Patience County War (Madeleine Toche Series) (27 page)

“How are we set for Claymores, Colonel?” Joseph asked.

“I used a few remote detonate pieces. I didn’t want some fool kid or one of the dogs to get blown up,” John said.

Sam smiled. That big monster that had saved his life was no ordinary dog. He would never think of Genghis in the same way again. That animal could think. Maybe not in a way he understood, but it had saved his ass.

“Where is Genghis dad?”

“Don’t know, but he’s around. He knows what guns are and what men do with them. He’ll stay out of the line of fire.”

“He was in the right place at the right time,” Sam said.

Just then TJ called from behind a tree in a low but clear voice,

“Coming in, Colonel.”

All three men looked at TJ with a pronounced sense of respect. The smaller man looked just like his Mayan ancestors: small, fine featured, and the deep bronze color of the people of the equator.

“You a LRP, TJ?” Sam said.

“Mike Force,” TJ said.

Sam had been a small boy when his father and Joseph were crawling around the jungles of Southeast Asia but he had heard during his own training about the Long Range Patrols, or LRPs and the specialized Special Forces Mobile Strike Force, Mike Force.

“He wore the tiger. Report,” John grunted.

“I came through two lines spread out side by side. I could smell a third one, I think.”

“Strength?”

“Enough. At least twenty and they’re placing enough Claymores to make things damn interesting.”

“What about Nathan? Dad, he could charge into a tripwire. I better go find him.”

“Sam, remember I trained you and Nathan. He is a brilliant man. Smarter than you or I am and practical. I told him to stay on the periphery
and to watch first. He will be up a tree to start and know where the mines are located in his area.”

“You’re right,” Sam said, breathing a little easier.

“Colonel, the enemy is well armed. I saw at least one rocket launcher and heavy machine gun. The guys I eyeballed looked calm, ready and well trained.”

“I expected a professional force. But we have the advantage. They expect a bunch of old farmers,” John said as the men dispersed along the front of the trench, watching and waiting.

C
rockett saw the muzzle flash when his Colonel was hit. He responded. He didn’t determine whether John was moving. He had his orders and one chance to respond. John had told him since there had been an assassination attempt on Sam that a sniper was all but guaranteed, and if so needed to be neutralized. Crockett did not want the sniper repositioning, so his chance was now. He sighted the fifty caliber and scanned for the sniper. The guy was in a guile suit, and almost invisible, except to another sniper. Crockett was in his own suit made to accommodate his girth. Without hesitation he adjusted for wind and elevation and put one through the man’s brain. Mechanically he moved back, keeping concealed and moving into a blind that he’d constructed a couple of hundred yards away. He didn’t need to radio in to John, the fifty sounded like a damn cannon, the report pealing across the valley like thunder. He’d taken a quick glimpse, relieved to see the old warrior moving with ease, must have incredible luck to have survived this long. Or God was on his side. Crockett smiled when
he thought of all the armies that felt that God was on their side. Usually there were only two sides, so how the hell did that work?

Nathan lay along the length of a branch, high up in the canopy of a massive oak tree. He’d only just made it into the blind constructed up in the crotch of the old giant. He had been up this tree countless times in the past, but it had been a while. It was a little work getting up here. Maybe he needed to climb a little more often. He watched as the soldiers moved below him. Even to his untrained eyes, they looked like they knew what they were doing. He was worried, not for himself but for his friends, especially Sam. He knew John was as fierce as they come but Sam was capable of anything and would immediately put himself between harm and his friends or family. Then he came to a conclusion. We just won’t let that happen, and it won’t if John Trunce has anything to say about it. He waited until the men were well past and crept down the tree. He followed at a discrete distance and made sure there were no stragglers bringing up the rear. Nathan watched as the men strung wire from Claymores and noted the spots. He had spent so much time in these woods and was in them several times each week, especially in the recent past since they’d begun preparing for an attack. His father and he were botanists and had an ongoing competition about who could identify any new species. They had each discovered and named new ones themselves, to make the point that people need to explore their own environments and stop destroying them. The loss of knowledge due to the destruction of rain forest itself was incalculable. Nathan contained his natural instinct to charge on in. He knew it wouldn’t be long now.

