Chapter Thirty

 

 

J.B. rolled behind the outcropping and came up with his Uzi in firing position just as two more steel-jacketed wasps stung the canyon wall overhead. The outcropping was over seven feet wide at its base and provided enough cover for everyone, as long they sat scrunched up, knees folded against their chests. Unfortunately it wasn't very high, barely four feet tall.

 

Jak cautiously peered at the opposite wall of the canyon, the only place for the shots to have originated. The sniper was well hidden. If it hadn't been for the teenager's keen sense of hearing, J.B. might have been chilled.

 

Jak ducked aside as another bullet ricocheted off the granite shield, but he had seen a glint of sunlight on a gun barrel. "Spotted him."

 

"An Indian?" J.B. demanded.

 

Jak shrugged. "Only saw gun."

 

Krysty passed the Steyr SSG-70 to Doc, who passed it to Jak, who passed it along to J.B. Pushing his spectacles onto his forehead, J.B. brought the rifle to chin level, settling the rubber-cushioned stock into his shoulder. He peered through the image-enhancing scope and followed Jak's direction to the reflected light.

 

He spotted it and took slow aim, centering the cross hairs, waiting for the sniper to show more of himself than just his gun barrel. Jak said, "I'll speed along."

 

He lifted his head until the top of his white mane rose above the edge of the outcropping. J.B. glimpsed a dark arm and head through the scope and squeezed the trigger of the rifle. The report sounded like a giant twig snapping in two.

 

"Think got him," Jak whispered.

 

Almost at the same second, a dark shape slithered over the lip of the canyon wall and fell with a clatter to the stones below. J.B. saw it through the scope and identified it as an SA-80 automatic rifle.

 

"It's Hellstrom's people," he said grimly. "They must have figured out who we were and came after us."

 

"He'll send men up on both sides to block us off in two directions," Fleur said fearfully.

 

Peering over the outcropping, Jak said, "Two across from us, hear at least two more above us."

 

Doc craned his neck, looking up the canyon wall. "We have been cast in the roles of the proverbial fish in a barrel. They will not have to expose themselves to point their weapons down and shoot."

 

"Mebbe so," J.B. said, pulling his sack to him. "Mebbe not so."

 

He pawed around in the bag and pulled out an oval gren, the thin metal walls encircled by rubber rings. He tossed it experimentally in his hand.

 

"What are you planning to do with that?" Krysty asked.

 

"Take care of the coldhearts above us."

 

"You'll have to arm it and throw the damn thing straight up, J.B. There's no guarantee it won't just drop back down and blow up in our laps!"

 

J.B. smiled. "This is a DM-19 incendiary gren with a phosphorus filler. It has a pull-cord arming device, but detonation occurs when the casing breaks."

 

"So?"

 

J.B. tossed the grenade to Jak, who caught it gingerly. He turned his back to the outcropping and leaned as far back as it would allow. He looked straight up, holding the Steyr to his shoulder.

 

"Jak, when I say 'now,' I want you to throw the gren straight up, over our heads. Try to put a little effort into it so it'll land on the top of the wall, but it doesn't matter if you do. Just make sure you throw high and straight."

 

J.B. flattened himself against the rock and fitted his eye over the scope. He waited, watching and listening. There was a faint clink of metal against rock and he said softly, "Now."

 

Jak lobbed the bomb up in a straight line. J.B. followed the gren's vertical flight through the scope, and when it lost its momentum and began to drop, he waited until the small object was level with the edge of the canyon wall before squeezing the trigger. He was right on target.

 

The blast of the detonating gren echoed across the canyon and back like a thunderclap. A fireball bloomed, and tongues of flame curled in all directions. Everyone below felt the slamming concussion. As the echoes of the explosion still reverberated, clattering rock fragments and screams of agony added to the noise.

 

Shielding his eyes from the falling rock chips, Jak looked up and said with a grin, "Flash-fried 'em."

 

A pair of automatic rifles began chattering from the opposite wall, striking and ricocheting from the outcropping. J.B. hitched over, saw the men on the facing edge of the canyon and fired the Steyr at them. After one man fell, arms windmilling, and the other dived for cover, J.B. said, "Time to move. I'll lay down a covering fire."

 

As the friends broke from their granite hiding place, J.B. propped his Uzi atop the boulder and depressed its trigger, sending a steady stream of bullets to chew up the topmost edge of the opposite wall. He kept the sec man up there pinned down, afraid to raise his head, until the five people had reached the bottom few feet of the stone staircase.

