Ancients: An Event Group Thriller

by David L. Golemon

  “Holy shit,” Mendenhall said as his light caught the large and intimidating features of two statues along the far wall. “I think we hit the right spot.”

  “Now, that’s impressive,” one of the soldiers said as he looked at the closest twelve-foot statue. “Who is it?”

  “Zeus,” Mendenhall answered. “Listen,” he said.

  The two Special Forces men quieted as they shone their lights around the earthen room. The twin statues of Zeus, on either side of a long and dark corridor, watched them as they looked around. Will’ shone his flashlight down the eight-foot-high corridor and caught sight of a sloping ledge in the distance.

  “When these guys dug a hole, they really dug one,” Will said as he glanced down and noticed something in the outer limits of his light’s range.

  “What in the hell—” He leaned down and felt the dark earth. It was wet, and as he held his fingers to the light, he saw that they were red with blood. It had been there for a while but, without the sun to dry it out, remained moist. As he aimed his light around the ground, he saw that he was standing in a large stain that had yet to soak entirely into the soil.

  One of the soldiers stepped past Will and started forward.

  “Major Dutton wants this recon done ASAP,” he said as Mendenhall reached out and tried to stop him.

  Leekie had briefed every team member who was to enter the dig about the intelligence of ancient people when it came to protecting their property.

  The staff sergeant had taken only four steps, and then his fifth footstep depressed a patch of soil covering a pressure plate with a connection to a sealed ceramic jar. The jar broke and released salt acid that had become stronger over the centuries. It burned through an ancient spun cable of copper, which snapped with a loud ping and sent a solid wall of razor-sharpened bronze down on top of the soldier.

  Mendenhall watched in horror as the fifteen-foot-wide wall came down, slicing cleanly through the soldier’s body, the backside of which stayed upright. The wall stayed in place as the horror of half a man peeled away from the wall. Will ran forward and started to bend down, but then he felt it was a waste of time. Instead, he placed his hands against the razor-edged wall and pushed up. The wall slid into the cave’s ceiling as easily as a window blind. Once Mendenhall saw the other half of the soldier, he turned away, but not before he thought about the bloodstain that he’d seen moments before the sergeant tripped the booby trap.

  Mendenhall slowly pulled the 9-millimeter from the back of his pants and looked around with renewed interest, knowing that they had not been the first to enter the cave.

  Leekie was staring down into the hole and was becoming anxious when there was no immediate word from Mendenhall. She stood and brushed sand from her pants and then left to find her repelling equipment. When she returned, she climbed to the edge of the tunnel after tying her rope off to the spikes.

  She smiled at her American team members and was about to push off from the edge when the world exploded around her. She was thrown over the lip of the shaft by a blast she never saw coming. Her belly ring caught the rope but her momentum, plus her weight, was too much for the twist of rope to catch and she fell down the shaft.

  She felt the rush of cooler air and came awake enough to reach for the rope. Her grasp slowed her momentum, cutting her speed in half, and then by a quarter, until her back struck the cool earth below.

  The Special Ops team returned fire at the low-flying helicopters after the first volley of Hellfire missiles struck the low foundations of the mosque. The old AH-1 Cobra attack helicopters were legend in aviation and had earned the respect of ground soldiers the world over.

  The Coalition pilots chosen for this ambush were very good. One was Israeli trained and the other British. They attacked Major Dutton’s ground element with devastating effect. Twenty-millimeter explosive rounds struck positions and tore into flesh and sinew with ease. Dutton was lucky thus far, as only three of his men lay dead after the first pass of the two Cobras. The major saw that they could not stay out in the open and ordered the platoon to the protection of the crumbling mosque.

  Once the major had dived behind one of the low foundations, he pulled out a small transmitter similar to the one Collins was carrying. He pushed the Transmit button and said two words: “Feather River!”

  The first of the two Cobra gunships came low over a scrub dune and loosed a barrage of rockets that struck the crumbling walls of the mosque. Several soldiers and diggers were buried alive as the explosions tore through the ancient stone.

