The front axle struck a particularly ugly rut, and Claude’s head almost hit the roof of the Land Cruiser. The driver’s arm muscles bulged with strain as he manhandled the big SUV around a slippery bend, and the ground firmed as the terrain rose in a gentle slope. Claude was framing a neutral answer when the surrounding jungle exploded with gunfire, and high-velocity assault rifle rounds thwacked into the wet earth around the rolling procession.
The driver floored the gas, and Claude returned fire as the Toyota accelerated like a runaway train, the other vehicles doing their best to keep up as the soldiers in the truck beds opened up on the shooters. Slugs thumped into the truck behind Claude’s SUV, and three of the soldiers screamed in agony as they were cut down by crossfire. Claude continued to squeeze off disciplined bursts as the two soldiers in the rear of the Land Cruiser did the same, ignoring the salvo of rounds that peppered the cargo area of the SUV.
One of the men grunted and looked down at his abdomen with an expression of surprise: a red stain spread through fingers slick with blood with each pulse of his heart. Claude ejected his spent magazine and was slapping another into place when a blast from the track just ahead rocked the vehicle, causing the driver to momentarily lose control as he fought the wheel.
“Damn. RPG. That was close,” the driver growled through clenched teeth. Sweat streamed freely down his face, but his eyes never left the road.
“Get us out of here,” Claude ordered, and began shooting again, painfully aware that the odds were against them, what with the terrible road conditions and their assailants hidden by the dense jungle.
The motor revved as the driver downshifted. Both he and Claude flinched when a slug punched through the rear window, and the unwounded soldier’s head vaporized in a cloud of red emulsion, splattering them both along with the inside of the windshield. The man’s lifeless finger locked onto the trigger of his assault rifle and emptied through the sheet metal roof as Claude continued firing at the invisible attackers.
The last Hilux’s big Browning M2 .50-caliber machine gun opened up on the area from which most of the shooting was emanating. A standing soldier was operating the weapon as his companions laid down cover, and the staccato boom of the large-caliber rounds was deafening. With a rate of fire of over six hundred rounds per minute, it spewed a hail of death into the trees, and the shooting at the convoy eased.
Claude’s driver goosed the accelerator as the knobby tires found purchase and rounded the bend, trailed by the remainder of the column, two of the Hiluxes lost as smoldering casualties of the ambush back on the muddy trail and the surviving soldiers were quickly cut down by the attacking force. An RPG detonated behind the final truck but missed by a safe margin, and then the column was clear of the gunfire, back in the still of the jungle.
Claude twisted to survey the carnage in the rear seat. Both soldiers lay twisted unnaturally as the Toyota bounced along, and the muggy interior of the SUV stank of blood and death. The driver glanced at the rearview mirror and shook his head.
“We lost half our men,” he said, wiping away a fleck of blood from his cheek. No stranger to combat, his voice was calm, if tight.
Claude nodded as he reloaded his weapon, his ears ringing from the gunfire, and reached for the radio.
He relayed a terse report. When he was done, Henri’s voice was ominously quiet. “There had to have been a leak. And your cargo?”
The driver and Claude exchanged a look. Claude turned to study a small wooden crate in the back of the SUV and then replied into the radio, “Safe.”
“I’ll see about getting a helicopter into the air to clean up after you,” Henri said. “I’d hoped to keep from attracting attention, but it’s too late now.”
Claude gave him the coordinates of the ambush and signed off. Whether or not Henri followed through, the important thing was that they’d made it past the worst their attackers could throw at them and were still alive; and with their precious charge intact.
The driver tapped the dashboard with a finger as thick as a cigar. “Something’s wrong. We’re losing power.”
“Damn.” Claude’s brow furrowed as the driver waited for instruction. “Keep going. Let’s get some distance before we check the damage.”
The driver nodded, and then the rear window blew out in a shower of glass as more rifle fire hit the Land Cruiser. Claude ducked down and was already firing out the ruined window. The SUV behind them slowed as rounds tore through the doors, and it careened off the track and crashed into a tree, leaving only the two remaining Hiluxes on the trail. Spent brass shell casings streamed from Claude’s weapon as he fired blindly into the underbrush, his face grim. The driver gunned the engine and the vehicle rounded another turn, leaving the gunfire behind.