by Michael Priv
“NSA,” I replied weightily.
“Fuckers all the same. What’s going on?” he yelled again, jabbing in the Rangers’ general direction.
“We’re on your side,” I replied. “Obviously. We’re here with you and not there with them.” The Major mellowed a tiny bit. “We’re killing fucking Rangers here, United States fucking Army. And they’re killing us. Look at this.” He pointed at the burning Humvees and dead bodies around us. “Talk, you two!”
Linda and I exchanged quick glances. “What do you think is going on?” I asked. “No fucking idea.” The Major rubbed the short stubble around the fringes of his head. “All’s I know I disobeyed a direct order, and now I’m getting murdered by our own frigging Army.”
“Did you query your orders?”
“Yes, I did. I was told the shit’s rolling down all the way from the DOD. An ‘anti-terrorists’ op.” Sad, I nodded.
“I suppose you didn’t buy the terrorist angle, then?” Linda asked.
“Gi ve me a break.” Fioretti shook his head. “The entire Siletz Reservation? Everyone’s a friggin terrorist, including even tourists and campers and any stray driver on the highway? Not a chance.”
I looked around. Soldiers were laying out their dead alongside a wall in rows. Medics were helping the wounded. They’d taken quite a hit here. The National Guard pummeled by the Army Rangers. Fucking Roberts. I did not see the Russians.
“What happened to the guys in sports suits?” I asked Fioretti. “They got bandaged up and disappeared during the mortar attack,” he replied. “They refused to tell me who they were, too. They sure sounded like Russians. Are you guys together?”
“Yup, they’re with us,” Linda assured him.
“You know you’ll have to move forward to the college? Your right flank is compromised, Major, you’ve got to do something.” The Major threw an incinerating look at me. “You order me now? I want in on this shit. I want to know what’s going on,” the Major repeated curtly. He nodded in the direction of his casualties. “Have they all gone nuts over at the Pentagon?”
“Pentagon’s been hijacked,” Linda said. “The DOD is an imposter.”
“General O’Hara? Are you crazy? And you still didn’t show me any IDs.”
“We will not show you any IDs,” Linda assured him coldly. “Just look around you. That’s our ID for you.” “O’Hara, Roberts, we don’t know who else but definitely others,” I confirmed. “They are after a top-secret NSA spaceship prototype, hidden in a secret bunker about two miles east of here. Long story. That’s what this is all about.”
“ A spaceship in a bunker?” Fioretti asked suspiciously. “A prototype of a spaceship,” Linda said.
“There’s shit happening that you don’t know about and better not find out.” I stared straight into the Major’s eyes, unblinking. Fioretti averted his stare and scratched his head.
“Roberts is running this op. He’s here somewhere,” Fioretti noted thoughtfully.
Roberts was here. I caught Linda’s worried glance. The news did not make either of us happy.
“Makes sense actually,” Fioretti continued calmly. “That explains the bunker busters and that whole Air Force mess.”
“Exactly, Major. The Air Force failed. That’s why we are dealing with this now.” I pointed at the Rangers’ positions.
“Well, no idea what to believe.” The Major shook his head. “Look around you. Don’t listen to us, just look at the civilian casualties. Does this look like the Pentagon you knew?” Fioretti kept shaking his head. “Are you two on the level? Is this the truth?” He jabbed a chubby finger into my face. “Not all of it,” I assured him.
“An acceptable version of the truth.” Linda nodded.
“We told you what we could.” I shrugged. “Need to get going there, Major.”
“They’ll draw and quarter me for this,” the Major said with a sigh, wiping his forehead with a dirty hand. “Hey, listen, for whatever it’s worth, to me you are honestly and truly a full four-star General. You got a heart, you got brains and you got balls. My hat’s off to you, Fioretti, forever and ever. Thank you.” I slapped the Major on the shoulder.
“Well, shit, all right then,” Fioretti mumbled, astonished by what I just said.
“You are the only hope we’ve all got,” Linda confirmed. 52 “Hey, s omebody get on that fifty, right now!” the Humvee driver, Corporal Miller, yelled at the top of his lungs to make himself heard over the booming cacophony of the battle.
