Matthew Reilly - Scarecrow Returns

A stray bullet whistled down through the fog and lodged in the mud-wall beside Schofield’s head. He barely noticed it, kept moving.

Champion said, “If they see you up in that watchtower, they’ll hit it with an RPG within thirty seconds . . .”

“I know,” Schofield said. “That gives me thirty seconds to do what I have to do.”

SCHOFIELD AND his group came to the edge of the trench system, to the point where it was closest to the watchtower.

“Okay, folks”—Schofield readied his MP-7—“this little operation will have two phases. First phase, I’m the bait. I make a break for the watchtower . . . their snipers up on the eastern and western rims fire on me . . . you take them out. Got it?”

“Oui,” Baba said.

“So long as you’re happy being bait,” Mother said.

“And the second phase?” Champion asked.

“I take out their other sniper position over on that southern watchtower.”

“Which will of course depend on whether you survive the first phase,” Champion said.

“Yeah.” He took a deep breath. “Okay, let’s roll.”

And with those words, he broke cover and sprinted for the base of the watchtower.

Muzzle flashes erupted immediately from the eastern and western rims of the crater, and a line of bullets chewed up the dirt inches behind Schofield’s running feet.

The strafing was about to catch up with him when Mother, Mario, the Kid, Champion and Baba all rose together—Mother, Mario and the Kid pointing east, the French pair pointing west—and opened fire on the enemy positions.

The two sniper posts were ripped apart by their fire, and in each position, three figures were hurled backward. The muzzle flashes from up there ceased.

Schofield hit the base of the watchtower at a run as a new volley of gunfire pinged against its crisscrossing struts.

This gunfire came from the other watchtower, the one that stood on top of the office building at the distant southern end of the Stadium.

His heart pounding, Schofield clambered up his watchtower’s internal ladder.

“Mother! That other watchtower!”

Bullets sizzled past him as he climbed, ricocheting off the tower’s struts, whizzing past his head. One round made a popping sound as it broke the sound barrier millimeters in front of his face and cut a slit-like mark on the lens of his glasses. Another hit his left hand, smashing into his little finger. Schofield grimaced with pain but kept climbing.

The others offered what cover fire they could, but the south-facing angle wasn’t as good as the eastern and western ones, and the fire from the southern watchtower was only minorly inhibited.

Schofield reached the cupola of the watchtower and he saw the whole massive crater spread out around him, a perfect 360-degree view.

But he didn’t stop to enjoy it. His thirty seconds were almost up.

For right then he saw a small figure on the southern watchtower hoist a long-barreled object onto his shoulder: an RPG launcher.

Schofield kept moving.

He yanked his Maghook from his back-holster, aimed it skyward and fired—

—at the exact moment the figure in the southern watchtower fired his rocket-propelled grenade.

The Maghook flew up into the sky, trailing its cable—while the RPG lanced across the Stadium at blinding speed, a tail of smoke extending out behind it.

The Maghook’s magnetic head thunked against the underside of the T-shaped girder-junction above the massive crater and Schofield hit SPOOL on his handgrip and he was suddenly whisked up into the air, shooting skyward on the Maghook’s cable—

—a millisecond before the entire watchtower beneath him was hit by the RPG and exploded, instantly transformed into a multitude of metal shards that showered outward in a star-shaped spray of fire and smoke. A gigantic fireball expanded beneath the fast-rising figure of Shane Schofield.

Reeled upward by the Maghook’s internal spooler, Schofield came to the underside of the girder-junction, and for a moment he hung suspended a dizzying 150 feet above the floor of the Stadium.

He didn’t care. He quickly climbed up on top of the four-pronged girder-junction, re-holstered his Maghook and then did what he’d come up here to do.

He lay down on his belly, pressing his chest armor flat against the superlong metal girder that stretched away from him southward, shooting down at a wickedly steep angle over that half of the Stadium: over the lake and the office building and even the watchtower at the far end.

The girder was about three feet wide; Schofield reached out with his arms and hooked them over each side, gripping his MP-7 in his right hand and his Desert Eagle in his left.

Then he pushed himself off.

Headfirst, Schofield skimmed down the length of the massive girder, sliding on his chest armor, gaining speed as he went, arms and legs bent on either side, pressing against the outer edges of the girder, keeping him steady and controlling his speed as he rocketed down the steep slope.

The floodlights suspended from the girder rushed by beneath him. He saw the lake go by, and then the southern office building came closer, then the watchtower mounted on it.

At which point Schofield opened fire with both his guns—withering fire, deadly fire. He pummeled the watchtower all over and saw all the men on it convulse under the weight of his crushing gunfire. Five of them dropped, dead.

Then he arrived at the southern rim of the crater, arresting his slide by pressing his boots against the outside of the girder, and he came to an abrupt, lurching halt.

He saw three more enemy soldiers in parkas gathered at the base of the watchtower and he slid on his butt down the rocky inner wall of the crater behind them, firing as he did so. They all fell as, finally, he came to a halt at the bottom of the crater wall, guns smoking and empty, his enemy’s position silent and devoid of movement.

He still held his guns leveled even though he was out of ammo. If anyone had survived his attack, he was screwed, but it appeared that no one had.

Within moments, Schofield was up in the cupola of the second watchtower, reloaded and rearmed and looking down the barrel of one of his enemy’s sniper rifles.

“Mother,” he said into his throat-mike. “The way is clear. Bring everybody through the underwater walkway. I’ll cover you from here.”

Veronique Champion and Baba just stared openmouthed at what they had just seen.

Champion said nothing.

Baba nodded. “I like this man Scarecrow!”

THE KID, Mario, Chad, Ivanov, Champion and Baba dashed for the walkway again—only this time, instead of being fired upon from the far watchtower, they were covered by it, by Schofield.

The original Army of Thieves unit that had hounded them out of the Bear Lab—Bad Willy’s unit—was now pinned down on the stairs at the northern end of the Stadium by Schofield’s sniper fire.

“Zack,” Schofield said into his throat-mike as he peered through the scope of the sniper rifle. “Where are you?”

“ We’re still lost in the trenches ,” Zack’s voice replied.

“Well, get out of there and get to the walkway again. I have it covered now.”

“ Copy that, ” Zack said. “ We’re coming. ”

Zack hustled through the trenches with Emma hanging off his shoulder and Bertie rolling along beside him. He panted as he ran, breathless and afraid.

He rounded a mud-walled, frost-covered corner and saw another mud-walled, frost-covered trench.

He was hopelessly, hopelessly lost.

“How you doing?” he asked Emma.

“It hurts like hell,” Emma winced as she limped along. She looked at him. “Please don’t leave me, Zack.”