Target Deck - 02 (43 page)

The tank lurched, threatening to shake Deckard off. Finding a bump where one armor plate was welded to overlap on top of another revealed a very small handhold but it would have to do. Pushing off with one boot against the plate, Deckard flung himself up and got the tips of his fingers on the metal lip. Grunting, he got his other hand onto the lip and walked his legs up until his knees were almost in his chest. He would have to make one more reach to the top of the metal tower and his strength was already giving way.

He was dangling by his fingertips and unlike a rock climber, he was outfitted in body armor, rifle, grenades, magazines, and other tools of the trade.

Suddenly the entire bulldozer quaked beneath him causing one hand to slip off the lip. The next thing Deckard knew, sheet metal was raining down around him. Rocks were dropping down and clanging off the roof of the tank's tower. Something hard struck his shoulder and he lost his grip.

Deckard kept his feet and knees together but still nearly blacked out when he impacted the street below. Groaning, he spat dust out of his mouth. Propping himself up with one arm, he saw the bulldozer smash the rest of the way through the entire corner of a warehouse. Bricks rained down around the dozer and the sheet metal roof collapsed in entire sections. The tank simply rumbled right over the debris and turned back out onto the street.

They must have had cameras somewhere on the outer skin of the tank and had seen him climbing up the back end of it. The mercenaries left the street corner they had taken shelter behind and moved up to help their commander out.

Deckard handed his rifle to one of them before unplugging his head set from his radio and undoing the Velcro on the cummerbund of his body armor. Ripping off the plate carrier he handed that off as well as his radio headset. All he kept with him was his pistol belt that had his 1911 pistol, extra pistol magazines, his knife, and his dump bag with the grenades on it. He needed to be light and agile if he was going to scramble up the side of the tank. It was a calculated risk.

Up ahead of them the tank driver threw one control level forward and the other backward to turn each of the two treads in opposite directions to spin the tank around to face the mercenaries.

“Hurry up,” Deckard yelled as he took off towards the tank. Once again, running away would have been futile and they would have been cut down by the machine guns. In this case, they needed to get back under the gunner's arc of fire. Closer was safer, relatively speaking.

The mercenaries sprinted up and followed Deckard as he dodged to the side of the tank and ran around the back again. Out in the middle of the street, the driver must have realized that he didn't have any obstacles to run up against and knock of any sappers crawling up the side of his hull. Throwing the tank in reverse, Deckard was nearly impaled by the ripper but managed to climb up on top of it again.

Frantic screams beside him made it clear that one of the mercenaries had not gotten out of the way in time. Deckard reached out and grabbed the Kazakh's hand as his eyes went wild. He was trapped under the treads and was being crushed. His hand was violently ripped from Deckard's as he was crushed to death. As the tank tread rolled over the mercenary it had the effect of rolling a tube of toothpaste from the bottom up to the top. Deckard looked away as the mercenary burst in a tide of blood and gore. He braced himself against the armor plating, he was dizzy and about to vomit.

The tank was backing up into a brick wall and if he didn't move fast, Deckard knew he would be crushed as well. He hopped back up and found purchase on the lip of the armor plating, then reached up with his free hand and grabbed the ledge at the top of the tower. Executing a pull up, Deckard climbed up on top of the tank.

Reaching into his dump pouch, he palmed one of the thick cylindrical hand grenades. Pulling the pin, he lay down on his stomach and looked down over the front end of the tank where the port hole was. He could feel the heat through his uniform and gloves. Without hesitating a second longer, he plunged his hand through the port hole and dropped the grenade.

Panicked shouts came from within the metal beast.

Hanging off the edge of the tower, Deckard pushed off and was airborne for what seemed like forever before he hit the ground and stumbled down to his knees. Knowing there was probably only a second or so left on the grenade's time delay fuse, he threw himself to the ground and covered his head with his arms

The formal name of the
thermo-baric grenade
was the Anti-Structure Hand Grenade. Thermo-baric, meaning heat plus pressure made for a longer blast duration than conventional hand grenades as well as increased thermal output. The PBXN-109 inside the grenade created enough heat and pressure to collapse a building's walls, collapse an underground tunnel, or drop the top of a cave on top of pesky Taliban insurgents.

When the grenade went off it performed as advertised. Rather than some big fiery explosion, the thermo-baric grenade collapsed the tower built on top of the bulldozer by creating a short burst of over pressure. One of the side panels crashed to the ground causing the roof to cave in. Deckard got to his feet and dusted himself off as the tank came to a halt. Whoever was inside had been pulped and would have to be soaked up in a sponge if someone wanted to attempt a funeral.

The mercenary commander turned and walked away.

“Now we have two dead,” Deckard said to the remaining mercenaries unemotionally. “One we can do nothing about and the other has live ordinance lodged inside him. Hide the body inside that warehouse that the tank drove through. We can't risk transporting him and having that RPG rocket go off.”

“Yes sir,” one of the Corporals confirmed.

“If I die,” Deckard added. “Make sure you come back and recover the body.”

38

“Backblast area clear,” the Carl Gustav Assistant Gunner screamed above the sound of the firefight. When the Samruk ground convoy rolled up to the enemy stronghold they immediately began receiving effective fire. They would be pushed off the objective area entirely if the mercenaries didn't act fast.

