Sniper Elite: One-Way Trip

CHAPTER 49

General Couture stood staring at the screen with his arms crossed over his chest, watching intently as Gil shimmied slowly back from the edge of the roof. Captain Metcalf was beside him. The unexpected sighting of Aasif Kohistani minutes before had caused a stir in the room, leaving everyone convinced that Sandra Brux was definitely being held inside the building marked by the strobe.

Couture leaned closer to Metcalf. “If you have someone you can call in to assist your man,” he muttered, “now would be the time to do that.”

Metcalf looked at him in confusion. The president had just ordered them to stand down.

“You’re telling me you don’t have anyone you can call?” the general asked.

Metcalf scratched his head. “Well, the truth is, General, we’ve already sent for them… and the MPs can’t seem to find them.”

Couture gave a curt nod, glancing at the screen. “What about back in Langley… inside of SOG?”

“General, what about the president’s—?”

“Look, Glen. I’d like to kick Shannon’s ass for pulling this fucking stunt, but Sandra’s in that goddamn building. So if you’ve got some kind of SOG voodoo you can work here, nobody in this room is going to say anything.”

The Navy captain drew a breath, pausing before making his reply. “General, if I may speak frankly…?”

Couture made a “come on” gesture with his hand.

“Master Chief Shannon doesn’t think he’s a ninja, sir. He knows he’s not infiltrating that village and stealing Sandra away from those people without help. It’s my guess that whatever voodoo he’s going to need has already been laid on.”

“Which, I presume, is why the MPs can’t find Steelyard and Crosswhite.”

“I don’t know, sir, but whatever those two lunatics are up to… you can bet they’re not hiding under the bed someplace waiting for the all-clear.”

“Fine,” Couture said. “Then neither are we.” He snapped his fingers to get the attention of his communications officer. “Lieutenant, get Colonel Morrow on the horn.”

“Yes, sir.”

Metcalf and Couture stared at the screen as Gil made his way north along the river.

“Where the hell is he going now?” Couture wondered aloud.

Metcalf sucked his teeth. “I believe he may have it in his head to kill Kohistani.”

“Just grab the girl and go,” Couture quietly urged. “She’s right there, for Christ’s sake!”

“We can’t see everything that he sees, sir. He may be seeing something we can’t.”

Couture gave him a glance. “You’re worse than my wife, Captain. Let me watch the damn game, will ya?”

Metcalf chuckled. “Yes, sir.”

“Cynthia, widen the angle a bit, please.”

Gil began to shrink as the shot pulled back, revealing a section of the village about as long and wide as a soccer field.

“Shit, who the hell are those guys?” Couture pointed to the top of the screen. “Cynthia, tighten it up.”

The shot zoomed directly in on half a dozen armed men marching along the river toward the village from the north. They were all heavily armed with RPGs and belt-fed Russian PK light machine guns. Only one of them marched with his weapon at the ready, but they were on a direct collision course with Gil.

“Those are mountain fighters,” Metcalf said, rubbing the back of his neck where he was beginning to tense up. “They’re coming down from the Hindu Kush to answer Kohistani’s call for jihad. Probably marched all night to get there.”

Gil froze when the mountain men closed to within seventy-five yards, going immediately to ground with the Remington extending out in front of him.

“Shoot!” Couture muttered. “Shoot!”

Breathe, Metcalf thought to himself. Breathe.

A few seconds later, the fighter marching with his PK at the ready, jerked as if he’d been stung by a wasp. Less than a second later, the man beside him dropped dead to the earth.

With the sudden realization that they were taking fire, the other four gunners raced to unsling their machine guns. The next man in line dropped dead, and then another. There were three left alive. The first fighter hit was down on his knee, hammering at the receiver of his machine gun with the heel of his fist.

“Shannon shot his weapon in the receiver,” Metcalf said.

By the time Metcalf had completed his remark, the man with the disabled weapon was the only one left alive. He flung the broken machine gun aside and jumped up to run but didn’t travel a full step before his head exploded and he went down.

“My god!” someone said. “How long did that take?”

“I’d say just over ten seconds,” Couture remarked, turning to Metcalf. “This is what you missed not being able to watch the Iran mission.”

Metcalf nodded, lips puckered, deeply concerned for his man on the ground. Couture was a good general, highly educated, a solid tactician. As a major general, he had even been shot in the face with an RPG, surviving a terrible wound to go on and earn himself another couple of stars… but he had never killed anyone. As a combat veteran with seven Cold War kills under his belt, Metcalf had a great deal of appreciation for what he was seeing on the screen, but he still did not consider it a spectator sport. He sneaked a look at the chronograph on his watch. Gil Shannon had killed six heavily armed men in nine seconds with a bolt-action rifle at a distance of seventy-five yards, and judging from the lack of HIK activity within the village, he had done so without allowing his enemy to get off a single shot.

“General, I’ve got Colonel Morrow on the line.” Colonel Mack Morrow was with the Air Force 24th Special Tactics Squadron, another Special Mission Unit under the auspices of the CIA’s Special Operations Group/Joint Special Operations Command.

Couture went to the back of the room and took the phone. “Mack, sorry to wake you. Listen, I want a pair of Black Hawks loaded and ready on the tarmac for an emergency extraction, ASAP. I may or may not end up needing them, but if I do, it’s going to be soon. They’ll be going into the Panjshir, Mack, so keep this as low-profile as possible. You’d better ready a pair of Cobras as well.”

He returned to the front of the room, where Captain Metcalf stood watching him.

“All set, General?”

“Yeah,” Couture said. “I’ve got it set up so you and I both will be in the unemployment line by the end of the week.”

“You have to admit, General, Fell Swoop was a death sentence for Sandra.”

Couture grunted. “Well, for what it’s worth, I did try talking the president into going with DEVGRU… not real hard, but I did try.”