Cole reached for his rifle, picking up the Springfield this time. His rate of fire was slower, but he liked the feel of the familiar stock in his hands. Better to die with an old friend, he supposed.
He put the rifle to his shoulder and fired, dropping another soldier.
But now, more and more soldiers streamed through the barrier, gathering in the road in front of Cole. They were led by a political officer who looked as if he had been through the wringer, his once-fancy uniform now torn and dirty. Cole thought that the Chinese officer had the same frantic energy as a mean little banty rooster.
Across the road, the two men locked eyes and a jolt of recognition passed between them. Cole could see that this was the officer who had terrorized the village and tried to capture the downed pilot. This was also the officer who had been on the hilltop, directing the snipers shooting down at the parapet.
The son of a bitch seemed to know Cole, too — he was smiling at Cole with a wolfish grin.
“Nín!” the Chinese officer shouted.
“You,” Cole muttered back.
Cole tried to pick him off, but somehow, the officer always managed to keep a buffer of soldiers in front of him. The mass of soldiers grew, fanning out down the road and pressing toward Cole, forcing him closer to the edge of the cliff beyond the road.
He kept shooting. More Chinese swarmed onto the road now, his bullets barely making a dent in their numbers. A few bullets whistled around Cole, then stopped. To his surprise, the Chinese officer seemed to be ordering the men not to shoot.
Cole didn’t plan on returning the favor. He fired at a man no more than a dozen feet away who looked ready to rush him.
Cole realized that the Chinese weren’t trying to shoot him anymore. There were at least twenty rifles pointed at him, but nobody was shooting. They intended to capture him.
Cole remembered what Lieutenant Commander Miller had said about the Chinese wanting to put prisoners on parade like animals in a zoo.
“Like hell you will,” Cole said. For good measure, he shot another enemy. The faces of the soldiers looked terrified, knowing that they might be next, but they held their fire. They were more scared of the officer than they were of Cole.
Cole was down to his last clip. He fired several more times, but the Chinese just stepped over the bodies of the dead and tightened the circle around him, trapping Cole against the cliff.
Finally, he had one bullet left. Not sure what else to do, Cole lowered the rifle muzzle but kept the Springfield pressed to his shoulder.
The officer stepped forward, still wearing that broad grin. He held his hand out toward Cole, indicating that he should hand over his rifle.
Cole looked past the officer at the grim Chinese faces encircling him. He edged backwards, trying to put as much space between them as possible, but there was no place left for Cole to go. He was at the edge of the cliff. He looked over his shoulder at the yawning emptiness. He saw treetops, boulders, the glimmer of water far below.
Pretty as a picture postcard, he thought.
“You surrender,” the Chinese officer said in passable English, gesturing again for Cole to hand over his rifle.
If he made any effort to raise his rifle now, he would be riddled with bullets — or those soldiers would rush him and capture him once he had shot down one last soldier.
Damn, but he hated to give up when he still had one bullet left.
The officer watched him expectantly, still smiling. “Tóuxiáng! You surrender!” he repeated more insistently.
“You can go to hell,” Cole said.
With his back to the void, there was nowhere else to go. He wasn’t sure what he was going to do next until he did it.
Cole stepped off the cliff.
The Chinese watched in amazement, too stunned to react. For an instant, Cole appeared to defy gravity and hung in the air. It was just enough time to raise the rifle and shoot that banty rooster of an officer through the head.
Then Cole fell.
Chapter Twenty-Three
What remained of Task Force Ballard began its retreat toward the Jamestown Line, abandoning the fortress. They had accomplished their mission, which was to delay the advancing Chinese troops. Vastly outnumbered, they’d never had a chance of stopping the enemy.
Battered and bloody, the survivors hurried down the mountain road. The wounded who were able to do so limped along, often supported by a buddy’s shoulder. Several other wounded had to be carried on stretchers by the more able-bodied. No one still living had been left behind. As for the dead, well, they were beyond caring. Although it was normally a matter of pride to bring back the dead, that was not possible without vehicles.
There was no panic or fear in anyone’s eyes, however. The look in their eyes was one of defiance, indicating that they had done all that they could, and now the only option was retreat.
“Where’s Cole?” Lieutenant Commander Miller asked the kid, looking around for the sniper. “I haven’t seen him. I figured that if anyone knew where to find him, it would be you.”
The kid just shook his head. “You know that hillbilly. Cole is stubborn as a mule. He stayed behind to hold back the Chinese at the barrier, to try and buy us some time.”
“By himself! That’s crazy.” The officer turned and started to walk toward the rear of the line as if he was seriously contemplating going back and fetching Cole, but the kid reached out and grabbed him by the arm to stop him.
“Sorry, sir. I know you are an officer and I shouldn’t do that. But there’s no point in going back now. If anybody could take on the enemy single-handedly, it was Cole. But let’s face it, sir. He’s gone now. We need you to take charge and get us back.”
Miller stared at the road behind them. Smoke still stretched into the sky, but they had made enough progress that the fort and barricade were out of sight, more than a mile away. “How old are you?”
“Nineteen, sir.”
“You’re pretty smart for nineteen, kid. I guess you’re right,” Miller said. “Between me and Lieutenant Dunbar and his tank crews, I suppose we can keep this column moving. It can’t be any harder than flying a plane, anyway.”
“Yes, sir.”
Miller looked behind them one last time and shook his head. “That goddamn hillbilly. If we make it back in one piece, it’s because of him.”
But the task force wasn’t out of the woods yet. Cole was just one man, and there remained hundreds of Chinese soldiers coming up fast behind them.
“We need to pick up the pace,” Miller said. “Spread the word. Double-time!”
When they had marched up this road the day before, it had been in tight-knit groups. For the most part, the Korean villagers had not mingled with the Borinqueneers or the veterans of the rifle squad. Now, everyone was mixed together, helping each other where they could. A wounded Borinqueneer limped along with the help of a Korean guerilla. Two soldiers from Ballard’s original squad carried a stretcher with a wounded Korean. Before, there had been language barriers between them. Now, none of that seemed to matter. They were united in one purpose.
Cisco moved among the Borinqueneers, helping where to could to urge them along or tend to the wounded.
“Aqui!” someone shouted, and Cisco ran to help a man whose bandages had come undone. Quickly, he worked to staunch the fresh flow of blood as the soldier winced in pain. He urged the soldier to hold the fresh bandage in place and keep moving. They had no time to bind the wound properly. Cisco shook his head. What this soldier needed was rest, fresh water, and something to eat, but there wasn’t time for much else. To stop now meant certain death at the hands of the enemy.