by Sean Wilson
Within a matter of seconds, the two teams had assembled along the inside of the sandbags as illumination flares lit up the outside of the base, turning the perimeter into a brightly-lit killing ground. ‘Fucking dogs!’ The second squad’s team leader was breathing hard as he changed magazines and pointed his weapon back along the dusty pathway he’d just covered. ‘Dog picked up on a dead sentry as we were finishing up and then everything went noisy. Jessie took a hit in the leg and shit, Mike, I’m really sorry but we fucked up’
Ducane checked his watch as his men began to acquire targets in the strange, flickering light from the flares that danced across the dust and gravel. The teams were hidden in deep shadow on the inside of the perimeter but the parachute flares clearly illuminated clusters of figures in Russian uniform advancing on the sandbags. Only five minutes to go before the explosions would begin to turn the heroin into smoke. Five minutes. They needed to buy themselves some time.
Mike passed the word, ‘Respirators’ and each man pulled on his mask. He keyed his throat microphone and spoke clearly and calmly. ‘Every second man. One round of Willie Pete. Fifty meters.’ The squad’s assault rifles were equipped with 40mm grenade launchers. White phosphorous rounds popped out of their launch tubes and landed in flaring sprays of incandescent heat. The tents in the immediate vicinity quickly burst into flame and soldiers staggered in circles, screaming as their uniforms fizzed and burnt with the searing, flickering chemical. Taking advantage of the confusion, Mike signalled the teams to move out and take up a new firing position further along the perimeter. They had to buy time and they still had to get out of the compound. Vehicle engines were roaring in the distance. Armoured vehicles.
Searchlights illuminated the perimeter and the situation was getting out of hand. They couldn’t make a break out of the compound and they couldn’t hold out against vastly superior numbers. They just needed a little more time. A few more minutes. And a prayer to the lords of war that the explosives hadn’t been discovered. Mike pointed to the sandbags behind him and urged his guys to start dragging them out of the defensive barrier and lay them in a low wall in front of them, creating some sort of cover from the advancing Russian troops. It was obvious they’d soon be discovered and it was time to even the odds a little. Ducane pointed to the missile tubes the guys had lugged all the way from the landing site. A dull roar followed by a thundering crash blew a hole in the row of sandbags where the teams had been positioned. The Russians were using their armour to attack. ‘OK, boys. Here they come. Gerry. You’re up. You should get a clear flank shot. Cook those bastards!’
Out of the gloom and dust and dancing shadows cast by the illumination flares, an armoured assault vehicle roared into view, belching clouds of diesel fumes and hammering the smoking sandbags with 20mm cannon fire. One squeeze of the trigger and the missile flew from its launch tube and punched a hole right in the side of the vehicle. A millisecond passed before the missile’s warhead detonated inside the confined space of the eight-wheeled vehicle. The blast shattered the interior before the over-pressure split it wide open in a boiling cone of flame and smoke. ‘Move, move, move!’ Mike shouted and the team scrambled further along the perimeter, two men helping the wounded mercenary who insisted on carrying his rifle and squeezing off shots in the direction of the Russian troops.
Thirty seconds to go. ‘Again! Make a wall!’ The team grabbed sandbags and dumped them in a loose pile in front of them to provide some semblance of cover before the Russians worked out where they were. It was only a matter of time before they were assaulted from both sides and then it was game over. Twenty seconds. AK rounds began to home in on their position, chewing up the sandbags in front and behind. ‘Watch the flanks!’ ‘Here they come, Mike!’ ‘Use the grenade launchers! Suppressing fire!’
There was a moment when the noise from the rifles and the explosions seemed to blend into a deafening curtain of sound, a moment when the men’s hearing turned to a constant whining and high-pitched metallic scream and that was when a louder, deeper series of explosions sent percussive pressure waves eddying through the camp. Mike felt the ripples against his chest and in his ears. The choppers and their aviation fuel had just blown up, high explosive charges ripping out the engines and igniting the fuel dump. That meant the warehouse charges should’ve ignited too. Not violently explosive like the choppers’ charges. Slower and ultimately more damaging. A massively intense ball of super-hot material creating a sphere of white hot flame that could ignite and incinerate metal. The heroin was cooking on a super-heated nano-thermite stove, the latest and best way to burn pretty much anything. Within seconds, pungent clouds of freshly cooked smack were coiling out of the smouldering warehouse and covering the base in a blanket of truly mind-blowing and deeply pleasurable opiates. Men staggered as they breathed in the smoke and collapsed in heaps of insensate oblivion. It was one of the biggest heroin love-ins in the history of the drug and no one was around who was willing or remotely able to record the event for posterity. The firing eased and finally ceased altogether. The surviving Russians were smacked completely out of their heads, lying on the cold, hard ground with beatific smiles on their faces, assault rifles loosely scattered in the dirt, hardly finding the energy to breathe. Mike looked out through the protective lenses of his respirator and couldn’t help smiling. Amongst the chaos and smoke and death and blood and destruction, he’d just neutralised an enemy force with a massively non-lethal dose of pure heroin. It was a moment to savour to the full. The Russian troops were chasing the dragon and ingesting industrial quantities of unadulterated smack. From warriors to hippies in a couple of breaths. He had no idea whether the smoke was dangerous or even lethal to the hundreds of troops sprawled out on the ground. The truth was he didn’t care one way or the other. What a way to win a fire fight. A fire fight with real fire and several tons of high-grade heroin! It was the stuff of legend and no one outside the DIA brass and a handful of senior movers and shakers in Washington would ever know about it. It wasn’t going to appear on the Russki six o’clock news, that was for sure. He signalled to his men and they stood up carefully, weapons at the ready, scanning the ground for possible targets. They made their way carefully back to the entry point on the perimeter, now blown wide open by Russian high explosive rounds. First team led the way through the minefield, two men from the second squad carrying the wounded man to ensure they all kept to the single file track that led to safety. Mike was the last man out, his outline lit up by the gouts of flame that leapt up from the blazing processing plant. He was still partially covered by the thick clouds of smoke billowing out of the warehouse. It was smack-head paradise and Mike was glad to be getting out. He adjusted the pack on his back, aware of the tightly-wrapped packages secured in his gear. He wasn’t leaving empty-handed after all.
