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Authors: Jon Land

BOOK: Fires of Midnight
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Wills continued before Fuchs could issue his commands. “I can have my men close in, take him before the parade starts.”
“You don’t know who you’re dealing with.”
Wills made sure Fuchs could see the hard stare in his eyes. “Neither do you, Mr. Washington. I let your people handle this, things could turn out bloody.”
“Not as bloody as they will if your people botch it, Chief.”
“You trying to pull rank on me again?”
“I’d hate to see you prosecuted for treason, Chief, but if your stubbornness ends up aiding and abetting a wanted fugitive, I’m afraid you will leave me no choice.”
“The fuck you say?”
“This will all be over soon, Chief. Just leave everything to me.”
A subordinate summoned Wills back to his console and handed him a microphone. Turk accepted the report, then looked again at Fuchs.
“Another of your man’s apparent accomplices has just been spotted, Mr. Washington. Real big guy. An Indian.”
“Prepare to move,” Fuchs said into his headset, not about to wait any longer. “On my signal.”
 
B
laine saw Johnny Wareagle only at the last, when the big Indian had drawn abreast of him. His expression was grim.
“They’ve made us, Blainey.”
“I figured as much. How many we talking?”
“Fifty, sixty maybe, along this street alone. More coming.”
“Rooftops?”
Johnny’s eyes darted briefly upward. “Well hidden.”
“Another problem: Krill’s here.”
Wareagle stiffened, didn’t look surprised. “I know. I found a storage room in the tunnels where he’d been.”
“He was heading out of the park, Indian. You figure maybe he planted something? You think Haslanger wants to make sure he can walk away from this no matter what?”
Johnny recalled the supply of fireworks loaded in the storeroom: one of the crates had been pried open and several shells were missing from it. “Yes, Blainey, but not planted.” He gestured at the sky.
“Oh, shit …”
“I must stop him.”
“And now, ladies and gentlemen, on this magical Fourth of July night, the Magic Kingdom proudly presents Spectromagic. To fully enjoy the performance …”
“I’ll cover you as long as I can …”
“ …
the Kingdom’s lighting will be shut off
… .”
As Johnny started off, all of Main Street went black at the same time a calvacade of multicolored lights approached from Cinderella’s Castle, accompanied by music blaring from unseen speakers.
“ … unless I don’t have to,” McCracken completed to himself, Wareagle having disappeared into the darkness.
 
“
W
hat happened to the lights?” Fuchs demanded. “What happened to the goddamn lights?”
“Let me see what I can do,” Wills replied quickly, moving for the communication console.
“There isn’t time!”
“Just wait a—”
“I won’t risk losing him!”
“Shit, in the dark you—”
“Take McCracken!” Fuchs ordered into his headset. “Take McCracken now!”
 
