by Tom Kratman
They could still hear screaming.
At least the screaming's stopped, Fitz thought as he directed the firefighters forward into the container. The thing reeked of gasoline, smoke, burned plastic, and, far worst of all, burned hair and flesh. His own face felt warm where the initial flash had hit it, singeing away a good deal of his hair.
Mrs. Liu had gotten the gantry positioned to lift the container off and drop it over the side.
"Can you handle the flames, Fitz?" Stauer asked.
Fitz nodded and said, "Yessir."
"Because if you can't, we've got to dump it."
Fitz felt heat that didn't come from his reddened skin. "And dump our people, Reilly's people, over the side without a proper burial? No fucking way . . . sir."
"All right," Stauer agreed. "Get in there and get our people . . . our people's bodies, out. Then over it goes."
At the rate they were squelching the fire, Fitz thought and said, "Give us five minutes, no more. Then we can hook the container up and dump it."
"Fair enough," Stauer agreed.
They found the driver half out of the vision port in front of the Ferret. Apparently he'd gotten stuck there and burned from the rear forward.
"Awful way to go," one of the firefighters said aloud as he and another twisted the charred thing to and fro to wriggle as much as they could of it out of the Ferret. Part of one hip and a leg stayed behind. The Ferret, itself, was too hot to enter to retrieve those pieces.
The mechanic-what was left of him-was easier to recover. He was scrunched up on the container's floor in a fetal position with nothing much holding him in place except his fingers. Those were wrapped around an up-down metal rod that held the door closed.
"Just . . . break the fingers off," Fitz said. He sighed, "No time to be careful. And we've got the important part."
"Roger," the navy types trying to extricate the body answered. With a gulp one of them took hold of the mechanic's charred hand and broke the fingers off. They came away surprisingly easily, though they made a sound like crisp bacon being crumbled. It was that, more than anything, that made the sailor vomit.
While the bodies were being carried off on stretchers, FitzMarcach looked up to where two of his own people were hooking the container up to the gantry. One of them looked down at Fitz, questioningly.
He nodded and shouted up, "Signal Mrs. Liu to dump it."
Back on the bridge Stauer watched the gantry lift and swing over the side the container with the burned-out Ferret and small bits of his people inside.
Jesus, he thought, three dead already, two hurt that I know of, and three we've lost contact with, and we haven't even started the shooting part yet. Shit.
And my boys, dead like that. He pushed the thought away violently. Mourn later; there's a job to do now.
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
Let your plans be dark and impenetrable as night;
when you move, fall like a thunderbolt.
-Sun Tzu, "The Art of War"
D-Day, Safe House, Elayo, Ophir
The text signal from the ship had been simple. "Auth. Cd. RBF. Do it, 02:15 hours, plus or minus 15."
Though some hundreds of miles farther north, the same wind that blew dust from the stern of the Merciful and made rubber boat-borne RTOs want to cough raised clouds of dust around the safe house and the town, on the outskirts of which it sat.
Buckwheat closed a wooden shutter, then looped a piece of string around two handles. "Let's go."
Fletcher, Rattus Hampson, Vic Babcock-Moore, and Wahab all sighed. Most did so with a trace of fear. In Fletcher's case it was pure anticipation.
Wordlessly, the five filed out of the safe house and boarded their vehicles in the dusty yard just behind. They left one of the Land Rovers behind. The vehicles started without problem. The team drove nine miles east from Elayo, past the utterly insignificant fishing village of Siyaada, before they killed their lights. They then passed the last major wadi before the airport. At the wadi, they turned south into the intensely, even incredibly rough patch of hills cut by wadis that ran perpendicular the coast.
By compass and GPS they moved another four and a half miles eastward through that, the bouncing of the vehicles causing pain to kidneys and, in Rattus's case, a bit tongue. They came at last to a steep sided bit of ground, small and most unlikely to be investigated. There they pulled the vehicles in tight against the sides and dismounted.
Leaving Wahab behind to guard the transportation, the other four, moving in single file, began the two thousand meter trek to the northeast. They left their gear, most of it, behind, carrying only their weapons and ammunition, dun-colored gillie suits, night vision devices, a GPS, personal communicators, and in Buckwheat's pocket a satellite phone.
The way led steeply up, past a thin dirt road. They crossed this by simply getting on line on the near side, listening for a few moments, then rushing across as one. On the far side they flopped down again, listening for several minutes after.
Hearts were pounding and not just from the minor exertions of walking and rushing.
"Okay," whispered Fulton, "now to the ridge."
The closer they came to that feature, the lower they walked, until finally, perhaps a hundred meters shy of it they went to hands and knees and began to high crawl. From there, they crawled all the way to it, to a point from which they could see the airfield below.
There they waited while Buckwheat flicked on his night vision scope, took a firing position, and slowly swept the scope's field of view across the airfield. He counted silently as he did, then again, just as silently, as he swept it back.
"I count six Hips," he said, "plus eight fixed wing, four of those jets."
"No change then," Fletcher said. Despite the plain and simple words, his voice held the passionate tone of a man about to make love to a woman he has long desired. "And I agree with your count."
"Good. Let's go."
