by Wolf Riedel
Sage nodded and ducked down under the trailer. She worked her way to its far side and took up a position behind a set of flat tandem duals to watch down the length of the opposite two lanes of the deserted street.
Mark followed her to get a better appreciation of what was on the street on the far side of the semi-trailer. From Sage’s position he had a good view. The far side of the curb had another half dozen semi-trailers backed over the curb between some trees, side by side, with their kingpins facing the street. Behind and around them were more scruffy trees and bushes and a scattering of small broken down brick shacks. No lights showed beyond the dim street lights on the main street. Everything was quiet.
Mark returned to the back of the SUV. To its front the chatter of rifle fire continued. Mark tilted his head and listened more closely. The cracks he was hearing were the sound of the rifles firing and not that of the supersonic shock of bullets going by. So far so good. No one was firing their way. As best as he could tell all the fire that he was hearing was heading away from them or, at worse, flying obliquely across their front.
It had been no more than five minutes. The bursts had paused momentarily after the bang-crump of an RPG which had created a fireball of sparks that illuminated the entire compound as it had blasted away the steel picket gate on the front of the compound. A minute later a similar display erupted from the back of the compound. A flurry of gunfire and loud shouts in Spanish was replaced by more controlled bursts that were typical of fire and movement. The army was closing in.
“Mark!” shouted Sal. “We’ve got visitors.”
Mark looked over and saw Sal pointing back up the street. A glance that way disclosed two vehicles moving up slowly without headlights. As they passed under one of the streetlights Mark could make out that they were pickups with one or two men standing in each of the load beds.
Sal rose up and ran across the street and tucked himself behind the tandem axle of a semi-truck that protruded onto the dirt sidewalk. He leveled his pistol at the pickups.
Mark shimmied along the side of the SUV and grabbed the PFP officer by the sleeve to make him aware of what was happening behind them. He immediately realized the significance of the predicament and opened the drivers door to access the car’s radio. The sudden illumination of the dome light attracted the attention of the oncoming pickups which came to a stop allowing their standing occupants to take a few shots at the car. This time Mark clearly recognized the cracks of near misses and, finally came to Sal’s point of view and wished that they had assault rifles instead of 9 millimeter pistols.
Tucking himself against the SUV’s left rear quarter panel, Mark returned fire just as both Sal and Sage let fly with a few rounds at the pickups. Mark estimated the range as about a hundred meters. A crappy range for pistol accuracy but darn easy shooting for a rifle. The hope was that by shooting back they’d spoil the aim of their attackers and either discourage their activities or at least hold them off until the PFP or army could come to their assistance.
A quick series of clangs gave evidence to the fact that at least one of the attackers had managed to hit the SUV. A shower of glass falling over his head told Mark that they had been close and he instinctively pulled further back along the car. Behind him the driver’s yelling on the radio had stopped and instead Mark heard the loud bursts of the officer’s G3 firing over the SUV’s front right fender down the length of the vehicle. The rifle’s hot 7.62 millimeter cartridge casings bounced across the hood and rained down on Mark. At the same time Mark could hear the crack of more outbound rounds from the soldiers at the intersection behind them. Their rounds sped past the SUV on their way to the pickups.
At this point discretion became the better part of valor for Mark as he scurried sideways to lie down in the dirt between the SUV and the semi-trailer beside it. Under the car he was able to get a glimpse of Sal and noticed he too had pulled further into the trucking compound to avoid a stray army round finding him on the sidewalk.
That’s good, thought Mark. He’ll be able to keep a watch for anyone trying to flank through the yard. Let the army have the street as their shooting gallery.
Mark looked over to his right under the semi trailer and saw Sage likewise laid out flat and hugging the ground behind a set of flat duals and keeping a watch on the far side of the street. A round clanged into the tacqueria sign just behind him.
Shit! Outgoing or incoming? he thought.
The hit had made him turn around just in time to see a group of four soldiers tear across the street to run over to the far curb, heading for the six semi-trailers parked across from Sage.
“Sage!” he yelled.
She turned her face toward him.
“You’ve got a bunch of soldiers coming up behind you!” he yelled pointing behind her.
She looked back down the street and then back at Mark and nodded. Slowly she pulled herself back under the vehicle and closer to Mark. She’d understood. When doing an uncoordinated firefight with people who don’t speak your language and don’t expect you to be there then get the hell out of the way and stay quiet. The best bet here was to stay as close to the PFP officer as possible because, presumably, the chances were higher that the army knew that he was a friendly. Sal looked safe where he was for the time being.
From his position on the ground and looking under the semi-trailer Mark could see the boots of the soldiers on the far side of the street as they moved from cover to cover closing in on the two pickup trucks’ flanks.
And then as quickly as it had started it came to an end. The flanking attack had worked and with a flurry of rifle fire pouring in on them from down the street and from the flanks, the gunmen at the pickups went down one by one. None surrendered; none tried to run; they all went down and the street became quiet.
Mark yelled over at Sal and told him to stay in his position until Garza returned. He wasn’t about to take the chance that a soldier at one end of the street or other would take a pot shot at an unknown suddenly walking across the street. While he waited he went over to Sage to see if she was all right.
