Savages (24 page)

“This won’t be easy.”

I keyed my radio. “Never is. Why should today be any different?”

Through the slightly grainy resolution of the night vision scope, Gabe looked like a greenish gargoyle crouched behind a brick smokestack. He sat motionless, rifle aimed toward the guards at the gate, finger no doubt taking up the slack on the trigger. I shifted back to the task at hand and did the same.

Static. “All stations, Tex. In position.”

“Tex, Wolfman. Copy. Stand by.”

The plan was not complicated. Gabe, Great Hawk, Hicks, and those of Anderson’s men not killed or missing fanned out and took position a block away from the gate. I stayed where I was to provide close sniper support. Same story for Gabe. Hicks and May moved in with big bags of nasty explodey stuff and the deliberate intent to do mayhem in the name of God and country.

More static. “All stations, Wolfman. Engage on my mark.”

A pause. Deep breath, held it a moment, and let it out slowly.

“Three, two, one,
mark
.”

The next sound I heard was the tremendous
hiss-BANG
of two RPGs hitting the gate simultaneously. I flinched as the shockwaves rolled over me, creating a terrible, familiar hollowness in my chest and stomach.

The gate disappeared in a cloud of smoke and flying debris. Seconds later, two more RPG’s hit, making more smoke and sending up more debris. I heard screaming, shouted orders, the panicked sounds of confusion. At the same moment, from rooftops all around me, the chatter of automatic gunfire filled the night.

A breeze that had picked up while Hicks and I waited for Gabe’s crew to arrive carried the worst of the smoke away, revealing the remnants of the gate. The guards closest had been blown to pieces, limbs and weapons and twisted fractions of torsos littering the ground in a semicircle around where two large steel doors once stood. The doors and their support columns had collapsed, spilling a few wounded Alliance troops to the ground. Gunfire from Task Force Falcon ripped into them, creating terrified disarray.

I added my own rifle to the chorus. The reticle centered on a downed figure firing his weapon randomly in the general direction of the lead hailstorm ripping his comrades apart. I aimed a little high to compensate for the drop of the projectile, let out a breath, and fired. A plume of dark liquid painted the crumbled concrete behind the doomed insurgent’s head.

Next target. Not a person, not an enemy, just a target. This one was on his feet, gesticulating, shouting, others looking to him and going where he pointed.

Leader.

I hit him three times, center of mass. Opened my left eye to take in the overall picture. Guards were fleeing the gate. Confusion, panic, fear, surprise, the dawning knowledge they were facing overwhelming firepower.

Now
,
Gabe.
 

Just as I thought it, the radio crackled. “All stations,
move now
.”

I didn’t need to be told twice. My feet carried me to the edge of the roof, I sat down, pushed away, caught the edge of the dumpster with one hand to slow my descent, bent my knees with the impact, rolled sideways once, felt something jab painfully into my side, then was up and running.

Buildings and crumbled ruins zipped by on either side. I was in full stride, arms swinging, head down, legs pumping, mouth wide open to take in as much air as possible, big deep breaths, barrel shroud of my carbine clutched tightly in one hand. I stayed to the edge of the street where the shadows were deepest. Ahead of me, a grenade exploded. I ducked instinctively, realized I was out of its range, and kept running.

One second I was alone, the next someone ran next to me. I almost raised my rifle, but then realized it was Gabe. Great Hawk followed behind, gaining ground quickly. A few seconds later he passed us, long legs covering ground swift as an antelope. I’m not slow and neither is Gabe, but Great Hawk outclassed us both.

As he closed in on the gate, I saw the Hawk had a pistol in one hand and his ancient tomahawk in the other. A guard emerged from cover and tried to sight in on him. The pistol in Great Hawk’s hand barked twice. The guard fired, missed, and screamed in fear and pain as razor sharp steel bit into the side of his neck. The big Apache jerked his weapon free without breaking stride and kept on trucking.

I leapt over the dying guard’s body on the way by. Did not look at his face.

Push, push, push, digdigdigdigdig, get there!

