Five Rings of Fire

13

A loud beeping broke the stale silence. Gadgets Schwarz, lying in the warm comfort of Babette Pavlovski's bed, refused to answer the summons.

"It's Pol," he said groggily.

"Well, answer it," said Babette, who had just opened her eyes, yet already looked bright, cheery.

"Can't," Gadgets complained. "Can't move. Complacency's set in."

Babette giggled, gave Gadgets a playful shove and answered the summons.

"In ten minutes," she said. "No, Pol, not alone. Both of us. Please. It's my fight. Okay."

She signed off then rolled back toward the still-dozing Gadgets. "It's time. I told him we'd be there in ten minutes."

"We'dbe there?"

"I'm coming too, Gadgets. It's me they tried to kill. It was one of my athletes they did kill. It's my fight."

Gadgets knew better than to argue with the woman; he was smart enough not to get into fights he knew he would never win. With all the effort in the world, he dragged his butt out of bed. Babette beat him to the floorboards. She also beat him in getting dressed.

She wore tan slacks, a brown shirt and a brown patterned scarf over her hair. Gadgets hopped into the clothes he had on earlier, including the life-saving flak jacket.

"Pol says we're going to the desert," she said as they headed for the door.

"UCLA," he told the guard as they moved toward the elevator. "There'll be a chopper waiting."

When they hit the street, Gadgets looked up at the starry sky. "God," he mumbled, "what time is it?"

"Sixteen minutes after midnight," one of the Feds answered.

Ten minutes later they arrived at the helicopter. Blancanales stood waiting for them, an Ingram and a bandolier of clips for Babette in hand.

The Sikorsky H-76 was already turning over. The trio crouched as they ran under the forty-four-foot rotors. Pol climbed in a front door to the copilot seat. Gadgets and Babette went through a door farther back to the passenger compartment. The copter was lifting off before Gadgets had the door secured.

Babette took a seat. Gadgets went to the weapons boxes. He pulled off the gaudy sport shirt, electing — like his teammates — to wear a more neutrally colored flak jacket for nighttime desert fighting. He packed both hot and cold thermal packs and crisscrossed two bandoliers over his shoulders, filling the pouches with spare clips and grenades. Then he began the task of setting aside the M-16/M-79 over-and-under hybrid for Lyons. By the time he had added belts of grenades for the launcher and plenty of 5.56mm ammo for the assault rifle part, there was a mound of equipment and a web that weighed close to sixty pounds.

"What's all that for?" Babette shouted over the whine of the two Allison turboshaft engines.

"For Lyons," he replied. "He needs a lot of weight to keep his feet on the ground."

"What are you taking?" Babette asked.

"Ingram, Beretta," he answered. "Same as Pol."

They were already away from the city, surging forward at 150 knots. In an hour and twenty minutes they settled in a swirl of sand beside an identical chopper.

Lyons was in the door as soon as Blancanales opened it.

"Radio off," Lyons commanded the pilot, "unless you're wearing headphones. I don't know if the bastards are doing a radio monitor, but sound carries like crazy in the desert. Observe radio silence and noise discipline."

Lyons then looked in the back.

"What's she doing here?"

Babette came forward carrying Lyons's gear.

"I belong here," she answered, handing the Able Team warrior his tools. "They tried to kill me. They killed Tracy. Now they've got Kelly. If they had Pol or Gadgets, would you let yourself be cut out of the action?"

"I know you did a helluva job in that parking complex," Lyons said, "but our job is to keep you alive, not put you into a fire zone."

"Would you let yourself be cut out of the action?" she asked again.

"No," Lyons snapped.

"Listen," Babette said, a firmness in her voice. "I don't expect to lead the charge over the hill, but I can't be left behind either. I've got a big stake in this."

"Okay," he growled. "But your head ain't gonna be on my head. You've been warned."

Babette smiled. Gadgets and Pol shot her the thumbs-up sign.

Lyons finished arming himself to the teeth.

"Stovepipe Wells, next stop," Sam Jackson announced to the others in the limousine.

"Afraid not," Boering said. He pulled the long car off the road and, for the first time, turned on the car's CB radio.

"This is Swimmer on the beach," he said. "This is Swimmer on the beach." His voice took on a clipped quality. He called about once a minute. After the third call he was greeted by a reply.

"Swimmer, this is Lifeguard," came a voice with a Georgian drawl. "Swimmer, this is Lifeguard. What's the trouble?"

"I've got five survivors. Send the lifeboats."

"This was not part of the plan," the man at the other end crackled. Anger gripped the voice.

"Just send the lifeboats. Argue later."

"Ten four," came the acknowledgment.

Lightning Sam Jackson looked at his watch. It was just past 11:30 P.M. At 11:43 he heard the roar of dune buggies over the desert. Suddenly he saw them sweeping over the nearest dune. Three had extra motors and propellers on the back. They looked like something out of a science-fiction movie.

