Liberty Run

Chapter Twelve

Blade had to hand it to Nick. The old Freeb was as good as his word. Nick seemed to know every alley, every ditch, every unfrequented street, within 20 miles of Valley Forge. His endurance and agility were remarkable for a man his age. He maintained a steady pace, never flagging, and they reached their destination two hours before dawn. They approached Norristown from the north. Nick guided them through the fields and across yards adjacent to Highway 363, then parallel to Egypt Road until they reached Ridge Pike. They continued to the south, sticking to the shadows, to the alleys and the side streets, skirting Jeffersonville, until they reached Norristown.

Blade was amazed by his first glimpse of Soviet-occupied territory.

People appeared to be going about their daily business without hindrance.

Traffic on the main arteries was light but steady. Civilian and military vehicles shared the roads. A checkpoint was posted between Jeffersonville and Norristown, but the Russians stationed at the checkpoint performed their duties in a desultory fashion. Squatting behind a hedgerow a block to the west, Blade saw the soldiers joking and laughing, and only occasionally stopping vehicles to verify papers. Again, he had to remind himself of the time frame involved. The Soviets had controlled this area for over 100 years. They were bound to be complacent after such a protracted interval. Which suited him fine, because their careless attitude increased the odds of successfully completing the run to Philadelphia.

Four times the trio inadvertently encountered civilians, and each time the civilians took one look at the Russian uniforms on Blade and Sundance and promptly made themselves scarce.

Once in Norristown, Nick increased their pace. They bore south on Lafayette, then turned left on Hawes Avenue, and dashed across Main Street to the far sidewalk. A military truck appeared in front of them, and Nick hastily led them into a side street. They traversed a succession of side streets and alleys, on the alert for patrols, until Nick abruptly stopped.

“There it is,” the Freeb whispered.

They were standing at the end of a side street. Before them were railroad tracks, a wide avenue, and an imposing structure. Floodlights rimmed its roof. A barbed-wire fence enclosed the perimeter. Soldiers patrolled the length of the fence, some with guard dogs on a leash. A gate in the northwest corner of the fence was closed.

“What is it?” Blade asked.

“The Norristown garrison,” Nick disclosed. “About eighty soldiers are headquartered there on a regular basis. There’s a motor pool in the rear.

The place used to be a newspaper. The Times-Something-or-Other. But the damn Commies took it over, like they did all the media.”

“You know a lot about it,” Sundance idly mentioned.

“You pick up bits and pieces here and there,” Nick commented.

Blade was appraising the garrison’s fortifications. “There’s no way we can break in there to steal a vehicle.”

“Maybe you won’t have to,” Nick said.

“What do you mean?” Blade inquired.

“Look,” Nick said, pointing.

A guard was unlocking the gate in the northwest corner of the fence. He pushed the gate open and stepped aside, waiting. A moment later, a jeep drove around the corner of the garrison, evidently coming from the motor pool. The jeep braked at the gate, the driver exchanged a few words with the guard, and the jeep accelerated. It took a left.

“Hide!” Nick said, and before the Warriors understood his intent, he moved from the cover of the side street, out into the open, in clear view of the jeep’s driver.

Blade grabbed Sundance’s right arm, and they retreated into the shadows.

“What’s he doing?” Sundance queried.

“I think I know,” Blade said.

Nick was wobbling on his feet, staggering, seemingly inebriated. He glanced at the jeep, then put his left hand in the crook of his right elbow and snapped his forearm up, his right hand clenched into a fist.

The jeep slowed, then swerved, wheeling toward Nick.

Nick laughed and backpedaled, tottering.

The jeep was bearing down on the side street.

Nick stayed on the sidewalk, stumbling away from the wide avenue, leading the jeep further up the side street, out of sight of the garrison gate.

The jeep screeched to a stop, and two Russian soldiers climbed out, leaving the vehicle running.

“Hey, you bloodsuckers!” Nick called and snickered.

“Hello, comrade,” the driver greeted Nick. He was stocky, his complexion florid.

“I ain’t your lousy comrade!” Nick retorted.