On bellies now, the men crawled forward another two hundred meters to some rocks. There they stopped while Buckwheat used his world phone to send a brief, pre-set text message. The answer came back immediately, a text message that simply said, "Roger."
"You take this position," Fulton whispered to Fletcher. "Vic, let's go."
Those two then crawled, Buckwheat leading, to a different set of rocks perhaps one hundred meters east of the set they'd just left and about as much closer to their targets. There, once again Fulton used his scope to view targets.
"Fletcher, Buckwheat," Fulton whispered over his personal radio. "From left to right . . . engage."
D-Day, five miles north-northeast of Nugaal, Ophir
The airstrip was about six thousand feet in length, running east-northeast to west-southwest, paralleling the road that lay to the southeast about half a mile distant. There was a single, white, propeller-driven aircraft at one end of the strip, guarded by two armed men who seemed reasonably alert. Between the main road and the airstrip stood a large house-more of a palace, really. That palace was the objective. It belonged to the chief of Ophir, and leader of the Habar Afaan clan, Gutaale.
The palace was surrounded by a wall, at three to four feet in height more decoration and demarcation than defense. Built into the wall were two buildings. One of these was presumed to be servants' quarters, the other a barracks large enough to hold at least fifty men. In front of the palace were a couple of sedans, one commercial truck of about five tons capacity, and a few rattletrap hoopties.
The chief wasn't expected to be home, since this was only one of several palaces he maintained. According to Wahab's sources, and Buckwheat's confirmation, Gutaale's accountant, however, was.
From his prone position, overlooking the airfield, Welch scanned with night vision goggles. He could see the entire area well, or at least as well as could expected through image intensification.
"Grau, Semmerlin," Terry whispered, pointing at the two airplane guards. "There are two men there. They're not in range. So far as I can tell they're not n
ight vision equipped. You two get in range-there's a decent firing position to our left-and take them out."
"Roger," Semmerlin answered, softly. "Come on, Grau."
Both men, like the rest of the team minus the already black translators, wore "Black-is-Beautiful," a creamy camouflage makeup that resembled nothing so much as boot polish.
Terry waited long minutes watching the two guards intently. Suddenly, one of them was thrown backwards, arms and weapons flying. A moment later the other one bent double violently before he, too, fell backwards. With the size and weight of the bullets the Russian arms fired, there was little likelihood of either of the victims living, or giving any trouble if they did.
And I never heard the shots, Welch thought. I love all Russian equipment.
The two snipers returned fairly quickly, taking their positions behind Welch.
"Gentlemen, well done," Terry said. "Now let's go."
D-Day, two hundred meters south of
Bandar Qassim Airport, Ophir
Thwupt . . . Thwupt. Buckwheat's .51 caliber rifle gave off barely a whisper. Not only was the bullet subsonic, the bullpup semi-auto rifle mounted a silencer about the size of four Foster's Lager cans, stacked one atop the other. It wasn't the most accurate rifle in the world, perhaps, but it was accurate enough for this.
Downrange, through his spotting scope, Vic saw chunks fly off the fuselage just above where the engine was mounted. Despite the low muzzle velocity of nine hundred and fifty feet per second, the nearly three ounce, solid bronze projectile was more than capable of ripping the guts out of a jet engine.
"I mark that as a kill," he told Fulton.
"Roger," the marksman said, adjusting his aim slightly left to the next helicopter in line. Thwupt.
"Kill."
"Roger." Thwupt.
"Miss," Vic said. "Change mags."
Buckwheat raised his firing shoulder up, keeping as much of a stock weld as possible, then reached over and dropped the empty magazine. Vic pulled that out of the way while Fulton pushed a fresh one into the well.
Thwupt.
"Miss."
"Dammit." Thwupt.
"Don't take it to heart; Russki quality control at the munitions factory is poor . . . Kill." Vic hesitated a moment, then said, "Uh, oh."
"Huh?" Fulton asked.
"I think you . . . "
He didn't quite finish the sentence before Fulton's last target started to burn. The fire began with a small flame. The flame became a jet as it heated the fuel behind it to a high pressure gas. From there, it quickly grew, locally, then began to spread as burning fuel spurted onto the ground.
Fulton keyed his small radio. "Fletch; Buckwheat. Screw subtlety. Service the targets fast."
From across the airfield, more than half a mile away, came a chorus of shouts as some scores of armed men began pouring out of a makeshift barracks. From farther away came a sound that, while strange to American ears, was almost certainly the siren of a fire vehicle.
D-Day, one mile north of Buro, Ophir
The engine coughed and shuddered once again before settling back, for the nonce at least, to a steady if anemic thrum.
This bucket won't make better than eight knots, Eeyore fumed, standing at the wheel he'd taken over from Morales once they were out of the harbor. We'll never make rendezvous at this rate.
The town passing to starboard shone a few lights. By the chart and the GPS Antoniewicz made it as being Buro, a nothing-too-much fishing village. It was not on the list of places the contingency plan would have had them hole up at to await a later pickup if everything went to shit.
Which it certainly has, for us, anyway.
Even without the lights of the town, they might have seen it, so far and so bright had the moon arisen.
