African Dragon

by David M. Salkin

  “What should I do?” Asked the driver.

  “Just keep moving. They’re looking for us. All they’ll see is a column of relief supplies. By the time they figure out what’s happening, we’ll be in Kinshasa.”

  Shen Xun-jun’s eyes opened wider as the aircraft formation changed shape and they began bearing down on them with incredible speed. He watched in amazement as objects began floating out from the jets, which opened up in a cloud of smaller objects. His brain understood what was happening, but wouldn’t allow him to process the information to his mouth. He just sat in the cab of the truck, watching the surreal scene above of him.

  Wong Fu-jia continued to ask questions, but received no reply.

  “Alpha Mike Foxtrot,” said Wolf, the pilot of the lead jet as he released his payload. AMF was acronym for “Adios, Mother Fucker.” The jet pilots watched as the column below transformed from a long line of trucks to an endless, rolling cloud of fire and smoke. Secondary explosions from the ammunition went on for several minutes as the vehicles flew through the air for hundreds of yards. Black smoke billowed in huge clouds that could be seen for miles. The smell of burnt flesh would bring the animals in for an abundant meal.

  The Harriers finished their bombing run, circled back slowly, and dropped lower with video cameras on with live feed to the ship. Whatever was once there had simply ceased to exist. Not since “The Highway of Death,” when American forces annihilated the Iraqi army as it left Kuwait, had there been more carnage along a roadway.

  “Wolf to base, bomb damage assessment confirmed. Returning to base.” The squadron commander hit his afterburners, and the others followed suit. Within a few seconds, the jets were roaring west towards the USS Makin Island.

  Captain Simms studied the video. “Get the admiral on the horn. Tell him the convoy is destroyed. If there are any survivors, they’re not invading anything.”

  51.

  Near Kinshasa

  18:00

  Cascaes and his team watched the “New Congolese Air Force” land in the grassy field. It was a great relief to have the team fully reassembled. The plane rolled to a stop, and Mackey was the first out. He had just paid the pilot more cash in one lump sum than the man had ever seen at one time.

  “Keep reading the newspaper. In a couple of days you’ll see how you helped save your entire country,” Mackey had told the nervous pilot. “We were never here.” He faked a quick smile.

  The pilot was all too happy to take off and turn towards Kinshasa airport. He would be having a very good dinner in the city that night.

  Chris led the team back into the woods, where they had set up a quick camp.

  “You’re just in time for dinner,” said Chris to Mackey and his team. “We pulled out all of the stops.” He tossed him a few MREs.

  The team spent a few minutes putting gear away and getting a few tents up for the night. Mackey pulled the satellite phone and called in to Langley. He and Cascaes sat in one of the newly erected tents.

  “Good news,” said Dex. “Navy air destroyed the PAC column en route to Kinshasa. It’s over. President Kuwali and Prime Minister Gugunga will be addressing their nation in the morning, and the remaining Chinese diplomats will be expelled shortly afterwards. With Mboto Kangani dead and the PAC forces destroyed, this little chapter in DRC history should be over. I was going to pull your team tonight, but the boss asked me to wait until after tomorrow’s speech to make sure everything went smoothly. We’ve also requested that Kuwali’s people have Cory Stewart’s body returned to us at the American consulate. We’re trying to arrange it so you can escort him back to the Makin Island. We’ll have helos sent to N’djili Airport to pick all of you up. I’ll get back to you with the exact time.”

  “Roger that.”

  “Great job. Extend the president’s thanks to your team. And we’re all sorry about Cory, Mac. At least you got Kangani.”

  Mackey hung up. Kangani being dead wouldn’t bring back Cory. Neither would a few thousand dead second-rate soldiers. It was just more death—more killing. It just never stopped.

  Cascaes looked at Mac. “What is it? Cory?”

  “Yeah, Cory. And getting old. I’m just too old for this shit, brother. Time to get out while I can walk and become a civilian.”

  “I’m pretty sure you told me the exact same thing a hundred times after the last mission,” said Cascaes.

