State Of Fear

State Of Fear Page 58

It was time to go.

Out in the courtyard, the crowd was growing restless. Sambuca squinted. The first waitman was long dead, the body cooling at his feet, no longer as appetizing as he was before. And those in the crowd who had not tasted glory were clamoring for their piece, for the next opportunity. The women were resting their bats and pipes on their shoulders, talking in small clusters, waiting for the game to continue.

Where was the next man?

Sambuca barked an order, and three men ran toward the thatch building.

It was a long, muddy slide down the steep hill, but Evans didn't mind. He was following Morton, who seemed to know his way around the jungle very well. They fell to the bottom, landing in a shallow running stream, the water pale brown with peat. Morton signaled for him to follow, and ran splashing down the streambed. Morton had lost a lot of weight; his body was trim and fit, his face tight, hard looking.

Evans said, "We thought you were dead."

"Don't talk. Just go. They'll be after us in a minute."

And even as he spoke, Evans could hear someone sliding down the hillside after them. He turned and ran down the stream, slipping over wet rocks, falling, getting up and running again.

Kenner came down the hillside with the two women right behind him. They banged against gnarled roots and protruding brambles as they slid down, but it was still the fastest way to get away from the village. He could see from the streaks in the mud ahead of him that Morton had gone that way, too. And he was sure that he had no more than a minute's head start before the alarm was sounded.

They came crashing down through the last of the undergrowth to the streambed. They heard gunshots from the village above. So their escape had already been discovered.

The bay, Kenner knew, was off to the left. He told the others to go ahead, running in the streambed.

"What about you?" Evans said.

"I'll be with you in a minute."

The women headed off, moving surprisingly quickly. Kenner eased back to the muddy track, raised his gun, and waited. It was only a few seconds before the first of the rebels came down the slope. He fired three quick bursts. The bodies caught in the gnarled branches. One tumbled all the way to the streambed.

Kenner waited.

The men above would expect him to run now. So he waited. Sure enough, in a couple of minutes he heard them starting down again. They were noisyfrightened kids. He fired again, and heard screams. But he didn't think he'd hit anything. They were just screams of fear.

But from now on, he was sure they would take a different route down. And it would be slower.

Kenner turned and ran.

Sarah and Jennifer were moving fast through the water when a bullet whined past Sarah's ear. "Hey," she shouted. "It's us!"

"Oh, sorry," Morton said, as they caught up to him.

"Which way?" Jennifer said.

Morton pointed downstream.

They ran.

Evans looked for his watch, but one of the kids had taken it from him. His wrist was bare. But Morton had a watch. "What time is it?" Evans asked him.

"Three-fifteen."

They had less than two hours remaining.

"How far to the bay?"

"Maybe another hour," Morton said, "if we go cross jungle. And we must. Those boys are fearsome trackers. Many times they've almost gotten me. They know I'm here, but so far I've eluded them."

"How long have you been here?"

"Nine days. Seems like nine years."

Running down a streambed, they crouched low beneath overhanging branches. Evans's thighs burned. His knees ached. But somehow it didn't matter to him. For some reason, the pain felt like an affirmation. He didn't care about the heat or the bugs or the leeches that he knew were all over his ankles and legs. He was just glad to be alive.

"We turn here," Morton said. He left the streambed, dashing off to the right, scrambling over big boulders, and then crashing into dense, waist-high ferns.

"Any snakes in here?" Sarah said.

"Yeah, plenty," Morton said. "But I don't worry about them."

"What do you worry about?"

"Plenti pukpuk."

"And they are?"

"Crocodiles."

And he plunged onward, vanishing into dense foliage.

"Great," Evans said.

Kenner stopped in the middle of the river. Something was wrong. Until now, he had seen signs of previous runners in the stream. Bits of mud on rocks, wet finger marks or shoe prints, or disturbed algae. But for the last few minutes, nothing.

The others had left the stream.

He'd missed where.

