Act I

I received special technical and manuscript help from Cheah and MetalViscount. MetalViscount is now a Midnight Cobra in Mechwarrior's Empire League. Good luck.

And Mom, thanks for pointing some things out.

Seps exertus

"Laws affect mainly those willing to obey them"

-The National Rifle Association

"Mien Kampf, Mien Gott, Mine Dogs!!!!! " David W. of Dorset England, Via chat room


They'd intentionally built it in the low country, in isolation, enticing. Many nervously spoke of the valley base as a Bien Dien Phu custom-ordered for the Prophet of Patmos, an arena for Armageddon, a place to die.

Roger Gordian listened respectfully in his South-East Iraq compound, but always replied that his ultimate tactical strategy for Camp William Eaton matched that for Khe Sanh. Low intensity conflicts are about attrition, and the best way to pull the enemy into large numbers is to coax them into attacking an irresistible target.

The first omen that the attack was on the way occurred on the major road to the west, where an UpLink vehicle Gordian hadn't told anyone about fell into an ambush.

It was a rare lapse in morality, one in a coming series, that contrived the opening volley in the assault. The target was an ordinary 18-wheel tractor-trailer rig, a fuel tanker without escort, at least, no escort except for two UAVs piloted by the only two people Roger Gordian could trust to accept this outrage; himself, and the perfect marine, the remorseless Paul Evens.


The truck's personnel were unemployable, un-insurable, and unfit for duty, at least by humane standards. Each man was early in a terminal illness, and had failed physicals for other contract companies. The driver, Eric Burk from Mississippi, had bone cancer, and maybe two months to live. He got a twenty thousand dollar signing bonus, ten thousand a month, and a fifty thousand insurance policy. He'll almost certainly make less than ninety thousand for his family.

Val Janikowski of Buffalo, New York, got the passenger seat. His paper mill happened to close when his enlarged heart needed replacing. Without company insurance or money, he didn't see how to pay for an operation, even if he had a match on the waiting list. He got a smaller signing bonus.

Jimmy Boute, a Creole from Mississippi, had once been an Ensign in the Coast Guard. He'd dipped since he was twelve, and now at thirty, throat cancer persistently comes back. He isn't technically terminally ill, but what the heck? He mans an equally expendable belted M60 as a waist-gunner in the trailer. If the barrel overheats, he'll just mount another. They're surpluses, ready to be melted down and converted to something more useful. Maybe to make a monument of peace in San Francisco.

Mfume Ali, an Aids surviver, had realized his drug cocktail no longer protected him from infection. In exchange for a heavy fee, and enough antibacterials and the latest antivirals, his gloved hands removed the hot barrels from the Vietnam-era gun, and reattached cool ones.

These men and others fatalistically went about their jobs behind steel sheets, broken concrete blocks, and sandbags.

They drove a racetrack course up and down the national road, sitting in discount lawn chairs in the trailer with access to drums of the drinks of their choice and prepackaged food. Camelpak vests cooled them from heat, and olive-green 7.62mm boxes rested on treadmills, operable at the flick of an electric switch, and the gas tank ceiling shielded them from the sun.

They called themselves the Euthanasia Kings, and they were six in all- two in the cab, two side-gunners, the barrel man, and a tail-gunner. The wheel-man drove from the American driver side, so the passenger/gunner could properly return fire into (hostile) traffic.

They remained relaxed yet perceptive all day, laughing, listening to music. Boute had his turn with the stereo selection, so it was zydeco hour. Val, the New Yorker, had arranged the cab ride to get away from the noise. Burk always listened to country, not Val's taste, but more digestible than Creole. Those people will turn anything that makes a racket into an instrument, and will label any cacophony as music.

Then Boute has the stones to call techno "Eurotrash!"

He hoped they all lived till tomorrow. Robin Williams will be on the air, and they all plan to listen together.

Between then and now, they have a truce for the next hour, a dose of NPR, then a flavor of Radio BBC, and before sunset, Armed Forces Radio. Maybe if they're behind schedule, they'll laugh at the English broadcast of Iran's state station. Then Hezbollah Radio in Damascus, if the truck breaks down.

Everyone was at ease when the tail gunner shouted out.


The tail gunner tended patrol through the smallest outlet to the world, a thin slit concealed by a transparent blue sticker from the outside. Although everything had an azure tinge, shapes and motion were frighteningly real enough.

"Heads up, we have a Tango in pursuit." All bolted to the ready. "Jimmy, on your side."

"I got him," drawled the southerner, lining up a shot just as the overhead Unmanned Air Vehicle (UAV) squelches the radio.

