Armed Resistance

“Let me be clear with you, bloke,” McCarter said. “There’s no room in our mission here for your personal vendettas. We appreciate the help, but if you plan on using us to seek vengeance on this Lester wanker you’d best just put the idea out of your mind. We’re here to do two things—find out what happened to the man you call Joe and shut down the weapons pipeline to the LRA from the States. That’s it.”

Kumar didn’t look offended but when he replied his voice took on an edge. “I intend only to help you, American. There is no reason to tell me what my duties are. But you should know that my people must first swear fealty to our own because they are defenseless and God demands we protect the innocent.”

This was something with which McCarter could empathize and he nodded in acknowledgment. They understood each other.

As soon as the group had changed into their fatigues and stored their gear, they set out single file. Encizo took point. They didn’t know what they would encounter and it wouldn’t do for Kumar, the only one who really knew where to go and was intimate with all sides of this fight, to buy the farm for that very reason. Hence, McCarter put Kumar between him and Encizo, and the remaining Phoenix Force warriors followed, each careful to put at least ten yards between each man.

A steady rain had begun to fall, only making more precarious their already treacherous journey through the mountainous jungle terrain that made up the border between South Sudan and Uganda. For each man to know where the one in front of him was, since the cloud cover had suppressed what little moonlight might have illuminated the trail, the Phoenix warriors wore small LEDs that clipped to the backs of the military webbing that held their side arms and canteens. A long-life watch battery powered the dim light that glowed in a suffused red, just enough for a follower to see but virtually undetectable from observers at the front or side of the team. Each man carried a spare in his pocket, as well, in the event that his primary gave out.

McCarter hoped they wouldn’t be there that long.

As they traveled, his keen senses staying attuned to their surroundings, the Briton began to wonder what they were walking into. He didn’t mistrust Kumar—hell, the chap seemed cooperative and decent enough—but he couldn’t figure how Bukatem, or anyone in the LRA, would have known Leighton worked for the CIA. Not unless somebody told Bukatem. McCarter hated to think Leighton might have been betrayed by this mysterious British agent, who was most likely attached to either SAS or MI6. McCarter didn’t want to believe a countryman would betray a fellow agent but he also knew the rules were much different in the world of espionage.

In either case, the mission had suddenly become more complex. McCarter didn’t like complicated; the Phoenix Force leader liked simple. In fact the bloodier simple it was, the better. Unfortunately it didn’t appear things were going to get simpler.

After more than three hours of traveling, the entire crew drenched and worn down, McCarter was about to call for them to stop and rest when the staccato of autofire resounded from somewhere ahead of their position. McCarter couldn’t be sure of the distance, since sounds were difficult to judge in the dense foliage of the jungle, not to mention the dark. The reports of weapons were especially deceptive because they bounced off obstacles like trees and boulders, and were suppressed by the canopy of intertwined branches overhead. These factors usually made them closer than they sounded.

McCarter signaled the others to form on Kumar’s position and then moved forward to converse with Encizo.

“How far ahead, you think?” he asked the Cuban.

“Maybe fifty yards,” Encizo replied. “Hard to tell.”

“That’s about what I figured.”

“Sounds like quite a firefight, too.”

“Stand fast,” McCarter ordered. Encizo nodded and the Briton returned to Kumar. “We anywhere near our rendezvous point?”

“Very near,” Kumar replied with an anxious nod.

“Okay, it sounds like your brother may have hit some trouble.”

“I would agree.”

“We’re going to help him but we’ll do it my way. Understood?”

Kumar mumbled something McCarter deemed as affirmation.

McCarter turned his attention to Hawkins and James. “You two swing around on the west side and see if you can flank the fire zone, but don’t engage until you get my signal.”

“And what’s that?” James asked.

McCarter grinned wickedly. “You’ll bloody well know it when you hear it. Go.”

The pair moved off and McCarter tugged Manning’s shoulder to indicate he should stick close to Kumar. “Give us ten seconds, then follow on our position. Make sure you keep your fields of fire away from Hawk and Cal.”

Manning nodded.

McCarter turned and moved back to Encizo’s side. He reached to his belt and held up one of the M-69 fragmentation grenades that had been procured for his team by Kumar’s contacts in Uganda. “We’ll go in using the Old Fifty-One. You ready?”

Encizo nodded his understanding of McCarter’s plan. The technique dated back to the Korean War, a reference to when Korean forces attacked U.N. command positions that were manned by numerically superior forces. Because the Koreans wanted to ensure success, they attacked the positions using gongs and cymbals so as to disorient the enemy. McCarter planned the same thing, only using something more conventional and spectacular.

They set off and traveled about the distance Encizo estimated before they saw the first evidence of the firefight in the form of muzzle-flashes. From what McCarter could observe, it looked like a small skirmish. It was still too dark to determine what lay ahead, friend or foe, but McCarter wasn’t planning to lob the grenade into the center of the fray with reckless abandon. His solution would prove more elegant.

