Gregg Loomis - Gates Of Hades

"Y' tellin' us the cavalry's gonna come chargin' o'er yon hill?" Adrian had asked, only half joking.

"Something like that," Jason had replied enigmatically.

"Exactly what will happen?" Maria wanted to know.

"I'm not sure," Jason confessed. "I just know we're gonna have to move in a-"

He was interrupted by a flash of light. Half a second later, a sound like a thunder reached the cave. All four peered out of the entrance to see smoke rising from a patch of ground near the house. Fifty feet away, a second burst was followed by the same roar and dense smoke.

Adrian was chuckling. "Practice bombs! Little noise, lots of smoke to show where the thing hit. 'Less a man knew, he'd think he was being assaulted by ground forces."

Against the billowing smoke, additional flickers silhouetted men running in every direction, firing at imagined attackers. One or two bullets whined off the rock at the entrance to the cave.

"We'll never have a better shot at it," Jason said, rolling out onto the rocky ground. "Let's go!"

With his hand on Maria's elbow, Jason dashed up the hill, followed by Adrian and Clare.

It must have been the loose pebbles and scree that cascaded from each hurried step that drew the attention of the ecoterrorists below. First one shot, then two, then a fusillade split the air above their heads.

Maria moaned in fear.

"Bloody sods dinna know where we are, just shooting at th' sound," Adrian puffed.

Maria ducked her head as though she might be able to dodge a stray bullet. "They do not have to know if they hit us."

As they crested the edge of the gully where the car was hidden, Adrian took the lead. He seemed to know their position from memory rather than whatever he could see with the nightscope. The steep hills blocked all but the stars directly overhead. It seemed to Jason they had been on this trek for hours, although his watch told him they had left the safety of the cave only minutes before.

Behind them, the sound of both rifle fire and practice bombs had stopped. Apparently, Eglov and company had realized they were not under any serious attack.

A glimmer of light on metal told Jason they had arrived at the place they had left the Volvo.

Adrian opened the driver's door and swiftly disabled the interior light. "Briskly, now."

The whine of a nearby rifle shot suggested they had not been quick enough.

"Somebody saw the courtesy light," Jason surmised, piling into the backseat just as the rear windshield became a spiderweb of cracked glass.

"Never mind," Adrian said, pulling his wife in beside him. "We'll be outta here…"

The sentence died with the empty clicking of the car's solenoid and the thump of two more rounds hitting sheet metal.

"Jesus wept!" Adrian was back out of the car, handing the Sten to Jason through an open window. "Spiteful ol' bitch! She picks a hell of a time to demand attention!"

Jason was considerably more interested in getting the Volvo going than attributing malevolent intent to it. He was using the butt of the machine gun to clear the remaining glass from the back window so he could see to shoot if necessary. "If you can't get her started, now's the time to run for it. They don't see us yet, but that interior light gave somebody the general location."

As if to verify the observation, a bullet kicked up pebbles as Adrian slammed the hood down. "Give 'er a try, Mother!"

Clare leaned across the seat and tried the key. The feminine touch was no more successful.

Jason opened his door. "Hey, you saved over a hundred euros, remember?"

"An' where's Antonio when you need him?" grunted Adrian.

"Not exactly the time to play mechanic, Adrian. We need to make a run for it."

"I dinna think so. In th' dark you'd na' be able to follow me. You'd be lost in five minutes, left to the tender mercies of our friends back there once the sun came up."

"So, what the hell do you suggest?"

Adrian leaned against the post of the open driver's door. "I suggest you bloody push on t' other side. There's a steep swale a few yards away an' we might be able to jump 'er off."

There was no time for argument. Jason put his shoulder against the car door, his feet scrabbling in the loose, rocky soil. The car didn't budge, and he saw one, two muzzle flashes as their opponents drew closer. Fortunately, the shots were still wild.

They wouldn't be much longer.

"Give 'er a shove, now." Adrian gasped. "On th' count o' three. One, two…"

The Volvo seemed to move forward a few inches before rolling back, but at least a ton or so of inertia had been overcome.

Jason ducked as a bullet sang by, too close for his liking. Ignoring a second, he heaved again.

This time the car began moving ahead, tires grinding at glacial speed against loose dirt and rocks.

"Should we get out?" Clare wanted to know.

"Nah. We get this thin' goin', there'll be na' time to stop for you," Adrian puffed.

If we get it going.

The Volvo was picking up speed, reaching the pace of a steady walk. A bullet buzzed past Jason's ear like an angry bee.

"Any chance that lot has access to night-vision equipment?" Adrian panted.

Jason was thinking the same thing. "Who knows?"

The automobile was now moving at the velocity of an octogenarian's brisk walk as four more shots sprayed Jason with biting, stinging dirt. "But I'd say it's a definite possibility. We're not in accurate range of the AK-47s they carry."

"When will we be?" Maria's voice asked from the floor of the backseat.

"No time soon, I hope, lassie. Jason, jump in."

This was going to be it. Either the balky Volvo cranked when Adrian popped the clutch or they had lost valuable time trying to escape. At least they had the chance, Jason thought. Had the Volvo an automatic transmission, there would have been no possibility of using the car's own motion to replace the starter motor.

The Volvo shuddered and jerked, its tires skidding on the dirt, then stopped.

Nothing.

"Not fast enough yet. We'll give 'er a go again," Adrian said with unwarranted optimism. "Jason, kin ye fend those lads off a bit?"

The Sten wasn't known for its accuracy at any sort of range, and Jason would have cheerfully exchanged the silencer for a flash suppressor. A shot would be hard to trace by sound in these hills, but the fire from the muzzle would pinpoint their location.

Jason rested the machine gun on the roof of the automobile and flicked the selector to single fire. "Soon's there's a chance of hittin' anything. How 'bout you get this buggy going?"

His answer was another shuddering jerk as Adrian popped the clutch again. This time the effort was rewarded with the sound of the engine. The Volvo fishtailed with the sudden application of power, steadied, then lurched forward. Jason fired two or three rounds behind them before jumping into the rear seat. Unlikely he would hit anyone, but it served notice to their pursuers to keep their distance.

"There's a paved road coupla kilometers on," Adrian announced. "We get there-"

The Volvo hit a bank, lifting the right wheels.

"If you dinna turn on the headlights, we'll na' make it to the paved road," Clare observed. "Easy to run right inta the edge o' the' combe w'out seein' it."

"She's right," Jason observed. "We're at the edge of their range, anyway. More chance of us crashing into something or running over a cliff than getting hit."

The road in front of them was suddenly visible in the car's lights. Jason marveled that they had not smashed the radiator against one of the boulders lining the rocky trail like irregularly spaced sentries. Or hit the unforgiving rock that, in several spots, towered above the path. This would have been difficult four-wheel-drive territory. That the Volvo had not left its oil pan or transmission housing along the way had to be the sheerest of luck.