“CDE looks clear on those coordinates,” I reply. “But I don’t have eyes inside the village. There could be non-combatants in the houses.” I also ask him to read back all of the coordinates once more, especially the three where my team is parked. Last thing I need is a Hellfire up my ass.
“Copy that. Stand by. We’re calling it in.”
“Just to be clear, there could be non-combatants in the area. CDE could be high. Repeat, CDE could be high.”
“Acknowledged. Striking only Tali coordinates.”
“Roger,” I reply, before relaying to my guys that an airstrike is on the way. “Keep your heads down, boys,” I add.
Airstrikes come in different flavors, including UAVs armed with Hellfire missiles, A-10 Warthogs, AH-64 Apache attack helicopters, AC-130 gunships, or even F-16C Falcons. The last three come to the party featuring a variety of precision munitions designed to assist Talis meeting their maker. And in this case, I’m betting the time-to-meet-Allah assistance comes in the form of cluster bombs, probably CBU-103s. These are precision-guided versions of the venerable and quite badass CBU-87, capable of zeroing in on the provided GPS coordinates, and each can cover an area of about 300 square feet with bone-shredding ferocity.
Now, with the Warthogs, Apaches, Falcons, and the AH-130 variants you at least get a warning as all four can be heard from a little way out. But UAV strikes are sudden, since you can’t really hear or even see the drones. And they are quite violent. The target is there one instant and, poof, gone the next.
After a few minutes, the distinct sound of turboprops signal that the strike in progress will be carried out by a Lockheed AC-130J Ghostrider gunship. This is the natural-born killer version of the classic four-engine C-130 Hercules.
“Incoming angel of death,” I say as the heavily armed beast comes in at around a thousand feet before starting its strafing run. The Air Force gray color of the gunship against the blue skies rushes over the western rim rock at three klicks from our position.
“SAM!” Cope shouts from his station, and we all turn to see the rising plume originating somewhere north of the designated target.
The Ghostrider immediately takes evasive action, cutting hard right to position itself at ninety degrees from the incoming vampire—presumably one of those reported Anza missiles—while dispensing flares. It’s actually a sight to see, even in daylight, as a shower of blinding sparks burst out of canisters mounted on the gunship.
A moment later, the missile goes astray as its heat-seeking head opts for the superhot flares clouding the sky, and the gunship resumes its run, rushing over us in another few seconds, before popping skyward.
“Cope, confirm you still have eyes on the PIDs.”
“Roger, that. But the hajis are now going bat-shit crazy inside that village, crawling up the walls like goddamned monkeys on steroids.”
The comment makes me think of the Talis we put down yesterday in Compound 35. I look at Dix, but he avoids my gaze.
“What is it?” I ask him.
“We really shouldn’t be here, Boss.”
“Why?”
“Can’t say.”
“Goddamn you, man,” I tell him, before pressing the mic and asking Cope the same question since he also should know what’s going on. But the sniper beats me to it.
“Hey, Dix,” Cope says. “You should see this shit. Hajis are leaping and scrambling. Remind me of the bastards we used to—”
A series of synchronized blasts signal the use of multiple CBU-103s, which main canisters break open over the designated targets to release their submunitions, bomblets that detonate when striking the ground. It’s the equivalent of multiple showers of IEDs all detonating at once.
But the ground shakes beneath me far more than I would have expected given the distance to the selected targets, and I feel the rush of air as the nearby explosions consume the available oxygen and draws more of it from its surroundings.
Did one of the bombs go astray?
“Call it off!” Murph screams as the gunship cuts a tight 180-degree turn to make a second pass, its turboprops biting the air. “Run, Chappy! Fucking RUN!”
“Wait up, Murph! What the hell’s happening?”
“Just run, man! On me! NOW!” Murph screams.
“Coming! Coming!” Chappy replies.
“We need to get the hell out of—”
“Murph! What the hell’s happening?” I shout.
“Call it off, Law! I think they hit Cope! Call it—”
A second set of synchronized blasts nearly blinds me as the entire village below and also the hillside just north of my position is engulfed in fire and shrapnel. The wind gusts past us, whooshing toward the center of the blast.
“Oh, Christ,” Dix hisses as a sheet of flames, rock, sand, and shrapnel shrouds the spot where Murph and Chappy were hidden, the detonations mixed with the whistling wind.
I try to scream but the shockwave that reaches us a moment later pushes me to the side.
Dix reacts first, getting to his feet before grabbing me by the collar, pulling me up, and giving me a shove downhill, away from our vantage point. He’s arrived to the same conclusion that’s blaring in my mind: some dickwad got the goddamned GPS coordinates mixed up.
I start running away from the inferno, from the overwhelming heat. The turboprops roar somewhere to our west as we rush down the mountainside, in the direction of the Marines. Dix scrambles right behind me, his boots pounding the terrain noisily, scraping and sliding.
There’s nothing pretty about this kind of retreat. You either run as fast as you can, or you die where you stand.
