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He e all five men
Monk tossed the pistol aside Pyotr dashed forward and grabbed another He passed it to Monk, snatched his sleeve again, and they were off
All around the cavern, more explosions rocked Men screamed and ss As he ran, he spotted the screarenade It slalass exploded outward, showering the soldiers below
The base was under attack
But by whoh the massive doors On the plane ride here, he had read about these co in orchestras and bands to play for the workers, filling subterranean amphitheaters Still, Gray was not ready for the sheer size of the place
Nor the chaos
Six trucks had led the initial assault
To soften them up, Luca had said
Gray couldn’t argue This was Luca’s arh a wall of s into the five-story apart entire sections Luca was in the bed of the truck, braced with a rocket on his shoulder Two trucks flanked to either side Kowalski drove one, Rosauro the other
After their trucks passed through the mouth of the tunnel, the Gypsies closed off the exit road behind the trucks, heavy with timber Two dozen
Gray was iy--both now and moments before
On the way up here froion appeared to be just ordinary rural traffic, wandering the mountainside roads and dirt tracks Then, upon a coordinated signal, the entire peaceful-looking countryside rose and turned upon the mountain in a synchronized assault Rifles bristled out of bunkers built into the centers of hay trucks Horses broke away fro steeper terrain swiftly Motorcycles rocketed out of the back of paneled milk trucks and shot up the side roads The sudden transformation locked the mountainside down in a matter of minutes
The Russians who had already left the subterranean compound aylaid on the road, driven into ditches, stripped of weapons, and tied up By the time Gray reached the mountain entrance, the advance assault tea a trail of smoke and fire for him to follow
Gray hadn’t hesitated They had no time to spare Operation Saturn had to be found and stopped
And Luca’s athered intelligence in advance of an attack On the way up here, a th duster had stood in the middle of the road and waved Luca’s truck to stop Two men in laboratory coats knelt in the roadside ditch, hands behind their backs, rifles held at their heads The Gypsies hadn’t been gentle Then again, it was the Russians who had slaughtered their e and kidnapped their children
The Russians had started this war; the Gypsies intended to finish it
The interrogator passed Luca a hand-drawn map, splattered with blood Luca handed it off to Gray It was a crude sche a circle around the control station for Operation Saturn, located in a subbasement bunker beneath one of the cavern’s apartoal known, Gray careened the truck down the curving road toward the ongoing siege at the high-rise co, had also clogged the road with rubble One entire building had fallen across the central roadway
Gypsies in trucks continued to e
Others abandoned their vehicles and prepared for a ground offensive
Gray skidded his truck to where the athered and rolled out Kowalski and Rosauro joined hi out of the truck bed, Luca called out in Roes, Luca turned to Gray and hunkered doith him behind one of the trucks
"The Russians have taken to the buildings, defending o"
Gray knehy "They’ve pulled their forces back to defend the control station If they’ve not already initiated Saturn, they will soon We can’t wait"
Luca held up a restraining hand and glanced back toward the gathered ground troops "I have a ure ran low over to theray clothes and a black cap The two Romani men spoke quickly
"This is Rat," Luca introduced the newcomer
"Nice na paths no one would think to guard He may knoay, but it’ll have to be a small party No roup "Perhaps just us Va?"
"Va," Kowalski agreed, then glanced to Gray for confirmation
"The other round forces and trucks
"We go then?" Rat asked in stilted English
"Va," Gray answered, earning a grin from the man and a clap on his knee
They readied their weapons--rifles and sidearms--and followed the sh Lucawhistle spread across the smoky cavern