“You are drunk, comrade,” stated the second Russian.

Nick laughed. “What was your first clue, butthole?”

The driver and the other Russian exchanged glances. “You will need to come with us,” the driver said.

“Like hell I will!” Nick rejoined belligerently.

“You must come with us, comrade,” the driver persisted.

“Why?” Nick inquired.

The driver and the second soldier walked toward the old man. They believed he was intoxicated, harmless, and in one respect they were correct. But in another, they were wrong.

“Please,” the driver said, “do not resist! Public drunkenness is not permitted.”

Nick straightened. “What about dyin’?”

The driver detected a movement to his left, and he spun, going for the automatic pistol on his right hip. His fingers were closing on the grips when other fingers clamped onto his neck. Powerful fingers, with a grip of steel. He caught a glimpse of a giant in uniform, and then he was bodily lifted from the sidewalk.

The second trooper saw the giant spring on the driver, and he went for his own gun.

Sundance sprang from the shadows, his arms swinging the FN barrel up and around, ramming the barrel into the second soldier’s throat. The soldier gagged, doubling over, and Sundance smashed the barrel against his head twice in swift succession. The soldier gasped and fell to his knees.

Sundance drew back his right leg, then planted his right foot on the tip of the soldier’s chin. The soldier flipped onto his back, blood spurting from his crushed teeth, oblivious to the world. Sundance glanced at Blade.

The head Warrior, his Commando slung over his left shoulder, was holding the driver’s neck in his right hand and the driver’s midsection in his left, while supporting the trooper in the air above his head. The Russian was kicking and wheezing, his brown eyes bulging. Blade suddenly brought his massive arms straight down, and the driver’s head produced a sickening crunching sound as it struck the sidewalk.

“Nice job,” Nick complimented them.

Blade glanced at the mouth of an alley 20 yards off. “Let’s stash them in there,” he suggested. Suiting action to words, he stooped over and gripped the driver by the collar. “Hurry.”

The two Warriors hastily deposited the soldiers in the alley, secreting the Russians behind a row of trash cans.

“That should do it,” Blade said. “Let’s get out of here.”

Blade and Sundance jogged to the idling jeep. As Blade was about to slide in, he stopped and looked around. “Where’s Nick?”

Sundance swiveled. “I don’t see him,” he said.

“Damn!” Blade spat in annoyance. What the hell had happened to the Freeb? “We can’t wait!” He eased into the jeep.

“Move it, dummy!” declared a voice from the rear.

Blade twisted.

Nick was hunched over in the narrow back seat. “You’d best take off! We’ve been lucky so far! I didn’t see anyone lookin’ out their window. Haul ass before we’re spotted!”

Sundance climbed into the jeep.

“We can’t take you with us,” Blade said to Nick.

“What’s with you?” Nick demanded. “One second you’re actin’ like you’re goin’ to piss your pants because you can’t find me, the next you’re bootin’ me out on my can.”

“I told you before,” Blade reminded the Freeb. “We agreed you could come with us as far as Norristown and that was it.”

Nick leaned forward. “I didn’t agree to nothin! And I haven’t had this much fun in years! I’m comin’ with you, unless you up and toss me out.

And you’d best get your ass in gear. Someone’s liable to peep out at us at any moment. And that Commie on the gate might be wonderin’ what happened to this jeep.”

Blade glanced at Sundance.

“Bring him,” Sundance recommended. “He might come in handy.”

Blade, annoyed, executed a tight U-turn and drove to the wide avenue.

True to Nick’s prediction, the gate guard was standing near the northwest corner, gazing in their direction. Blade waved at the guard, hoping his features were invisible in the dark interior of the jeep.

“That’s a nice touch,” Nick commented. “He’ll think you’re his buddy.”

Blade took a right.

“Don’t forget to stop at the red light,” Nick stated.

Blade braked at the first intersection.

“So where are we goin’?” Nick asked.

Blade sighed. “Philadelphia.”

“Philly?” Nick chuckled. “I know Philly like the back of my hand.”

“I thought you would,” Sundance interjected, grinning.

“What’s in Philly?” Nick inquired.