More people joined me on the way, some in front, some behind. I knew them, recognized them. Kept running. Voices to my left. Looked. Bjornson and LaGrange emerging from a side street, no sign of Taylor. Waved my arm for them to hurry up.

GOGOGOGOGO!

Sprinted up and over fallen concrete. Slipped once, recovered, kept moving. Dodged sharp blooms of metal, fallen doors, steel twisted and blackened from the blasts, smell of chemicals and thick dust.

Now across grass. No more gunfire. Kept running, running, running. Breathing hurt. Legs hurt. Kept moving. Voice shouting.

“This way!” Lena.

The fog in my head cleared a little. Lena ran in front of Hicks in her stocking feet, the dress shoes discarded so she could run faster. I turned in the direction she pointed. The treeline loomed larger and larger until it towered over and enveloped me. I slowed down and moved gratefully into its concealing darkness. There may have been infected nearby, but they were a far less daunting threat than what lay behind me.

I smelled the horses before I saw them. Two nervous looking men moved among the animals speaking in whispers, trying to keep the horses calm. I approached one of them and took the reins from his hand.

“Got it from here, chief.”

He backed away, eyes wide. “Okay.”

I swung into the saddle. He horse nickered a little, but did not try to throw me. A good sign. The others were climbing onto horses of their own. Most handled the reins with competence, if not tremendous enthusiasm. I wondered if horsemanship had become part of ongoing training for Green Berets.

Great Hawk took the time to unstrap his pack, dig out his ruggedized laptop, and fire it up before climbing atop his mount one-handed.

“Follow me,” he said simply. A swift backwards kick, and his horse trotted into the woods.

“Eric.”

I looked to my right. It was Hicks. He pointed to my forehead. “Might want to turn those on.”

“Shit.” I flipped down the NVGs I had forgotten about and activated them. The pitch dark night became a buzzing sea of motes and shadows the color of spring grass. Not perfect, depth perception a little off, but I could see. The others had already taken Great Hawk’s lead and were riding away. My horse, probably as a result of herd mentality, followed without any prompting.

I leaned over the saddle and kept my head low to avoid branches. The horse sped up to a trot, the sound of shod hooves pounding the earth ahead of me. It was a joyful noise to my ears. With each beat of the fifteen-hundred pound living drums, Carbondale grew farther and farther away.

We covered what I figured must have been close to two miles before we emerged into a clearing. Great Hawk sat calmly astride his horse, Lena Smith in close conversation next to him. I could not hear them, but I saw the Hawk point to the sky. I looked where he pointed, but saw nothing. Heard nothing. Perhaps a minute passed. Some men dismounted and held reins in nervous hands, eyes casting impatient glances back the way we came.

“The fuck are they,” I heard Gabe mutter next to me. “Should have been waiting for us.”

Another minute. Anderson said something about riding back to Union territory. Great Hawk shook his head once and said, “Everyone shut up. Listen.”

Silence. Straining ears. And then I heard it.
Thumpthumpthumpthumpthump
, growing louder. Trees swayed in the distance from the force of rotor wash as two stealth Blackhawks drifted into view. My face split into a grin and I hit Gabe on the shoulder. He was smiling as well.

“Never been so happy to see a helicopter in my life,” I said.

Gabe grabbed me by the shoulder and gave me a shake. “Makes two of us.”

The choppers landed in the clearing, sending a wave of dust and plant detritus into our faces. I dismounted and let my horse gallop away and ran toward the closest one. Gabe, Great Hawk, Hicks, and May did the same. Anderson took Lena Smith by the arm and led her to the Blackhawk farther away. LaGrange and Bjornson went with them.

A crewman with a painted face, NVGs, and black fatigues waved me into the cargo hold. It was dark inside, hot, and redolent of exhaust. It was the best thing I had ever smelled. I moved to the back, sat down, and began buckling my harness. A dark figure handed me a helmet and told me to put it on. I thanked him and obeyed.

