into the underground garage.

"That was the others!" Coral told Lyons. "Your Americans. I saw them in the back."

"If we can free them, that'll be seven of us. Wish we could have brought the Yaquis. But in a way, I'm glad we couldn't."

"They will be here soon. Many others will come."

"Good." Lyons looked over to the unconscious Gunther. "As soon as we're moving, we have to get him someplace safe. We've brought him too far to lose him now to stray bullets."

On the floor, his hands tied behind him, his feet tied, Gunther eased one eye open to a slit. He did not move or otherwise betray himself. His eye glanced to the men around him. Then his eyelid closed. He waited.

The caravan descended into the underground garage.

"What do you see?" Lyons asked, flat on the floor.

"There are many men around. They take the North Americans out of the car. A Mexican colonel goes to an old man in a suit. The colonel salutes the old man. Maybe the old one is General Mendez."

"What about my partners?"

"The soldiers and pistoleros punch them. But they stop. Now we arrive. Be ready."

Lyons heard voices outside. The truck's doors opened, then the cargo doors opened. Coral dragged out Lyons and dropped him on the concrete.

As the gunmen of the International kicked him, Lyons saw Gadgets and Blancanales only a step away.

"Where's the general?" Coral called out. "I want my gold!"

Gunther bellowed, "Shoot them! It's a trick!"

A gray-haired man in a gray business suit stood several steps away. "Give them their reward!" he commanded with a sneer across his patrician features.

Hands went under sports jackets as the gunmen of the International reached for their holstered pistols.

"Pol! Wizard! Down!" Lyons yelled. "Get down! Down!" Without taking the second to untie his feet, Lyons shouldered and twisted his way through the legs of the fascists. A fascist kicked him in the face twice, but Lyons turned away and crawled on. He grabbed the ankles of his partners and dragged them down.

As the Americans went flat, the four Ochoas scythed down the gunmen of the International.

Coral aimed the six-inch-long sawed-off shotgun at General Mendez. Two fascists stepped in the way of the blast. The brains of the first man sprayed over the man behind him. As the headless body dropped, a second blast from the shotgun sheared away the face of the other man and punched holes in a third soldier's neck. Only two of the double-ought lead balls hit the general.

One of the general's arms jerked back as a .33-caliber ball broke the bone. The second ball hit just above his belt, a spot of red appearing on his white silk shirt.

The general staggered back, whining with pain as the scene exploded in front of him. Coral pocketed his shotgun pistol and shouldered his Thompson.

On both sides of Coral, his men emptied their submachine guns, firing without aiming, simply holding their weapons at stomach height and firing from one side of the crowd to the other. High-velocity 9mm hardball bullets punched through fascists to kill again. The .45 slugs in Coral's Thompson and his friend's Ingram ripped through men, throwing their bodies back.