James Tarr - Dogsoldiers

But… if they did have to shoot, they’d lased all seven bridges and knew exactly how far away they were. The opposite side of the Cass Avenue bridge, directly south of them, was just two hundred yards away. The 3 rdAvenue bridge, farthest to the west, was a hair over five hundred yards. The furthest bridge was Beaubien, over seven hundred and fifty yards away. All their magazines were loaded with Black Hills’ specialty Mk 262 Mod 4 ammo, a 5.56 load featuring 77-grain TMK bullets optimized for performance at distance. The rifles were topped with Vortex Razor HD Gen III scopes. Their 1-10X magnification range was a good compromise and allowed the rifles to be used at close range if they had to fight their way clear.

“Bipod or backpack?” Seattle mused aloud.

“Backpack,” Bill said without hesitation. “You might have to do a lot of lateral movement.” From the Beaubien to the 3 rdAvenue bridge was over 120 degrees of swing.

Seattle just grunted, then looked down at the electronic device on the desk. It, not the rifles, was their primary weapon. It was why they were in that building.

The two men stood two yards apart, behind the desks, binoculars up to their eyes, scanning each intersection in turn.

“Soon?” Seattle wondered.

Bill shrugged behind his binos. “Could be thirty seconds, could be twenty minutes. I don’t think it’ll be longer than that, if they’re hoping to catch us in those buildings.”

Their radios were clipped to their chests, and they clicked to life. “Almighty to all squads, Almighty to all squads. Eye in the sky shows enemy reinforcements en route. Four columns, proceeding north up the Lodge, Cass, Woodward, and John R. They’re moving cautiously. Total of at least thirty vehicles. ETA three, possibly five mikes. Over.”

Bill and Seattle looked at each other, then at the building around them. “Well fuck, I guess we guessed right,” Bill said.

Seattle looked at the encrypted multi-channel wireless detonator sitting on the table. “Jesus, I’m glad we thought to label the frequencies, this could get hairy.” His heart was hammering in his chest, and fresh sweat broke out all over his body. He looked from the detonator to his partner. “You want the honors? You’ve got rank.”

“Yeah.” Bill wiped his sweaty hands on his thighs and busied himself with the detonator, flipping it on and making sure it had power and signal. They’d stuck strips of tape all down the side of it, with the list of pre-set frequencies and the streets to which they corresponded. “They could veer off onto another street and the drone might not see it in time, so keep your eyes open.”

“Roger that.”

The two men, binoculars glued to their faces, swung left and right like metronomes.

“Enemy spotted!” Bill shouted suddenly. “Cass. Maybe a couple blocks south of I-94, heading this way.”

Seattle swung his binoculars left and right, checking the other streets. The other Tab elements weren’t in sight yet. “Nothing else in view.”

Bill grabbed the detonator and clicked it to the frequency pre-set labeled “Cass”. He held it in one hand while using the other to hold the binoculars up to his eyes. The column of vehicles on Cass Avenue was moving slowly, tentatively. Bill flipped off the safety and waited. “Come on baby, come to Papa,” he murmured.

Seattle was looking left and right. “Still nothing elsewhere.”

The armored column was barely one hundred yards south of the bridge over I-94. An IMP and a Growler were in the lead, followed by at least four more Growlers, an IMP, and at the rear of the column Bill saw the squat shape of a Toad.

As the armored force crawled north at slightly better than walking speed, on their right was a four-story office building, part of a local university. On the left was a six-story parking garage. The roof gunners on the IMPs were slewing their weapons back and forth, checking every window and shadow. The street was one lane in each direction, with parking on both sides. There were a few vehicles parked or abandoned on the street, but not many.

Past the office building on the right was a tavern, then a Carhartt retail outlet, then the bridge, which was very exposed.

From his perch on the sixth floor of the old Cadillac LaSalle building Bill watched the lead vehicles pass the rusted white van parked on the street just before the tavern. He waited until the second pair of vehicles, two Growlers, were abreast of the van, then hit the switch.

The scene through his binoculars disappeared as the four hundred pounds of C4 packed into the body panels of the rattle-trap minivan exploded. Every window still in a frame within two hundred yards was blown out, and the glass in the office windows near Bill and Seattle cracked as the huge blast wave hit their building a fraction of a second after detonation. They felt it in their chests, and their feet.

“Jesus,” Seattle said. There was now a huge cloud expanding where the convoy had been. They’d positioned the van so the blast would reflect off the faces of the office building on one side and the parking garage on the other. They caught just a glimpse of the lead IMP on its side and a Growler on its roof before the cloud of dust and smoke covered them. Movement caught his eye and he looked over, then jerked his binoculars up to his eyes. “John R!” he shouted excitedly. “John R!”

Bill switched the detonator over before looking up. The column on John R street had just appeared south of the bridge when the explosion occurred two blocks from them. They paused in shock, then they accelerated, the hope being that speed would carry them through any danger zones. Bill watched four Growlers followed by an IMP racing across the open bridge to the near side of the freeway.

“They’re racing up Woodward too!” Seattle called out. Assuming they were also targets of IEDs the other convoys were racing to get out of what they suspected were kill zones.

Bill didn’t let himself get distracted. On the northeast corner of John R and the service drive was a long two-story apartment building. It was old and constructed of crumbling red brick. A pile of rusted metal in front of it once had been a compact car. There was also a big roll-away Dumpster on the street before it, full of lumber and crumbling drywall, broken glass and plastic bags. After ten years of sitting out in the weather it was so badly rusted it was falling apart. Bill waited until the middle of the racing convoy was passing the dumpster, then hit the button on the detonator. The 110 pounds of C4 in a shaped charge inside the Dumpster blew outward in a fan-shaped explosion. Three Growlers were immediately destroyed, and all of the IMP’s wheels facing the Dumpster were shredded.

Bill didn’t have time to admire his handiwork—he switched the transmitter over to the Woodward setting and looked up. The third convoy was already racing across the bridge, IMPs and Growlers and two Toads. The Woodward Avenue bridge over I-94 was six lanes wide, and the vehicles were using every lane.

On the northeast corner of the bridge was an overturned car which had been there for years. It was collapsing with rust, and two-foot-long stalks of grass were growing up through its body. Combat engineers had managed to secrete ninety-two pounds of C4 inside it and Bill blew it without hesitation. The blast completely destroyed two Growlers, killing the Tabs inside, and flipped two others, but the remaining vehicles avoided immediate destruction because of their distance.

The Woodward IED was actually the closest to their hide, and it shattered their cracked office windows, the glass hitting the floor and the desks in front of Bill and Seattle. They watched the remainder of the Woodward column assume a defensive perimeter and Tabs bailed out of the IMPs and Growlers to tend to their wounded. Many of the soldiers seemed to be stunned by the blast.