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  But the shooting continued. Marines fell. Some of them spurted red fluid in ways that were obviously special effects, but others went down with arms and legs suddenly bent at weird angles. A Marine's head exploded in a halo of blood that no Hollywood special-effects shop could duplicate-because it was horrifyingly real, as Colonel Emile Tepperman now knew.

  The tanks rolled over many of the bodies with callous disregard for human life. Some of the men were already dead. Others simply played dead, not realizing that the script had been changed. The expressions on their faces when they felt the bite of steel tank tracks was horrible, their screaming inhuman.

  It was completely out of control.

  Tepperman yelled "Cut!" until his voice cracked. He stumbled between the tanks and the broken bodies until he reached Jiro Isuzu. He grabbed the Japanese by the shoulder and whirled him around.

  "Stop this!" Tepperman thundered. "I order you to stop this at once. What are you doing?"

  "We are firming," Jiro said. He pointed above their heads. A big square camera lens was focused on them. "This is carnage, slaughter, and you're filming it."

  "Branks," Isuzu told him, smiling toothily. "Not to worry. "

  "Those tanks aren't blanks. They're real. They're crushing people. Listen to those ungodly screams.

  "Perhaps mistake has been made. Gun, prease. I check." Dazedly Colonel Tepperman allowed Jiro Isuzu to take his sidearm. The Japanese was so calm and unruffled that for a moment Tepperman doubted the reality-or unreality-of what was going on all around him.

  Isuzu placed the muzzle to Tepperman's forehead. "Now, for camera. Do you surrender this base?"

  "Uh, yes," Tepperman stammered.

  "Say the word, prease."

  "I surrender," Tepperman said.

  "Now I wirr purr trigger. Not to worry. Brank. Okay?" Tepperman steeled himself. He knew that a blank shell could not hurt him. He never learned differently. For when the trigger was pulled, it was as if a sledgehammer had struck Tepperman between the eyes.

  The explosive force of the gunpowder had punched a hole in his skull. Propelled by expanding gases, the paper wadding penetrated his brain. He hit the ground as dead as if shot by a steel-jacketed round. The only difference was that there was no exit wound.

  "You never surrender," Jiro Isuzu told his unhearing ears, as the last involuntary twitching of his leg muscles died down. "It is shameful."

  Chapter 12

  Bartholomew Bronzini had been accused of many things during his cinematic career. He had been criticized for making too much money, usually by the rich. He had been criticized for his monotone delivery, usually by out-of-work off-Broadway actors. He had been criticized for being prolific, usually by someone who had never done anything more creative than listing a Cocker Spaniel as a dependent on a Form 1040.

  Bronzini got used to those things. They were the price of fame. Like signing autographs for people who insisted they wanted them for relatives.

  But the criticism that really perplexed Bartholomew Bronzini was the accusation that he was somehow a phony when he played the American war superhero Dack Grundy without ever having served in the U.S. military himself.

  The first time he fielded that question during a TV interview, Bronzini replied "What?" in a dumbstruck voice. The interviewer assumed that was his definitive answer and went on to the subject of his latest multimillion-dollar divorce settlement. By the time he was asked it again, Bronzini had formulated a ready-made answer. "I'm an actor playing a part. Not a soldier playing at acting. I'm a John Wayne, not an Audie Murphy." Bartholomew Bronzini was not acting now.

  He was perched on the sloping turret of the lead T-62 tank rolling along the main road of MCAS Yuma. Behind him, a Japanese crewman stood in the turret well and sprayed the air with the swivel-mounted .50-caliber machine gun. Defending Marines were corkscrewing more realistically than any extra. Heads exploded. Arms were sawed off by bullet streams.

  Bartholomew Bronzini was no fool. He might never have seen combat, but he had made a lot of war movies. He realized before anyone else that this was no movie. This was real.

  Yet they were filming it. It made no sense. Isuzu had told him that they were going to make a grand entrance to impress the Marines, and that Bronzini should ride on the lead tank. But as soon as the column passed the gate, the Marines had opened up. With blanks. Then all hell broke loose.

