Worlds in Chaos (64 page)

But as the truck pulled away, a bright lamp from outside illuminated the interior to show Cavan trying to untangle his gun from a pack, Dash reeling off-balance and tumbling from the sudden jolt, with the others frozen in confusion. It would be a slaughter in there. The truck would never pull away fast enough, and Mitch, blinded by the light shining in from outside, couldn’t see to protect them.

Legermount hit the brakes, and even while Keene and Mitch were slamming into the dash panel, crashed the shift into reverse and gunned the truck backward. A series of sickening thuds accompanied by screams came from the rear end. The light disappeared abruptly, and Keene felt a wheel lurch over something. Legermount braked and reengaged forward gear. Again, the gruesome lurch, and they picked up speed. Shots followed, a few hitting the bodywork, but the truck was away by now. Keene put his face close to the cutout. “Anybody hurt back there?” he called through.

Cavan appeared outlined against the frame of the still-open door a few seconds later. “No . . . I think we’re all okay. Would you believe it, Landen? The first chance I get to actually use this bloody thing, and it gets caught up in the straps. Maybe the desks were more my line after all.”

The last stretch of road up to the launch site was clear and deserted. From the final bend at the top of the slope, the view to the side looked down over the direction they had come, visibility being better now as a result of the conflagration to the west, drawing in clearer air from the Gulf. Several new craters glowed below on the plain, while beyond, shining pink in the ghastly light, the line of the inrushing tide was already visible as an immense wall dwarfing the scale of the previous one.

52

Finally, they came within sight of the launch facility. Apart from the ubiquitous rock debris and some superficial damage in places, the structures stood intact. The gates were still locked. Jason and Joe ran forward and severed the padlock hasps with bolt cutters. Legermount took the truck through, waited for them to reboard, and Keene pointed the way to the access building serving the silo that had been made operational. Again, Jason and Joe came around with tools to force open the doors. As the last lock gave, they waved the others out from the cover of the truck. Legermount gave it a friendly parting slap before grabbing his kit and hastening away.

While Jason and Joe disappeared inside with Legermount, Keene and Mitch stood by the doorway ushering the others through while Cavan saw them down from the truck: Cynthia and Charlie; Colby with Vicki, helping Robin; Alicia, followed by Dash; Birden and Reynolds. . . .

“There’s one more,” Keene called. Cavan looked momentarily uncertain. “Where’s Sid?” Cavan turned back toward the truck. Keene went over as Cavan shone his flashlamp inside. Sid Vance was still sitting at the far end, his back to the wall, his face blank. Keene threw Cavan an ominous look and climbed in. “Sid?” He nudged Vance’s shoulder cautiously. Vance keeled sideways silently, then doubled over. Keene lifted him back up while Cavan played the flashlamp from the door. Sid’s head lolled limply to one side. There was a single bullet hole in the front of his jacket, hardly any blood. Keene checked his face and raised an eyelid with a thumb, then turned away, shaking his head.

“I never really found out who he was,” Cavan said as Keene got back down.

“Just a kid who always hit lucky—until this time,” Keene said. He looked past Cavan and stiffened suddenly. Cavan turned and looked back. Three sets of headlights were coming up the road from the village.

“It seems that our friends back there don’t intend letting the score go unsettled, Leo,” Keene said. “You might get a chance to use that gun yet.”

They went in, found Mitch, and set him about organizing some defense while Keene, Jason, and Joe went on down to the service bays adjoining the silo to check the situation. Only dim emergency lights were on, running off a battery system in the generator room that had also been left driving the refrigeration plant for the liquid oxidizer portion of the hybrid fuel mix. That was the most crucial part. It meant that the oxidizer storage tank was ready to deliver to the shuttle now—the operation had to be done at the immediate prelaunch phase. Had the refrigeration been turned off, liquefying the oxidizer would have taken hours. With a supply ready to flow, transfer could be accomplished in about fifteen minutes. Keene breathed a silent prayer of thanks to whoever the engineer had been who allowed for this kind of situation.

Jason threw switches along a panel and started the standby diesel generator. They had power. Keene heard him go into the control booth, and moments later lights started coming on in the concrete-walled rooms and equipment bays, through the stairwells and corridors, and among the ramps and service platforms around the silo above. Keene went through to the pump room and ran quickly over the valve settings. As he started up the oxidizer transfer process, Jason’s voice came from the general address system serving the area.
“Okay, Joe, you should have power. The access hatch should be at green, bridge extended.”

“Right. That’s what we’ve got,” Joe’s voice shouted down from the access bridge to the shuttle, higher overhead.

“The onboard system’s showing live. I’m disconnecting power umbilicals and switching everything to internal. Okay, start getting everyone inside.”

The lower gantry through to the silo was down. While Jason went through the blast door into the silo to release locking pins and safety latches, Keene went up to the monitor panel at the access level to begin retracting the service gantries and power up the silo’s covering doors. Charlie Hu was at the bridge crossing the gap to the white body of the shuttle. Joe had already gone through to commence flight-deck procedures.

“We’re still missing some,” Charlie said. “Where are Cavan and the troops?”

“Securing the outside. It looks like trouble followed us up from the village.”

“What about Sid?”

“Sid didn’t make it.” Keene saw Charlie’s hesitation, wanting to contribute something more. “Go on inside and make sure the others get strapped down, Charlie. There’s nothing you or they can do. We can’t have everyone out there.” Charlie nodded, turned, and disappeared into the hatch.

