Stephen Hunter - The Master Sniper

“Fine,” the man said, “fine and fine again.” Then his excitement beached itself. “Uh. Didn’t see you was an officer. Uh, sir.”

“Forget it. No rules tonight, that’s the only rule.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Get the major and our stuff,” Leets told Roger, who’d already started.

The two groups of men filed by each other in the fading light of the flares. One of the drunken GI’s suddenly looked up at the three fellows passing him, and saw them grave-faced, a trifle solemn, grumpy with their automatic weapons. “Jesus,” he said, stunned at the vision, “you guys know where there’s a war or something?” But he got no answer.

As Leets climbed into the Ford staff car, he forced himself to check his Bulova. He didn’t want to but there were a lot of things he didn’t want to do that night that he knew he was going to have to do anyway, and the easiest of them all was to look at the watch.

It was almost ten.

It was almost eleven. Repp felt sluggish from his long wait in the cold rocks. During this time he had closed his mind down with his extraordinary self-control: he had willed out unpleasant thoughts, doubts, twinges of regret. He’d put his mind in a great dead cold place, letting it purify itself in the emptiness. He wasn’t exactly sure what happened in this trancelike state and he’d never spoken of it to others. He simply knew that such an exercise in will seemed to do him a great deal of good, to generate that icy, eerie calm that was the bedrock of the great shooting, the really fantastic shooting. It was something he’d learned in Russia.

But now it was time to bring himself up, out of the cold. He began with exercises, pedantic physical preparations. He rolled to his belly and entwined his fingers, clamping them behind his neck, elbows straining outward. Then, slowly, he lifted his torso from the ground, chin thrusting high on the strength of his stomach. He rocked, stretching, feeling the pain scald as the muscle tension rose; then, sweetly, he relaxed. Up, hold and relax: three sets, ten each. Then the shoulders and upper chest: this was difficult—he didn’t want to do a classic press-up because he didn’t want to deaden his touch by putting his weight on his palms. He’d therefore evolved an elbow press-up, planting them on the ground, gathering his fists before his eyes. Then he’d force the fists down, levering his body on the fulcrum of his elbows—a painful trick that soon had the girdle of muscles around his shoulders, chest and upper body singing. But he was hard on himself and pushed on, feeling at last the sweat break from his body and its warmth come bursting out his tunic collar.

He lay on his back and thrust his arms out above him; he twisted them, clockwise, then back, each as far as he could, forcing the bones another millimeter or more in their casings of gristle and meat. He could feel his forearms begin to throb as the blood pulsed through and enlarged his veins. He struggled against the pain, knowing it to be good for him. His hands he opened and closed rapidly, splaying them like claws until he felt them begin to burn and tremble.

Repp lay back, at last still. His body felt warm and loose. He knew it would build now in strength and that when his heart settled down it would be deadly calm. He stared up through the canopy of firs at the stars blinking coldly in the dead night. He stared hard at the blackness above him. It was impenetrable, mysterious, huge. Repp listened for forest sounds. He heard the hiss of the wind among the needles, forcing them to rub dryly against themselves. He felt it to be an extraordinary moment: he felt he’d actually become a part of the night, a force in it. A sensation of power unfolded in him like a spasm. He felt himself flooding with confidence. Nothing could stop him now. He envisioned the next few minutes. In the scope, the buildings would be cold and blank. Then, a moment of blur, of blitz almost, as the warmth from the door opening dissipated in the cool night air, molecules in the trillions swirling as they spread. A shape, shivering, iridescent, would tumble across the screen, almost like a one-celled creature, a germ, a bacillus, a phenomenon of biology. And another, and another, out they’d tumble, buzzing, swarming, throbbing in the inky-green color Vampir gave them, far away, and Repp would count… three, four, five… and with his thumb slip off the STG’s safety and begin tracking… thirteen, fourteen, fifteen… Vampir’s reticule was a black cross, a modified cross hair, and he’d hold it on the lead shape… twenty-four, twenty-five, twenty-six…

And then he’d fire.

The sound of an airplane rubbed the image from Repp’s eyes. He rolled over to his stomach and slithered up the rock to the rifle. He felt calm and purposeful, a force of will. He did not want to draw the rifle to him yet and have to hold the shooting position too long.

The airplane had faded.

He glanced at his watch.

It was almost midnight.

Plenty of time.

It was almost midnight. They’d been in the air nearly an hour now and Roger may have been more miserable in his life but he wasn’t sure when. In the first place, he was scared. He’d never been scared like this before because he’d never jumped into battle before. He was so scared it hurt to breathe.

Following close upon this terror, indeed making it keener, richer, was his bitterness. He was ferociously bitter. The war was over! That fact linked up with the other one: he was going into combat!

Next, working down his taxonomy of misfortune, he was uncomfortable. He squatted in the hull of the Mosquito, which was rocketing along at about 408 miles an hour but a Mosquito, a twin-engine fighter-bomber noted for speed and maneuverability, was a three-man kite, and Roger, after the pilot and Outhwaithe beside him in the bubble cockpit up top and Leets forward in the Perspex nose cone, was the fourth man. All they had for him was a crappy little seat, typical British junk, wedged into the tunnel between nose and cockpit, and he had to squat like some nigger shoeshine boy. He was also jammed with equipment which made the small space harder to bear, the parachute for one, a supremely ridiculous M-1 Thompson submachine gun, eleven pounds of gangster’s buddy, for another. Worst of all, the hatch, through which, sometime soon, they’d all take the Big Step, didn’t seem sealed too well and rattled around loosely just a foot away from him, cold air just crashing through. But then what didn’t rattle in this crate? It really was wood—plywood, glue and canvas, just like the Wright Brothers’ Dayton Flyer or a Spad. And just as cold. And it smelled of gas, and the engines, big enough to drive a fucking PT boat, were hung off the wings just outside the hull on either side, Rolls-Royce 1680’s, and they pulsated crazily, filling Roger’s young bones with dread. He had a headache and no aspirin. He felt a little sick and not too long ago he’d peered down the tunnel to Leets—it wasn’t far, six feet—and seen, over Leets’s hunched shoulder, white . White? Snow, you dope. Then he’d felt the plane banking and sinking, his stomach floating for just a second, and he’d realized they were in the Alps. They were knifing through the Alps.

Suddenly, Tony hung down and then was beside him, having descended from his perch in the bubble. He roughly butted young Rog aside as though he didn’t count for bloody much, and sprang the hatch. Cold night air rushed in, inflating under Roger’s coat. Goose pimples blossomed on his pale skin and he began to shake.

What’s going on? he wondered.

His nigger’s place in the aircraft wasn’t even equipped with an intercom jack. The three big shots must have been merrily chatting away all this time, and here he was in this dark tunnel in the guts of the plane, unable to see, not knowing what was going on, and suddenly this: hatch open, Outhwaithe checking his gear. Roger realized they must have found it. He felt Leets, who’d crawled down his tunnel, next to him. Leets gestured wildly. He seemed unhealthily excited. Roger felt numb, even tired, under his fear, disgust and chills.