The teams headed east from the Russian camp and took a break in the cover of a low rock formation to check their weapons, assess their ammo and water situation and to dress the wounded man’s leg. He could walk with support from one other man so the squad took it in turns to help the guy keep up with the determined pace that took them away from the Russian camp. Mike estimated that any search would probably focus on the nearest militia positions to the south. The DIA-sponsored cruise missile strike had drawn a lot of attention south so Mike and his guys headed east. As they moved into a rocky lay up position an hour before dawn and settled beneath their desert camo netting, they could hear helicopter turbines whining in the distance. The Russians were scouring the desert for whoever had attacked their base. God help anyone who got caught out in the open. No one would be safe. They’d blow up and shoot every goat herder and camel rider, any truck, car or bicycle they came across. By early morning, Mike could see dust clouds in the distance from armoured reconnaissance vehicles criss-crossing the sand. He nodded to himself, fully aware of how difficult it would’ve been to cross the terrain to the south and reach the evacuation point with hordes of seriously pissed off Russkis on their tails. Forget the DIA b
rass’s blithe optimism. They’d never have made it. Fact. DIA Central understood that their chances of survival were slim. Ducane had decided on a change of tactics. He’d worked out a better plan, a change of direction that would help to increase their chances of getting back alive.
As the day progressed, the Russian search perimeter widened and the team’s outlooks watched as armoured vehicles fanned out across the desert plateau, stopping to scan the horizon for signs of movement, hell bent on vengeance. They heard firing in the distance as reconnaissance teams shot up suspected targets. Word must’ve come down from the highest levels of the Russian government to put a lid on the catastrophe and find the men responsible. ‘Yeah’, thought Mike. ‘That must’ve cost you billions, you murdering sons of bitches.’ His only regret had been the absence of Spetsnaz forces. He still harboured a pathological desire to decorate the roadside with a neat line of sharpened wooden stakes, each one bearing the head of a Spetsnaz trooper. Even in their hide out with hundreds of Russian troops searching for him, the thought still made him smile.
As night fell and the Russian search helicopters strafed targets further to the south, Mike and his team shouldered their packs and headed east. There was still a risk that they would be discovered but the odds of survival had been improved with the change in the officially sanctioned escape plan. DIA brass would know the mission had been a success from the satellite imagery. It was impossible to miss the clouds of smoke and the charred remnants of the processing factory. Ducane correctly estimated their original rendezvous site would’ve been overrun by the Russians by now. And he was right. The Russians had brought in additional troops and were dropping search and destroy parties along the obvious routes to the south. If Mike’s party was discovered, they still had portable missiles, but any contact would betray their position and only delay the inevitable as the Russians switched their focus to the east. They’d be surrounded and the lucky ones would die in the fire fight. The unlucky ones would survive to be tortured and interrogated until a Russian soldier stepped forward and shot them in the back of the head with his service pistol. Not the happiest of thoughts when you were far from friendly forces and covering a lot of ground in a forced march with no hope of rescue.
Mike and two of his team were carrying miniature beacons in their gear, devices that could be activated to reveal their position to DIA Central Command. Sure, the devices could be switched on in an emergency but there was a risk they could also be picked up by Russian monitors. And since DIA Central were not planning on sending in the cavalry, there was no point in using the beacons. Mike and his highly-skilled team were on their own.
They were making good progress and the wounded man was coping very well with his patched up leg when Mike called a halt in a narrow dried-up river bed and gave the team a chance to rest and top up their fluids. The Russians were still far to the west and south, shooting up suspected militia positions and bombing villages and anything that was moving on hooves or wheels. The team heard jets in the night, flying in low to drop their high explosives on civilians and soldiers with equal abandon. It had been inevitable that the Russians would retaliate with overwhelming violence, destroying hospitals, schools, mosques and any building that might have been used by their enemies.