  Even though it wasn't in the script, Bronzini leapt upon the machine-gunner. The Japanese released the gun's trips and tried to rabbit-punch the powerful actor. Bronzini took the man by the back of the head with one hand and pummeled his flat features to a pulp with the other. Then he knocked the Japanese off the tank and took the .50-caliber in hand.

  Bronzini swept the gun muzzle around. He had never fired a loaded .50 caliber. But he had fired many blanks. Pulling the trigger was no different. It was what came out the barrel that counted. He pulled the trigger.

  The face of the Japanese driver in the following tank disintegrated. He slumped forward. Out of control, the tank veered left, cutting off the tank behind it. The tracks merged and began shredding one another.

  Bronzini swiveled his .50 toward the Japanese foot soldiers. He cut them down with a long burst. A Japanese popped out of the turret of his own tank. Bronzini didn't waste any bullets on him. He yanked the .50-caliber's muzzle around and brained the soldier with it, putting him over the side. As he lay stunned, the second tank crushed his legs with a splintery sound.

  Bronzini looked around. He saw Jiro Isuzu off to one side of the entrance, his samurai sword high in the air.

  He was directing the action in a style that was half-Hollywood and half-military.

  Bronzini sighted on his open mouth and pulled the trips. Nothing happened. He spanked the breech with the heel of his hand, saying, "Come on, you mother!" Then he saw that the feed belt was empty.

  A bullet spanged off the turret by his boot with so much force Bronzini felt the impact in his clenched teeth. Another round went past his ear. It made an audible crack as it split the air.

  "The fuck!" Bronzini said, seeing AK-47's in the Japanese hands lining up on him. He was no soldier, but he knew that when you're taking fire, you seek shelter. He dived into the turret.

  He found himself sprawled behind the cannon breech. Obviously, the tanks had been restored to fully operable condition before they crossed the border. Beside it was the open hatch that led to the driver's cockpit, which was set forward, inside the hull.

  Bronzini crawled to the hatch. The driver was down in his seat, peering through the periscope as he guided the tank by its handlebarlike lateral controls.

  Bronzini silently unshipped the combat knife sheathed in his boot. It was no prop. He reached in and took the driver by the throat and ran the knife into his kidneys. The Japanese thrashed, but there was nothing he could do in the cramped driver's cockpit except sit and struggle against the remorseless hand that found his mouth with a stifling hold as the knife was slowly turned clockwise, and then counterclockwise, until he was dead.

  Bronzini pulled him back and squeezed into the bloodsoaked driver's seat. There was no time to sort this out. Bronzini was on automatic pilot, going on pure instinct, the very thing that had guided his career.

  Bronzini realized that he couldn't hope to fight the Japanese from the driver's seat. He had no gun or cannon control. He'd need a tank crew for that.

  So he jammed the lateral to the left, sending the tank pivoting on one locked track. The perimeter fence came into view. Beyond it was an endless expanse of sand.

  Bronzini lined up on the fence. There were knots of crouching Japanese soldiers between him and freedom. "Fuck 'em," Bronzini said, sending the tank clanking ahead, "and the rats they rode in on."

  Bronzini kept the fence in view. The Japanese saw him coming. They scattered. He heard frenzied screaming as his tracks caught a running man's boot and pulled him into the rollers. Bronzini kept going. Somewhere in the din of gunfire, he could hear Jiro Isuzu sh
outing the name "Bronzini" over and over.

  Two Japanese suddenly appeared in the periscope. They set themselves against the fence and, firing single shots, tried to hit Bronzini through the periscope.

  Bronzini hunched down and floored the gas. The T-62 surged ahead like a steel-plated charger.

  The tank's smoothbore cannon went between the soldiers, collapsing the fence like so much mosquito netting. The soldiers, lashed by Isuzu's harsh voice, held their ground, trying to put their shots into the bouncing periscope port. One went in. It missed Bronzini's head and ricocheted once, digging a furrow across the top of the seat back.

  Then the tank rolled over the fence. And the two men. Their screams were cut off very quickly.

  Bronzini sent the tank across the road. The clatter of its tracks on asphalt turned with a gritty growl as it dug into the sand. Bronzini put the tank on a straight heading.