  “Yeah, I probably did. But I mean it this time. And you too, man. You’ve got a nice thing with Julia. It won’t work in the field. You two get out together and go do something fun. Travel the world without having to shoot anyone for a change.”

  “Man, you do sound old,” said Chris with a smile. “But, yeah. You’re right. I don’t want to blow this.”

  The team finished setting up camp, ate a lousy meal of MREs, and set up patrols. The rest of them relaxed and talked quietly about the mission, the countryside, the wild animals, and the mission.

  It was almost three in the morning when Ripper barged into Mackey’s tent and shook him awake.

  “Skipper, we got company. Large enemy force coming down the hill heading straight for us. We’re talking a whole fucking army, boss.”

  “How long before they get here?” Asked Mackey, already up and pulling on his boots.

  “Minutes, not hours. Moose was using his thermal scope and spotted something weird when we were on patrol, so we moved out to investigate. We got about a mile out and stopped. They’re moving fairly quickly. Way too many to count—we’re talking thousands.”

  “Jesus! Where the fuck did they come from? If that’s the PAC army, then who the fuck did the navy blow up today?”

  “I hope it wasn’t the real Red Cross,” said Ripper.

  Within five minutes, the entire team was fully assembled with all of their weapons and gear, including night vision. Mackey was back on the phone to Dex Murphy, who was in his bed at home.

  “Thousands? We have zero intel on any other PAC forces out there. Zero!” screamed Dex. “Are you sure it’s PAC army? Could it be refugees moving through the area?”

  “Boss, we went back and took another look after Ripper spotted them. Estimate a force of several thousand guerrillas. These looked like real commandos with proper gear and weapons, moving with quiet discipline through the forest. They were up in the hills, and they’re headed right for us. We’re between them and Kinshasa. I can give you coordinates for a fire mission, but we need to move, pronto!”

  “Jesus, Mack! I’ll need presidential approval, and he’ll need approval from President Kuwali. There’s not enough time. Get your asses out of there. Fall back to Kinshasa and find a defensible position. You may end up being a delaying action until the DRC regular army can get out there, or until we get approval for fire or air support. God damn it! Why didn’t we know about this?”

  “I’ll call back when I can. Out.” Mack hung up and quickly spoke to his team. “Listen up. We got a whole army heading this way towards Kinshasa. We’ll need to boogie to the outskirts of Kinshasa and keep track of these guys. There’s twelve of us and a few thousand of them. Not a good time to pick a fight. Smitty—you got any more claymores?”

  “Negative, Skipper. We used everything we had at the fish farm. We can set a few little booby-traps with grenades, but nothing big enough to slow down this many guys for too long.”

  “Alright, skip it. Let’s beat feet. I hope you all feel like going for a nice long run. You may have noticed the Africans do pretty well at the Olympic marathons.”

  Earl Jones smiled. “Y’all follow me. This African American can run faster than them skinny-ass bitches. Especially when I got five thousand mutherfuckers chasing me…”

  The team ditched the tents and extra supplies, taking only battle packs and supplies. They started their run through the woods, snaking down through the dark forest wearing night vision goggles to assist them thro
ugh the tangle of woods and myriad of streams.

  52.

  Wong Fu-jia began his move towards Kinshasa as planned, moving his troops as quickly as possible in the dark towards the outskirts of the city. At oh-four-hundred, Shen Xun-jun’s coordinated attack would begin, and Shen Xun-jun would be supplied with heavy weapons at the designated rally point. General Fu had tried many times to reach General Shen, but was having the same radio problems that Shen Xun-jun was having reaching Sergeant Major Han’s patrol. It was maddening.

  Unlike Shen Xun-jun’s ragtag army, Wong Fu-jia’s men were mostly mercenaries and moved quickly and quietly through the darkness. The only noise was the shush of bodies against leaves as the columns moved through the brush. Several small farms were in the path of the army, and these were broken into, the inhabitants murdered quickly, and then abandoned without a second thought. By the time the army had reached the suburbs of Kinshasa, they had already murdered a few hundred civilians.

