James Axler - Sky Hammer

“Done,” the mechanic said, laying down his wrench and throwing a freshly greased lever.

A light flashed, there was a snap of electricity, and the motor room concrete bunker shook slightly as a pair of ancient motors rumbled into life. The meters on the housing flickered alive, and the guns began to move as the hydraulic pressure reached functional status.

“Excellent.” The colonel smiled. “Well done, Comrade.” Then, drawing a pistol, he shot the startled man in the heart. The body limply collapsed onto the hydraulic hoses, the red blood pumping to spread along the lines between the tiles of the floor.

The colonel gave the corpse a salute, then holstered the pistol. At least the mechanic died well, from an honest Chinese bullet, rather than vomiting his intestines like the fools at the United Nations would soon be doing. The death of that many hundreds of diplomats would throw the world into chaos, and China had carefully laid out plans to take every advantage of the political turmoil. Every member of his cell knew this was to be a suicide assignment. There was no hope of returning home. Glory would be only earned if they accomplished the mission, so they would succeed or die trying.

By now, a man at the cannon was frantically turning guiding wheels to alter the elevation, while a second checked a compass in his hand.

“Left twelve degrees!” he commanded. “Hold! Now, up ten degrees! Hold!” He turned. “We’re on target, Comrade.”

Smiling, the colonel stuck his thumbs in his belt. “Load the shell!” he ordered.

Slowly the technician from Beijing stood, holding the artillery shell as if it were a priceless artifact.

A burly Red Star agent worked the latch and swung aside the breech to make ready. But there came an odd rattling noise from the cannon, as if something had broken loose and was moving freely.

Furious, the colonel advanced closer as three grenades rolled out of the open end of the cannon and landed on the sandy ground.

“Run!” a man screamed, turning to flee when the grenades exploded.

Thundering flame and hot shrapnel filled the area, teeth and broken limbs flying into the air as the hydraulic lines ruptured and pressurized red oil rose like blood from a cut artery. Not yet locked into position, the cannon impotently lowered its muzzle until pointing at the empty beach.

The colonel barely had time to react when the men of Able Team arrived, firing as they climbed over the seawall at different points. The last few Red Star agents collapsed, trying to fire their AK-47 assault rifles in response, but only getting off a few short bursts before falling on top of their weapons.

Pulling his pistol, the colonel shot the Beijing technician before he was torn apart by the incoming American lead, the hardball ammo going through the man to ricochet off the wall behind. As the technician dropped, he let go of the shell and it rolled across the sandy platform to bounce down a sand dune and come to a stop on the beach near some driftwood.

DROPPING A SPENT CLIP, Schwarz reloaded while the others stood guard. Then Blancanales replaced his exhausted clip as Lyons shouldered the empty autoshotgun and drew a .357 Colt Python from his belt. Moving to the edge of the gunnery bastion, Schwarz hopped down to the beach and walked over to the Chinese artillery shell lying near the water line.

“Clear?” Blancanales asked, looking around.

“Clear,” Lyons confirmed.

“Oh, shit,” Schwarz cursed, sitting on the piece of driftwood. “We’re in trouble.”

Weapons out, Blancanales and Lyons rushed over. By the time they arrived, Schwarz had already ripped open a Velcro pouch at his side and was placing electrical tools on the damp sand.

“What’s wrong?” Lyons asked. “That thing can’t possibly be live.”

“Oh yeah, the shell is live,” Schwarz said in a flat monotone. “The damn thing is designed to arm itself after a set number of revolutions after it spirals out a cannon.”

“Rolling down the sand dune did the same thing?”

“Apparently so.”

“Shit!”

“My word exactly.”

“What can we do?” Blancanales said, leveling his M-16 at the shell. It was standard U.S. Army procedure that in case of a nuclear emergency, shoot the bomb. Once the uranium sphere was distorted, even slightly, the device could no longer detonate. One shot and the artillery shell would be dead. The same as Able Team after about ten days of slow dying by radiation poisoning.

“Your call, Hermann,” Lyons said, aiming the .357 Colt Python at the red-and-green-striped shell.

“Make me a hole,” Schwarz ordered, sorting through the tools.

Blancanales fired a burst from the M-16 at the beach, chewing a depression into the sand. Schwarz gently placed the shell into the hole and packed the loose sand around it.

Sitting on the damp ground, the electronics wizard wrapped his legs around the bomb to hold it tight and started working in the recessed side bolts.

“Thought you were supposed to go in through the top,” Lyons said, watching his friend work on the nuclear charge. An explosion on the beach would boil the ocean for a hundred feet, the radioactive steam contaminating a hundred miles of New Jersey, killing thousands of people. There couldn’t be a worse place to set off a nuke than the sea! His hand tightened on the checkered grip of his revolver. Three die, or three thousand. Hell, that was an easy choice. Another ounce of pressure on the trigger was all it would take to get the job done.

“The top? Not this model,” Schwarz said, both hands busy. A sharp snap of breaking metal and Lyons and Blancanales both jumped slightly. The men held their breath as their teammate slid the casing off the nose of the bomb, exposing the complex internal mechanism.

“All the wires are the same color,” Blancanales said with a scowl. “How the hell will you know which one to cut?”

Jamming his knife deep into the device, Schwarz stopped a tiny flywheel from spinning, then ripped out a handful of wires.

“Just got to know what you’re doing,” he said, casting away the circuits. “Whew, that was close!”

“Too close, brother.” Blancanales sighed, raising the assault rifle. “You sure it’s dead?”

“Oh, yeah. Deader than disco.”

“Good.”

“I happen to like disco.” Lyons chuckled in relief. Touching his throat, the big man activated the radio link. “Stony Bird to Nest, all clear. We found a hot egg, but it will not hatch. Repeat, the egg is dead. What was that?” He frowned. “Roger, on the way.”

“Take the bomb, we’ll store it in our lead safe on the van,” Lyons directed, startling briskly for the parking lot.

“We’ve been recalled to the Farm,” Schwarz stated, lifting the core of the bomb out of the shell. It wasn’t a question.

“Yep.” Softly in the background, police sirens could be heard coming this way. The covert team paid no attention. Then the noise abruptly stopped.

“Sounds like they were also recalled,” Blancanales said, glancing at the exposed workings on the mechanism swinging in his friend’s bare hand. But Blancanales wasn’t worried. If Hermann thought it was okay for them to travel with the nuke this way, that was good enough. He trusted the electronics expert with his life in battle, so why not now?

“Just a little diversion by Bear.” Lyons grinned, hoisting the Atchisson to a more comfortable position. “As soon as we’re gone, they’ll be directed right back here, along with the FBI and Homeland.”

“More Red Star?” Schwarz asked.

“Not this time,” Lyons said, avoiding the civilian bodies. “We’ll be briefed on the way to Bethlehem.”

Schwarz balked. “We’re going to Israel?”

“No, Phoenix Force is. We’re going to see some Nazis in Pennsylvania.”