  He abandoned that tactic when a geyser of sand and fire exploded thirty yards in front of him. A dull boom echoed in the cockpit.

  Bronzini threw the tank sharply to the right, then to the left. Another cannon shell struck off to starboard. Sand particles peppered the hull like a fine dry hail.

  Bronzini zigzagged across the desert. He popped the driver's hatch and craned his head out. Back at the ruined fence, two T-62's were elevating their 125-millimeter smoothbore cannon. One cannon spit a flash of fire. The recoil sent the tank rolling back.

  The shell overshot Bronzini's tank by an easy hundred yards. The wind kicked up and began dispelling the floating sand cloud. But more sand blew in with it. Bronzini buttoned up the hatch.

  "Sandstorm," he muttered, grinning like a wolf.

  He sent the tank into the obscuring storm. Sand came in through the port, making it impossible to see where he was going. But Bronzini didn't care. A cannon boomed far behind him, and was answered by an equally distant detonation. If anything, the shell had fallen further away than the last one.

  Bronzini set his tank on a straight line and held it. The Japs could empty their cannon all over the desert, for all he cared. He was driving a sand-colored tank through a sandstorm. It couldn't be more perfect than if he'd written the script.

  Then Bronzini realized that in a way he had. His Sicilian face darkened with wrath. Hunched under the sand-spitting port, he fumbled for the protective goggles he knew every tank carried. He found them and yanked it over his eyes. They afforded him no more visibility than he'd had before, but at least he could look out the periscope. Sand stung his face like hot needles, but Bronzini felt a different kind of pain.

  Somewhere beyond the haze lay the city of Yuma and help. Bartholomew Bronzini vowed he wasn't going to stop until he reached the city.

  "I should have known!" he muttered. "Nobody pays an actor a fucking hundred million dollars for a one-picture deal. Not even me."

  The C-130 Hercules transports were warming up, their rear drop gates down and gaping like maws as First Assistant Director Moto Honda pulled up in a microwave-equipped TV transmission van.

  Air Force Rangers stood waiting under Colonel Frederick Davis' proud steely gaze.

  "Snap to it, men," he barked. "It's showtime."

  The airmen were attired in their camouflage utilities. First A. D. Moto Honda approached Colonel Davis with a hard face that might have been formed out of a block of dog chewbone.

  "You men ready, Coronel?" he demanded brusquely.

  "Just say the word," Colonel Davis returned. "Just don't forget-I jump first."

  "Understand," Honda said, bowing. "You jump first. Be first to hit ground."

  "Real fine," Davis said. "How're the Marines doing?"

  "Not werr. Base has farren to invader."

  "That's what I like. Hardheaded realism." Davis noticed the camera being set up. Another camera was being lugged by another uniformed Japanese crewman. "So shall we go for a take?"

  "One moment. Sright change in script. Propman make mistake with parachute."

  "Which one?"

  "Arr parachute." When Davis looked his lack of comprehension, he added, "Every one."

  "Oh. I understood they were thoroughly checked by your people as well as my own. Where's that stunt guy of yours, Sunny Joe?"

  "Here!" Sunny Joe Roam called. He loped up to the knot of men. "There a problem, Colonel?" he asked.

  "Smarr probrem," Honda said. "Change in script. We wirr not firm parachute drop as night scene. Parachute must be ... What is word?"

  "Substituted?"

  "Yes. Thank you, substituted. Instead of brack parachute, we issue white day parachute."

  Colonel Davis looked at Sunny Joe Roam.

  "What do you think?" he asked uneasily. "My people found them shipshape."

  "They're good chutes," Roam admitted.

  Honda spoke up. "New chutes from same factory, Nishitsu. Only finest materiars. But we must hurry."

  "Hold your water," Roam snapped. "I'm responsible for the safety on this shoot."

  "We lose much money by deray," Honda pointed out. "Shooting schedule tight."

  "Damn!" Roam said distractedly. "Sure wish Jim was here. Well, trot them out. We'll both look 'em over. That good enough for you, Colonel?"

  "Yes. Anything to keep the film on schedule." Honda led them to the back of a van filled with packed parachutes. They were so tightly jammed into the van that Sunny Joe Roam and Colonel Davis had difficulty extracting a pair. Finally, two came loose. They knelt on the ground and opened them.

