Devil's Guard- The Complete Series Box Set

by Eric Meyer

  “Too right, useless bastards. They walked slap bang into an ambush, and they were shot to pieces.”

  “I thought you were leading them, so doesn’t that make you responsible?”

  I shouldn’t have said it, but it was too late. He glared at me, and I could see the fear in his face.

  “Not for fools like that, no. We all have to take out own chances. You’d better get the aircraft ready, we’re leaving.”

  I felt my anger glowing red hot. This callous fool was planning on abandoning these people. “The hell we are. I’m waiting until Luc has been treated, and we have a proper evacuation plan for the rest of them.”

  “I call the shots, Hoffman. If I say we’re leaving, we’re leaving.”

  “You’re wrong. I call the shots around here.”

  We all whirled. Lieutenant Rains had appeared silently from behind the building. He was with Sergeant Mason and two of his infantrymen who both carried M-16s.

  “Who the fuck are you?” Walker snapped.

  “Lieutenant Rains, US Infantry. And I decide when and if we leave.”

  “That’s my aircraft, Rains, and this is a CIA operation, so you’d better not interfere.”

  They squared off against each other, Walker’s men with stubby M4A1 carbines, Rains’ men with their assault rifles, and us waiting to the side, forgotten. Rachel looked at me and raised her eyebrows. It was a pissing contest, which was for sure, one between heavily armed men, and outside the hut where Luk lay desperately ill, fighting for his life. I felt it was time to do something positive before these macho idiots started shooting.

  “You’re both wrong,” I interjected, moving to stand close to them, but not in their line of fire. They stared at me. I’d broken the spell, but now I needed to concoct another.

  “As pilot in command of the Twin Otter, technically, that leaves me in command of the decision as to when and if it leaves. And that decision will be taken by me, and not by either of you.”

  “Bullshit!” Walker snarled. But before he could say anymore, Rains cut in.

  “That sounds fair to me. You’ve got to fly it, and so you call the shots.”

  It struck me that he was relieved to have someone to take over the responsibility of command for him. Some officer, and even his sergeant looked surprised.

  “That’s crap!” Walker continued.

  “Mr. Hoffman, any trouble with these people, and I’ll have them restrained. What do you want us to do?”

  “Sir, is this the correct…?” his sergeant murmured.

  “This is the way we’ll handle it, Sergeant Mason. Now, Mr. Hoffman, what’s the plan?”

  * * *

  Master Sergeant Wendelski flexed her fingers and put them on the control stick for the MQ-9 Reaper attack drone. She felt excited. At last she would get the chance to kick some ass. Except that it was nightfall in Afghanistan. She’d called up her commander and offer to fly a night operation.

  “Sir, those birds are equipped with thermal imaging. There’s plenty to see even at night.”

  “Yeah, I’m sure you’re right. Isn’t this your first time out with one of these birds?”

  “Well, yes, but I’ve had dozens of hours on the simulator.”

  “That’s what I thought. Go home and get some sleep, Master Sergeant. Report here in ten hours time, and get yourself ready for daylight operations. You know that you’ll need clearance before you can launch any of those missiles, at least until you’ve got some flying hours under your belt.”

  “Yes, Sir, but there are people out there that…”

  “Go home, Master Sergeant. That’s an order.”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  She hung up the phone. Maybe he was right, and at least in daylight she’d be able to see everything. And with any luck, she’d be able to file an after mission report with a list of her kills. Now that was really something!”

  Chapter Eight

  The Taliban are not demoralized. Despair is a sin. The Taliban are united. We are giving the US and the coalition forces a tough time. We are hunting them down like pigs.

