Apocalypse unleashed

14

United States 75th Army Rangers Outpost

Harran

Sanliurfa Province, Turkey

Local Time 0628 Hours

By the time Chaplain Miller hurried back down the basement stairs, Goose was almost ready to crawl out of his own skin. He’d been pacing for the last twenty minutes in an effort to burn off the excess energy that filled him. In the last seven minutes, the outpost had come alive. Screaming Klaxons and the sound of grinding equipment invaded the basement.

The lantern jumped all the time now.

Miller breathed rapidly and blood suffused his face. “The Syrians are coming.”

“The lieutenant knows?”

“Yes. I was in his office trying to persuade him to come see you when we got the news.”

“How bad is it?”

“They’re throwing everything at us but the kitchen sink.”

Fear swarmed Goose for a moment, but he wasn’t thinking of himself. The 75th had some old-timers in the unit, like him, but there was a lot of young blood too. Iraq hadn’t prepared them for what they’d seen these last few weeks. He knew because he’d buried them.

Goose shook his head in disbelief. “They’re catching us flatfooted. How’d they get so close?”

“They jammed the communications relays to the satellites.”

“We haven’t had sat-recon?”

“Not for hours.”

“Swindoll should have known this was coming. Captain Remington should have known.”

“The systems out here haven’t been reliable all the time.”

“You never trust hardware 100 percent. Swindoll should have known that.”

“He’s today’s army.” Miller frowned.

“The army’s got a lot of tech backing it these days. Good stuff. But too many of these kids rely on the toys too much.” Goose blew out his breath in disgust. “It’s not completely their fault. The brass puts too much stock in them too. But we’re in a fix now.”

Miller focused on Goose. “You knew they were coming.”

“I thought they were.”

“From the lantern.”

Goose nodded. “Heavy armor can come quietly sometimes, but the vibrations still give them away.”

“The lantern’s movements could have been caused by vehicles moving around here.”

“Could have been. But it turns out it wasn’t.” Goose headed up the stairs.

“Where are you going?” Miller hurried to catch up.

“Out. There’s a lot of boys out there who are going to be in trouble.”

“The lieutenant hasn’t released you.”

Goose ignored that. He banged on the door. The eye reappeared.

“Get back in your hole, Sarge,” the guard snarled.

“The Syrian army’s coming.” Goose mustered his full voice. “I’m not going to be down here when those troops arrive.”

“Until I get different orders, you’re staying there.”

“Goose,” Miller said, “maybe-”

Goose slammed a shoulder into the door. The cheap lock fractured and fell apart. Propelled by his strength and weight, the door swung out and caught the guard flush, driving him from his feet. The harsh sunlight made Goose wince in pain as he stepped outside.

A second guard pointed his M-4A1 at Goose while the first guard tried to get to his feet. “Take another step and I’m going to shoot you.”

“You or the Syrians,” Goose said. “Either way, I’m not dying down there. Not today.” He pointed at the nearby jeep. “I’m going to walk over there and get my gear. If you feel like you have to shoot, I’ll understand. But just so we’re clear here, I have to get that gear.”

The familiar ratchet of assault rifles charging reached Goose’s ears. Several Rangers surrounded the basement. Goose knew he couldn’t escape them all. But he couldn’t stand idly by either.

“Nobody’s going to shoot you, Goose,” Sergeant Mack Theissen stated. He was in his early thirties and had been in the Rangers since high school. Lean and leather-faced, he’d seen action in Africa, Kosovo, and Afghanistan. “With what we got coming at us, the last place you need to be is out of the action. These boys are about to realize the error of their ways and stand down.” He paused and looked at the soldier holding the rifle on Goose. “Ain’t that right?”

With obvious reluctance, the soldier lowered his weapon. “Sure. Just following orders.”

“I get that, Private,” Theissen said. “Why don’t you and your buddy go follow orders someplace else? The real soldiers here got a job to do.”

The two guards beat a hasty retreat.

Goose crossed to the jeep and got his gear. He strapped on his Kevlar vest, helmet, and sidearm, then picked up the M-4A1 and settled it comfortably in his arms.

“I appreciate what you did, Mack,” Goose said quietly, “but when Remington finds out about it, things might not go so easy on you.”

Theissen grinned. “Yeah, I figured that out all by myself. But this whole invading Syrian force kinda put me off my feed anyway. The captain being mad at me? I can deal with it. I’ll get someone to bring me a deck of cards in the brig and start working on my pension.”

Goose couldn’t help but grin a little. “Thanks.”

“What we got coming at us, we need every able-bodied man.”

“How bad is it?”

