Citadel Run

Chapter Eight

His blasted left shoulder hurt like the dickens!

Hickok hurried, striving to ignore the pain, his injury the result of his uncontrolled plunge to the road surface after bailing out of the troop transport.

Things weren’t as bad as they appeared.

Sure, Blade and Geronimo were still in the hands of the Army. Sure, Joshua was alone in the SEAL a mile or so ahead. Sure, their plans had been shot to heck and back. But there was one bright spot on their horizon.

He had his Pythons!

Come what may, he was ready for it!

He was hastening toward Moore Lake. His only hope of rescuing Blade and Geronimo depended on reaching the SEAL. The soldiers were unaware of the special features incorporated into the vehicle, and the special armaments could be used to devastating effect.

All he had to do was reach the SEAL.

That was all.

If the jokers on his heels didn’t catch him first.

He knew there were two of them and they’d been on his trail for some time. They’d probably found the point where he left the highway and dove into the woods.

Let ’em catch up!

He’d blow the varmints away!

Or would he?

Hickok leaned against a tree, slightly winded, checking for any sign of his pursuers.

Nothing yet.

What if he did shoot them? he asked himself. The shots would draw other soldiers, maybe even the Wacks, to his position. Gunfire would advertise where he was for anyone interested. So what should he do? Try to outrun them? Hide and hope they passed him by? Or take them out quietly?

Hickok glanced around, seeking a potential weapon. His eyes alighted on a broken limb five feet away. He walked over and picked up the branch.

It was about four feet in length and relatively straight, with the thicker end blunt and ragged and the thinner part tapered into some semblance of a point.

Not much, but it would have to do.

He resumed running, deliberately applying extra pressure as he pounded his moccasins on the ground. His tracks had to be fresh and clear if his plan was to succeed. The element of surprise had to work in his favor, and it would if the soldiers were intently concentrating on his sign, on his footprints.

Time passed.

Hickok came across the spot he’d been searching for, an ideal location for an ambush. To his left stood the charred trunk of a tree, the apparent victim of a lightning strike. Only ten feet of the burnt trunk still stood. To his right, six feet from the tree trunk, was a giant boulder, the side of the boulder facing the trunk essentially flat while the other side was tapered and rough.

Perfect.

He ran around the trunk of the tree and stopped dead in his tracks.

Slowly, carefully, he retraced his steps, walking backwards, meticulously placing his feet in the exact print or impression he’d made while first coming around the trunk. When he was between the trunk and the boulder he tensed his leg muscles, took a deep breath, and leaped as far as he could in the direction of the boulder. He landed in front of it and moved to the other side, scrambling up the boulder until he was just below the rim.

Okay.

Let them mangy wimps come!

They did.

Within minutes, Hickok heard them approaching through the underbrush. For a couple of supposedly professional military types, they made more noise than a pregnant horse! He clutched the branch and patiently waited, unwilling to risk a peek and jeopardize his chances.

“He’s moving faster,” someone whispered.

“Think he knows we’re after him?” inquired a second man.

“No way. The jerk doesn’t know his butt from a hole in the ground,” replied the first voice.

There was a moment’s silence.

“What’s the matter?” asked the second man.

“His tracks stop.”

“They what?”

“They stop right here,” said the first man.

“How can tracks just stop in the middle of nowhere?”

“They can’t,” stated the first man, evidently the tracker. “I must have made a mistake. Let’s go back a bit.”

Hickok slowly counted to himself, and when he reached ten he launched his body over the top of the boulder.

Bingo!

The two soldiers were almost directly under the gunman, one of them kneeling and examining the tracks while the other was staring at the charred trunk. Something warned the second man, perhaps his sixth sense, but whatever it was he suddenly looked up and tried to bring his M-16 into play.

Hickok wasn’t Rikki-Tikki-Tavi, the Family’s exceptional martial artist, but he had been trained in hand-to-hand combat, spending years under the tutelage of a Family Elder with vast experience at infighting, and the gunman applied his knowledge now as his life hung in the balance. He lashed out with his right leg, his foot catching the standing soldier in the face and knocking him aside. The kneeling tracker glanced up, puzzled, his mouth widening in alarm.

The Warrior brutally rammed the pointed end of the limb into the trooper’s left eye, imbedding the tip of the branch at least four inches into the man’s skull. The soldier screamed and recoiled, grasping at the limb in a feeble attempt to extract it.

Hickok shot a glance over his left shoulder, just in time.

The other soldier had recovered. He’d lost his M-16 when kicked in the face, but now he whipped out a long knife from a sheath on his left hip and lunged.

Hickok released the branch and dodged aside, grabbing the trooper’s wrist with both hands and driving the forearm down onto his right knee.

There was a distinct snapping sound and the soldier shrieked at the top of his lungs.

Hickok swept his right hand up and in, his fingers straight and hard, using the edge of his hand as he slashed the trooper across the throat.

Once.

Twice.

The soldier gurgled, his chin falling limply to his chest, as blood and froth spewed from his mouth.

Hickok glanced at the tracker. He was lying on the ground, on his back, the limb sticking upward as if it were trying to take root.

The second soldier moaned once, then fell, dead.

Hickok nodded in satisfaction. “A piece of cake,” he said to himself. He bent over the troopers and rummaged through their uniforms.

Quite a collection!

He found wallets on both men, each containing paper money in varied denominations. He also discovered a handful of coins, each imprinted with the countenance of a stern man with a beard and a funny hat and the words “In Samuel We Trust” encircling the coin. One of the men, the tracker, had a photograph in his shirt pocket, a picture of the tracker and a pretty young woman and a small child, a boy of four or five years old.

Dear Spirit!

Were they the soldier’s wife and son?

Hickok stared at the photograph for a long, long time, considering the ramifications. In all the fights he’d been in, all the gunfights and battles, he’d never given a thought to the relatives of the enemies he killed in combat. This trooper had had a wife and son! How would they feel when they learned he was gone? How many widows, the gunman wondered, had he made during the course of his illustrious career? He thought of his own wife of a couple of weeks, his beloved Sherry. How would she…

A bird singing nearby shattered his reflection.

He vigorously shook his head, his blond locks flying, ending his morbid introspection. As a Warrior, he couldn’t afford the luxury of grieving over his opponents. He had to tell himself, over and over, his whole duty involved preserving the Home and protecting the Family. Nothing else mattered.

Besides, these men were soldiers. They knew they were in a deadly profession. They were aware of the hazards.

Hickok stood and glared at the tracker. Idiot! Why did you leave your family alone and neglected, just so you could get your thrills in the military?

Inexplicably angered, the gunman hauled off and kicked the tracker in the face.

Served the varmint right!

He scooped up their M-16’s and spare ammunition, gazed at them one last time, then began jogging northward.

There was still plenty of daylight left.

Good.

He wouldn’t stumble over a mutate on his way to the SEAL.