"Down there," he rasped into his headset microphone. "There-get us down there." Then he switched channels, into the all-bands monitoring system so both Borozeni's ground commanders and the pilots of the other helicopter gunships could hear him. "This is Rozhdestvenskiy-we will converge on the factory due west of the town. Only KGB personnel will be allowed inside the factory complex itself, and only those with a clearance level over CX Seven will be allowed within the factory. Crush any resistance."

He glanced through the bubble in front of him as another skyrocket soared up, exploding, as if the fools-he thought-were celebrating the attack.

Into the microphone again, he snapped, "And find the source of those fireworks; I want them stopped!"

As he judged it, the factory was less than a mile away now so again he spoke into the microphone, but on the aerial-force band only. "This is Rozhdestvenskiy. Commando squad ready! Pilots take up positions!"

His own ship was hanging back as a half-dozen helicopter gunships, their cargo doors open, formed themselves into a crude circle around the factory fence, perhaps one hundred feet in the air.

Rozhdestvenskiy saw the first of the ropes being let down; then suddenly, like dozens of spiders sliding on filaments of web, dark-clad forms started down the ropes, rappelling toward the ground. "Good man!" he rasped, unconscious that he had spoken into the microphone.

The first of the men were on the ground, establishing a perimeter, their a.s.sault rifles and light machine guns ready.

The last of the commando team was down. "Move out, commando force ships,"

he barked into the microphone. "Take up positions two hundred yards from and around the factory fences."

Rozhdestvenskiy turned to his own pilot, tapping the man on the arm, then jerking his thumb downward.

The pilot nodded, then started the machine ahead and down.

Rozhdestvenskiy's mouth was dry, his palms sweating.

He snapped up the collar of his windbreaker, checking I.

the AKM across his lap.

He had never been in ma.s.s combat before.

The helicopter gunship was hovering, then dropping, gliding forward slightly and stopping.

He felt the lurch, felt the impact; then he released the restraint harness, throwing open the side door and stepping out near a squad of the commandos already on the ground, his own personal KGB team surrounding him.

"We enter the factory. Follow me!" He started to run, remembering as he ran to raise the rifle into an a.s.sault position.

The gates of the factory complex were locked with a chain, a ma.s.sive padlock securing them.

"Stand back." He raised the a.s.sault rifle, firing into the lock. The sound of the jacketed slugs tearing into the metal of the lock was deafening, but the lock seemed to have been broken.

He reached for it, feeling the heat of the metal despite the gloves he wore, wrenching it open, then twisting it free of the chain.

"Get the gates opened-now!"

The chain-link twelve-foot gates swung inward, and Rozhdestvenbkiy stepped into the service drive of Morris Industries-a giant step, he felt, in history.

He started to run, shouting again, "Follow me!" Above him, there was a spectacular burst, a skyrocket of blue and red and gold in a starburst, ma.s.sive, exquisite.

He continued running, reaching a set of double doors. They would be locked. He raised the a.s.sault rifle again, firing into the locking mechanism. A burglar alarm sounded.

"Idiots," he shouted, then reached the doors, twisting on the outside handle, wrenching the door open outward. He stepped into the factory complex, his men surrounding him. The building was in reality a series of interconnecting buildings.

"The loading docks," he shouted, then started running. It the materials he sought would he anywhere, they would be by the loading docks. There would be time then to search out precisely where they were manufactured. Gray light shafted through wire mesh-reinforced gla.s.s windowpanes as he ran the length of the first building; and occasionally through one of the windows as he looked out, he could see fireworks in the sky-more rockets, more starbursts. Were the people here insane?

He reached the end of a long corridor, already breathless from the running. Glancing to right and then to left, he looked right again.

"There-hurry." For some reason, some reason he couldn't understand, he felt the need to hurry that much greater each time one of the skyrockets would explode. He felt-he couldn't define it.

Ahead of him he saw ma.s.sive garage doors of corrugated metal, and between the doors and the corridor through which he ran, he could see crates-coffin-shaped and roughly the same size. He stopped running, leaning heavily against the wall, his breath coming in short gasps.

"Victory," he shouted. "The final victory over the Americans!" Suddenly the gla.s.s from the wire-meshed corridor windows shattered over his head, shards of it falling on and around him.