 

J.B. grabbed his sack and scrabbled out on the ledge, climbing, crawling and sliding. He heard voices shouting from the mouth of the canyon, and he recognized one of them as Hellstrom's. Evidently he had sent a scout force ahead, holding back the remainder of the sec squad.

 

Fleur, Krysty, Doc and Jak had taken cover behind rock tumbles beside the cave entrance the moment they'd jumped from the stone staircase. J.B. slid down to join them, hopping from ledge to ledge. Although the exchange of gunfire and the gren explosion had happened in a very short span of time, he feared that whoever or whatever lurked inside the cave had been alerted. He expected a swarm of beetles to swoop from it immediately. At the very least, he expected Hellstrom and his sec men to charge down the canyon, weapons blazing.

 

J.B. managed to join his friends behind the rocks on the right side of the cave opening before either one happened. He didn't have to wait long before six shaven-headed, X-scarred men raced down the canyon, blasters flaming, heading straight for them. They fanned out and took cover without hesitation. The sec men kept up a cone-shaped firing pattern. Bullets whined from their stone shelter and exploded against the rocky wall over their heads, sprinkling them with dust and gravel.

 

"As long we stay down, we're safe," Krysty said. "But if we try to make a run for the cave, we'll make excellent targets."

 

A bullet dug a gouge in a rock very close to Doc's head. The shot had come from above, and Jak returned the fire with a double blast from his Colt Python.

 

Krysty and J.B. exchanged hard-eyed, knowing looks. It was only a matter of time before the sec men got in position to lob grens at them, or the sniper above would pick them off.

 

Doc chuckled mirthlessly, peering out between the open spaces in the rocks at the men shooting at them. "This reminds of the time I took my daughters to see Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show."

 

Fleur stared at him as if the white-haired man had suddenly decided to turn senile, but Doc continued. "The climax of the performance was a stirring scene of settlers beset by bloodthirsty Indians. When events looked their darkest, the gallant Colonel Cody led the U.S. Cavalry in a charge to rout the savages and set things aright."

 

No one responded to Doc's story. J.B. had only the vaguest idea of who Buffalo Bill Cody had been, and at the moment he wasn't inclined to solicit Doc for further information about him.

 

A movement on the canyon rim caught his eye. The head of the Helskel sniper was silhouetted against the blue of the sky, and sunlight gleamed dully off the gun barrel as he brought it into firing position.

 

As J.B. raised his Uzi, the sec man's head suddenly acquired a new and different shape, and the automatic rifle in his hands tumbled down the face of the cliff. The crack of the rifle shot was lost in the echoes of the gunfire from the men on the canyon floor, but the Armorer definitely heard the volley of shots that followed it.

 

Bullets punched gouts of dirt from around the sec men's cover, and they shouted in surprise and fear. J.B. scanned the towering walls and saw at least half a dozen copper-skinned men on horseback, men with feathers in their long black hair, paint on their faces and blasters in their hands. He recognized Touch-the-Sky among them.

 

J.B. stared at the band of Sioux as they poured a withering hail of autofire down on the sec men from above. He turned to Doc and said, "That ain't your Colonel Cody or the U.S. Cavalry."

 

"I'm not going to complain," Krysty said, smiling with relief. "Are you?"

 

J.B. wasn't going to complain, but he did wonder whether the Lakota, after chilling the sec men, might end up blasting them down. He doubted that Touch-the-Sky's arrival was to pull their fat out of the fire. More than likely he was taking advantage of the opportunity to rid the Black Hills of white intruders once and for all.

 

Jak and Krysty opened fire on the sec men while they were occupied by the Sioux. They were spread out all over the canyon floor, and half of them shot back at the Indians while the other half blasted away at them. But most of their shots went wild, since they were trying to dodge and duck the death belching from the rifles above.

 

Seeing that the sec men were thoroughly occupied with the Lakota, J.B. said, "Let's hit the cave."

 

"No time like the present," Doc said, rising stiffly to his feet.

 

The five people climbed quickly over the rocks and sprinted for the cave opening. The few hasty shots directed their way kicked up dirt and rock, but none came uncomfortably close. As far as J.B. could tell, the bullets didn't come from above.

 

As they darted inside, J.B. risked a backward glance and saw the Lakota astride their ponies, swerving away from the edge of the canyon and galloping toward its mouth. If Hellstrom lurked anywhere back there, the Indians' pounding arrival would flush him out.

 

The cavern had a huge, irregular dome shape. The sunlight slanting into the canyon reached only a few yards past the opening. Beyond that, darkness was a congealed mass, and none of them moved toward it.

 

"Remember what Hellstrom said about the beetles," he warned.