  Hodges and Jones had acted as the rear guard, using Hodges’ sniper scope to keep the army’s position. The team was smaller and faster than the PAC and had increased the distance between them to almost a mile and a half. Hodges and Jones were dangerously close, but confident that they could evade the PAC as long as it stayed dark, which would be another forty minutes or so. They had called several times to report the attacks on the small farms, but there was nothing they could do about it. As the team fell back towards the city, they called Murphy’s line twice and got no response.

  Wong Fu-jia was getting furious with Shen Xun-jun. He had tried over ten times to reach him by satellite phone and got nothing. Shen Xun-jun was supposed to take the N-1 into Kinshasa from the east. Wong Fu-jia was supposed to move through the city from the west after the initial attack on the presidential compound, and then move to the N-1 from the west until they could link up with Shen Xun-jun for resupply. After they were more heavily armed, they were simply to be “unleashed” on the capital for as much death and destruction as possible until the city fell. Without word back from Shen Xun-jun, Wong Fu-jia was stuck. To assault the capital too early could give away the whole plan. To arrive too late would mean moving through a crowded city in broad daylight. In a city of that size, with millions of civilians fleeing in panic, their arrival to the rally point would be delayed for hours.

  Wong Fu-jia stopped the column and studied his map. They were close enough to the city to see the lights. The suburb of Kimbwala was between them and their target, and was too heavily populated to move through unnoticed. They had a problem. Without Shen Xun-jun’s status update, they would have to move farther north and move along the Congo River, which was much less populated. This would waste hours, but they simply couldn’t stop and wait without being detected—not with twenty-five hundred armed guerrillas.

  Wong Fu-jia ordered the column to move north along the river, not realizing that a recent heavy rain had turned the entire area into one big swamp. Black boulders, worn smooth from a few million years of erosion, made up the banks of the Congo River, and between slipping and sliding over the boulders and moving through thigh deep marshland, the column’s discipline began to strain. Their pace slowed, and as the mosquitos woke up in the first rays of sunlight for breakfast, the army became angry.

  Hodges and Jones stayed close enough to follow their movement, and the rest of the team fell back to Kimbwala where they finally reached Dex.

  “Jesus, Dex! I’ve been trying you for two hours!” blurted Mackey.

  “I’ve been a little busy! I woke up the president, who had to call President Kuwali. It’s one thing taking out a column in the middle of nowhere. Kuwali doesn’t like the idea of starting a war in a heavily populated area.”

  “We’re trying to prevent the war, Dex! I’ve got a few thousand guerrillas on my ass. They aren’t racing towards the city to sing happy birthday to Kuwali. If he doesn’t stop them now, they’ll be in his living room in another two hours. They’ve been butchering civilians along the way just to practice. They make it into the city, it’s going to be a bloodbath!”

  “Listen, I get it, okay? I totally understand your position. But we can’t force another nation to take our help. If Kuwali doesn’t approve an airstrike, then we can’t touch them. He did say he was mobilizing his own forces, but they won’t stand up to the PAC. If you’re not careful, you’re going to get stuck in the middle. I suggest you break contact, and move south until we get more intel and communication from Kuwali.”

  “That’s it? We’re just supposed to run from this bunch of thugs and watch them rape and murder their way to the capital?”

  “Mac, I don’t get to make the call, and neither do you. Stand down and get to a safer location.”

  “You do realize there’s nine million people down there, right? Nine million!”

  “Mac, you have your orders. Move south to a safer location and await further instructions. Out.” Dex hung up.

  The other members of the team had been watching and listening. Mac shook his head, his anger palpable. “Okay. Our orders are to move south and go quiet until we get more instructions.”

  Theresa was the first to speak up. “And what about the PAC army that’s about the slaughter a few thousand civilians?”

  “Kuwali is mobilizing his army. It will be up to him to defend his city.”

  “And when the PAC scatters Kuwali’s army, then what? We watch the city fall apart right in front of us while we do nothing?”

  “I don’t like it any more than you do,” said Mackey.

