by Jack Murphy
“What the hell do you mean rolled up?”
“Jimenez correlated the calls made by the drop phones being distributed by both Aghassi and Samantha. It is right there on his computer, it looks like he used analysts notebook to compile the data.”
Frank looked up at the projection on the wall showing Samruk International's target deck for the Oaxaca operation. There was Jimenez at the top, with his lieutenants under him, and then dozens and dozens of smaller cells that were franchised out on a contract basis for smuggling, killing, and other more technical tasks such as telecommunications and network security. What none of them had realized was that all the while, Jimenez had been building a target deck on Samruk and their network as well.
“Where is Deckard?”
Deckard walked across the freshly expended hot brass that rolled across the street.
“It is for you,” the radio man sitting in his assault truck said as he gave him the hand mic.
With Fedorchenko's platoon on stand down to recover from their airborne operation and Aghassi and Nikita running recon, Deckard was out on a parallel operation with Sergeant Zhenis and Second Platoon. They were back in Oaxaca City, mowing grass and churning through their target deck. After a brief firefight, they had taken down another ring of contract killers.
“This is Six,” Deckard said over the command net.
“We have a problem.”
It was Frank.
“What?”
“Our entire ring of informants is about to be liquidated. Spooky-One's mission was a success and they are on exfil right now. The virus allowed us to tap into the cartel's network but not in time to stop him. Jimenez had someone conduct a link analysis on all cellular traffic in Oaxaca.”
Deckard's guts twisted in a knot.
“How bad is it?”
“We're trying to establish that now while we reach out to as many of our sources as possible.”
Gun fire popped off somewhere deeper in the city. It was just a few shots, which soon turned into a spray. Seconds later, the heavy bolt of a machine gun thumped on full auto coming from a different direction, each blast echoing across the city.
“Start giving me names and locations,” Deckard told him. “We'll see how many we can pull out.”
As he listened to the gunfire, Deckard knew it was already too late.
Nikita pushed off the rock wall one final time and brought his hand behind him to slow his descent. The rappel rope was pulled through the figure eight snapped into his climbing harness as he lowered down to the slope. When his boots made contact, he braced himself against a tree. Aghassi came down right behind them.
Slipping on the muddy slope, Aghassi fell to his knees before struggling back up. They both looked at each other, shaking their heads. One too many close calls for one night. They needed a beer or ten.
Pulling the rappel ropes free, they pulled one end of the doubled up rope until it slid through the single carabiner they had left concealed on an anchor point up above. The one piece of equipment lodged deep inside a crack in the rock would be the only evidence left behind that they had even been there. The ropes and other gear went into a rucksack they had stashed at the bottom and the two mercenaries began making their way down the slope.
They had no idea as to what a shit storm they had just uncovered.
27
Deckard braced himself against the dashboard as the assault truck jerked to a stop.
“Samantha, call your source right now,” Deckard spoke into the radio hand mic. “Tell him that we are right outside his house and are taking him with us.”
The assault vehicles that the Samruk mercenaries drove were outfitted with eight seats in the flatbed in the back, four on each side sitting back to back. The moment the trucks stopped, they popped the quick release on their seat belts and slipped right off the edge and down to the ground. The turret gunner remained, maintaining security with their PKM machine guns. The assault teams formed together en route as they ran towards the target house.
“I'm calling now,” Samantha replied.
“Tell him if he doesn't come with us that he won't be safe. We'll bring his family if need be but if he stays the cartel assassins are going to clean him out tonight.”
“I'm dialing his cell, it's ringing.”
The lead assaulter kicked the door, not to kick it in but to knock with his foot and get the home owner's attention. He didn't want to lean in front of the door and knock with his fist in case the residents decided to answer with a 12-gauge buck shot.
No one was answering, shotgun blast or not.
Looking down at his Falcon View navigation program displayed on a Tough Book computer, he saw that they were in the right place.
“I just talked him,” Samantha reported from the Operations Center. “He's coming to the door now. I told him to make sure he is unarmed.”
Suddenly, the door opened a crack. The assault team kicked it the rest of the way in and stormed the building. There was gunfire popping off all over town. Jimenez was having his right hand man, Ignacio, take out their entire network of informants. The Kazakh mercenaries and their Western advisers were not taking any chances. They secured the source and whoever else was home, bringing them back to the trucks for extraction.
Seconds later, the assaulters were already pouring out of the house with the source and his wife, both flex cuffed and blindfolded for everyone's protection. Once Samantha confirmed their identities back at the compound they would have their restraints removed.
With his night vision goggles flipped up, Deckard could see all the way down the street with the occasional lights illuminating the area. His eyes went wide as tires squealed and smoked down at the intersection. A tractor trailer skidded to a halt, blocking off the road. Behind them, a second trailer pulled across the intersection, cutting off any chance of escape.
“Shit,” Deckard cursed. “Light them up,” he said flipping over to the assault net. “We're about to get hit.”