 

They remained at the mouth of the cave, hunkering down on either side of it, not shooting, just watching, waiting and listening. The sec men didn't fire at them. They had to be aware of their situation, being trapped in the middle between the guns in the cave and the guns of the Sioux, but they stayed where they were, behind cover.

 

"J.B.," Krysty called, "shouldn't we look for that mat-trans gateway?"

 

"I don't want to bump into those flying mechanical bugs in the dark. Besides, we should stay and finish it with Hellstrom."

 

Jak grinned ruefully. "Nervous too about going back there blind."

 

Fleur snorted. "We may not have a choice, if our men make a charge."

 

" 'Our' men?" Doc echoed, angling an eyebrow at her. "I was under the impression you felt thoroughly disaffected from your former fraternity."

 

"You're welcome to go out there and join them," Krysty said in a tight, cold tone. "If you think they'll let you. Of course, if they do, I'll chill you personally."

 

The roar of an engine floated up from around a bend in the canyon wall, and mingled with it was the crackle of gunfire and yipping war cries. A few seconds later the AMAC jounced into view, with hard-riding Lakota flanking it, shooting at its armored hide and uttering fierce screams. A warrior was crouched on the roof, clinging to the periscope. As the wag drew closer, J.B. recognized the Indian as Touch-the-Sky. Though the windshield was tinted, he assumed Lars Hellstrom himself was behind the wheel.

 

The sec men were rising to their knees, believing the AMAC was making a rescue run and would brake, allowing them to board it. The vehicle didn't stop, didn't even slow. It sped past the sec men, and they howled in anger and terror. The Lakota had used the big armored wag as mobile cover, and when their ponies paralleled the sec men's position, they directed their fire into them. The return fire was sporadic.

 

Though a couple of the Sioux pitched from their saddle blankets with bullet wounds, the remainder leaped from horseback and grappled hand-to-hand.

 

The AMAC kept coming on a straight course for the cave entrance, bouncing over loose stones. J.B., Krysty and Jak triggered their blasters, and ricochets sparked from the front bumper guard. The windshield acquired a few stars, but it didn't break. Nothing less than armor-piercing rounds could wound the vehicle, and though there were some in the sack, there was no time to load them into their blasters.

 

Snatching a gren from his sack, J.B. armed it and flung it in the AMAC's path, trying to place it beneath a tire. A red-yellow bouquet of flame bloomed beneath the wag, and the dulled thunder of the detonation rumbled loudly. Still, the exploding gren did little to impede the vehicle's progress.

 

Whirling, J.B. shouted, "Move, goddammit!"

 

He began to run into the blackness, hearing his friends sprinting beside and behind him. The engine roar seemed to fill the cavern. He heard a woman shriek, very briefly, and he cast a glance over his shoulder.

 

The AMAC rocketed through the cave opening, and the driver cut the wheels sharply to the right, stomping the brakes at the same time. The resulting skid wasn't controlled, and the rear end floated around in a 180-degree turn. A wave of sandy soil crested from beneath it, the vehicle thrown off balance in the loose dirt when the brakes were applied.

 

The swinging rear end slapped against Fleur, swatting her off her feet and flinging her to the right. The rear of the AMAC hit the rock wall hard, with a shrill squeal of metal grinding into stone. It lurched violently to a halt.

 

The woman was pinned between the armored wag and the stone wall of the cavern. There was no need to dwell on the sight; the life had been crushed out of her body in a microsecond.

 

J.B. and his friends kept running through the dark throat of the cave, and within a few dozen yards they couldn't see their hands in front of their faces.

 

"Everybody link hands," Krysty said.

 

The Armorer had a small pen-flash in his pocket, and after the human chain was hastily assembled, he took the point. The light was hardly more than a needle of white incandescence, piercing only a few feet of the cloying blackness. The cavern widened, and the ceiling grew in height. Irregularly formed stalactites hung from above. The light glinted off mineral deposits embedded in the fissured walls. The walls were also decorated with faded, crude paintings and carvings, representations of bizarre figures and shapes. They were obviously very old.

 

"Petroglyphs," Doc whispered. "Now I see why Touch-the-Sky didn't care to enter this place. It's a holy spot."

 

The clink-crunch of stones came faintly from behind.

 

"Hellstrom isn't worried about holy spots," J.B. said softly. "If he gets a bead on us with one of those SA-80s, he can cut us to pieces without getting close."

 

"Turn out light," Jak urged, staring behind them. "Wait until gets into range. Chill him big time."

 

J.B. complied and they were plunged into absolute blackness, which lasted only for a moment. In the gloom before them shone a fiery red orb, casting a blood-colored luminescence over their faces.

 

"Dark night," J.B. managed to husk out.