The athletes rumbled.

"What the hell's going on?" Zak Wilson asked. "Where you taking us?"

But their fears were quickly quelled by the smooth-talking Boering, who assured them that he was just taking another necessary step to get them out of the country.

On the trip to the dunes, the three props brought up the rear, the prop wash obliterating all signs of a trail. The buggies arrived at a camp in the dunes. Camouflage netting covered sand buggies and nearly buried tents. Jackson pulled something from his pocket, fiddled with it, then tossed it into the sand.

As they climbed from the buggies they were met by a tough-looking blond man. The man looked at Boering and then at the athletes.

"They're not in handcuffs," he stated.

"Put them somewhere for now," Boering said. "We can't talk here."

The leader whistled and four older men materialized, pointing guns at the athletes.

"Put them in with the other guests," the leader ordered.

"Hey! Why the guns?" Helen demanded. "We're here voluntarily. We're not your prisoners."

One of the guards tapped her on the head with the barrel of his automatic.

"Shut up, nigger," he said.

"No need for that," Boering snapped. He turned to the U.S. athletes. "It's just a security precaution. Please go along with it. We'll be here just a very short time."

The athletes looked at one another, but said nothing. They were herded into a large tent that was almost buried in sand.

Boering and the blond leader went over by the vehicles where they could talk in private.

"What the hell are you trying to pull?" the man said.

"Easy, Ditch. We have our black defectors. Everything is going well. The problem is that they insisted on leaving before the Games, not after. What could I do?"

"Don't you ever call me Hitch," the man replied. "I've been Bill Frazer for nine years. I'll remain Bill Frazer until I return to the homeland."

"Touchy," Boering noted aloud.

"You know stage two of this operation. What good will a bunch of dead American athletes do us?''

"None," Boering said. "They must be evacuated before blood time."

"And how are you going to accomplish that miracle?"

"It won't be hard, Bill. We have a ship standing by just outside territorial waters. There's a copter aboard, of course. I ordered it to arrive here at three. Load the Americans onto it and they'll be out of your hair."

"But they now know about the Zambians."

"So? When they read in the papers about the way the Americans came in here and shot up everybody, we'll have them hating their homeland. They will be much more verbal against America. It will be better than we could hope."

"I don't like it," the leader muttered. "Do you realize that if anyone was searching for the Zambians, or following the Americans, you will have led them right here?"

"I covered my steps and took all possible precautions. No one followed us here. If they find us, it'll be too late. We will have left by the time they track us down."

"Be damn careful what you say in front of the Klansmen," the leader warned. "If they find out these athletes are Americans leaving the U.S., we'll have nothing more than dead black meat to send on to Mother Russia."

"I'll watch my tongue, but you make sure nothing like that happens. That would sink this operation.''

The blond-haired mole nodded. He did not need to be reminded that a sunk operation usually ended with a bullet to the head.

"I'm going back to Los Angeles now," Boering said. "I wouldn't want anyone to miss me. Just get those Americans on that copter when it lands. It will need instructions. You have the frequency?"

Ilitch nodded.

It was dark inside the tent. The American athletes could not make out the new surroundings they had been placed in. They took small, tentative steps and encountered bodies stretched out on all sides. They were barely in the tent, but could find no space to move.

"Anyone alive in here?" Sam Jackson asked, almost afraid of the answer.

"That you, Sam?" a tentative female voice answered.

"Kelly?" Sam asked.

"Yeah, it's me," she replied.

"Who's with you?" asked a rumbling voice from close to Kelly.

"A few buddies," Sam said. "No gunmen, relax. Is that you, Mustav?"

"Got that one right, little man."

"Make room for these people," Mustav ordered. "And let's sing a hymn of rejoicing for our brothers — sing it just loud enough that those outside cannot hear our conversation."

There was a great deal of shuffling and shifting. It was like a small reunion of friends, many of whom had not seen one another since the international meet at Montreal.

Kelly, Sam and Mustav put their heads close together so they could hear one another's voices over the singing.

Kelly asked if Jackson knew anything about Babette.

"She's okay," Jackson said. The boxer then got down to business.

"Some blond guy sent us out here to find you."

"What are you talking about?" a relieved Kelly asked.

"Some blond-haired guy. I don't really know who he is. He's got something to do with Olympic security and I heard some guys — two guys he hangs around with — call him Lyons. I'll tell you, he's one mean mother. I wouldn't want him against me."

"Sounds like one of the guys I met at the airport," Kelly said.

"He was definitely at the airport with you," Jackson said. "He told us about you getting on the bus after you spotted something strange coming down.''

"I knew something weird was happening and I wanted to be with Mustav, but I sure didn't figure they were going to start gunning at people."

"Anyway," Sam said, "seems you forgot to throw bread crumbs out the window so this Lyons could follow you. So he got us to find you."

"How'd you do that?" Kelly asked.

