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“Take your shot!” he yelled to Kowalski

The large man already had his assault rifle up Kowalski braced hiht the rifle to his shoulder Gray heard him almost purr to his weapon “C’mon, baby, make Daddy proud”

Directly ahead, the jeep had reached the end of the tracks It slowed to make the sharp turn but still took the corner hard The driver fought to hold his vehicle to the road

Gray heard a pop-pop from the sidecar The Russian AN-94 fired double shots with every squeeze At the same time, the jeep suddenly fishtailed as the driver lost control, his left rear tire s tread It skidded sideways and slammed into a concrete pylon between the ends of the track

Kowalski hooted his satisfaction and rubbed the side of his weapon “Thank you, baby!”

Further self-congratulation was cut off as their cycle left the sandy wash and sailed back into coarser terrain Spitting rocks, the cycle tore forward and reached the roadway in seconds

The Russian jeep rested where it had crashed, one side cruer seat The other three occupants had piled out and retreated into a jumble of concrete barriers and low metal shacks that filled the space between the two track rails

As Gray rounded into view, a roar of clapping erupted fro The cere its climax Covered by the noise, Gray barely heard the shots fired at them The bike’s front tire blew, but Gray had anticipated an attack and aimed the cycle to the far side of the cru stop behind it and rolled off the bike

Kowalski tuether they sheltered behind the crashed vehicle

More rounds pinged off the front of the jeep

Gray risked a fast peek around the rear buht down the center of the tracks, which rose eight feet tall to either side, built of concrete and steel

Nicolas Solokov was oal—in this case, the back end of the rolling archway Gray tried to get a shot at him, but a bullet struck the buli pistol, borne aloft by a raven-haired woman

Elena

Cursing, he dropped back

Kowalski yelped, nicked in the shoulder

The woman and a soldier held them pinned down

Gray checked his watch

Ten minutes

Nicolas heard gunfire behind him and tried to race faster down the concourse between the raised tracks, but he’d twisted his left ankle after the crash He had to trust Elena to keep him safe

Torkers walked behind the backside of the steel Shelter Thea foot a s, drawn by thejacks to either side

A garage-door-size service hatch lay open ahead and offered access to the inside of the loo Shelter It was the main reason Nicolas had fled fro in front of that open door when Operation Uranus came to fruition

He hobbled as fast as he could down the packed gravel roadway between the tracks He had to get through that door, across the interior of the Shelter, and out the rear side before it closed

Even he couldn’t stop Operation Uranus

All he could do was get out of its way

The plan had been formulated back in 1999, when the Shelter Ioal was to stabilize and cover the old Sarcophagus Engineers had been warning for years that the old crypt could collapse at anytwo hundred tons of radioactive uranium to the atus had already begun to crumble Tiny holes and fissures had forht to stabilize the Sarcophagus Thatup structural wall pillars, and securing the rickety ventilation stack This was all done while the Shelter’sconstructed a safe four hundred yards away