Matthew Reilly - Scarecrow

Most of them held sinister-looking short-barrelled VZ-61 Skorpion machine pistols: the signature weapon of Russia's elite special forces unit, the Spetsnaz. It was from this gun that they had garnered their bounty hunting nickname: the Skorpions.

They'd been waiting.

A man wearing major's bars stepped forward from the group. 'Drop your weapons,' he said crisply, curtly.

Schofield and the other four Marines did so. Two Spetsnaz soldiers immediately rushed to his side and held him firmly.

'Captain Schofield, what a pleasant surprise,' the Spetsnaz major said. 'My intelligence did not mention that you would be at this site, but your appearance is a welcome bonus. Your head may pay exactly the same price as the others, but there is no doubt a certain prestige that goes with being the bounty hunter who brings in the famous Scarecrow.'

The major seemed to appraise Schofield down his long aquiline nose. He snorted. 'But perhaps your reputation is unwarranted. Kneel, please.'

Schofield remained standing. He nodded at Gant's laser-emitting diode on the ground. 'You see that device down there. That diode is leading a 21,000-pound laser-guided bomb to this mine. It'll be here in five minut—'

'I said kneel.'

One of the guards whacked Schofield behind the knees with his rifle butt. Schofield dropped to the ground underneath one of the cathedral-like domes of the air vents.

With a sharp slicing noise, the major then withdrew a glistening sword from his back-holster: a short-bladed Cossack fighting sword.

'Really,' the major said as he approached Schofield, rotating the sword lazily in his hand, 'I am somewhat disappointed. I had thought killing the Scarecrow would be more difficult than this.'

He raised the sword and, gripping it with both hands, started to swing it. . . just as a pair of blue laser dots appeared on the chests of Schofield's guards. The next instant, the two guards were blown away.

Schofield snapped up—

The Spetsnaz major whirled around—

And they all saw him.

He was standing out in the open, underneath the other air vent, two silver Remington shotguns in his hands, held like pistols. High-tech blue laser-sighting devices were attached to the shotguns' stainless steel barrels.

Erected next to him on collapsible tripods were two remote-operated FN-MAG machine-guns—also equipped with blue laser sights. One of the robot guns was now illuminating the Spetsnaz major's chest with its blue targeting laser, the other gun just roved randomly among the Russian troops.

Whoever this man was, he was dressed entirely in black.

Black fatigues.

Black body armour, scratched with battle scars.

Black hockey helmet.

And on his face—a rugged face, weathered and hard, unshaven—he wore a pair of wraparound anti-flash glasses with yellow lenses.

Schofield caught a glimpse of a thick rope hanging vertically from the air vent above the man, before— whoosh —it whiplashed up into the vent, disappearing like a spooked snake.

'Why hello, Dmitri,' the man in black said. 'Gone AWOL again have you?'

The Spetsnaz major didn't look at all pleased to see the man in black. Nor was he thrilled at the blue laser dot now lighting up his own chest.

The Russian major snarled. 'It is always easier to disappear on these international missions. As I'm sure you of all people would know, Aloysius.' He pronounced the name: allo-wishus.

The man in black—Aloysius—stepped forward, walking casually in amongst the heavily-armed Spetsnaz unit.

Schofield noticed his black utility vest. It was equipped with a bizarre array of wow-military devices: handcuffs, mountain-climbing pitons, a small hand-held scuba tank called a Pony Bottle, even a miniature welding torch—

The man in black strode past a Russian trooper, and suddenly the trooper whipped his gun up.

Muzzle flash. Gunfire.

The trooper was riddled with bullets, nailed.

The roving robot machine-gun whizzed back to pin its laser sights on the other Spetsnaz troops.

Unperturbed, the man in black stopped before Schofield and the Spetsnaz major.

'Captain Schofield, I presume?' he said as he lifted Schofield to his feet. 'The Scarecrow.'

'That's right. . .' Schofield said guardedly.

The man in black smiled. 'Knight. Aloysius Knight. Bounty hunter. I see you've met the Skorpions. You'll have to excuse Major Zamanov. He has this really bad habit of cutting off people's heads as soon as he meets them. I saw the laser signal from the air—when is the bomb due?'

Schofield glanced at Mother.

'Four minutes, thirty seconds,' she said, eyeing her watch.

'If you take his head, Knight,' the Russian major hissed, 'we will hunt you down to the ends of the earth, and we will kill you.'

'Dmitri,' the man named Knight said, 'you couldn't do that if you tried.'

'I could kill you right now.'

'But then you'd die, too,' Knight said, nodding at the blue dot on Major Dmitri Zamanov's chest.

'It would be worth it,' Zamanov spat.

'I'm sorry, Dmitri,' Knight laughed. 'You're a good soldier, and let's be honest, a fucking psychotic asshole. But I know you too well. You don't want to die. Death scares the shit out of you. Me, on the other hand . . . well, I couldn't give a fuck about dying.'

Zamanov froze.

This Knight character, Schofield saw, had called Zamanov's bluff.

'Come on, Captain,' Knight said, handing Schofield his MP-7 from the ground. 'Grab your boys and girls and follow me.'

With that, Knight led Schofield and the other Marines through the ranks of Spetsnaz troops without another shot being fired.

'Who are you?' Schofield asked as they walked.

'Never mind,' Knight said. 'The only thing you need to know right now, Captain, is that you have a guardian angel. Someone who doesn't want to see you killed.'

They reached the eastern end of the Al-Qaeda barricade, a short distance from the tunnel in the corner of the cavern.

Knight yanked open the door to a wide-bodied Driftrunner truck that formed the end section of the Al-Qaeda barricade.

'Get in,' he said.

Schofield and the others climbed inside—under the baleful glares of the Skorpions.

Aloysius Knight jumped into the front seat of the Driftrunner, keyed the ignition.

'Now,' he turned to Schofield, 'are you ready to run? Because as soon as we leave the cover of my remote guns, those cocksuckers are gonna be really pissed.'

'I'm ready.'

'Good.'

Then Knight gunned the accelerator and the Driftrunner shot off the mark, disappearing into the small tunnel in the corner of the cavern.

No sooner was it out of sight than the 20-odd members of Zamanov's Spetsnaz team were moving, jumping into other Driftrunners, three men even leaping into Schofield's abandoned Light Strike Vehicle.

Their engines roared and the chase began.

Headlights in darkness.

Bouncing, jouncing, carving sabre-like beams through the dust-filled air.

The Black Knight's Driftrunner roared down the narrow tunnel. The Driftrunner was about the size of a Humvee and essentially just an oversized pick-up truck, with a long rear tray and a partially-enclosed driver's compartment. There was, however, no dividing wall or window between the driver's compartment and the rear personnel tray: one could traverse between the two simply by climbing over the seats.

The tunnel around it was almost perfectly square, with sheer granite walls and a flat hardstone ceiling held up by wooden support beams. It was also practically dead straight, stretching away into darkness like an arrow.

And it was tightly—tightly—fitted around the Driftrunner. There were only about 12 inches to spare on either side of the speeding truck. Above the vehicle's roof the gap was about four feet. The Skorpions were close behind them.