The others were inside within moments, the helicopter lifting off before we were all strapped in. As we gained altitude, I lay my head back and felt the adrenaline begin to subside. I was tired. Everything hurt. There was a gouge and a large streak of blood on my right arm. I tested it with my fingers and found a shallow groove coagulated with blood. Must have took a grazing shot somewhere along the line. I had not felt it then, but I certainly felt it now.

I remember leaning toward Gabe sitting across from me. I remember reaching out and clasping hands with him, a half-hysterical laugh bubbling from my chest. I remember the relief on my friend’s face, the whiteness of his smile in the dark, and the welcome thrum of rotors vibrating the metal beneath my feet.

The next thing I remember is waking up.

The world was blurry and green.

Sounds came to me from a far, far distance, muted and unintelligible. Voices shouting. I was sleepy, wanted to drift down into the dark, wanted to rest. Something shook me, had been shaking me for a while now. Stinging pain hit the side of my face.

“Wake up, amigo. We gotta move.”

My vision cleared. I was still wearing my NVGs, still strapped to my seat. Gabe was standing over me, boots on either side of my chest. A blade appeared in his hand and cut the harness away. I realized I was lying on my back and the helicopter was on the ground sideways. That wasn’t right. We were supposed to be in the air.

Strong hands hauled me upward and propped me on trembling legs. Turned me around. An arm gripped me around the waist and I took three steps. At the front of the chopper, I saw a tree trunk where the windshield used to be. The pilot and co-pilot were motionless, pressed against their seats, chests crushed almost flat. I looked away. Stepped on something yielding. It was the crewman who had handed me the helmet I still wore. He lay inverted, legs bent at strange angles, head twisted unnaturally to one side. I mumbled something about helping him.

“He’s gone,” Gabe said. “No use. Now come on, we have to get out of here.”

Then I was being lifted up. Hands grabbed me from above and pulled. I saw Great Hawk, May, and Hicks. Fell into their arms, tried to help, was dragged to a tree and sat down. Someone shined a light in my eyes and told me to follow it around.

“How bad?” Gabe.

“He will live.” Great Hawk. “He should not sleep tonight.”

“I don’t think any of us will be sleeping tonight.” Footsteps walking away.

I looked toward the chopper and wondered how it was my NVGs still worked. The helmet was uncomfortable. My fingers felt like poorly connected sausages as I fumbled at the clasp along my jaw. Opened it. Let the helmet fall away.

Christ my head hurts
.

I felt for lumps and cuts. A big sore spot on the back of the precious, one-of-a-kind skull, but no damage otherwise. The helmet had done its job. Probably saved my life. I felt bad for thinking ill of it a moment ago.

At the chopper, Hicks and May had climbed in and were tossing rucksacks out the cargo door. Gabe grabbed his and mine and walked over to me. Helped me stand up.

“Come on, don’t go all limp noodle on me. It was just a little bump on the head.”

I managed to get the straps over my back and buckle the clasps at chest and waist level. The ruck was heavier than I remembered.

“Everybody ready?” Great Hawk said. Heads with protruding NVGs nodded in unison. I muttered something I don’t remember.

“Hicks, Garrett, make sure Riordan does not die. I will take point. Does anyone have a working radio?”

I fumbled at mine and turned it on. “Check, check.”

“Got you.”

Caleb and Gabe’s radios worked. May’s did not. Caleb took mine from my belt, disconnected the earpiece, and handed it to May.

“Won’t do you much good right now anyway,” he said.

I had neither the energy nor the inclination to argue.

The next part is hazy. There was a lot of running, and, in my case, a lot of falling down. Every step was torture. My head was a pulsating ball of agony. My shaky, traitor legs couldn’t seem to find any kind of rhythm. The path a .380 round had taken through my calf muscle a few months ago felt like it was trying to rip itself free. The shallow graze wound on my arm burned and itched. Every muscle, tendon, and joint felt battered and inflamed. I ran anyway.

