Rick leaned out of the helicopter as TC eased it over the ridge, his eyes scanning the ground below for any sign of Magnum and Katsumoto.
As they cleared the ridge, he could see the tree cover thinning out, then being replaced by open ground and the neat, serried ranks of the plantation trees. A decrepit-looking building was just off to the left of their course, then a more solid building. Much further down the slope, he could make out another large building, which looked to be a combination of a barn and warehouse.
And outside that building, he could see a black Mercedes. He couldn't quite read the plates from their altitude, but he'd bet good money that they were personalised plates. Nick Stevens could run, but he couldn't hide.
"TC. Check that car by the main entrance." The satisfaction in his voice earned him a smile from Higgins.
"That sure looks like the same car." TC suddenly jinked the chopper hard to the right.
"What?" Rick's single word carried a wealth of questions.
"Down there." TC looked to the side, swinging the chopper around to highlight his concern. "That was our boy. And Katsumoto. Just gone into that building."
"That's not all." Higgins chipped in, sounding worried. "There's another man down there. To the right, just out of the trees. Going towards that same building. With a gun."
Rick pulled himself across the long seat of the chopper and stared out the opposite side of the helicopter. He squinted against the late afternoon sunlight, then reached for his rifle.
"That's Nick Stevens, TC."
"What do you need, brother?" TC was calm, the words even. Rick appreciated the steady support.
"An overview." Rick offered, and hung on as TC lifted the helicopter another thirty feet. The panorama beneath them expanded, the plantation resolving into clearly-delineated sectors.
Rick scanned the whole area and saw other men running towards Stevens, obviously coming to back him up, guns out and at the ready. Stevens himself was heading for the door of the building housing Magnum and Katsumoto, gun raised. Not good at all.
Rick settled his rifle securely across his arm, checking the entire area through the scope. He let his mind settle into the discipline of his training, breathing evenly and keeping his hands still.
Another small movement caught his eye, and he checked that area through the scope. He spotted another two men coming up the far side of the slope, beyond the area where the barn stood.
Three targets. But not enough time to eliminate all of them, not without at least one of them making it into the building where Thomas was sheltering. At least Thomas knew about Nick Stevens, and he would have to trust that Thomas could come up with a plan to hold on long enough for TC to drop Rick and Higgins to the ground.
But the other two guys were an unknown quantity, a complication that Rick didn't need. That simplified things. He'd start with them. Cold calculation filled his voice when he spoke again.
"TC, there's two guys trying to flank that building."
"I see them." Higgins spoke. "They're getting awfully close."
"Not for much longer." TC was nonchalant. "What angle, brother?"
"Just to the left of the building, down about ten feet." Rick was calm now, nothing in his mind other than facts concerning angles, distances and how to compensate for the inevitable slight movements that TC simply wasn't able to prevent. TC was the world's greatest chopper pilot, in his opinion, but even the greatest pilot couldn't control air currents.
"Done." Rick smile turned cold as TC spun the chopper around on its axis, then eased it to the side until it was hovering exactly where Rick needed it to be.
"Stevens is trying to get into the building." Higgins chipped in, but Rick barely heard her. His immediate concern was the two men now filling his scope. He lined up a shot on the first man, breathed out and pulled the trigger. The man fell to the ground, both hands clutching his knee. The second man froze, then backed up one step and stared at the helicopter. Then he turned to run, heading away from his fallen partner.
The man was leaving his injured partner, possibly even his friend, behind in an effort to save himself. Rick had considered him a poor excuse for a human when he'd first seen the two men coming after his friends. But now, his opinion dropped to something lower than that. You never left a man behind.
"Coward." Rick whispered, the murmur coinciding with another careful pull on the trigger of his rifle. The second man fell, face first, to the ground. One hand scrabbled in the dirt as blood stained the back of the man's shirt.
"He's running." Juliet's yell caught Rick's full attention and he looked back towards the entrance of the building. Nick Stevens was running back towards the main entrance, no doubt hoping to make it to his car and leave the plantation.
"Another coward." Rick commented drily. "Looks like today's our day for meeting the scum of the earth."
"Guess so." TC agreed with a grin.
"Drop us off, TC." Rick requested. "Then go get that guy before he runs."
"You got it." TC headed further down the slope before bringing the helicopter closer to the ground.
"Why here?" Rick's question carried surprise.
"Rotor wash." TC offered. "I'm not sure that building would have survived it."
"Thanks, TC. I didn't even think of that." Rick nodded to TC in thanks. He glanced over his shoulder and a shudder ran through him at the thought of that pile of unsteady-looking wood collapsing on his friends. Even Thomas would have trouble surviving that.
MPI-MPI-MPI
Nick Stevens ran as fast as he could, attention focussed on the ground in front of him. He couldn't risk tripping, or falling. He had no idea who the people in that helicopter were, but he didn't need to know who they were, to know what they were.
