Into Africa
By
UCSBdad
Disclaimer: I own no Castles. Or Becketts. Rating: K+ for language. Time: The present day, but in an alternate universe.
Rick was happy after their third full day on the rock. The engineers had done their thing and had loaded up their equipment and helicoptered out just before sunset. All that was left now was some housekeeping for the various bunkers to make them more livable and more workable. He looked around his command bunker and smiled. He had his radio net set up so he could talk to his subordinate units, his boss back at base aerienne 201, and he could keep track of any aircraft in his area. In addition, he had drones in the air sending back real time images of the area around him and fixed sensors keeping track of any places that jihadis could climb the rock and attack him.
Equally importantly, they had the team coffee maker and mini-fridge hooked up to the generator.
All in all, he felt pretty good.
He knew that couldn't last. He was right.
"Sir," Warrant Officer Reed stuck his head into the bunker, "you're going to want to see this."
Rick stepped outside and looked to the north, where Reed was pointing.
"Jesus fucking Christ! Where do those morons think they are?"
The archeologist's camp was lit up like a Christmas tree. Every tent had a light inside of it and there was a large fire by the dig itself. A half a dozen people were listening to loud rock music and dancing around the fire.
"I'll take an ATV and go shut that down." Rick said.
When he arrived at Dr. Beckett's tent, she was sitting outside working on a laptop with an electric light beside her. Both were powered by the dig's own generator.
"I'm afraid I'm going to have to have you turn off the lights, Dr. Beckett. You people make a perfect target like this."
"And I'm afraid I'll have to decline your request, Captain Rodgers." She said politely.
"I explained to you about Chapter Twenty-Three, didn't I?"
"Yes, you did. But I read the entire contract with the legal department of Duquesne University. Chapter Thirty of the contract says that the internal organization, work arrangements and operations of the dig are completely under the control of the leader of the dig. That's me. And I say that we need lights at night so that we can do needed paperwork and reports after working on the site in the daytime."
"And I disagree. Dr. Beckett, I'm going to ask you…"
"And I'm going to refuse. And before you start something with me, I suggest you talk to your commander. The legal department has already sent our position to the Pentagon. I assure you that the lawyers have assured me that I'm in the right here."
"Being in the right won't do you much good if you and your people are all dead."
"We've explained to the locals that we're a scientific expedition and not a threat to them. Your people, on the other hand, are a threat to them. Captain, I've been in Africa before, probably longer than you have. I know what I'm doing."
"The coastal regions of Kenya aren't the Air Mountains of Niger. I submit that you have no idea what you're doing."
"But I do have the law on my side. So, if you don't mind, I have work to do." Beckett's eyes went back to her laptop.
Rick rode back to his command bunker and got on the radio. "Do you know what Dr. Beckett is doing?" He demanded of the colonel.
"I just got briefed by the Defense Attaché in Niamey. She's got her dig lit up like a night time firing range and is refusing to turn the lights off?"
"Exactly. And I need to shut the damned lights off before she gets her whole damned team killed. Will you back me on this?"
Sadly, the colonel shook his head. "It's out of my hands, Rick. There's a legal team from the Pentagon reviewing the legal opinion they got from Duquesne's lawyers."
"Jesus, sir, by the time a bunch of JAG officers get through reading the damned thing, it'll be too late."
"It's not being reviewed by Judge Advocate General people, Rick. The Pentagon's top civilian lawyers are reviewing it."
"None of whom have ever been in combat, I guess?" He said sarcastically.
"Probably."
"What about Senator Souder? He can't want a bunch of archeology students shot up."
The colonel shrugged. "From what I understand, he's being a typical politician about this. He's on both sides of the issue. He appreciates Dr. Beckett's position and he understands our concerns. But, he feels it's a legal matter between us, Dr. Beckett and the Government of Niger."
"Can the Nigerien government do anything? They don't want a massacre up here."
"They don't want to step on the toes of an influential US Senator either."
Rick thought for a moment, but had no further ideas. "So, when things turn to shit, I'm the guy who'll be lip deep in the shit with the tide coming in."
'We'll do our best to protect you, Rick, but…"
Rick nodded. "I know. If there's a US Senator baying for my head, no one is going to be much of a help. Thank you, sir. I'd better get busy doing what I can to prepare for what's going to happen."
Rick called his team, Lt. Glass and his platoon sergeant, Sergeant Hobbes, Lt. Diori, and Dr. Fields together. He explained the impasse with Dr. Beckett. "We've put sangars up around the dig, but we've refrained from manning them so as not to piss off Dr. Beckett and her people any more than we have to. That's got to change. I want the sangars nearest the eastern rock manned with one fire team and one machine gun team. We'll need to keep one squad and two machine guns in the bunkers covering the best way up here. An attack on the dig could be a feint to draw us away. Lt. Glass, have your other squads and heavy weapons teams check the sangars and get familiar with them. Have a drone check the eastern rock, especially the rock spire and the ridgeline for any sign of occupation. Anyone not in the southern or eastern areas will be our reserve. Any questions?" No one had any.