The machine gunner lay prostrate on the floor of the vehicle with a large, smoldering hole right above the edge of his Kevlar vest. Linda was busy firing her Scorpion through her gun port—and so was Major Fioretti.
I hurriedly took position in the turret, caught in my sight some movement across the street and squeezed the trigger. The heavy gun came to life most satisfyingly for a few seconds and then—the world stopped.
The explosion ripped a large hole in the Humvee ’s driver’s side. First thing I saw when I came around was Corporal Miller slumped at the wheel—his blood, mixed with tissue fragments, was all around the cockpit.
There we go, that familiar taste of blood and shrill whistling in my ears. The Major was trying to get out of the vehicle. The way he acted, he looked a bit like a turtle on its back—he didn’t seem to be able to coordinate his movements very well. Linda was also getting out listlessly. She looked at me.
I couldn’t see well. I tried to focus, and then realized that I simply had blood in my eyes. I wiped the blood off and blinked a few times. My vision returned—for the most part.
I squinted through the shattered windshield in time to catch movement straight ahead. Long muzzle flashes. Multiple points. I turned toward Linda, much easier now, feeling my strength returning. Still groggy, she was climbing out of the destroyed Humvee’s back seat, dragging her machine gun behind her. Linda looked at me with a smile on her bloodied face. Her lips moved. No idea what she was saying. I smiled back. We were alive. I liked that a whole lot.
What was left of the Humvee shook. I recognized the powerful frame of Corporal Kozlovsky, whom I met earlier. He was yanking the door on my side. A bullet hit Kozlovsky’s Kevlar-clad chest, propelling his body backward. The big guy rocked back but otherwise ignored it. The door must have been jammed by the explosion. I rammed into it with my shoulder. Pain shot through my body, clearing my head a little. The door gave with a screech. I heard that screech. Good news.
The battle sounds suddenly returned. Several National Guardsmen were already laying suppressive fire cover to get us out. I also heard the characteristic pops of rifle-mounted grenade launchers laying out smoke cover for our evacuation from the busted Humvee. Kozlovsky half-dragged me away from the vehicle toward the second Humvee, a couple more men rushing to help.
I freed myself from Kozlovsky ’s grip in a sudden panic. I did not see Linda. Relieved, I saw her and the Major right behind us. I let them pass me to cover Linda’s back. A bullet pounded the Major on the back in a puff of dust, knocking him off his feet. Thank God for Kevlar. The loud rapport of at least two 50-caliber machine guns on other Humvees nearby, aggravated by the cascade of M16s and AR’s, reverberated painfully through my skull. The unit opened up in earnest, the RPG’s, more guns joined in, adding to the cacophony, punctuated also by the crisp snapping sounds of at least two M82s, the large caliber sniper rifles. I wondered how effective the snipers would be in this smoke.
“Where’s my gun?” I croaked. Somebody thrust an assault rifle into my hands. Attacking the dug-in Rangers full on did not seem right. In my endless, quilted past, I usually dwelled in recon units or with commando hit squads, in the artillery or air force, doing my killing in stealth or from afar. Running smack into a hailstorm of bullets would never be my cup of tea by choice, except this time it had to be. We ripped through bullets and explosions toward the other side of the street held by the Rangers, firing at the muzzle flashes among the smoldering ruins up ahead, covering each other, Linda and I
shoulder to shoulder. The Rangers dug in behind a stone wall up ahead with a 50-cal gun. We slid into a bomb crater amid the asphalt upturned by explosions, pinned down in the open, returning fire, bullets whistling all around. With a loud boom, a fiery comet suddenly lit up the darkening sky. The missile rammed into the remnants of a stone wall harboring the machine gun nest in front of us, obliterating the entire structure.
“A Hellfire missile!” a soldier next to us shouted , grinning happily, jabbing back toward the main National Guard positions behind us with his thumb. I glanced back in time to see a wave of National Guard soldiers clearing the smoking ruins behind us and running toward and past us, shooting at the ruins ahead. I saw only two Humvees among the attackers. Most of the vehicles must have been destroyed, but we were on the attack again.
Linda went through some dead soldier ’s bags and came up with four clips. She tossed two of them to me. I nodded my thanks. Things were looking up again.