Just then an RPG-7 gunner let off a rocket that streaked down the street. Passing between two assault trucks, it bounced off the road and detonated against a stone wall, crumbling it in a cloud of smoke. A second RPG followed hot on the heels of the missed shot, blasting into the armored front cab of the lead assault truck.
Gunfire rained down on the street from roof tops on both sides, the bullets plinking off the thick bullet proof windshield. A Samruk commando went down under a fusillade of gunfire right before Deckard's eyes.
Deckard clicked the hand mic in his hand.
“Blue building, right side of the road, fifty meters to our front. Do it.”
PKM gunners churned through 250 round belts of ammunition as they sprayed the rooftops. Muzzle flashes traversed from side to side as they homed in on enemy gunmen. The drivers gunned it, one driver moving out before the men were fully loaded. One assaulter was flung off the back of the vehicle while his truck took off without him.
“Stop! Stop!”
As Deckard's truck jerked forward and then buckled as the driver braked, he flung open his door and reached out for the Samruk mercenary while firing his AK-103. With the butt stock wedged under his arm pit, it wasn't aimed fire, but intended to suppress the enemy along with the PKM gunners. Grabbing the fallen mercenary, he pulled him inside the vehicle, still firing with the door hanging open.
“Go!”
The convoy shot forward a second time. The first truck had already smashed right through the garage door. Deckard's Kazakh driver expertly turned the wheel hand over hand, sharply turning while slowing just as they passed into the now open garage door.
The driver had to spin the wheel again to avoid the first truck. It was smoking as it had crashed into a large industrial metal rack loaded up with metal poles. The blue building Deckard had chosen to escape the kill zone turned out to be an aluminum shop. Aluminum scrap was stacked everywhere alongside the various hardware and tools of the trade. One by one, each vehicle squeezed into the metal shop until a
ll five were out of the line of fire.
Somehow, the truck that absorbed the RPG round had limped in as well but once it stopped it was clear that it wouldn't be moving again anytime soon. The PKM gunner on the last vehicle rotated to cover his six o' clock and fired occasional bursts across the street.
Sergeant Zhenis jumped off the back of his truck and began barking orders in Russian. The platoon medic began treating a casualty who had been shot through the leg. It was too late for another mercenary, he had taken a round in the neck and had already expired. A pool of blood spread underneath him as his comrades lowered his body to the ground.
With Zhenis pushing his men where they needed to go, several took a knee next to the garage door. Others began climbing the metal racks all the way up to the roof. They moved up one at a time with their rifles slung over their backs. At the top, one found a hole in the roof that had been covered over with a piece of rippled sheet metal. Pushing it aside, he cleared the way and pulled himself up through the opening.
Deckard turned as the radio in his truck crackled.
“Six,” Cody said on the command net. “We are inside the enemy's network. It is exploding with chatter. You've got every gunman in the city converging on your position.”
“What am I up against Cody?”
“Everyone. Once Jimenez and Ignacio determined which source you were going to pick up they must have arranged the ambush. They let you drive into their trap. Sorry we couldn't catch it sooner but I'm still penetrating the network-”
“It is what it is,” Deckard cut him off. “How many enemy are we looking at.”
“Hundreds. Jimenez also put out a contract on our heads on his Facebook and Twitter feeds.”
“He has a Facebook and Twitter account?”
“I'm afraid so, and most of Mexico is listening. Iganacio's soldiers along with every freelancer and wannabe sicario is descending on your position. I'm going to work on shutting down the part of the communications network that you are in and monitor the rest of it for early warning but it's going to take time. It would be faster if you took it out manually.”
“Where is it?”
One of the windows suddenly shattered from the overpressure created by a nearby RPG blast. The stench of sulfur wafted through the humid night air.
“It is another concealed commo mast on the other end of the block.”
Deckard thought it over, they needed to break out and he wasn't going to split his platoon in half to take out one communications repeater. It would weaken his own forces without much of a gain in his opinion.
“Get Fedorchenko's men rolling. We're going to try to shoot our way out. Have them bump to our freq when they get close and we will join forces.”
“I'm on it,” Frank announced over the net.
The PKM and both riflemen at the entrance fired controlled bursts, the gunfire shaking dust from the ceiling. Another RPG slammed into the exterior wall, rattling the building to its foundation. Deckard was amazed that the concrete wall was still standing. He looked around at the chaos and at the bodies.
“Let's go,” he snapped. “Get that guy's leg bandaged, put a tourniquet above the wound and stop the bleeding then get that son of a bitch on the firing line to pull security!”
“You, you, and you,” he pointed to three of the PKM gunners still on their trucks. Their weapons were useless indoors. “Get up on the roof and prepare to move. You,” he pointed to the fourth gunner. “Dismount and orient that gun facing out that window.” The final gunner was left in place to watch the entrance.
“Zhenis,” he said keying his radio as he walked across the dusty floor. “Talk to me.”
“We are taking fire from all directions,” he said from up on the roof.
“Roger that, which way will get us out of here the fastest?”
“Back the way we came, but first we need to get that trailer out of the way”
Enemy gunfire continued to rain down on the aluminum shop while the mercenaries on the ground returned fire. Outside, Deckard could see the lifeless forms of several cartel gunmen laying in the street.