"We defected — as much as an American can defect. It was Lyons's idea. We told Boering we'd leave the U.S. but only if he could get us out immediately. We put as much pressure on him as possible. He went for it. Lyons figured he wouldn't be able to get us out right away so he said the bastard would bring us here as a stopover. Now old Boering's heading back to L.A. — to a hotel room full of cops."

"What good does it do anyone to have you guys held captive here with us?" Mustav asked.

"We carried bugs. Lyons and his partners will find us now."

"You mean they didn't check you?" Kelly questioned.

"God, yeah. Boering's a suspicious man. He checked us twice, but this guy — Gadgets or something — planted a couple of bugs on the car for Boering to find. He thinks this Gadgets is dead. He expected somebody to bug the car so he had an ambush waiting. I don't know if he made it or not."

"If they had an ambush waiting for him," Mustav said, "he's probably dead."

"Don't bet on it," Jackson said. "Earlier, this Gadgets and another guy, Pol, were waiting for Babette to come back to the team. So was a motorcycle gang of thirty or forty men. Babette and the two made it to the parking building. They killed off about half the gang before Lyons and some tactical squad came in and mopped up."

"Okay, so they're good, and tough," Mustav conceded. "How are they going to find us if they scanned you twice for bugs?"

"We were each given one to carry. They had on-and-off switches, something this Gadgets guy devised. Whenever Boering reached for the bug sniffer, we turned the bugs off. I thought we'd be searched here. I tossed my bug into the sand."

By this time Jackson's eyes had adjusted to the darkness. He could see sand had been piled up in one area.

"Mind telling me about the sand castle you're building?"

"We've burrowed below the sandbags in three places," Mustav explained. "We've been going in and out of here for hours. We wait until one of the guards is distracted, then someone slips out. They'll see the digging in the morning, but we don't figure we'll last much longer than that if we don't do something."

"Sounds positive."

"Listen, Sam. When they brought us here, no one covered their faces. We could identify any of those guys. They know it. We know it."

"I don't think they'll do anything until they get us out of here," Sam said. "I think they really want us to go Commie. It'll look good for their system and look like shit on ours. They paid me good money, and I don't think they did it just to kill me."

"We're waiting for them to settle in and get bored," Mustav told the boxer. "Your arrival stirred things up. Soon as it settles we'll start slipping out again one at a time. The first time they see anybody, we charge."

"That's suicide," Sam said.

"So is just sitting here waiting," Kelly countered.

"Why not wait for those dudes to come?" Jackson asked.

"No," Mustav said, his voice firm, his mind made up. "The plan goes ahead."

"Okay," Jackson said. "You really figure all those guys out there are Ku Klux Klan?"

"Seem to be," Kelly answered. "Except for a couple of the young ones. They don't fit the mold. Everybody noticed."

"Something still stinks," Jackson said. "It just doesn't make sense. Any Klansman I've ever heard of would rather kiss a black than help a Commie. No matter how I pile this, I get a load of shit."

"Either some of these guys are KKK or they're damn good at faking it," Kelly said. "Or, maybe most are KKK and they don't know there's any Communist involvement. Listen, if these guys are genuine KKK, they'd rather associate with us sub-humans than Communists."

Mustav picked up on the idea. "We can continue to try and sneak out of here. At the same time, let's pick the most likely candidate and tell him that Sam and his group are Americans. If he goes through the roof, we'll know they're the real thing."

The threesome planned and plotted some more. Mustav then passed the word around that the singing could stop.

Sam Jackson listened as the voices died out and silence took over. The big boxer had a small plan of his own. He could hardly wait for the gunmen outside to settle down. Then he'd make his move.

Anatoli Rustov did not receive his briefing from the captain of the Soviet spy ship; the instructions came directly from Portisch, the Party representative on board.

"We will go directly up to that little tub and raise hell," Portisch said. "Simply fly straight east. The bulk of the ship will cut off their radar. They won't be able to hear you over the noise of our speakers. The captain will make sure that there is plenty of noise. He wishes to return to Russia some day.

"When you approach the land radar, we have two small planes set to attract the attention of all the radars — they'll look like they are going to crash. When you get to the desert region you'll get the homing signal. It will sound like two radio amateurs chattering. There's gasoline at the pickup point, but you shouldn't need it.

"Pick up the athletes and get out of there quickly. At dawn there will be an airborne attack on the camp. If you're still there, you can expect to be eliminated."

"Is all that clear?"

"Yes, sir," Rustov answered.

"Good. On the way out, be careful. If you're spotted, run for it. Once you set down on this ship they won't touch you. A chase, by the way, would make good press. Five of their top athletes are leaving their country just before the Games. And the mighty U.S.A. is reduced to chasing them to try and stop them..."

"I'll get them here," Rustov vowed.

"Excellent, comrade. With people like you serving our nation, there can be no doubt we will soon rule these soft imperialists."