Jason appeared, having finished his chores below. “Just the oxidizer to complete,” he announced.

“I can take care of that,” Keene said. “Where can we get a connection to the flight deck?”

“This way.” Jason led him back to a control room outside the blast wall of the silo and activated a screen on one of the panels. It showed the face of Joe, working systematically inside the shuttle.

“Roger,” he acknowledged.

“Can we get some remotes from the security cameras outside?” Keene threw as an aside to Jason. “And see if you can pick up Mitch or Cavan on the band they were using.” He turned to the screen showing Joe. “All in order here. How are you doing inside?”

“Well, if you never heard of seat-of-the-pants spaceship flying before, this is gonna be it,” Joe replied. “I’ve got a reading on the outside wind. We could never launch in this with a regular sequence. I’m programming the side thrusters to fire as we come up out of the hole and create a horizontal counter thrust. Just hope I’ve got these numbers right.”

Keene had never heard the like of it. “I don’t have a lot of confidence in first-time guesses,” he answered dryly.

“That’s why you need a pilot, not an engineer.”

A shudder ran through the structure as something large impacted not far away.

“Lan, look at this,” Jason called from another console.

“Keep the line open, Joe,” Keene said to the screen, and moved across. Jason had operated one of the external cameras to view the main gate into the compound. The three cars had arrived outside, but somebody had driven the truck back and parked it there, blocking the entrance. As Keene watched, a helmeted figure jumped from the tailboard, ran a few paces, then turned and threw something back inside. Seconds later, the truck flamed into a torch. Keene remembered the spare cans of gasoline they had loaded at San Saucillo.
“Who is that crazy bastard?”
he yelled.

“I think I’ve got Mitch here,” Jason said, passing Keene a mike.

“Mitch, can you hear me?”

“Just,” a voice acknowledged distantly through a blur of static.

“This is Lan Keene. That’s not you at the gate?”

“I’m on my way up to the roof with Legermount and Dash. Birden and Reynolds are covering the entrances.”

That accounted for five. Then it could only be Cavan. “Oh Jesus,” Keene groaned. “Head for the front, Mitch,” he shouted into the mike. “Leo’s gone out there to delay them. He’s going to need cover.”

“Got it.”

On the screen, two cars were bumping their way along the outside of the fence toward a place where something had torn a gap. The third car was still outside the gate and had disgorged a figure who began firing at Cavan through the fence. Cavan turned and dropped to one knee, and for a heart-stopping instant Keene thought he had been hit. But it was just to aim, and Cavan dropped his target with a quick but accurate burst. However, more were appearing from the car. With one gun against several, and being out in the open, Cavan would have no chance. He rose and began zigzagging back across the compound. But with the distance still to go, there was no way he was going to make it.

“Perimeter lights!” Keene snapped at Jason. Jason reached for a panel beside the console and began flipping switches. White light enveloped the gate area, throwing the burning truck into relief and highlighting the figures clustered against the fence. One of the soldiers from the building—either Birden or Reynolds from what Mitch had said—ran forward into view and began firing at them. They retreated in confusion into the darkness farther back, and Cavan sprinted for the building, followed by whoever had covered him. Meanwhile, Jason had managed to direct a second camera at the two cars making for the gap, which was now also clearly visible in the fence lights. One of the cars stopped suddenly, figures tumbling out and throwing themselves for cover, evidently from fire coming from somewhere, probably the roof. The other veered off into the shadows and doused its lights.

“Is it you doing that, Mitch?” Keene asked into the mike.

“Right. We’re on the roof at the front. Good move with the lights. How’s Leo?”

“Looking good.”

One of the lights over the gate was shot out. Seconds later, the two nearest the gap through the fence went the same way.

“I’m just about done here,” Joe’s voice called from the screen showing the flight deck in the shuttle. “We need everyone on board.”

The third car was coming out of the darkness, heading for the building. Behind it, several dark forms came through the gap and began spreading out. One of them fell. Muzzle flashes were coming from the others and from the car.

Then Keene realized that there was something odd about the background in the scene. Unless his sense of direction was confused, the view from the roof in that direction should have shown the plain below, lighted up by the fires and the glowing meteorite craters. Instead, it was black and featureless except for flecks and patches of white. He stared, puzzled for several seconds; and then, suddenly, a chilling feeling ran through him as he realized it had turned into ocean. And then, even as he watched, the fires of the village they had just passed through, maybe one or two hundred feet below them in his estimation, dissolved under what he could now make out to be an oncoming front of churning foam.

“
Mitch! It’s time to pull out!
” he shouted into the mike. “
Look down the hill!
”

“
Christ!
” Mitch’s voice exclaimed.

Keene turned to Jason, “I’m going down to wrap up the lox. We need to open the silo doors.”

“I can do it locally from the ramp.” Jason crossed the room at a run and disappeared out the doorway.

Keene flew down the stairs to the lower level, checked the gauges, and shut off the pumps. As he retracted the umbilical, the sound of firing came from inside the building. He climbed a steel stairway to a platform above the pump area and entered a passage as Birden appeared at the far end, stopping to send a burst of fire back from the cover of the corner, then ducking back around as it was returned. In the other direction was a steel door that led through to the access stairs. “
Birden!
” Keene yelled out. “
This way.
”