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They dashed to the building and went inside. Instead of turning on the lights, Eddie lowered his night vision goggles. Raven did the same and led Beth by the hand.
“They should be in the back,” Beth said. “They’ll be in sixteen tubes.”
“Sixteen paintings?” Raven asked.
“They’ve amassed an incredible collection.”
“We can’t carry that many,” Eddie said.
“The tubes are large in diameter, so we can take them out and roll up some of them together. We won’t need more than six tubes.”
“Will that damage the paintings?”
Beth shrugged. “It’s better than leaving them here to burn. The tubes have straps, so we can carry them easily.”
“These paintings better be amazing,” Eddie grumbled.
“You have no idea.”
At the back of the trailer, there was a large metal cabinet. It was secured by a heavy padlock.
“This is a tough one,” Eddie said. “Might take me a little longer than that door.”
He crouched down next to it and got to work.
• • •
JUAN DIDN’T DARE close the door of the explosives storage room or make a move for the exit. The acoustics of the quiet factory meant that he and Linc could easily hear what was being said all the way on the other side. Tagaan was talking to four other men. All of them were armed with Chinese assault rifles.
“Comrade Locsin has become a threat to our movement,” Tagaan said. “We have almost a million Typhoon pills in the truck, but he wants to waste our advantage and risk everything before we are ready.”
One of the men protested, “But he will kill us all if he finds out that we are going to betray him. So will all the others who are loyal to him.”
“That’s why we need to act now. His guard is down because of the storm. When he’s dead, they will see that I’m the one who should lead us.”
Linc raised an eyebrow at Juan. “We should let them off each other,” he whispered.
Juan nodded. “If only we had the time.”
“Locsin will begin his daily factory inspection at dawn,” Tagaan said. “Two of you will wait in the Semtex storage area. When he enters, make sure you shoot him in the head. The other two and I will kill Dolap and his most faithful men. Then we will take the truck to secure the Typhoon supply. Understood?” They nodded, and two of the men started heading toward the storage room.
“I understand that we better get out of here,” Linc whispered.
Juan readied his pistol. “Wait until they’re close. We’ll try to take them out silently.”
Linc raised the crossbow.
As they were walking, one of the men walking toward Juan and Linc called back over his shoulder, “Comrade Tagaan, why is the door to the storage room only partly closed?”
Tagaan turned around, alarmed. He gestured for the other two men to join the first two.
“That plan failed in record time,” Juan said. He holstered his pistol and swung the assault rifle around. With a nod, he kicked the door wide open and shot the closest man through the heart. Linc got his companion through the eye with a crossbow bolt.
“MacD’s going to have to fight me for this,” he said.
With their presence revealed, Juan and Linc ran for the factory’s side door. A few shots came their way until Tagaan ordered his men to avoid hitting the Kuyogs. Then they raced out the front entrance.
Juan and Linc burst through the side door, but Tagaan was waiting for them to appear. From the cover of the building corner, he let loose a wild volley with his assault rifle. The other men would be coming out the side door any second, and it was a long way to the far end of the factory, so Juan sprinted to the building next to them and charged through the door. He and Linc made it inside just as bullets slammed into the closed door behind them.