As it turned out, Rick had three days to get ready. On the third night, while asleep in the command bunker, he was woken up by the sound of automatic weapons fire. He shot to his feet and saw that Lt. Glass was already on the radios, arranging the defense.
"Sir, I've sent the rest of second squad to the sangars by the dig along with a machine gun team and the sniper team. I've got the mortar team up and ready, firing on preregistered targets on the eastern rock. As soon as I'm sure that there'll be no other attack, I want to move two Humvees over, one with a Ma Deuce and one with the minigun. Okay?"
Rick nodded. "Just like we planned it. I'm going to go outside and take a look around." Rick grabbed his flak jacket, helmet and M-4 and left the bunker. He flipped his night vision goggles down over one eye and looked to the north. He could hear screams as well as the sound automatic weapons fire: Mostly fully automatic fire incoming and single shot and short bursts of fire from his people. He wasn't sure, but he thought that the lights were still on in Dr. Beckett's tent. He heard the thunk of the mortar being fired, followed by an explosion on the eastern rock.
He stuck his head back into the command bunker. "I'm going up there to take a look around. Everything okay here?"
Lt. Glass nodded. "So far, so good, sir."
"Let me know if you need me." He tapped his radio and was gone.
Just outside of the command bunker a machine gun team was loading onto an ATV. "Got room for one more?" He asked,
"Always room for one more, sir." The driver turned his head. "Loomis, get your skinny ass on the handlebars and don't you drop even one round of my ammo."
A soldier weighed down with ammo boxes climbed on the front of the ATV and Rick jumped on the back. The ATV took off towards the fight in the north.
"We're headed to sangar number seven, sir. That good for you?" The driver asked.
"It'll be just fine."
They arrived at sangar seven and the team piled off and into the sangar. Rick sprinted to the next sangar, which he knew contained the sniper team.
"Sergeant O'Meara, what's happening?" Rick said, dropping beside the sniper and his spotter.
"Got maybe twelve or fifteen jihadis out there, sir. Mostly useless pray and spray types. Fire half a clip, then fire the other half without ever actually aiming. Bullets are going all over, sir. They got no tracers, so they can't see where their rounds go, dumb fuckers." There was a clatter of bullets off of the sangar. "They do have one or two that has an idea, though, sir." Sergeant O'Meara fired. "I'm thinking they brought sand bags with them, sir. They know where the good hides are, too. If we can get someone to correct the mortar fire, that'll slow 'em down." O'Meara fired again.
"Keep at it, sergeant. I'll see what I can do about a forward observer." Rick sprinted to the next sangar, where he found the problem had been solved. The fireteam leader was on the radio to the mortar squad, correcting the fall of shot. Rick kept going.
Ten meters from Dr. Beckett's tent, Rick dropped to his belly and began crawling. Someone who had an idea was shooting up Beckett's tent.
"Dr. Beckett? Are you in there?"
No answer.
"Dr. Beckett, are you wounded? Are you okay?"
"They're shooting at me." She called out.
Rick crawled to the front of her tent and opened the tent flap. Beckett was on the right side of the tent, prone, behind a large wooden crate. He could hear rounds impacting the crate. Beckett's light was still on her desk, illuminating the tent for the shooter.
"Dr. Beckett, you have to turn off the light."
"I can't. If I stand up to turn it off, I'll get shot." As she spoke, a bullet zipped through the lampshade.
"Reach around the crate. Your light is plugged into a light strip by the crate. Just reach over and pull the plug, okay?"
She reached around the crate and pulled a plug. Her computer went off.
"What happened?" She asked. "Why didn't the light go out?"
"Wrong plug. Pull the other one."
"I don't want to get shot."
"I don't want you to get shot, Dr. Beckett. Just reach around and pull the plug."
She did and the tent was plunged into darkness. Rick waited for a few seconds and heard a bullet zip past the outside of the tent. "They don't have a light to use as an aimpoint now. They don't know where you are. Now, I want you to crawl back to me so we can get out of here. Okay?"
Dr. Beckett began to crawl out of the tent backwards.
"Okay, now get on my right." Rick said.
"Why your right?"
"We're going to crawl to the next sangar, which is to our right. I have a flak jacket and a helmet on. Hopefully, anything that hits me will get stopped and not hit you."
"I'm sorry, Captain Rodgers. I'm so very sorry."
"We can worry about that later. I'm going to put one arm around you to guide you and we're going to crawl to the sangar. You can see it by the muzzle flashes, right?"
"I can see it."
As they crawled, Rick discovered that Dr. Beckett had a very firm, muscular stomach. For just a second, he wondered what the rest of her felt like. Then a bullet hit in front of them and he got his mind back on business.
"Okay, we're at the sangar. Just crawl forward and we'll be under cover." Once there, Rick relaxed a little.
"What's happening, Sergeant?"