Jim DeFelice - Cyclops One

Duke trailed along the south side of the road just a few yards behind the man who had the point. Their man had called from a point about a mile up the trail, near what passed for a highway here — right in the path of Indian troops pursuing a small band of Muslim guerrillas.

Poor bastard’s luck was holding.

He hadn’t called back yet, a bad sign. They had the building where he’d called from pinpointed about a quarter of a mile away. There was a village along the highway to the right; to the left the road switched back and forth like a snake, gradually making its way up a mountainside beyond. There were a few small houses in that direction; they’d check them after the building, then take stock before reconning the village.

Assuming the Indians and Pak guerrillas hadn’t started taking shots at them yet. The Osprey had let them off a quarter of a mile behind in a sloping field, then taken off. Duke had left one of his men and Fisher aboard to play cavalry if needed.

Duke came to the edge of the field behind the building. McIntyre had picked a good spot: It would have been easy to make a pickup here.

Poor dumb bastard. Just had horseshit luck.

“Let’s take a look,” he told his point man. But before they could approach the building, two figures dressed in dark brown clothes emerged from the opposite side of the field and ran toward the highway. Duke and his trooper ducked down, watching as the men — obviously guerrillas — checked the road and then crossed. Two others appeared from near the building, running up near the road and setting up a position there.

Trucks were coming down the road.

McIntyre fled in the direction of the helicopter, running toward the building he’d been in earlier. He got maybe a hundred yards before his lungs started giving out and he felt stitches in his side like knives. He stopped, then abruptly fell to his knees. Bright dots of red covered his knees; he stared at them, thinking for a moment that they were paint.

Then his stomach started to turn. He felt as if a fist had taken hold of his insides, punching upward. Vomit spewed from his mouth; for a minute, maybe more, he retched uncontrollably, only vaguely aware of his surroundings.

Deep instinct took hold of him then, made him wipe his mouth on his shoulder, forced him back to his feet. He left the idea — the absolute knowledge — that he was a murderer in the pool of puke and began walking toward the road. His legs shook; he was far past his limits of endurance. But the instinct that had picked him up would not let him stop. He walked to the stone wall, paralleling it for a short distance, tripping in the loose dirt and vegetation. Realizing that he could make better time on the road, he put his hand on the wall and went to hop over. He didn’t have the strength nor the balance; his legs landed awkwardly, but he managed to get both on the ground and, though stumbling, kept himself going.

Sounds were jumbled in his ears: vehicles — tanks, maybe — and gunfire. He walked a bit farther, maybe twenty feet, then realized something else was coming up the road from behind him. He climbed back over the stone wall and hunkered down, waiting for what seemed like an eternity. As he waited he realized he’d left the other gun behind at the wrecked shack; for a moment he actually considered running back to get it.

Instead he decided to try the phone again. He turned it on, waiting this time as the small screen flashed.

He thumbed the menu, selected, hit Send.

Nothing.

One of the guerrillas fired a bazookalike weapon at the lead truck as it rounded the corner. The missile plowed into the engine and exploded, but most if not all of the men in the back managed to get out before the fire really got going. In the meantime other troops surged up from behind, fanning out in pursuit of the guerrillas.

Duke’s communications specialist, who was maintaining contact with the Osprey and F/A-22Vs, slid over to the captain and told him that two Indian helicopters had been reported about twenty minutes away. They were being escorted by fighters. Meanwhile an armored vehicle was making its way up the road from the west; it would reach their position in another few minutes.

It was possible McIntyre was still in the industrial building, but if they were going to check it out, they were going to have to do it now.

“Tell the Osprey and the Velociraptors to stay close,” Duke told the como specialist. “As soon as we check that building, we’ll bug out.”

McIntyre stared at the phone. It was ringing.

It was ringing.

He pushed the Talk button and held it to his ear. “Yes?”

“McIntyre, our guys are looking for you,” said Brott. “Are you in the building?”

“No,” he said. “I–I’m up the road about a mile. There’s a house — Wait.”

He heard something coming behind him, something big.

“Something’s coming for me.”

“We’re tracking you down,” said Brott. “Keep talking. We’re very close to you. I have somebody who’s connecting with the ground people now. You’re looking for a guy named Duke.”

“You’re breaking up,” said McIntyre. “My battery is dying.”

“Leave the phone on. Just—”

Brott said something else, but it was garbled. The tank was close now, very close.

McIntyre threw himself down. The heavy stutter of the diesel shocked the ground. He concentrated all of his energy on wishing it away, wishing it past him. As the sound began to fade he turned his head up just enough to see that there were soldiers walking behind it.

One of them shouted.

McIntyre jerked up, drew the gun to his side, and began firing. The dozen or so soldiers in the road dropped down, unsure at first how large the enemy force was.

Timmy had his cursor zeroed in on the armored personnel carrier, waiting for a decision.

“What we doing, Bird One?” he asked Howe over the short-range radio, checking his speed and altitude.

“We’re hanging tight,” replied Howe. “They’re checking the building now. They want to see if he’s inside.”

A moment later Brott’s excited voice, filtered by static as it was relayed across the globe, broke into his helmet.

“There’s a tank — something — men firing at him. He’s a mile up from the building. He said there was a house.”

“I have a BMP,” Timmy said, referring to the infantry fighting vehicle leading the attack. Its turret and tracks made it look like a tank. “I’m going to take it out. Tell our guy to kiss dirt.”

Howe started talking to Brott, trying to get better details on the location. The Osprey chimed in, but Timmy was so intent on the target, the babble of voices didn’t register as one of the mini-bombs slid out from the belly. Guided by a GPS steering package, the bomb’s warhead struck within an inch and a half of the center of the BMP’s turret. Though the bomb weighed roughly half what an old Mark 82 did, the combination of its shaped high explosives and precision accuracy made it arguably as effective as a thousand-pound bomb, possibly even more.

In any event, such fine points were lost on the truck’s crew. The bomb blew through the thin armor skin as if it were the top of a tuna can, incinerating the men. Fragments from the shell of the personnel carrier flew into the squad of men who’d gathered behind it for protection, downing them all. Timmy had no idea of the casualty count; he just saw that he didn’t have a substantial target.

“Osprey, I see you,” he said, running over the road. He saw a lot of bodies down on the road, and a man running to the left. “Hot down there. Hold off!”