Читать книгу Syrian Rescue - Don Pendleton - Страница 11

Deir ez-Zor Governorate, Syria

The Jeep Wrangler was twenty-plus years old and showed it, mangy rust spots peeking through its faded paint, a long crack stretching across the lower left-hand quadrant of its dusty windshield. The canvas roof rattled and flapped. Its seats were sprung, their stuffing visible where seams had split, and underneath a set of worn-out rubber mats, passengers could watch the desert rolling past below, if they were so inclined.

Mack Bolan didn’t care about the Jeep’s appearance or its comfort. Before accepting it, he’d checked the tires—not new by any means, but serviceable—and the 4.2-liter engine, testing out the four-wheel drive, until he was more or less convinced that it would take him where he had to go and bring him back again.

Maybe.

A lot of that depended on terrain, of course, and any obstacles—human or otherwise—they met along the way. So far, they had been making fairly decent time.

The man riding in the shotgun seat was a slender Syrian with a patchy beard, wearing a checkered keffiyeh and faded desert camouflage, the sleeves rolled up, pants cuffs tucked into well-worn combat boots. He had a pistol and a wicked dagger in the waistband of his trousers, hidden by the loose tail of his four-pocket BDU shirt.

The heavy hardware rode behind them, on the Wrangler’s floorboard and backseat.

They had left Highway 7 ten miles north of Al Mayadin, angling northeastward on a road that wasn’t marked on any map, barely a shadow of a line on Google Earth. No one had ever bothered paving it or even laying gravel down. Why waste the time and energy, when desert winds and shifting sand could cover and conceal it within minutes?

“We are in bandit country now,” Sabah Azmeh observed.

“I’m more concerned about the army and irregulars,” Bolan replied.

“They’re bandits, too. They just have newer clothes and weapons.”

That was true enough. Deir ez-Zor Governorate harbored armed forces of various factions in Syria’s long civil war. Bolan was hoping to avoid them all and complete his mission with a minimum of static, but he knew that notion wasn’t realistic; hence, the hardware in the back.

Beyond armed opposition, there was still the desert to contend with—over ten thousand square miles of nothing but sand, stone, scorpions and cobras. Water was scarce, cover likewise, and the only ally he had was riding in the Wrangler’s shotgun seat.

Azmeh spat out a curse and pointed off to Bolan’s left, toward a plume of beige dust rising in the still, hot air. One vehicle, at least, and it was headed their way. “If they’re hostile, we’ll deal with it,” said Bolan. “Grab the rifles.”

Azmeh twisted in his seat and rummaged underneath a tatty blanket covering a portion of their mobile arsenal. He fished out two AKMS assault rifles, their metal stocks folded, both with forty-round box magazines in place, loaded with 7.62×39 mm rounds.

“It’s too bad,” Azmeh said.

“Too bad,” Bolan agreed.

But the encounter was unavoidable.

* * *

“YOU SEE IT?” Youssef Sadek asked his driver.

“It’s hard to miss,” Sami Karam replied.

“Get after them.”

Karam changed course to chase the distant rooster tail of dust, downshifting first, then bringing the GAZ Sadko cargo truck up to speed. Their men in the back would be cursing by now, maybe craning their necks for a glimpse of whatever had drawn them off course.

Karam knew the drill: stop and search anyone they found drifting around in the desert, unless they were Syrian regulars. Karam and his men were Hezbollah fighters, and their party had long sided with the Syrian government.

“One vehicle, I think,” Sadek observed, talking to help himself relax. It was a trait Karam had noticed in the past but did not share.

“Perhaps one,” he replied, to keep from being rude.

“Not large,” Sadek said. “Maybe a UAZ.”

“Maybe,” Karam agreed, scanning the desert that still lay between them and their quarry.

“You can overtake them, eh?”

“I hope so.”

The GAZ Sadko had a 4.67-liter V8 engine, generating 130 horsepower, but the truck could only do so much off-road, on rough terrain, without falling apart or pitching the soldiers out of its open bed like popcorn bursting from a pot with no lid.

Karam fought the steering wheel and grappled with the gearshift, sharp eyes twitching from his target—which was definitely fleeing now—to the ground in front of him, watching out for hidden obstacles. The last thing he needed was to crash against a boulder or tip into a wadi that he’d overlooked.

The one thing worse than meeting unexpected adversaries in the desert would be getting stranded there, long miles from any help. The Sadko had no radio, of course, and while Karam was carrying a cell phone, picking up a signal here would be impossible.

So, no mistakes, then.