  “Are you ready for the surprise of your life, assholes?” Dutton screamed at the second Cobra as it made a low pass and started strafing positions where his men had dug in.

  There was a low rumble coming from the south and Dutton smiled in anticipation. These jerks don’t know who they’re messin’ with, he thought.

  Mendenhall and the remaining sergeant ran back the way they had come, jumping over the line of pressure devices that activated the deadly trap and separated the cave from the manmade excavation at the rear. The slope was all but forgotten when the attack started above them. Heavy thumping and explosions sounded as they came closer to the shaft. Mendenhall reached Leekie first and knelt beside her. The Special Forces sergeant looked up the shaft and saw a body fall against the opening and drape over the edge for a moment, then fall toward them.

  “Look out!” he called.

  The sergeant pulled Will and the unconscious Leekie clear of the hole just as one of the Ethiopian laborers hit the ground with a large hole in his chest. The young sergeant quickly ran forward and checked the man.

  “He’s dead,” he said and then ran for one of the dangling ropes.

  “Well, the doc’s alive, just had the wind knocked out of her,” Will said as he looked up. “Hey, don’t do that!”

  The sergeant had reached one of the ropes and had started to pull himself up, ignoring Mendenhall’s order.

  “Sergeant, I order you to—”

  The sergeant suddenly fell back down. He hit with a thud and Mendenhall saw the perfectly round hole in his forehead.

  “Dammit,” he cursed. He then quickly gathered Leekie up and made for the darkness of the cave.

  Collins was just getting ready to move down to assist the defense of the mosque but Everett forcibly stayed him with a hand.

  “Jesus, Jack, we have company!” he said, looking through his binoculars.

  Collins focused his field glasses to the left and saw several vehicles approaching the area between the low dunes. Then he looked skyward as the roar of jet engines screamed above them. Two F-15 Eagles were making a run on the attacking Cobras. This was Dutton’s sure-fire backup plan. Jack again lowered the view of his glasses and saw that the vehicles had stopped and men were removing tarps from the backs of trucks.

  “Damn! It’s an ambush!” Jack said as he clenched his teeth. “They were expecting Dutton to have air cover!”

  Everett followed Jack’s lead and focused on the vehicles.

  “SAMs!”

  “Those Eagle pilots are sitting ducks,” Collins said as he dropped his glasses and reached for the radio on his belt. He turned to the frequency that the expedition used and hit the Transmit button.

  “American aircraft, this is friendly asset on the ground to the south. Abort your attack run, I repeat, abort your run, we have mobile SAMs tracking you from—”

  Collins stopped talking because he knew he was too late to save the Americans as four brown-painted missiles left their launch platforms.

  The two F-15s screeched in low and the lead pilot targeted the first Cobra in line. He was about to fire his 20-millimeter cannon into the thin armor of the attack chopper when his threat receiver started going crazy. The American pilot was too late. As he started to abort his attack and two SAMs apiece tore into their airframes.

  Major Dutton, in his anger, actually forgot where he was for the briefest of moments and stood as the American aircraft disintegrated right before his ey
es. As he cursed the trap that had been set, his body jerked as ten 20-millimeter rounds tore through his body. The stream of death reached out toward the mosque and the remnants of the Special Forces team.

  “Ryan!” Jack called as he stripped his pack away, opened it, and pulled out several extra clips of ammunition for his Beretta. “Get over here.”

  Everett anticipated Collins’s order and started stripping away all his unnecessary gear. He reached into his pack and pulled out an MP-5 with a folding stock. He took out a bandolier of ammunition and slung it around his neck. Then, as Ryan approached, he tossed him his pack.

  “Weapon and ammo only,” Everett said as he placed a magazine into the MP-5 and charged the handle, chambering a round.

  “Damn, what in the hell did I miss?”

  Jack reached into his pocket, pulled out his small transmitter, and hastily broke off the plastic cover that protected the red button inside. He pushed the button until it clicked and then tossed it away. He chambered a round into his Beretta and then looked at Ryan and Everett.