 
A
rm clasped to Susan’s elbow, McCracken turned from the head of Main Street U.S.A. and squeezed along the sidewalk in search of the first route away from the pedestrian clutter. Gunmen were likely to be closing on them even now and he kept his eyes alert for any sudden movement.
Suddenly the dark he’d been relying on for camouflage was pierced by the lead figures of the parade in the form of neon-costumed, silvery shapes perched within moving balls down the center of Main Street, waving to the crowd as they spun one way and then back the other. Behind them loomed a seemingly endless procession of floats and attractions recreating favorite Disney characters and films, all ablaze in bright spectral light.
The music reverberated loudly and McCracken found himself even with Mickey Mouse wearing a sequined tuxedo atop a golden harp float by the ice cream parlor, when he spotted a trio of men plowing relentlessly his way. He swung back around only to see another two closing from the rear.
He drew his SIG as stealthily as he could manage. “When I push on your shoulder,” he told Susan, “hit the ground.”
“But—”
“Just do as I say and keep looking for the kid, no matter what.”
The bright light from the Spectromagic Parade was enough to catch flickers of motion on the rooftops behind the facades of the buildings on the other side of Main Street, concentrated atop the magic and bookstores all the way down to the arcade. His Splat bullets had gotten wet back at the Jungle Cruise, rendering them useless. He was facing an army with only a pair of standard nine-millimeter clips to wage a defense.
A float lined with musical notes come-to-life slid past, followed closely by one manned by characters from
The Little Mermaid
as the song “Under the Sea” played. Blaine chose that moment to abruptly push on Susan Lyle’s shoulder. He squatted as she went down and turned toward the advancing gunmen, ready for anything except what happened next.
The second-story facades of the buildings lining the other side of Main Street exploded one after the other, taking out large concentrations of the enemy. Hit by what McCracken recognized as
grenade fire
.
Fired by
whom
, though?
Shards of wood sprayed into the air, showering the audience as well as the Spectromagic participants. The parade ground to a halt. The
Little Mermaid
float rocked and then listed heavily to the left, mounting the sidewalk and slamming into the bakeshop. Another series of flashing balls manned by silver-faced figures spun wildly across the road, seeming to chase some of the fleeing crowd. People scattered in all directions as muzzle flashes filled the night with fresh color, aimed expertly and discriminately at Fuchs’s troops who’d been closing on Blaine.
What the hell was happening?
McCracken grabbed Susan and shielded her against the ice cream parlor’s frame, back to her so he was facing Main Street, watching Fuchs’s men swing wildly about in search of the unseen force that was killing them. Panicked throngs of spectators were tripping over the spilled bodies as they screamed and struggled to flee. Blaine glimpsed additional members of the opposition darting for the remaining strategic positions in the buildings across the street. More grenade fire peppered those troops as well and the shower of debris started up anew, intensifying the panic.
McCracken used the opportunity to smash the ice cream parlor’s front window with his SIG-Sauer. He shouldered through the remnants of the glass and lifted Susan inside, ignoring the jabs from the remaining shards. He led her around behind the counter, remembering the men Sal Belamo had found inexplicably dead back inside the “Pirates of the Caribbean.”
“What’s happening?” she managed, ducking low for cover.
“I don’t know. Stay here.”
Blaine bounced over the counter, ready to join the chaos outside, only to find himself facing an impossibly familiar figure standing sideways to the door.
“What do ya say, Captain?” greeted Harry Lime.
J
oshua Wolfe had hoped the Spectromagic Parade would prove enough of a distraction to let him escape from the Magic Kingdom. The darkest moments would come when the section featuring
Fantasia
passed the center of Main Street and, ironically, the eerie chords of the film’s soundtrack had just begun to play when the explosions erupted.
Like many others the ensuing chaos caught Josh with the force of a Midwest twister and spun him around at will. He slammed into one person, then another, might have collapsed if there’d been any room on the street to do so. He managed to separate himself from the panicked horde of parents desperately trying to find their children and backed free of the riotous throngs.
The dark
Fantasia
float featuring the Black Demon had tumbled over, and one of the demon’s still-extended wings tripped Josh up and spilled him to the ground when he tried to backpedal. Unhurt, he regained his feet, realizing that escape toward the main entrance of the Magic Kingdom was out of the question. He had no choice but to turn and try looping around the worst of the congestion.
Two men extricated themselves from the crowd and started in his direction. Josh glimpsed them long enough to find the recognition on their faces before he rushed off.
 
 
“A
nd me thinking you were dead,” Blaine said to Harry Lime.
“That’s the way it was supposed to be.”
“You were in on this with Livingstone Crum’s bunch, Thurman and the rest of them.”
“Just doing my job, Captain, same as you.”
“A lot of people got hurt.”
“That’s why I’m here.”
“How’d you find out?”
“Thurman called me. Said he owed you.”
“And the others you brought along for the ride?”
“Key West Irregulars you met that night in the bar, Captain. They always did love a good fight.”
A fusillade of bullets shattered what little glass remained of the ice cream parlor’s front window. McCracken dropped to a crouch and opened up with his SIG on the enemy troops darting across the street. Harry instantly swept a submachine gun from his shoulder and added his fire to Blaine’s. A grenade launcher dangled menacingly behind his back.
“They’ve certainly got one tonight,” said Blaine.
 
“I
’m going down there!” Wills insisted, strapping a gun belt around his waist.
“You’ll be killed,” Fuchs told him, with a calm that seemed just as unsettling as the chaos that had overcome the park.
Turk wanted to shoot the bastard. “You expected this, you son of a bitch!”
“No, but I should have.” He should have known McCracken would have brought reinforcements with him, lying in wait until they were needed. “An unfortunate distraction, that’s all.”
“Distraction
? Are you fucking
crazy
? Look at what’s happening out there!”
“The price is well worth the cost, Chief. Rest assured.”
“I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to rest again.”
Fuchs completed the instructions to the rear-based team of his men and then started for the stairwell leading into the tunnels.
“Where the fuck do you think you’re going, Mr. Washington?”
“Out there as well, Captain. To a different section of the park entirely, where my quarry awaits me.”
“Fuck you,” Wills said loudly, too late for Fuchs to hear as he disappeared down the stairs.
 
