Singapore Sling Shot - Andrew Grant [39]
The sound of my shots barely registered above that of the alarm. The newcomers were down. I then had seven rounds left in my automatic before the Browning became as useful as a doorstop.
Again I didn’t stop to check on the fallen men or grab another weapon. I vaulted them and hit the landing rolling, my gun looking for a target. There were none there. No more bad guys waited on the landing or the bridge. The sky was blazing with stars and the moon was like a giant icy spotlight vying with the lights of Singapore for attention.
“Oh great,” I muttered as I started down the wide stairs. Just when I needed the cover of maximum darkness, the universe took over. I just had to get across the terrace, down the ramp, past the toilets and the lower terrace, and into the water. Easy, huh?
“Are you okay? We heard the alarms and shots?”
“I’m okay. I have it. Going for the water now.”
“Negative, Daniel. There’s a Police Coast Guard boat heading straight for the fort. They’ll be there before we are. Go for your entry point.”
“Okay.” I started to run for the ridge, but Sami came back to me immediately.
“Abort that. There’s another launch coming in from the channel. We’re going to have to bug out. Can you make the sea beyond Siloso Beach and we’ll go round?”
“Roger that,” I replied. I had to get out of the fort. I started down the roadway, keeping close to the wall on the right, hugging the shadows.
The black outfit I was wearing and my blacked-out face were hopefully doing their job. I was just another shadow, albeit a fast moving one.
There were police sirens, a lot of them, and they were getting louder. Then below me, around the curve of the driveway, I could see figures coming up towards the fort. The moonlight was glinting off the guns they held ready in their hands. These most definitely were not the good guys. I was still in the shadows and I didn’t think they’d seen me. I knew they would in a few seconds unless I got the hell out of there. There was only one place to go: up!
I scrambled up the steep grassy bank to my right. It bordered the driveway for half its length. There was a narrow flat terrace on top with a wide drain running down the centre. I figured that I’d have at least some cover if I needed it. I was ten or fifteen feet above the road. There had been no shouts or shots, so I had to believe they hadn’t seen me.
I stopped and knelt in cover at the edge of the jungle fringe. I needed to protect Stanley’s recorder if I had to hit the water again. I pulled off the backpack and put the device into the waterproof vinyl camera bag I’d earmarked for it. I zipped the bag into my pocket. It was possible I might have to ditch the backpack at some stage.
I stayed where I was and continued playing at being a shadow as the half dozen guys who were sprinting up the road pounded by below me.
The moment they were gone I started away again, keeping as low as I could, slipping into the straps of the backpack as I went. Ideally, I thought I should ditch it, but I wasn’t about to leave any evidence of my presence anywhere near Fort Siloso if I could help it.
I paused at the end of the terrace. There were lights at the hotel gate down and around the corner to my right and there were lights around the aquarium buildings and the concourse itself. There didn’t appear to be anyone playing sentry near the vehicle barrier or the fort ticket office, but who could tell. I had to take a chance. In the first instance, I didn’t want Lu’s men to get me and, in the second, I couldn’t let the police catch me in the fort.
I slithered down the grassy bank to the road and started towards the shelter of the aquarium complex. I figured I could move under cover as far as the covered bus shelter and then sprint across the concourse to the beach. There I’d swim out to the nearest island, go over