CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
“Coming back again.”
There were muffled groans and Ed, hunkered on the basement stairs, stared upward unseeingly at the stairwell ceiling. The drywall was bubbled and stained parchment yellow. He could hear the throbbing roar as the Kestrel swung around for another pass. The chopper was running low, he could tell that just from the sheer volume of noise. Really low, and slow. The whole house had rattled on the bird’s first pass and Ed’s hair was grey from the dust that drifted down from the deteriorating drywall.
The squad below him nervously fingered their weapons in the darkness. The basement had two narrow windows near the ceiling, but the lawn outside was so overgrown hardly any light reached the cracked panes.
“I hate this shit,” Jason heard Weasel say in the dim light. He could see a faint gleam from the skinny man’s eyes as they stared upward. The small basement echoed with the sound of coughing, shuffling feet, and the clink of metal on metal. It began to grow thick with the smell of unwashed bodies.
“Is this asshole flying between the houses?” Mark said loudly, as the roar of the helicopter once again began to shake the small bungalow.
“He’s trying to draw fire,” Quentin observed.
“I’d like to oblige him.”
The clattering rumble of the helicopter came closer, and closer, and then began to fade.
“That wasn’t as close,” George said from behind Ed, crouched halfway down the basement stairs.
“No,” Ed agreed. They waited in silence as the helicopter put distance between it and the small residence, then turned and came back for another pass. This time it was obvious to every man in the squad that the helicopter wasn’t coming as near.
“Moving away,” Ed breathed in relief. He sat on the top step and stared down at George and Quentin, half in shadow at the bottom of the stairs, as the helicopter made pass after pass.
“Anybody got a cigarette?” George asked over his shoulder. That got a lot of laughs. They hadn’t seen any tobacco in months.
Weasel shuffled into view at the bottom of the stairs. “Here.” He tossed something at George, who caught it reflexively, then stared in amazement at the pack of cigarettes in his hand.
“Where the fuck did you get these?”
“Spoils of war, my man,” Weasel said. He was more excited about the three boxes of 9mm NATO ammunition he’d found inside the IMP. The 150 rounds would be enough to fill five of his MP5 magazines. He’d still have about six empties, but it was better than nothing.
“You grab any steak or chocolate while you were shopping?” Mark asked him. He hadn’t smoked in years and wasn’t about to start. Food, on the other hand….
George extracted a cigarette from the pack and stuck it between his lips, then dug around in his pockets. He finally found a battered Zippo which reluctantly ignited after half a dozen flicks. He sucked down a lungful of smoke with gusto, held it in until his face started to turn red, then blew it forcefully toward the ceiling.
“Toss me one a them.” Early’s drawl floated up from the darkness. He replaced Weasel at the bottom of the stairs.
“You smoke?” Ed asked him. Early gestured at the cigarettes in George’s hand. George tossed him the pack.
Early hefted the pack. “This ain’t smokin’,” he said derisively. He pulled one out and held it up for them to see. “But unless somebody liberated some Churchills it’ll have to do. I’d kill for a Partagas or Arturo Fuente.” He jammed it between his thin lips and handed the pack back to George. Early’s Zippo looked like it had been driven over by a tank—twice—but the flame sprung up yellow and bright with just one gentle roll of the wheel. George gave Early’s lighter a dirty look.
Ed watched the two men blissfully suck down nicotine. “You know,” Ed told them, “those things’ll kill you.” A grin he couldn’t fight split George’s face, and he shook his head. The chuckling that rolled up out of the basement warmed Ed’s heart in a way he hadn’t felt in months, perhaps years.
“Echo Two-Eight, Hotel.”
“Go ahead Two-Eight.” The Major sounded resigned to having a bad day.
“We’re rolling up, Hotel.”
“Roger, keep your eyes open.”
“Echo, this is Lima Twelve, over.”
“Go ahead Twelve.”
Cornwell watched the small column through the armored window at his feet as it wound its way through the littered streets toward the smoking Growler and stationary APC. “It’s two blocks up and on your right. You’re aiming for the smoke. I’ve got no movement and nothing on thermal. You can take that for what it’s worth. Eleven and I are on station at five hundred. Over.”
“Roger Twelve. Vehicles in sight now.”
The Captain leading the column switched his radio over to the ground channel. “Two-Four and Two-Six, take the street to the east, Two-Five and -Seven, the one to the west. We’ll roll up slowly.”
“Roger Eight.”
“Roger, breaking off now.”
The Captain watched out the slowly opening rear hatch of the IMP he and ten of his men sat in as the first two Growlers behind him peeled off to the right. The next two turned left, each vehicle loaded with five soldiers and equipped with a pedestal-mounted heavy-caliber machine gun.
The IMP rolled sedately along, the trooper manning the belt-fed grenade launcher on the roof nervously scanning the houses to either side. The two pairs of Growlers roared up the parallel streets to either side in hopes of flushing out any potential ambushers.
The Captain watched the nervous faces of the young men crowded into the personnel carrier. Barely more than kids, most of them, looking to him for reassurance and guidance. Once, he’d have been able to give it to them. Now, he wasn’t so sure. The back hatch stopped, fully descended. The soldiers nearest the hatch raised their weapons and scanned the passing houses.
“Eight, this is Four. Got nothing.”
“Seven here. Nothing moving.”
The Captain stood and shuffled up the compartment to stand next to the driver. He peered out through one of the window blocks and saw they were about a hundred yards from the ambushed patrol’s IMP.
“All right,” he called out, turning back to his men. “I want two lines, either side of the street. Keep your intervals. I’m going to keep this thing rolling for a bit. You start taking fire get your ass back in here. Move.”
As his soldiers stood and began hopping off the tailgate of the slowly moving IMP, weapons up and scanning the nearby porches, the Captain got back on the radio. “Four, Seven, you stay on your streets, opposite the smoke, and sing out if you see anything. Five and Six, roll up the south end of this street and hold up about fifty yards out. Keep a man on the gun and one behind the wheel, I want everyone else checking for survivors and hostiles.”
“Roger that.”
“Let’s hope.”
The Captain smacked the leg of the roof gunner and the man looked down through the hatch, hands tight on the grenade launcher. “We start taking fire I want you to put rounds in every fucking house you can see. There’s fifty rounds in that can and it better be empty before you get off the trigger.”