Morton would make sure of that, he thought. Morton would know a good place to leave the river where their exit wouldn't be noticed. Probably somewhere with ferns and swampy, marshy grass between boulders on riverbanksgrass that would be spongy underfoot and would spring back at once.

Kenner had missed it.

He turned around and headed upstream, moving slowly. He knew that if he didn't find their tracks, he couldn't leave the river. He would be sure to get lost. And if he stayed in the river too long, the kids would find him. And they'd kill him.

Chapter 83

RESOLUTION

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 14

4:02 P.M.

There was one hour left, now. Morton crouched among the mangroves and rocks near the center of Resolution Bay. The others were clustered around him. The water lapped softly against the sand, a few feet away.

"This is what I know," he said, speaking low. "The submarine tender is hidden under a camouflage tarp at the east end of the bay. You can't see it from here. They have been sending the submarine down every day for a week. The sub has limited battery power, so it can stay at depth for only an hour at a time. But it seems pretty clear they are placing a kind of cone-shaped explosive that depends on accurately timed detonation"

"They had them in Antarctica," Sarah said.

"All right, then you know. Here, they're intended to trigger an underwater avalanche. Judging how long the sub stays down, I figure they are placing them at about the ninety-meter level, which happens to be the most efficient level for tsunami-causing avalanches."

"What about the tents up here?" Evans said.

"It seems they're taking no chances. Either they don't have enough cone explosives or they don't trust them to do the job, because they have placed something called hypersonic cavitation generators in the tents. They're big pieces of equipment about the size of a small truck. Diesel powered, make a lot of noise when they fire them up to test them, which they've been doing for days. They moved the tents several times, just a foot or two each time, so I assume there's some critical issue about placement. Maybe they're focusing the beams, or whatever it is those things generate. I'm not entirely clear about what they do. But apparently they're important for creating the landslide."

Sarah said, "And what do we do?"

"There's no way we can stop them," Morton said. "We are only fourfive, if Kenner makes it, which he doesn't seem to be doing. There are thirteen of them. Seven on the ship and six on shore. All armed with automatic weapons."

"But we have Sanjong," Evans said. "Don't forget him."

"That Nepali guy? I'm sure the rebels got him. There were gunshots about an hour ago along the ridge where they first found you. I was a few yards below, just before they picked you up. I tried to signal you by coughing, but amp;" He shrugged, turned back to the beach. "Anyway. Assuming the three cavitation generators are meant to work together to create some effect on the underwater slope, I figure our best chance is to take one of the generators outor maybe two of them. That would disrupt their plan or at least weaken the effect."

Jennifer said, "Can we cut the power supply?"

Morton shook his head. "They're self-powered. Diesel attached to the main units."

"Battery ignition?"

"No. Solar panels. They're autonomous."

"Then we have to take out the guys running the units."

"Yes. And they've been alerted to our presence. As you can see, there's one standing outside each tent, guarding it, and they've got a sentry somewhere up on that ridge." He pointed to the western slope. "We can't see where he is, but I assume he is watching the whole bay."

"So? Big deal. Let him watch," Jennifer said. "I say we just take out all these guys in the tents, and trash the machines. We've got enough weapons here to do the job, and" She paused. She had removed the magazine from her rifle; it was empty. "Better check your loads."

There was a moment of fumbling. They were all shaking their heads. Evans had four rounds. Sarah had two. Morton's rifle had none. "Those guys had practically no ammo amp;"

"And we don't either." Jennifer took a long breath. "This is going to be a little tougher without weapons." She edged forward and looked out on the beach, squinting in the bright light. "There's ten yards between the jungle and those tents. Open beach, no cover. If we charge the tents we'll never make it."

"What about a distraction?"

"I don't know what it could be. There's one guy outside each tent and one guy inside. They both armed?"

Morton nodded. "Automatic weapons."

"Not good," she said. "Not good at all."

Kenner splashed down the river, looking hard left and right. He had not gone more than a hundred yards when he saw the faint imprint of a wet hand on a boulder. The damp print had almost dried. He looked more closely. He saw the grass at the edge of the stream had been trampled.

