Afghan Storm (Nick Woods Book 3) (12 page)

Chapter 35

The team
advanced toward him in a wedge formation, weapons up and on edge.

Nick heard
Marcus say, “Stay alert, guys. You see movement, or even if you think you do,
engage it.”

The team
kept ten yards between themselves and stayed focused on their sectors. Nick stood,
shoved the pistol and its long silencer into his gear, and knocked the dust
from his chest, knees, and elbows.

The heat
from the silencer was uncomfortably warm through his Afghan clothes. Nick
glanced behind him to see the littered trail of bodies.

The team
arrived, and Marcus studied Nick’s face. Nick stood upright and tried to look
more in control than he was, but Marcus noticed.

“You all
right, boss?” he asked. “You look a little pale.”

Nick didn’t
even argue.

“Not sure
that was one of my wisest moves ever,” Nick said. Had he really just gone after
nearly thirty men armed only with a pistol? Not many of his mentors would
approve of such stupidity, but he didn’t have time to reflect on it. What was
done was done, and he seriously needed to get control of himself. And keep his
men from worrying about him.

“Let’s go,”
he said, as he marched back toward the compound without looking back at his men
or the bodies.

They made it
back to the truck without taking any more fire. Back behind the compound wall,
they loaded back up as they had. Truck jumped in the driver’s seat of the
four-wheel-drive Toyota and handed his AK-47, which was technically Red’s, to
Nick in the passenger's seat. Nick kept the silenced Glock .45 stuffed in his
web gear in case he needed to silently dispatch anyone, and accepted the AK
from Truck. He placed it barrel down between his knees and performed a brass
check. He then removed the mag and confirmed by its weight that it was crammed
full.

A screech of
metal-on-metal told him Red was ready, having plunked the RPK machine gun’s
bipod legs on the roof of the cab. Nick glanced behind him to make sure Marcus
was loaded and saw the muscle-bound, prior drill instructor tending to Ahmud
al-Habshi.

Truck looked
at Nick and asked, “Lights or no lights?”

“Let’s go no
lights, at least down the hill,” Nick said. “Might be that some of those
assholes are still alive.”

Truck eased
the 4x4 off the wall.

“Nice park
job,” he said, trying to bring some levity to the situation.

Nick didn’t
know what to say and said nothing. His hands still shook and he gripped the AK
to keep it from being obvious.

Truck
drove
toward the gate. Visibility should have been still roughly thirty yards, but
their eyesight had been shot by the flares and bright muzzle flashes of their
own weapons. Bottom line, they could barely see, so they wouldn’t be going
anywhere in a hurry.

Truck
kept his
foot on the brake, and the truck crept forward at less than five miles per
hour. No sounds could be heard, but Nick didn’t trust his ears, which still
rang from all the firing. He finally remembered the NVGs hanging from his neck.

As the
Toyota continued around the corner of the compound’s gate, Nick pulled the NVGs
up and searched the terrain below them. Through the green shades, he could see
approximately one hundred yards down the hill.

“Hold up a
sec,” he said.

He scanned
from left to right and back across the front, slowly checking pieces of cover
and depressions. Nick saw nothing. Perhaps everyone that was available to
attack had rushed the compound and been killed or seriously injured in the
action.

“I think
it’s safe to flip the lights on,” he said, pulling the NVGs back down.

“You won’t
have to tell me twice,” Truck replied. “I’m ready to get the hell out of here.”

He flipped
the lights on and guided the vehicle into a rough truck path that curved its
way down the hill. As they descended down the steep hill, the truck bounced
side-to-side, and he navigated the rough spots with care.

Nick checked
his watch. It read 0448.

“We gonna
make it back to the border before dawn?” Truck asked.

Just as he
said it, the right tire slammed into a hole on the right side, slinging Nick to
his right and into the door.

“It’ll be
close,” he said, as he recovered. “Depends on what the road is like below in
the valley.”

Chapter 36

But their escape via the
road below was soon forgotten as the Toyota’s
headlights revealed a worsening driveway directly ahead. They had not gotten
more than a hundred and fifty yards from the compound’s entrance when the trail
suddenly went from rough yet passable to something more like a location sought
out by professional 4x4 enthusiasts.

“Damn it,”
Nick growled, glancing down at his watch again and looking up at the sky for
signs of dawn around the corner.

“Nothing to
do but try it,” Truck said.

The path had
two deep channels for vehicle tires, but rain and lack of maintenance through
the years had washed out the ruts to dangerously deep levels. The severe
grooves were made more treacherous by the higher ridge between them that hadn’t
been worn by heavy, spinning tires or rushing water racing down the hill.

Avoiding the
driveway wasn’t an option as big boulders and basketball-sized rocks covered
what little ground there was on both sides of the trail. They were, after all,
on the finger -- or apex -- of the ridge heading down to the road below. Both
sides of the finger were steep enough to threaten to overturn the truck.

“Bring it,
bitches,” Red said from behind them, his voice ringing through the cab’s roof.
“Ain’t nothing on this mission been easy yet, so why start now?”

