Hyena Dawn

by Christopher Sherlock

  ‘Put your hands up, get out of the jeep. Watch it, Guy, I know there’s a gun beside you. That’s better. Now, get over to the garage.’

  Larry walked out of the bank, an Uzi carbine in his hands and an ugly expression on his face. He moved with his back to the road, some two metres from them.

  ‘Larry, you fucking bastard!’

  ‘Shut it, Gallagher.’

  Rayne guessed Larry’s plan. He shouldn’t have given him the map showing him the pick-up point. Larry would lock them in the garage next to the bank, drive out to Lois and tell him they’d all been killed. He was the only one who knew about Lois, because Rayne hadn’t yet been able to tell Michael Strong or Bunty about him. Larry would probably fly out of the country with Lois, then kill him and keep the money for himself. It was that simple, and that disgusting.

  ‘Move it to the garage. Don’t try anything stupid.’

  They moved slowly away from the jeep and towards the open doors of the garage. Now they would be caught by the Russians, and that meant certain death. How could Larry do this to them? It was worse than shooting them in cold blood.

  Suddenly there was the noise of a vehicle in the street behind them. Larry turned momentarily, and Mick took the opportunity to go for him. He sprinted forwards, aiming for Larry’s back.

  Mick was almost on him when Larry turned back again. Rayne shouted out in desperation, ‘Mick!’

  Mick grabbed the muzzle of the Uzi as Larry pulled the trigger. He spun away from the barrel as the bullets hit him in the stomach.

  Larry pointed the weapon towards Rayne and Guy. ‘Don’t try anything, you fuckers, or you’ll go the same way.’

  Rayne kept his eyes on the Russians who were jumping out of the truck down the road. He saw one of them raise his rifle.

  Larry screamed out as the bullets tore into his back. Pock­marked with blood, he fell forwards. Rayne ran to pick up the Uzi. He moved in close behind the wall and pushed the muzzle over the top, letting off a quick burst of fire. There was a scream, and the sound of metal crashing into concrete. When he looked over the wall it was to see one Russian lying in the road clutching his leg and three more running for cover. He aimed again and hit one man before he made it to safety. Then he ducked to avoid the burst of fire that came from the other two. Mick was lying on the ground next to him, holding his stomach and trying desper­ately to get up.

  ‘Stay down, Mick, they’ll cut you to pieces.’

  Guy crawled up beside them and lobbed a grenade at the wall their two attackers were hiding behind. They ducked, and waited for the explosion.

  Seconds later there was an ear-shattering thump and they all made for the jeep. Guy carried Mick and dumped him in the passenger seat, then he leapt into the driver’s seat and started the engine. As they pulled away, the firing started again and Rayne opened up at the wall. They accelerated up the main street, leaving the bank far behind.

  Guy pushed the jeep as hard as the engine would go. Each time the revs reached bursting point he would change gear and the vehicle shot forward. Mick kept on screaming out with pain, but there was nothing they could do.

  Rayne slapped a fresh magazine into the Uzi and grabbed another from the floor of the jeep. Now he had two machine-guns, one in each hand, and he braced himself against the back of the jeep, ready to fire the moment they ran into trouble. Mick gradually won his battle against the pain of his bullet wounds and managed to hold a Galil assault rifle in his hands. It wasn’t a moment too soon. As they rounded the next corner, they ran straight into an ambush.

  A truck had been turned over, blocking their path, and gunfire erupted from both sides of the road. Rayne opened up on the left side and immediately there was a reduction in fire. Mick pumped a couple of carefully positioned shots into the bush on the right as Guy aimed the jeep at the gap between the left side of the road and the roof of the truck. They tore towards it, travelling at over a hundred kilometres per hour.

  Rayne kept firing into the bush. Bullets whacked into the side of the jeep. They made it through, immediately running into thick smoke from the burning fuel tanks near the roadside. Gunfire was everywhere, anti-aircraft shells kept on exploding in the sky above them.