"We have him, Xavier," replied Ali, calling the vehicle by its radio handle. They're using Marvel Comic characters when flying in a pair. The second drone is called Logan.

Jimmy opened wide his side panel, protruded the gun barrel out, and linked his fire with Val's. All very routine. The car, Jimmy noted, had the truck door removed, to open up a perch for an RPD heavy gunner. 'Hmm, watch his body spasm. The drum mag shattered, bronze tokens showered out. Yawn-worthy, this was so routine. The glass, worthy of a tired sigh, engorged into a pack of Arab meat, a hazard they should have foreseen. They never plan for being shot, as if it doesn't happen every day. Tragic, that. Without being ill, they demonstrate more indifference than the Euthanasia Kings, a pity and a half.'

"This is Logan. I see a limpet mine on your stern, over."

Probably on a short timer. It's now no wonder they drove in close for a point-blank cab shot; the fatal wound was insured. So, tactics have changed again.

"Roger," Mfume responded flatly, "I'm on it."

The trailer had one last notable piece of electronics worth mentioning, and its interface was a simple switch on a box. Mfume flipped it, activating a small generator which coursed juice down copper cables webbed around the hull, "degaussing" it. Roughly two seconds passed before an explosion rocked the rear wheels.

"Looks like it was on a timer, alright. They've obviously figured out we've fudged their radio detonators," opined the rear gunner, who just closed up his hatch.

"Yeah, good thing we flipped it on in time," seconded Jimmy.

"I'd like to meet the person that thought of that before I die."


A good mile ahead, a mudjaheddin teen shimmied down his lookout post, a creosote telephone pole, just after lighting the signal tire he'd nailed up there.

The flame shouted in the jihad's name that the crusader's fuel still came. The incendiary signal hastened the movements of the assembled Mahdi forces.

Quickly, as if pulling guns from licking fire, they attached the radio trigger to the bulbous RPG-7 shell, and stuffed the hot bomb into its camouflage; the ribcage of a Bedouin dog killed by a rushing car. It didn't offer much punch, but young boys could surely haul it to the roadside before the infidel's frequency sweep caught them with their own petard. Again.

The boys' commander, Kassam, age 17, didn't much like the openness of the martyrdom field chosen, but the day had come when the enemy was just too alert in the cities.

With the well-masked machine-gun nests, maybe Allah will smile on them.


The degaussing had been a masterstroke. Now, with the copper mesh's dampening of magnetic fields, the Tangos out there can't even stick mines to the trucks, and they've had mysterious troubles with their remote bombs for months now. They'll have no effective choice but to improvise or get into direct gun battles from now on. It will be just as it should.

Eric Burk clutched his lucky eight ball, the head ornament of his stick shift, and geared the Peterbuilt semi to eleventh. It gave a mother of resistance, at least to a guy with malignant cells in his skeleton. He may be forced to take a gun station soon.

In the far distance was a shepherd's shack, over eight-hundred meters from the road. Well, that makes it a useless firing point for anyone with most Russian small arms, Burk thought.

The radio crackled.

"Jean Gray, be advised. You're passing a Stone Age signal flare: a burning tire. Cowboy up, 'cause the Comanche are all riled up."

Eric unhooked the mike.

"Roger that, Xavier. I'll pull a 'U,' and see how they're flustered."

He applied the brake, shifted down, and made an eighteen-wheeler's famous wide turn left, off the road.

"That got 'em antsy," deadpanned his side-gunner, Val.


Kids in white robes and keffiyeh scraped out of their burrows, giving frantic chase. Two boys crew-served a Chinese Type 58 RPD reproduction, while lying on the flat ground. The April wind eased sand aloft, not at all heavy enough to obscure them from sight.

The truck caught them with a broadside barrage from the Vietnam-era slung-on squad guns. The cab gunner walked his fusillade up from the barrel, hefting a boy's lead left leg, worked the swath over the abdomen, and puncturing the liver, releasing a gusher of black blood. His comrade ate dirt in time to avoid judgment.

Jimmy reacted against a cornucopia of boys ejecting from a wealth of holes. Iraq as a hornet's nest was no longer just a metaphor. By keeping the pallor piece scalding a little longer, until the physics of the metal changed to red line status.

The child soldiers became more and more a rearward problem, until the tail stole his field of fire.

"Anyone hit? Anyone hit?" Boute removed his tool, put Mfume to work, and swiveled back and forth, checking for bullet holes. They were aplenty, just not in the gray up-armored parts.

"Ali!" Boute manhandled the sports drink cylinder, upturned the contents... not to celebrate winning the Super Bowl.

