Part 46 (1/2)
”Roger, Skipper,” Webster said, then turned off to oversee the consolidation.
”Good luck, Reilly, ya doggie Irish b.a.s.t.a.r.d, ya,” Cazz said at the dust cloud behind the advancing armor.
And now I feel my age, Reilly thought, as his turretless Eland bounced over the rough ground, beating his kidneys like a good son of the Prophet would beat a sharp-tongued wife.
He stood in the s.p.a.ce that would have held a turret, with Schiebel on the pintle-mounted machine gun ahead of him and James driving. James was a d.a.m.ned fine driver but, Jesus, this is rough ground and old technology.
Two vehicles ahead of him, the commander of a gunned, turreted Eland turned and flashed him a smile that would have been brilliant in the day. From the posture and shape he knew it was Lana Mendes. He'd have known anyway, since the order of march was by his command.
Almost, almost, he'd told Green to switch the order of march from First Section leading to Second Section. He hadn't because it would have been such obvious favoritism that he couldn't have stomached it. Nor, he suspected, could Lana have.
But I can hardly stomach that a girl I care for is preceding me into combat, either, even if only by fifty meters. f.u.c.k, f.u.c.k, f.u.c.k! The old rule is good: ”n.o.body else's wife, n.o.body's girlfriend, and none of the hired help.” f.u.c.k.
Lana was young and very healthy. The bouncing of the Eland caused her kidneys no serious discomfort. If it had, she might not have noticed anyway. The woman's heart sang at riding into battle on an iron steed, emulating the heroes of her childhood: Dayan, Sharon, and Israel Tal.
Turning her face back to the front, she placed her hands on either side of the vehicle commander's cupola. Night vision goggles on, she scanned to the front and to the left. Although it was premature, she ordered, ”Viljoen, gun to ten o'clock.”
”You see something, Lana?” the Boer asked, although his hand was already spinning the traversing wheel.
”No, just being careful. You should have done it without being told.”
Viljoen bit back a snarly reply. Even so, he thought, No, you should have told me. A vehicle in order of march takes its cue from the one ahead of it, sweetie, or from SOP. Since we don't have an SOP, and the one ahead of us is aiming straight front, there was no cue. Ah, well. It's a little thing after all.
Reilly was about to pitch a b.i.t.c.h at the First Platoon leader when he saw the gun of the second vehicle, Lana's, swing left. Number Three automatically began to traverse to the other side.
He turned full about and saw the gun and turret of the next Eland in line, Sergeant Abdan's, moving to the left. Satisfied, he set his own head and eyes to the front, out to where the scouts led the way.
While it's possible to do bounding overwatch with three vehicles, Snyder, the scout section leader, thought, it just isn't practical.
Bounding overwatch, a military term meaning, in essence, one section moving while another watches over it, ready to fire in support, would have been clearly preferable when heading into the unknown. This, quite despite the fact that there was an unmanned aerial vehicle overhead and forward, scouting in advance of the scouts. The problem with doing it with three vehicles, and after the accident on the boat that was all Snyder had, was that one could either have uneven teams, with lessened security and lessened confidence for the shorter of the two, or one could have one vehicle continuously switching from one overwatch to the other. This last could be done, but it was somewhat slow and somewhat p.r.o.ne to screw ups.
Instead, Snyder kept his three Ferrets in a broad wedge, one-his own-in the center and following an approximately straight path to the objective, the others about three hundred meters to either side-RPG range-to spring any ambush the locals might throw together at the last minute.
Best we can do, I suppose. Well, that, and navigate the company to the objective. ”And for that,” Snyder said, aloud, ”we've got GPS.” d.a.m.n, but we've all been spoiled absolutely rotten by GPS.
D-Day, MV Merciful Merciful
Stauer didn't say anything for a few moments, taking in the screens visible past the UAV pilot's shoulder. One showed a map, and the location of the UAV. Another showed the ground in an image-intensified camera carried on the nose of the aircraft.
”Anything on the ground?” Stauer asked of the pilot.
The pilot shrugged. ”Couple of runaway goats. Other small animals.”
”How about at the tank lager?”
”Looked at it twenty minutes ago. Nothing unusual.”
Boxer and Waggoner walked in and stood behind Stauer.
”We've got no unusual cell phone calls coming from anywhere, yet,” Boxer said. ”But we do have unusual activity at Bandar Qa.s.sim. People loading boats, that sort of thing. And at least one boat that was at its moorings isn't anymore.
”By the way, it looks like Buckwheat and company did a killer job on the airport to the west of the port, too. Wrecks and flames everywhere.”
”Source?” Stauer asked.
”I tapped into NSA.”
Stauer shook his head. There was something just so fundamentally wrong about a private citizen, even if a retired two star, accessing the most secret means of intelligence gathering available to the United States of America.
Seeing the headshake, Boxer defended himself, ”Hey, it's not like I'm giving the information to enemies of the United States, is it?”
”I think,” Ken Waggoner interrupted, ”that we need to launch on Bandar Qa.s.sim now, boss. We've got to a.s.sume the sub went down somewhere, and probably before completing its mission. If we launch now, the planes will hit just after daybreak.”
Stauer felt a twinge at the phrase, ”the sub went down.” Mourn later. He thought a moment before agreeing, ”Yeah, do it. But since there's at least one boat missing from the port, have the planes skirt the coast and take out anything sailing our way between here and there.”
Waggoner considered that, found it wise, and answered, ”Roger. Send the medevac flight, too?”
”Yeah. Have it loiter out of small arms range, though.”
D-Day, six hundred meters south of Bandar Qa.s.sim Airport, Ophir
Maybe this wasn't so f.u.c.king smart after all, thought Buckwheat. He was panting too hard to say it aloud even if he'd been of a mind to. His lungs bellowed, sucking air. Lord Jesus, it purely sucks to get old.
Bullets cracked and ricochets sang around the team as they withdrew at a dead run. The group shooting at Buckwheat and his people seemed to lack night vision; nothing else really explained that their fire was dispersed along the entire ridge. But they could see well enough that it hadn't come from the sea to the north and the pattern of wrecked and burning aircraft suggested strongly that it hadn't come from east or west, either.