  "Looks good to me," Roam said, running his fingers between shroud lines.

  "I'm satisfied," Colonel Davis agreed.

  Honda grinned tightly. "Very good," he said. "Have men rine up for exchange."

  Colonel Davis returned to his men. Sunny Joe Roam stood by his side, his face troubled, his big arms folded over his chest.

  "Listen up, men," Davis bellowed. "There's been a script change. We're getting new chutes. Each drop team will form a line at that van." He pointed back to the van, where uniformed crew members were hastily dumping parachutes onto the ground. They set several of these aside. No one noticed that this weeding-out included only the chutes that had formed the exposed group from which the test samples were selected.

  Three lines of airmen formed up. They shucked off their chute rigs and traded them for white packs. Remo Williams was at the end of one of the lines. He caught Sunny Joe's eye. Sunny Joe sidled up to him. "What's going on?" Remo whispered.

  "Another damned script change. They were going to film the scene with filters to make it look like a night drop. Now they want a day drop. So out go the black parachutes and in come the white parachutes."

  "Anybody test these things?" Remo asked worriedly.

  "The colonel and I looked a couple of them over."

  "That's it?"

  "They're as good as the others. If you're worried, think of it like this. Out of five hundred chutes, how many of them could go bad? One, maybe two. The odds of your getting a bad one are pretty damn slim."

  "Whatever you say," Remo said. He was still concerned. He hadn't expected filming to be this immense and fragmented an operation. How the hell was he going to protect Bronzini if they kept getting separated? Not that Remo cared much about Bronzini. The guy was obviously a stuck-up jerk. But an assignment was an assignment.

  Remo was the last in his line to pick up his chute. He buckled it on and tested the webbing straps. They seemed solid.

  As three lines formed near the three droning transports, Colonel Davis looked to First A. D. Honda. Honda was looking through the lens of the camera. He looked up and nodded to Davis. Sunny Joe ducked into one of the transports to get out of camera range. "Action!" Honda called.

  Another crewman warned, "Rorring!"

  Davis turned and shouted a command to his men over the climbing whine of the transport turbines. The airman teams turned snappily and humped up the ramplike drop gates. As they crouched down on the floor of cargo bellies, the gates rose like hydraulic jaws. Remo watched the sunlight being
swallowed by the closing gates and felt the plane shudder as the brakes were released. He felt like Jonah being swallowed by a whale. The noise was overpowering until the Hercules lifted off the flight line.

  Sunny Joe Roam hunkered down beside Remo. "You go last!" he shouted over the engine sound.

  "Is that an honor?"

  "No, you're the only civilian on the jump. If something goes wrong, the others will catch you." Roam clapped Remo on the back. Remo was not amused and said so.

  "What's eating you?" Roam asked.

  "Never mind. Let's say this wasn't what I expected." The flight was short. When the pilot called back that they were over the drop zone, Bill Roam worked his way forward to the cockpit. He looked out the window. Down on the desert floor, a worm of purple smoke lifted lazily. It showed perfectly against the color of the sand. He spotted the green-and-white tent where the ground camera crew was positioned, and a pair of APC's. "Try to find the camera ship," Roam told the pilot.

  "Got it." The pilot pointed to a tiny red-and-white dot at one o'clock. It was the Bell Ranger helicopter.

  Roam nodded. "Okay. Radio the other pilots to drop their gates when I give the word."

  "Roger." The pilot spoke into his microphone. Then he handed it to Roam, saying. "You're all set."

  Bill Roam watched the mountainous expanse of the Yuma Desert roll down below.

  "This is your jumpmaster," Bill Roam said in the mike. "Stand up!"

  Instantly, in each Hercules transport, airmen jumped to their feet and formed three lines down the center of the cargo bay.

  "Hook up!" Roam called.

  The airmen attached their chute lines to the nylon static lines suspended the length of the cargo belly. "Drop gates!"

  As the grinding sound of hydraulics came from in back, Bill Roam saw the two leading transports start to open up. Then he called "Jump!" and rushed back to the cargo belly.