From the tower, Jimmy and Jaime were able to target the big vehicle and strafe the top of it, forcing the gunners to seek safety below. Jimmy, having served four years in the Marines, knew that they would not be able to keep that up. As the Stryker drew nearer and they found a place to stop and steady their weapons, their accuracy would improve, and the tower would be their primary target. The two Hilltop men just hoped to keep their heads down as long as they could.
Jimmy spared a glance to the north to see the ruined twin tower which was still smoking. The structure had been chopped off at an angle; the roof parts completely blasted away. The barrel of the other fifty was sticking out of the rubble engulfed in flames, and the stored ammunition was popping as it cooked off in the heat. He was certain no one could have survived such destruction. He also knew that it would soon be their turn. Until that happened though, they were determined to do all they could to protect their friends.
As bullets peppered the tops of the defensive walls around us, I pointed the barrel of my weapon out at the battlefield in front of me and fired blindly with my head still down and protected. I knew we had to slow the enemy infantry’s advance if we hoped to keep them from overrunning us. I ran through an entire belt and locked in another one. This time I risked a peek over the wall and was able to target another one of the gun trucks. He had just turned around to circle away from our walls, and I caught him with his backside facing us. I popped up further to get a better sight picture and fired off half of a belt.
The machine gunner in the truck bed was blown apart as my barrage caught him in the torso. The bullets didn’t stop there, however, they continued on through the shell of the truck cabin and into the driver. The truck veered sideways at a sharp angle and rolled over three times.
My recklessness inspired the other three M-240 operators, and they all rose up to send aimed streams of destruction at the enemy trucks and knots of infantry. I caught sight of a band of maybe six foot-soldiers who were sprinting from one point of cover to another and fired off the last of that belt. I ducked down to reload but not before seeing two of them get hit by my bullets. In the meantime, our surviving fifty cal was still hammering away at the enemy troops and the remaining gun trucks. Before it had been concentrating on the gun-mounted trucks but now it was mostly occupied at keeping the approaching Stryker from turning its fifties on us. By continuously strafing the top of the tank it was forcing the gunners to stay below and away from their guns. The enemy vehicle was still a far distance away but closing in on us fast.
Activity to my left caught my eye, and I looked over to see Pops and one of Marcus’ people coming out of the access door to the towers. Pops was backing out, and he was carrying a stretcher in his hands. Sharon was beside him, holding up a plastic bag of liquid that was connected to whoever was on the stretcher by a slender thread of transparent tube. They quickly crossed the compound and disappeared down the cargo ramp.
Damn!
I consoled myself by thinking that at least someone had survived and was being treated. The person’s head was turned away from us, but his size suggested to me that it was probably Buck. That meant the other member of the machine gun crew, Pepper’s dad, was still up there. My insides did a few flip flops, but I knew I couldn’t spare any maudlin feelings at this time. I needed to keep bullets flying downrange, and the enemy heads down.
Pepper was watching the door to the towers, waiting to see if her father was going to come out. I saw the damage that the rocket had inflicted on the tower and knew the chances of that happening were slim. I was surprised to see that even one person had survived.
The main body of enemy foot soldiers had now closed to within a hundred and seventy-five yards. That put them close enough to deliver effective shots at us. The landscape in front of them now had no cover at all that would allow them to continue their slow advance, but that would soon cease to be an issue. With the big tank making its way up the hillside, they would have more than enough cover. They could line up behind the Stryker and follow it right through the open front gate. Then their twin fifty-cals would shred me, Pepper and everyone else defending our home. I was surprised at how easily I was able to accept the prospect of my imminent death. In truth, I was more concerned about no longer having time to be with Pepper and my father than dying and I resolved at that time to make the enemy pay dearly for depriving me of it. I couldn’t stop thinking about the futility of the whole situation because there was no need for this to be happening. It was being done for the sole purpose of allowing some people to force their will on other people.
