Captain Paterson, August 11th, 2000
Randy, you sad, dead, son of a bitch. You took our box, took out OT and nearly took Moon-Pie's life. I will personally see you as crow food. Let's start with your girl friend.
When we first linked up with the traitor he had to stop at his girl friend's and pick up his kit. That should have been the first clue as to something not right with him. He's been here less than two weeks and he's already shacked up? Not likely.
We hit her apartment hard. Had her in hand before she could react and almost splattered her little dog. Leo engaged in some persuasion to get her talking. She says he had been back today. He had an out of town job and would be back in a week. She was to wait for him, he'd have money then. She lied with conviction she did.
Might have believed her if it wasn't for the partially filled suitcase on the bed and the shiny gold and silver coins stashed in the sock pocket. Leo tried again with a bit more vigor.
Yes, yes, yes the answer came. He'd felt a package and some gold. Hide the package, be ready to move out. He needed to stash something big then they'd meet later. She was to go to Nowy Hut, he'd find her there. It all was going to make him rich with the black market.
We got the package from the space above her closet. I looked the wrapped book over while Leo continued to chat her up. Very nice, a graph lined log book detailing preliminary work. Experimenting with cold fusion. I skipped to the end, our box laid out in a exploded sketch. Oh, George and his Colonel will like this.
Leo got some more info out of the lady. She knew people in the black market. Times to get in touch and places where they ran events. Quasi-legal these boys. Just use some script and the ORMO was glad to look the other way. I told her, she's coming with us. I can use you if we need to talk to them. I left the alternative unsaid.
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Nowy Hut's not someplace we could just roll into and expect to find Randy. The place was an industrial town downstream from Krakow. Or had been. They'd made something important to the war effort. Caught a tac strike back in '97. Nobody lives there now.
But he might not even be in Nowy Hut. He'd talked to the friend first and then taken our OT out. The mighty cow would stand out in the ruins. No, he'd stash it and take another route in. We went back to the lot and talked to our ORMO friends. Spread a little script around and learned what road he'd taken.
Now tracking a vehicle used to be a difficult thing. Good luck with wheels on pavement. But here, we're looking at 3 years of no maintenance and high track traffic from the war. Pavement is chewed to rubble where it isn't coated with dirt and mud run-off from the hills. Plus, I've got the keen eyes of Leo and Moon-Pie along. We can follow in fits and starts.
He went up into the hills north of Krakow before taking to a fire trail. Donald, looking up from a map, says we're in a National Park. Good, less witnesses. His track leads down to a hollow where the Park had maintenance sheds and vehicle storage. I left Ed and the girl with the UAZ and took the rest down.
The main vehicle building had a double door vestibule on one long end and an emergency fire door on the other. Two roll up garage doors graced each end. With any luck they were pull through making the interior one long firelane. The few windows were high and narrow for light and ventilation rather than gazing.
Leo snuck over to the fire door and quietly wedged it shut with a knife in the door jam. He rejoined us and we crept around to the vestibule keeping low. The frosted glass of the front double doors blocked the interior. We kept back along the building walls while Leo gingerly reached out and pulled the left hand door open. I joined him.
The open space was a mud room with doors set opposite the entrance. Their glass was clear. Leo stood enough to peak over. "OT in the garage, wire on the right hand door, claymore to catch them both."
"Just the right?"
"Da. Which one do you always use?"
True enough. Try as I might, when I don't think about it I run into Poles and Germans going in or out.
Moon-Pie hisses from the outside, "Psst, make it fast. We got company coming from the hills."
"Nothing on the left?"
Leo doesn't answer, just takes the door handle and pulls it open. "Guess not."
The crew quickly moves in. Leo takes time to switch the wires around so the left door is trapped. The rest of us secure the building. No one home. But there's our OT. Inside is our box.
I have the men load up. I take the wheel. Leo grabs the turret. Moon-Pie rides shotgun.
"Don't start ut up," says Leo. "I want to watch as they come through the door."
" 'K fine, but I'm taking it right through the roller when you're done."
"Don't want to open first?"
"No," answers Moon_pie for me, "We're several tons, it's sheet metal."
Leo laughs and cranks the turret around manually.
If our company was just passing though they'll be gone in ten minutes. If they're coming here, and I think we all know they are, they'll be here any time now.
The watch goes tick-tick-tick.
Leo, "Shadows at the door."
They open the left one, the one they've been told was safe, and now isn't. The ball bearings shred them, but Leo has to put a long burst through there as well. "Just to be sure."
The garage door goes down just as fast to the OT's mass. We swing by Ed and hit the road.
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We travel until we get to a park rest stop. Girl friend's been doing some more talking to Ed and Doc. They've got a good idea where Randy would have holed up to wait for her. Doc takes her shoes and we kick her to the curb. It'll take her a day or three to walk back to Krakow, but she gets her life. We're convinced she wasn't an instigator, just swept along with one, and I won't have her life for another's sins.
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Down by the river in Nowy Hut there was a factory built into the bluff. The lower level allowed direct access to river barges for cargo transfers while the upper allowed easy use of the road net. Randy should be on that lower level using the bulk of the bluff and factory to block any lingering radiation. He'd be holed up for the night.
I think we were all exhausted and adrenaline rushed because we hit on a marvelous plan to take him in one go. The OT-64 is amphibious, we'd just putter down the river and roll up onto the dock and right through the loading bay doors. We had the box and book, Randy didn't have anything we wanted. The KPV would chew him up quick. So, that's the plan.
Thing we forgot, hell just didn't know, was the loading doors dropped down into a ramped pit to allow semi's to back up to the dock. Ed stomping the breaks prevented us from ramming it and trashing the OT's alignment. The second thing was the door was draped over the KPV turret. Ed reversed us right quick, but we couldn't get the door clear.
Leo, Doc and I bailed. We set off back into the factory on foot. Up above we could here echoes of booted feet on metal stairs and catwalks. We headed up. When we reached the top level an iron emergency door slammed. We didn't slow down. Cleared the door at a run, which was stupid in retrospect as he could of shot us all if he wasn't still rabbiting, and looked around. Down the bloack and about to round the corner sprinted Randy. Three guns spoke so closely together that they might as well have been one. Randy, in full stretch, rag-dolled out into the intersection. We shouldered arms and approached at a walk.
Almost there when the OT appeared and rolled over that fool's remains. Moon-Pie looked down from the gunner's hatch. "Was that him?"
We nodded back and he grinned. "Good, you don't mind?"
We didn't voice any protests so he shouted down into the hatch. "Driver, forward ten! Driver stop! Driver Reverse! Driver stop! Driver forward..."
It took some five or six repetitions to get it out of his system. Eddie added some side to side action of his own to stave off the boredom. All that was left was crow food. I left his tags. He doesn't deserve to be remembered.
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