"Ah!" Ali's pupils dilated, his gloveless fingers plied apart, smoke evaporated. Jim watched dumbstruck as Mfume wailed.

"Stay at your post!" It was the left gunner, Dennis Trammel, shouting at the tail gunner. His eyes reflected the soul of a berserker. He impatiently deluged his heated gun from the Camelpak, then crackled a second suppressive spray. Ali's screams didn't quit; the gloves had burned so quickly.

Jimmy's eyes slowly panned to the bow, to a service ladder. They had one more fresh M60 up top, fully exposed. Tied by indecision, motion slowed. He gripped for traction. Amid all the friction outside, nothing had his grip. A tracer plinked high on the tank, deflecting its trajectory down, between the shoulder blades. He crashed to both knees, and found the traction needed.

"Hey Ali," he whispered/hailed, "listen, I need a lift."

Mfume's onyx eyes narrowed, confused.

The Mississippi native lapsed redneck.

"Don't look stupid, y'hear? Forklift your arms under my armpits, and haul me up that ladder before I rip the black off you!"

Those were fighting words, and the black man didn't hide his rancorous expression, but yielded from striking.

"I've got you. Ally-oop!"

"Appreciated."


Above

"They're out in numbers," Roger Gordian observed sourly, "and these flechette rockets are so expensive, too." Not compared to guided ordnance, or a lost life.

"If we're here to win, then so be it, Xavier. We did this for a lopsided attrition win, and I'm counting fifty-plus hostiles sprawled in the open," radioed 'Logan.'

"I'm taking the shot, old man. That's what my paycheck is for, after all."

"I'm arming the napalm rockets, to be thrifty."

Burn baby, burn.

The marine yawed the nose left, descends, lining the yellow brackets over the youngster barking orders, and removed the trigger guard. Paul briefly pondered if Mohammad neglected to promise these guys a burn ward in paradise, then tapped the HOTAS (Hands-On-Throttle-and-Stick) firing stud, martyring some more. He pulls back the stick, rudders hard left, tops out, and slopes back for a second pass.

Phosphorous burns fiercely when exposed to oxygen, and that's why Evens deployed a duo of those.

"Still within my payload: high-explosive rockets number four, and the flechettes in inventory equal two. I suppose Uncle Sam is supposed to graft new skin on those kids, over."

Evens banked steeply, grazed the deck, and goosed the throttle, for the surviving fighters elevated their aim.

Gord followed the tracers, and let slip the coup de grace.

The insidious rubber miasma, or rather, that smoking tire, again.

"So, do you like audio books?"

Eric Burke attempted to lighten the mood, seeing another prone force ahead. One hand rested on the eight ball. 'Go for it,' he thought, putting the turbocharged "Pete" in overdrive.

"Punks ahead, punks on both flanks. This is one bad neighborhood."

In the open wing glass all trucks seem to have, a beefy Desert Eagle "cannon" pistol dangled. Burke was really particular with his ballistics. He wanted the limited edition ten-inch gold .50 caliber from IMI (Israeli Military Industries) and a firm from Minnesota (Magnum Research Inc.), packed with a seven round magazine, containing seven steel-jacketed 325 grain hollow point bullets.

He thumbed the big safety, and pondered why exactly he insisted on this piece.

Well, for starters, he reasoned, using a semi auto would remove the temptation to spray-and-pray, and second, this gun could make bigger holes than any other semi auto pistol. Third, he acknowledged, TV and books had pulled him into the hype around his model; and a dying man can be vain. He has the right, you know.

Burke's mind drifted back to reality when the pistol jammed. He manually cycled the slide, and bored another garnet cavity on another high torso. Another? Guess I'm on autopilot.

'This looks disquietly like the Los Angeles riots of 1992. Gawd, they're close!'

The lazy man's armor kit is seemingly holding. They'd used an easy, ancient method, dating back to the 1948 Arab-Israeli feud. You just take a sheet of scrap metal and some concrete mortar, and sandwich the pieces together. It's no harder than working in a Chicago deli, ha ha! You get double the metal with a concrete layer, and you have no need for spot-welding.'

The pistol clicked empty, so he dumped the spent clip, jacked in another, and reentered the fray.

"Clump."

They punctured the tank again. Burke tried isolating the sound. It resealed before breathing in enough air for the fuel to go through combustion. No boom.

Another exothermic reaction, however, caught the front left fender. Eric read the dials.

"Temperature is climbing; they cut the water pump."

He fish-tailed the vehicle.

"Power steering is kludgey. Well, this has been a pleasure."

Jimmy Boute tugged the shimmering ammo belt, and locked it tight in his 'sixty' placed above not just any article of armor but the big 1500 can of munitions, and the rear armor plate of a HUMVV.

