George Martin - Busted flush

"What we're doing is about people," Kate said. "That's what matters. Half the world is suffering because of the embargo. That's the reason we're here." Then, a laugh that made him grin. "That sounded like John, didn't it?"

"All you need is a scarab beetle in your forehead."

There was silence, and he worried for a moment that she'd taken offense. "Sorry," her faint voice responded at last. A squawk of static cut off most of what she said afterward. "… watch yourself, especially. And see you soon back home, okay?"

"Right," he told her. "Soon."

"How's Curveball and the others?" Rusty asked.

"It's good," Michael told him. "Everything's good."

The rest of the day was uneventful. Michael and Rusty toured the wellheads that their team had secured; all seemed well. The evening subsided into semi-boring routine as the workers arrived from Baghdad International: derrick workers whose job it was to get the oil flowing again. The feeds they received from the news channels were full of praise for the work of the teams. Fortune sent word through Barbara that the aces would be brought out within the week-there was more need of the Committee elsewhere with this operation going so smoothly.

The next day, Michael and Rusty, along with two blue helmets-Lieutenant Bedeau and Marlon, another French soldier-decided to sweep through the refinery area to the south of the Administration Building, where crews were scheduled to begin work. Tomorrow, Michael and the others would be heading somewhere else, landing in some other desert wellhead.

They walked along a large open area set in the middle of the cluttered refinery: weapons shouldered, their Kevlar vests unbuttoned against the day's broiling heat-Michael, against orders and his own nagging paranoia, was entirely bare-chested in the fierce sunlight. Marlon was snapping pictures with a digital camera; Bedeau was speaking into a satellite phone, reporting in to Colonel Saurrat's adjunct. "The refinery looks to be operable," Michael could hear Bedeau saying in French-accented English. "There's no-"

The voice cut off with a grunt. Michael glanced back. Bedeau had dropped the phone and was clutching his stomach with both hands, a look of surprise and shock on his face as blood poured through his fingers and bloomed on his uniform shirt. A strangled, wet cry came from his open mouth as his knees gave way and he crumpled. At the same moment, there was a familiar, chilling metallic chatter: small-arms fire. Something pinged from Rusty's body and whined away past Michael's left ear, leaving behind a burning line from his ear to his forehead. He could feel blood sliding hot down his cheek.

"Shit! Take cover!" Michael screamed. A four-foot-tall set of thick pipe sections was stacked a dozen feet away. Michael took two running steps and flung himself behind them. Marlon was trying to get his FAMAS up when a round took him in the biceps and spun him around; he managed to crawl behind the pipes with Michael, puffs of sand kicking up around him from bullets.

Rusty hadn't moved. He stood in the open, pointing to the north and a tangle of steel pipes laced between two buildings a hundred feet away.

"The fellas are over there," he said calmly. "I see six or seven of them."

"Great," Michael told him. "Now get the fuck down."

A trio of bullets struck Rusty's body and caromed away, leaving shiny scratches on his chest. He grunted. "I'm fine," Rusty said. "Let me try-"

A stream of orange fire and black smoke raced past well above them and slammed into the side of the main refinery building fifty feet behind. The concussion of the explosion was like a fist, the sound was deafening. Michael could feel the heat of the fire as debris rained down around them. A brick slammed into the sand a hand's breadth from Michael's right side, burying itself several inches deep. "RPG," Michael shouted to Rusty, wondering if any of them could hear anything over the lingering roar. He was trying to wrestle his own M-16 from his back. "That's why you have to get down, Rusty! Marlon? You okay?"

The man was cursing loudly in French, and blood stained the sleeve of his uniform. "Fuck," he said in English. "I think so, but the lieutenant, I think, is dead."

Rusty had stooped to grab Bedeau's body, then came lumbering behind the piping with the others. "How is he?" Michael asked, glancing at Bedeau's open-eyed stare and already knowing the answer. Rusty shook his head.

Michael felt his stomach turn over. He gulped acid.

They huddled behind the pipes. It was the only cover-they had been caught in a large swath of open ground, the nearest building the one now burning behind them: a good twenty running strides away and already a conflagration, vomiting black smoke and fire from the hole the RPG had punched in it. Rifle fire rang from the pipes like a Midwestern hailstorm. To their left and right there was nothing: just sandy ground for a hundred yards or more-a killing field if they tried to retreat.

Michael could hear more small-arms chatter to the north and to the east-separate firefights on the compound. Someone with a high, thin voice was shouting in Arabic near where Rusty had said their attackers were hidden. Through the din, Michael heard the dull k-WHUMP of another explosion somewhere in the distance, followed by the thrup-thrup-thrup of a chopper's rotors starting up. He hoped it was one of their people at the controls. Christ, it wouldn't take many of them to get us all.

Marlon was moaning as he ripped open his medical pack. Michael helped him apply the pressure bandage to his arm. "Can you still use that?" Michael asked him, gesturing at the soldier's weapon. Marlon nodded grimly. "Good. Look, it sounds like the others are dealing with their own problems right now. We can't just sit here and wait for someone to rescue us-and if our friends have another RPG and send it our way, we're dead. Rusty, you willing to take a few more hits? If we can see the muzzle flashes, Marlon and I can return fire and hopefully take a few of them out, and maybe then we can figure out a way to get the fuck out of here."

"Sure thing," Rusty said. He lumbered to his feet behind the pipes as Marlon and Michael moved to either end of the pipes. Gunfire popped and hissed; Michael could see the glint of fire from the muzzles-their attackers were settled in a snarled nest of piping and flow valves between two buildings; judging by the flashes, there seemed to be five or so separate people with guns. Twenty feet over their attackers, a heavy pipeline bridged the structures. Michael heard the chatter of Marlon's gun and he pressed the trigger on his own weapon, the recoil slamming into his upper shoulders, his lower set of hands bracing himself on the pipes. The Arabic shouting returned, more alarmed this time, but Michael doubted they'd hit anyone. Michael saw a bloom of fire and smoke-"Rusty! Down!"-and another RPG arrowed toward them. Rusty stood there gaping as the round passed a bare few feet over his head before slamming into the burning building behind them with a new eruption of fire.

Rusty hit the ground belatedly with a grunt. He stared at Michael wide-eyed, his steam-shovel mouth open. "Yeah," Michael said. "I know. Cripes. We're lucky that bastard's a lousy shot, but we can't sit here waiting for him to get more practice."

Another bullet ricocheted from the pipes, the sound like a drumstick on the bell of a cymbal. The heat from the fire behind them was searing; Michael began to wonder what was going to kill them first.

"They be amateurs, these ones," Marlon spat in his broken English. "Professionals would now spread to come from different angles; but these-they stay all together." He made a quick sign of the cross. "This is good, yes? If they are well trained, we would be already like poor Bedeau."

"Yeah, there's some comfort," Michael told him. The gunfire had slowed to erratic single shots. Michael hoped that wasn't because they were taking Marlon's advice. The wind was whipping the choking smoke away from them, but flames were gushing from the ruined building and the heat was nearly unbearable-Michael was almost afraid to touch the pipes in front of him. The fire hissed loud and throatily and suddenly leapt thirty feet into the air as a gas line in the building ruptured. They all felt the fiery embrace of the inferno. "We really can't stay here. We gotta make our move. Rusty, you willing to take a chance on being a target again?"