  “We have a quarter mile to cover. I don’t know if the doc is still alive, but I know Will must already be inside of whatever Leekie found in the tower’s base. We have one goal: make sure these bastards do not get the diamond. Ready … Go!”

  The three men broke and ran toward the mosque.

  Four additional mobile SAM vehicles arrived and took up station behind the same dune that had hidden the first four. A Land Rover broke free from the group of trucks. The small vehicle headed for the mosque and the attackers did not see the three Americans break and run for the site below. They kept to the backside of the dunes as they ran.

  The Land Rover was equipped with a .50-caliber machine gun that was perched on the top, and a gunner started firing at the few men left inside the mosque’s walls. The two Cobras kept swooping in and firing streams of 20-millimeter rounds into the piles of rubble.

  The four-wheel-drive SUV stopped only fifty feet outside the walls and the gunner continued to fire into the ruins. One Special Forces sergeant stood and loosed a full magazine at the Coalition vehicle and managed to drop the gunner, while the rest of his bullets ricocheted off the Rover’s armored skin and glass. A circling Cobra fired its remaining rockets and killed the sergeant before he could take cover again.

  The vehicle slowly started to advance when the return fire from the mosque fell off to nothing. Three men jumped out and ran for cover. One of the Cobras took up a hovering position a hundred feet over the mosque and covered the ground team as they cautiously approached.

  Suddenly, the last remaining Green Beret stood and arrogantly aimed a small tube at the hovering Cobra. The Stinger let loose with a screech as it left the launcher. The three men fired at the man who stood bravely watching the missile’s exhaust trail as it tracked the Coalition’s Cobra.

  The Cobra pilot turned as soon as his missile-warning system lit up. He popped chaff and flares in an attempt to escape. However, the distance was far too short and the Stinger was fast. The small but powerful missile made impact on the engine housing on the starboard side and tore through into the engine itself. The warhead detonated and blew the engine and rotors entirely free of the airframe. The attack chopper simply fell one hundred feet into the largest section of the mosque and exploded.

  The three Coalition men ducked the flying debris and then quickly recovered. The first man to fire took a quick and terrible vengeance for their downed pilot. He fired and struck the last of Major Dutton’s ground team. The man fell through the tower doorway and lay dead in the sand. The three men stood and waved the second Cobra in to safeguard them as they checked the ruins for survivors.

  Collins, Everett, and Ryan saw the Green Beret attack on the Cobra as they neared the last dune before they had to break cover.

  “Good for him,” Everett said as he saw the chopper explode.

  The three men slowed and then slid into the sand as they came to the edge of last dune. Jack looked around and saw the last of the three attackers enter the tower base. He grimaced as he heard shots fired and screams of men as they were shot down in cold blood.

  “Goddammit!” Jack said as he ducked back. “Dutton should have known better. With the mosque around them, they could have held off a brigade for half a damn day. We’ve got to take out that last Cobra.”

  “The only way we can do that is have a bunch of bullets shot at us.”

  “I’ve got to take the Land Rover; we need that fifty-cal.”

  “If we had just one damn grenade,” Everett said.

  “Mr. Ryan, you’re the fastest. If I take out the fifty-gunner from here, can you sprint the distance before another takes his place?”

  Ryan was breathing heavily and it wasn’t just because they had run a quarter of a mile. He was frightened.

  “No; I would have to start before you take a shot. It won’t take long for someone to pop up and start shooting at us again. I’ll run, and when he turns to fire I’ll take him out. That will give me about twenty yards to cover and the time I need.”

  Collins looked at the small navy pilot and nodded.

  Everett shook his head and tossed Jack the MP-5. He knew that Ryan had never lacked for balls, but what made him so convincing was that he was always scared to death. Scared men got the job done.

  “Don’t be shy about wasting ammo, flyboy—empty a full magazine of nine-mil through that sunroof of theirs,” Everett said, and then he pulled out his own Beretta.

  “Right,” Ryan said as he looked at the colonel. “Don’t miss, or my boat-surfing days are over.”

  Collins was silent as he extended the retractable stock and then wrapped the MP-5s shoulder strap around his forearm. He raised the rear site and adjusted for distance. Then he placed the stock into his shoulder.