The Rangers unleashed hell on us. The intensity and accuracy of their fire was devastating. The National Guard attack fizzled. We retreated, suffering staggering losses. People dropped dead all around me as I covered Linda’s retreat. Amid my recent concussion, worsened by extreme stimuli and terror, I suddenly recognized the familiar ping of understanding that I was about to die. “Linda!” I yelled, searching for her with my eyes. I found her prostrate on the ground about twenty feet to my rear. “Linda!” I yelled again. As I approached her, running, I saw what looked like a large smudge in the back of her armor. “Linda.” I turned her to face me, ignoring the bullets. She opened her eyes.
“Picky, can we leave this party already?” Linda mumbled weakly. “Sure thing, hon, should we just order takeout and stay home then?” I cradled her head in my arms. She nodded with a weak giggle.
With Linda in my arms, ignoring the bullets whistling all around me, I crossed the remainder of the way to the relative safety of a pickup truck, squashed by a fallen electrical pole. There I took a better look at Linda’s back. The bullet didn’t penetrate.
“Did it go through? Am I dying?” Linda asked quietly. “No, it didn’t go through and yes, you’re dying. You’ll be dead in seventy years.” I slapped Linda on the butt, grinning.
Linda got up on all fours, whimpering. “I think all my ribs are broken,” she said. I didn’t reply, fi ring from my new position at the muzzle flashes and moving shadows across the street. Linda joined me, shooting short bursts. A National Guard soldier jumped into safety next to us and immediately slumped sideways, a bleeding hole in his forehead. Another soldier hit the dirt dead next to our cover. Another sniper shot bored through the body of the pickup truck next to Linda. Too close. We were pinned down.
The dry cracking of a high-power sniper rifle behind me attracted my attention. Then another one. I turned in time to see a Russian slinking in the ruins. Lethal. Nazdorovie!The Ranger’s sniper across the street stopped firing.
Movement across the street intensified momentarily in preparation for something. Now, with the Rangers sniper taken out, I did not intend to stick around to find out what the Rangers were planning for us.
“Linda, run!” I yelled, grabbing her arm. The salvo of their mortars, fortified by shoulder-launched missiles and rocket-propelled grenades rocked the entire neighborhood, throwing debris and bodies in the air, scattering the National Guard troops. The Rangers’ machine gun fire and the booming of the 50-cals intensified. Together we ran away from the truck, which promptly took a hit and exploded behind our backs. We ran from the Rangers, looking for better cover. Half-destroyed woodframe houses and barns didn’t offer a lot of protection.
I hit the dirt behind a horse trough in what used to be somebody’s backyard, Linda next to me. Bullets splashed into the water harmlessly or kicked the wooden sides of the trough.
“Where to?” Linda asked, panting, and holding her ribs. I really wished I could get her away from all this. Too late now. “Remember we saw a concrete building on the monitor in Stan’s office? What was it, a community center or something?” “The Tribal Center,” Linda confirmed. “I think it’s that way.” She pointed northeast, more or less in the direction of the base, which was more due east.
“Okay, let’s go.” We moved swiftly through the ruins with the retreating and decimated National Guard unit, leapfrogging in the general direction of the Tribal Center and covering each other. The Rangers seemed unstoppable, a blind, relentless force. They plowed right over any points of resistance that we managed to put up. With our advantage in numbers long gone, we were running for our lives. The rapid energy weapons’ flashes and explosions from our right, approximately in line with our receding position, spelled similar trouble for the A5B fighters and the two Guards’ contingents. Our entire front was being pushed back toward the base.
We hit the dirt behind a pile of firewood to lay our share of fire cover for the retreat. From our new position we saw Rangers advancing quickly across the yard of a ranch house, shooting somewhere to our right where several National Guard soldiers were trying to make a stand behind some tractors next to a barn. Both Linda and I opened fire at the exposed Rangers, taking out at least two of them. The rest scattered for cover. A hailstorm of bullets immediately hit the firewood, forcing us to run. An RPG round struck the stack of firewood in our wake, sending splinters through the air like shrapnel. Fire suddenly intensified. I stole a glance back to the shocking sight of two Russians behind a tree, hosing the remaining Rangers with machinegun fire, covering our retreat.