They were trouble.
Not the sort of trouble he could deal with now, or here. Maybe not ever. Which made getting far away from the plantation the only option for him right now.
He had enough money put away that he could live comfortably for at least a few years. And Ted Morkot would be his escape route. The man didn't need to know that tonight would be the last time Nick would set foot on his boat. If the police arrested him after Nick had made his escape … well, that was unfortunate for Morkot. But it wasn't Nick's problem.
He glanced back to see that helicopter hovering just above the ground behind him. Two people jumped from it, one person landing on either side of it, each carrying a weapon and a bag of some sort.
The rest of his men could deal with those two, and the helicopter. He increased his speed, knowing that if he could just make it to his car, he'd be able to get away before anyone could stop him.
He stumbled once, ankle turning on a loose stone, but he managed to stay upright and recover his balance. Finally, the ground levelled out, and he slid to a stop next to his car.
The supervisor stood just outside the main building, staring at him with wide eyes. He simply raised his gun and watched the man scurry out of sight in a heartbeat.
He pulled his keys from his pocket, opened the car and fell heavily into the seat. He dropped his gun on the seat beside him, panting as he shoved the key into the ignition and started the car. He put the Mercedes in gear and laid his foot on the gas pedal. The car responded instantly, wheels spinning sand up behind him as he sped towards the open gate.
One more minute, and he'd be on the road away from this place. One more minute, and he'd be free to run.
The workers from the main building scattered from his path, a few tripping and rolling away from the tyres as he aimed the powerful car towards the gate. One man looked up, eyes wide in disbelief, before rolling to the side and wrapping his arms over his head. Nick Stevens didn't care about what had caused that reaction, as long as it got the man out of his way.
The open gate was now directly ahead of him and the car shot forward.
Only to come face-to-face with a helicopter.
Stevens stomped on the brakes, feeling the car jerk at the sudden deceleration. Only his tight grip on the steering wheel kept the vehicle from fishtailing. He stared through the windshield, cursing the pilot of the helicopter even as his mind churned through options.
The helicopter hung just beyond the gate, three feet above the surface of the road, close enough that Nick could see the set look on the pilot's face. A look that made it clear that, whoever the pilot was, he knew the men in the old barn. And he was not happy about what had happened to them. The anger on the pilot's face clearly had its basis in a deep and personal connection to those two men.
And then the man in the helicopter smiled, a slow baring of white teeth that chilled Nick to the bone. That smile was a promise, and Nick was suddenly sure that whatever future he had left would end, painfully, if that man ever laid a hand on him.
Instinct had him spinning the steering wheel hard to the right and jamming his foot on the accelerator again. Moments later, he was racing back towards the old barn, heading for the back road at the best speed he could make over the rough ground.
Ahead of him, he could see two people he didn't recognise as members of his group. The two from the helicopter, no doubt. One was a woman with short, blonde hair. As he watched, she fired a single shot casually to her left and dropped another of his men to the ground. The man stayed down, writhing in agony.
The other person was a man with brown hair, carrying a rifle. Nick knew that this had to be the man who taken those shots from the hovering helicopter. An expert with his weapon, and clearly not a man to cross in any way.
But still, marksmanship skills aside, they were only two people. And people were no match for a car.
He aimed the car directly at the two people and tightened his grip on the steering wheel. He saw the moment when the woman realised his intention, and watched as she yelled something at the man and ran away from the barn. That cleared part of his route for him, but he still needed the man to move.
But instead of moving away, the man simply planted himself directly in the car's path, then raised his rifle. His face was unconcerned, his hands steady, his movements calm.
Nick Stevens understood too late that he'd miscalculated how this was going to play out. He'd expected fear and self-preservation. What he got, instead, was cold anger and deadly focus.
Less than a second later, he saw a flash from the barrel of the rifle and felt the steering wheel jerk hard to the left in his hands. The car slewed wildly across the sandy ground, the uneven tilt a clear indication that his one front tyre, the left, was now nothing more than scrap rubber.
He struggled to manage the car, to direct its movement, dragging the wheel to the right as hard as he could to counteract the slide to the left. But he overcompensated, and by the time he'd managed to steady himself enough to look out the windshield again, the rest of the situation was well beyond his minor influence.
The car had now pulled drastically to the right, and ploughed directly into the doors of the old barn.
The front end of the car crumpled immediately, folding in on itself like a worn-out concertina. The windshield cracked in a jagged line, fragmenting his view of the world, and the one wing mirror sheared off as though made of putty.
The car went from speeding uphill to motionless in less than a second.
The airbag deployed instantaneously, exploding outward. But the motion of the car slammed his head into the door frame before the airbag pushed him back against the seat. Pain flared in the side of his head, and he could feel something warm running down his face.