The Goose gunner sighted in using the M10 scope attached to the recoilless rifle's v-slide lock mount. When he squeezed the trigger, the over pressure was so great it felt like he was underwater for a moment. The
flechette
round cleared off an entire section of the high walls of cartel gunmen. They had taken up positions on the walls to repel the mercenaries but the anti-personnel
flechette
round made mincemeat of them.

“Cock safe,” the gunner yelled while cocking the weapon. The Assistant Gunner popped open the venturi at the end of the Goose, yanked out the expended shell casing and slammed home a fresh 84mm round.

“Backblast area clear,” the AG yelled above the gunfire around them as he slammed the venturi shut.

The gunner aimed at a different section of the wall and let the
flechette
round go. A pink mist hung in the air as an entire row of gunmen went down under the metal shrapnel he had fired.

“Get the ladders up,” Sergeant Major Korgan ordered his men.

With PKM machine guns from the assault trucks offering suppressive fire against any enemy left up on the walls, the assaulters surged forward from behind their vehicles and ran to the walls with their homemade wooden ladders.

The former convent had been converted into a cultural museum by the government of Oaxaca before Jimenez had taken it over. The walled compound and stone cloistered buildings inside provided fortification to the defenders. Whether or not it was impregnable remained to be seen.

The ladders went up and like medieval crusaders the mercenaries began scaling the walls.

Meanwhile, the Goose gunner lowered his recoilless rifle. They were out of the game for the time being with friendlies having moved into their field of fire. The Samruk mercenaries got to the top of their ladders and climbed up onto the roof where the firefight picked up intensity all over again.

The chatter of PKMs sounded alongside the
chunk-chunk-chunk
sound of the enemy's M240B machine guns. AK-103s popped off intermittently with sharper sounded M-4 carbines firing the smaller 5.56 round mixed in between. The sounds of death permeated across the entire city as civilians scurried indoors as fast as humanly possible.

“What's going on here,” someone said from behind the Carl Gustav team. Turning, the two Kazakh mercenaries saw their commander arriving with seven other Samruk shooters. They were covered in sweat, some of them covered in blood as well.

“They just went up the walls,” the Goose gunner yelled. “Sergeant Major Korgan is leading them.”

Deckard nodded. He knew his man and he would be leading from the front.

His chest heaved under his plate carrier and his uniform was completely soaked through with sweat. They had run about ten blocks from where they had killed the improvised tank to the objective. With their truck demolished they had little choice. They also had to shoot their way through a check point in the middle of the street manned by cartel gunmen. Jimenez had planned his defense in depth with layers or concentric rings of obstacles and fighting positions arrayed around his compound.

“Six, are you out there yet,” Pat's voice came over Deckard's radio headset.

“We just got here,” Deckard answered, panting between the words.

“We've got wounded up here. They had fighting positions prepared for us and we are getting pinned down.”

“Where is Shooter-One?”

“He is up here with us.”

“Tell him to make his way back down and find a flanking position on an adjacent building. Maybe he can give you some breathing room to maneuver.”

An RPG rocket whistled over the top of the convent and zoomed off into the city.

“I'm going to take my element in from another direction and probe their defenses. If you can fix the enemy in place and keep them from withdrawing we should make it out of this. I need you and Korgan to hold out.”

“We will,” Pat said over the sound of gunfire.

Deckard knew he may have just handed his men a death sentence. It was a chance they had to take.

“Goose gunner,” he said. “What rounds do you have on you?”

“We have an HEDP round in our assault pack, the rest are on the truck.”

“Perfect. I want you to blow the gate.”

There was a small wrought iron gate that led into the compound. The mercenaries had wisely chosen the high road rather than the low one as they didn't want to get trapped in the cloistered courtyards with the enemy firing on them from the museum rooftops. Now, with the enemy distracted and fixated on Samruk's main force, Deckard would attempt a different method of entry and see if he could get behind the cartel gunmen. From there, they could launch a devastating assault against the soft underbelly of the cartel's defenses.

“Roger,” the Kazakh affirmed.

The AG loaded up the High Explosive Dual Purpose round and shut the venturi. He waved several of Deckard's teammates out of the way before declaring the backblast area clear. The gunner fired and the wrought iron gate blasted open on impact, jolted right off its hinges.

“Nice job. Load up some HEAT rounds,” he said referring to the Gustav's High Explosive Anti-Tank munition. “Just in case. I think you'd prefer that over a thermo-baric grenade if another tank shows up.”

Taking the lead, Deckard's AK-103 led the way as he jogged across the street and stepped over the remains of the metal gate. Moving through the doorway, he quickly ran through the thick stone entrance and out into the vaulted ceilings of the overhang that lined the near side of the courtyard.

The firefight was raging above them. Tracer fire could be seen in the daylight, zipping overhead with occasional RPG rockets crisscrossing the sky. Down on the ground level, Deckard saw several corpses belonging to cartel gunmen. M-4 rifles lay next to them as a pool of blood leaked from under the bodies and between the cracks in the cobblestone floor.