Marcus and Red shared a laugh,
while Nick stared at the terrain ahead and grabbed onto his seat a little
tighter. Nick ventured a look over at Truck as the Toyota’s axle caught
violently on the middle hump of dirt. The big man was in his zone focused
determinedly ahead. Nick would have guessed that based on Truck's overall body
language and his frequent, and seemingly casual, glance at the rearview mirror
-- most likely a habit of having years behind the wheel since the only thing
that could be seen out this particular back window was crotches -- that the man
was practically relaxed. The only wrench in that illusion was the telltale
flutter of a flexed jaw as he gritted his teeth.

Nick also would have
guessed that considering Truck’s set expression that he had completely blocked
out Red’s earlier remarks. But as the truck again snagged on the ground beneath
them, slinging them to the right, a hopping-skitter sound of tripod legs tapped
its way across the cab’s roof in an arc.

A look of irritation
flickered over Truck’s face as the big man reached his arm out the driver side
window, pounding his meaty hand on the cab’s roof, and barked at Red.

“Hey, Tiny! Take a chill
pill, will ya? And get my gun down off that damned roof! This ain’t gonna get
any prettier, and any scratches you put on her, I plan to take out on your
ass!”

Red complied, pulling the
RPK down with him, leaving Marcus standing over the cab, while he and the big
gun settled down into a lower position in the truck bed.

“Most
vehicles coming up the hill probably don’t have so much weight in them,” Truck said,
once they had rammed through another piece of ground.

“We do have
five men, four heavy packs, and quite a bit of computer equipment,” Nick said.

The truck’s
weight and downward momentum served them well, tearing through most of the snags
until suddenly the vehicle slammed into something in the middle that didn’t
give. Everyone was slung forward, and the packs and gear careened ahead with
impressive force.

“Ahh!”
Marcus yelled as packs hit him in the back of the knees and dropped him ass
over backwards. Nick had been looking out the window and banged his elbow and
head into the dash.

After that incident, with
both his buttocks and his pride a bit bruised, Marcus decided to join Red down
lower in the truck bed. Similarly, Nick decided from that point on that having
both hands pressed against the dash for support was not at all unmanly or
overly cautious. Hell, he thought, I’ve got these ruggedly handsome good looks
to protect, after all. Besides there ain’t nothing less manly than having to
eat mashed potatoes the rest of your life, because this one time a damned
dashboard kicked all your teeth down your throat.

Once
everyone stabilized and stopped cursing, Truck shifted the Toyota into reverse.

“I had been
worried about whether the truck would make it all the way to the border,” Nick
said, “but with how rough this driveway is, I’m now worried on whether it’ll
even make it down the hill.”

“No
kidding,” Truck said, attempting to coax the vehicle backward.

The
vehicle’s motor strained, but the ground was dry and its tires caught hold. Truck
backed them up about ten feet and rolled forward again. This time, he angled
the wheels left and caught just enough higher ground on the side of the ruts to
clear the obstacle before the truck slid back down into the grooves.

“Probably a
buried rock in there,” Nick said.

“Agreed,”
Truck said, his hands straining on the wheel. “And I don’t know why I’m even
bothering to try to drive. As deep as these ruts are, the truck is driving
itself.”

They picked
up speed again, returning to their pace of three miles per hour almost
instantly, the truck yanking and jerking and banging inside the deep trail
ruts. Nick wanted to punch his fist through the dash, he was so angry.

It was
frustrating to think that the truck was going so slow that they could have
matched its speed on foot. Not that he wanted to carry those damn heavy packs
again.

They
maintained this pace for thirty feet until their headlights revealed a massive
boulder in the right rut. It was just a tad smaller than a bathtub and extended
from the right bank through the right rut and into the middle groove. Moving
the truck left to avoid it wasn’t a possibility as a boulder the size of a
Volkswagen Beetle sat up on the left bank.

“Damn it,”
Truck said as he stopped the truck.

“Fucking
lazy-ass Taliban don’t know how to do a damn thing,” Red shouted. “All they do
is sleep all day and wouldn’t know what to do with a shovel if it was handed to
them.”

The boulder
in the rut wasn’t some smooth stone like you might find in a river. It was
jagged and hard edged. It looked as if it had destroyed many a good 4x4 tire.

Nick wished
there were four more feet of width on the top of either bank alongside the
boulders. That would provide just enough ground for them to flank it, but no
such luck. Both sides had steep cliffs that were sheer drops of more than
thirty feet. Erosion and time had not been kind to this finger coming off the
ridge. Probably in another year or two, the road would be completely washed
out, and they’d be hiking to the compound by foot or ATV.

“That rock
has a great chance of blowing a tire,” Truck said, stating the abundantly
obvious.

“We’ve got
no choice,” Nick said. “Let’s go. We’ll deal with the consequences afterward.”

Truck guided
the Toyota toward the obstacle and angled the wheels to the left. The tires
gripped the surface and pulled the truck up higher from the ruts, but the
Volkswagen to the left prevented further height away from the obstacle. As if
on cue, the right bumper collided with the bath-tub that jutted into the rut.

