The Destroyer - 79 - The Destroyer 079 - Shooting Schedule by Warren Murphy & Richard Sapir

Author:Warren Murphy & Richard Sapir [Murphy, Warren & Sapir, Richard]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Pulp Action
Publisher: PINNACLE BOOKS
Published: 2010-03-19T14:52:12+00:00

Chapter 12

Bartholomew Bronzi­ni had been ac­cused of many things dur­ing his cin­emat­ic ca­reer. He had been crit­icized for mak­ing too much mon­ey, usu­al­ly by the rich. He had been crit­icized for his mono­tone de­liv­ery, usu­al­ly by out-​of-​work off-​Broad­way ac­tors. He had been crit­icized for be­ing pro­lif­ic, usu­al­ly by some­one who had nev­er done any­thing more cre­ative than list­ing a Cock­er Spaniel as a de­pen­dent on a Form 1040.

Bronzi­ni got used to those things. They were the price of fame. Like sign­ing au­to­graphs for peo­ple who in­sist­ed they want­ed them for rel­atives.

But the crit­icism that re­al­ly per­plexed Bartholomew Bronzi­ni was the ac­cu­sa­tion that he was some­how a pho­ny when he played the Amer­ican war su­per­hero Dack Grundy with­out ev­er hav­ing served in the U.S. mil­itary him­self.

The first time he field­ed that ques­tion dur­ing a TV in­ter­view, Bronzi­ni replied “What?” in a dumb­struck voice. The in­ter­view­er as­sumed that was his defini­tive an­swer and went on to the sub­ject of his lat­est mul­ti­mil­lion-​dol­lar di­vorce set­tle­ment. By the time he was asked it again, Bronzi­ni had for­mu­lat­ed a ready-​made an­swer. “I’m an ac­tor play­ing a part. Not a sol­dier play­ing at act­ing. I’m a John Wayne, not an Au­die Mur­phy.” Bartholomew Bronzi­ni was not act­ing now.

He was perched on the slop­ing tur­ret of the lead T-62 tank rolling along the main road of MCAS Yu­ma. Be­hind him, a Japanese crew­man stood in the tur­ret well and sprayed the air with the swiv­el-​mount­ed .50-cal­iber ma­chine gun. De­fend­ing Marines were corkscrew­ing more re­al­is­ti­cal­ly than any ex­tra. Heads ex­plod­ed. Arms were sawed off by bul­let streams.

Bartholomew Bronzi­ni was no fool. He might nev­er have seen com­bat, but he had made a lot of war movies. He re­al­ized be­fore any­one else that this was no movie. This was re­al.

Yet they were film­ing it. It made no sense. Isuzu had told him that they were go­ing to make a grand en­trance to im­press the Marines, and that Bronzi­ni should ride on the lead tank. But as soon as the col­umn passed the gate, the Marines had opened up. With blanks. Then all hell broke loose.

Even though it wasn’t in the script, Bronzi­ni leapt up­on the ma­chine-​gun­ner. The Japanese re­leased the gun’s trips and tried to rab­bit-​punch the pow­er­ful ac­tor. Bronzi­ni took the man by the back of the head with one hand and pum­meled his flat fea­tures to a pulp with the oth­er. Then he knocked the Japanese off the tank and took the .50-cal­iber in hand.

Bronzi­ni swept the gun muz­zle around. He had nev­er fired a load­ed .50 cal­iber. But he had fired many blanks. Pulling the trig­ger was no dif­fer­ent. It was what came out the bar­rel that count­ed. He pulled the trig­ger.

The face of the Japanese driv­er in the fol­low­ing tank dis­in­te­grat­ed. He slumped for­ward. Out of con­trol, the tank veered left, cut­ting off the tank be­hind it. The tracks merged and be­gan shred­ding one an­oth­er.

Bronzi­ni swiveled his .50 to­ward the Japanese foot sol­diers. He cut them down with a long burst. A Japanese popped out of the tur­ret of his own tank.

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