  “Okay, Colonel,” Ryan said, taking three deep breaths. “Do some of that black-operations stuff you’re famous for,” he said as he suddenly burst free of the dune and ran as if the devil himself were chasing him.

  As luck would have it, Ryan broke cover just as the remaining Cobra turned and gained a better vantage point. That was where his luck ended. The gunner on the top of the Land Rover must have had excellent instincts for danger, because before Ryan had taken five steps the gunner started turning the heavy weapon his way. To Ryan it was as if everything went into surreal slowness as he awaited the large-caliber rounds to hit his small body and tear it apart.

  Jack kept both eyes open as he aimed. In his peripheral vision he saw the long barrel of the .50-caliber turn in Ryan’s direction. Collins took a breath and then allowed half of the air out. Then he sighted again, taking his time. The sight was center-lined on the man’s throat. Jack figured that the MP-5 would bolt up at the split-second discharge of the bullet, so he accounted for recoil and pulled the trigger.

  Ryan saw the gunner smile as he continued to run. He knew the man had two fingers on the triggers of the machine gun, so he concentrated on running even faster. When he was sure he was done for, Ryan felt something buzz past his left ear. Just when he wondered if the colonel had forgotten about him, he saw the gunner’s head snap back, and then the barrel of the .50-caliber slowly rose into the air as the man fell back into the sunroof.

  Ryan covered the remaining distance without a rational thought in his head. Just before he reached the Land Rover, he knocked his sunglasses off and then hit the bumper perfectly and bounded up and onto the roof. He actually started shooting before he had aimed into the cab, and several bullets hit the roof with a loud thud. Then he adjusted and fired directly into a man who was rising to take the gunner’s place, and then he shot the driver, who was quite shocked at his own death.

  Jack stood and along with Everett made a dash for the mosque. At the same moment, the last Cobra completed its turn and saw the two men break from the sand dune. It banked hard and made a run for the sprinting men.

  Ryan saw the Cobra, but it had not seen him. He jumped through the sunroof and landed on something soft a
nd wet. He took the handles of the large weapon and hoped he remembered how to fire the thing. He was short enough that he didn’t need to lean down to bring the barrel into the air. He aimed at the attacking Cobra and fired. The first five rounds flew out of the barrel and then the weapon jerked out of Ryan’s hands, almost breaking his fingers. He cursed and took the .50-caliber again and aimed. He braced himself this time and cut loose a long stream of bullets. He saw the tracers and adjusted his fire until it crossed paths with the slow-moving Cobra just as it started firing its 20-millimeter cannon at Collins and Everett. Ryan’s fire hit the cockpit and smashed through the canopy glass and into the pilot and the weapon’s man.

  Ryan’s jaw fell as he watched the Cobra turn over and fall away. The rotors smashed into the scrub and the small helicopter erupted in a fireball.

  Fifty yards away, Jack and Carl had stopped and were looking at the downed Cobra and then back at Ryan. The small navy man waved quickly and then ducked as small-caliber rounds struck the Range Rover from the rear. When Ryan turned, he saw ten men running in his direction. It crossed his mind for a split second to turn the machine gun on the charging Coalition men, but he decided that he had pressed his luck just as far as he could for the day. He hopped out and ran to the mosque.

  Collins and Everett ran through the opening of the tower base and slammed right into two Coalition men who had entered unseen. Everett slammed the man so hard that he hit the rounded wall, and when he rebounded toward Carl, he shot him three times. The other didn’t live quite as long, as Collins in a last-second move raised his 9-millimeter and shot the man twice in the head. Everett almost shot Ryan as he entered the tower base.

  Jack didn’t wait for the others as he wrapped one of the three ropes around his right boot once and then took up a large loop in his right hand. Then, without hesitation, he pushed off into the shaft. Ryan and Everett followed. Ryan didn’t know how to rappel without the proper equipment, so he just grabbed the rope and went hand over hand until it started cutting and burning. As he slid down the rope, he passed Everett and Collins and hit the bottom with a thud.