Exhausted and bloodied, we reached the Tribal Center, a twostory concrete building. One corner of the massive wooden roof collapsed, taking down a concrete pillar. There was also a large hole in the middle of the roof, the result of a direct hit by a bomb or a missile, which must have broken through and exploded on the second floor, bringing a part of it down as well. The whole building seemed to be supported by three remaining concrete pillars. A plan formed in my mind.
The National Guard troops and the local fighters kept pouring in, carrying the wounded. I saw a Russian and a National Guardsman dragging in an unconscious local, who did not look good.
“Who’s in charge?” I yelled to a soldier running by, straining under the weight of an ammunition case he was carrying. “Lieutenant Peterson.” He nodded toward a small contingent taking position by the basted windows.
Peterson was a young kid busy directing the defenses, yelling in all directions at once.
“I have a plan,” I told Peterson. Wisps of sweaty blond hair stuck out from under his helmet. Could be ROTC, a recent college grad. “Who are you?” he asked, annoyed by the interruption. “No, sorry, can’t deal with the civilians right now.” He shook his head. “Huang,” he yelled to an Asian-looking soldier. “Take care of the civilians.”
“We’re not civilians. Huang , as you were!” I replied. Huang shrugged and went back to laying out his grenades in preparation for the upcoming attack. The Peterson kid stared at me.
“Where’s Fioretti?” I asked. “K IA.” The Lieutenant’s emotionless reply dropped on my head like a brick. “Are you the spooks with the NSA spaceship?” Peterson asked.
“Who we are is on a need-toknow basis,” Linda told him weightily.
The NSA spaceship. Fioretti briefed his troops. That’s how legends are made,I thought with a tinge of pride. “What do you want?” Peterson removed his helmet and made a decent attempt to wipe sweat mixed with soot and blood off his forehead with a very dirty hand, but only succeeded in smearing it all over his face.
“ Listen up, Peterson,” I raised my voice to counter the suddenly renewed noise. “We have four Claymores here.” I showed him the bag. “You draw them into the building and blow those three remaining concrete pillars. Look, that one, there and there.” The Lieutenant looked. “That’ll bring most of the building down on their heads. We could probably take out a full platoon’s worth that way, if we do it right. Or more. Set up your 50-cals in the back to catch any survivors on their way out.”
“Kozlovsky!” Peterson yelled over his shoulder after only a moment of consideration. No novice in a firefight, the kid was sharp. Corporal Kozlovsky’s large frame materialized behind him. I nodded to the big Corporal with a grin, happy to see him alive. He replied in kind, slapping Linda on the back. She yelled in pain and recoiled to Kozlovsky’s dismay.
“Help…” he started giving his order to Kozlovsky, then stopped and turned to face me again. “What’s your name again?” “Call me Norman,” I yelled back. “This is Linda.” “Okay, so get four Claymores from Norman. Set them up at the pillar, that one. Use all four Claymores.” He pointed. “Then use whatever we have to blow the second one and that one over there. Set it up and wait for instructions.”
Kozlovsky nodded, taking the bag with the four Claymores from me. I was happy to see the bag go. About a hundred National Guard troops and locals were defending the building. The Rangers, at a disadvantage, attacked full on in the gathering darkness, suffering losses but not about to be stopped. Seeing the quickly mounting numbers of the defenders’ losses, I figured it was time to open the trap with no further delays.
“Ready?” I asked Peterson, who was directing the evacuation of the wounded. “ The charges are set,” Kozlovsky reported.
“Ready,” Peterson confirmed.
“Let them in now!” I yelled to the Lieutenant.
“Retreat!” Peterson yelled, just as we started taking fire from the roof through the huge hole. The Rangers had found their way up on top. Good. The more, the merrier.
The retreating National Guard were digging in across the street now to engage the attackers, who poured into the building. In retreating across the square away from the building, we had to cross a wide, shallow fountain. Linda, running in front of me, cleared it fine, but I stumbled over the low fountain wall and fell inside, headfirst, into four inches of water. No chance of making it across with the pursuers so close behind. I took cover behind the fountain wall and opened fire. After a long second, another machine gun joined mine. Linda had come back for me, making me proud once again.