“We’ve got movement, Colonel,” TJ said.

“Confirmed on my side,” Sam said.

“Nothing yet here,” Joseph said as he scanned down the slope.

“What are your orders, Colonel?” Joseph continued.

“We engage, this needs to end here and now. They want it, they brought it.”

With that, John loudly cranked back the Browning fifty caliber machine gun positioned on the rim of the trench, surrounded by sand bags concealed with dirt and leaves, and opened fire. Simultaneously, the other men did so as well, aiming either towards the men they’d spotted or into likely cover positions.

Paco spaced his men carefully at the bottom of the hill leading up to the fortified position along the ridge. Although well hidden, someone had prepared that position for assault. Paco’s unease grew as he realized that he had no idea the number of men that held that position. Had their attack been expected? Were they forewarned? The more he thought about it the angrier he became. That fool Jose had destroyed their advantage of surprise. Regardless, he will be a casualty. He looked at his men dispersed throughout the trees. These woods were a strange environment to a man who lived and worked in the desert. It wasn’t jungle like those in Southeast Asia, but they had their forbidding denseness. He suddenly knew the advantage lay with the defenders.

“Cover,” Paco yelled as the woods around him came alive with bullets. Two men were instantly hit and went down screaming. They were pulled out of the line of fire, one dead and one seriously wounded. His men immediately returned fire. Automatic weapons fire tore into the top of the ridge. Paco nodded to the two men who carried the light anti-tank missiles. Between them they had ordinance for several shots.

“Shit,” Paco yelled. There’s more than one man up there,” He yelled into his headset, “Echo one, you hear that?”

“Well boss, I guess we’ve got more than one man,” Philippe yelled back.

“I hear a fifty,” Paco said unbelieving.

“A fifty Cal?”

“Gotta be,” Paco screamed back over the din. Then it all came to him. No intel on the family or friends.

“Keep cover and advance. Let’s see how the fifty likes RPG rounds. Fire at will,” Paco ordered.

To Nathan and Crockett it sounded like the whole woods came alive with gunfire and then the whoosh of an RPG and a huge explosion off to the side of the ridge.

“They’re hot,” John yelled, and Sam let loose with an RPG from the ridge.

For the next ten minutes it was absolute bedlam as each side peppered the other with automatic gunfire. Twice an RPG had exploded within a few feet of the front of the trench. There was smoke and dirt everywhere, across the ridge and down the slope to where the three advancing units took cover and moved up the ridge. Sam was bleeding from several places. The helmet
and body armor that he had insisted his father and the other men wear had easily saved each of them from serious harm or death. Shrapnel flew in all directions as the ground shook. Neither side could keep this pace up for long. John had stowed plenty of ordinance but not for a damn siege. He knew the enemy would have limited time to carry out their mission. Even though Patience was isolated, the sound of a full scale battle would attract attention and outside law enforcement would arrive. He both welcomed and feared that happening. If their attackers were trapped, they would try to fight their way out. Modern law enforcement is well armed, but these were well trained mercenary soldiers. John’s intention was to defend and to send a message. If the enemy intended to take the ridge, many of them would die doing so.

It was during this initial madness that Nathan took up his spears and the huge shotgun slung over his shoulder and began to run, crashing through the woods all along the perimeter of the ridge and behind the attackers. The first man he took had no time to react. As he fired his RPG, Nathan threw a spear through him with such force that it was embedded in a tree several feet beyond. The man’s entire head was just gone. The man had been hit with a spear easily weighing thirty pounds. It tore through him like a freight train going through a watermelon, without slowing at all. The shaft of the spear was tipped with a blade several inches wide and an inch thick. Only a dark flash was seen by the other men as Nathan crashed through, firing both barrels of a .8 gauge shotgun, spraying buckshot into more than one man. The men had body armor but their legs, arms, and heads were exposed and were savaged by the buck shot. The enemy fired wildly back as Nathan charged by, but had little time for accuracy, pinned down by the defenders in front.

