Sky Strike by James Rouch Page A

counterweight, the Russian closed his eyes tight, as though in prayer, and didn’t look up as the eight-wheeler trundled past.
    ‘Boris and dine must be guessing right about those coded radio signals we keep intercepting. They’re about us.’ Hyde knelt behind Revell’s seat. ‘Perhaps we should be looking for a change of transport?’
    ‘There’s no need, not yet.’ Revell checked his map, pencilled in the location of the roadblock. ‘That kid won’t have reported us, so as far as the Ruskies are concerned they’ll think we’re still back there, somewhere.’
    ‘And pretty soon they’re going to realise we’ve slipped through. Better to make the switch now, while we’ve the chance to choose the time and place.’
    ‘I say stick with this wagon for as long as we can.’ Burke was enjoying the drive. The mist had lifted sufficiently for him to motor as close to the vehicle’s top road speed as the twisting route would allow; enabling him to take advantage of the absence of other traffic, in the lull of activity between the re-supply convoys using the cover of the dark, and the coming of full day, when civilian, inter-unit and local traffic would take over. ‘Where the hell would we get another.’
    ‘Commie vehicle in this condition!’
Both driver and NCO had made good points, but for Revell it was a third argument that prompted his decision to press on as fast as they could. In fact it wasn’t even an argument, it was a solid gut feeling that told him to go for mileage first and subtlety afterwards, but it would do no harm to offer a placatory gesture to the sergeant.
    ‘Let’s see if we can’t have the best of both worlds. First chance we get we’ll pull over and do what we can do to alter this APC’s appearance. It’s too distinctive, so let’s see how we can make it look the same as the other Warsaw Pact wrecks of its type. God knows there’s enough of them about, we should be able to merge into them. They can’t possibly check every one.’
    As if to bear out Burke’s argument, they passed three trucks pulled into the edge. Engine covers were raised on all three, as they were on a massive six- wheeled recovery vehicle a few hundred yards further on.
    ‘We’re being followed,’ Head poking out of an open hatch to catch some air and overcome the feeling of nausea the vehicle’s harsh ride gave rise to, Cline had seen a pair of machine gun armed motorcycle combinations and an armoured car gaining on them. Any doubts he had as to whether or not the APC was the subject of a pursuit were swiftly dispelled when a roof-mounted klaxon on the car began to blare up and down the scale.
    ‘Slow up. Let them get close.’ Revell tapped a grenade at Dooley’s belt. ‘You and Andrea pitch them some presents. Half a dozen should do it.’
    The lead motorcycle had closed to twenty-five yards when the APC’s side hatches were thrown open and the grenades tossed out. 
    Six irregular-shaped lumps of cast metal bounced on the road surface and rolled to a stop at its edge, then shattered and hurled fragments of metal in every direction.
    Caught in the centre of the storm, the second combination disappeared from sight completely, hidden by the smoke and barely glimpsed flame of the detonations. The passenger and rider of the leading machine hunched low as they felt and heard the explosions behind them but it was too late. The bike’s rear wheel deflated, slashed open by a sliver of casing, and at that instant the rider slumped over his handlebars, a gaping wound in his neck.
    Making a wild grab for the controls the passenger attempted to avert disaster, but it was already inevitable. The bike’s front wheel crabbed to the left and as the scuffing rubber sent it out of balance, men and machine were sent cart wheeling into the hedge.
    As the mushroom of smoke from the grenades drifted upwards they were supplemented by a growing pall from the pools of blazing petrol and the burning bodies in the road. The