  Mullah Omar

  Marine General Daniel Westwood, the ISAF commander for Afghanistan, emerged from his bathroom, his face still dripping with cold water while he dried it with a hand towel. Both officers noticed the tiredness in his eyes, but it didn’t show anywhere else in his face. All three officers were wearing Universal Camouflage Pattern fatigues, but there was no doubt about who was in charge. General Westwood, shorter than the other two men and slight in build, crackled with a ferocious energy that seemed to constantly seek for an escape, like high pressure in a steam engine. Westwood was an old school marine, hard as hickory, and he expected his men to display the same qualities of energy and toughness. They’d been up for an hour, and it was still only three in the morning. He glanced at Lieutenant Colonel Brooks, his intelligence officer.

  “How are we looking Charlie, are we holding them?”

  “We are, General, but we’re stretched to the limit. We need a few more days before the emergency is over, and we can start taking the offensive again.”

  “General, my men are ready to go now,” Lieutenant Colonel Vance Everard protested. “These tribesmen will just fade away into the mountains if we don’t hit them hard. They did the same when the Russians were here.”

  “I’m with you there, Vance, but we don’t have the men to protect our people, look after our Afghan allies, and go after the bad guys. Not yet, anyway. Give it a few more days.”

  Everard grimaced. “It’ll be too late, as usual. They’ll get clean away.”

  Westwood glanced at him and smiled. “Maybe, but if we go off half cocked, we could lose a lot of the advantages we’ve won so far. Our allies need help, Vance, and they need our protection. If we charge out with our battle flags fluttering in the breeze, and the Taliban come in behind us and murder the people we left behind, how much good will that do us?”

  Everard said nothing. General Westwood seemed satisfied that he’d made his point and shifted his gaze to his intelligence officer.

  “Charlie, what about those infantrymen who were escorting the French medics?”

  “Medecin Sans Frontieres,” Brooks reminded him. “We lost touch with them. One of our drones from Creech had a sighting yesterday, and we’re hoping to regain contact today. They had some technical trouble with a Predator, but they’re putting up a Reaper instead.”

  Westwood grunted. “That should be helpful if they’re in any kind of trouble.”

  “The first drone sighting showed their vehicles destroyed, and the group is sheltering in a village near the border.”

  “Are they in trouble?”

  Brooks nodded. “Big trouble, a strong force of Taliban was nearby. Maybe it had them pinned down, we’re not sure. Until this emergency is over, there’s not a lot we can do. The morning overflight should tell us more.”

  “Ok, now listen. I know that the Rules of Engagement are for those Reaper drivers at Creech. But they are for normal operating conditions. It’s anything but normal at present, so you can advise whoever is flying that bird that they are to make a unilateral decision on any fire missions. Will you pass that on to Creech?”

  “Is that wise, General?” Brooks looked anxious. “We’ve had more than our share of friendly fire problems.”

  “Wise or not, those are my orders. If that party is in trouble, it’s the least we can do to have someone able to help them without filling in a truckload of forms in triplicate. Is there anything else?”

  Both colonels shook their heads.

  “Good. Colonel Everard, be ready to move as soon as we’re over the immediate danger. Then you’re cleared to go and find the enemy. Search them out and destroy them wherever you find them. Until then, you wait.”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  “Unless, of course, you uncover our number one target. If that happens, all bets are off.”

  Everard nodded. Yeah, that was the big question, the one they all wanted answ
ered. “Where is Mullah Omar?”

  * * *

  It was a bad night. The enemy constantly fired into the village. Their aim was wild, but it was clear their object was to keep them from getting any sleep. The tactic succeeded, and they were all bleary-eyed and tired. While it was still dark, I enlisted the help of six of Rains’ infantrymen to help unload the aircraft. We had two cases of C4 explosive on board still, and the Twin Otter was a sitting target. If it was hit, I didn’t want to add to the damage by leaving plastic explosive on board. We carried the cases back to the village, together with the satphone and the sniper rifle. I checked my watch. It was four in the morning. To my astonishment, Luk appeared. He was using a stick to support himself.

  “What the hell are you doing, Luk? You’re supposed to be at death’s door.”

  “They packed me full of fresh blood and stitched up the wounds. Apparently, it wasn’t as bad as they thought. You brought my rifle, I see. That could be useful.”