  Ripper added his two cents. “So this was all for nothing? Cory got wasted in this shithole so we could watch the DRC turned over to the PAC and the Chinese?”

  “It’s bullshit,” added Moose.

  “They’re north on the river,” said Jon. “Not too many civilians out there. An airstrike out there wouldn’t have much collateral damage. Once the Pac gets into the city, it’s all over.”

  “Kuwali wouldn’t allow an airstrike.”

  “Well, we can’t allow them to make it to the city!” snapped Theresa.

  “Boss, we fight a delaying action along the river, we can hold them up until Kuwali’s army shows up. Then we split and head south. But we could buy the army a couple of hours. At least trap the PAC with the Congo River at their back. A hell of a lot better battle space than house-to-house fighting,” said Cascaes quietly.

  “You, too?” snapped Mackey, unhappy that his number two man was also ready to disobey direct orders.

  “They gave us a mission. Cory died for this mission. And I feel pretty shitty about turning tail last minute. So yeah, me, too.” He glanced at Julia, who nodded.

  “Fuck,” grunted Mackey under his breath. “This ain’t a democracy.” He looked around at his team. His radio came to life. “Yeah?”

  It was Hodges. “Skipper, they’re moving along the river real slow. Terrain out here is shit. Swamp up to your ass and thorny shit that attacks your legs. It’s a perfect spot to hit ‘em.”

  Mackey’s face turned red. “Were you listening to our conversation?”

  “Say again, Skipper?” asked Hodges, confused.

  “Wait one.” He turned to the team. “You all understand that we’re going to be going against a few thousand trained guerrillas, not a bunch of rent-a-cops? No air or artillery support—against orders. This is what you want to do?”

  “I think it’s what we have to do, boss,” said Moose quietly. “We know what the deal is. We can’t go toe-to-toe with them. But we can hit them all over and keep moving fast. Keep them against the river until the army gets there, and then we melt into the forest and disappear. You know what these guys do to civilians in this part of the world. We’d never be able to sleep at night. Let’s do it.”

  Mackey exhaled slowly. “It has to be unanimous. This could be a suicide mission you dumb fuckers.”

  “I’m in,” said Moose,
raising his beefy hand. Everyone else’s hand went up instantly.

  Mackey spoke into the phone. “Alright, Hodges. Start putting some ideas together fast. We’ll be coming up from your southwest. Probably fifteen minutes out.”

  “Gonna be more like thirty, Skipper,” replied Hodges. “I’m serious about the terrain. Great place for an ambush—not so great for moving.”

  53.

  Wong Fu-jia was so angry he broke the stock of his assault rifle off against a tree trunk. He had tried, now too many times to count, to reach Shen Xun-jun and gotten nothing. They were now miles out of their way, stuck in swampy marshland with vicious mosquitoes, venomous snakes, thorny plants that were cutting everyone like bayonets, and a myriad of wild animals that remained unseen but were so loud they were terrifying even to men with weapons.

  Wong Fu-jia was already anticipating what would happen. The attack would fail and Shen Xun-jun would blame him for not being in the proper position at the right time. He had considered trying to reach the Ministry of State Security to ask for further instructions, but to do so would show a lack of leadership, if not outright incompetence. No. Wong Fu-jia would not allow himself to be the scapegoat. They would push east along the river, no matter how brutal the trip was, and then sweep through the city annihilating everyone in their path as they moved towards the rally point.

  Fu snapped at his officers to push the men harder—they were wasting too much time. The long columns of men stretched out almost a half mile along the Congo River. A dozen mercenaries from neighboring Angola served as scouts a few hundred yards ahead of the main column. Wong Fu-jia barked at them on his radio to find an easier route.

  With his night scope, Hodges watched the dozen scouts move through the jungle. These guys were pros, no doubt. They were quiet and concealed, and moved effortlessly through the heavy underbrush. Occasionally, an animal would run out from cover, and the group would stop moving, get low in the brush, and watch carefully before moving again. If not for the fact they were still moving in the dark, it would have been difficult to spot them—a wonderful thing, night vision.