He witnessed disturbing smoke trails, but nothing incoming. He pursued the sources to friendly drones, two of them, pounding Hades out of Tango congregations. A whiz-pop meant lethal nails dispersed out the sides of flechette rockets. Enemy boots toppled in synchronization with the noise; flash and thunder.

Flames of damnation boiled left and right. Concussive blasts tenderized uncooked meat. A-ha! Read your Marx! Americans are consumers, consumers of Arab meat! Here we are, with two rows of teeth. Gnashing, biting. You disdainfully call us a consumer society? We, the food chain elite?

Boute whipped up some Cajun cooking, he guaranteed. He swept one way, then another on his turret, then shifted back, just like politics.

Shining casings cascaded down the hole, drumming a champagne toast sort of noise repetitively. The crowd congratulated him every time he fired the weapon, it seemed. That's unnerving, being praised like a puppy.

He graduated to a stop-and-go approach, target, burst, welcome cool air in the barrel, aim, annihilate, repeat.

A quartet of shells deflect upward from the tank slope, colliding with the plate, but one freak angled higher, at his helmet seam.

"Brack!"

A gash opens on the forehead. Blood stings his tear ducts, and he wipes it away. He realizes the majority of bullets are after him…! His enlightenment comes awfully late, because the threat is now only rearward, and dissipating.

The Euthanasia Kings pull through in time for Val to douse the fires snaking at Eric's feet. The lubricants are drained, meaning friction builds in all the moving parts.

The New Yorker isn't accustomed to uncommon valor, even in this unit, but the fire must be under the hood, and the only way to drench it is by going outside, when they can't stop. Goody.

"Back drafts occur by opening flames to sources of air," Evens radioed, seeing the body hang out the window.

"We know, Logan. He's going to work the nozzle in a niche, and spray around," said the driver.

"Understood. Remember you have some wiper fluid. That's a little extra for beating back the flames."

"Thanks, Logan. Out."


They survived their first mission, an anvil and hammer operation, Euthanasia King style. For this mission alone, CENTCOM recommended Val Janikowski and James Boute for the Medal of Freedom. But when the full report reached the President's desk, the whole unit received the citation, and the president personally pitched Congress for awarding the Peacetime Medal of Honor, since civilians can't be officially recognized for taking part in war.

Many in Congress questioned the reasoning there, but the motion passed for Boute, under the condition the award remain "black" for five years.

In the United Kingdom, Tenth Downing Street backed the idea of giving Janikowski and Boute the Malta Cross. Parliament seconded, and it was done.

As one last honor, the queen made the crew Commanders of the British Empire.

After a fortnight of battle, Eric Burke became too weak to take part anymore. A British Airways flight took him to a care center in Jackson, Mississippi, where he died with his new Malta Cross.

Mfume Ali occupied a bed in Bethesda, Maryland, in a sterile environment long enough for Roche to release a drug for a niche market; the one he was in. Ervin "Magic" Johnson volunteered to pay for the treatment.

James "Jimmy" Boute got over his morbid complex, and decided death wasn't inevitable. He didn't leave Iraq, however. After asking for a revision in his contract, the Mississippi Creole reported for duty at Camp Claire L. Chennault, Sword's brother to William Eaton, on the Iraq-Syria Border.

Dennis Trammel remained a regular rider in the Trojan Horse mission until perishing under fire at a bogus checkpoint in the Al Anbar Province.

Val Janikowski found his heart…and a bank that forgave his credit record.

As of Christmas, 2004, he's recuperating from surgery. He promises to fill out his contract obligations after Iraqi national elections are held in January.

Sword folded the decoy squads after the June handover.

Act II Rater Infinitas

"I think that water will come to be more and more valued as a scarce commodity …". Terasen Inc. chief executive John Reid, quoted in an April 2004 news story. The same news story reported that "Reid brushed aside a shareholder's concern that privatizing municipal water distribution could open the door to foreign acquisition of Canadian water under NAFTA".

"Gentlemen, one thing I've learned at sea is that the procedure manuals are written by people who have never been at the business end of a torpedo with the plant crashing around them, with the captain shouting for power, where a second's delay can mean death. The meaning of being an officer in our Navy is knowing more than those operation manuals, knowing how to play when you're hurt, when the ship is going down and you need to keep shooting anyway. That's really it, isn't it men? The ability to play hurt. That's the only way we'll ever win a war. And in fact, that's the only way you can live your lives. Do that for me, guys. Learn to play hurt."

-Admiral Kinnaird McKee

April fifteenth, Tax Day back home. The television crews film the happenings of contractor life on base, looking for the brighter side, the good news in the mission. They get great human interest stories every night, and plenty of raw footage for award winning documentaries.

