Andrew Britton - The Exile

The four police officers were still searching the parked cars on the other side of the street. Clearly, they had decided that whoever had left the Blackwater vehicle had sought out the closest position of cover. It was the natural assumption to make, and Kealey had been counting on them to do just that. Now he approached unseen from the rear, but just as he was about to engage his first target, his earpiece came to life, jarring him out of the moment.

“Kealey, where the fuck are you?” It was Flores, and he was clearly panicked, the words coming out in an incomprehensible jumble of English and Spanish. “They’re right on top of us, and they’re armed to the fucking teeth. Estoy saliendo de aqui! Do you hear me? Si no puedo manejar en otra parte, yo saldre de este camion y-”

“Don’t move,” Kealey hissed. He was beside himself with rage, furious that the man had picked that crucial moment to distract him. “There’s nowhere to drive to, Flores, because the truck is blocked in, and if you get out of that vehicle right now, you’re a dead man. Do you understand me? They will kill you before your feet touch the ground, so don’t fucking move. ”

He didn’t hear the Honduran’s response, but he didn’t need to; it was just another barrage of scared threats and angry demands. Still, it was a distraction, and he yanked the Motorola receiver/transmitter out of his right ear. Lifting the rifle to his shoulder, he dismissed the idea of moving closer, deciding it would be better to use the parked cars as cover. Besides, he didn’t have time; the officers were already losing interest in the search, and one had stopped looking entirely. That particular officer was moving carefully toward the rear door on the driver’s side of the Land Cruiser. His weapon was at the ready, his body crouched below the bottom edge of the windows. He was doing his best to approach the Toyota unseen, and it seemed to be working; Kealey didn’t think that Flores had seen the man in his side mirror.

Kealey was just moving past a silver Ford Ikon, a delicatessen off to his right. Clearing the Ford’s front windshield, he stopped, straightened, and found his first target. The FNC wasn’t fitted with a telescopic sight, but at a distance of 20 feet, the iron sights were all he needed. The SAPS officer closest to the Land Cruiser was just putting his hand on the door handle when Kealey fired a three-round burst into the back of his head. As the man started to fall, Kealey swung the barrel smoothly to the left, picking out a second target. At the same time, he switched the FNC’s fire selector to single and squeezed the trigger.

Two rounds to the chest dropped the second police officer, who had just finished turning toward Kealey’s position. The third officer almost had time to get his weapon to his shoulder before Kealey’s first round entered the base of his throat, puncturing his trachea. He jerked the trigger of his R5 involuntarily, a dozen rounds tearing a jagged line in the concrete as he stumbled away. His left hand whipped up to the tiny hole in his throat, and as he backed into a Mercedes coupe, Kealey’s second round pierced his upper lip and blew out the back of his skull, showering the roof of the car with blood, fragments of bone, and brain tissue. The man spiraled to the ground. On the way down, his limp body tore the side mirror off the Mercedes. He landed on top of it, twitched once, and stopped moving.

Kealey was already moving for cover. The fourth police officer in the open had managed to dive over the trunk of a parked car and was now crouched behind the vehicle, firing in Kealey’s direction. It was panic fire, though, and it was aimed too high. With his back to the Ikon, Kealey could see the officer’s rounds punching into the front of the delicatessen, chipping the brick facade above the plate-glass windows. The angle, as well as the indiscriminate grouping of the shots, told Kealey that the man was probably firing over the hood of the car, which meant he had no idea where his rounds were going.

Taking the chance, Kealey spun to the right and stood, exposing his upper body. He snapped the FNC up to his shoulder, but it was just as he’d suspected. The fourth officer wasn’t visible, though his hands were. He was holding his R5 assault rifle over the hood of a red Fiesta, firing blindly across the street. Moving left, Kealey shifted his focus to the SAPS vehicles and saw that both drivers were still behind their respective wheels. Propping his elbows on the hood of an M-Class Mercedes, he sighted in on the driver of the lead SUV and prepared to fire.

Just as he acquired his target, the man flung open his door and started to climb out of the Land Rover. Since the steering wheel was on the right side, the officer was perfectly framed against his vehicle, and Kealey squeezed the trigger twice, both rounds striking the man in the center of his chest. A look of shock came over the driver’s face. He reached out to grab for the door, but his legs were already giving way. The police officer dropped to his knees, then fell face-first to the cement, his handgun clattering a few feet from his body. He did not move again.

The second Land Rover was already reversing, the light bar flashing blue on top of the vehicle. Kealey ignored the vehicle, though he caught a glimpse of the driver’s terrified face as the SUV hurtled past his position. Instead, he kept his sights fixed on the Ford Fiesta, which was parked 18 feet northwest of his position. The police officer crouched behind the vehicle had brought his weapon down, and Kealey could only assume he was reloading. Kealey had kept careful track of his own spent brass, and he knew that he had fired 23 of the 30 rounds in the FNC’s magazine, including the long burst he had fired to scatter the pedestrians. That left him with more than enough ammunition to finish the work he had started, as long as he used it carefully.

He was still waiting for the police officer behind the Fiesta to show himself when he spotted movement to his right. He turned to appraise the new threat and saw the driver’s side door on the Land Cruiser swing open. He swore under his breath as Flores climbed out of the vehicle, a Glock 19 in his right hand. The Honduran turned right and began edging carefully along the side of the truck, the Glock extended at arm’s length. His swarthy face was fixed in a strange expression, a combination of restrained fear and intense concentration.

Kealey watched the ex-Honduran soldier move with mounting rage and disbelief. He was tempted to shout out an order, to tell the man to get back into the vehicle, but some inner sense of self-preservation stopped him from doing so. He shot a glance at the Fiesta, but the police officer was still hidden from view. To Kealey’s left, the second Land Rover was still reversing at a high rate of speed, and he turned in time to see the driver attempt a desperate, near impossible turn. He was clearly trying to swing the SUV back into the alley, but he cut it far too short, and there was a loud bang as the rear end of the vehicle smashed into the corner of the residential building, tearing away part of the redbrick wall. The truck died instantly, and even at a distance Kealey could see the police officer struggling in vain to restart the engine.

It was an incredibly easy shot, more akin to murder than a fair exchange of gunfire, but Kealey hadn’t started this fight, and he wasn’t about to hesitate now. Standing up, he moved to the back of the Mercedes SUV and leaned around the corner. Bending his knees slightly, he braced his right shoulder against the Mercedes and fired a three-round burst into the front windshield of the incapacitated Land Rover. He saw the driver jerk in his seat, then slump to the right. It was clear that his rounds had hit their target, but he fired another short burst, anyway, just to be sure. As the echo died away, he heard Flores calling his name. He did not respond, not wanting to give away his position, although he realized his last shots had probably done just that. Instead, he continued moving around the back of the M-Class Mercedes, the retractable stock of his FNC tucked in tight to his right shoulder.