This was where they had left the stream.

He set out, heading toward the bay. Morton obviously knew his way around. This was another streambed, but much smaller. Kenner noticed with some unease that it sloped downward fairly steeply. That was a bad sign. But it was a passable route through the jungle. Somewhere up ahead, he heard the barking of a dog. It sounded like the dog was hoarse, or sick, or something.

Kenner hurried ahead, ducking beneath the branches.

He had to get to the others, before it was too late.

Morton heard the barking and frowned.

"What's the matter?" Jennifer said. "The rebels chasing us with dogs?"

"No. That's not a dog."

"It didn't really sound like a dog."

"It's not. They've learned a trick in this part of the world. They bark like a dog, and then when the dogs come out, they eat them."

"Who does?"

"Crocs. That's a crocodile you hear. Somewhere behind us."

Out on the beach, they heard the sudden rumbling of automobile engines. Peering forward through the mangroves, they saw three jeeps coming from the east side of the bay, rumbling across the sand toward them.

"What's this?" Evans said.

"They've been practicing this," Morton said. "All week. Watch. One stops at each tent. See? Tent one amp;tent two amp;tent three. They all stop. They all keep the motors running. All pointed west."

"What's west?"

"There's a dirt track, goes up the hill about a hundred yards and then dead-ends."

"Something used to be up there?"

"No. They cut the road themselves. First thing they did when they got here." Morton looked toward the eastern curve of the bay. "Usually by this time, the ship has pulled out, and moved into deep water. But it's not doing it yet."

"Uh-oh," Evans said.

"What is it?"

"I think we've forgotten something."

"What's that?"

"We've been worried about this tsunami wave heading toward the California coast. But a landslide would suck water downward, right? And then it would rise back up again. But that's kind of like dropping this pebble into this ditch." He dropped a pebble into a muddy puddle at their feet. "And the wave the pebble generates amp;is circular."

"It goes in all directions amp;"

"Oh no," Sarah said.

"Oh yes. All directions, including back to this coast. The tsunami will hit here, too. And fast. How far offshore is the Solomon Trench?"

Morton shrugged. "I don't know. Maybe two miles. I really don't know, Peter."

"If these waves travel five hundred miles an hour," Evans said, "then that means it gets to this coast in amp;"

"Twenty-four seconds," Sarah said.

"Right. That's how much time we have to get out of here, once the undersea landslide begins. Twenty-four seconds."

With a sudden chugging rumble, they heard the first diesel generator come to life. Then the second, then the third. All three were running.

Morton glanced at his watch. "This is it," he said. "They've started."

And now they heard an electronic whine, faint at first but rapidly building to a deep electronic hum. It filled the air.

"Those're the cavitators," Morton said. "Kicking in."

Jennifer slung her rifle over her shoulder. "Let's get ready."

Sanjong slid silently from the branches of the overhanging tree, onto the deck of the AV Scorpion. The forty-foot ship must have a very shallow draft, because it was pulled up close to the peninsula on the eastern side, so that the huge jungle trees overhung it. The ship couldn't really be seen from the beach; Sanjong had only realized that it was there when he heard the crackle of radios coming from the jungle.

He crouched in the stern, hiding behind the winch that raised the submarine, listening. He heard voices from all sides, it seemed like. He guessed that there were six or seven men onboard. But what he wanted was to find the timing detonators. He guessed that they were in the pilot-house, but he couldn't be sure. And between his hiding place and the pilothouse was a long expanse of open deck.

He looked at the mini-sub hanging above him. It was bright blue, about seven feet long, with a bubble canopy, now raised. The sub was raised and lowered into the water by the winch.

And the winch amp; He looked for the control panel. He knew it had to be nearby because the operator would have to be able to see the submarine as it was lowered. Finally he saw it: a closed metal box on the other side of the ship. He crept over, opened the box, and looked at the buttons. There were six, marked with arrows in all directions. Like a big keypad.