  The doctor appeared in the doorway. “I told him to rest, but he wouldn’t listen. Perhaps you can persuade him?”

  “I’ll do my best, Doctor.”

  He smiled. “It’s Yves. I don’t think that kind of formality serves any purpose in places like this.”

  He was a good looking man, typically French, with that Gallic élan and flair for style that the whole nation seemed to possess. Even in his camouflaged combat trousers and white jacket, with a T-shirt underneath, he managed to look good. He was young, maybe twenty-five or so, and his unruly hair was a rumpled mess. It could have been from all he’d been through lately, or perhaps it was just the style that young people wore these days on the Champs Elysses. It wasn’t difficult to imagine him with a beautiful and chic Parisienne on his arm, strolling through the bistros of the Left Bank.

  “Ok, Yves. Thanks for what you’ve done.”

  He winked. “I’ll send you a bill when I get home. If I get home.”

  “You will, Yves, and that’s a promise.”

  He stared at me. “You know, I believe you. Get me home in one piece, and I’ll tear up the bill.”

  I chuckled as he walked back into his treatment room. When I looked around, Luk had taken hold of his sniper rifle. I pulled it away from him. “No way, not until Yves pronounces you fit, and that isn’t going to be for a while.”

  He looked very tired, and he didn’t put up a fight. “Fair enough. What about the plastique? Can’t we do something with that?”

  It hadn’t occurred to me to do anything, other than make it safe so that it didn’t do any more damage. But that was civilian thinking. I was now in command of both civilians and soldiers, which was my understanding.

  “I’ll think about it. You go and get some rest.”

  Rachel helped him back inside the stone hut. The medics had just noticed he’d gone missing in the darkness and were already looking for him; like a naughty schoolboy. Rachel and I both laughed. Then the mortar barrage started. Apparently, the Taliban had decided they’d waited long enough for us to come out, so now they were piling on the pressure. I ran around to the stone wall where Rains was crouched down with his sergeant and two soldiers.

  “I think we can assume this barrage is the preliminary to an attack, Lieutenant. Is everything ready?”

  He looked at Sergeant Mason, who replied. “We’re as ready as we can be. We’ve put machine guns to cover the approaches to the village. That should hold them when they come. There are two mortars ready to use as well, but we need a target for those. The boys are ready, Mr. Hoffman, don’t worry.”

  “It’s Max,” I reminded him.

  He nodded absently, just as one of his men dashed over and slid down beside us.

  “They’re coming, loads of them. We can hardly make them out in the darkness, but they’re there all right.”

  Mason gave me a cynical glance. I knew what he meant, ‘you’re supposed to be running this show, you decide’. So I did.

  “Are they attacking in a rush or slowly, keeping in cover?”

  “They’re coming mighty slow, Sir, keeping those turbans well down, so we can’t shoot them the hell off.”

  “Ok, do your best to keep them away. I’ll see if I can rig a surprise for them. Sergeant, would you come with me?”

  He looked surprised, but Rains nodded, and he followed me to the stack of C4.

  “Would you start taking the blocks of explosive out of the crates. I’ll go and find someone that knows how to fix the detonators.”

  “I can do that, Sir.”

  I noticed the Sir. At least I had one good man on my side.

  “Very well, let’s do it. I want the explosive stacked against that defensive wall where your officer is hiding. Then we’ll get them to pull back. I guess you know the rest.”

  He grinned. “That’s good enough for me.”

  We started to assemble the charges, and Mason called two of his men over to start carrying them to the stone wall. When Rains discovered I was leading the enemy onto the wall to destroy it, and them with it, he protested.

  “This wall offers good cover, Hoffman. The last thing we want is to destroy it.”

  I laughed at him. “Rains, they’ll charge straight over this wall. You need to pull back into the village and establish a new defensive position.”

  “I do?” He looked totally lost now, and his men looked worried at his forlorn expression.

  “You do, yes. Right now.”

