Glad that he had exercised restraint, McPherson turned to the other two men. "Keep moving uphill till you're clear of the ridgeline. Jones is over there already. You have sixty seconds before I light up the Russians." Then, remembering the vulnerability of his position, he turned to Hogg. "I recommend you go with them."
Sorted out and ready, Hogg shook his head. "I'm staying here with you. Where's there a safe place?"
"Edinburgh, if you must know."
Angered that his NCO would joke at a time like this, Hogg snapped back, "Jesus, man! I'm serious."
McPherson was just as quick and equally adamant, "Well, so am 1."
For the first time, Hogg looked around. Even though he could not see everything in the darkness that engulfed them, it didn't take long for him to appreciate just how vulnerable this spot was. "Why in hell didn't you pick someplace farther back?"
Trying to keep track of where the Russians were at the same time he was dealing with his commanding officer, McPherson's answer was to the point. "Not enough wire."
Like most assault units a Special Operations team carries only that which is required to handle the assigned mission and unanticipated contingencies. This is especially true when the team will be expected to cover a lot of broken ground on foot. Although each team had brought two oversized shaped charges with them, the second was meant only as a backup. Each Tempest team had a dual means of detonating their charges. The primary means was a delayed fuse. The secondary was the manual blasting machine McPherson now held in his hand. This machine required a spool of wire in order to function, and only enough wire to prepare one charge for detonation from a safe distance had been included in the demo kit.
Unfortunately, the situation that McPherson faced when setting up his ambush had forced him to make compromises. In order to have the desired effect his captain wanted, he could not get around the necessity of setting off the two charges simultaneously. Since he had to wait until the Russians had entered the kill zone before executing the charges, he could not use the time fuses. When the distance between the two charges was added to this problem, McPherson had no choice but to gamble that his chosen spot, located at the very end of the wire he had on hand, would be good enough.
In an instant, Hogg realized this and started to reconsider his decision to stay where he was. He was in the midst of this deliberation when the sky off to the east of them was suddenly lit up with a brilliant flash. Without thinking, both men turned in the direction of the missile silo. Several seconds letter, a booming report rolled through the vale toward them. Even as this wave of sound hit, the eastern sky lit up again. This time, instead of a bright flash, a sheet of flames that put Hogg in mind of a freshly lit welder's torch shot straight up. "Well, the major's done his job," he said, feeling a sense of relief for the first time that night.
Though he had taken a moment to watch the spectacle in the distance, Sergeant McPherson quickly turned his attention to their immediate problem. "The bastards have stopped."
Without hesitation, Hogg scanned the vale below. He could see that the Russians pursuing them had come to a complete halt. Like McPherson, they were also watching the death of the missile they had been assigned to guard. Near the head of the loose formation, one of them looked up in the general direction that he assumed Hogg had taken, then back at the sky that was being lit as bright as day by the burning of the missile's propellant. With a wave of his arm and a shouted order, this individual signaled to the others that they were giving up their pursuit and heading back.
Without hesitation, Hogg gave the order: "Fire the charges."
The Scottish NCO, who had also been watching, hesitated. "But they're not fully in the kill zone."
Hogg turned on the sergeant and repeated his order. "Fire the charges, now!"
Dropping down, McPherson turned away, pushed himself up against the berm that separated him from the vale below, and gave the manual blasting machine a quick, violent twist.
Chapter 17
When he opened his eyes, Stanislaus Dombrowski was only vaguely aware of where he was. Unlike many of his companions, the Polish NCO was not the type who benefited from brief catnaps or a few stolen minutes of sleep. Once he shut his eyes and went down, he needed to stay down for four hours, minimum. Anything less than that only seemed to exacerbate his fatigue.
Slowly, Dombrowski struggled to rise up off the ground he had thrown himself onto scant hours ago. In the process of prying his eyes open, he noticed that it was considerably lighter. It must be day, he told himself as he finally managed to peer above the level of the fallen trees he had nestled in before drifting off. At first he could not see anything or anyone in the thick arctic fog that clung to the ground. Were it not for the sound of subdued voices piercing the chilly veil, the Pole could almost have convinced himself that there wasn't another living soul anywhere near at hand.
With a shake of his aching head. Dombrowski endeavored to collect himself. Lifting one hand to his chest, he instinctively groped about until he felt his FA MAS assault rifle. Since he could never rely on having enough time to properly wake, he always hung his weapon around his neck when he lay down to rest. That way, no matter what the circumstances were when roused, he'd at least have handy his primary means of defending himself.
Comforted that all seemed to be in order, Dombrowski cleared his throat, forcing up a mass of phlegm in the process. Leaning over, he spit the disgusting wad of mucus out as far as he could. He was still in the process of wiping a bit of drool from the corner of his mouth, when Ingelmann's voice cut through his early morning stupor.
"Ah, there you are. my friend." the cheerful Austrian called out.
"If it weren't for that quaint practice of yours, I'd have never found you."
Coughing and clearing his head, Dombrowski grunted. "Ingelmann, you're the only man in the Legion who gets lost going to the crapper."
Emerging from the thick, cold mist, Ingelmann groaned. "Now that happened only once, and only because there was a sandstorm brewing."
Looking up at his companion, the Pole saw that his fellow legionnaire was carefully balancing two steaming mess cups as he navigated the jumble of fallen trees and debris in which they had come to rest. "Twice," Dombrowski countered. "You somehow managed to do so twice."
When he reached his comrade, the Austrian offered one of the cups to him. "Oh, that," he replied dismissively after handing over the cup. "I was drunk."
Not in the mood to carry on this exchange, at least not until after he'd enjoyed some of the warm beverage that he had been handed, Dombrowski brought the cup up to his lips. After taking a sip, he looked down into the black, steaming liquid, then up at the smiling Ingelmann. "Where in the hell did you find this?"
The Austrian chuckled. "The American signal section had a whole pot of it brewing. They were guarding it like it was gold."
Quickly, Dombrowski took another sip, savoring the taste of genuine American Army coffee and relishing the feeling the warm fluid left in its wake. "My friend," he sighed as he closed his eyes and held the steaming cup with the same reverence that a priest would a chalice of sacrificial wine, "this is gold." Opening his eyes, he looked over at Ingelmann. "How did you manage to liberate it?"
The Austrian legionnaire pulled back the hood of his cold weather parka and tapped the unadorned front of his beret. "The Americans are suckers for souvenirs." Then, as if this comment triggered another thought, Ingelmann stuck his hand into a pocket of his parka. When he pulled it out, he was holding a foil packet, which he presented to Dombrowski.