On Tax Day, they payed special focus to the latest invention of Roger Gordian's Wisconsin mind, a deep drilling project. UpLink isn't competing with the established oilmen, he knows better than that. Nor is he importing the newest oil and natural gas drills. What he's going after is the solution to a problem that has concerned the CIA community more than the oil crisis for years now.

"The Central Intelligence Agency released a science paper a few years ago that some people have been fretting about. The paper raised concerns that many regions of the world would be so short of fresh water, that nations would actually go into conflict over scarce supplies.

The paper set a start of the crisis for 2015, and the fighting would naturally begin in the Middle-East. What the analysts forgot, however, is that drillers often bore super-deep holes in this portion of the world, estimating there are deep reserves of fuel in the ground. They didn't know drillers often find deep aquifers at some sites, then jot them down as a bust. They're looking for a different commodity, and don't think much of their finds."

"Heck , where the drillers are from, the United States or Western Europe, fresh water's as free and plentiful as forests- another resource

the Middle-East doesn't have."

The visionary deftly dipped one vanilla cream wafer in his favored frothy coffee, and wiped the bottom half against the China cup rim.

"But water's more difficult to acquire here, but now an ocean's worth is actually trapped above the oil. We've taken some older, supposedly useless drills from the energy giants in the region. It's a cheap venture, in fact, in comparison too, say, satellite communications.

"And in our strategic location, Geraldo," Gordian pointed with an outstretched arm, "we can sell hear in Iraq, south to Kuwait, south-west to Saudi Arabia, and if relations are fixed anytime soon- with Iran, all without stretching our pipelines more than a hundred miles."

The reporter recounted the conversation in his head.

"So what your saying is you've averted a major regional war over water, created a new industry, and basically, you saved the world. And here I am, right smack dab in the middle. This world can be a funny place." He shook his head, disbelieving.

Roger basked in history. He liked the rays.

"I estimate we'll beat the coalition's Project Eden, the marsh area restoration, by enough years to make the drilling profitable, even if our only market is in Iraq, and it won't be."

One of the Marsh Arabs, the Sheik's son, shifted a scowl at the camera, yet quickly regained his composure.

"So far, we're supplying ourselves with enough water to drink and bathe with for a major industrialized city, and we're siphoning a lot of gallons into the barren desert, not enough to cause major erosion, mind you, just trickles at a time, so we don't screw everything up."

'Or maybe he's siphoning out just enough to keep the locals dependent on his product,' thought someone nearby.

They watched the afternoon sun wane, as strategists.

Who else needs clean water, India? Is it conceivable to stretch the pipes that far for water? Perhaps there's no need to lay new pipes, if we can connect to existing bone-dry lines servicing Tehran, then join into any Afghan pipelines lain by coalition forces (if they have any).

Roger didn't believe the infrastructure existed. 'Oh well, maybe shipping the water will be profitable. If not, the market's profitable enough right here. That's concrete, not a pipe dream. O ho! A pun, pipe dream.'

The boss continued gazing at construction, specifically, the new concrete dome being inflated with the new balloon construction method, when the well cap burst, opening an artificial geyser.

Construction crew emerged from the mist, drenched and hyper-awakened. 'Something interesting is happening.'

"Look's like something's up," understated Gordian, "I think we'd better go inside."

"You bet. Ladies and gentlemen, we are in danger, but we will gallantly report the news as it's happening-"

The boss yanked the reporter's arm.

"Come on, you idiot! There's no time for B.S!"


Southern Iraq

The USA Amry's 3rd Infantry Division had swept a patrol through the previous hour, using an M2A3 Bradley to considerably beef up a force previously made up of HMMWVs, but the khaki vehicles have since returned north. All moved as Plenkanov has foretold.

'Now only if the A-10 patrol doesn't spot us,' mused Ruzhyo.

He led a shock team of his choosing just north of the extreme southern city of Umm Qasr,

to the right off Highway #7, the route to Basra.

The target is the internment facility, Camp Bucca (named for Ronald Bucca, a New York City fire marshal who perished in the aftermath of the 9/11 attack), guarded by the 800th Military Police Brigade, a reserve unit of 1,700 out of New York.

According to the plan, which is iffy, Ruzhyo should have his own surprise column inside.

Ruzyho had due respect for the regular and special combat forces of the United States, but let his disdainful feelings show toward these Yankee cops.

His feelings showed in the size of his own strike force; himself, Grigory Zemya, or the Snake, Job Geroj, the hero, and Peter Strelok, the team's designated marksman.

