Ahern, Jerry - The Web

Ahead of him he saw massive garage doors of corrugated metal, and between the doors and the corridor through which he ran, he could see crates—coffin-shaped and roughly the same size. He stopped running, leaning heavily against the wall, his breath coming in short gasps.

"Victory," he shouted. "The final victory over the Americans!" Suddenly the glass from the wire-meshed corridor windows shattered over his head, shards of it falling on and around him.

He stepped away from the wall, looking through the corridor windows into the dawning sky—a huge starburst, the largest firework he had ever seen—pale colors against a pale sky. And the concrete beneath him began to

tremble, the walls to shake, dust and infinitesimally small chunks of debris drifting down.

"My God!" Where had he learned that? he thought. "They're blowing it up!"

He started to run, the crates— the precious crates—behind him. Survival was more immediate now as the cross supports began crumbling and a three-foot section of concrete killed the commando beside him—just beside him.

Squads of assault rifle-armed Soviet infantrymen were pouring through the streets.

"Damn it," Rourke rasped, both of the twin Detonics stainless .s in his fists. Suddenly, the ground beneath him began to rumble, to shake.

He glanced at the black luminous face of the Rolex Submariner on his left wrist, then squinted skyward— full dawn. The explosions had begun just as Martha Bogen had said they would.

There was no time now—no chance to save the town. Russian troops—why?

The explosions. Already, in the distance near the high peaks of the rim of the valley, he could see rock slides starting.

He had waited near the school, still several blocks from Martha Bogen's house—and the garage where his Harley should still be hidden.

But waiting for the Soviet troops to clear the street in front of him would be suicidal now.

Thumb-cocking both pistols, he started to run, the ground shaking beneath him still more violently.

Gunfire. Soviet AK series assault rifles, firing toward

him, glass shattering in the louvered classroom windows beside him as he jumped a hedgerow, running.

Rourke wheeled beside a concrete vertical support for a portico rooi. He fired the pistol in his right hand, then the pistol in his left, bringing down an assault rifle-armed soldier. The man's body spun, his assault rifle firing wildly, into his own men.

Rourke started to run again. Past a flagpole. During the day there would have been an American flag there and a Kentucky state flag as well.

He was nearly to the street beyond the school front lot. The ground trembled again.

He tried envisioning what the men and women of the town would have done to ensure their mass suicide. The ground trembled again and he saw a black disk sail skyward out of the street. There had been a large natural-gas storage area. . . .

"Natural gas," he rasped, throwing himself to the grassy ground beneath him.

The gunfire, the shouts, the commands in Russian and in English to halt—all were drowned out. Rourke dropped his pistols, covering his ears with his hands.

The street a hundred yards ahead of him was a sea of flame, chunks of paving hurtling skyward. They had mined the gas system.

Rourke grabbed for his pistols, pushing himself to his feet, running, stumbling, running again. A line of explosions—smaller ones—ripped through the road ahead of him in series. He had to cross the road to reach Martha Bogen's house on the other side.

He ran, bending into the run, arms distended at his sides. The gunfire resumed from behind him; he couldn't hear it, but could see the grass and dirt near his feet

chewing up under it.

He hit the pavement, still running, the explosions gutting the road drawing closer. Debris—bits of tarmac and cement and gravel—rained down on him. His hands, the pistols still in them, were over his head to protect it.

The road was now twenty-five yards away; his body ached; the waves of nausea and cold were starting to take hold.

"Narcan," he rasped. He needed the Narcan shot. He tripped, sprawling, pushed himself up, then ran on.

Ten yards. He was feeling faint, sick, the morphine was taking hold of him again.

Five yards. He jumped, the street ripping as a manhole cover less than a dozen yards to his right sailed skyward, roaring up on a tongue of flame.

The street behind him exploded and he was thrown forward.

Rourke rolled, still clutching his pistols.

He started to his knees, hearing—not hearing but feeling—something behind him.

He wheeled, hitting the road surface, firing both pistols simultaneously.

Two Soviet troopers fired at him; the ground beside him erupted under the impact of their slugs, both men going down under the impact of his.

He stumbled to his feet, lurching, feeling as though he would black out.

Rourke rammed both pistols, cocked and locked, into his wide trouser belt, then snatched at the injection kit inside his shirt against his skin. His hands shook, cold and nausea making his head reel. He dropped to his knees. The Narcan injection was in his right hand.

He looked beyond his hand as he tested the syringe.

"Man with a gun—Russian," he rasped, telling himself to act, forcing his body to respond. His left hand—he

could feel the slowness—found the butt of one of his pistols.

Automatically, he swept the left thumb around behind the tang of the Detonics to reach for the safety on the left side of the frame. He worked it down as the Russian soldier raised his assault rifle.

Rourke's right hand worked toward his left arm, the sleeve pulled up already—he had planned ahead as he a/ways did.

He started raising his left arm, as if both sides of his brain were taking separate control of him. He tried squinting at the sights a moment, seeing the hypodermic come into his line of fire.

His right hand jabbed the hypo into his left forearm.

"Aagh," he shouted, feeling the change sweep over him, seeing the slow-motion movement in his left hand as the thumb moved back around the tang, out of the way of the slide.

He was suddenly back—cold and sweating, but back, his mind working. His left first finger worked the trigger and the Detonics bucked hard in his hand.

The Soviet trooper's assault rifle fired skyward as his body twisted, almost as in a dance, then crumpled to the roadside.

Rourke pushed himself to his feet. That had been the last Narcan shot, but the last he should need. He snatched at the other pistol in his belt, worked down the safety and—he could not run again—he started into a loping walk to the curb.

Rourke assessed his surroundings—head left. He started that way. It was at least another block, maybe two. The B-complex shot would start working soon after he administered it—after he got to it.

The nausea was passing, the coldness subsiding; his

head ached and his muscles ached.

As he increased his stride, more explosions rocked the ground beneath him.

Glass, in windows on both sides of the street he loped into, shattered; fires erupted everywhere.

Another manhole cover sailed skyward on a column of flame and Rourke jumped away, the explosion ringing in his ears, debris falling like rain on him.

He rolled onto his back, protecting his face with his left forearm.

He had to run. He rolled onto his knees, then pushed himself up, starting forward, lurching into a ragged, long-strided run.

More gunfire behind him. He wheeled, almost losing his balance. He pumped a shot at hip level with the Detonics in his right fist, downing a Soviet soldier at the end of the block.

He turned and kept running.

He could see the house—white frame with green vines growing up the round columns on the front porch. Rourke could see the driveway; his bike would be in the garage at the end of it.