The following day, a Russian drone flew overhead, scanning the terrain and searching for targets. It meant the search was being widened but Mike’s team had blended flawlessly into the background, perfectly camouflaged amongst the low rocks and scrub, invisible to the pilotless aircraft that flew above them with its advanced optics and a rack of air to ground missiles. About an hour later, the team was woken by the distant sound of explosions, far away to the east. Mike scanned the horizon with his high resolution binoculars and picked up the wisps of smoke that pinpointed a drone attack. Probably a vehicle strike. One missile. One vehicle. The Russians killing anything that moved. Not necessarily significant because there were fewer targets in this part of the desert than in the southern stretch of terrain that marked the focus of Russian activity. By nightfall, Mike was ready to press on with their long trek away from the Russian base. As well as the extra weapons and ammo, he’d loaded up his guys with extra food and water, all adding to the weight they had to carry but at least the water was being consumed and reducing the burden one mouthful at a time. They were tough soldiers, thoroughly accustomed to handling endurance challenges, covering long distances with a heavy pack and weapons. But the desert had its own problems. Besides the obvious shortage of water, the men had to contend with the dry air and dust that could cause respiratory problems. Keeping hydrated was essential as their mucus membranes dried up and their lungs struggled to cope with the super dry air and dust. Mike noticed that more of the guys had started to cough up gobbets of phlegm and dust as the dry air affected their respiration. They were burning body fat on the march, inevitably short of the daily six thousand calories they would need to maintain their body weight. They had no choice. If they were going to survive, they had to keep going with whatever they could carry. There were no 7-11s in the desert. Ultimately, it would come down to their grit and determination to tough it out, to keep putting one boot in front of the other until they reached their destination.
Halfway through the night and Mike was called back to check on the wounded guy. It was obvious he was struggling. It was a tough march for the unwounded men so Mike could only express his admiration for the limping soldier’s courage. He knelt down by the exhausted mercenary and put a hand on the man’s shoulder.
‘How you doing, Jessie?’
‘Doin’ fine, boss. Just taking a break and then I’ll be ready to jog on out of this shit hole and buy up every cold brewskie in base camp.’
Mike smiled.
‘Listen up, Jessie. You’ve done great but I’m going to assign two guys to carry you.’
‘No way, boss. Fuck that! Leave me here and I’ll take care of any bastard Russki who shows up! I’ll be fine.’
Mike shook his head. ‘It’s part of the deal, Jessie. No one gets left behind. And that includes you.’
It would slow them down because the guys would have to take it turn to carry their wounded buddy and Mike would need to stop to replace the carriers every fifteen minutes at most. But there was no choice. You didn’t abandon your guys. You didn’t take them round the corner to put them out of their misery like a sick dog. It wasn’t ideal but Ducane had factored Jessie’s wound into the escape plan and he knew at some point that they’d have to carry the guy. Despite their fatigue and the ever present danger of being compromised, there was a lot of ribbing. Soldiers would always find a way to turn a crisis into a joke. It was an ancient coping mechanism and helped to keep their spirits up.
‘Shit, Jessie. Couldn’t you go on a diet, man?’
‘You did it on purpose, didn’t you? Anything to get me to carry you and your shit out of this goddamn open toilet!’
‘What have you been eating? You weigh a goddamn ton!’
‘Hey, nobody said you were supposed to enjoy being carried around like a Turkish princess on honeymoon, Jessie!’
‘Hope your bonus can cover the costs of this taxi ride.’
‘Yeah. The meter’s been running on triple-time since we blew up Russkiville.’
Despite the pain and exhaustion, Jessie couldn’t help smiling.
‘Faster, you sonsabitches! I’ve got a hot date back at base. Can’t be late.’
By dawn the following day, the team was showing signs of real fatigue. They had another click and a half to cover to reach their lay up position and Mike was only too aware that they were exposed and out in the open. Jessie had fallen asleep which made it harder to carry him but Mike took over as one of the carriers and urged the rest of the team to speed up and get under cover as fast as they could. It meant jogging with their heavy loads but that was what made them such exceptional soldiers. Mike nodded to his buddy. ‘OK. Let’s pick up the pace. We need to get under cover right now.’
The exhausted team
was still about seven hundred meters from the rocky scrub that Mike had chosen as their final lay up position when three vehicles broke out from cover and started driving towards them.
‘Mike dropped Jessie in a heap on the desert floor and shouted, ‘Firing positions! Now!’
He grabbed one of the portable anti-tank missile launchers from the back of the man in front of him and powered it up as he crouched on the hard grit and sighted on the leading truck. ‘I’ve got the centre vehicle. Shane take the left one. Josh – you got the right. Stand by! Stand by! On my command.’
The three vehicles had been concealed amongst the low rocks that Mike’s team had been heading for. And now they were heading straight for Mike’s position. Things were about to get noisy and Mike knew that as soon as he launched his missile, the Russians would know where they were. The trucks had probably already alerted the main search parties. It was only a question of time now and Mike was rapidly running out of options. He could expect jets, attack helicopters, armoured vehicles and a few hundred seriously pissed off Russkis who would take great delight in removing the more delicate parts of his anatomy with a set of rusty wire cutters. The team would fight. You always fought. You never quit whilst you had ammo to spare.