A
single guard had been on duty on the lagoon dock when Krill got there. Krill dispatched him without incident and settled himself into a launch that was identical to the three watching over the barge.
He had almost reached the first when the explosions began inside the Magic Kingdom. Krill paid them little heed, other than to realize what a blessing they were for helping him reach the security launches one after the other virtually unnoticed and dispatch those on board.
Krill tied his launch up to the barge and mounted it quickly. He checked his watch: two more minutes to go before the fireworks commenced. He could see easily enough through the darkness but the sight atop the barge confused him.
Mortar tubes of various diameters were lined up in neat, symmetrical rows interspersed with thinner launchers loaded with Roman candles. Dozens and dozens in all. Disney had also perfected a system for automated reloading, so the number of shells filling the air with color and sound could stretch well into the hundreds. But which would be the tubes to be fired first?
Krill could only guess. Just load his shells into the most accessible tubes as quickly as possible and then take his leave.
He tucked the small bag containing his shells into his right hand and advanced toward the nearest mortar tubes. The barge was heavy and stable, but its wet surface was slippery. He lowered his bag to the deck when he reached the first row of tubes, just behind some of the larger Roman candles. He had centered one of his altered shells over a tube, about to drop it in, when he heard a strange sloshing sound. Krill turned in time to see the Indian he recognized from the picture in McCracken’s file lunging for him from the starboard side of the barge. Impact carried him sideways toward the edge, but not before he let the shell drop. It sank down the tube into firing position, ready to be shot into the air.
 
J
osh never stopped running, not even when his breath turned to hot, burning gasps in his chest. But he ran without clear destination, without purpose. He weaved through the rapidly emptying northwest section of the park, hoping to lose himself but quickly seeing the futility in that strategy. By the time he reached Liberty Square near the Hall of Presidents, pursuit by the Men seemed to be closing from all directions.
Boxed in, he dashed onto the boarding platform for the three-tier riverboat that was moored before him. Josh dashed along its length and reached the end just as footsteps thumped across the platform in his wake. Desperate, he jumped into the water and paddled frantically behind the cover of the huge boat. Reaching its aft side, he caught Tom Sawyer’s Island in his gaze and began swimming toward it.
 
T
he boy was halfway to the island before he was spotted.
“Follow him!” Fuchs ordered his men who had reported from the scene. “Don’t let him out of your sight!”
The men obeyed. The first group on the scene plunged off the riverboat into the water and swam after Joshua Wolfe. They had closed the gap considerably by the time the boy reached the shoreline of Tom Sawyer’s Island, stumbling, falling and finally regaining his feet. The dual islands, especially this one, offered plenty of places to hide in the form of thick brush and crevices, not to mention the mine and cave. And hiding was exactly what the men expected Joshua Wolfe would do.
But instead he stayed on the move, smashing through the thickets and racing along the paths leading to the footbridge connecting this island with its twin.
“Subject confined to second island, Colonel,” reported the first Group Six man to reach the still wobbling footbridge into his walkie-talkie. “We have it surrounded from the shoreline.”
Fuchs had abandoned the tunnels beneath the complex to be present when his men captured Josh. Nearing the riverbank, he boarded the ferry and waited for it to transport him across. The colonel thought quickly. There was almost nothing on the second of the two islands, except for more foliage and Fort Samuel Clemens.
“Hold your positions until I arrive,” he ordered.
 
