Stephen Mertz - The Korean Intercept

"You talk too much," said Galt.

Chai grunted, stepping in fast. Galt dropped to the side, delivering a reverse elbow strike that caught Chai in the mouth, breaking teeth. Gasping, blood pouring from his shattered mouth, Chai stumbled again. Roaring with pain and anger, he whirled with surprising speed to lash out with another kick as Galt closed in. The force of the kick to his chest drove Galt backward into the wall. With a shout of triumph, Chai rushed him. Galt drove a hard right cross to the bandit's face, knocking him backward to the floor.

Galt was on him in a flash, grabbing Chai's arms above the elbows. He rammed a knee into Chai's abdomen. Chai gasped breathlessly from the blow, but he managed to snap his head forward so he could butt his forehead at Galt's face. The blow missed its mark, and frontal bone met frontal bone. Both men were dazed, but Galt was more stunned as the receiver of the head butt. Chai broke free of Galt's grip. He seized Galt's throat with both hands, and Galt felt Chai's thumbs dig into his windpipe, fingers pressing into the carotid arteries in his neck. He clasped his hands together and thrust them between Chai's arms, his elbows striking the bandit's wrists. The fingers popped away from his throat, allowing Galt to chop his hands in a short, downward stroke that smashed Chai across the bridge of the nose. Blood squirted from Chai's nostrils as he staggered backward from the blow. Galt slugged him with a hard left hook.

Chai toppled to his hands and knees, but he managed to lash out a boot. The kick caught Galt in his left hip. He gasped and nearly lost his balance. Chai sprang from the floor and whipped a back-fisted stroke at Galt's face, following up with a side kick to Galt's chest. Galt managed to keep his balance, and Chai decided not to continue the barehanded battle. He dashed to where one of his bandits had dropped an assault rifle. He grasped the rifle and whirled, bringing it in Galt's direction.

While this was happening, Galt was drawing the K-Bar knife from its sheath at mid-chest. He was instinctually calculating the distance as Chai drew the carbine into target acquisition. There was only one chance with the knife. If he missed, Chai would cut him down. His arm snapped forward in a single flowing movement blurred by speed, and the Ranger knife streaked through the air. The steel point hit Chai in the center of his chest. Sharp metal split the breastbone, the blade lodging to the hilt. The bandit froze, his rifle held at approximately port arms. He looked down at the knife handle protruding from his chest. His scarred face was astonished. His mouth fell open, and he vomited crimson, then collapsed limply to the floor.

Galt leaned down to withdraw the knife from the dead man's chest. "That's for Barney Markee," he told the corpse, "and for a pilot named Morales."

He heard Kate say, "And mark that as payback for the four crewmembers of Liberty who did not make it."

Galt inhaled deeply, allowing the air to fill his lungs. His hip throbbed, and his head ached. His chest, abdomen, throat and jaw reminded him of what he had endured during the battle. But he almost welcomed the pain. It meant that he was still alive. He walked, unsteadily, over to the fallen carbine and gathered up the weapon, then turned and steadied himself when he realized that Kate had gone to kneel at Bob Paxton's side.

She gestured for him to join her. When he did, she was all business. "Bob stopped a bullet in the gluteus maximus," she reported with the unflinching directness of an emergency room nurse. "He'll live. It was a ricochet, so it didn't carry much of a punch, just broke the skin. He must have hit his head when he fell."

Paxton chose that moment to begin regaining consciousness, making soft blubbering noises at first. Then he came awake with a convulsive lurch that jolted him from Kate's touch. He rolled onto his back and instantly emitted a painful squall, twisting himself quickly onto his side.

"Oh, my ass. Jesus Christ, they shot me in the ass!"

Kate rested her hands on him again, the fingertips of one hand massaging his temple. "Hush, Bob," and when his whimpering slackened, she said to Galt, "He's not ambulatory."

Galt knelt at Paxton's other side. He started to position his arms around the astronaut.

Kate stayed this movement with a touch to his upper arm. "What are you doing?"

"I'm about to haul this guy out of here, double time, and you're coming with us. There could be more of Chai's goons around here."

Kate nodded. "That's why I'll do the hauling. You're the firepower." She brushed his arm aside and slid her arms under Paxton's arms to encircle his shoulders so that when she rose, she scooped up the semiconscious man across her back. She allowed Galt to assist in steadying and helping balance Paxton, but that was all. She had always worked out in gyms before becoming an astronaut, even before Galt had known her. She stooped only slightly under Paxton's weight, and she wasn't breathing hard.

And for one second, Galt could think of nothing but how beautiful she was like this, with her hair tangled, her face smudged with grime. She would have thought she looked terrible, but to him she looked like the strength of woman incarnate, facing a mighty challenge with bravery and grace. In her lively eyes, he saw the golden flame in each iris that had hooked him from the minute they'd met and would never let go, and in that instant Galt knew that he was still in love with his wife.

As he stepped past her to assume the point position, he said, "By the way, Katy, good work on the chi thing."

Then he lengthened his stride away from the stacks of electronic equipment, following the tunnel toward the sounds. She managed to keep up with him, though she jostled her human cargo enough for Paxton to groan, "Oh, my butt!"

"Chill, Specialist," Kate grumbled. "It's not as bad as it feels. You'll be medevaced out of here before you know it."

"I'm sorry, Kate. I've been a goddamned pain in the ass."

Kate chuckled without breaking her stride. "I guess that makes your fate poetic justice, Bob."

"I'm sorry, Kate. I've caused us a lot of grief. I thought I was tough, but I'm not. I'm not the man your husband is."

"No one is," said Kate.

"Hush," said Galt from several feet ahead. "Back away, you two. Here comes trouble."

The sounds of warfare, which had been rumbling through the tunnel from around the bend ahead, had faded to practically nothing. The tide of battle had turned. He heard only a sprinkling of single gunshots. And he clearly heard the frantic shouts in Korean, and the undisciplined footfalls rapidly approaching from the other direction, around the bend in the tunnel that was just ahead.

"Damn," said Kate. "I should have picked up a gun." She dutifully dodged aside with Paxton.

Three bandits raced in a dead heat around the bend and instantly spotted them. The brigands drew up short, splitting away from each other, their eyes widening, their rifles aiming at Galt who had thrown himself to the ground and was splayed out flat. He loosed off a short, precise figure eight burst from the carbine that chopped down the three bandits. He stayed low and hurried over to where Kate had set Paxton down on his side.

She was watching Galt expectantly. Paxton was wide-eyed as the reverberations of the gunfire faded. He started to speak.

More figures appeared, running into view from around the bend. But these were not bandits. These were Army Rangers. The laser beams of their rifles swept the semi-gloom of the tunnel like red pencil lines slashing across black paper. The beams found and centered on Galt.

Donnelly banked his Apache gunship around for another run over the compound. There was nothing remaining for Kendall, his weapons officer, to shoot at. The target area was pockmarked with craters, littered with bodies. The towers were a burning torch, and each of the rocket launcher and AAA emplacements was a massive, scorched, gouged-out hole in the earth.