Rules of War

by Matthew Betley

  Logan fired first, initiating the attack on the airfield that was in reality a geopolitical struggle on a tactical scale. The 7.62mm rounds struck the soldier in the chest, and his black jacket flared up behind him as he fell. Even before he hit the ground, the remaining members of the team opened fired on their targets as the explosion of unsuppressed gunfire echoed off the tarmac and the hangar.

  Before the Venezuelan security detail could return fire, six of General Cordones’s men lay on the cold tarmac, cut down in the first volley.

  Logan transitioned to a second target inside the hangar and squeezed the trigger, all the while stalking forward in a crouched combat walk.

  * * *

  Victor didn’t even flinch at the sound of gunfire behind him, although he couldn’t say the same for President Pena. Of the two men on the ground, Pena’s head of security reacted appropriately, turned to the man who was under his protection, even while in captivity, and shouted, “On your stomach. Stay low!”

  Victor was impressed with Antonio’s dedication and concern for his master, but Victor didn’t have time to commend him for it. A stray round struck the president’s head of security in the side of the neck, and he fell over, blood pumping from the mortal wound and pooling on the epoxy floor. His eyes were focused on President Pena, the last image he saw before he died.

  Victor grabbed the president, whose light-gray suit and white shirt—no tie—were splattered with Antonio’s blood, and yanked him to his feet. More gunshots, this time from Victor’s men—About goddamned time, he thought—rang out from inside the hangar. “Time to go,” he said, and pulled the president to the back of the execution area, the Browning Hi-Power .40-caliber pistol in his right hand.

  “You’re insane, and you’re going to get us both killed!” the president said with combined disgust and panic.

  Victor reached the back wall of hanging cloth, and said, “If you really want to die right here, right now, I can make that happen.” He reached down, pulled the bottom up, looked at the president, and gestured for him to go underneath.

  President Pena fully grasped the deadly predicament he was in—die now, or pray for a miracle with every passing minute that he remained alive. In the end, it was no choice at all, and he ducked his head under the cloth and stepped behind the curtain.

  CHAPTER 48

  The second volley from Logan’s team dropped the remaining two members of the security detail on the outside left of the hangar and three more inside, which left five shooters from the security detail alive and fighting. Unfortunately for Logan and his task force, those five men reacted the way Logan and his friends would’ve—calmly and smoothly.

  They opened fired on the approaching force as the V formation split, a mitosis of men and weapons with Logan, the vice president, Marcos, and Jack dashing to the right to seek cover behind the satellite truck. Cole, Thomas, and Frederico broke left, angling toward two white pickups and a bulk fuel tank.

  The last thing Logan saw as he reached the relative safety of the white satellite truck with the Globovision logo on the side was General Cordones drag President Pena under the back of the black curtains. Where the hell is he going?

  Bullets kicked up puffs of concrete and punched holes into the side of the truck, and Logan hid behind the front left quarter panel, protected by the wheel and the engine block. The truck vibrated, not from the helicopter or gunfire, but from the engine itself. It’s still running. Must’ve been getting ready to film his award-winning executive snuff film, Logan thought.

  Logan glanced to the left and motioned to Cole and his team. He pointed at Cole, let his AK-103 dangle across his chest for a moment, performed a shooting gesture with both hands, pointed at himself, and then pointed over his shoulder to the back of the heavy-duty truck. Cole nodded in return and relayed the plan to the rest of his team. Logan gripped the AK-103 and moved past his teammates as he said, “Cole is going to draw their fire, and I’m going around the back of the truck to get a better angle. Feel free to open up from the front. Or not. There are only five of them left. It’s almost a fair fight.”

  Cole watched as Logan reached his assault position. Cole raised his arms above the front of the pickup truck and opened fire in a spray-and-pray shooting position, a move that would make every weapons instructor the world over cringe in disapproval. Thomas and Frederico dropped to the pavement and delivered more concentrated fire from under the pickup truck.

