Ньют Гингрич - Collusion

Kim next started MUTT-TWO, which he drove remotely from its pallet.

“MUTT-TWO is armed with side-by-side, lightweight ASh-12.7 battle rifles. Favored by the Russians for urban combat. I bought the guns and ammunition from an arms dealer in Azerbaijan to make it appear this is a Russian attack.”

Garrett glanced around the clearing, searching for signs that would signal if someone else might have been there.

“Don’t worry,” Kim said. “I’ve had an employee watching this clearing nonstop since the drop.” He turned his computer screen so Garrett could see it and increased its magnification. Kim waved and one of the two figures next to MUTT-TWO could be seen on the screen waving.

“Smile,” he said.

It was dusk, and several bat hawks appeared chasing their dinners. “As you planned, we are about five miles from Gromyko’s compound. The ambush site is about a quarter mile north in the trees.”

“How’s the ground cover?” Garrett asked.

“Yes, we really couldn’t get a good feel for that from satellite imagery, but based on what we have been hiking through, I believe we’ll be okay. There are enough trees and bushes here to hide the MUTTS, but not so much foliage to obstruct their rounds or prevent them from moving. Actually, they’ll be able to move safer than you.”

“You better head back to the Range Rover,” Garrett said. “Just make certain you don’t get lost or bitten by a snake or shot without me there to rescue you.”

Kim said, “While you’re ambushing Gromyko, I’ll be controlling your teammates from the air-conditioned safety of my Range Rover miles away. In this scenario, who is more likely to need rescuing?”

General Gromyko had prepared his compound for a military assault. The razor wire fencing around it was buttressed with IEDs and monitored by motion detectors. Like all top Russian officials, he had stolen as much money as he could during his military service, and he had put his millions to good use hiring mercenaries and bribing the local warlord. His paid fighters lived in barracks near his main house, where he stayed with Boris Petrov, who had joined him in exile.

Garrett had easily identified the weak link in Gromyko’s defenses. There was only one road leading in and out of his well-patrolled compound. The ambush site that Garrett had chosen was where the one-lane road was edged on both sides by trees and bushes. Plenty of spots to hide.

Nine a.m. at the ambush site and the road remained empty. A half hour later, still no sign of Gromyko. At ten, Garrett began to wonder about the truthfulness of Kim’s paid informant—or had Gromyko simply gotten off to a late start or decided to postpone his trip? Garrett remained hidden in the tree line. He was sweating profusely under his heavy ghillie suit. He’d augmented his camouflage covering made of netting and loose strips of burlap colored to match the leaves, twigs, and ground around him with bits of branches. To pass the time, he watched a parade of ants inches from his face going to and from some food source, the workers returning to their nest with engorged bellies that they would regurgitate to feed those left behind.

At eleven, Kim spoke through Garrett’s earpiece. “Satellite shows caravan leaving compound. Looks like we’re finally a go.”

A ruby-red Toyota Tacoma 4x4 with a heavy machine gun bolted on its truck bed was the first of three vehicles. Next was the Maybach, covered with dust from the unpaved single-lane road, and finally a half-ton troop carrier with what Kim estimated from his satellite viewpoint was at least fifteen armed men.

Kim had positioned his MUTTs some seventy yards apart in the forest that edged the vehicles’ right side. It was important for Garrett, who was concealed on the road’s left side, not to leave his position, which was tagged on Kim’s computer screen, because the MUTTs would be firing across the road in his direction.

“Here we go,” Kim said through Garrett’s earpiece.

The cracking sound of MUTT-ONE’s machine gun caused birds to abandon the trees. Three of its rounds hit the Maybach two inches behind its front wheel. The impact shook the entire car. Three more rounds aimed at those entry holes knocked the sedan slightly sideways, disabling it.

MUTT-TWO’s machine guns sounded next, aimed at the troop carrier, causing the mercenaries aboard it to leap off onto the road. Some took cover behind the vehicle while others lay on the road in the knee-high grass that edged the one lane on both sides, providing twenty yards of clearing between the road and the forest. The fighter manning the U.S. military M2 machine gun on the Toyota’s bed began firing indiscriminately into the trees in the direction of MUTT-TWO. His shots became erratic when the Toyota’s driver suddenly began backing up, running the truck off the road next to the passenger side of the Maybach to shield it from the gunfire coming from the woods.

Kim zeroed in on the machine gunner and fired a burst of rounds from MUTT-ONE, killing him. Kim now concentrated his aim on the engines of the two still mobile trucks to prevent Gromyko from escaping in them. Neither the Toyota nor the troop carrier was armored, so their engines proved easy to destroy. Having disabled both, he unleashed MUTT-TWO’s twin guns at the troop carrier, riddling its cab and puncturing its rear gasoline tank. The mercenaries who had been clustered around it ran, anticipating a probable explosion.

“Stay in the car,” Petrov told Gromyko. He exited from the passenger side into the narrow space created between the Maybach and Toyota truck. Two mercenaries had unloaded crates from the Tacoma, which Petrov opened. Inside one was an assortment of Russian F1 and American MK2 hand grenades, purchased locally. He urged the two fighters nearest him to begin throwing them in the direction of fire. The second crate contained more lethal weaponry—RPO-A Shmel—disposable single-shot Russian-made rocket launchers. He grabbed one of the 93 mm–caliber tubes fitted with an RPO-Z incendiary warhead and fired it into the forest in the direction of MUTT-TWO. Unbeknownst to Petrov, Kim was in the process of moving both MUTTs. The fired warhead exploded, scorching the ground vegetation and downing three trees in a brilliant burst of yellow flames. But MUTT-TWO was untouched.

Petrov ordered his men to stop shooting, and for a moment, it was eerily silent along the road.

Having now been repositioned, MUTT-ONE unleashed a barrage of .50-caliber rounds at the Toyota truck, pockmarking its red exterior and shattering its glass.

A half-dozen mercenaries began running south up the road, abandoning the firefight. Others retreated to the grass on the left side of the road between the vehicles and the tree line where Garrett was hiding. He watched one fighter as he approached, seeking cover within a few feet of him. Garrett held his fire, not wishing to expose himself.

While the mercenaries were shooting into the forest from their hiding spots, Petrov remained upright, as if daring his enemy to kill him. He tossed aside the spent RPO-A Shmel and removed another one, which he shoulder-fired in the direction of MUTT-ONE to his left. Kim was already moving the motorized machine gun. Another thunderous explosion. Another fireball. More underbrush now in flames and trees toppled. More grenades thrown. It seemed impossible that any living being could survive the rocket blast.

Kim returned fire with MUTT-TWO stationed to Petrov’s right, aiming his guns at the pinned-down mercenaries near the abandoned troop carrier. One screamed in pain when wounded. Kim moved his aim toward the Toyota, sweeping it with rifle fire, killing the two fighters throwing grenades from either end of it, along with the Maybach’s driver, who had foolishly left the safety of the luxury sedan to help.