He tried to worm an arm past the airbag, feeling frantically for the door handle and tugging desperately on it. But the damage to the car had jammed the door shut.
Above him, he heard the overstressed timbers of the barn creaking ominously. He suddenly remembered all the times that Seb had told him the old building was a death trap, and how he had laughed at the other man's fears and concerns. Maybe he should have listened.
Something landed heavily on the top of the car. The car frame caved in under the weight, forcing the ceiling down in a massive collapse that struck him on the head, making his ears ring.
His sight started to fade out, and he knew he was losing the fight to stay conscious. He couldn't help but think that he'd had better days.
A deep rumble filled his ears, and he wondered what it was. His sluggish brain eventually recognised the sound, and informed him that the rest of the barn was collapsing around him.
That rumble was the last thing he heard before everything went black.
MPI-MPI-MPI
Katsumoto braced himself to move when Magnum did. He didn't have to be a mind reader to know that the other man planned to put himself between Katsumoto and whoever was about to come through that barn door. Being gently manoeuvred into the corner while Magnum had eased himself into a position blocking Katsumoto's view of the door was a major clue.
He wondered for a second if the investigator realised just how predictable he was, in certain circumstances, and whether Katsumoto should make a point of mentioning it sometime. Or perhaps saying something would just embarrass the man; Katsumoto had seen before how Magnum tended to brush aside any type of thanks for protecting or helping other people, acting as though putting himself in danger was just the way things ought to be.
Clearly one discussion about the man's lack of self-preservation hadn't been enough. In any other situation, Katsumoto would have laughed at his own stupidity; why had he ever thought that talking to the man once would be enough?
The door squealed further open, then stopped moving altogether. Moments later, the sound of a low-flying helicopter filled the air, interrupted by the sharp reports of gunshots. Katsumoto's mind automatically classified the shots as coming from a rifle, rather than a handgun. He hadn't seen anyone with a rifle when he first got to the plantation, and the man who'd knocked him out certainly hadn't been in possession of one.
That fact implied that there were new arrivals at this party. Katsumoto pondered who it could be, then decided that it really didn't matter. Any distraction would offer him and Magnum a chance to escape and make it to their cars.
Then the barn door slowly groaned shut again, the shadow gun disappearing along with the dying daylight. Movement outside the door suggested that whoever had been about to enter was running away. Always a good thing.
Magnum stood motionless, head tipped to the side, clearly hearing something that had a deeper meaning for him than the detective. Then he turned to face Katsumoto, eyes bright and happy. Which could only mean one thing …
"TC?" Katsumoto asked with a smile, realising that Magnum must have recognised something specific in the sound of that helicopter. "A rescue mission?"
"Yeah." Magnum nodded. "Something like that. They're all here."
"How can you be sure?" Katsumoto raised a hand to stop Magnum's answer. "Never mind. The rifle shots, right?"
Magnum smiled. "And Higgins would never let Rick and TC have all the fun."
"Right then." Katsumoto straightened up, reaching out a hand to steady Magnum. "Shall we?"
They moved towards the door, pain and relief causing them to make the journey slowly. Katsumoto noticed how tightly Magnum pressed his right arm to his side, but figured that mentioning the injury would do no good. Instead he simply made sure that he stayed on Magnum's right, close enough to support the man without making his intent obvious.
More shots had Katsumoto sharing a concerned look with his friend.
"I don't like the sound of that."
"Not great, I admit." Magnum conceded, speeding his steps slightly.
Another single shot sounded, then they heard the sound of an engine revving wildly. A moment later, a woman's voice yelled, "Rick!"
"Higgins!" Magnum shifted his weight, ready to run for the door.
A single loud rifle report echoed, and the sound of the engine grew louder and closer. Katsumoto tilted his head, working through the sounds, and coming to an unpleasant conclusion. The vehicle, whatever it was, was heading directly for the barn.
He took a quick step back, reaching out and pulling on Magnum's shoulder. The investigator refused to move, and Katsumoto tugged again.
"Magnum. Listen to me." The other man glanced at him. "That vehicle is heading right at us. We need to move."
He could see that Magnum was itching to get outside and help his friends, but was only too aware that he wasn't at full strength. He held on tighter and tugged again, getting the man to move back a foot.
"We need to get back to that corner. Wait until after that vehicle is gone." Katsumoto offered some reassurance. "Then we'll go out and help them."
"We should go now."
"Maybe." Katsumoto let his exasperation leak into the next words. "But I'm no match for a speeding car. Are you?"
"Maybe not." Magnum sighed and started to move back to the far wall again.
"They're not slowing down." Katsumoto couldn't believe what he was hearing. He shoved Magnum hard in the back, pushing his friend ahead of him. "Run!"
MPI-MPI-MPI