Throwing the jeep into gear, Blancanales accelerated for the gate. He flashed the high beams. As before, the sentries opened the gates. Lyons leaned forward to the prisoner.
"Look straight ahead. Don't even think of making a noise. If you want to live, you're taking us to Quesada."
"I understand," their prisoner answered.
"Which way to Quesada?" Blancanales demanded.
The prisoner nodded to the right. Blancanales sped through the gate, sideskidding on the wet pavement as he made the right turn.
Lyons saw that the service road continued straight for hundreds of meters. Far ahead, taillights blinked and disappeared. No other vehicles traveled the road.
Standing, Lyons checked the jeep's rear M-60. The machine gun had no belt in place. Opening the side-mounted box of ammunition, he found the belts of cartridges dry. He threw open the M-60's feed cover.
In the blue white light from the mercury-arc streetlights over the road, Lyons saw rust in the mechanism. He had no time to clean and oil the weapon. He put a belt in place, shut the feed cover and jerked back the operating handle. A cartridge chambered. He jerked back the operating handle one more time. The cartridge ejected. Maybe the M-60 would fire.
Squinting into the wind-driven rain, he looked at the forward M-60. The second machine gun had no belt of cartridges loaded.
The Salvadoran army officers had entered the free-fire zone without arming their heavy weapons. Not wanting to risk leaning over the fascist prisoner to arm the second machine gun, Lyons sat down. He shouted over the noise of the tires and rain to Blancanales.
"Ask Ricardo what goes on in those mountains. Today, the Commies hit those troop trucks. The officers in this jeep were part of the react-force. But you know, they went into those mountains unloaded. Neither one of these M-60s had a belt in place."
"What?" Blancanales asked, incredulous.
"Take a look," Lyons said, pointing at the second M-60. "I just loaded the back gun. But that one, it's empty. And I bet you those ammo belts in the can got no rain on them. What do you think of that?"
"Later! Look"
They approached a landscaped area. Immaculate lawns surrounded a ten-foot-high concrete wall. The modernistic, flowing lines of the cast concrete offered no hand-or toeholds. The lawns, lit bright as day by many lights, provided open fields of fire for the machine guns placed in guard positions built into the wall. No flower beds or decorative greenery offered cover for infiltrators.
A sheet-steel gate barred the entry. A concrete-and-steel security office in the center of a traffic circle blocked the possibility of ramming through the gate. Without artillery or antibunker rockets, the two men of Able Team saw no way in but the steel gate.
Lyons leaned forward to their prisoner. "What's inside?"
"Colonel Quesada," el jefeanswered. "That is the family compound. Inside, there are homes and offices and the Quesada personal guards. Soon, you will see."
A Dodge four-door had stopped at the bunkerlike security office. Under glaring lights, the passengers stood in the shelter of an alcove while guards with M-16 rifles searched the car.
One of the passengers wore the uniform of the army of El Salvador.
The other passenger wore fatigues, polished black jump boots and black web-gear. He wore a holstered pistol. A red hammer and sickle marked his shoulder.
"La Vibora!" Ricardo gasped. He pointed at the man in fatigues next to the army officer. "Alla! El es mi capitan, el capitan de la PFL. La Vibora! No es un revolucionario. El es una facista!"
Slowing to stop behind the Dodge, Blancanales translated for Lyons. "He says that's his officer. The one that got away from us this afternoon."
"The army and the Communists," Lyons said loudly, "going in to visit the colonel. A miracle of Salvadoran politics."
El jefedived out of the jeep. He smashed into the pavement and rolled.
As Blancanales floored the accelerator and whipped the steering wheel to the left, Lyons saw the guards at the gate startle. The soldiers searching the car turned. Then the broken and bleeding el jefescreamed, "Americanos. Mateselos!"
Auto weapons roared.
17
A line of tracers shot from a slit in the wall. Blancanales careened across the lawn, throwing muddy bluegrass behind the jeep's tires. Lyons fought G-force, one arm around the M-60's pedestal, his free hand grabbing for the pistol-grip of his Atchisson rifle.
But Ricardo was the first to strike back. He jerked the pin from one of the Italian MU-5OGs and threw it at his former guerrilla leader. Before the tiny frag hit, Ricardo pulled the pin on the second. He saw the army officer and La Vibora dropping flat beside the Dodge. He let the lever flip free as he braced for the throw. He turned in his seat and awkwardly, threw the second grenade.
The first grenade bounced off the security-office wall. A guard braced his M-16 on the roof of the Dodge and sighted on the jeep. Popping behind him, the grenade shattered the Dodge side windows and peppered the guard with hundreds of pinpoint wounds. Arching backward in shock, the guard fell, his M-16 spraying wild autofire straight up.
La Vibora dashed for the M-16. The second grenade skipped across the asphalt, then rolled under the Dodge. The army officer saw the tiny grenade and scrambled away on his hands and knees. La Vibora looked down at his feet and saw it.
Hundreds of tiny steel balls slashed his body like razors. Steel punched into his downturned face. The blast knocked his feet from under him. Blinded, his feet ripped to blood-spurting tangles of leather and flesh, he crawled for safety. Dying on the asphalt, his body released an immense blood pool that spread around him.
As Blancanales steered the jeep through a half circle, Lyons untangled his Atchisson from his yellow raincoat. He flipped the fire-selector down to full-auto. Patterns of high-velocity steel swept the guards and the army officer, silencing their weapons.
But the machine gun still fired from the slit in the compound's concrete wall. Lyons knew he had no hope of killing that gunner. From the top of the wall, other weapons flashed. His voice almost lost in the hammering of the machine guns and autorifles, Lyons screamed to Blancanales, "Make distance! Get us out of here!"
Ricardo saw a sentry running along the top of the wall. The young man pointed his M-16. In his panic, he sprayed the entire magazine in one burst. He missed the guard and the wall, and the last three slugs, red tracers, streaked high into the rain.
Slapping another magazine into his Atchisson, Lyons hit the bolt release to strip the first shell into the chamber, then set the safety. He tore off the bright yellow raincoat and let it flutter away. He slipped the Atchisson's sling over his neck so that the autoshotgun hung ready at his right side, then stood up behind the pedestal of the M-60.
The guard on the wall fired down at the jeep. Windshield glass shattered. Lyons sighted on a gray-uniformed militiaman and fired, the burst lifting the man off his feet, tracers passing through his body.
Blancanales skidded through a high-speed turn, and they left the Quesada family compound behind. Now on the plantation service road, Blancanales floored the accelerator. Lyons turned, saw headlights on the road.
"Ricardo!" Lyons shouted. He slapped the M-60.
The teenager understood and moved instantly. Slinging the M-16 as Lyons had slung his autoweapon, the boy stood and took the machine gun's pistol-grip.
Lyons stepped over the seat to the forward gun. He popped open the can of belted ammo, then threw open the machine gun's feed cover. He slapped down the belt of 7.62mm NATO cartridges, jerked back the operating lever and fired.