"Hey, Eeyore," Morales asked, "do you remember that movie, The Princess Bride?" He was standing beside Antoniewicz, facing aft with his diving mask on his face and his monocular turned down.
"Sure," Antoniewicz answered.
"You remember that scene where Inigo Montoya asks, ‘Are you sure nobody's following us?'"
Antoniewicz thought for a moment, remembering back to childhood, before answering, "Yeah, I remember it."
"Good, 'cause I was just about to ask the same question."
Antoniewicz didn't have his mask handy. He glanced backwards even so to see if the pursuer could be seen in the moonlight.
"Shit," he said.
D-Day, five and a half miles north-northeast of Nugaal, Ophir
Terry Welch wasn't the subtle type. Thwuptupt. Two silenced, low velocity shots and the two guards at the gate to the palace grounds were thrown back to the low surrounding wall, bonelessly crumpling to the ground.
Grau and Semmerlin took up the rear as two files passed them, racing for the gate. One of the files, the one on the right, was smaller than the other, consisting of a two-man machine gun team, Graft gunning, one of the translators, Issaq Abay, carrying ammo plus an RPG, and Semmerlin. Issaq had said he could use an RPG and there was no reason to disbelieve him. At the gate, the machine gun team took up a firing position partially protected by the low wall and the mud brick pillar of the gate. Semmerlin cut right. Crouching low to take what cover the wall offered, he ran to the corner, then took up a position to cover any rear entrance to the barracks that might be there.
The rest, eight men with Welch in the lead-Little Joe Venegas having been left behind to guard the packs-charged forward. The rear two of those, Buttle and Grau, cut left to take up security at that corner of the palace. There was presumed to be a roving guard, somewhere on the grounds.
The brace of guards at the door proper to the building weren't as alert as they might have been. This cost them as Welch snapped his silenced submachine gun to his shoulder and fired two quick bursts that spun first one, and then the other, to the floor, spurting blood from violated bodies. As much blood as the men shed, Terry knew as he bounded over the corpses that it was nothing as compared to the damage done inside by the subsonic, but frangible, ammunition he'd used on them.
Terry wasn't subtle, but he wasn't precisely "Hulk smash" material either. He didn't throw his body against the large wooded double doors that fronted the palace. Instead, like a gentleman, he tried the knob. It was open.
He took in the first floor of the palace with a glance. Long wide corridor, rooms to either side, and a broad staircase that led upstairs.
He made a two-fingered gesture at Pigfucker and Mary-Sue. Here. Guard. Then he led the remaining three, including the last of the translators, up the flight of stairs to the second floor. Then he unscrewed the suppressor from the muzzle of his submachine gun and pointed it at the ceiling.
"Standby to translate," he told the interpreter. "Prep stun grenades," he said to his two Americans.
Then Welch smiled and said, "Shock is good," just as he pulled the trigger.
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
But I've a rendezvous with death
At midnight in some flaming town
-Alan Seeger, "I have a Rendezvous with Death"
D Day, Beach Red, Ophir
Reilly was standing there, impatiently, when Fitz reported.
"The mechanic and the Ferret commander were pretty shaken up, boss," Fitz said. "I figured we ought to leave them behind. Top concurred."
The XO was standing in the surf next to the ramp, with waves washing around his ankles. Behind him a vehicle squealed over the wet steel and into the water. Spray from the armored car's wheels sprinkled his back.
"And we haven't a clue what caused the thing to catch fire," Fitz added. "And, since we dumped it over the side, we never will. Buuut . . . those things were pretty old. We've been lucky so far. They stood up through Brazil, after all."
"Mmmm . . . yeah," Reilly answered. Mourn later. "'Luck.' Nothing for it now. You made the right call. Mount up. Move out in five mikes."
***
They moved mostly in a column, with the three remaining Ferrets of the scout se
ction forming a wedge at the point, three hundred meters ahead of the main column. Behind the Ferrets, out of range of any RPGs they might encounter, came the first section of Elands, then Reilly's command vehicle, then the second section, then Second Platoon, the antitank section, also in Ferrets, Third Platoon, the mortars, and lastly the ash and trash of headquarters.
In all, it made a column almost a kilometer long, raising clouds of dust as it roared out from the perimeter set up and held by the Marines
"Start pulling the boys into a tighter perimeter," Cazz told his first sergeant as the last of the armored cars rolled through.
"Roger, Skipper," Webster said, then turned off to oversee the consolidation.
"Good luck, Reilly, ya doggie Irish bastard, ya," Cazz said at the dust cloud behind the advancing armor.
And now I feel my age, Reilly thought, as his turretless Eland bounced over the rough ground, beating his kidneys like a good son of the Prophet would beat a sharp-tongued wife.
He stood in the space that would have held a turret, with Schiebel on the pintle-mounted machine gun ahead of him and James driving. James was a damned fine driver but, Jesus, this is rough ground and old technology.
Two vehicles ahead of him, the commander of a gunned, turreted Eland turned and flashed him a smile that would have been brilliant in the day. From the posture and shape he knew it was Lana Mendes. He'd have known anyway, since the order of march was by his command.