“Faster!” Sadek urged him, as if simply saying it would make the truck perform beyond its capabilities.

Karam said nothing, concentrating on the smaller vehicle ahead of them. The gap was closing, though not fast enough to please his agitated passenger. Sadek enjoyed killing—well, who didn’t?—but he sometimes rushed into a fight without considering the possibility of failure.

Closer now, Karam could see that they were following an ancient Jeep, not an official army vehicle. That still left many possibilities, given the Governorate’s state of near chaos. For all Karam knew, they might even now be wasting time and fuel, chasing a party of their so-called friends: the Badr Corps or the Promised Day Brigade—they were too numerous to count on any given day.

Focus on what you know, he thought.

Four passengers at most inside the Jeep, which meant they were outnumbered more than two to one by Karam and his men. Fair odds, but you could never truly judge an enemy until you joined him in battle.

And if you had misjudged him…

Karam had to be prepared when they made contact. Wedged between his left knee and the driver’s door, his AK-47 was already locked and loaded. He could bail out of the truck, firing, or run down anyone who tried to flee the Jeep on foot.

Beyond that, all Karam could do was clutch the steering wheel and pray.

* * *

“THEY’RE GAINING ON US,” Azmeh said.

Bolan could see that in his rearview, and he didn’t care to comment on the obvious. Instead, he asked, “So, any thoughts on who they are?”

“The truck is standard issue,” Azmeh said. “But no flag or insignia. Not army or police, then, but beyond that—anyone.”

That helped a little. Bolan drew a private line at killing cops, regardless of what side they served or how corrupt they were.

The problem now: assuming that he couldn’t lose the truck pursuing them, where could they stand and fight?

The flat, featureless desert offered no concealment, nothing in the way of cover if he stopped to shoot it out. Bolan could see heads bobbing in the truck’s bed, men with rifles who would likely have no qualms about eliminating him. At the moment, Bolan didn’t know who was pursuing them. They might be Syrians or Lebanese, Jordanians or Kurds, Iraqis or Iranians, Sunnis or Shi’ites.

And it made no difference. He had to take them out.

The hardware Bolan had on hand was standard issue, for convenience. His pistol, like Azmeh’s, was the same Browning Hi-Power carried by Syrian army officers. The other arms were Russian, from their matched AKMs to a Dragunov SVD sniper rifle, an RPK light machine gun, an RPG-7 grenade launcher with a mix of warheads, and a case of F1 hand grenades known in the Motherland as limonka for their supposed resemblance to lemons.

First thing, Bolan scratched the long-range weapons off his mental list. His Dragunov was loaded, packing ten rounds in a detachable box magazine, but the rifle was meant for solitary, unsuspecting targets at a distance. He could use it to stop the truck, sure, if he took the driver out or maybe cracked the engine block, but would leave shooters scampering around the desert, no fit job for the Dragunov’s PSO-1 telescopic sight.

It would be down and dirty, then, a bloody scramble with their vehicles as the only cover, in a firefight where the Jeep was nearly as important as their own flesh and blood. If they lost their transportation, their mission was a washout.

Trapped in Syria on foot, they were as good as dead.

Bolan checked the Jeep’s fuel gauge: three-quarters full, two hundred fifty miles or so before the tank would run dry. They had spare cans of gasoline in back, but those were vulnerable to incoming fire, the first thing that a random burst might ventilate. Besides, he couldn’t hope to ditch the truck simply by outpacing it. For starters, it would have a larger gas tank—maybe two, three times the size of the Jeep’s—and even with its greater weight it could outlast the Wrangler in the long run.

No, they’d have to fight. The only questions now were when and where.

“Be ready when I give the word,” he warned Azmeh. “Don’t hesitate.”

“I will not.”

Bolan stood on the accelerator, racing over rocky ground that sent jolts through his spine, still looking for a place to make a stand.

* * *

“WHY ARE YOU slowing down?” Sadek demanded.

“I’m trying not to wreck the truck,” Karam replied, tight-lipped.

“We cannot let them get away!” Sadek spat back at him.

Karam had no answer for that, but Sadek felt the truck accelerate a little in response to his tirade. A little, yes, but not enough to suit him.

They had spent the past two days patrolling empty landscapes, wasting time and fuel. Returning to his captain empty-handed made Sadek feel like a fool. It marked him, he was sure, as someone who could not perform to expectations. Someone who should not advance to a higher rank. He hated feeling like a failure, even though the purpose of jihad was serving Allah, not one’s self. Another flaw in Sadek’s character, but one he’d learned to live with over time.