McCarter waved his fist to indicate Manning and Kumar should hold position where they were at—about fifteen yards to the rear—before he yanked the pin and tossed the grenade toward the east, far outside the perimeter of the fire zone. Three seconds ticked off before the hand bomb exploded.

And with that, Phoenix Force moved in to engage the enemy—whoever it might be.

CHAPTER SIX

David McCarter had been right: as soon as Hawkins and James heard the grenade explode, they weren’t in any doubt the show had opened.

“Sounds like an Old Fifty-One,” Hawkins whispered as he put the MP-5 he carried into battery.

James did the same with his M-16 A-3 carbine and replied, “Tally ho.”

The pair stepped from the jungle brush behind which they were concealed and met the first enemy gunners head-on. James wondered a moment how they could tell the bad guys from Kumar’s people but then he remembered that the LRA generally wore uniforms since they considered themselves an organized military force, while the SPLA dressed in whatever rags they could acquire. The green dungaree-style fatigues worn by the four men they encountered, coupled with the nasty silhouettes of Kalashnikov variants, served as positive identification.

The LRA fighters were surprised and while they responded with incredible speed, it couldn’t match the battle-tested skills of the Phoenix Force veterans. James leveled his M-16 A-3 and triggered a short burst that lifted the nearest target off his feet and dumped him into the wet grass with a sloppy thump. The 5.56 mm rounds from James’s weapon ripped holes in the man’s chest. The second gunner tried to swing the muzzle of his weapon to bear, but James had angled away from his original position and triggered a burst on the run. These also found their mark, stitching a bloody pattern across the man’s midsection. His eyes widened with shock and he triggered an ineffective burst of his own reflexively before staggering forward and dropping his now useless weapon. James finished with a second volley that blew off the top of the terrorist’s head.

T. J. Hawkins dispatched his first opponent with the sweep of a muzzle in corkscrew fashion. The 9 mm rounds weren’t as high-velocity as those from James’s weapon but they were no less effective. The slugs drilled through the man’s body and dumped him face-first in the wet muck of the jungle floor. The remaining LRA terrorist managed to get a short burst off before Hawkins cut him down with a fusillade that left a near-perfect vertical pattern from crotch to throat. The man produced a gargled scream as blood erupted from his mouth, the 9 mm buzzers rupturing his lungs.

The men of Phoenix Force swung their weapons in every direction but no further threats appeared, and they finally relaxed a moment to catch their breaths from the encounter.

One lucky round had hit Hawkins in the forearm, taking a small chunk of flesh with it. Hawkins didn’t immediately notice. It wasn’t until James pointed it out that the area began to burn like a dog bite. Calvin James, who doubled as the team medic, immediately whipped a medi-pouch from the small supply bag he carried, ripped the top away with his teeth and slapped it on the wound.

“Ouch! Shit, Cal, take it easy there,” Hawkins snapped.

“Don’t be a sissy,” James said as he wrapped the pouch with the attached elastic bandage and tied it off with a hasty knot.

“I thought you medical people were supposed to have some compassion.”

“Compassion won’t keep you from bleeding out.”

“Dandy of you to point that out,” Hawkins replied drolly.

THE REVERBERATIONS from the explosion had barely subsided when McCarter and Encizo burst through the underbrush and engaged the enemy.

The first LRA fighter, identifiable by the fatigues and gold epaulettes, was still preoccupied with the spectacular light show in the distance. That hesitation cost him his life as he detected Encizo’s approach much too late to respond effectively. The Cuban leveled his MP-5 sub-gun and triggered a short controlled burst that ripped through the man’s guts and spun him into a tree. He smacked the trunk head-on and fell stiffly onto his back.

McCarter took the next two with a weapon he’d not utilized in some years, an Ingram M-10 machine pistol. While no longer as popular as it had once been, the Ingram suited McCarter in a close-quarters situation due to its accuracy at shorter ranges and its stopping power. The weapon stuttered, McCarter holding it tight and low as it spit death at a rate of nearly 1200 rounds per minute. Of course, McCarter didn’t need nearly that many since the .45 ACP slugs, one of the two native calibers for the M-10, proved more than effective.

The first LRA terrorist caught a 4-round burst dead-center, the slugs blowing golf-ball-size holes out his back. The second took two rounds to the pelvis, which left smashed bone and cartilage in their wake. The man screamed and dropped his weapon, the scream cut short by two more rounds that entered below his jaw at an angle and blew off the top of his skull, generating a grisly spray of blood and gray matter.

McCarter and Encizo pressed forward even before the last body hit the ground. A couple of rounds buzzed over their heads but it sounded as if most of the fighting had abated. The warriors pushed through more brush and entered a clearing where they spotted eight men, three of them on the ground motionless and a fourth cradled in the arms of another. Blood dribbled from the man’s mouth, visible only because another man had a flashlight on him.

The remaining men gathered around the pair turned toward McCarter and Encizo, raising their weapons in preparation to engage. McCarter heard a shout a heartbeat before something brushed past his arm. He looked to see Kumar throw himself in front of the Phoenix Force warriors and raise his hands.