I heard a sound over top of us and looked back to see a line of large bullets smashing into the remaining tower. Each bullet strike left a hole the size of a watermelon in the stone surface. Those were fifty caliber rounds, and their impacts showed me that the gunners on the tank were getting bold enough to risk a few quick shots before popping back down in their holes like whack-a-moles. The strikes on the tower showed me that they were getting close enough to target our sole remaining Ma Deuce nest at the top of the tower. Once they took that out, there would be nothing to stop them except the other M-240 operators and me.
Emma and the other grenadiers were still launching their loads over the wall, trying to score a hit on the hidden ground troops. They weren’t having much success, but their efforts did serve to keep the infantry from getting bolder. I kept pouring full auto fire at them whenever I saw a head pop up from behind cover. I saw one man unwisely standing up from behind a rock at regular intervals. He would shoot a full magazine of .556 at us from an M-4, then duck back down behind cover. It was almost too easy. I waited for his next appearance with my sights aimed at the point where he last rose up. When he popped up again, I caught him before he was able to deliver his next barrage. My burst propelled him backward, making his body jerk and shudder before collapsing.
All around me, others were also keeping the attacker’s heads down which gave us more freedom to target them safely. All of our M-240s were now engaged, and all of the gun trucks were either aflame or shredded husks. At least we wouldn’t have to worry about them or their machineguns when the tank arrived.
The smoke in the air was now so thick that my eyes were watering and Mona was experiencing a hacking cough. Pepper had tied a rag around her nose and mouth, and it seemed to be helping her. I looked around but didn’t see anything to use as a mask.
Every time I reloaded my gun the metal was growing increasingly hotter. Each bullet propelled from the weapon was the result of a small explosion inside the chamber which generated a considerable amount of heat. The M-240 was designed to handle the high temperatures…to a point. Engineers could frustrate the laws of physics only so far, and I knew we were getting close to that point. If we didn”t give the gun a chance to cool down, it would eventually seize up and quit functioning. The presence of the ground troops, however, was forcing me to continue shooting, keeping them from charging at us.
I was surprised to see the Major dashing by me on his way to the access door to the towers. His face was as red as I had ever seen on a person and he was shouting something into his walkie as he passed. Seconds after he went in, the shooting from the fifty stopped. A minute later he, Jimmy and Jaime all came out, and they were muscling the big gun through the door and into the open compound. Jimmy and Jaime put the weapon down on the concrete and ran back into the tower. They soon re-emerged carrying ammo crates. My instinct was to rush over and give them a hand but I had my own responsibilities.
Pepper had found a stained rag that she tore into two pieces, giving one to me and the other to Mona. It helped with the smoke, reducing the coughing but not the watering eyes. I reloaded a fresh ammo belt and started shooting at a low hill behind which I had seen a considerable number of enemy ground troops. I didn’t hit any of them, but I kept them from shooting at us.
The Major ran back over to the desk where Gayle was still sitting and shouted something into her ear. She nodded and reached for the remaining group of
phones on the tabletop.
There was an insanely loud blast out beyond the walls. I watched transfixed as the hill at which I had been shooting suddenly exploded, throwing rifles, backpacks and human body parts high into the air. Moments later, two more explosions erupted in the distance, each one occurring at a site in which the enemy infantry had taken cover. The carnage was unbelievable. Dead bodies and parts of bodies now littered the clearing leading up to the castle. I estimated twenty or more enemy corpses and a fair number of wounded who were crawling to safety or begging for help from their comrades.
The sight hit me with conflicting feelings. The dead enemy soldiers and their wounded, suffering brethren were human beings, and the images of them should have sickened me, but I purposely suppressed my humanity. The feelings of anger at their arrogance overwhelmed those of compassion for fellow human beings.
I found the sights on my weapon and aimed at a man who was running away from his recently detonated hiding place. His jacket was blackened and torn, and his left arm hung uselessly by his side. I put my sights at a spot where he would soon be and waited for him to run right into it. He arrived at my ambush point, and I pulled the trigger.