He stepped away from the wall, looking through the corridor windows into the dawning sky-a huge star-burst, the largest firework he had ever seen-pale colors against a pale sky. And the concrete beneath him began to tremble, the walls to shake, dust and infinitesimally small chunks of debris drifting down.

"My G.o.d!" Where had he learned that? he thought. "They're blowing it up!"

He started to run, the crates- the precious crates-behind him. Survival was more immediate now as the cross supports began crumbling and a three-foot section of concrete killed the commando beside him-just beside him.

Squads of a.s.sault rifle-armed Soviet infantrymen were pouring through the streets.

"d.a.m.n it," Rourke rasped, both of the twin Detonics stainless .s in his fists. Suddenly, the ground beneath him began to rumble, to shake.

He glanced at the black luminous face of the Rolex Submariner on his left wrist, then squinted skyward- full dawn. The explosions had begun just as Martha Bogen had said they would.

There was no time now-no chance to save the town. Russian troops-why?

The explosions. Already, in the distance near the high peaks of the rim of the valley, he could see rock slides starting.

He had waited near the school, still several blocks from Martha Bogen's house-and the garage where his Harley should still be hidden.

But waiting for the Soviet troops to clear the street in front of him would be suicidal now.

Thumb-c.o.c.king both pistols, he started to run, the ground shaking beneath him still more violently.

Gunfire. Soviet AK series a.s.sault rifles, firing toward him, gla.s.s shattering in the louvered cla.s.sroom windows beside him as he jumped a hedgerow, running.

Rourke wheeled beside a concrete vertical support for a portico rooi. He fired the pistol in his right hand, then the pistol in his left, bringing down an a.s.sault rifle-armed soldier. The man's body spun, his a.s.sault rifle firing wildly, into his own men.

Rourke started to run again. Past a flagpole. During the day there would have been an American flag there and a Kentucky state flag as well.

He was nearly to the street beyond the school front lot. The ground trembled again.

He tried envisioning what the men and women of the town would have done to ensure their ma.s.s suicide. The ground trembled again and he saw a black disk sail skyward out of the street. There had been a large natural-gas storage area. . . .

"Natural gas," he rasped, throwing himself to the gra.s.sy ground beneath him.

The gunfire, the shouts, the commands in Russian and in English to halt-all were drowned out. Rourke dropped his pistols, covering his ears with his hands.

The street a hundred yards ahead of him was a sea of flame, chunks of paving hurtling skyward. They had mined the gas system.

Rourke grabbed for his pistols, pushing himself to his feet, running, stumbling, running again. A line of explosions-smaller ones-ripped through the road ahead of him in series. He had to cross the road to reach Martha Bogen's house on the other side.

He ran, bending into the run, arms distended at his sides. The gunfire resumed from behind him; he couldn't hear it, but could see the gra.s.s and dirt near his feet chewing up under it.

He hit the pavement, still running, the explosions gutting the road drawing closer. Debris-bits of tarmac and cement and gravel-rained down on him. His hands, the pistols still in them, were over his head to protect it.

The road was now twenty-five yards away; his body ached; the waves of nausea and cold were starting to take hold.

"Narcan," he rasped. He needed the Narcan shot. He tripped, sprawling, pushed himself up, then ran on.

Ten yards. He was feeling faint, sick, the morphine was taking hold of him again.

Five yards. He jumped, the street ripping as a manhole cover less than a dozen yards to his right sailed skyward, roaring up on a tongue of flame.

The street behind him exploded and he was thrown forward.

Rourke rolled, still clutching his pistols.

He started to his knees, hearing-not hearing but feeling-something behind him.

He wheeled, hitting the road surface, firing both pistols simultaneously.

Two Soviet troopers fired at him; the ground beside him erupted under the impact of their slugs, both men going down under the impact of his.

He stumbled to his feet, lurching, feeling as though he would black out.

Rourke rammed both pistols, c.o.c.ked and locked, into his wide trouser belt, then s.n.a.t.c.hed at the injection kit inside his shirt against his skin. His hands shook, cold and nausea making his head reel. He dropped to his knees. The Narcan injection was in his right hand.

He looked beyond his hand as he tested the syringe.