And that’s when I hear the gunship coming back around for a third pass, the grumble of its turboprops suddenly mixing with an explosion of gunfire down the hill. The Marines have opened up on the Talis.
“Hotel Niner Seven! Hotel Niner Seven!” I shout while changing frequencies and trying not to lose my footing. “You’re hitting my team! Repeat! You’re fucking hitting my team!”
“Hold on! We’re surrounded and—”
“Call it off, Brooks! Now, Goddammit! NOW! You’re killing us!”
“That’s impossible!” I hear him shout over the noise of the engines and the mixed-caliber hell those guys are unloading on a threat I can’t see down there. “My guy called in the no-strikes coordinates to avoid—”
The blast behind me is overarching, the pressure crushing, as if the devil himself has punched me in the back with all his fiery might.
Before everything goes dark.
Chapter 5
“Look at me, Law! Stay with me! Lawson! LAWSON!”
I open my eyes and try to focus on Kate’s face, on her eyes glaring at me with raw fear. I try to lift my head off the gurney, but she is forcing me down. And the ringing in my ears makes her voice seem distant even though I can tell she is shouting.
“My… team,” I manage to say through the most excruciating pain I’ve ever felt, as if a hundred knives are raking my back. “What…happened…to…”
“Don’t know,” she replies.
But those eyes betray her.
I can see through the ache squeezing my mind that she is lying, that they’re either dead or… like me, broken.
Although my nervous system is in a state of shock, I force my mind to work through the pain, like we were trained to do, locking it down tight. I replay those last few seconds, as the gunship unleashed its cruelty on Cope, then on Murph and Chappy, and finally on Dix and me. Then total darkness, until a moment ago, when I came about on a gurney flanked by medics and Kate.
“But we’re going to take good care of you, Law!” she adds. “You hear me? We’re going to take damn good care of you!”
“Dix,” I mumble. “He was…right behind…”
I can’t complete the sentence, much less the thought as the throbbing u
p and down my spine tears through my defenses, squeezing my mind.
Oh, Sweet Jesus!
I don’t know how long I can stand it.
As I gaze about wildly at the blur of scrubs and surgical masks surrounding me, I notice a young man sitting on a gurney smoking a cigarette.
A cigarette inside the Role 3?
He’s wearing dark-olive pants, black boots smeared in mud, and an open vest exposing his tanned chest. A vintage M3 submachine gun rests on his thighs. A pack of Lucky Strike is held by an elastic band on a World War 2 vintage helmet as his brown eyes meet mine across the trauma unit.
Hey, kid.
I blink, recognizing his features from the framed photo on the mantel.
Pops?
You’re a frogman, kid. Like me. Like your dad. So, take the fucking pain.
But before I can answer, a figure in scrubs walks in between us, and when it passes, the gurney is empty.
What the hell?
And that’s my last thought as the world starts to spin, before I feel like I’m falling away.
All sound vanishes. I see Kate again. Focus on those beautiful lips. They’re moving, but I can’t hear anything as her face gets smaller, as my vision tunnels and all goes dark.
Chapter 6
The vibrations awaken me.
I try to ignore them but they persist, rattling me.
And the light.
Piercing.
Stabbing my optic nerves.
“He’s coming around,” a woman says.
I blink, trying to focus on the picture directly above me: pipes and wires lining a metallic ceiling painted Air Force gray.
I tense, staring at the same color of that damn gunship.
And now I hear its engines.
But not the turboprops of a gunship.
These are jet engines, and they’re droning at cruise setting, a sound that evokes memories of my many deployments aboard C-17 Globemasters.
For reasons I can’t explain, my groggy mind remembers what grunts call these ugly four-engine transports: Bugsmashers.
And my eyes suddenly get very heavy.
I try to will my mind to stay awake. I need to know what happened to my team. But I’m quickly losing this battle. As much as I force my eyelids to remain open, they come crashing down, like a garage door on steroids.
Slamming shut.
Hard.
And everything once again turns black.
#
I hear a voice in the darkness.
Distant.
Remote.
As if it was speaking through a closed door.
“Commander Pacheco?”
I inhale, my eyes flickering as I sense light again.
Slowly, I open them.
An image resolves over me: an attractive brunette wearing an NWU—Navy Working Uniform—hovering in my limited field of view checking her tablet computer.
The sound of jet engines tells me we’re still aboard the Air Force transport, and I still have no idea what’s going on. Last thing I remember was being in the ER at KAF, then that strange vision of Pops, followed by Kate’s face, and then a complete blank. No dreams. Not even nightmares. Just her face as I dropped away. Then a moment of consciousness in this plane, when I fought to remain awake. And now this woman.
The insignias on her cap and in the middle of her chest rank her as a lieutenant. The name stenciled over her left breast pocket says HARRIS. And above it she wears the insignia of the Navy Flight Nurse Corps, a pair of gold wings flanking an oak leaf.
“Welcome back, Commander Pacheco. It’s good to see you awake. I’m Lieutenant Harris. How are you feeling?”