  The rain lashed down harder and the jeep slewed from side to side as it careered along the dirt road at top speed. Guy fought with the steering wheel, battling to keep the vehicle on a straight course without losing speed.

  It was impossible to tell which direction trouble would come from next. They had to get away from the centre of the action as quickly as possible.

  Everything had gone horribly wrong.

  Major Balashov, first-in-command at Beira airport, watched the Lear jet climb skywards. Visibility was bad, and the plane was almost out of sight although it had only just left the runway.

  ‘What the hell?’

  Balashov nearly fell over backwards as he saw an explosion at the rear of the plane. It looked very much as if it had been hit by a ground-to-air missile, but who could have fired it?

  He yelled at the radio operator. ‘Make immediate contact! They must try to land if it’s not already too late!’

  The plane plummeted earthwards, smoke pouring from the rear, but the engine did not seem to be on fire. Balashov looked on with grim fascination.

  To his surprise, the pilot regained control and the plane began to climb again. The radio crackled into life. ‘We have slight rear end damage. Will continue to Nairobi.’

  Balashov shrugged his shoulders. If they wanted to live dangerously, then why should he interfere. Now he must find out who had fired the missile at the plane, and why. He headed for the stairs - then fell forwards as the building shook from the force of an enormous explosion.

  Bernard was trembling. He’d been afraid before, but never like this. The whole plane had shaken as the missile hit it. At first he’d thought they were finished and he’d gripped the edge of his seat, powerless to do anything.

  One name sprang to mind. Vorotnikov. The man was cut from the same cloth as himself, totally ruthless.

  He heard the pilot’s voice come over the intercom. ‘Jolly close shave that, sir, I can tell you. It’s a damn good job we didn’t try to get back on the ground. Look down out of your port window, the whole place is going up.’

  The charges had ripped across the runway, tearing it to pieces. At the same moment, they rocketed ten of the closest planes, then moved forward to fire on more of them. The wave of heat was unbelievable. Michael Strong tried to make a quick mental calculation of the value of the planes exploding around him, but gave up.

  The rocket attack on the Lear jet had preceded their assault by seconds. At first he’d been furious because he thought the rocket had been fired by one of the men under his command. However the incident had worked to his advantage because all the Russians in the control tower were looking upwards at the stricken jet when the runway blew up. The sleek white plane had skimmed effortlessly away through the clouds of rain. Michael Strong wondered if the men inside knew just how lucky they’d been.

  The attack on the ground was now going better than he’d expected. The planes were catching light fast; aviation fuel was running out of them, shooting out across the runway in sheets of flame.

  It was only now that they were out of Beira, that they could afford to stop. Guy continued the breakneck pace along the main dirt road until he found an innocuous-looking turn-off, and sped down it for some metres before swinging hard into a clump of thick bush and killing the engine.

  Mick was far more seriously hurt than Rayne had first thought. They laid him down on a groundsheet and Rayne carefully removed Mick’s jacket and undershirt to get a better look at the bullet wounds. He felt sick when he saw the ugly line of holes running across Mick’s belly. It was clear the Rhodesian didn’t have a chance of surviving, in fact it was nothing short of a miracle that he was still alive.

  Mick tried to speak, but dark blood came out of his mouth and he coughed badly. Guy held a water bottle to his lip
s and he managed to take several deep gulps.

  ‘Dammit, sir,’ he whispered, ‘I knew Larry was a bad bugger, but I never thought the bastard could shoot me so close up in cold blood.’

  His face was white and his body was very cold. His eyes gazed fixedly in the distance, and tears ran down the side of his face, though he wasn’t openly crying. Then the pain hit him again and he pulled Rayne towards him, staring at him desperately.

  ‘Don’t blame yourself for this, sir. Listen, I’ve got a little girl, her mother can’t stand the sight of me, but Tracey still needs the money. Just. . . just make sure she gets it, will you?’