"Man with a gun-Russian," he rasped, telling himself to act, forcing his body to respond. His left hand-he could feel the slowness-found the b.u.t.t of one of his pistols.

Automatically, he swept the left thumb around behind the tang of the Detonics to reach for the safety on the left side of the frame. He worked it down as the Russian soldier raised his a.s.sault rifle.

Rourke's right hand worked toward his left arm, the sleeve pulled up already-he had planned ahead as he a/ways did.

He started raising his left arm, as if both sides of his brain were taking separate control of him. He tried squinting at the sights a moment, seeing the hypodermic come into his line of fire.

His right hand jabbed the hypo into his left forearm.

"Aagh," he shouted, feeling the change sweep over him, seeing the slow-motion movement in his left hand as the thumb moved back around the tang, out of the way of the slide.

He was suddenly back-cold and sweating, but back, his mind working. His left first finger worked the trigger and the Detonics bucked hard in his hand.

The Soviet trooper's a.s.sault rifle fired skyward as his body twisted, almost as in a dance, then crumpled to the roadside.

Rourke pushed himself to his feet. That had been the last Narcan shot, but the last he should need. He s.n.a.t.c.hed at the other pistol in his belt, worked down the safety and-he could not run again-he started into a loping walk to the curb.

Rourke a.s.sessed his surroundings-head left. He started that way. It was at least another block, maybe two. The B-complex shot would start working soon after he administered it-after he got to it.

The nausea was pa.s.sing, the coldness subsiding; his head ached and his muscles ached.

As he increased his stride, more explosions rocked the ground beneath him.

Gla.s.s, in windows on both sides of the street he loped into, shattered; fires erupted everywhere.

Another manhole cover sailed skyward on a column of flame and Rourke jumped away, the explosion ringing in his ears, debris falling like rain on him.

He rolled onto his back, protecting his face with his left forearm.

He had to run. He rolled onto his knees, then pushed himself up, starting forward, lurching into a ragged, long-strided run.

More gunfire behind him. He wheeled, almost losing his balance. He pumped a shot at hip level with the Detonics in his right fist, downing a Soviet soldier at the end of the block.

He turned and kept running.

He could see the house-white frame with green vines growing up the round columns on the front porch. Rourke could see the driveway; his bike would be in the garage at the end of it.

Still running, he glanced behind him. No one. Perhaps the Russians were getting out while they still could.

More explosions. Rourke glanced up, toward the rim of the valley; rock slides were everywhere, the very faces of the peaks changing, seeming to melt away.

Rourke turned up the driveway, running harder now, sweating. The garage door-ten yards, five . . . He stopped. It would be locked. He raised both pistols, firing the one in his right hand, then the one in his left. The garage-door lock shattered as he loped and lurched forward. He fell against the door.

Jamming the pistols into his belt, he wrenched the door handle, twisting it, shoving it up, letting the door slide out of sight.

The jet black Harley-he saw it. Rourke stumbled toward it. His gear looked untouched.

He s.n.a.t.c.hed at the CAR- wrapped inside a blanket and a piece of ground cloth.

He ripped the covering away, then searched the musette bag slung on the handlebars, he found a thirty-round magazine, rammed it up the well, and eared back the bolt handle.

He let the bolt slide forward.

"Come on," he rasped, staring out into the street. He could hear the sounds of more explosions; the gas lines were still going, of their own accord now.

Rourke slung the CAR- cross-body from his left shoulder, under his right arm.

He started searching the Lowe pack and found his medical kit, the injection kit inside it. Rourke opened that, taking the B-complex syringes and jabbing one into his left forearm.

He dropped to his knees, trying to even his breath.

Her jaw hurt where the man, John, had hit her. On her knees, on the window seat in the main room of the library overlooking the street and the post office beyond, she wrang a handkerchief in her hands, red hearts embroidered on it, a gift from her husband years ago.

There were fires all over the city; she was afraid of fire.

Everyone else was with someone, safe, ready to die. John was out there in the streets, somewhere. He wouldn't make it; she knew that. She had nursed for her husband often enough to know that in hib condition, he would be too weak (o travel far. She had never even told him the secret paths through the valley to reach beyond the mountains.

He would die alone; she would die alone.