"You're supposed to leave the mine in the bag," Milosz said, regretting it instantly. He simply couldn't help himself.
"I didn't know this was a common task test, motherfucker!" Gardener shouted back.
"It is just that I have investments now," he called back. "A reason to live. I plan to die as wealthy oil tycoon, not stinky-ass soldier with head blown off."
She ignored him and unrolled a copious amount of slack from the spool of firing wire. "How much do you think we need?"
"Thirty feet," Wilson said.
"Right." She unspooled thirty feet of slack and set the wire at her feet before jamming the mine into the bucket. Milosz smiled as he read the words FRONT TOWARD ENEMY. That always made him smile. Perhaps they should have had a tag at the end of their rifle: BULLET COMES OUT HERE. VERY FAST.
Using "hundred mile an hour" tape, the air force lady fixed the mine firmly in place and opened the detonator well.
The tracer fire abated just a little, and Milosz could hear voices through the ringing in his ears. The sound of a muffled footfall reached him. A lieutenant from the 82nd Airborne dived and slid across the floor to fetch up beside him.
"You Sergeant Milosz?" he asked at full volume.
"Not if you are from Immigration."
"What?"
"Sorry. Bad joke. Relieves tension of waiting for pointless death. Yes, yes, I am Milosz. You bring good news for me, yes? Otherwise, you will please to be fucking off backward out door through which you slid. Nice work, by the way."
"Thanks. I'm looking for you and a Master Sergeant Wilson and-"
"Present!" cried out Wilson.
"And T.S. Gardener."
"That's me," she yelled without stopping her work on the improvised mine. Milosz was beginning to worry about the punch she was trying to pack into those two buckets. Wilson had collected another three claymores from the militia troops scattered about the room.
"I'm Lieutenant Cleaves," the airborne man explained. "I got sent here by battalion. They need to confirm you met a couple of civilian contractors, a-" He checked a small piece of folded paper and frowned. "-a Mister Rhino A. Ross and a Ms. Julianne Balwyn."
"That's Lady Julianne," Milosz corrected as Wilson looked up and gave him a warning look. "Her family once had castle and everything. Not so much now, though. Why you ask?"
"We've had flash traffic from a classified source. Says they have some documents and need airlift immediately."
Milosz leaned around the corner of the cabinet and squeezed off a round. The tracer fire resumed, impacting against the marble wall above his head, steadily chewing through the masonry and showering him with stinging chips of hot rock. The small clutch of militiamen hiding over there scurried away to find better cover.
"Is this hippo man and lady saying they have documents or classified source?" asked Milosz.
Cleaves could only shake his head in confusion. "Sorry?"
"Does not matter? What for you need to speak to us?"
"Command needs to verify these people before it'll task airlift to get them out. The source says you can do that."
Milosz, Wilson, and Gardener had a whole conversation without saying a word. Milosz had no idea what was going on but had to assume that the smugglers had found whatever they needed and had somehow lucked into a way of getting out of the free-fire zone. It was infuriating that he didn't know for sure, but what was he to do? He just had to assume that if they could talk their way into an airlift, they could talk their way out at the other end, especially if they convinced this "source" to help out. He hoped that didn't mean a further dilution of his cut. And if it did mean he got his ass kicked, so what? Soon enough Fryderyck Milosz would be a wealthy former soldier whose only care was how to get the wealthy former Technical Sergeant Gardener to show him a good time.
"Yes," he said at last. "Tell battalion they should pick them up. These are good guys, this hippo and Jules lady. They saved my Polish ass from angry pirate asswits."
"Good to know," Cleaves said. "Do you, er, think I could get a little covering fire?"
Milosz and Wilson obliged, with a couple of the militia pukes throwing in for good measure as Cleaves exited the anteroom as quickly as he'd arrived.
"What the fuck was that about?" Wilson shouted.
"Ours is not to know, Master Sergeant. Ours is but to protect our investment in offshore oil field and not get fucking heads shot off like dopey militia unit inappropriately named Worthy."
Another surge in fire from the reading room had them fucking the marble floor and Gardener demanding to know how much ammunition the towelheads had, anyway. As Milosz watched, she gave herself a meter of slack; taking the plug from the detonator well of one of the claymores, she slid the blasting cap through and with great care screwed the plug back into place, arming the mine.
"Got 'em both," she said. "Would have been quicker with a satchel charge."
"This is the army, my friend," Wilson said. "We go with what we got; now give me one bucket. And give Fred the other one. You keep the firing devices."
She handed them over and allowed Wilson to connect the device, the "clacker," to the firing wire.
"You motherfuckers had better knock that shit off," Wilson shouted at the reading room.
The fire slackened momentarily. "Fuck you, George Bush!"
The Americans looked at each other in astonishment.
"Man," said Gardener. "Some people just cannot get their heads out of the past."
Milosz popped around the corner, sighted in on the loudmouth, and punched a single round through his forehead.
"Ha! Stupid nig nog!" Milosz shouted. "Second Amendment trumps First every time."
Wilson stared at him like he was insane.
Milosz shrugged. "For what purpose is that look, Wilson? I am forced to learn civics classes for citizenship but not to use knowledge learned for taunting pirate asswits?"
Wilson shook his head. "Let's just ram the corncob in the hole."
He turned to address all the shooters he had at his command.
"Sergeant Milosz and I are going to save your worthless asses in just a second with a display of ranger awesomeness that will make you pee in your fucking pants every time you remember it for the rest of your lives. But first you got to give us covering fire when I say go. That means hauling your sorry asses up off the ground and actually sending some joy downrange on the fucking enemy. It also means fixing bayonets right now and following us into there when I tell you. Are we clear?"
The ragged response forced him to yell.
"ARE WE CLEAR?"
That drew a louder roar, and Wilson raised his eyebrows at Milosz.
"Good enough, you think, Fred?"
"Soon to be finding out, Wilson. Shall we go?"
Wilson tossed him the heavy bucket loaded with high explosives and shrapnel as the other men in the anteroom clicked their fighting knives into place at the ends of their rifles. When Milosz caught the can and set himself to take off, Wilson yelled.
The unexpected savagery of the Americans' coordinated fire slammed a lid down on the jihadi defenses, giving the two rangers time to leap up and sprint for the door to the reading room.
"Fire in the hole!" Wilson shouted as he heaved his bucket through the door a fraction of a second before Milosz. The heavy improvised bombs arced up high into the air over the improvised palisade from which the jihadis were fighting. In the surreal silence that seemed to hum inside Milosz's head he distinctly heard Gardener give both clackers three squeezes.
Detonated by a small electric spark, the tightly packed C-4 of half a dozen claymores detonated over the heads of their enemy, unleashing a steel rain of more than four thousand ball bearings all traveling at 3,995 feet per second. The explosion was far louder than any other noise in the confined space of the library building, and the concussion was enough to knock Milosz to the floor, even shielded as he was by the thick walls of the reading room.