T
he logistics along Main Street U.S.A. worked to the advantage of Harry Lime’s Key West Irregulars, especially since the panicked rush of people prevented the Group Six troops from using their superior numbers to full advantage. Captain Jack, Jimmy Beam and Johnny Walker settled into a hit-and-run, guerrilla-type strategy. Meanwhile, Papa and the Sandman, dressed in his customary bathrobe with extra ammo weighing down the pockets, had managed to splinter the opposition by luring isolated small groups into the Walt Disney World Railroad station and Main Street’s City Hall. There they could be picked off in confined spaces that significantly reduced the advantage of superior numbers.
The park was emptying at a remarkable clip, the chaos transferred to the monorail station where people forced their way onto train after train, pounding on the doors when they closed without allowing them to board. Many gave up on the effort and simply ran to get away.
Inside the ice cream parlor Harry Lime and McCracken reloaded and prepared themselves to rejoin the battle.
“Can I make you a sundae before I leave?” Blaine asked Susan, who was still perched behind the counter for cover.
“I’d settle for you coming back to get me.”
“Count on it.”
“Find Josh, Blaine.”
McCracken stole a glance at Harry before responding. “Count on that, too.”
Lime led the way back onto Main Street U.S.A., firing the last shells from his grenade launcher. When it was empty, he stripped a pair of submachine guns from his shoulders and glided down the sidewalk with one in each hand. McCracken snatched a similar weapon from one of the opposition corpses and pocketed a pair of extra clips for it as well.
Most of the lighting still had not been switched back on, keeping Main Street in a dull glow. The pall of smoke from explosions and gunshots hung low in the thick, moist air. Except for the combatants, the immediate area was deserted. People had fled leaving their souvenirs, tote bags and backpacks behind to mix with the blast-riddled debris and bodies claimed by the battle. McCracken had seen entire towns leveled by warring parties, but there was something even eerier about this.
Fresh gunfire strafed the street from the side opposite them, originating on the first floors of all three main buildings smoldering there. Blaine and Harry ran down the sidewalk letting go with nonstop barrages that shattered what little remained of the windows and turned the contents of the shops into a shambles. For a time they were actually firing back to back, exchanging fresh clips for exhausted ones almost in unison. Then Harry took a hit in the shoulder and discarded the weapon he’d been holding in that hand. He lunged over the sidewalk and joined McCracken beneath the overhang of the old-fashioned cinema.
“Don’t look like my boys can hold all of ’em back, Captain.”
“Then let’s see what we can do about the ones who got by them,” Blaine said to Harry as the first of the fireworks burst in the sky, showering them with light.
 
W
areagle tried to spin away from the edge of the barge back toward the mortar tubes, specifically the one in the center where he’d seen Krill insert his charge. Krill, though, held Johnny off, fighting for time. The two giants grappled across the edge of the barge, jarring some of the mortar tubes forming an obstacle course that threatened to trip either up with a single misstep. Each tried to topple the other off so as to complete his task: Krill, the loading of his two remaining shells; Johnny the disabling of the mortar tube loaded with the first.
Krill’s inhumanly long arms and apelike forearms held Wareagle at bay and kept angling for his throat. Johnny realized that just maintaining the stalemate would be a tall order, never mind overcoming this adversary. The elongated face before him looked like a skull with a coating of flesh-colored paint, dominated by bulging eyes and protruding teeth.
Krill’s already misshapen features distorted into a snarl. Without warning he snapped his head forward, leading with those awful teeth. Johnny reeled backwards but still felt a burst of piercing agony when Krill’s mouth-mounted razors tore a piece of his cheek off. Krill snapped his neck
forward again, and this time Wareagle risked freeing a hand to wedge against the monster’s chin to hold off the assault.
The move worked at the expense of leaving one of Krill’s arms free and he instantly fastened it upon Johnny’s throat. His fingers were obscenely long and thick, allowing him to close all the way around Wareagle’s expansive neck. A less muscled man would have perished to a crack of cartilage almost instantly. But crushing Johnny’s throat took more effort than Krill had anticipated, which surprised him enough for Wareagle to twist to the side and ease the pressure on his windpipe. In the process he withdrew the hand pressed against the monster’s chin and rocketed it forward with all the force he could muster.
The Indian’s tightened palm flattened Krill’s nose and staggered him. Krill backpedaled briefly, a low growl rising from his throat before he swept his other hand outward, fingers curled like a claw.
Johnny felt his shirt tear and flesh rip as if a bear had raked a paw across it. Krill swiped at him a second time in the opposite direction and the fiery pain struck Johnny again, a bloody X now drawn down the center of his chest. Krill used that X as a target for a knee hurled upward. Johnny’s breath exploded from him in a rush. He felt the monster’s hands curl round his head to snap his neck and he thrust his hands out for a comparable hold.

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