Tom Clancy's Op-center Balance of Power - Tom Clancy [124]
When the dungeon door blew open, the Strikers found themselves behind what was left of a three hundred year old arras. The bottom of the tapestry had been torn off in the explosion and the top was still fluttering as they rushed through. The Strikers' orders were to disable opponents wherever possible and they were ready for the first wave of soldiers that came to investigate the blast. The Strikers' ski masks contained goggles and mouth filters which would protect them from the Orthochlorobenzylidene malononitrile grenades Privates DeVonne and Scott were carrying. The fast-acting agent caused burning eyes and retching. In an enclosed area like the palace rooms, the gas would disable an opponent for up to five minutes. Most people couldn't stand the effects for more than a minute or two and attempted to get to fresh air as quickly as possible. During the leapfrog approach, DeVonne and then Scott would take alternate tosses as necessary.
The first group of Spanish soldiers was swallowed in a huge yellow-and-black cottonball of gas. They dropped where they stood, some in the doorway and a few just inside the room. Anticipating that the Spaniards wouldn't fire blindly into the thick cloud, the Strikers moved boldly through the doorway and proceeded along the southside wall. The door to the Hall of the Halberdiers was straight ahead, on the same side.
Soldiers were rushing toward them, guns raised. Scott's partner. Private Pupshaw, crouched and fired ahead knee high. Two soldiers fell and the rest went racing to doorways for cover. While they scattered, Scott rolled a grenade down the hall. There was a three second delay and then the hallway filled with smoke. August and Private Honda leapfrogged ahead, followed by Private DeVonne and Corporal Prementine.
The Strikers were halfway to the Hall of the Halberdiers when August heard shouts inside along with gunfire. As soon as August and Honda were back in front of the team, the colonel held up a hand to halt their progress. He didn't know how many people were inside the chamber or why there was shooting, but Striker was going to have to neutralize the entire room before they entered. He raised three fingers, then two-indicating attack plan thirty-two-then pointed at Privates DeVonne and Scott with the other hand. He motioned them ahead, Scott to the near side of the door, DeVonne to the far side. As soon as they were in position, both rolled grenades into the Hall of the Halberdiers.
When he was helping to train NATO troops in Italy, August had described the effect of the OM gas as very much like pouring boiling water in an anthill. The targets went down where they stood and just squirmed. Here, as Striker moved from room to hall to room, the impression of moving through an anthill was especially strong.
August pointed back to Prementine and Pupshaw, who rejoined their partners on either side of the door. They heard coughing and vomiting inside. When no one came out, August and Honda went in. The two Strikers squatted low on either side of the door, weapons ready, and surveyed the room.
August wasn't quite prepared for the sight that greeted him: hundreds of bodies, mostly civilians and a few soldiers, writhing on the floor of the Hall of the Halberdiers. August knew that they wouldn't die. But his mind flashed to images of the Holocaust, to gas chambers from the Second World War, and he had a flash of guilt-one of Father Uxbridge's moral paradoxes.
He forced it aside. He had to. Once a tactical strike force set out, no member could afford to waver. The lives of the soldiers didn't depend upon a shared ideology. They did depend upon a shared commitment.
August motioned for Honda to go right around the mass of bodies. Still squatting, August went left. Both men stayed close to the wall. There were bullet knicks in the marble near the