Even with
the lack of speed, the hit was hard, rocking the truck. The boulder hadn’t even
budged, but without question the bumper had.

“There’s no
way we can climb that if the bumper won’t even clear it,” Truck said.

“Don’t any
of these lazy fuckers ever fill in any of the roads here?” Red cursed again
from behind them.

Nick yanked
his door open and stepped out. He slung his rifle across his body and looked at
Red, “Jump down and help me pile some rocks in front of this. Marcus, you jog
down the hill a piece and see if it gets any better.”

Truck
backed the
Toyota up, and Nick and Red piled smaller rocks in front of the bathtub boulder
in the right rut. It wasn’t hard to do as rocks of all sizes lay about in
abundance.

“Why doesn’t
anyone open up a damn rock quarry over here?” Red asked.

“They’re too
busy building mosques and bombs to see the opportunity,” Nick said as he
dropped a particularly heavy rock in front of the obstacle.

“Wonder if
us repairing this driveway would qualify as giving aid and comfort to the
enemy?” Red asked.

“Probably,”
Nick said, wiping some sweat from his forehead. “But we’ve got to get al-Habshi
back, so we can find out where that bastard
Rasool
Deraz hides at. And once we do that, we’ll show them some real ‘aid and comfort
to the enemy.’”

“That might just make all the hell we’ve been through worth it,” Red
replied. “But as of right now, I’m leaning toward a transfer back down to
Mexico.”

Red groaned as he hefted a nearly eighty pound rock and stumbled toward
their growing pile. He dropped it, and it bounced once and smashed to a halt.

“S3 still have a bureau open in Mexico?” Red asked, panting. “I might
not mind seeing Isabella while I’m down there.”

“Easy,” Nick growled, as he added another rock on the pile. His voice
had carried more anger than he had meant.

Guys were supposed to be able to joke about ex’s. Why couldn’t he? It’s
just because she was the first after Anne, Nick told himself. He shook the
thought of her from his mind and selected an even larger rock to pick up.
Nothing like hard work to help you forget about a woman.

The two of them constructed a half-decent ramp of rocks leading up to
the jagged boulder, and Nick surveyed the work, deeming it acceptable.

He stepped out of the deep rut and waved Truck forward.

The Toyota’s motor groaned as its front right wheel searched for
traction among the pile of stones. The ramp shifted some but remained
remarkably stable. And with the aid of their makeshift ramp, the 4x4 fought its
way over the boulder and dropped off hard on the other side.

Marcus came jogging up and shook his head with disgust.

“It doesn’t get any better,” he reported to Nick. “If anything, it’s
worse. Lots of big rocks just like that one blocking the ruts on both sides all
the way down. And no way around them -- same as here.”

Nick wanted to break the AK over his knee. At the rate they were
progressing, they might as well apply for citizenship in Pakistan.

“We’re not going to make it back before dawn,” he muttered, glancing
down at his watch. “Which means we’re probably in for a lot more fighting.”

Nick scanned beyond Marcus’s shoulder down the rocky, shitty driveway. The
road did look worse, and the hill dropped down even steeper. It even looked
quite dangerous in places. And this is why you can’t count fully on drones and
satellite imagery, Nick grumbled to himself in anger. He knew he was thinking
like an old veteran who hated technology, but none of the men had expected the
driveway to be this difficult.

And partly it was an assumption, which truly pissed him off. They had
assumed that the Taliban regularly traversed it, so surely they could. Nick
reminded himself that to assume anything “makes an ‘ass’ out of ‘u’ and ‘me.’”

Even a single sniper pulling recon on the objective would have been able
to tell them they were wrong by watching just one truck wrestle to make its way
up the mountain.

“Marcus, you and Red empty
out your packs and run back up the hill. I’d say there’s some ammo we could
collect from those attackers outside the compound. Find what will fit our
weapons, and if there’s a bunch of 5.45 mm, go ahead and grab it all, plus one
or two of the best AK-74s you find.”

Nick and his team carried
the older style AK-47s, preferring a heavier bullet (7.62 x 39 mm) with more
punch, especially when distance was a concerning factor. Newer AKs fired a
smaller and lighter bullet (5.45 x 39 mm), quite similar to M-16s (5.56 x 45
mm).

Nick figured if there were five hundred to a thousand rounds of 5.45 mm
ammo up on the hill, it would be stupid to leave it and much better to grab a
couple newer AK-74s so that they could use it, as well.

For all Nick knew, his team could be headed toward an Alamo-like
situation, needing all the ammo they could find. And since they had the truck,
a little more weight and a couple extra weapons weren't a bad thing. Not a bad
thing at all.

As Marcus and Red jumped in the truck bed to dump their packs, Nick had
one other thought. “Oh. And Red, you might as well run back to the compound and
grab that RPG we saw if there are at least a couple rounds for it.”

“Will do,” Red said, with a wicked grin.

Nick nodded and moved down the hill to build more rock ramps. They’d get
down the hill eventually, one way or another.