The Phoenix Affair - Dave Moyer (smart ebook reader TXT) 📗

“Someone on the roof across the lane?” Allen said. “General’s guys waking up I think, and into action pretty quick. We may live, yet.”

Then he counted “one, two, three” and the two of them rose above the parapet, sighted, and fired.

There was not one large group as they’d hoped, but six smaller ones. Some had 5 men, at least three were smaller. So the full automatic bursts of 2.25 seconds each were wasted initially, but they fanned outward from what they’d guessed would be the center of a large group and 4 more bad guys went down before their breeches locked open and they dove to lay flat on the deck as far from the wall as they could.

There was firing and bullets and concrete fragments everywhere, but there was definitely outgoing fire from at least one other roof.

“Now we’re outta here…GO” Allen yelled.

He and Ripley fast-crawled to the door and into the stairway, then down the stairs. They found Cameron at the bottom watching the front door from a nearby doorway. They started talking about how to go outside, make a flanking maneuver, get behind the attackers at the gate-end of the lane. Then the phone started ringing in the living room.

“You guys are better equipped than me for guard duty, I’ll get it.” Cameron said.

It was Fahd calling from his villa. Cameron listened for 20 seconds and hung up.

He walked back into the hallway. “That was the General. He says under no circumstances should we leave the villa. He’s thrown a switch that shoots steel bolts on the gates in the walls of each villa, so we’re safe enough if we sit tight. His guys are engaged from 3 rooftops, and the attackers are making a mistake: they’re working their way down the lane between the two rows of villas. Taking heavy casualties in the crossfire from the roofs of 2 and 3 on the West side and now just villa 3 on our side since you guys came inside. More importantly, there’s about to be a nasty surprise down by the…”

He was interrupted by a hammering outside that both Ripley and Allen instantly recognized. “M-60” they said at the same time.

“Yep. Two of the retainers got into the garage next to the mosque, armory under the mosque, and the M-60 is now hosing down the lane where all these guys are exposed.”

The phone rang again, Cameron went to answer.

BOOOOM! He never got there. Allen yelled “R-P-G” as he and Ripley found their way to the kitchen. “RPG” he said again, “and the M-60 has stopped. I think the tide just turned.” They could still hear AK’s firing outside…

BOOOOM! “Shit, that had to be one of the gates going down,” Cameron said.

“Yep, time for another game change,” this was Ripley. “We’re going out the back, gotta flank them and get rid of the RPG shooter, quick, or a lot of the General’s family are in the shit.”

There was no argument. He brushed past Cameron and headed for the back door of the villa. Allen looked at Cameron, reached into his pocket and handed over his own pistol. “You may need two” was all he said.

Cameron nodded in acknowledgment, then Ripley cracked open the door, took a peek outside. Nothing. Allen tugged it open and was first through, Ripley following and Cameron bringing up the rear. Nobody in the garden, wall tops clear. Across the yard to the back gate. Ripley on the gate, Allen ready, opening it a crack…

RRRP! Allen let go a 3-round burst. “GO, GO, GO…” he yelled, and was out the gate and moving. Ripley fell in just behind him, and Cameron went out last.

They were in a wide alley between the back wall of their villa’s garden and the outer wall of the compound. They hugged the garden wall, Allen looking toward the front gate, Ripley at the big wall, and Cameron back down the compound toward the mosque and garage end. They could hear the firing from the front side of course, but here there was nothing moving.

Allen scuttled along the wall, quickly reaching the corner but staying in the shadow. He got down on the ground and peered around the corner. “Two guys on the gate” he said, loud enough for the others to hear but not loud enough to carry to the gate over the noise. “Ripley, can you hit anything from this range with an MP5?”

Ripley was insulted. “Goddam right I can,” he said. “Together?”

“Right. I’ve got right side and you have left. Get up here.” They squatted together at the corner, Allen very low and Ripley hunched just above him. “OK, on three, we shuffle forward, sort, and take ‘em. Ready?” Ripley nodded. “OK…one…two…three…”

Cameron turned to watch. The two CIA shooters were like artisans. They leaned forward as one being, sighted just for an instant, then simultaneously loosed one round each, then they were back behind the corner.

“Down” said Allen.

“Down” echoed Ripley.

“You fuckers are dangerous,” Cameron said.

“Fucking-A” said Allen.

“Now what?”

Allen sat against the garden wall and looked up at him. “Well Colonel, there’s all hell breaking loose down the main drag out there. I got a look over that way…bad guys are holed up behind low walls either side of the lane, firing down toward the mosque at the end and upward at roofs, I guess. A lot of them I could see. I figure they’re down to maybe half their original number: those two make either 9 or 10 for Ripley and me alone. But it’s still nasty out there. We got no body armor, all you got is the two pistols…wait a minute.”

Allen got down on all fours and crawled low over toward the outer wall. Cameron noticed a lump out there for the first time, and realized it must be the guy who took the burst as they came out of the garden gate. Allen came back out of the dark with an AK and a vest holding several magazines.