Nathan continued his attack, killing three men, tearing each apart with a massive spear. He targeted the men with the weapons that could do the most damage to his friends. The psychological effect on the attackers was pronounced. Even the combat hardened officers had never seen anything like it.

“Find me that man, Philippe. Take him out,” Paco tersely ordered. He could not afford to be boxed in from the rear. He would eliminate the threat and then they would advance under an all-out barrage and deliver a satchel charge that would completely take out the entrenched position. Because of the angle of the hill, the rockets they fired struck dirt or impacted trees
on their way to their target. He and his men were pinned down in predetermined fields of fire, and that heavy caliber machine gun up there was pre-sighted on their position. He knew that the sheriff was Special Forces, but he sensed another hand in this. He was confronting an enemy trained in the type of warfare that he was, older, more traditional.

“Roger that.” Philippe didn’t have to ask who his commander meant. He spoke quick words to his next in command and slid off into the woods to find his man. Philippe too could move like a ghost in the woods, jungle, or any terrain for that matter. He would track the man.

Philippe soon caught a glimpse of a huge shape crashing through the undergrowth about seventy five yards behind and to the right of him. He smiled and thought “I have you now, my spear throwing friend.” Guy must be nuts. A silenced weapon got the job done just fine, even a bow, but a spear? What the damn hell? The guy also had a shotgun, and that meant limited range. The man would have to stop at some point, and when he does, I’ve got him.

Nathan slowed after he’d put some distance between himself and the rear of the attackers. He kept to the densest part of the undergrowth and tried to remain as inconspicuous as possible. Even though he was in good shape, his heart pounded in his chest and he was gulping huge breaths of air. He needed to stop, take cover and assess his situation. He had never been in combat, but had trained for it all his life. He was proud not to feel fear; something else had taken over, something handed down from some of the fiercest warriors the world had ever known. As his breathing slowed he watched the woods in front of him and to the sides, missing the small shape dart far to the right and behind him.

Philippe came at Nathan’s position from the behind and slightly to the side. He couldn’t get a shot, as the man had positioned himself up against a huge tree covering his back. The little Philippe could see of the man was huge. He could also see the end of a side by side shotgun. Judging by the damage it had done it was a blunderbuss, had to be an eight gauge. He did not want that thing going off in his face. He didn’t have a world of time either, and needed to get back to the line and take that hill and get the hell away from this crazy place. They had expected some possible resistance, but this was the most intense combat Philippe had ever seen. You couldn’t even exaggerate it. Using the cover of the gunfight that continued, he used every skill in his arsenal to advance on the man. It would have to be quick
and he held a side arm ready to fire as he crawled forward. His target shifted and he froze, all the while keeping the protruding barrel of the shotgun in sight. If it moved, he froze as he inched closer. He had been trained by the best the former Soviet Union provided. He had him either way. If the man broke cover he was dead. If he didn’t move he was dead. He was less than five yards from the man now and had reached a point where it would be impossible for the man to bring that shotgun to bear in time. He just wouldn’t be able to swing it around before he was shot. He readied and sprang, firing. It was too late by the time he saw the shotgun resting in the fork of a branch shoved into the ground. No! Phillipe screamed in his mind as he saw Nathan’s giant hand dart out and grab his head with crushing power. As he tried to recover, he fired wildly off balance and was jerked off the ground and swung towards the massive trunk. Philippe’s head smashed like a pumpkin against the side of the tree. Once was all it took. The force was so great that a dead limb fell along with some other forest litter.