Nothing.
✽✽✽
Barrett was shaken awake from the action of being pulled out from under a pile of dirt and rocks. He hacked and spat dirt from his mouth and tried to wipe his eyes clean, but the gritty soil was clinging to his eyeballs. One of the two women who had extricated him leaned forward to shout into his ear so he could hear her.
“Try to keep your eyes opened. I’m going to flush them clean.”
Barrett complied. Defying his body’s natural inclination to squeeze his eyelids shut as the liquid poured into them. She did one, then the other and told him to blink, then flushed them again. His vision cleared.
“What the hell happened?”
The young blonde woman with the canteen was covered with dirt, and her eyebrow had a jagged laceration which was bleeding freely. She brushed dirt from Barrett’s hair and leaned close in to him. “I think they had this location mined, Sergeant.” Her head inclined to her left. “We weren’t the only ones, either.”
The sergeant twisted his head so he could look in the direction she had indicated. There were two more natural rises in the landscape behind which some of his people had taken cover. Both had been obliterated by explosives.
Barrett shook his head and spat again. He’d been afraid of this very thing and had told Arlo so, but the “Lieutenant” had given him specific instructions on the plan of attack. The younger man had been forced to comply because the rest of their army would be following the plan and he hadn’t had time to contact them and try to call it off. So it was that he had reluctantly gone through the motions even though he was aware of the holes in Arlo’s strategy. The intelligent move would have been to lead the attack with the Stryker. The armor of the big tank could stand up to anything the Hilltop people had thus far thrown at them. The two fifty-cals would have annihilated the towers and then busted its way through the gate. That was Barrett’s suggestion. Had it been followed, this whole thing would be over by now and fewer of their people would be lying dead or dying in the fields.
“That pompous, strutting peacock of an ass,” thought the sergeant.
Barrett didn’t know how long he’d been out, but he could see that his people were still pinned down by withering fire from the compound walls. That meant it hadn’t been too long. The dead bodies that littered the approach to the castle fueled his rage, not against the defenders, but Arlo. All of this had been unnecessary. If he had just listened to his second-in-command instead of the blood-crazed little man who led the gang, they would now be setting up camp for the night, somewhere far from here.
He returned his attention to the battle at hand. Arlo’s voice was coming through over the walkie, ordering the infantry to continue pushing forward. Barrett grabbed his walkie and thumbed the button. “Attention all non-coms. Pull everyone back to positive cover. Repeat; pull everyone back to cover positions.”
Arlo’s radio response was immediate. “Negative, Sergeant. Continue your attack. That is an order.”
“Stick your orders up your ass, Arlo. All ground troops follow my orders. Pull up and wait for the Stryker’s arrival. Let’s let our brave leader actually lead for a change.”
✽✽✽
I saw the enemy start to pull back and hoped that meant they were withdrawing, at least temporarily. That would give us a chance to help our wounded. I could see at least six of them nursing gunshot injuries. Another five or so people were lying about in positions that made it obvious they were never getting up again. I opened the action on the M-240 to let it cool faster. The heat had finally swollen the internal parts, seizing up the action.
The girls both seemed okay even though Pepper was still showing the effects of knowing her father was probably dead. With the enemy in retreat, I left my post and helped her sit down with her back against the wall and went over to the drone table.
Dwayne and the Major were both watching the monitor and the video projection from the fixed wing. I put my hands on Dwayne’s shoulders as I peeked over to see the feed. It looked like the enemy infantry had withdrawn to better cover behind the big swell of land that led up to the long approach to the castle. The Stryker was churning its way up the hillside behind them. I figured we had maybe two minutes until it got close enough to start showering us with fifty caliber rounds. We would fight back, of course, but the tank would shed our bullets like a wet dog sheds water.
