Slugs tore past him as the militiamen sighted on their jeep's taillights. Ricardo returned the fire. But with the lurching and bumping of the jeeps and trucks over the earth and mud, no one hit anyone.

Lyons climbed into the back. As Ricardo watched for targets, Lyons pulled his Colt Python. He held the revolver by the barrel and leaned over the tailgate of the jeep. He smashed out the taillights.

Blancanales cut to the left. Crashing across rows, swerving, he zigzagged to confuse the pursuers. He maintained a course parallel to the road, then veered back for the blacktop. Lyons saw headlights in the rows continuing in the opposite direction.

But on the road, headlights waited for them. A truck's spotlight swept the rows of coffee. Lyons motioned Ricardo to the front machine gun. He leaned to Blancanales and explained.

"Here's the plan. Get as close to the road as you can while the kid puts out some rounds. Then turn parallel. Then cut for the road. Got it? Straight on, parallel, then straight on to the road and make it for the gate. I'll be right behind you."

"What are you talking about?"

"I'm getting us a truck."

"Crazyman!"

"You got any ideas?" Lyons touch-checked his equipment. Bandoliers. Pistols. Grenades. Knife.

As they neared the road, the spotlight found them. Autorifles fired. Blancanales switched off the headlights and swerved through bushes. Ricardo aimed the M-60 at the lights. Blancanales spoke to him quickly in Spanish. The teenager raised the barrel and fired a short burst over the truck.

Forms scattered. The searchlight went dark. Lyons tapped Blancanales.

"Now!"

The jeep slowed for a moment. Lyons stepped into the darkness, running for a few steps. He crashed into a bush and rolled through mud. The jeep accelerated away in the darkness, plunging through coffee rows.

Lyons moved fast. Mud sucked at his boots. Ahead, he heard voices. Rifles fired blindly into the coffee rows, the slugs cutting through leaves and branches. He moved closer. He saw militiamen bracing M-16 rifles on the hood of a gray Silverado. They watched the rows for the North Americans.

Lights appeared a hundred meters to his right as Blancanales switched on his headlights. The militiamen at the truck snapped bursts from their M-16s. The jeep's headlights wavered as Blancanales bounced up the shoulder of the service road and skidded through a hard right turn.

Three militiamen scrambled into the Silverado. Lyons, sprinting across the broken, muddy ground, stopped, pulled down a breath to steady his aim and lined up the Atchisson's tritium nightsight on the windows of the truck.

In the front seat, the militiamen died before they heard the shots that killed them. Blasts of steel smashed through the passenger-side window and punched through their skulls. In the back seat, a man's eyes whirled toward the flash in the darkness. Steel balls shattered his window and tore away his head.

Lyons sprinted to the passenger truck, the Atchisson ready in his hands. He fired blasts point-blank into the seats to kill any militiaman waiting to surprise him. But the Silverado contained only corpses. He shoved aside the driver's body and started the truck.

Racing after the jeep, he flicked the high beams again and again. He saw Ricardo aim the M-60 at the Silverado's windshield. Lyons flicked the high beams once more and waved a hand out the window. He accelerated to pass the jeep.

"Stop!" he shouted out to Blancanales.

Blancanales slowed. "What?"

The jeep and the Silverado coasted on the blacktop. Lyons saw the guard tower and gate three hundred meters ahead. He leaned across a gory militiaman to speak to Blancanales through the shattered passenger window.

"You two put out rounds. Get as close as you can risk, and then put out everything you got. Or they're going to chop me to shit before I hit that gate. There are heavy machine guns up there. Maybe rockets."

"Anything you say. This is your idea."

"You first, then I come up to speed."

Blancanales accelerated ahead. Looking in the rear-view mirror, Lyons saw headlights weaving through the smoke and the flames far behind him. Other headlights came from the coffee rows.

Tracers arced down from the tower. Blancanales swerved from side to side as Ricardo aimed the M-60's autofire at the gunner. Flame flashed from the tower and a rocket shrieked into the earth. Blancanales slammed to a stop. He snapped up his M-16/M-203 and fired.

A 40mm grenade popped against the tower. The frag did not silence the machine gun. Blancanales aimed the jeep's front M-60. Two streams of tracers found the tower. Lyons saw tracers going in one window and out the other side.

Lyons prepared to crash the gate. He shoved the corpses of the militiamen into the footwell. He kicked one dead man up against the firewall. Then he put the heavy passenger truck into gear and floored the accelerator.

Driving the truck like a missile, he aimed for where padlock and chains secured the gates. A heavy steel crossbar braced them.

The designers of the Quesada security perimeter had anticipated attack from the outside. Therefore they had installed speed bumps in front of the gates to stop vehicles from hurtling into them. But they had not protected the gates from vehicles crashing out.

Lyons flashed past the jeep.

The machine gunner in the tower directed his weapon at the racing truck. Tracers sparked off the road.

Two lines of tracers found the machine gunner.

In the Silverado, Lyons held the steering wheel until the last instant, then threw himself against the dead men in the footwell.

The flesh of corpses reduced the shock, but the impact stunned him. At one-hundred-plus kilometers per hour, the Silverado cut its way through the buckling gates, snapped chains, bent the steel crossbar around the truck, threw one gate into the air.

The Silverado survived the crash, but not the speed bumps.

The springs shattered. Wheels smashed into fenders and the axles snapped. When the frame hit the bumps, the Silverado flipped end over end.

Blancanales saw the hulk roll to a stop on its side. He sped to the gate, skidded almost to a stop to negotiate the bumps. Ricardo fired burst after burst, aiming upward through the floor of the tower. No fire answered. Blancanales braked behind the shelter of the mangled truck.

"You alive?" he shouted out.

Lyons struggled to climb out the window. Blancanales grabbed the Atchisson from Lyons's hands, then helped his partner from the wreck. The Ironman stared around him, his eyes unfocused. Gore covered him.

Running his hands over Lyons's arms and legs, Blancanales checked for broken bones. He found only blood and pieces of flesh. Lyons watched him.

"You're wasting time," Lyons said. "That's other people all over me. Check my gear. I got my pistols? Where's my Atchisson?"

"Colt .45. Revolver. Here's the shotgun..."

"Then get me out of here. I am all fucked up," Lyons intoned.

Blancanales half-carried him to the jeep and eased him into the seat. In seconds, they raced away from the finca.

Infinitely slowly, Lyons turned in the seat to look back. Flames and columns of black smoke rose from several fires. Gasoline fireballed as he watched.

Two pairs of headlights still pursued them. He slowly turned forward again. He closed his eyes and spoke.

"You know what this means, don't you..."

"Don't talk. You might be broken inside. I'll give you some morphine when we get back to the Wizard."

"It means we lost the element of surprise. But I'll get him."

"What're you talking about? I'm radioing Grimaldi for a medevac."

Lyons continued as if Blancanales had not spoken. "Now we know what's going on. We know Quesada's in there. But he knows we're out here. Now it's going to be a real drag."