An explosion lit up the night behind us. Great Hawk stopped, looked back, nodded to himself, and started running again. I vaguely remembered someone mentioning something about where to place the charges. Made sense. Wouldn’t want any insurgent types to get their hands on a stealth helicopter.

I remembered the pilots and the crewman. McGee. Liddell. Stewart. All dead, and all to thwart the ambitions of a few small-minded, power-mad little men. And what had anyone gained? Deaths on both sides, and a larger conflict prevented. That was all.

I pitied the people of Carbondale. Nuclear winter, even a fading one, makes for short summers. The cold season would be a long one this year.

*****

I remembered a line from a poem I read a long time ago. Lord Byron, I think.

Morn came and went and came, and brought no day / And men forgot their passions in the dread of this, their desolation.

Morn came. But in our case, it brought day with it. The light did little to ignite my passions, and nothing at all to decrease the dread of my desolation.

“We are eight miles south of Carbondale.” Great Hawk swiped the cracked screen of his ruggedized tablet. Images moved sluggishly under his finger, indicating the battery was almost dead.

“No problem.” Gabe produced a compass and tapped the side of his head. “Got everything we need to get home right here.”

A warning light flashed on the tablet and the screen went blank. Great Hawk closed the cover flap and stashed it in his pack. He had a folding solar charger, but the forest canopy blotted out too much of the sun and we were short on time.

“It will have to do.”

Eight miles
. How I had run that far in my condition was beyond comprehension. But I had done it. And I had much, much farther to go before I could stop looking over my shoulder. I thought of the horse I had set free before boarding the crashed Blackhawk and cursed my shitty luck.

“Any word from Anderson?” Hicks asked.

Great Hawk shook his head. “No. I think they were hit as well. Probably went down somewhere ahead of us.”

“Speaking of,” I said, teeth clenched against the pounding in my head, “what the hell happened? Why did we go down?”

“Enemy aircraft,” Gabe said. I looked at him.

“Are you kidding me?”

A shake of the head. “Nope. Alliance must have had one on standby. Outfitted with an M-240, unless I miss my guess. Chewed up our tail rotor, and I think they got a piece of Anderson’s ride as well. Good thing we were skimming the tree tops. Didn’t have far to fall.”

“I saw LaGrange hanging out the cargo bay,” May said. He looked to be in good condition save for a nasty cut on the side of his head. Someone had bandaged it, the white of the gauze standing out sharply against the sheen of his dark brown scalp. “Had an RPG. The other helo blew up a few seconds later.”

Hicks popped some kind of pill and washed it down. “Saw it too.”

“Then at least we know that particular threat is gone.” Great Hawk tucked his tomahawk into his belt and stood up. “I realize we are all tired, but we have to keep moving.”

No one complained.

*****

More walking. A breeze began blowing from the north and the sky darkened overhead. Trees swayed and branches rustled like static white noise, the dull roar masking the sound of our passing. From overhead, sticks and leaves and loose bark fell and whipped about, all of it seeming to aim for the five of us. Birdsong and bugs and the skittering of small mammals stopped. The forest sensed a storm coming.

My head was beginning to clear. I still had no memory of the crash, but my steps were steadier and I did not feel like I was going to pass out anymore. Which was the only good news in a day otherwise filled with abject misery. My head still hurt. I needed to answer the call of nature and dreaded using leaves in lieu of the washable damp cloths most people wiped themselves with these days. Something was seriously wrong with my right knee. I was hungry and sleep deprived and the water purification tablets did nothing to improve the flavor of the stream runoff in my canteen. I took a long drink to alleviate the burning in my throat and felt a fresh coat of silt settle over my teeth. I definitely had seen better days.

A chirping sound cut through the increasingly loud roar of leaves blowing in the strong wind. Great Hawk stopped and fished a satellite phone from his vest, pressed a button, and held it to his ear. He gave an authorization code and the earpiece buzzed, but I could not make out the voice on the other end.

“Copy. Aircrew KIA on our end. Bird was not compromised. What is your twenty?”