I want to tell her that I feel like shit, but my throat is so damn dry all I can manage is a barely audible, “Water.”
“Yes, of course,” she replies, putting down her tablet and reaching for a small bottle of water with a red straw already in it. She places her left hand behind my head to prop me up just enough to guide the straw to my lips.
Oh, man. It tastes like heaven, but after I take a few sips, she moves it away.
What the hell?
She must have read the expression on my face.
Smiling, she says, “You can have more in a moment. Don’t want you getting sick.”
She then reaches for my wrist and checks my pulse. I notice that my other arm has a catheter connected to an IV drip swinging over me as the plane goes through light turbulence.
Well, at least my arms are where they’re supposed to be. But I’m too damn weak to lift my head on my own, so I can’t check to make sure my legs and my balls are still where they belong. I can feel my toes wiggling, but it could be a phantom limb, the fake sensation that an amputated or missing limb is still attached. And it is at this moment of growing disconcert, that Kate’s words echo in my chemically-altered mind.
I felt very fucking noble amputating kids’ mangled legs and cutting off what was left of their balls.
I sigh and hope that isn’t the case while I take another look around, though doing so suddenly makes my head dizzy and my eyes very tired. “Where?” I ask.
“Air Force transport. Bound for Landstuhl.”
I frown, knowing precisely where that is.
Landstuhl is a U.S. military hospital in Germany where they send injured troops after they get patched up at KAF.
“You’ve been through a long surgery,” she adds. “You boarded this flight…” She checks her watch. “Almost six hours ago. Have another five left. The good news is that you’re going to be alright and—”
“My…team?” I ask, forcing the words through my sore throat as I feel the curtain coming down once more.
She starts to speak but I can no longer hear her words.
Dammit.
Not again.
But I can’t help it. I can’t keep my eyes open as darkness once more swallows everything.
#
A strong jolt pulls me out of the blackness.
I open my eyes and stare at the bundle of wires running along the ceiling of the same Air Force transport. At least I think it’s the same one. I can’t be sure since I don’t know how long I’ve been—
Another bump.
Lightning gleams through the round windows along the opposite side of the fuselage, followed by the clap of thunder.
We’re flying through a storm.
Great.
This time I manage to lift my head, and I immediately sense movement from the front of the plane.
It’s Lieutenant Harris in her NWUs making her way down the cabin trying to balance herself in the same turbulence that woke me up.
“Hey, handsome,” she says, smiling her pretty smile. “Buy you a drink?”
I nod. Very much so.
She produces another bottle of water and a straw, and this time she lets me drink as much as I want, nearly half the bottle.
“Better?” she asks.
Another nod. My throat is still very sore, coarse actually, like I’ve swallowed sandpaper. But I still manage a, “Team?”
She frowns, looks over her right shoulder, and back at me. Then, “Here’s Commander Reid. He’ll discuss your condition with you.”
I want to tell her that was not what I fucking asked, but my vocal cords betray me. All I can muster sounds like the moans of a castrated animal, which I hope to God I’m not.
She drops her brows at my guttural protest and shifts aside to make room for a man in his forties with salt and pepper hair also wearing NWUs. He’s a lieutenant commander, like me, and also a physician, wearing the Naval Flight Surgeon insignia over his name.
“Glad to see you awake, Commander,” he says in a deep voice, checking his own tablet computer before eyeing the level of my IV. “How’s your pain level, one to ten?”
“Two?” he says, raising his brows. “Not bad. Not bad at all. Now about your—”
“Team?” I force the words.
He sighs, pulls up a chair, and nods at Lieutenant Harris to give us some space. Then he briefly looks in the precise direction where she did when I asked her the same question.
“Look,” he starts. “I’m not really sure what happened on that mountain, but the Marines brought in three wounded. That’s you and two of your team members. The first one, U.S. Army Command Master Sergeant Leslie Hope had polytrauma. Upper and lower extremities, plus multiple internal injuries.”
Jesus Christ Almighty.
I inhale deeply and feel acid squirting in my stomach. This can’t be happening.
“We patched up Sergeant Hope the best way—”
“Dix.”
“Excuse me?”
“Name’s…Dix.”
“Oh, I see, of course…Dix…we patched him up the best we could and transferred him to Bagram. His condition is…stable, for now.”
I manage a slight nod, knowing what it means. Dix’s too mangled up to travel to Germany.
“We’re really concerned about his spine,” he adds. “He took a lot of shrapnel up on that mountain, and we won’t know more until we get him to the OR at Bagram.”
Yeah. He took a lot of fucking shrapnel.
Meant for me.
I remember how Dix grabbed me and forced me down the hillside, running behind me, shielding me with his massive bulk and—
“The second man that came with you,” he continues, “Chief Petty Officer Scott Murphy, is three beds down.” He points in the direction he had looked a moment ago. “He’s unconscious and—”
“Murph,” I mumble.
“Excuse me?”
“Murph…not…Scott.”
Highest Law: A Gripping Psychological Thriller Page 6