Red Shark

Tokugawa’s hand was a blur. A ceremonial dagger appeared from inside the folds of his kimono. He thrust the dagger’s needlelike point against Jefferson’s belly, piercing his cammies, pricking flesh. Jefferson froze, his face inches from Tokugawa’s, Scott’s iron grip locked around his wrist.

They stood pinioned, motionless, until they heard the faint whock-whock-whocking of an approaching helicopter.

Tokugawa stepped away from Jefferson, but with the dagger still pointed at his belly. “The security forces have arrived,” he said, his breath coming in ragged bursts.

The clatter of the helo’s rotors and thunder of its turboshaft engine grew louder, until the villa itself began to vibrate. Ojima looked up, as if expecting any second to hear armed men rappelling down lines, landing on the roof.

Scott forced himself to think clearly, to gauge distances, timing, and, above all, the odds. Time had run out and there was only one avenue left. He ached to move, now, like lightning, but he feared that anything he did would only get Fumiko killed.

Suddenly the mini-talker in Jefferson’s cammie shirt pocket chirped. A muffled voice said, “Tango One, I’m on your beacon — stand by.”

Tokugawa, looking stunned, grasped what was happening: A Navy Seahawk helicopter was swinging in over the villa, its pilot homing in on the signal from the mini-transponder that Jefferson had activated before going over the wall.

“Tango One, I need a final — copy?” crackled over the mini-talker.

Jefferson looked helplessly at Scott: If he didn’t reply to the pilot’s query, he’d abort.

“Tango One — copy?” said the pilot.

Ojima, his body pressed against Fumiko’s, jammed the Sig against her right temple, shoving her head against her left shoulder. She fought Ojima’s biting grip and shouted over the helo’s racket, “Jake, he knows about the nukes… a ship… it’s the only way—”

“Kill her!” Tokugawa roared.

Fumiko, a blur of motion, delivered a crippling blow with her right elbow to Ojima’s rib cage. At the same instant Scott launched himself at Tokugawa with a lowered shoulder that lifted the old man off his feet onto his back.

Ojima, shocked, paralyzed with pain, backpedaled into a display case, which toppled over and shattered on the floor, shards of glass and ceramic art pinwheeling everywhere. The Sig in his fist exploded twice: one round went wild, the other pierced a glass curtain wall. Before Ojima could fire again, Fumiko took him down with a kick to his groin and a hand-chop delivered between his neck and shoulder, which shattered the collarbone and left him screaming in agony. The Sig skittered away across the floor; she moved like lightning to scoop it up.

“Tango One — aborting—”

Jefferson tore the mini-talker out of his pocket and bellowed, “Tango Two we copy! We copy! Hang in there, buddy! We’re on our way!”

“Roger that,” said the pilot. Then, “Ah, Tango One, better hurry. We’ve got company. I count four vehicles approaching your AO. You expecting anybody?”

Fumiko was on her feet, fighting for breath, a look of triumph on her bruised face.

“You okay?” Scott shouted over the din from the chopper.

She waved him away.

The chopper dropped lower, until it was hovering over the garden, the hurricanelike downdraft from its spinning rotors whipping debris into the air. A powerful beam of light shot from the ship’s cabin and played over the garden and villa.

“Move it!” Jefferson shouted.

Fumiko started ransacking cabinets and drawers for papers, jamming whatever she found into a canvas shoulder bag.

“Forget that shit, we don’t have time,” Jefferson bellowed. He rounded up their gear and weapons, then picked up and threw a heavy chair through one of the glass panels facing the garden. Rotor wash roaring through the shattered panel ripped scrolls and pictures from the walls, tossed furniture around like toys.

Buffeted by the downdraft, Jefferson grabbed the lowered sling and held it open for Fumiko to put over her head and under both arms. A helmeted crewman in the open door 30 feet above got ready to reel her in.

“Where’s Jake?” she shouted. “I don’t see him!”