The Prisoner's Gold

52

Brilliant spears of daylight pierced the white cloud of plaster dust as the AFV plowed through the far wall of the building. Debris slid away from the vehicle’s clogged viewports as concrete ruptured all around it. When the haze cleared, they found themselves on a wide concrete walkway that led to a glassed-in breezeway between two much larger buildings.

The structures looked far too stout for the powerful AFV, but McNutt knew the glass breezeway would yield like tissue paper. He pulled a lever just before they hit, activating steel shields that dropped over the viewports. The sound of tinkling glass reverberated throughout the cabin as broken shards pinged off the vehicle’s metal skin.

A second later, McNutt raised the viewport shields again and saw nothing but a straight concrete path for a thousand feet with a busy road at the end of it. He tramped on the accelerator, and the AFV charged ahead at full steam.

Maggie popped her head into the cockpit. ‘Our guest won’t talk.’

‘No worries,’ Cobb said. ‘I figured he wouldn’t.’

‘Are we going to smash into more things? If so, I’d like to strap into a chair.’

‘No, ma’am,’ McNutt said. ‘I’m done smashing things for now.’

A moment later, they heard a loud thunk sound behind them. One of the pursuing AFVs had fired its cannon. The shell smashed into a huge tree, just as they passed it. The top of the tree fell over on the roof of their AFV with a massive crunch, but it didn’t stop them.

‘For the record, that wasn’t me,’ McNutt said with a smile.

‘Drive erratic,’ Cobb ordered.

‘I thought I was!’

‘No,’ Cobb stressed, ‘remember the helicopter in Loulan?’

McNutt grinned at the memory. ‘Gotcha, chief.’

Cobb hustled back into the passenger area then climbed the ladder up the gun turret, just as McNutt jerked the wheel again, swerving the AFV left and right in unpredictable patterns.

Cobb flung open the hatch, reached out for the handles on the machine gun, and quickly pulled himself halfway out. He hooked an ankle around the upright of the metal ladder for support and then swung around, leveling the machine gun back at the pursuing AFVs. He immediately realized that only two of their pursuers were behind him, and wondered if the third had taken a different route, attempting to cut them off.

The driver of the first vehicle had his head sticking out of a hatch in the cockpit, but he quickly dropped down when he saw Cobb level the machine gun. But Cobb wasn’t trying to hit him. He aimed the weapon lower and blasted at the front tires of the first AFV.

Cobb waited just a tick as McNutt swerved violently across the concrete and onto the lawn on the right. They were heading for another tree, but Cobb knew the vehicle would swerve again in a second. Just as they hit the grass, the pursuing AFV fired its cannon again with a thunderous report that rattled Cobb’s bones in his body like a subwoofer at a rock concert.

The shell passed harmlessly by as their AFV jerked again.

The move had put Cobb in the perfect position to target the front two wheels on the right side of the lead AFV. He opened fire with the heavy gun, the chug-chug-chug of the weapon rattling his body further. Cobb knew that AFVs were always equipped with eight run-flat tires, and most of them could actually lose multiple wheels and still roll on.

Unless, of course, the correct few were disabled.

The steady stream of 7.62 mm rounds shredded the first two tires on the right side with ease. The rubber split horizontally across the wheel and flipped off, like a blowout on a semi-truck on the interstate. With both tires blown, the front right corner of the vehicle tipped down to the ground, striking sparks off the concrete and wrenching the vehicle sideways.

As soon as the left side came into full view, helped by another of McNutt’s wild turns, Cobb laid into the damaged vehicle’s other front wheels. He destroyed the first tire under a volley of heavy fire, but he ran out of ammunition before he could get the second one. It didn’t matter, though. The nose of the lead AFV mashed into the concrete walkway and the armor dug in deeply before the driver had the good sense to take his foot off the accelerator.

No way it could catch them now.

Cobb dropped down the hatch just before the second AFV swerved around the immobilized carcass of the first, their machine gunner spraying fire back. The volley of rounds hit the open hatch lid, denting it and clanging it shut just above his head.

Cobb breathed a sigh of relief after that one.

He had planned to come down for more ammunition, but the gunner above had changed his mind. As he made his way toward the cockpit, his ears were still ringing from the noise of the machine gun, but he clearly heard an argument as he neared the front of the vehicle.

‘Trust me!’ McNutt screamed.

Garcia shouted in their ears. ‘That’s not the bridge you want! The one you want is another mile west! That one takes you to an island in the middle of the river. You’ll be trapped.’

McNutt pulled hard on the steering, sending the AFV onto the road that Garcia had warned him not to take. ‘Just trust me, Rodrigo.’

Cobb looked to Sarah for an explanation.

She merely shrugged and grimaced.

Cobb noticed that Maggie was holding the back of Sarah’s chair in a death grip, her knuckles turning white from the effort. He smiled at her and told her to relax before he turned his attention to McNutt.

‘What are we doing, Josh?’ Cobb asked.

‘We won’t make it to the next bridge,’ McNutt said, jerking the vehicle unexpectedly to the left, and then quickly back to the right. ‘Those guys are too close, and the road is too straight. One hit from that cannon, and we’ll be cooked in here like scrambled eggs.’

The AFV was jolted hard from the rear, throwing everyone forward. Cobb realized the pursuing vehicle must have rammed them.

‘Hang on,’ McNutt said as he leaned into the steering wheel.

Cobb glanced ahead and saw they had only two hundred more feet of asphalt before they would hit a decorative fountain. There didn’t seem to be any road after that.

‘What’s the plan?’ Cobb demanded.

‘Yeah,’ Sarah said. ‘We’d all love to know.’

McNutt grinned. ‘I want to see if those teenagers in the RV fully understand the capabilities of their vehicle. I’m guessing they don’t.’

‘Guessing?’ Sarah shouted as they neared the fountain. ‘You’re guessing?’

‘What are you—’ Cobb began as the Marine sped up more.

The AFV smashed through a wooden bench before hitting the fountain in a spray of water and rubble. A geyser erupted in the wreckage behind them as the AFV continued forward, barreling down a steep slope that led to the surging rapids ahead.

Sarah and Maggie screamed, but McNutt didn’t stop.

He merely laughed as he drove straight into the river.