Target Acquisition

Calvin James spun, bringing up the SPAS-15.

The combat shotgun boomed like a cannon in his hands and steel shot scythed through the CS-tinged air to strike two AKM-wielding figures. The Iraqi terrorists were thrown backward and spun apart, arms flying in the air, weapons tossed aside by the force of the blasts.

One of them tripped over a wastepaper basket and went down hard. The second bounced off a wall and tumbled into a chair. James moved between them, double checking as he went. The one on the floor was leaking red by the gallon from a chewed-up throat and torn-open chest. The second was missing enough of his face that the ex-SWAT officer could see his brains exposed.

There was a burst of rifle fire and the SPAS-15 was knocked from James’s hands. Heavy slugs slammed into the ceramic chest plates of his Kevlar body armor. He staggered backward and grunted. His shoulder hit the wall and he went to one knee. Reflexively his hands flew to his Beretta. As he drew the handgun David McCarter lunged past, the M-4 carbine up and locked into his shoulder, the muzzle erupting in a star pattern blast.

He saw the figure wearing an expensive black silk thobe at the last moment and pulled his shot. The 5.56 mm rounds struck the man in his legs and swept him to the floor of the building. Bright patches of blood splashed in scarlet blossom on the figure’s thighs.

Behind them the front of the building exploded as Tokaido’s Hellfire struck.

CHAPTER SIX

McCarter was thrown to his knees. He grunted with the impact as something heavy and wet struck him between the shoulder blades, then he looked down and saw a severed arm lying on the floor. He felt the heat of the raging blaze behind him.

He struggled to his feet.

“Talk to me, people!” Akira Tokaido shouted over the line. “Talk to me!”

McCarter didn’t answer but lunged forward. Abu Hafiza was screaming from his shattered thighs but was pulling a Jordanian JAWS pistol from out of his robes. McCarter slashed out with his M-4. His bayonet caught the man across the forearm, slicing a long ugly gash. The Iranian screamed again as he dropped the pistol.

Still on all fours McCarter scrambled forward, wielding the M-4 in one fist. The blade of the wicked M9 bayonet jabbed into the soft flesh of Abu Hafiza’s throat and pushed the man backward.

“Freeze!” McCarter snarled in Arabic. “Move one fucking millimeter and I’ll put your brains on the wall!” He lashed out with the bayonet again, lancing the tip into the meat of the Iranian’s shoulder and opening a small wound.

“Speak to me, Phoenix!” Tokaido hollered again.

“Manning up,” Gary Manning answered. “That was very danger close, my man,” the Canadian special forces veteran said.

“Pescado, is good,” Encizo said. “I’m knee deep in tango guts, but that blast blew the front off the building.”

“Copy that,” Tokaido said. “They had two platoon-size elements as reinforcements at the door. Forty, fifty guys all bunched up at the entrance.”

“McCarter up,” McCarter said. “But Cal took a round and I have our boy.” He paused. “If we’re clear, I need help.”

Instantly there was a reaction from behind him and the massive frame of Gary Manning appeared by his side as Encizo scrambled over to pull security near the prone Calvin James.

Encizo leaned in close, his eyes hunting for enemy motion from behind the lenses of his protective mask. “Speak to me,” he demanded. “You okay, bro?”

James turned his head and opened his eyes. He opened his mouth to speak but no sound came out. Encizo, ears still ringing from the Hellfire blast, shook his head to clear his hearing.

“Speak, bro!” the Cuban demanded.

James lifted his head and muscles along his neck stood out with the effort. His lips formed the words under his protective mask and his eyes bulged with his effort under the lens but no sound came out. Finally there was a rush of air through the blunt nose filter.

“That hurt!” he wheezed. “Jesus, that hurt. I think I cracked my ribs.”

“Is he good?” McCarter demanded over one shoulder. His weapon’s muzzle never wavered from Abu Hafiza’s face. “Is he good?”

Beside the Briton, Manning fired his M-60E in a short 4-round burst. A crawling Iraqi terrorist shuddered under the impact of the 7.62 mm slugs and lay still. Encizo turned toward the Phoenix Force leader and shouted back.

“Yeah, he just had the wind knocked out of him. Maybe bruised ribs, maybe cracked—we don’t know, but he’s ambulatory.”

“He’s also right goddamn here,” James snapped, sitting up. “He doesn’t need you talking about him as if he were incapable of speech.”

“Good,” McCarter replied, his voice echoing weirdly under the mask. “I got our boy but he needs patching up before we yank him back to Wonderland.” McCarter switched to his throat mike. “Akira, how we look out there?”

“You got vehicles coming up the street. You’ll have more bad guys on site very shortly. I’m still sitting on Hellfire number three.”

“Fine. Hit ’em at the gate and cause a further choke-point but save number four for my direction.”

“Understood.”

McCarter pulled back as James moved forward, medic kit in hand. Abu Hafiza looked at the black man with real hatred as the ex-SEAL ripped open the thobe and began to treat the Iranian’s wounds.

“Give him morphine,” McCarter said as he rose. “We’re going to have to carry him anyway with those leg wounds. It’ll keep him docile.”

“I’ll be the one to play doctor here,” James said.

“Fine, you’re the medic—what do you want to do?”

“Probably going to give him a heavy dose of morphine to keep him docile.”

“Whatever you think is best.” McCarter shook his head.

Encizo spoke up. “What about the son of a bitch Saheed el-Jaga?”

McCarter looked over at the Cuban combat swimmer. “You guys tag and bag him?”

“Yep,” Manning interrupted as he rose. “We got him against the wall.” The big Canadian began to move down the length of the room toward the blazing hole in the building, checking each of the downed bodies as he did so.

“We aren’t prepped to carry two deadweights out of here,” McCarter pointed out.

“What’s the penalty for treason?” Manning asked.

“Firing squad,” Encizo said, an ugly smile splitting his face.

James looked up from bandaging the glowering Abu Hafiza. “Where will we find volunteers?”

McCarter turned, lifted his M-4 to his shoulder and pulled the trigger. Across the stretch of floor broken by the rapidly thinning clouds of CS gas the corrupt Iraqi police officer Saheed el-Jaga caught the 3-round burst in the side of the head.

Blood gushed like water from a broken hydrant and the blue-gray scrambled eggs of his brains splashed across the floor with bone white chips of skull in the soupy mess. McCarter lowered his smoking M-4.

The ex-SAS commando leaned down close to the wounded Iranian. “Abu Hafiza, you see I’m a serious bastard now?”

The al Qaeda commander paled under the scrutiny of the coldblooded killer. His eyes shifted away from the death mask McCarter’s face had become. Then he jerked and winced as James unceremoniously gave him an intramuscular shot of morphine.

The black man smiled with ghastly intensity at the captured Iranian terror master. “Don’t worry,” he said. “If we shoot you, it’ll only be in the gut.”