Extinction Crisis

“We have news from across the pond.” Barbara Price opened the conversation. “Ironman and his boys encountered some delivery men just like yours. Their special present was a two-fold surprise.”

“Whatever it is, it had a self-destruct mechanism,” James deduced. That brought sharp stares from the others in the station wagon.

“All right. Only one surprise,” Price corrected herself.

“It was a robot?” James inquired.

“Here’s the surprise. It’s been rigged with antipersonnel defenses, and was utilized for the assassination of an investigator that Ironman was liaising with,” Price explained. “It gave Ironman a pounding with Tasers, a wire saw and its tail boom.”

“Tail?” James asked.

“It’s a worm- or snake-shaped robot, which probably allows for greater flexibility through vents and drainage pipes,” Price said.

“Okay. That makes sense. I was imagining one of those modified radio-controlled cars or a rebuilt lawn mower device like the battle bots that show up on British television,” James said. “So the delivery men don’t control the robots themselves?”

“No, but they do sit on a remote signal relay,” Price told him. “Gadgets and Bear agree that the command frequency is beamed through a tight focus point, which allows the signal to penetrate concrete and steel over short distances.”

“The usual structures of a nuclear power plant would interfere with the robot’s reception,” James agreed, following Price’s logic.

“Precisely,” she said. “A narrow-band, high-energy transmission allows for real time control in a power-plant campus or even your average office building.”

“And these things are rigged for fighting?” James continued.

“Ironman was tased, and when the saw got snarled on a wastebasket he used for a shield, it nearly shattered his arm with its shield,” Price recounted. “But that was the extent of its offensive weaponry.”

“So it’s agile and tough to escape our favorite caveman,” James said.

“Carl put a .357 SIG round into it and was only able to take out the robot’s Taser battery,” Price described. “I’d hate to see what would happen if the Taser were replaced with a Glock.”

“Chances are, that’s what we’ll have to deal with,” James muttered. “Thanks for the heads-up on the destruct mechanism, as well.”

“It’s enough to kill everyone inside of a Grumman Kurbmaster,” Price added. “But Carl was only fifteen feet from the van when it exploded, and came through unharmed. That’s not to say the destruct mechanism can’t produce its own shrapnel.”

“Add in constant monitoring, presumably through built-in cameras,” James said.

“Just built-in cameras?” Encizo asked from the Peugeot’s shotgun seat. “Ask mother hen if she happens to have an eye in the sky over our position.”

“Just satellites.” James relayed her answer. “And they don’t see anything in the air.”

Farkas spoke up. “That’s the point of remote observation drones. If they showed up on radar and aerial cameras.”

“Figures,” Kristopoulos grumbled. “Robots belly-crawling on the ground and flying in the air over our heads.”

“It’s only observing us so far,” Encizo said. “But if they warn the Brotherhood members in the van or if it has weapons of its own, we’re screwed.”

“We are hanging back far enough that the drone operator may not think we’re following their people,” Farkas offered.

“If they are paranoid enough to put a set of eyes in the air, then they’re too smart to leave our continued trailing of their deliverymen to chance,” Encizo countered. “We were made long before I ever noticed their bird.”

“Well, that’s the end of a perfectly good surveillance operation,” Kristopoulos said. “What would be their response?”

“Anything from scorched earth to the Brotherhood engaging in evasive maneuvers,” James said. “But the deliverymen don’t seem to have deviated from their normal course.”

“Maybe they want us to know,” Farkas said. “After all, how do you defend against armed, murderous robots?”

Encizo brought his field glasses to bear on the back of the Muslim Brotherhood van. “The back door just moved.”

The Cuban drew his Glock 34 from its spot in a cross-draw holster under his photographer’s vest. He heard Kristopoulos and James do likewise in the backseat.

“We might not know how to prevent robots from infiltrating a nuclear power plant, but a pissed-off terrorist with an assault rifle is practically a Friday-night get-together for us,” James said.

A hundred yards ahead, the muzzle-flash of an AK-47 burned. Even as the windshield cracked and deformed under the first impact, Farkas swerved hard to avoid the rain of shattered glass and steel-cored bullets tearing into their vehicle.

CHAPTER THREE

Rafael Encizo crouched tightly in the passenger’s seat of the Peugeot as Farkas swerved. Bullets cut through the windshield and metal frame holding up the roof of the automobile before slicing the air over his head. Centifugal force and the anxiety of 7.62 mm rounds snapping past so close that his black hair flew with their passage made him grip the Glock 34 Tactical pistol tightly in his fist. Only his index finger resting on the dust cover kept the point-and-pull weapon from discharging from muscle tension. The idea of a handgun versus a Kalashnikov didn’t appeal to the Cuban Phoenix Force veteran, even though the G-34’s five-plus-inch barrel milked every ounce of range, power and accuracy out of the 9 mm round it fired. The polymer pistol still lacked the punch and reach of a .30-caliber rifle.