He turned to peer at his men through the cab’s rear window. They were rocking with the truck, clinging to their weapons and their bench seats. Some, the younger ones, were smiling, happy to be hunting, while the more experienced among them were expressionless. The veterans had been through this before, with variations: travelers detained and questioned, then released if they identified themselves as allies, executed if they failed to prove their allegiance. Each enemy eliminated was another victory, however insignificant it seemed.

And this quarry was running. That proved something to Sadek.

He would not allow them to escape.

“Enough of this,” he snarled, lifting his AK-47 from between his knees. He twisted in his seat and eased the rifle through his open window, sling around his right arm to prevent it from falling if his sweaty hands slipped.

“Youssef…” Karam warned.

“We have to stop them,” Sadek said as he tried to aim, a rush of hot air in his face, making him squint.

His first short burst was wasted, rattling off to the far right of the fleeing Jeep. Cursing, Sadek tried to correct his aim, but it was difficult, the door’s sun-heated metal nearly blistering his bare arms while the jolting of the truck made the Kalashnikov’s adjustable iron sights vibrate erratically.

He fired again, four rounds on full-auto, and imagined that he saw one punch a divot in the old Jeep’s fender. An improvement, but he had to do better if he meant to stop them.

Another rifle fired somewhere above him, making Sadek flinch. One of his men had followed his example, shooting at the Jeep. A flash of irritation stung him, then he realized it did not matter who managed to stop the vehicle, as long as it was done. A second rifle rattling overhead made Sadek smile.

The travelers had doomed themselves by running, even if they were not enemies. His men were hunting, and they wanted blood. So did Sadek, if he was honest with himself.

Now, if Karam would only hold the truck steady enough for him to aim…

* * *

A BULLET STRUCK the Wrangler’s right wing mirror, ripping it away. Sabah Azmeh slumped lower in his seat, half turned to watch the truck behind them slowly gaining ground. Two riflemen were aiming across the truck cab’s roof, a third man leaning from the passenger’s window, rifle in hand.

How had he come to this?

The answer mocked him: he had volunteered.

“I’ll try to slow them down,” Azmeh told the tall American who called himself Matt Cooper.

“Good luck,” Cooper replied, seeming to mean it.

Given how much they were swerving to avoid incoming fire, Azmeh couldn’t crawl into the rear. The best he could do was aim his AKMS through the hazy back window, hold steady when he fired, and hope the hot brass spewing from his weapon did not fall down Cooper’s collar, burning him and maybe causing him to crash the Jeep.

Azmeh braced one elbow on the low back of his seat to help steady his weapon, which was switched to semiautomatic. He didn’t think he could stop the truck, much less take out its occupants, but if he slowed them down a bit, perhaps Cooper could think of something.

Azmeh’s first shot drilled through the window’s yellowed plastic and flew on, hopefully to strike the truck. Azmeh would have loved to drill its radiator, stranding their assailants and leaving them to simmer through the afternoon and freeze overnight.

That mental picture cheered him, and he fired twice more before an enemy bullet pierced the Jeep’s window. Azmeh flinched and ducked as it struck the roll bar and shattered, spraying the seats with shrapnel. Something stung his left arm.

“Full-auto now, I think,” he said to Cooper.

“Your call,” the American replied, and somehow found a way to wring more speed out of the Wrangler’s howling engine.

* * *

AT LEAST THREE RIFLEMEN were firing at them now, by Bolan’s count. He couldn’t see them well, between the dust, his wobbling mirrors and the Wrangler’s canvas top, but they were gaining, and their prospects for a hit seemed better than Azmeh’s. Bolan was locked out of the action, doing what he could to dodge incoming fire without rolling the Jeep. He hoped there were no wadis hiding out there, waiting to derail them in the next few hundred yards.

Azmeh squeezed off another burst, then muttered something to himself. Before Azmeh fired again, Bolan called out, raising his voice over the wind. “I want to try something. Fasten your seat belt.”

Azmeh didn’t question him. He had to know that they were running out of time and options now. If Bolan couldn’t pull off a surprise for their pursuers, they were toast.

He heard the seat belt click and said, “Okay, hang on!”

Cranking the Wrangler’s wheel hard to the left, he whipped the Jeep’s rear end through a long, sliding one hundred eighty-degree turnaround. The knobby tires spewed sand and gravel, raising clouds of dust.

Before it settled, Bolan scooped up his Kalashnikov and bailed out of the Jeep, leaving Azmeh to follow him as they went to meet their enemies.

Whatever happened next would be on Bolan’s terms.