Sage was fine but took one look at Mark’s face and using her hand turned his face to the light.
“Did you know you were bleeding?” she asked.
Mark put his hand up to check and Sage slapped it away.
“Don’t touch that with your filthy fingers,” she said. “God only knows what’s in that shit you rolled around in.” She went to the back seat of the car and came up with a water bottle and pulled a packet of Kleenex out of her pocket.
“Duck your head in here,” she gestured into the backseat of the shot up SUV, its dome light still burning brightly.
Sage poured a little water onto Mark’s face and then used a couple of Kleenex to wipe it down.
“Not too bad,” she said. “Maybe a half dozen superficial cuts.”
“Got hit by some flying safety glass from the back of the SUV,” said Mark.
“Yeah,” Sage said. “That’s what it looks like. That or you cut yourself while shaving. There’s a couple still leaking and I’ll just stick some Kleenex on them until it stops. Here,” she handed him the rest of the Kleenex and the water bottle. “You can clean that up more with the mirror when you have time. Doesn’t look like a Purple Heart kind of thing, if you ask me.”
Mark laughed. “Maybe not but maybe I’ll get some decorative scars to improve my rugged good looks.
“Where’s Sal?” she asked.
Mark looked around and spotted him across the way still tucked in beside the truck he had used for cover. Mark nodded in Sal’s direction and noticed that he was just closing off a call on his cell phone.
“You got a connection out here?” he called across the street.
“Absolutely perfect,” Sal said. “Five bars. You do know that the border’s only two miles that way, don’t you?”
Mark smiled. He hadn’t given it any thought. “What have you got?” he asked.
“That was DiAngelo,” he called back
. “They had an incident on the surveillance.”
“Tell me when you get back over here. We probably shouldn’t be yelling it around the barrio here.”
Five minutes later Garza was back and ensured Sal could safely recross the street.
Mark pulled Sal aside.
“So what did DiAngelo have?” Mark asked.
“The Cabello surveillance. We’d managed to set up a crew across and down the street from the guy. Just before one thirty this morning, their time, they noticed a car slowly drive by Cabello’s joint and then come back again a few minutes later and park on the street just in front of their stake out pad. Two shave-headed guys get out and walk over to Cabello’s so our guys get all antsy ’cause they figured these are two more guys from Cabello’s bunch having a late night meeting. Anyway, their audio picks up a door being busted and a lot of yelling and a couple of gunshots so our guys call for backup from the St. Pete PD and head out to see what they can do when the two dickheads come back out dragging Cabello along. There’s a shoot out and the two dickheads go down, one dead, one lightly wounded in the leg, Cabello’s scared shitless but okay but one of our guys gets wounded too. Then the LEOs come.”
“Who got wounded and how bad?” asked Mark.
“Steve Ingrim. One of the augmentees sent down from Benning. Not bad, I guess. It’s a light flesh wound on his hip. Apparently no bone was hit. Luckily the perp was using a piece of shit snub nose thirty-two.”
“So is DiAngelo all over this?” asked Mark.
“Yeah,” said Sal. “Whitlock and Platt stuck their noses in to help get the St. Petersburg PD to step aside on the promise that if anything else comes up on their side of the Bay they’ll be brought on board. They shipped that up the chain of command and they’re sorting that out now at the grownup’s level.”
“Anything about Noda?” asked Mark.
Sal shook his head. We’ve only got enough guys to cover him by phone taps and during the day. The team watched him when he went home and will pick him up again in the morning.”
“Call DiAngelo back and have someone get over to his place now. If he gets word about Cabello, he might take a runner or lead us to more contacts.”
Sal nodded. “Yeah I’ll give him a call.”
“Good,” said Mark. “Do that while we walk over to the compound. Garza’s got a lot to show us. Bring your gear with you.”
CHAPTER 47
Khalkari, Zabul, Afghanistan
Monday 19 Mar 07 1400 hrs AFT
Norowz ducked down behind a wall of grey-brown stone and mortar. Rock chips flew over his head from a few random bullet strikes. The fire wasn’t accurate but if God decreed that this was the day of your death, then one would find you. Norowz was devout although not demonstrably so. His task this day, like all days, was to ensure that whatever time God had written for him and his men was yet far in the future.
He duck-walked along behind the wall keeping his head down. His AK in his right hand, his Icom two-way radio in his left. He knew the Americans would be listening so his team’s voice procedure was a mixture of simple code words and thinly veiled speech; no proper names for the fighters or objectives. Norowz used these rarely these days because he knew that even the manner of how they spoke and their voice prints could be traced and with time the infidels would build a profile of his lashkar.
They had been a bit later arriving in their positions than Norowz had planned. Tofan had been in position first and ahead of time; Norowz’s had been on time while Amanullah’s people had been last even though their trip had been the shortest. It had gone as Norowz had expected.
His own team had been the one which had made the first contact. As they came out of the wadis where they had assembled and started to sweep across the checkerboard of walled fields, they had encountered several of the village’s men working.
