JAMES ROLLINS - SANDSTORM

The second guard was back by the plastic water barrel, tilting it while trying to fill a paper cup.

Painter knew he’d never have a better chance.

He rolled from his bed with hardly a squeak, grabbed the pistol from the guard’s hand, twisting the man’s wrist savagely. He pumped two bullets into the guard’s chest.

The impact blew the man backward onto the cot.

Painter dropped to a shooter’s stance, aimed at the second guard, and fired three shots. All at the man’s head. Two struck home. The guard went down, brains and blood sprayed on the back wall.

Leaping back, Painter held the gun out. He trusted that the roar of the storm had muffled the shots. He swept the room. The wounded had clothes and weapons stacked nearby, out of immediate reach. That left only the medic.

Painter kept his eyes focused on the man, his peripheral gaze on the rest of the room. On the cot, Pearson moaned, bubbled, and bled.

Painter spoke to the medic. “Go for a gun, you die. This man can be saved. Make your choice.” He backed to the laptop, reached blindly for it, snapped it closed, and tucked it under his gun arm.

The medic kept his hands in the air, palms toward him.

Painter did not let his guard down. He sidled to the door, reached behind to the handle, and yanked it open. Winds almost buffeted him straight back into the room. He leaned against the onslaught and forced his way out. He didn’t bother closing the door. Once out, he turned on a heel and spun away.

He aimed in the direction he’d heard the armored tractors stop, and tunneled through the sand and wind. Barefoot, he wore only his boxers. Sand scoured him like steel wool. He didn’t bother keeping his eyes open. There was nothing to see. Sand choked him with each breath.

He held the pistol out in front of him. In his other hand, he clutched the laptop. It had data he needed: on the Guild, on Safia.

His outstretched gun struck metal.

The first of the tractors. As much as he would’ve liked to take it, he moved on. The mammoth vehicle was pinned down by the others behind it. He heard its engine running, to keep the batteries charged. He prayed they were all idling.

He continued down the line, moving fast.

He vaguely heard shouts behind him. Word was out.

Painter dug faster through the storm’s headwinds, keeping a shoulder to each tractor’s tread. He reached the last in the line. Its engine purred like a happy kitten, a twenty-ton kitten.

Sliding down the side, Painter found the door and struggled to open it against the wind. Not a one-handed job. He tucked the pistol into his boxer’s waistband, its weight half pulling his shorts down. He set the laptop on the tread and finally got the door open enough to squeeze through. He snatched the computer with him.

At last, he slammed the door and latched it closed. Leaning his back against the door, he spit sand from his mouth and rubbed his eyes, clearing his eyebrows and lashes of grit.

Gunfire peppered the side of the carriage, stinging his back with their rattling impacts. He shoved away. The fun never stops around here.

He hurried to the driver’s compartment and slid into the seat. He tossed the laptop onto the other seat. The sandstorm swirled beyond the windshield, a permanent midnight. He flipped on the lights. Visibility stretched for a whole two yards. Not bad.

He kicked the gear into reverse and headed out of Dodge.

He retreated straight back. If anything was back there, he’d simply have to trust that the armored behemoth could bull through it.

More gunfire chased him, like kids throwing stones.

He fled, noting when he cleared the charred remains of Shisur. He escaped into the desert, shooting backward. Eventually he’d think about forward gears. But backward worked fine for now.

As he glanced to the windshield, he noted twin glows bloom in the darkness, out in the city.

Pursuit.

AS THEothers took a brief rest, Omaha stared at the queen’s palace. The structure had managed to escape the initial bombardment. Maybe they could make a stand here, up in its tower.

He shook his head.

Fanciful, but impractical. Their only hope was to keep moving. But they were running out of city. Not much lay above and beyond the palace. A few streets and low buildings.

He glanced over the lower city. Sporadic gunfire still flared, but it was both less frequent and closer. The Rahim’s defense was wearing thin, the line being overwhelmed.

Omaha knew they were doomed. He had never considered himself a pessimist, just a pragmatist. Still, he glanced at Safia. With his last breath, he would keep her safe.

Kara stepped beside him. “Omaha…”

He looked at her. She never called him Omaha. Her face was exhausted, lined by fear, eyes hollow. Like him, she sensed their end.

Kara nodded to Safia. Her voice was a sigh. “What the hell are you waiting for? Bloody Christ…” She stepped away to the courtyard wall, slumped against it, and sank to a seat.

Omaha remembered her earlier words. She still loves you.

From steps away, he watched Safia. She knelt beside a child, holding both the girl’s small hands between her own. Her face shone in the glow overhead. Madonna and child.

He moved closer…then closer again. Kara’s words inside his head: Life is hard. Love doesn’t have to be.

Safia didn’t look up, but she still spoke. “These are my mother’s hands,” she said so quietly, so calmly, defying their situation. She stared at the child. “All these women. My mother still lives through them. An entire life. From babe to elder. A full life. Not one cut short.”

Omaha dropped to one knee. He stared into her face as she studied the child. She simply took his breath away. Literally.

“Safia,” he said softly.

She turned to him, eyes shining.

He met her gaze. “Marry me.”

She blinked. “What…?”

“I love you. I always have.”

She turned. “Omaha, it’s not that simple…”

He touched her chin gently with a finger, and turned her face back to his. He waited for her eyes to find him. “That’s just it. Yes, it is.”

She attempted to shift away.

He would not let her escape this time. He leaned closer. “I’m sorry.”

Her eyes shone a bit brighter, not from happiness but from the threat of tears. “You left me.”

“I know. I didn’t know what to do. But it was a boy who left you.” He lowered his hand, gently taking hers. “It is a man on his knees now.”

She stared into his eyes, wavering.

Movement over her shoulder caught his eye. Figures pushed out of the dark around the corner of the palace. Men. A dozen.

Omaha leaped to his feet, scrambling to push Safia behind him.

Out of the shadows, a familiar figure strode forth.

“Barak…” Omaha scrambled to comprehend. The giant of an Arab had been missing since before the attack.

More men followed behind Barak, in desert cloaks. They were led by a man with a crutch under one arm.

Captain al-Haffi.

The leader of the Desert Phantoms waved to the men behind him. Sharif was among them, as hale as when Omaha had last seen him, out at Job’s tomb. He had survived the firefight without a scratch. Sharif and the men dispersed down the streets, strapped with rifles, grenades, and RPG launchers.

Omaha stared after them.

He didn’t know what was going on, but Cassandra was in for a surprise.

ALL THATwas left was the cleanup.

Cassandra kept one foot on the pontoon of her boat. She listened to the open channel as various teams swept the city in quadrants, clearing away pockets of resistance. She clutched her electronic tracker, fingers digging. She knew exactly where Safia was within the city.