“Plenty bad. This is a major effort. They’re hoping to claim some serious real estate today.”

“We’re not in a position to stop them.”

“No. Best we can do is try to get everybody out safe.”

Goose filled his BDUs with extra magazines for the rifle, then strapped on a bandolier. He checked to make certain the water bladder on his LCE was full as the morning heat baked into him.

Antiaircraft guns mounted behind sandbags screamed to life.

Goose glanced at the sky and spotted four fighter jets streaking toward Harran. Missiles jumped from the wings.

“Incoming!”

Men dove for cover wherever they could find it. Many of them faded into the alleys between the buildings.

“Stay away from the windows!” Goose roared as he ran toward a young private who had taken shelter near the closed electronics store next door to the house where he’d been kept captive. “Stay away from the glass!”

The private looked up as Goose closed on him. Goose grabbed the younger man by the sleeve of his BDUs and yanked him to his feet. They ran deeper into the alley.

Theissen picked up Goose’s instruction.

The missiles slammed into the city. Goose hunkered down against a wall away from any loose debris and watched as a Ranger fell from the Ulu Cami mosque’s tower an instant before one of the missiles took out the structure. The moment seemed surreal as the mosque fell in a heap of loose and broken stones before the sound reached him. The other missiles chewed into the city.

Buried in the thunder and noise of the attack, Goose waited and hoped that casualties would be light. But he knew they wouldn’t be.

Cannonfire ripped into the nearby buildings as the jets whipped by overhead. The concussions of the detonations shattered the windows of buildings that weren’t hit. Shards of flying glass turned into daggers and jagged spears ready to pierce the flesh of anyone taking shelter nearby.

Goose got to his feet and readied his rifle. He looked at the men around him. “C’mon. You guys didn’t come all this way to sit this one out, did you?”

Most of the men had been blooded before the Syrian confrontation, but there were a handful who stood up on shaking knees and had ashen faces. Still, they stood, and that was what the Rangers had trained them to do.

The jets flew past the city and began a turning radius.

“Let’s go. Single file and spread out.” Goose jogged toward the city’s edge where the front line was going to take shape. That was where he belonged.

Local Time 0636 Hours

Danielle threw herself to the ground beside a small dentist’s office. The Closed sign posted on the door had faded from exposure to the sun.

Gary took cover beside her. His arms wrapped the camera as he sat with his back to the wall. The chin strap on his Kevlar helmet hung loosely, but it reminded Danielle to clap her own back onto her head. She’d grabbed it from the ground when they’d broken for cover.

Machine-gun fire ripped into the buildings and the street. Pockmarks appeared on both. The noise reverberated between the buildings.

“Do we still have satellite feed?” Danielle asked.

Gary looked at her as though she were insane.

Danielle raised her voice. “Can you hear me?”

“I heard you.” Gary glanced at the camera, then nodded. “We still have sat-link.”

“Then let’s get moving.”

Gary pointed at a group of Rangers tucked into shelter across the street. “They’re not going anywhere. I’m taking that as a sign that we probably shouldn’t be going anywhere either.”

“They’re waiting for orders.” Danielle stood and looked up in the sky. The jets had passed again, but they were turning. “We already have our orders. We’ve got to bring this story to the public.”

“I’m thinking maybe the public would understand if we sat here quietly and just spent some time being afraid.”

Danielle reached down and pulled Gary to his feet. “You have just as much chance of getting shot sitting there as you do trying to get somewhere else.”

“It doesn’t feel like it.”

“Trust me.”

“Man, you get me into more trouble. It’s like you’re jinxed.”

“Thanks. But just keep reminding yourself that what we’re doing here might just net you a Pulitzer.” Danielle ran back toward the residential area where Goose was being held. She held on to her flak jacket. Perspiration trickled down her body from the heat.

They crammed in tight against a sundries shop as the jets passed overhead again. Cannonfire hammered the building across the street. One of the structures tumbled down in a loose heap of debris.

“I don’t think we’re going to make it out of this one.” Gary breathed rapidly, on the edge of panic.

Danielle grabbed his shoulders and shook him. “You stay with me. Do you hear? Stay with me, and we’re going to be fine.”

Gary nodded, but he didn’t look convinced.

“The army’s got helicopters on the other side of the city. We can get out of here in one of those. Do you hear me?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I hear you.”

“Good.” Danielle took a shuddering breath and hoped what she told him was the truth. She hoped he at least believed it more than she did, because her belief wasn’t so strong. “We need to find Goose.”

“Why?”

“Because he’s our story.” More than that, Danielle wanted to make sure he’d been let out of confinement. “We stick with our story.”