Jack Coughlin: Kill Zone

They named it Excalibur, after King Arthur’s magical sword, and it was more than strong enough to end any bad guy’s day.

Jeff counted down from five and whispered, “Go!” Tim pushed the blue barrel overboard and it hit the water with a loud splash. Twenty knots may not seem fast, but the twisting target rushed away from the boat, tumbling in the wake, already growing smaller. Kyle could not fire until all three were in the water. He heard the red one go over, watched it through the scope as it wiggled into the distance, and the final fifteen seconds seemed like an eternity before the yellow one splashed overboard. “You may fire in five seconds,” Jeff said, and did another countdown.

He looked for the yellow barrel, but already the water had snapped it out of the frame of the scope. It was just too close, and he lowered the magnification by fine-tuning the focus ring. As he brought it back into the picture, he punched the laser button once to lock onto the target and a second time to get the range. Exactly 547 meters. That alone was amazing, since he did not have to consult any written tables of mathematics nor wait for a second man, the spotter, to come up with the information. It was all right there in the scope, and the rifle was making its own adjustments. The laser locked on and talked to the GPS system, which had a brief chat with the gyrostabilizer, and it didn’t matter what the barrel did now as long as Kyle kept it in view. Excalibur automatically computed any changes and adjusted the firing solution. The barrel squirmed in the water and the rifle tracked it, numbers whirling in the scope.

“You may commence firing,” said Jeff. The scope gave a microsecond flash of a bright blue stripe down one edge that meant everything was ready. Kyle gently squeezed the trigger straight back, for to press it even slightly sideways could screw up a shot.

Excalibur barked a sharp, keening sound and the bullet smashed hot and hard into the yellow barrel, detonating the collected gasoline fumes inside like a small bomb. The container disintegrated in a loud explosion and pieces of shrapnel showered down, some almost reaching the Vagabond. Lady Pat was not going to be pleased about that.

Swanson was already looking for the red barrel that was somewhere on the other side of the ball of orange fire and gray smoke. Some movement contrasted with the ordinary motion of the water, and he found it out at 893 meters, about nine football fields behind the boat. This time he didn’t wait for the blue stripe, but just locked on the laser and squeezed the trigger. Another explosion shook the water to prove the hit, followed by a ball of fire and more smoke as he jacked in a fresh round.

Jeff was dancing a little jig off to the side. He had stolen a look at the money men and their wives at the rail, and they were pointing and talking excitedly. “They’re wetting their knickers up there,” he said. Tim Gladden held a pair of big binoculars to his eyes.

But when the smoke cleared, Kyle couldn’t see anything but water. The damned barrel seemed to have vanished, but he did not dare remove his eye from the scope. “I don’t see it, Kyle,” Gladden said.

Swanson slowly glassed the wake directly behind the boat and let the laser scan the surface, looking for something solid. The laser blinked momentarily when it found the steel surface of the bobbing barrel, and Kyle saw a little blue dot that was not much different from the color of the water, ducking and weaving behind low waves.

“There!” said Gladden. “About a thousand meters or so and off to the port side ten degrees.”

The laser measured and the computer did its thing. Exactly 966 meters. Tricky-ass shot. Follow the bouncing ball and trust the numbers. Swanson exhaled and took up slack on the trigger and the blue stripe flashed in the scope. Squeeeeze. Excalibur barked in triumph and he could see the disturbed air trailing the bullet, which ate up the distance in an instant. This time everyone saw the fireball detonate before the sound of the explosion reached the boat.

“Yes!” cheered Tim. “My, what a fine shot!” It was as high a compliment as could be expected from another warrior.

“Beautiful,” said a relieved Jeff. “You got them all.”

Swanson lowered the rifle to a little stand beside the mat and realized that he was drenched in sweat. “Boys,” he pronounced, “this puppy works.”

His part of the demonstration was done. Now he and Shari could totally relax for the next ten days. Tim would run things for the next few days while Jeff wrung cash from the impressed investors. The rest of the cruise would be a treat, with opportunities to sample the local wines, food and grapes and cheese, and fire-breathing ouzo in places like Piraeus, Monemvasia, and Mykonos. The two of them planned to spend a few days alone in Venice, walk over the Bridge of Sighs, visit the Doge’s Palace, slip through the canals in one of those big canoes called gondolas, and dance in the moonlight on the wet stones of St. Mark’s Square. Time for fun.

TWO MERCENARIES RESTEDtheir elbows in pockets of loose sand and held large binoculars steady as they watched the oncoming Thursday morning traffic. Only their hands and heads, covered by desert-brown camouflage, were visible above a small hill crowned by scrub brush about ten meters from the highway between Riyadh and Dhahran in Saudi Arabia. AK-47 assault rifles were strapped across their backs and rocket-propelled grenade launchers were at their sides. Between them, a radio transmitter lay sealed in a plastic bag that protected it from sand. Everything was in place for the snatch-and-pull ambush.

They had worked through the night, digging into the gravel beside the highway. By dawn, passing vehicles had whipped up enough dirt and debris to erase almost all traces of their work. The only evidence that a bomb had been planted was a needle-thin wire antenna that stuck up six inches above the dirt.

The night had ended suddenly, and the brilliant summer sun rising behind them punished the eyes of oncoming drivers. It was hot, already in the low nineties, and sweat trickled down their faces, but they would not lower their binoculars.

“Gettin’ hot, Vic,” observed former U.S. Army Ranger Jim Collins. He stood six feet tall but was the smaller of the two.

“No shit, Jimbo? Hot in Saudi Arabia? You’re fuckin’ brilliant.” Victor Logan’s rumbling voice was more like a low growl. The former chief petty officer in the U.S. Navy SEALs never let Collins forget who was in charge of this Shark Team.

“Just sayin’,” Collins replied, then shut his mouth and thought about the money instead. They were getting fifty thousand dollars each for this job. He wanted to talk about what he planned to do with the cash. Definitely a new truck. When they got back to the house, he would log onto eBay Motors and shop for a while.

Vic Logan and Jimbo Collins were part of an elite group of hand-picked former special ops warriors who were used only for high-risk, off-the-books jobs by a multinational private security company. Logan grinned. If we’re Sharks, then I’m a Great White and this dumbass is a fucking Hammerhead.

The big American was pissed at everyone, including himself. He had been less than six months from retirement, with twenty years in the navy, when his career went down the toilet. The body of a badly beaten young prostitute was discovered in an alley in Naples, and the shore patrol found him passed out a block away, drunk as a skunk. Since the only witness was dead and no evidence tied him to the girl, the cops had to cut him free, but Vic Logan was through as a SEAL. They had kicked him off the teams so fast it had made his head spin. And I hadn’t done anything all that wrong! There was not enough evidence for a court-martial, but some sea lawyers picked through his records and found enough dirty laundry for fighting, drunkenness, assault on an officer, and suspicions concerning another dead whore in Olongapo, that dirtbag town right outside of Subic Bay, to lay an Administrative Separation hearing on his ass. The AdSep ruled Logan to be morally unfit for service, which was the navy’s chickenshit way to get rid of him. It took everything-rank, loss of pay, benefits, and retirement-and he was told to consider himself lucky that there was no jail time and no federal conviction.