Chapter 14 - The Extraction
""Into the command van! Move!"" Julian ordered, grabbing Sarah’s arm and steering them toward the armored vehicle Keller had left running near the container.
Bruno limped heavily behind them, his breath coming in shallow, wheezing gasps. The shrapnel wound on his flank was bleeding profusely, and his left foreleg was trembling under the accumulated trauma of the night's battles. Yet, the dog refused to fall, keeping his body positioned between the approaching helicopter's searchlight and the little girl.
Julian shoved Sarah and Emma through the heavy rear doors of the armored van. ""Get in the back! Stay below the window line!""
He turned to lift Bruno into the cargo bay. As Julian hoisted the massive animal by his harness, a burst of heavy machine gun fire ripped across the asphalt from the circling gunship. A heavy round struck the concrete inches from Julian’s boot, sending a shard of jagged stone slicing across his cheek.
Bruno let out a sharp whine as another fragment clipped his hind hip, but he scrambled inside, collapsing heavily against the steel floorboards beside Emma’s knees. Emma immediately threw her tiny arms over the dog's massive, scarred neck, her tears soaking into his wet black fur.
""Good boy, Bruno... good boy,"" she whispered, rocking gently back and forth.
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Julian slammed the armored doors shut, locked the reinforced deadbolts, and threw himself into the driver's seat. He slammed the gear selector into drive and mashed the accelerator to the floorboards.
The heavily armored vehicle surged forward, its reinforced steel ram smashing through the chain-link perimeter gate of the shipyard just as a barrage of high-explosive rockets detonated behind them, turning Pier 44 into a towering inferno of twisted iron and burning fuel.
