by Chris Lowry
The Choppers dropped them on the edge of a meandering river. The pilots were amazing.
The birds whirled in just above the treetops, settled softly on the waving grass beat back by blades, and spit the men out in a well-timed pattern.
Two choppers flew in circles while the third emptied on the ground, then resumed a lookout position as they switched places.
Brill was in the third helicopter to touch down.
He barely felt the wheel’s crunch clay on the one lane red dirt road leading out of the rock dam across the river when Becker grabbed him by the vest and double timed him down the ramp out of the back.
He could hardly believe he was flying again.
His first time in an airplane was two months ago, and now he was running out of a helicopter.
His heart raced as adrenaline flooded his system.
Becker motioned him to squat next to the road as he checked in with the squad leaders.
The helicopters swirled around in a circle and took off for a landing strip they were using as a Forward Operating Base twenty miles away.
Simon manned the Command Tent there, working with a set of radio operators and coordinating with Becker.
The men were fanned out along the edges of the road, rifles held up and ready, aimed at the jungle. If their incursion had been heard, or if stray rebels were about, they wanted to be ready.
The darkness was almost impenetrable.
Brill was from the South, an undeveloped portion of a backwater State many referred to as a Banana Republic in an almost joking manner, so he was used to a night sky mostly unadulterated by backwash from city lights.
His home sky was nothing compared to the jungle night.
There was no backwash because there were no lights.
Here, people used kerosene lamps or firelight, and at 4:15 am there were no lights.
The sky was amazing, the stars stacked so deep on top of each other it was hard to make out individual pinpricks of white light.
Becker reached down and lifted him up, breaking his reverie.
"Stay close," he whispered.
They took off down the road.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
After four kilometers, the men veered off the road and into the jungle.
Becker sent a recon team ahead to scout out the location of the MPLA.
Brill watched the hard-looking men with green and black paint on their faces douse the green glow lights on their tactical vests and quietly disappear into the brush.
Becker pulled his squad leaders in.
"Pincer move here boys," he said softly. "A & B squad, like we practiced."
The two leaders grunted affirmation and peeled off their men to circle through the other side of the jungle.
"You're never more than a meter from me," Becker growled at Brill. "If we get in a firefight, keep your grouping tight. It's better to hit duck and cover when the bullets start flying, but if I'm moving you are on my ass. Understand me?"
Brill nodded.
"I need you to say it out loud."
"Yes Sir," said Brill.
His knuckles were aching on the stock of his rifle.
Sweat dripped down his palm making his grip slimy, it dripped down his face, but the black and green camo paint didn't run.
He was shivering while he baked. Even at night the jungle heat was relentless.
"Move up," said Becker.
The rest of the squad leaders dispersed and began their preassigned movements.
The mercenaries were approaching the edge of the camp where they would observe and wait for a signal from the Recon group.
Those squads would find the rebels hiding within the encampment, call in the position, at which point all teams would converge on the target.
The plan seemed sound in the comfort of a camp tent, but Becker told Brill before they loaded into the back of the modified Sea Stallion helicopter.
"No plan survives contact with the enemy."
The enemy was sleeping, that time before dawn when the dreams pull hardest and the REM is deepest.
Since war began men have attacked just before dawn for that very reason.
An enemy yanked from sleep is disoriented, half caught between what is real and what is imagined.
Those precious seconds could mean life or death.
They settled in next to the open expanse of the diamond mine camp and waited for the call.
CHAPTER TWENTY
They found them.
The radio crackled close to Brill and Becker took the proffered handset from his radio operator.
"Copy that," he grunted and circled a hand in the air.
They were moving out.
The rebel leaders were encamped on the other side of the compound, between the diamond pit and the small village of trailers and huts set away from the others.
The mine was owned by an international conglomerate with little regard for local politics except as it impacted their ability to extract diamonds from the ground.
It was often a case of which side to bribe, and most of the time cheaper to bribe both for "just in case" scenarios.
In country, it was different.