Unless a shakedown has changed the status created in last night's fog, the team has the support of a couple of inmates scheduled to move out for the exercise yard at eleven A.M.

The Chechen also wasn't sure of the reliability of his prison recruits in terms of their loyalty, and ability to hide contraband from even the most bored of Empire State corrections officers. He'd decided to institute a few extravagant flourishes within the assault, figuring a multitude of different trick teeth could compensate for an inelegant script.

It was a feat of application and imagination, but Plenkanov had successfully added trace gradients of solid rocket propellant and microfiber strands of sensitive wires surrounding the temperature-sensitive propellant. The result is a danger that radio frequency radiation births the risk of explosive detonation. In military parlance, all the vehicles in the parking lot are not HERO safe, meaning they're not protected against HAZARDS OF ELECTROMAGNETIC RADIATION TO ORDNANCE.

Job Geroj appreciated the touch, after Strelok explained it to him.

They aren't HERO safe, alright.

It's more than a minor footnote that the early Hydra 70 rocket motor, not HERO safe, had caused the devastating fire on the USS Forestal's (CV-59) deck.

The emitter is in the guise of a pirate radio station just over in Kuwait's border.

If Ruzhyo had felt his normal self, he'd have enjoyed the irony. Plenkanov's nemesis, Roger Gordian, had served aboard the flat-topped vessel in the summer of 1967, when that inspirational fire had broken out. Then the ship was retired September 11, 1993. On the eighth anniversary of the ship's entrance into mothballing, the namesake for the prison they planned to attack had been killed. Try figuring out all the super symmetry in that!

Just a trick of mathematics, the rifle dismissed, realizing his brain was attempting his rescue from dispair by wandering. What had the Scot, Milton, said? "What need a man forestall his date of grief and run to meet what he would most avoid?" What had Strelok, the shooter, meant when he'd relayed that quote in Persia, and what had he sensed in the Chechen? Strelok is clearly not straight in the head, even more scrambled than the typical solitary sniper.

Maybe. He could think over it, when the time is right. As for the matter of his craft, this 800th Military Police Brigade is a component of what had once been the 77th Army Infantry Division, which had made a heroic stand during the Meuse-Argonne Offensive of World War One. Cobbled together as the "Lost Battalion," they'd shown surprising substance under the leadership of Major Charles S. Whittlesey, a Congressional Medal of Honor winner, said Strelok.

Ruzhyo vaguely remembered seeing the movie in the hospital waiting room, on the History Channel.

Strelok had shown mirth in relating the tale of their messenger pigeon, that had been nameed Bon Cher, or something French like that. After crediting the bird for saving the unit, they'd stuffed it, and displayed it in a museum.

They've gone from there, to being "regional support." Are they now just a legacy with no modern meat? Maybe.

"One final note about them, Rifle. The big-shot war correspondent, Ernie Pyle, was attached to them when a Japanese sniper zapped him."

Strelok had probably imagined doing the deed himself, and had probably re-inacted the event on some Pacific island, ideally, one covered in volcanic ash. The shooter followed the history of his craft carefully.

One time, Peter Strelok had role played his favorite book, using all his contract earnings on paying actors to take part, just so he could re-create the conditions needed to assassinate the late Charles de Gaulle. Sane people just don't do that sort of thing.

They've made it to their op point with a few minutes to spare. Ruzhyo unfolded the butt of his AN-94, without question a tool perfectly suited for Mikhail the Rifle. He'd read reports of the crappy ergonomics. Ha! Maybe for clumsy Russian conscript hands, but a Chechen out of SpetsNez can get used to a strange new rifle. He especially adored what the 5.45x39mm jacketed round could do in the 2-round burst mode of fire, but sadly, was the only one so interested.

Grigory and Geroj both stuck with the trusted AK design, going for modern "Western" Kalashnikovs, with polymer parts and chambered for 5.56x45. Neanderthals.

Strelok, the team's designated shooter, fielded the latest variant of the classic SVD.

Peter, the Shooter, circumscribed the facility's spa in the aperture of his scope. A few off-duty bathers played under the gazebo. How smart of them to construct such a diversion from the same old grind. Well, we have more than enough diversions to compensate.


Inside the prison

The most convenient thing about infiltrating an internment camp is that you don't need to craft a safe personal history to get inside. As it turns out, the military actually aspires to take in the ones with dirtier records! Ideally, the coalition is looking for suspicious expatriate individuals, because, for one thing, honest hardworking Iraqis don't really care if an innocent (or shady) Jordanian is arrested. Despite all the talk by pundits about Iraqis not having a sense of nationalism, most on the street identify better with someone who'd lived under Saddam's regime, then, say, the late King Hussein.

