Greg Iles - The Spandau Phoenix

flashes of the bunker guns. "Momser!" he shouted, but no one heard

him. The noise inside the Armscor had reached a deafening level.

Hauer was leaning into the driver's compartment to urge Captain Barnard

forward when Pieter Smuts detonated the first string of Claymore mines.

Two Claymores exploded directly beneath the Armscor, hurling the

eighteen tons of hardened steel into the air like a child's toy. The

vehicle tottered on its three right wheels, then crashed back onto all

six and continued toward the house. Another string of Claymores

exploded in front of the Armscor; hundreds of steel balls scythed into

its hull, shattering the polycarbonate windshield. Captain Barnard

screamed in pain, but the Arrnscor kept rolling.

Hauer's mind raced: they still had more than a hundred meters to cover.

The mines could be handled, but not under the fire of the tower gun. If

the gunner cleared his weapon in the next thirty seconds, they didn't

stand a chance. The Vulcan had to be silenced.

"Stop!" he roared. "Turn this thing sideways and stop!"

Captain Barnard-not enthusiastic about hitting any more mines

himself-gladly obeyed. Hauer turned back to General Steyn and his men.

"Pour it in! I'm going Out!"

One of the masked men jumped down from a firing slit, ripped off his

respirator and grabbed Hauer's arm. It was Gadi. "If you go out there,

you're dead!" he yelled.

Hauer jerked his arm free. "Just keep those bunker guns off me!"

While Gadi stared, Hauer snatched up his sniper rifle and unlatched the

Armscor's side hatch. The full din of battle filled the vehicle.

Holding the Steyr-Mannlicher close against his body, Hauer took a deep

breath, and leaped outside.

He hit the ground hard and rolled beneath the huge vehicle, praying no

one had seen him. He got to one knee. There was almost enough room for

him to stand beneath the Arrnscor's undercarriage. The six giant wheels

provided a wall from behind which he could fire in relative safc Bracing

his right knee behind one of the giant tires, raised the Steyr to his

shoulder and sighted in on the tower.

The last light of dusk had almost gone. He had no nightvision scope,

but the standard Kahles-Helios ZF69 optical scope was excellent.

Even in near darkness it brought the tower in nicely.

When Hauer saw the turret in detail, he groaned. At 120 meters,

accuracy wasn't the problem. With the Steyr, he could fire ten bullets

into a sixteen-inch circle from six times that distance. The problem

was the "glass" he saw for-ming part of the turret's circular wall. It

would undoubtedly be made of transparent composite armor. Through the

scope he searched for a weakness suited to his weapon. The turret

rotates, he realized, noticing the huge gears mounted beneath the

observatory dome. But I can't damage those gears. Twelve seconds later

Hauer spotted his chance. Just where the Vulcan's six barrels protruded

from the "glass," a narrow port had been cut so that the gun could be

traversed vertically. Hauer felt the hair on the back of his neck rise.

He could see men working frantically to clear the jammed weapon.

He laid his cross hairs on the tiny port and chambered a round into the

breech. The Steyr accepted a ten-round magazine, but like most sniper

rifles it was bolt-action. He would get one perfect chance, then nine

snap shots. He took a deep breath and pressed his b(>dy into the huge

tire that shielded him. He felt the reassuring weight of the rifle on

his shoulder, the wooden stock cool and familiar against his stubbled

cheek. The sound of the battle grew dim and distant as he focused on

his target, melding his eye with the tiny crack between the Vulcan's

barrels and the armored glass. In his mind, the coin-sized target

expanded into a saucer, then a dinner plate ...

His finger settled firmly on the trigger.

Squeeze ...

The instant before Hauer fired, a blast of flame erupted from the

Vulcan's spinning barrels. Tracer rounds arced out toward the rim of

the bowl. The turret began to rotate ...

He felt his shot disintegrating. His shoulder twitched, his stomach

heaved in sudden confusion. All around he heard the desperate rattle of

guns firing at the moving turret, all to no avail. The dazzling beam

marched from position to position, silencing one gun after another. He

felt a sudden surge of hope. The gunner was ignoring the Armscor! He

thinks we're out of the fight! Because we're not moving, he thinks his

bunker guns stopped us! Hauer searched swiftly for a shot. With the

turret rotating, hitting the tiny gun port was out of the question.

Instead he picked a spot a few centimeters to the left of the Vulcan's

barrel-the spot he estimated the gunner would be sitting behind.

He fired.

Nothing happened. His bullet struck the very millimeter of glass he had

aimed for, but the transparent armor was simply too strong. How many

perfect shots would it take to drill through the polycarbonate?

Like an automaton Hauer worked the bolt-action rifle, tracking his

moving target.

Fire! Eject shell, close bolt, fire! The transparent wall shuddered as

Hauer's slugs relentlessly hammered the same single square of armor. Six

shots ... seven ... eight ... Fire!

Eject shell, close bolt, fire! He jerked out the empty magazine and

loaded his spare.

Around him the battle raged on. The Vulcan whined, the bunker guns

chattered, the hull of the armored car rattled like a tin can in a

hailstorm. He smelled the burning phosphorus of tracer rounds as they

streaked across the field in brilliant, lethal arcs. Suddenly, with a

strange shiver, Hauer sensed the Vulcan's tracer beam stagger somewhere

off to his right. He jerked his eye away from the scope and scanned the

dark field. Christ! The gunner had spotted his muzzle flashes!

His mouth went dry as the Vulcan's angle of fire lowered toward him.

Every fiber of his being screamed, "Run!" He shut his eyes against the

fear, then forced himself to open them again and put his right eye back

to the scope. Somewhere out there, he thought fiercely, is the man who

is trying to kill me. He could feel the Vulcan's slugs hitting the

ground, thousands in each burst, like the first shuddering waves of an

earthquake. The roar seemed to swallow up,the very air.

And the light ... it was mesmerizing, like some lunatic laser beam.

The tracer beam slowed as it neared the Armscor. Smuts wanted to be

sure he did not miss. In that moment of hesitation Hauer steadied his

twitching muscles, fixed his eye upon the tiny square of armored glass

he had spent his first magazine against, and opened fire.

Pieter Smuts found his mark first. In the first two seconds of contact,

the Vulcan slammed two hundred shells into the Armscor's tail, shearing

off a quarter-ton of hardened si armor.

The vehicle shuddered like a great wounded beast; black smoke poured

into the air. Suddenly the Armscor's turbocharged V-8 diesel roared to

life. In a last frantic bid for survival Captain Barnard floored the

accelerator. The armored car bolted forward like a wild bronco, leaping

out of the Vulcan's line of fire and leaving Hauer exposed on the

ground.

Stunned, kneeling alone on the dark plain, Hauer raised his rifle and

pressed his eye to the scope. Dirt showered over him as the Vulcan's

bullets thundered after the Armscor just meters away. There is nothing

here, said a voice in his brain, nothing but you and the man behind that