Around us, everyone was preparing for what we knew was coming. People were either running around at top speed, performing a myriad of tasks or they were sitting numbly in groups or by themselves, some crying, others just…waiting. There were still bullets hitting the top of the wall, but they were no danger as long as we kept our heads down. I was surprised to see Dr. Tashnizi attending to the wounded. He was wearing a white dress shirt that was streaked with blood and was wrapping gauze around a young woman’s arm. The only good thing happening was that a slight breeze had come up, dispersing the smoke from the battle.
The Major was involved in studying the video feed, so I didn’t say anything to him. I turned away, intending to go back and spend whatever time we had left with Pepper, but then I saw Gayle. She was sitting at the folding table we had put out for her. Her head was down on the tabletop, and her shoulders were shaking as she cried.
I tried to be comforting as I knelt next to her chair. “Hey, it’s gonna be all right.” I knew it was a lame cliché, but it was all I could think of to say.
She raised her head to look at me, her chin quivering. “We both know that’s not true, Virgil.” She used her sleeve to wipe at her nose. “Even if we were to beat them, I have to live with the fact that I’ve helped kill dozens of people today.” Her eyes brimmed with tears. She dug a used tissue from her pocket and blew her nose.
I was kind of at a loss as to what to say so I decided on stating the obvious. “Yeah, well you also saved a lot of lives, Gayle. Every person that your bombs took out would have been killing you and all of your friends, given the chance. They’re trying to kill us so they can continue their way of raping and killing others. This is a simple case of good guys versus bad guys. Someone has to stop them, Gayle.”
She looked hard at me for several seconds before I saw a slight smile tug at her mouth. She nodded and wiped at her eyes with the backs of her wrists again.
There was nothing more I could say to Gayle, and I wanted to spend whatever time I had left with Pepper. I jogged back over to where she and Mona were sitting. I sat next to Pepper and put an arm around her, drawing her close. She snuggled in and put her head on my shoulder.
“I love you, Virgil,” she said. “I think I’ve loved you since the day I first saw you.”
I hugged her tighter. “Same here, Babe. And I’ll always love you.”
Mona began crying. I realized she was facing death all by herself. “Come ove
r here,” I patted the ground next to me. “You’re one of us, Mona.” She sniffled as she crawled around us on hands and knees before settling in on my other side. I put my arm around her, and the three of us just sat there together, saying nothing.
What was there to be said?
A few seconds later my walkie crackled. “Okay, people, here they come.”
✽✽✽
Arlo tentatively stuck his head up through the portal and searched around until he could see the smoke billowing still from the ruined tower.
“You’re right,” he acknowledged. “The other tower isn’t shooting.”
Banner shouted back over the roar of the diesel engine. “Told you.”
“I wonder why?”
The gunner pulled his head back into the vehicle so Arlo could hear him. “They know we’re getting into range. Once we get within three hundred yards, we can stop and take aim without bouncing over these damned hills and rocks. That other tower will be an easy target.”
Arlo smiled at Banner’s prediction and pushed the button on the intercom. The driver of the Stryker, a young woman, known to Arlo only as Bates, answered.
“Yeah?”
Arlo fought the urge to chastise her for the lack of formality while speaking to her superior officer. “Can’t we go any faster?”
There was a slight delay in her response as the tank rose up high in front before slamming down on the other side of a rise. “Not unless you want me to tip us over. We’re a lot more top heavy than those pickup trucks. I have to hit these hills at a good angle and at low speed or the shift in weight could roll us over.”
Arlo wondered if that was true or she was just being difficult. Bates and Banner had served together on a Stryker crew in Afghanistan so she should know what she was doing. It just seemed to be taking so long.
The ex-lieutenant climbed back into the portal and grasped the hand-holds for the big machinegun, mentally urging the tank to go faster. He wanted his people to see him at the controls of the big gun as they swept into the stronghold, destroying everything in their path. He figured that sight would buttress his image as a warrior.
Virgil's War- The Diseased World Page 47