“Damn!” he heard Calvin James bellow from the backseat.

“Are you hit?” Encizo called back.

“Got cut by flying glass!” James snarled. “Farkas, pull over. We’ll get our big guns from the trunk.”

“No can do!” Farkas returned. “The Brotherhood is coming back around!”

The station wagon squealed its tires as Farkas spun the vehicle away from the enemy van. Its roof and all of its windows were blasted into a sieve of shattered glass and perforated metal. The hostile truck went into full reverse, backing toward them. The Peugeot ground to a halt, and Encizo realized that he was facing the stern of the Brotherhood’s van head-on. If this was an old naval battle, Encizo would have been in position for an unopposed salvo on the vehicle, but in a modern assault-rifle battle where he’d only brought a side arm, he was a sitting duck, even behind the door of the station wagon. The gunman in the back poured on more fire. Encizo winced as a round, slowed by the car door, plunked into the Kevlar he wore. The body armor barely protected his stomach from the awesome punch of the Kalashnikov bullet. In response, Encizo thrust the Glock out of the passenger’s window and blazed away. A half-dozen rounds jetted out of the extra-length barrel and speared through the night at the enemy gunner, each shot going off as fast as Encizo could pull the trigger.

From the back, James and Kristopoulos added their firepower to the fusillade of 9 mm clatter against the Muslim Brotherhood vehicle. The handgun rounds just didn’t have the same oomph. Rather than punch through the door that the enemy gunman was using for cover, they merely dented the metal, and they weren’t even able to smash the window through which they could see the silhouette of his head. The rounds only smacked starred impact craters in the glass. Sure, the fifty-yard distance lessened the penetrative punch of their bullets, but as the Brotherhood van drew closer, a second rifleman poked his weapon out of the passenger’s window.

“Hit the gas!” the Cuban shouted. The Peugeot station wagon shot forward, avoiding the twin streams of full automatic thunder. The rifles clattered as their owners swung the muzzles of their weapons in an effort to keep up with Phoenix Force and company.

Encizo levelled his Glock now that he had an angle on the open, passenger’s-side window of the enemy vehicle. He ripped off four fast shots, and while he couldn’t hit the head or the torso of the Egyptian gunman inside, he was able to break the killer’s arm with three lucky hits. His last bullet clanged off of the AKM’s receiver. Forearm bones splintered and muscles chopped into a bloody mess of shredded mead and the Egyptian terrorist let his weapon clatter into the dirt road.

The Brotherhood van swerved hard as the Peugeot swung for a brief moment, parallel to the enemy vehicle. Phoenix Force and their allies were the only ones able to open up, this time taking full advantage of the broadside they had been presented. At the space of ten feet, the Glocks had more than enough punch to tear through the van’s thin metal skin. James, Encizo and Kristopoulos unleashed a torrent of rapid-fire handgun rounds into the hostile van, the Peugeot’s interior filling with smoke and thunder. Though no handgun could be fired with the speed of a submachine gun or assault rifle, the three warriors were more than able to pour on a storm of copper-jacketed lead that slashed across the van’s passenger side. The wounded rifleman’s head snapped violently as it caught a 9 mm slug cored through his temple. The enemy vehicle jerked violently as blood and brain matter flew into the driver’s eyes, shocking and blinding him.

“That got him,” James growled as the Egyptian radicals ground noisily against a roadside barrier in a spray of sparks from metal-on-stone violence.

The rear of the van vomited a tongue of flame and the roar of an AK-47 that blew the rear window out of their station wagon.

Kristopoulos glared at James. “They didn’t stay screwed.”

“Less bitching, more shooting!” Encizo snapped at the bickering pair in the back.

“I concur!” Farkas agreed as he cranked the steering wheel, pulling the group out of the line of fire of the enemy assault rifle. “Kill him!”

Once again, Encizo, James and Kristopoulos opened up with their side arms, but Farkas, in his instinctive effort to avoid the withering bite of the enemy gunman’s full-auto assault rifle, had pulled their station wagon out of direct view of their target. Their 9 mm bullets clanged against the side of the Brotherhood van, but there was no way to tell if they had struck the gunman in the van’s cargo compartment.

“We don’t have a shot, Farkas,” the Cuban complained.