  “Ok, I’ll do it. Corporal Delgado, come with me, and we’ll set up a new position.”

  They left the shelter of the wall. There were several men waiting for orders, and Mason detailed them to bury the explosives under blocks of stone. He made a final check on the wiring, and then we pulled back with the remote detonator. We found a new position almost a hundred yards away, inside some kind of a stonecutter’s yard.

  “Sergeant, do you think you ought to check how the battle’s going?”

  “Yeah, I guess so. They’ve gone a bit quiet.”

  “Planning a final rush, maybe?”

  “Probably. You’re all ready, Sir?”

  “I am.”

  He doubled away, and Rachel slipped in beside me.

  “How are things going, Max? What’s happening?”

  I explained as best I could. She looked horrified.

  “So you’re leading them into the village?”

  “The outskirts, yes. Then we blow the charges.”

  “It’s a hell of a risk.”

  I stared at her. “It’s called war, Rachel. You were an Air Force officer, so you should know.”

  “Yeah.”

  She waited with me, and Sergeant Mason returned with two of his men.

  “We’re all set. We just need to wait for the bastards to come nearer.”

  It didn’t take long. The first rays of dawn started to dilute the darkness, and there was a roaring shout as they charged forward. There were at least fifty of them, counting the muzzle flashes as they fired their assault rifles. When they realized we’d pulled back, they came straight over the low wall, and Mason detonated the charges. There was a huge explosion, the ground shook and the wall disappeared in a show of small stone fragments, along with the attackers. A massive sheet of flame lit up the sky, ripping away the darkness. And in that violent light, we saw the second wave of Taliban advancing, another forty or fifty of them, about two hundred yards back.

  “Oh, shit,” Mason breathed.

  “Call up the machine guns. We need to try and hold them off.”

  “I reckon we do.”

  He rushed back, shouting orders for them to resite the machine guns. They started their monotonous chatter, and the attackers dived for cover, but they crawled forward. It was obvious it would only be a matter of time before they overran us. They reached the wreckage of the stone wall and the devastation that was all that remained of their first attacking wave. They stopped there and started shooting up the village, and then their mortars started again. Rachel tugged at my sleeve. I hadn
’t realized she’d been shouting for my attention.

  “Max, we could try and get the Twin Otter out of here with the casualties and some of the medics.”

  I looked across the wide gap to the road where the aircraft sat waiting and shook my head.

  “We’d be a sitting target just getting across the open ground, and they wouldn’t let us take off. As soon as we start the engines, they’d rip us apart with machine gun and rocket fire. I’m afraid we have to forget the plane for the time being. What about Luk?”

  “He’s trying to get Yves to allow him to get to his sniper rifle. They’re almost having to hold him down,” she smiled.

  “At least that means he’s recovering well. Are you armed?”

  She held out her Colt .45. I nodded. “You’d better warn Yves and his people to stay inside the stone hut. It’s the best cover in the village.” She ran off.

  They crawled nearer and nearer, and their fire was so intense that it was all we could do to keep our heads down and stay out of the withering gunfire. Sergeant Mason doubled over to us.

  “Any suggestions? I don’t think we can hold out much longer. We’re running low on ammunition.”

  I shook my head. “None. Except the obvious.”

  “Surrender?”

  I nodded. “I can’t think of any other options.”

  “The Taliban don’t have much of a reputation for looking after their prisoners.”

  “At least we’d be alive, Sergeant.”

  “At first, yeah.”

  I looked around at the battle that was raging around the small village. It was growing even lighter, but the flashes of gunfire and exploding mortar shells still lit up the sky. There were three times as many flashes from the incoming fire than from our defense, and the conclusion was obvious.

  “We’ll just have to hope for the best. They’re not all animals, and maybe this lot are not so bad.”

  He gave me a skeptical look.

  “If you say so. How are we going to play this? I mean. Do we use a white flag, or something?”

  “I think so, that’s the universal signal, I believe. Warn the men first.”