Second, a foreigner better fits the profile of a terrorist, at least to the coalition's world view. So, Scimitar, as he was known to Ruzhyo, made it all too easy for a troop of Polish soldiers to scoop him up in a counter-intelligence sweep. Then he'd artfully orchestrated a "dropsy" of Jordanian identification at their provocation.

It hasn't been a fun stay, but then yesterday, weaved within the morning mist, Gospel, the bringer of good news, slipped by the wire with a nicely balanced compact Derringer, a double-barreled one, with a snob nose, just enough handle to grip a single finger around, and sights filed down to a nub.

That Ruzhyo character didn't care much for large caliber guns, and that had shown when he'd commanded Gospel to pass on snub nose .22 Derringer. He'd asked the impossible.

"You've never been to Ford's Theater, have you," he'd said, leaving Strelok to explain the assassination of Abraham Lincoln at the aftermath of the American Civil War. The sick Russian had re-enacted it for him. So, a head shot from a single meter is possible, that doesn't make escape too promising.

It was time. The plump footfalls of yet another American rent-a-cop intruded on his reverie. Stomaching his doubt, Scimitar, ha, he'd be within scimitar range, cornered around his 8x8 foot cell for his only chance for a shot from concealment. The guard, the Jordanian could barely see, wore a black muscle shirt with a company logo.

Scimitar aimed for the animal depiction in the upper chest. The guard, now swiping a smart card, leaned only four feet away, but the Jordanian bothered to aim, mimicking the logo of the Tom Clancy endorsed games. At some level, he felt like a cricket player, posed like so, but somehow, it felt right. He yearned for more practice, but felt content in this role.

When he panned attention down the corridor, registering the tiny gun, Scimitar flexed the finger on the steel.


They'd put him in this hole solely for being a Palestinian newly arrived in Iraq in April of 2003, had ignored Habeas Corpus, and kept him shackled half the day! Tariq Assad couldn't take it anymore. Just one good opening, and this Arab's rampaging!

The door opens. This is the right time for the exercise yard, alright. Oh boy, it's another fat one, big surprise. It's all the pork and beans, they've got to stop stocking their slops with that foul pork and beans!

This one had a silver beard with his porcine features. He looks like St. Nickolaus, as portrayed on Coke bottles, except more dull and witless.

"C'mon, tis time do your Dervish-dance outdoors. Now git moving to Sandland. God, I hate this place."

The pig sighed. These abductors sigh a whole lot. They must miss their pastures and filled slops.

BANG!

Upon solid contact, mercury fulminate surged behind the brute force, crashing a liquid metal tide against lipids, a sea of lipids, and other body makeup. Banned by international treaty, exploding bullets inject the smallest of calibers into horrendous projectiles.

Scimitar paled, suppressed a twitching in his extremities. The guard retreats against a security door, looking baptized by demons. The aorta, lying open, extracted from beneath the ribs, sputtered.


Assad, named for the lion, plastered the backup pig to the wall, mindful to elevate his turgid shoulder hard under that porcine chin. That way, brain's base clashed with a hard metal sheet. The man's eyes flickered dormant. Assad had hammered the Occipital Lobe hard enough.

Time is short. Move on now.

A gunshot, punctuated by a muffled explosion, awakened Gospel from his religious studies.

Eleven O'clock. Well, Mr. Scimitar is on time, he mused, while keeping his nose in the musty holy book.

Gospel, the good news, peeked right at his cell's door. His glance met the ebony eyes of a dark American checking on him. The guard shut the slit peephole. He didn't see the duel timed detonation pencils stuck in an aluminum foil-wrapped cake of gelignite (nitroglycerin, guncotton, wood pulp, and potassium nitrate).

Gospel had been counting in his head, and guessed the detonation strikers were due to spring, so he sought refuge under a bunk. He had really cut it close...


Outside

"There's an uprising!"

Peter Strelock held the dark crosshairs of his scope a finger length above the dogtags of a shirtless white male, thankful for an exposed target larger than a head for once. H was at the extreme range of his gun's capabilities, and knew the rifles MOA roamed dangerously wide under these conditions. A torso he can hit... even if it's turning!

"Enemy attack! Tangos are here!"

The shooter, as much as he didn't like the role, plinked a sandy-haired Caucasian male leaping from the pool, swiveled one bi-pod peg left... oh, a woman, a young one with Slavic features, ducked under the water. A blond, the strawberry kind, she looked the part of the "first crush" substitute teacher.

Don't hesitate! As much as she may look civilian, she could reach an Armalite any second!

She slumped in the garnet spa, with the half dozen others. She'll be another face to coalesce with the others..