  ‘I promise, Mick.’

  ‘Just make sure she gets it.’

  His eyes closed and his head dropped to one side. Tears started to Rayne’s eyes, tears which he made no attempt to hide from Guy. They’d been through so much together. If only he’d obeyed his instincts, he would never have recruited Larry Preston.

  He stood with Guy in the pouring rain, not saying anything, the dead man lying between them. In the distance there was continuous rifle fire. Rayne guessed it must be coming from the airport.

  The first sally came at them a minute after the explosions began. Fifteen Russian soldiers charged them, all armed with AK-47’s. Michael Strong gave the command to fire.

  The Russians immediately dived for cover and retaliated. For five minutes bullets lashed into the ground all round Michael. But his men were good, and slowly but surely eliminated every one of the enemy soldiers. After that, no one else tried anything for a while.

  Then small pockets of fire began erupting from the area round the control tower, and he gave the command to have it rocketed. The missile smacked into the top of the tower, blowing the roof off and setting the control-room on fire. Men poured out of the bottom door and ran for cover. Another group of Russians was desperately trying to put out one of the planes with a fire- extinguisher, but to no avail.

  The Colonel could see that there was complete breakdown of command. Men were running around directionless; officers screamed out orders, but no one obeyed them.

  Now would be a good time to detonate the next set of charges. These had been carefully laid next to the supply store, which he was sure contained large numbers of weapons and high explos­ives. The more devastation he caused, the better.

  He pushed the plunger down hard and blew up the barracks.

  ‘You can’t blame yourself,’ Guy said. ‘I would have hired Preston, he was a bloody good soldier, but he was also a greedy man.’

  Together they dragged Mick’s body over to some boulders, and covered it with earth and stones. They worked in silence, grim-faced, and when they had finished they stood still for a moment, taking a last look at their comrade’s grave.

  It was as they were moving back to the jeep that Rayne heard the noise. Immediately he gestured for Guy to get down. They each picked up an assault rifle and moved carefully into the bush. Then they crouched down and waited.

  For a while all they could hear was the dripping of water in the leaves of the surrounding trees, and the far-off sounds of men at war. With the soldier’s instinct they waited patiently, listening for other more distinctive sounds. It was a safe bet that if they had heard men in the bush, then the men would also have heard them. It would be a war of nerves to see who would move first.

  At last there was a faint rustle in the bush not ten metres away from them. They saw a shape moving stealthily towards the jeep, and another appeared just behind it. The one in front was definitely carrying a gun. At first Rayne thought they were going to investigate the jeep, but instead they continued past it. He gestured to Guy to start moving in behind them. They kept some twenty metres apart and began to close in.

  ‘Halt! Drop your weapons!’

  Rayne shouted the command in Portuguese and prepared to open fire. The two figures stopped dead in their tracks but the one in front still held onto his weapon even though he did not turn round.

  ‘Drop it, or you’re dead.’

  This was it, thought Rayne, another second and he’d open fire.

  The man let the weapon drop to the ground. A desperation seemed to take hold of his frame and Rayne saw his shoulders sag.

  ‘Put your arms on top of your head. Both of you.’

  They obeyed the instruction and Guy sprinted forward and picked up the weapon.

  ‘Don’t try anything. You’re both covered.’

  Rayne moved closer, anxious to find out more but still very wary. ‘Turn round.’

  One of them turned round, the other seemed to hesitate but then followed suit.

  Rayne found himself staring at an enormous black man. The face radiated authority. The figure next to him seemed tiny by comparison, a dirty-faced white boy. They both stared at him in horror, and it was only then that he realised he must be covered in Mick’s blood. They looked quite desperate, and he realised that whatever they were up to it had little to do with the ordinary military operations conducted in the area.

  ‘We’ll have to tie you up and leave you at the roadside.’