  All five soldiers—two on the left near the Range Rovers and three near the plane—returned fire on the pickup, which was Logan’s cue. He emerged from behind the satellite truck and stalked forward, opening fire on the two men on the left. Several well-placed rounds hit the two closest targets simultaneously, as the two men stood with their profiles exposed to Logan, the second man just in front of the first from Logan’s vantage point.

  Jack opened fire from the front of the Globovision truck, and two men near the landing gear of the plane and the ladder dropped. The third man, in his late forties, his hair more gray than black, was the only one who made the smart choice: he fled up the ladder.

  Can’t blame the guy for trying, Logan thought, but still opened fire to prevent his escape. The first rounds struck the ladder and clanged loudly off the rungs of the metal rolling staircase. The man leapt up the stairs two at a time in the race of his life. Logan stopped his combat walk, raised the barrel slightly, and pulled the trigger. The man jerked at the top of the stairs and disappeared inside the plane. Logan waited for a two-count as the only remaining sound was that of the Hind gunship. The last man standing didn’t reappear in the doorway, and Logan lowered the weapon.

  He turned around and took three steps toward the execution area when a loud thump reverberated behind him. He recognized the sound, and thought, Oh no, and glanced back at the plane. The cabin door had shut, which meant Logan hadn’t killed the last member of the security force. Wonderful.

  Logan turned toward the plane, and as if taunting him, the two Rolls-Royce jet engines mounted on the main fuselage behind the wings near the tail roared to life. Logan turned away and watched as the high-pitched whine of the left engine sent a blast of air toward Logan that knocked the black curtains down and sent them twirling through the air like a magician’s cloak. The black walls gone, Logan saw why the general had fled toward the back of the hangar: a single exit door stood halfway open.

  The large business-class jet moved toward the open doors, a lumbering beast intent on escaping its metal pen. Logan didn’t know who or what else might be in the plane, and he didn’t care. No one else was leaving the hangar. No one.

  He raised the AK-103 and fired at the rear set of tires. The 7.62mm rounds ricocheted off the landing gear and struck the side of the compressed rubber, but the tires remained intact and the plane kept moving. What the hell? Logan knew airplane tires were highly pressurized to withstand the weight and stress of landing and takeoff, but he thought for sure 7.62mm rounds would have done the trick. Guess whoever owned this one anticipated getting shot at. Great.

  The jet pushed forward and taxied out of the hangar as Jack and the others opened fire on it from in front of the satellite truck. With Logan’s initial plan a failure, he was forced to choose—pursue General Cordones and the Venezuelan president or stop the plane. Hell with it. They’ve got this, he thought, confident in his teammates to do their jobs, and sprinted to the back of the hangar through the open door into the blackness beyond.

  CHAPTER 49

  The Hind’s cockpit was the lower of the two bulbous spheres of glass that gave the gunship the moniker the Crocodile. Unfortunately, it was also physically separated by metal and the helicopter’s frame from the copilot’s cockpit above and behind it, which was how Santiago found himself cramped in the confined space with the pilot. In addition to the headset he wore to communicate through the noise and chaos, he had two other items—the Glock that was an omnipresent warning if the pilot disobeyed his orders and a medical kit to treat the wound to the man’s le
g where Cole had shot him.

  The most critical decision Cole had made during the assault on the mountaintop base was sparing the life of the soldier who had impersonated the vice president. As fate would have it, that soldier was in fact one of the several pilots that General Cordones had recruited for his mission—and the only one left alive after Logan’s task force had run through the soldiers like a buzz saw. Sparing the man’s life had ultimately provided them with close air support for the raid on the airfield. One small decision in the heat of battle with such significant unforeseen consequences, Santiago had thought. Without the helicopter, the alternative options for assaulting the airfield were all in the favor of the general and his men. The Hind had provided cover for their arrival and dominance from the air, which was what Santiago needed as the white jet emerged from the hangar. As Logan and the others opened fire on the plane, he realized that whatever or whoever was on it had to be stopped.