The Kuwait pirate radio station received it's scheduled 11:00 AM automated phone call from the US Naval Observatory's atomic clock within a very small fraction of the correct time, starting a chain of events that benefited the enemy in Iraq.

"What? I heard an explo- Ah!"

Not every car exploded. The odds were actually absurdly low that any one car would, but the parking lot held dozens of vehicles, so all together, the odds of at least one car detonating was nearly certain.

As it happened, it was a white Department of Defense Chevy Suburban that succumbed to random chance. A piece of copper wire, barely a centimeter long, had a crumb of solid rocket fuel clinging to the side. The fuel tank, half full, had enough air to support combustion, and the speck of rocket fuel had just enough buoyancy, thanks to an air bubble, to float to the surface, when the radio station's electronic emissions passed through the vehicle.

The Chevy body violently expanded as if directed by John Woo, shaking a semi-buoyant

wire-rocket fuel combo to the top of a civilian Hummer H2. That vehicle surrendered to high-energy chemistry, committing fratricide against a military brother parked beside it. Their flames merged, generating enough heat to melt, then consume, the flammable paint of an Iraqi Police Honda, holding a suspect waiting for detainment. The rolled-up windows imploded, then kicked back out, propelled by the back draft of bursting compressed air.

That beat-up cop car had come in leaking motor oil, conveniently close to the front tire of an HEMMT. That truck had just been lubed with a petrochemical grease.

Eventually, parts of every car were set aflame, cooking off enough heat to melt the asphalt; and spark the mother-of-all flashes.


Gospel motioned with his smoking snub-nosed Saturday Night Special, down to four S&W rounds, toward the tool of the man he'd just executed. The fellow inmate got the idea. It was easier not looking at his face, the Arab realized, even if this man had been face-down, spread-eagle.

Gospel motioned again, this time nonverbally requesting that the other inmate, now armed with a stolen Beretta, to follow down the corridor.

He, in turn, motioned for two other inmates, welding shock batons, to follow him. Gospel then mustered the courage to earn his Nom de Guire.

"Fellow believers. The Mudjaheddin are here to cast out the infidel from unholy abomination we're in!"

He smiled grimly at reciting the atrocious dialog of some Western film villain. The smile turned more lopsided, more genuine, hearing the responsive cries of his brethren.

He assigned one club man to try keying some cells open.

"But don't take your sweet time. In this mess, the least active is bound to lose."

Ahead, an unusual pop.

"Scimitar! We're coming, bro!"

The comrade trotted to the group, working his only reload into the puny piece, the Derringer he'd just emptied.

Suddenly, a giant pummeled the penitentiary

"What was that?" asked a club man.

"Radio Free Caliphate," quipped the Gospel, "now let's hit the exit!"


Ruzhyo peeked left, saw Strelock ruffle his Ghillie suit, snapped his vision forward.

A fool shouldered a riot gun, maybe a Super Shorty shotgun, about a hundred meters ahead. He was strangely in black SWAT battle dress. Most guys encountered have worn cloth. The Chechen's senses opened up, out of professional curiosity, to record his first live-combat use of the Nikonov AN-94's automatic double-tap.

Grigory leap-frogged ahead, Job sprayed around the prison corner, fearful, Mikhail believed. Whatever, he covered Strelock's sprint to the next op point, a dirt pile by the canal.

The Snake knelt by the shotgun, explored the mechanics, vented vitriol at an exit.

"Whoa!"


The uprising sprawled flat under the staccato routine of a semi auto shotgun.

Gospel braved a peek. A armored MP taped a lower abdominal wound on himself, then sprayed a short burst outside.

He's alone, a circumstance of chaos, mused the good news, formulating a plan.

I've got him.

Up, he bumrushed the crouched reserve trooper.

"Ugh!"


Zemya had his AK muzzle on the door when two bodies tumbled through, eight limbs flailing. Ruzhyo shouted, halting the Snake, and affixed his bayonet. He used the rifle's long reach to avoid the fray, then struck. Kevlar offered no resistance, as the Rifle jabbed hard in a New York cop's lower back, but bone dislodged the blade.

"Huh, I shouldn't have dragged it," he said, in English. "Gospel, can you make it with us?" He fluttered back to Arabic.

"I am well, comrade. The others, I don't know of their health, but they've been well fed."

Ruzhyo curtly approved.

"Let's hustle like our days are short!"

The team, with new members, extracted to the ditch, under cover of Strelok.

"We have concealed hogan with arms and rations. Conditions are primitive, but safe from armed forces."

They trudged away.


Author's Note: More on the siege in the next chapter.