“Prepare the men for movement,” Deckard ordered the Platoon Sergeant. “I'm coming up.”
Cody stared at his computer screen, trying to work through the problem. Frank had taken off to go wake up Fedorchenko and send his platoon out as a Quick Reaction Force. That was when the OPCEN door burst open. Pat stood there holding the door by the frame.
“What's going on?”
“Deckard and Zhenis are pinned down inside the city. Our entire informant network has been compromised.”
“We need to get the other platoon rolling.”
“Frank is on it.”
Muffled gunfire could be heard outside, staccato bursts blazing away with a seconds pause between them. It was the perimeter guards up on the compound walls.
“We're getting hit,” Pat announced calmly. “They are hitting the walls.”
“FUCK.”
“Tell Deckard to do what he can, but we're going to have to fight off this attack before we can go in and get him out. I'm sure the enemy coordinated it this way, but there is nothing we can do about it now.”
Pat turned and ran outside as the gunfire continued unabated outside.
Cody turned back to his screen. Two and two came together and he figured out a work around for Deckard's problem. It was better than nothing.
Flipping through the various channels on Samruk communication's net, he began talking into his headset.
Aghassi pumped the car's brakes, tossing Nikita forward and waking him with a start as he slammed into the back of the passenger seat. He'd been dosing in the backseat since they pulled off target.
“Wake up fucker. We're not out of the briar patch yet.”
“What you want?”
“Fedorchenko's platoon is pinned down inside the city,” Aghassi informed him. “Just got the call out over the radio from Headquarters. We are being diverted to support them.”
Aghassi sped up, his headlights leading the way as he snaked around the wide turns on one of the main avenues of approach through Oaxaca City. The brightly colored single story homes meshed with old Colonial buildings and churches that stood silently in the night. Aghassi circled around the hilltop that ran into the middle of the city until they came to a large open air amphitheater. Running along the side, and up behind the theater was a paved road leading to the cell phone towers at the top of the hill.
The Samruk mercenary stopped the vehicle as the headlights stopped on a chain link fence gate that was closed across the road.
“The cartel is bringing in every shooter they can muster down on our boys,” Aghassi told Nikita as they climbed out of the car. “Cody wants us to disable that tower up there to help prevent the enemy from talking to each other and coordinating their actions.”
“So much for beer,” Nikita complained.
“No rest for the wicked,” Aghassi said as he popped the trunk and pulled out some tow straps. They had packed the car with recovery equipment ahead of their surveillance operation at Jimenez' compound. Running the straps up under the car and attaching them to the frame, the other ends were snap linked to the fence that was blocking their way. The locking gates of the snap links were facing up so that if they broke, the tow straps would snap down rather than up and smash the car's windshield.
Slowly backing up the car, Aghassi steadily increased the pressure on the gas pedal until the gate gave way and snapped open. Nikita quickly detached the straps and swung the gate the rest of the way open. The road wrapped around the hill as they drove up to the top and found the cell tower they were looking for. Aghassi shotgun parked before flipping off the lights and shutting the car down. Both carried their full equipment from the previous mission, but Aghassi added an AK-103 he had stashed in the car.
With their weapons held at the ready, the two mercenaries stood and looked out over Oaxaca City. From their vantage point they could see the entire panorama, lit up at night
with golden pin pricks of artificial light. The night itself was hot and oppressive. Clouds of black smoke rose throughout the city obscuring their view. Gunfire rattled away, echoing from so many places that it was impossible to tell what direction the sound was coming from.
“Jesus,” Aghassi muttered as he rubbed a hand across the stubble on his chin. “I had heard about this Deckard guy before but he really knows how to find the prettiest parts of hell, doesn't he?”
“You get used to it,” Nikita said turning away.
Aghassi followed him to the tower where they both looked up at the various satellite dishes and microwave relay systems. It would take a lot of demo and a decent amount of time to rig it all in order to collapse the tower. They didn't have either.
“I can shoot them out like I did in Burma,” Nikita offered.
“In Burma?”
“Yeah, it did the job.”
“How about I just flip the power switch,” Aghassi said hooking a thumb towards the generator shed.
“Okay,” Nikita agreed.
Walking towards the tower, the Kazakh reached up and grabbed one of the metal cross members. Pulling himself up, he hooked a booted foot over the support structure and began climbing his way up.
“What the hell are you doing?” Aghassi shouted. Nikita was struggling to climb with his assault pack and HK 417 slung over his back. It made the intelligence operative nauseous to watch him as his uniform changed color and intensity as the Kazakh moved. It was like he was looking right through him sometimes.
“Those muzzle flashes to the East have to be Fedorchenko's platoon. You can hear the PKM fire. Get on the radio and make sure that Deckard has them turn on their IR strobes so I can mark their location. Once I get to the top I can offer fire support.”
“That is a hell of a long shot,” Aghassi said looking over his shoulder. “Are you sure?”
“Better than nothing. Shut down the power or my balls will get microwaved while I am in tower.”