Notwithstanding that the workers had been unarmed, they had been cut down quickly. This was no place or time for prisoners. Everyone left alive afterward would try to take their revenge on Amanullah’s people. The fewer that were left the more secure Amanullah would be.
With their first shots, Tofan had started his bombardment of the Americans’ compound. It would take some time before they could react. God willing, he would have taken his objective and be well on the way back out before that happened.
Before them the defenses were thickening.
Two delgai formed fire bases—one to the left, one to the right—while he and his two strongest delgai moved into the village to find and kill Khan. The trick, if it was a trick, was to keep moving. If his people slowed down in the face of the sporadic fire they would stall and start with the ridiculous habit of hunkering down behind cover and shooting large ineffective bursts of fire in all directions. He had been training his people hard to avoid that but knew deep down that the only thing that kept them moving was his own example; leading from the front, urging the fighters forward by exhorting them by name and cajoling them into yet one more assault.
He had reached the end of the wall. From here it made a turn to the left. A hard-packed earthen trail lined the wall. Three feet to the side was a ditch partially filled with brown, brackish water. Almond trees and small greening scrub lined both sides of the ditch.
Norowz concentrated on the compound barely fifty meters down the trail. They had been fortunate here. Unlike Panjwayi, the inhabitants of Khalkari felt secure and had not improved the rudimentary defenses of the village; there were no mines, no loopholed walls, no fighting trenches.
He studied the way forward and the options available, ignoring the colony of spiders that darted around his feet along the ground and up the wall, desperately trying to escape the gigantic, unfeeling threat that hovered over them.
One good push will do it, Norowz thought.
Kurt threw himself flat on the dirt roof hugging the parapet’s wall closely. He’d been under 107 millimeter rocket fire before. The things were inherently highly inaccurate even when fired from the Chinese made Type 63 twelve-tube multiple rocket launcher they were designed for. The fact was that for the most part the Taliban used no launchers but merely propped them up singly on a framework made of sticks or a mound of dirt and roughly oriented the rocket toward the target. This made them even more inaccurate. Unreliable and inaccurate, however, did not make them safe. It only reduced the chance of being hit to a lucky—or unlucky—shot depending on your point of view..
The first rocket veered well off to the left striking about two hundred meters on the down slope side of the compound. Kurt instinctively knew the round had been ineffective. The rocket’s explosive warhead had a blast radius of barely twelve meters and the fragmentation the splinters created basically flew forward in a butterfly pattern. Rogue splinters could, however, could go in any direction and well beyond the blast radius.
When fired, the rocket initially flew at the speed of sound so waiting for the bang of the launch gave only a split second’s warning. In this case, however, the dirt kicked up by the launch had been clearly visible. Kurt counted off the flash to bang interval and put the launcher some six kilometers away; almost at the maximum range of the rocket and at that range about as inaccurate as it could get. As if to give proof to the guesstimate, the next rocket went left and overshot by a good five hundred meters.
“This happen often here?” Kurt asked Lesperance.
Lesperance shook his head. “It’s never happened here during any of my tours.”
Below one of Lesperance’s troopers emerged from the headquarters, looked around the compound and finally spotted Lesperance waving at him.
“McLean’s on the horn. They’re a bit north of Adin Chineh and have heard gunfire down in Khalkari. He’s moving down there to check it out.”
Lesperance held a thumb up and, just as the trooper was about to return to the building to his radios, Kurt called out “Stand fast on that.”
Lesperance looked at Kurt questioningly.
“That’s my team that McLean is with and
Shirazi is in charge of it, not McLean or Roper,” Kurt said.
Lesperance looked confused for a minute. It was obvious that his decisions hadn’t been questioned by anyone for some time but at last he reacted.
“Okay, Sir,” he said. “What would you like them to do?”
“I’ll go down and talk to Shirazi. I want them to move south and determine what the situation is but not become decisively engaged at this time. What do you want to do with your team?”
Lesperance gave it only a moment’s thought. “We’ll move up from down here. If your team gets in on the north we might be able to catch whoever this is between us.”
“Good,” said Kurt as he started to climb down the ladder. “I’ll talk to Shirazi, you get your guys spun up and also see if you can get some air in here.”
Norowz maintained his position on one knee next to the corner of the wall. The lead delgai had closed on to Khan’s compound. Norowz’s second delgai was scattered all around him providing covering fire. Their commander had sited them so well that they would be able to bound in on a moment,s notice to assist the first delgai.
Norowz had grouped his PK machine guns with the supporting forces on the flanks of the village. They had by now isolated the compound from the rest of the village. The guns poured a heavy fire onto anyone who tried to move forward to support their leader. In the meantime, they also rained a blisteringly accurate rocket propelled grenade fire into the compound. Screams were issuing forth in contrast to the quiet endurance of two of their own wounded fighters that had been pulled back around the corner of the wall behind Norowz. One’s leg had been hit low down shattering a bone; it had merely dangled and flopped loosely as he was hustled past supported on the shoulder of one of his comrades. He would probably live. Not so the other who had been gut shot. The wound did not bleed much—at least not externally—the man’s pallor and stupor, however, were a hint that there was serious internal bleeding.