The supervisors were often involved with faction leaders, especially the existing government through which contracts were awarded.
Being caught supporting rebels was cause for revolt, and sometimes arrest.
That didn't mean they weren't sympathetic to the MPLA or other rebel groups.
Often it amounted to which ethnic group they belonged to, as groups were divided along tribal lines.
A supervisor who moved up the leadership structure in the mining company would overlook certain actions by members of his tribe, so long as it didn't jeopardize his job.
This must have been the case here.
The remnants of the MPLA group were away from the main encampment by close to a half mile, entrenched with the mining worker’s village.
Which meant the supervisor knew they were there.
Being with the workers meant rebels could pose and hide as the need arises.
It also meant they could secret small collections of diamonds away from the workers to further finance their campaigns of terror disguised under the banner of freedom fighters.
Brill thought about the politics he and Becker had discussed as he trained while they crept to the edge of village.
These freedom fighters used terror against innocent women and children.
They used terror tactics against young men, like him, and tried to kill their spirit, to break them.
They didn't value human life, they didn't value creating a better country or better world for anyone but themselves.
They were bad men.
And Brill hated the bad guys.
Maybe it was the way he was brought up, under the guidance of a very disciplined grandfather who saw the world in distinct black and white terms.
Or maybe it was a rebellion against his hippie mom and alcoholic stepfather, who took the gray line and waved it around like a flag.
All life was a gray area.
He knew he didn't know enough yet.
Brill knew he needed training, and experience and especially new memories to offset the nightmares that existed in his mind now.
Nightmares courtesy of bad men.
In a world without Laurette, he knew the nightmares wouldn't stop, not for a long time.
But there was a way to lessen the pain.
"It's not revenge," he told Becker. "But that's part of it. It's righting a wrong."
His mentor nodded.
"That's what we do," he said to the boy. "Only for money."
It didn't sound like a bad life to Brill.
There was no way he could go back home. Not after what happened to him.
But he could build a new life here, among the men under Simon's command and learning the law of the jungle with Becker.
He watched as they moved through the grass on the edge of the clearing, imperceptible
shadows under the graying dawn sky.
These were men doing bad things in the name of good.
Righting the wrongs at a price.
It was a life he could get used to living.
"On my mark," Becker called into the radio.
He turned to Brill again, grabbed his vest and pulled his ear close to his mouth.
"One meter," he grunted. "Three feet. No more."
Brill nodded and readied his rifle.
Becker double clicked the radio mike, the signal to advance.
The squads stood up and converged on the village.
They moved in quick silent precision to three huts the recon team had identified.
Each hut was filled with rebels sleeping on the floor.
The MPLA members were all young, all men, dressed in scatterings of cast off clothing.
Some snored, some muttered, but all slept next to AK-47's resting on the mats next to them.
Two mercenaries stood on either side of the open doors and aimed inside.
A third knelt between the two and in sync, all teams opened fire with short three round bursts.
They killed the men where they slept.
Workers poured out of the other huts and found themselves facing armed mercenaries.
Most dropped their simple machetes and shovels, the only weapons they had.
Rebels shoved out of the backs of the huts and ran for the jungle.
Members of A squad and B squad popped out of the grass and cut them down.
It was a massacre.
Brill stood by Becker and watched, his finger aching to be on the trigger.
It was over in less than a minute. Cordite and gun smoke drifted across the village path as the sun crested the treetops and bathed the bloody scene in a surreal golden glow.
"Check in," Becker commanded over the radio.
Each squad checked in. No injuries. No survivors.
Becker turned to Brill and grinned.
"If only every contract was this smooth."
A hole opened up in his forehead and the back of his head exploded with a wet plop that sprayed the radio operator in gore and goo.
Brill ducked away and spun around searching.
Goldie jumped out of the open doorway of a trailer and sprinted toward the diamond mine.
He sprayed bullets from his AK at the mercenaries, short controlled bursts just like they had used.
Even without aiming, he was effective.
The men were distracted by the sight of their fallen leader sprawled in the village dust, the speed with which they had lost him.
