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"Now, how would he get in there? It's locked up tighter than my
mother-in-law's constipated ass."
"Well, he is a ninja, Major. You know how they are."
"I'm beginning to get a nasty inkling," Grimm said bitterly.
Exiting the car, they locked it up and surrounded the Hy-Cube car.
Grimm faced his security team. "I need a volunteer to enter the MLC car."
Several airmen raised their hands. One stepped forward. Grimm decided he liked
the man's initiative. "You game for this, Airman?"
"Yes, sir. I've seen a lot of ninja movies. I know what the little buggers are
likely to do."
"Okay. Just don't get yourself strangled."
Two airmen ducked under the Hy-Cube car and undogged the underside hatch with
a special tool. The volunteer airman crawled under next and, flashlight in one
hand and side arm in the other, started to squeeze in.
"See anything?" Grimm hissed.
The airman's "No" was hollow.
His belt disappeared, and then his legs pulled up and out of sight.
They waited for word. Five minutes by Major Grimm's watch. When it was ten,
Grimm hissed, "What's keeping that airman?"
The security officer shrugged helplessly.
Taking a flashlight, Grimm crawled under and used the light. He washed light
all over the access tunnel and saw nothing.
"Airman. Call out."
Silence came back.
"Airman!"
"Maybe he can't hear way in there," someone suggested.
"Damn. Somebody rap on the side of the car."
Flashlights banged the side of the modern Hy-Cube boxcar.
"Airman!" Grimm shouted.
The airman failed to respond or reappear.
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Ducking out from under the car, Major Grimm said, "I need another volunteer.
One with ninja movie-watching experience preferably."
This time Grimm got sheepish expressions instead of waving hands.
"The national security of the U.S. of A. may be at stake here. If I don't get
a volunteer, I'm going to have to pick one."
Two men stepped forward, faces stiff.
"Fine. You both go in. One first and the other right behind him. Make a human
chain. That way, we don't lose voice contact."
It was an excellent plan. It fell apart when the first airman thrust his upper
torso into the access hatch and fell back down on his butt-minus his head.
The head tumbled down to fall into his lap. It looked very surprised. The
mouth opened and it seemed to be trying to say something when the eyes rolled
up to show whites, and a tiny sigh escaped from both ends of the severed
windpipe.
"Get that body out of the way!" Grimm snapped.
The security team started dragging and vomiting.
"Okay. We have the ninja cornered. All we got to do is flush him out.
Suggestions?"
"Can we open the roof doors?"
"Not without activating the launch sequence."
No one seemed to cotton to that idea.
"Where's that other volunteer?" wondered Grimm, looking around.
The second volunteer was standing in the back of a knot of airman like a shy
gym student trying to escape the coach's gaze.
"You! Yes, you. Your turn."
"Yes, sir," the airman said in a thick voice.
"Here is what you do. We're going to hoist you in feetfirst."
"Yes, sir."
"You go in that way so he can't get at your neck."
"Yes, sir," said the airman, blood draining from his face.
"You know he's in there. He knows you know he's in there. Maybe he's crawled
back a ways. You go in with your combat knife and you hunt him down. Blade to
blade. You stick him good. A dead ninja's just as good as a live one, if not
better. Got that?"
The airmen felt his side arm being pried from his stubborn fingers.
"Can't have you shooting in there," Grimm said. "Not with all that
propellant."
"Yes, sir," gulped the airman.
They got him into position and, on the count of three, they hoisted him
feetfirst.
The lower body went in fine, but the heavier upper body was where they got
stuck.
"Push harder," Grimm hissed. "Get him the hell up in there."
The poor airman was standing on his hands, and his hands were being supported
by the strong blue backs of several security airman. They were arching and
grunting in their effort to get him all the way up there.
For his part, the airman looked as though he wanted to cry. Then he did.
"Help!"
"What is it?" Grimm hissed.
The airman's eyes were frightened china saucers. "I'm going in!"
"That's what we want."
"No! Something's got my legs. Pull me back! Pull me back!"
And the airman's voice was filled so full of horror that Major Grimm hastily
countermanded his order. "Out! Pull him back! Now!"
But it was too late. The airman went up slicker than a fox into a rabbit hole,
torn right out of the hands of the security team.
A single drop of clear liquid fell back. They never figured out if it was
drool or a tear.
They heard the swish, a meaty thunk, and then the airman's loose head dropped
down.
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It didn't die all at once. The mouth was distinctly working.
Reaching in, Major Grimm grabbed it. "Speak to me, Airman. What did you see?"
A puff of foul air came from the mouth. Then it dropped slack.
The light in the eyes looking into Grimm's went out.
Distaste on his own face, Grimm passed the head to his security chief, who
looked sick and angry at the same time.
From the open hatch a leakage of blood came. It stained the ties a bright
red.
"Enough of this damn pussyfooting. We gas the little cockroach out."
Gas masks were donned. Two grenades of CS gas were thrown in and the hatch
hastily shut and locked. Not a tendril leaked out of the missile-launch car.
It was airtight.
They gave the gas ten minutes to work, then a nervous airman was ordered into
the smoking hatch.
Shortly his gas-masked head tumbled down.
"There' s only one thing left to do," Major Claiborne Grimm said tightly.
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