Great Hawk motioned to Gabe and repeated a set of coordinates. The big man closed his eyes, concentrated a few seconds, then looked at the Apache and gave a thumbs up.

“Proceed on mission, Falcon Lead. Great Hawk out.”

“Anderson?” May asked.

“Yes. His chopper lost hydraulic pressure and landed three klicks south of where we stand.”

“They frag it?” I asked.

“Yes. We must have been too far away last night to see the explosion.”

“Lose anybody?”

“The crewman and co-pilot were both hit by fire from the enemy helicopter. They did not make it. The pilot is fine. Anderson’s sat-phone needed time to charge, which is why it took so long for him to check in.” Great Hawk passed a hand over his forehead and looked southward. “They have already started moving toward Union territory. Anderson, Bjornson, LaGrange, and the pilot will focus their efforts on getting Lena Smith to safety. It will be roughly forty-eight hours before another chopper can make it out to pick her up. In the meantime … we have problems to deal with.”

Gabe stepped closer. “Like what?”

“Bjornson’s team was not successful in assassinating General Samson. Taylor was killed in the fighting, and General Samson was wounded, but not seriously. He has rallied his troops, some hundred and fifty of them, and has begun a widespread search for Lena Smith.”

“Light cavalry?” Gabe asked.

A nod. “Forty of them. The rest are light infantry.”

“Shit,” I said. “Eleven of us against forty mounted troops and a hundred-ten infantry. I don’t like those odds.”

“It is worse than that, Eric,” Great Hawk said. “It will be only the five of us. We are to hold off Samson’s forces until Lena Smith is safe. Anderson and his team will not be able to help us until she is out of danger. Their orders are to keep Smith away from the fighting.”

“Lena fucking Smith.” I shook my head. “Whatever she knows better be worth all this shit. If it’s not, I’ll kill her myself.”

Great Hawk shot me a warning look. “She is the reason we were able to complete our mission, Eric. Do not forget that.”

“Right. Sure. Be nice to the traitor. Got it.”

The obsidian eyes flashed and darkened. “You have no idea what you are talking about. You know nothing about Lena Smith or her reasons for doing what she did. Until you do, you should shut your ignorant mouth.”

His tone bristled the Irish devil in me. “That supposed to scare me, Hawk?”

“Enough.” Gabe’s voice cut the air like a blade. “We don’t have time for this. Hawk, what kind of support can we expect?”

The dark eyes continued to stare at me. “A transport plane will fly over and drop supplies. Anderson will call in the landing coordinates once it is down. There will be ammunition, explosives, food, clean water, batteries, weapons and optics. Everything we need to mount an offensive.”

“I got a better idea,” I said. “How about Anderson debriefs Smith, calls in her intel to Central, and we hide like fucking rats until the choppers get here. Seems like the more survivable option to me.”

The Hawk shook his head. “No. Lena will speak only to the President and Joint Chiefs.”

“She’ll damn well talk if we let Bjornson do some convincing.”

Another head shake. “No. I will not permit that. Not when there is a better way.”

“Like all of us getting our asses shot off because one enemy politician wants to be stubborn?”

“First of all, Eric, Lena is not our enemy. Second, I will not condone torture. I have done it before, and the weight of my actions weighs heavy on my conscience. Third, and most importantly, it is vital to national security that only a select few people know what it is Lena wishes to disclose. If word gets out, it could compromise our efforts to defeat the ROC and liberate the people they have subjugated.”

I walked toward Great Hawk until we were a foot apart. “What makes you so sure? What do you know that you’re not telling the rest of us?”

No answer for a few seconds, then he put the sat-phone back in its pouch and started walking. “Need to know, Irishman.”

“Fuck that. I did my part, Hawk. If I’m going to risk my life for this woman, I deserve to know why.”

“As you said, Eric, you did your part. The mission succeeded, and on behalf of a grateful nation, I thank you. Your responsibility has been discharged. General Jacobs has been notified and will arrange for your payment. Feel free to take your leave whenever you wish.”

He kept walking and did not look back. Lacking any better options, I followed.