Brill dropped to one knee and aimed at the running back of the rebel.
He led him by a few feet and squeezed the trigger.
The bullets slammed into Goldie's back and sent him sprawling.
Brill jumped up and ran to him.
The rebel crawled toward his fallen rifle, dropped when he hit and fell. He grunted and sobbed as he fought for breath.
Brill reached him and kicked him over onto his bloody back.
Goldie glared up at him and spit curses in his native tongue.
"Do you remember me you son of a bitch?" Brill cursed back.
Goldie grinned. Blood caked his lips.
"Wake," Brill shot him in the face. "Wake."
He bent over and threw up next to the body.
The smell of brain matter and shit and urine mixed with the gunpowder made him sick.
He grabbed the rebels rifle and worked the bolt to clear the chamber and turned back to the worker's village.
Brill walked to where the workers were being held under gunpoint.
He raised the rifle and emptied the clip into them.
The men screamed and shouted and tried to run, but the other mercenaries joined Brill and opened fire.
When the clip ran out, Brill dropped it and emptied his own rifle.
When there were no more men to shoot, Brill began gathering ammunition from the fallen rebel rifles.
"What are you doing?" Arnoux put a hand on his shoulder.
Brill shrugged him off.
"Kill them," he sniffed. "Kill them all."
He grabbed two more AK's and began walking toward the main camp.
The rest of the mercenaries fell in with him.
Arnoux slung Becker's body across his shoulders and followed after.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Simon met them at the LZ on the compound.
He zeroed in on Brill and grabbed him as he hopped out of the Sea Stallion.
Simon held him by the collar as he watched two men carry Becker's body out of the helicopter.
"Come with me," he ordered.
Brill didn't have much choice.
The Commander half dragged half marched him across the compound to the Command tent.
"You led a massacre?" spittle flew from his lips.
"They were harboring rebels."
"Do you know what kind of shit storm this is going to bring down?"
Brill shrugged it off.
"I don't give a damn."
"Do you think that makes you sound tough? You better damn well give a damn," Simon opened up a trunk and fished out a bottle of Scotch.
He took a swig straight from the bottle.
"This kind of action gets the attention of The Hague. Do you know what The Hague is?"
"No," Brill pouted.
"It's the World Court. You just committed a war crime."
"They weren't innocent."
"I damn well know that, and you damn well know that but in the eyes of the world, those workers were not the rebels."
"But they could have been," said Brill. "They know what kind of things those men do."
"No, they don't," Simon shut him down. "They may suspect, and some may know because they were rebels once, but the other side has done just as much, just as bad."
"They were bad men," Brill snapped.
"They're all bad men," Simon yelled back. "We all are."
They stared at each other until Brill couldn't take the intensity.
He blinked and looked away.
"I'm not sorry."
Simon took another swig off the bottle.
"I'm pissed we lost Becker," he said softly. "He was a good man and my friend."
"Mine too."
"Alright," said Simon. "We've got a situation on our hands, but you got your revenge. I don't know if I can pay the price for it."
"I'll take his place," Brill said. "Not as your second in command, but I can be one of your men."
"Of course, you can't," said Simon.
"Sir?" Brill crinkled his eyes. "But what I did..."
"Yes, to all of that and more," Simon interrupted. "But we're soldier's, the best of them. We don't train you up. You did one operation, but you have too much more to learn."
"I could learn."
"But not from us."
Brill grit his teeth.
Simon was right.
He was eighteen and he got lucky in in one operation.
But he had lost that luck in the refugee camp so maybe killing the rebels had just balanced a scorecard.
Still he knew what he wanted.
He wanted to join the company.
The company wouldn't have him without training.
The solution was to get training, he decided.
But he didn't want to go back to the US. The rebels were backed by US forces.
The US didn't mean to kill the girl he loved, it didn't mean to violate him and change who he was at the core.
It just happened.
If he went home it would be too easy to turn into a homegrown terrorist.
He still had too much to deal with in the aftermath of what happened.