Blade twisted and glared at the Freeb.

“Fine,” Nick remarked. “I can take a hint. Go straight.”

The light turned green, and Blade drove straight.

“Don’t worry about a thing,” Nick said. “I’ll direct you to the turnpike, and we’ll be in Philly before you know it.”

“How long will it take?” Blade asked.

“We should be there by dawn,” Nick replied. “Of course, it would help if I knew exactly where you want to go.”

“I’m not exactly sure,” Blade confessed.

“Oh, that’s brilliant!” Nick scoffed. “You go to all the trouble of infiltratin’ the Commie lines, you swipe one of their jeeps, and you don’t know where the hell you want to go? What do you boys use for brains?

Sewage?”

Blade’s hands tightened on the steering wheel. He felt uncomfortable for several reasons. First, he didn’t like having Nick along. But the elderly Freeb had served them well, so far, and he might really know Philadelphia like the back of his hand. Secondly, he felt awkward driving the jeep. He’d used a vehicle with a manual shift before, when he’d driven some of the trucks and jeeps the Family had appropriated during the war with the Doktor and Samuel II. But he usually drove the SEAL, and the vast difference was oddly discomfiting. Finally, a vague, worrisome sensation was nagging at his mind. Something was subliminally bothering him, and he was peeved because he couldn’t isolate and identify the reason.

“Don’t you have a clue what you’re lookin’ for?” Nick queried.

“Did you happen to hear about an attack on—” Blade began.

“Those hairy weirdos in the wooden ships?” Nick exclaimed. “Yeah.

Everybody was talkin’ about ’em for a while. They had the Commies pretty rattled, I heard.”

“I’ll bet,” Sundance commented. He gazed out the rear window.

“So what about ’em?” Nick asked.

“We want to find them,” Blade said, then elaborated. “We know the Soviets captured twelve of those invaders, those Vikings. We know the Russians are holding them at a detention facility in Philadelphia. And we want to find them.”

“How’d you learn all this?” Nick inquired.

“That’ll have to be our secret,” Blade responded.

“Well, I don’t know as I can be of much help,” Nick said. “I don’t have the slightest idea where the Commies are holdin’ the ones you want.”

“Do you know where they might be held? Where the detention facilities are located?” Blade probed.

Nick contemplated for a minute. “I might be of some help, after all. I know the Commies built a big detention place in northwest Philly, in Fairmont Park, right off the Schuykill Expressway. It’s near the Schuykill River.”

“Then we’ll try there first,” Blade said.

“I don’t get it,” Nick stated. “What are these Vikings to you guys?”

“Nothing,” Blade answered.

“Then why do you want to find them?” Nick asked.

Sundance twisted in his seat. “You sure are the curious type, aren’t you?”

Nick shrugged. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to be nosy.”

Sundance jerked his thumb toward his window. “What was that bridge we just went over?”

“It goes over the Schuykill River,” Nick revealed.

“The same river near the detention facility?” Blade queried.

“Yep.”

“Any chance of us following the river into Philadelphia?” Blade inquired.

“Nope.”

“Why not?” Blade pressed.

“Because the roads don’t follow the Schuykill, dummy,” Nick disclosed.

“Our best bet would be to take the Schuykill Expressway all the way in. It sticks close to the river most of the way.”

“Can you direct us there?” Blade asked.

“No problem,” Nick asserted.

“We do have one problem,” Sundance remarked.

“Oh? What’s that?” Blade replied.

“We’re being tailed,” Sundance said.

Blade glanced in the rearview mirror. A pair of headlights was in their lane, perhaps 500 yards distant.

“They pulled out of the garrison as we were going over the bridge,” Sundance said. “They didn’t even stop for a red light at the intersection.”

Nick chuckled. “Sharp eyes you’ve got there, Sundance.”

Sundance looked at Nick. “I don’t miss much.”

“We’ve got to lose them,” Blade stated.

“Whatever we’re going to do,” Sundance declared, “we’d better do quickly.”

“Why?” Blade asked.

Sundance was gazing over his left shoulder. “Because they’re gaining on us.”