The Genesis Plague - Michael Byrnes [5]
Jason stole a final glimpse of position one. The RPG-7 launch tube jutted out from the rock, this time with a mortar securely affixed to its tip. It was going to be close.
Ducking down, he tossed his rifle to the ground, covered his ears, and pressed his back against the mound. He watched the missiles stream in along sharp trajectories that laced the crystalline blue sky with two crisp lines of exhaust smoke - a fearsome sight.
Then Jason witnessed an equally remarkable sight: as the tandem missiles hissed overhead, the rocket launcher’s mortar sliced upward and glanced one of them - not hard enough to detonate the Hydra’s warhead, but enough to push it off its intended path.
The first Hydra slammed position one and threw a reverberating blast wave over the mound that made Jason’s teeth rattle. A rush of intense heat came right behind it.
A split second later, the second Hydra struck and the ground quaked even harder. The explosion echoed off the mountains.
Jason watched the chopper bank hard to avoid the wobbling mortar, which stayed airborne for five seconds before plummeting into an orchard of date trees and exploding in a tight orange fireball.
As he pulled his hands from his ringing ears, a tattered white turban covered in red splotches came fluttering down from the sky and landed at his feet. With it came the smell of burnt flesh.
Snatching up his rifle, Jason flipped the selector to burst. Then he scrambled down the slope, careful not to let his sandals slip on the gore blanketing the hillside. With the rifle high on his shoulder, he swept the muzzle side to side, waiting for any movement near the decimated rock pile. The smoke and dust made it impossible to see what was happening behind the second position, so he eased back, took cover behind a boulder, and waited. He scanned the area through his gun scope. No activity.
A westerly wind quickly thinned the smoke.
Down below, Camel broke cover and sprinted up the slope. Jason covered him with suppressive fire until he did a home-plate slide through the gravel and came to a stop at Jason’s feet.
‘Safe!’ Camel called out, grinning ear to ear like a school kid out for recess.
Some guys are born for this. Then Jason got a good look at Camel’s face. It appeared as if he’d stuck his head in a bucket of gore. ‘You all right?’
‘I’m fine. My camel’s fucked. Why the ceasefire on the second position?’
‘Fahim Al-Zahrani is with them.’
‘What?!‘ Camel’s brow crinkled, cracking the congealing camel blood like dry clay. ‘Can’t be. Intel said he’s in Afghanistan.’
‘Intel’s wrong. Wouldn’t be the first time.’
‘You sure about this?’
‘Show you the pictures later,’ he said, tapping his binoculars. ‘He’s the tall one in the middle. Remember, the Pentagon wants him alive. So try not to shoot him and we’ll get home a lot faster.’
Suddenly, Jam screamed over to Jason: ‘They’re heading uphill!’
Jason and Camel went storming out on opposite sides of the boulder with weapons drawn.
The black smoke was still thick enough to provide cover for the Arabs, but Jason was relieved to see Al-Zahrani’s awkward, tall form being pulled up the slope by a pair of cronies. The remaining two Arabs trailed behind them, hauling a second polyethylene case.
As Jason and Camel closed in behind them, Meat broke cover to pull up the rear.
Then Jam popped out from the gulch and began sprinting along the ridge in a perpendicular intercept. He had his now-useless AK-74 clutched menacingly in his right hand, knowing the best he could do was intimidate the Arabs, maybe slow their advance.
The dragnet was closing.
When Jason broke through the smoke, he saw that the Arabs had decided against the crevasse and were instead heading for a sizable opening in the cliff face that looked like a cave. Judging by the flames licking the rocky outcropping above the opening and the fresh scars above it where an entire section of the mountain had sheared away and tumbled down the slope, Jason figured that it had been the impact point for the deflected Hydra missile.
Once the Arabs had funnelled