  “Take off right now,” he ordered the wounded pilot, whose name was Gabriel.

  A second later, with the rotors already turning, Gabriel pulled the collective up, and the Hind lifted away from the tarmac.

  “Good,” Santiago said. A practical, professional police officer, he’d realized over the past few days of spending time in combat with Logan West and his friends that while he was a very capable and dangerous man, they were inclined and almost enthusiastic in the way they dealt lethality and carnage to their enemies. He thought they’d be proud at how far he’d evolved in his thinking with what he had planned next. “Now stop that plane. I don’t care how, but make it happen this instant. And don’t hit my friends.”

  Gabriel was exhausted, in pain, and still bleeding. But he was an excellent pilot, passionate about his profession to the point where he served the way of the helicopter and the exaltation from flying more than any ideology. And with a war machine like the Hind, he felt a special affinity for the weapons package it carried. As a result, when his captor ordered him to stop the plane, his response was immediate, and he thought, Which one do I choose?

  The S-24 rocket was too large, as was the antitank missile. He’d likely kill everyone on the plane and several of Santiago’s “friends,” which wouldn’t be good for his health. No. It has to be the autocannon, he realized, adjusted the control cyclic, aimed for the landing gear under the right wing, and unleashed a volley from the four-barreled Yakushev-Borzov YakB-12.7mm mounted machine gun under the nose of the cockpit.

  Unlike the small arms fire, the 12.7mm rounds destroyed everything they touched, kicked up chunks of tarmac, punched holes in the back wall of the hangar, and most importantly, destroyed the landing gear and tires. That should do the trick, Gabriel thought with professional pride as he watched the chain-reaction destruction unfold.

  * * *

  Cole and the two assassins had been so focused on the plane that they didn’t even realize the Hind had lifted off until the 12.7mm rounds tore into the landing gear and the inside of the hangar. The autocannon fire caused Cole to flinch, and he instinctively crouched down behind the pickup truck, although he realized, feeling rather foolish, that there was no point since no one was shooting at him. Thomas and Frederico stopped firing through the gap below the truck and turned their heads to watch the Hind unleash its stream of fire.

  Please let this guy be accurate or he’s going to shred us to pieces as well, Cole thought. After a brief eternity, the autocannon ceased firing, and Cole stood up to survey the damage, which sent a surge of adrenaline and panic racing through him.

  The right front landing gear had been destroyed, and the tires were shredded. But somehow, the plane still rolled forward, the wheels disintegrating like the flat tire on a limping Nascar car. The plane had been knocked off-balance, the nose lowered, and as a result began a gradual turn to the right toward Cole and the two assassins.

  “Get up and move!” Cole screamed at Thomas and Frederico, who were jarred from their reverie at the Hind’s firepower. They scrambled backward, which was all Cole needed to confirm they’d heard his warning.

  The jet was less than forty feet away and closing quickly. Cole waited for another second as the two Venezuelan killers reached their feet. While they weren’t exactly CIA or Unit material, the two assassins had still fought valiantly alongside Cole, and he wasn’t about to abandon them on the proverbial battlefield.

  The three men dashed from behind the truck in a beeline toward the other part of the assault force. As they crossed the chasm between the pickups and the satellite truck, the jet lurched farther to the right, and the shadow of its left wing shrouded Cole and the two assassins in darkness, heightening the frenzied urgency all three men felt as they tried to escape. Better run faster before it hits, Cole thought, and emerged from the shadows with Thomas and Frederico close behind.

  Jack stood next to the open driver’s door of the satellite truck and yelled at them furiously to move faster. Marcos and the vice president, who was at his side after they’d exited the helicopter, had already sought cover at the back of the satellite truck.

  What the hell is it now? Cole thought, but then realized it didn’t matter. All that did was that the three of them reach safety. As Cole heard the collision, he realized they’d run out of time, and he dove into the air like an NFL player desperately reaching for the end zone.

