As if to compensate, the Aerostats zoomed into the woods to act as the train’s eyes. Searching for targets, they beamed back to the train. What they saw, the guns saw.
The nearest Aerostat—maybe even the same one that had checked out the dead bear earlier—zeroed in on Molly and the rest.
“It sees us!” Doc shrieked, bolting to his feet. He ran away from the canyon, deeper into the hills. “Skynet knows where we are!”
“Stop him!” Molly barked at Sitka. “Don’t let him get away!”
Jensen swung up his shotgun. The weapon went off in Molly’s ears. Buckshot ripped through the Aerostat, which was built for speed and agility, not durability. She and Tammi ducked to avoid being tagged by shrapnel. Sparks flew from the drone’s ruptured casing as it tumbled through the air before crashing into a solid tree trunk. Breaking apart, its lifeless pieces came to rest at the base of the pine.
Twin red sensors blinked out.
No more spying for you, Molly thought vindictively. She shoved Tammi and Jensen away from the fallen log only seconds before a plasma blast reduced it to splinters. The Alaskan guerillas scrambled to a new location.
Not far away, Sitka tackled Doc, knocking the panicked scientist to the ground. Getting a firm grip on his arm, she yanked him to his feet, then dragged him back to the others. Molly was glad to see that he hadn’t gone far. His part in this operation wasn’t over yet.
“No more of that,” she chided him. “Nobody runs out until I say so.”
He gave Sitka a dirty look. The teen kept her fingers locked around his arm. Then he turned back to the group’s leader, his eyes imploring in the red glow of the firelight.
“It’s not fair,” he whimpered. “I used to work in an office. I’m not cut out for this sort of thing.” He licked his lips. His hands shook. “God, could I use a drink right now!”
“Later,” Molly promised, offering a carrot. “You stick with us and you can have all the moonshine you want when this is over with.”
The promise of booze steadied the old man’s frazzled nerves. “Really?”
“Scout’s honor.”
Explosions, coming from the gorge below, cut short the pep talk. Molly realized that phase three of the assault on the train had begun. She watched from above as daring Resistance fighters charged from the woods toward the crash site. Dodging fire from the misaligned cannons, they targeted the exposed gun ports. Strong arms flung grenades, pipe bombs, blasting caps, and sputtering sticks of dynamite into the open gaps around the cannons.
Explosion went off inside and around the gun ports, blowing up the train’s defenses one by one. Warped metal screamed in protest as the damaged cannons fought to swivel into position. White-hot blasts tore up the landscape, yielding yet more steam and melted ice, but missed the nimble guerillas. The last of the river’s ice was broken loose by the explosions and sizzling plasma. Debris from the wrecked cannons was swept away by the current.
Molly silently cheered the bomb-throwers on. So far, everything was going according to plan.
Only one cannon still pointed in the attackers’ direction. Vic Folger raced toward it, holding a smoking pipe bomb. He hurled the explosive at the gun port, but his throw fell short, landing several yards short of its target. Not giving up, the former soccer coach dashed forward and kicked the bomb straight past the cannon into the gap behind it.
“Goal!” he yelled.
It was his final victory. The cannon wrenched itself in his direction. Its muzzle flashed like lightning. A single burst of plasma reduced him to ashes in an instant.
A second later, the pipe bomb exploded, avenging his death. Flames erupted behind the cannon, blasting it all the way onto the shore. Charred fragments landed just where Folger had been standing only moments before.
Mission accomplished. Molly mourned the man’s death, but honored his sacrifice. She had expected to lose some good people in this attack. Too bad one of them had to be Vic.
The echoes of the battle, bouncing off the steep walls of the gorge, began to fade away. As nearly as Molly could tell, there were no more guns pointed in their direction. A couple of Aerostats were still buzzing around, but they posed no actual threat. They were good for surveillance only.
The way was clear, at least for the moment.
This time Molly gave the signal. Retrieving another roman candle from Sitka’s pack, she lit the fuse and fired it out over the river. The streaking fireballs were a different color than before.
Green for go.
The Resistance fell upon the disarmed train like a pack of wolves, whooping and hollering, a few of them firing their guns in the air. Molly scowled at the undisciplined display. Granted, they had long ago sacrificed the element of surprise, but they could not afford to get sloppy. Dog sleds scampered down the hills and along both sides of the river, ready to cart away as much radioactive booty as they could carry. Protective lining in the metal drums and foot lockers was supposed to cut down on the emissions, but Molly knew that a little excess radiation wasn’t something most freedom fighters cared about these days. Cancer was an abstract, long-term danger. Few of the guerillas expected to live long enough to worry about it.
Herself included.
She was eager to take part in the plunder. After all, why should the rest of the cell have all the fun? She wanted to gather her gift basket for General Ashdown. A nice big slice of yellowcake for him to swallow along with his words, and a hefty portion of crow.
“Go for it!” she shouted to those who were closest. “But stay sharp!”
Pulling out flashlights and kerosene torches, now that the enemy had apparently been subdued, they dashed down to the riverbed. Smoke and haze hung over the floor of the canyon. Oily machine parts littered the snow. Bits of flaming debris sputtered out along their path. Burning timbers crackled beneath the weight of the train. High above their heads, the truncated ends of the bridge jutted from both sides of the canyon like roads to nowhere. The northern lights added a surreal touch of beauty to the devastation. The train’s glowing red eyes impotently tracked the Resistance teams as they converged on their prey.
Molly looked forward to stealing the uranium from right out beneath the train’s optical sensors.
Couldn’t happen to a nicer machine!
She led the way, and hugged the northern shore of the river, being careful not to slip on the icy stones. Tammi and Jensen followed closely. Sitka brought up the rear, dragging Doc behind her. A damaged railcar, lying atop a heap of splintered trestles, called out to her. Its armor plating had been sundered in the fall, tearing open a deep gash that looked wide enough to squeeze through. The opening was like an invitation.
Don’t mind if I do, she thought. Yellowcake, here we come!
“This way,” she called out to the others. Elsewhere along the length of the downed train, she saw her fellow bushwhackers attacking other cars with crowbars, sledgehammers, and even a welding torch. They went to work, peeling the train’s titanium skin from its bones. Lookouts stayed on alert. She shouted at the team behind her.
“Over here. I think I see a way in!”
She had just started climb up the heaped logs toward the gap, however, when the hiss of hydraulic doors came from both of the train’s twin locomotives. The bullet-shaped noses opened up, unfolding like the petals of a deadly metal flower, and disgorged four new machines that came roaring out.
Molly’s blood went cold. This wasn’t part of the plan.
“What the fuck?”
The streamlined newcomers resembled a cross between a Terminator and a snowmobile, not unlike the two-wheeled Moto-Terminators that sometimes patrolled Alaska’s few remaining highways. But these driverless killing machines had obviously been designed for more hazardous terrain. Growling two-stroke engines broke all the old noise pollution standards. Sleek black skis preceded the machines’ tapered, aerodynamic noses. Motorized tracks at the rear propelled them across the snow and ice. Binocular red sensors were mounted in their heads.