“Colonel, you know how to use this thing?” he asked.

“Not a bit” Cameron said, “other than point that end and squeeze the trigger.”

“What about the H&K?” Ripley asked hopefully.

“That either” Cameron answered. “Guys, I’m just a fighter pilot. Pistols, yes. M-16, sure way back when, for all the good that would do me tonight. But not this stuff.”

Allen and Ripley engaged in a quick conversation about the virtues of either gun in the hands of the inexperienced. In the end, stealth won out.

“OK boss, this is what we’ll do,” Allen finally said. “You take the AK, and put this on,” he handed over the vest with the spare ammo. “Me and Ripley will use the silenced HK’s, try to take down more guys without them figuring out we’re coming. You cover our asses with the AK, don’t shoot unless you have to so we stay quiet as long as we can”.

“OK,” Cameron said. “But what’s the plan?”

“Well, we go out there and help I guess,” said Ripley.

“Right,” said Allen. “OK, we go around the corner, haul ass for that planted area short of the center roadway, dive into the plantings and hide behind the palm trees. Or a rock if you find one in there. We get set up, prone, and then Ripley and me start taking down these guys from their right flank. If we’re lucky, we get enough of them that the others break and start to run for the gate, and they never turn their fire on us. If we’re not…”

“If we’re not, you open up with the AK, sir,” Ripley finished. “Hold low, stroke the trigger, try for 3 round bursts or so. Pick your targets. Lemme show you how to reload this thing.”

He did, showing Cameron how to eject the magazine, insert a new one, close the breech, begin shooting again. “These hold 30 rounds each” Ripley tapped a magazine. “Try to keep track, and change in a lull if you can; you don’t want to run dry at the wrong time.”

Cameron swallowed hard. “OK, got it.”

The volume of fire over on the lane increased, and there was another “BOOM” from the RPG. Cameron wondered suddenly how long this had been going on…he’d lost track of time. Seemed like forever, but surely someone would have come by now if it had been that long. Or maybe the police were happy not to come toward something that sounded this nasty, way out in the boonies in Saudi Arabia?

“Ready?” Allen asked.

Nods from Ripley and Cameron.

“OK, let’s GO!” Allen was up, and he dashed around the corner, Ripley was 3 long strides behind him, and Cameron brought up the rear. They didn’t run, but walked fast, rifles up at their shoulders. Cameron looked right of Ripley’s right shoulder, along the villa wall. Ahead, Allen was scanning from front to left front. The trees were up ahead, and Cameron saw they would be scant cover…the hoped-for rock wasn’t there.

Ahead he could now see at least 10 or twelve men firing down the lane. They two were sheltered in the trees across the way, or in the shadow of a low wall that flanked the drive. The angle wasn’t good. But Cameron took the right flank, behind a tree planted on a small rise in the hard earth.

There was no warning, but the soft barks of the H&Ks started up as Allen and Ripley engaged the targets. He saw two go down, then a third, and a fourth. He saw the guy next to that last one, who watched his pal get it and keel over, and he saw him turn to his right rear and unleash a whole magazine in their general direction…

Suddenly there were bullets everywhere. Some hit the dirt in front of Cameron, but luckily they guy was surprised, or scared, or inexperienced, or all three, because his rifle rose on its own with the trigger held down, and after the first few they all were spattering in or through the trees above them. Without thinking, Cameron lifted his cheek off the dirt, sighted his rifle on the shooter, and squeezed the trigger.

One round, center of mass. The bullet struck near the middle of his chest. Cameron saw the mist behind the guy, although in the dark he didn’t see the color. At this range it hurled the limp body back two paces where it dropped in a heap. His rifle sailed through the air to his right and clattered to the ground next to another guy.

And then it was just madness. The attackers could tell by their comrade’s fall that they were flanked. Cameron heard a shout in Arabic, and half the remaining shooters turned their guns toward the Americans. Cameron kept shooting, conscious of the bullets everywhere, but strangely also not caring much. Later, he remembered a “WHOOSH” as an RPG flew over his head and a “BOOM” as it exploded against the compound wall well behind him. He was still stroking the trigger when he realized nothing was happening, and he wondered how long that had been going on.

He rolled left, flat on his back behind his tree, and fumbled to change magazines. He was thumbing the breech closed when Ripley yelled, “Colonel on your RIGHT!”

Cameron still on his back, looked to his left as three attackers came running out of the dark ten paces away. He started to sweep the rifle that way, through a 90 degree arc, while his thumb tried to find the fire selector to switch to full automatic. It all seemed to be incredibly slow. He could see the nearest guy suddenly see them, could see his rifle also coming around. Cameron’s brain did the math…it would be close, but it looked like he would be too late, he was going to lose the race. In a flash he decided to fire early, maybe distract the guy. He squeezed the trigger: one round, not full auto. He squeezed again. The guy on the left staggered and went down. Then the guy on the right went down