  The plane struck the pickup truck as the uneven nose, which had dropped a few feet, tore into the roof of the cab on the passenger side. The momentum of the jet drove the truck backward and turned it, grinding it along the tarmac with an awful wrenching sound. But it wasn’t the pickup truck that had Cole and Jack concerned: it was the white jet-fuel tank behind it.

  The pickup truck was lifted on its side, and the plane dragged it forward, sparks flying in different directions as the bottom left part of the chassis was torn apart.

  Cole landed on his chest and waited for the explosion that he was certain would incinerate them all. Nothing happened, and panicked screaming brought him back to the moment.

  Marcos and the vice president stood in the open back of the satellite truck among the communication equipment, computers, and monitors. Its doors hung open, and they motioned for him to get in the truck. Thomas and Frederico hadn’t followed Cole’s lead in his aerial antics, and still on their feet, they reached the back of the truck before he did. The truck’s engine roared to life, and Cole realized Jack’s plan—use the truck to escape the imminent conflagration. Cole got to his feet and was pulled into the back of the satellite truck as the last of its new occupants.

  The plane slowed down with the impact and the increased friction of the vehicular weight it carried. Unfortunately, it didn’t stop, and the pickup truck slammed into the 3200-liter bulk fuel tank that contained Jet A-1 fuel. The front of the truck punctured the cylindrical tank a few feet from the bottom, and the kerosene-based fuel poured out of the tank as the plane finally stopped its kamikaze run.

  The Jet A-1 fuel splashed across the front of the ruined hood and covered the front of the pickup and the tarmac below. A normally inert liquid, it required a source for ignition.

  Jack turned the satellite truck to the left and accelerated as it pulled away from the hangar. Flooring it, he prayed the inevitable would hold off for a few more seconds. Another hundred feet and I’ll feel a lot better about our chances, he thought. The satellite truck reached the end of the hangar, and he veered to the left to place the building between them and the wreckage.

  The impact with the pickup truck had completely torn away the jet’s right-side landing gear. With no stability on the right side of the plane, its weight slowly crushed the cab of the pickup until it reached its breaking point, and the cab exploded inward. The plane dropped several feet, metal grinding on metal, and sent a shower of sparks across the pickup truck.

  The Jet A-1 fuel was combustible with a low flash point of 100 degrees Fahrenheit, and the shower of sparks was more than sufficient to ignite the liquid. The truck erupted with a deep, thudding whoosh, and a sec
ond and a half later, the flames reached the inside of the tank, which detonated with a thunderous explosion. The resulting fireball consumed the pickup, the plane, and the inside of the hangar and illuminated the entire airfield as if it were bathed in the light of an enormous candle.

  The satellite truck rocked forward as the shock wave slammed into the fleeing vehicle, and Jack gripped the steering wheel as he tried to maintain control. The truck’s shadow created by the fireball swerved back and forth across the tarmac as if battling itself. The truck straightened out, and Jack breathed a sigh of relief, at least until he looked left and realized they’d reached the main course on the night’s menu of death and destruction.

  CHAPTER 50

  When Logan had emerged through the rear exit door of the hangar, he found the back of the airfield shrouded in darkness. Beyond the edge of the tarmac lay a deeper pool of grayish black, and it had taken Logan’s eyes a few seconds to process the fact that fifty feet beyond the back of the hangar was a steep drop-off. He had no idea what lay below or how far down the slope went. There was no fence line, and the Marine officer in him mentally commented on the fact that the builders of the airfield hadn’t done the proper operational risk management assessment. Then again, this is Venezuela, and I doubt safety is high on the list of national priorities at the moment.

  He’d looked right and been rewarded with the sight, forty feet away near the edge of the hangar, of General Cordones forcing President Pena, his wrists zip-tied together in front of him, into the passenger seat of a black Range Rover. Logan had raised the AK-103 and fired three shots, but the rounds had missed as the general ducked behind the front of the SUV. There was a thud as the driver’s door had closed, and the taillights illuminated the vehicle with a reddish glow.