  Rayne had continued to speak in Portuguese but the black man replied to him in English. ‘I don’t know who you are, I don’t care. But if you leave us by the side of the road they will kill us. We have to get away. Keep me if you have to, but let him go.’ The other figure turned to Rayne. ‘We’re no threat to you, whoever you are. Let us go.’

  Rayne and Sam

  To Guy’s horror Rayne dropped his rifle and ran forward. The black man moved to block him, but stopped as Guy’s rifle came up to his chest; the white man screamed as Rayne moved forward, ‘No, no, no! You bastard!’

  It was then Guy realised that the man was in fact a woman. ‘For God’s sake, Sam, it’s me!’

  The woman stepped back a few paces, looking at Rayne, and then flung her arms round him.

  ‘Rayne, Rayne, I thought you were going to kill me. God, what’s happened to you?’

  ‘There’s no time to explain. We’ve got to get out of here.’

  He held her tight, still not really able to believe that it was her. Everything had changed. Now he could get the hell out of this place.

  Guy saw the black man staring in complete amazement. That makes two of us, he thought to himself. Then he remembered about the woman Rayne had been searching for.

  Rayne could not believe his good fortune, could not believe it had happened. He turned to Guy and the black man.

  ‘We need a few minutes alone, I know there’s not much time but it’s important.’

  The black soldier and Guy sidled uneasily back to the jeep. After a bit, Guy put down his Galil and pulled out a packet of cigarettes. He offered them to the black man and then took one for himself. The seconds were ticking by, seconds that could spell the difference between life and death, but Guy knew that whatever Rayne wanted to say to this woman, it was important. The black man spoke first.

  ‘You’re crazy, you’ll never get out of here alive. On foot we have a good chance, in a jeep you will be ambushed.’

  ‘We’re flying out of here. The rest of our men are attacking the airport. If they fail, we’re finished - the Russians will blow us out of the sky.’

  Tongogara stared at the blood on Guy’s uniform. ‘You’ve been hit?’

  ‘No. One of the men with us in the bank decided he’d like the money for himself. He turned on us.’

  ‘Money always leads to corruption.’

  ‘Where are you going?’

  ‘North, to Malawi. There I will wait till independence comes to Zimbabwe, which will be quickly. Then I will move down into the new Zimbabwe where there will be much work to be done. I want a peaceful life after all these years of war.’

  Guy regarded the black man with respect. This was no ordinary soldier.

  ‘It was you who blew up the fuel tanks?’

  Tongogara grimaced, then stared at the Frenchman. ‘Sam and myself. Once one tank went up, the rest caught very quickly.’

  ‘Bu
t how did you get away?’

  ‘I think the Russians thought it was an air attack. They just kept on firing up into the sky.’

  ‘Wasn’t the woman a hindrance?’

  ‘No. Sam’s a brilliant shot.’ Tongogara looked away to where Rayne and Sam were hidden in the trees. ‘I think she’s just found someone she’s been looking for for a long time.’

  Guy noted the sadness with which he said this and knew that behind the simple words there was a world of feeling.

  Sam stood looking at Rayne in silence, a hundred different emotions coursing through her body. In the surprise of his arrival she hadn’t had time to think, but maybe that was good because it meant she had shown exactly how she felt about him - and in the same moment she realised that he had reciprocated.

  Now she looked at him, she could see how he had changed in the short time they had been away from each other. He was thinner, and faint lines had begun to appear on his face. She noted that although he was dressed in a smart casual suit, an assault rifle lay in his hands, and his suit was caked with blood. What the hell was he doing in this awful place and how did he propose to get out of it?

  ‘I wanted to see you desperately but I was ordered to leave immediately.’

  ‘You left the army, you left me. I was furious; bitter too. I couldn’t understand how you could drop me so easily.’

  ‘It was important that my cover remained perfect.’

  ‘Important! Fuck you, Rayne Gallagher, aren’t I important? What are you doing here, trying to kill a few more blacks for the glory of Rhodesia?’

  The next minute she was in his arms sobbing.