Arabian Storm (The Hunter Killer Series Book 5) by George Wallace (different ereaders .txt) 📕

on the lead vehicle’s cab roof. He held his breath, anticipating imminent hellfire from above.

And nothing happened. No flashing streak across the night sky. No blinding explosion. Nothing.

“Jase, what the hell happened? You still have the link?”

Hall responded immediately. “Comms are good but the bird ain’t answering. Backup’s on the way. Two minutes out and closing.”

The group of trucks drove on, unaware they had just received a two-minute reprieve.

“Roger,” Ward answered. “Guys, keep your heads down, but be ready to engage.”

“Black Dog, this is Iron Hammer,” a voice suddenly crackled in Ward’s earbud. “Hold four technicals. Verify you are clear.”

“Iron Hammer, Black Dog. Roger. Team is clear.”

“Rolling in hot. Black Dog out.”

Just then an A-10 Warthog jet aircraft popped up over a line of hills almost two miles away, approaching at over three hundred miles per hour. Ward had just enough time to register the incoming jet before the lead truck below his position disappeared in a cloud of smoke and flames. The jet’s 30mm GAU-8 cannon blasted away at almost four thousand rounds a minute.

But then, just as suddenly, three missile trails arced up from the trucks. The terrorists had obviously remained ready and retaliated instantly. The missiles made a straight line toward the fast-approaching Air Force jet.

A tall figure—wearing Arabic robes, odd for the Somali desert—leapt from the passenger seat of the second truck. He stood there as if invincible, pointing at the jet, yelling something Ward could not understand. But he was obviously giving orders to his fighters. As the missiles raced toward the jet, the three remaining 23mm heavy machine guns mounted in the truck beds opened up. Golden-yellow blobs of tracer fire raced the shoulder-fired anti-aircraft missiles in the direction of the Warthog.

The warplane jogged hard left, ejecting a trail of flares behind it. The first fired missile fell for the ruse and skewed off course toward the flares. The other two were not distracted and continued unerringly toward the jinking, dodging jet. The bullet tracers shifted to close on the aircraft, too.

The overwhelming speed of the incoming ordnance overcame even the Warthog’s vaunted ability to avoid punishment. The missiles, employing infrared seekers, slammed into the jet’s hot engines while the machine cannon fire shredded its airframe. The plane’s canopy popped off and the pilot ejected, tumbling erratically, hardly a second before the Warthog smashed into the desert floor in a blinding ball of flame.

Even as the ground shook beneath him from the plane’s impact, a thought flashed through Jim Ward’s mind. In the space of two minutes they had gone from having strong advantage, following a good plan, on the attack with overwhelming firepower, to being in a very bad and risky position. Even with one truck destroyed and still burning, al-Wasragi’s fighters outnumbered and out-gunned Ward’s SEAL team. And now it was clear they were on alert and ready for just about anything.

There was no time to call in any more airstrikes. Nor was it an option to slip away to regroup to fight another day. By the time they could get another air or missile strike in action, the terrorists and their gold would be gone.

There was no other real choice. Ward and his team would have to stay and fight their way out of this mess.

They had one ace in the hole—the single Javelin missile that one of the squad members, Tony Martinelli, had lugged into the fight. Other than that, they had to fight heavy machine guns with only their HK417 battle rifles and M320 grenade launchers. With only seven shooters, these were not the odds Ward wanted.

Martinelli went to work. With a brief streak of light, the FGM-148F Javelin initiated the next phase of the fight. The deadly missile flashed across the valley, and its multi-purpose fragmentation warhead detonated as the missile slammed into the last pickup in line. Even with only eight kilograms of high explosives, the combination of blast and fragmentation sliced the truck, the fighters manning its gun, and its driver to shreds.

Both the terrorists’ remaining heavy machine guns opened up on the rocky outcropping that Martinelli had used for concealment when he launched the Javelin. The bullets raised a dust storm, but the SEAL was no longer there. He had already scooted downslope and settled into a new firing position.

Two other members of the SEAL team, Doug Broughton and Skip Cantrell, lobbed 40mm grenades into the fight with their launchers while Ward and Jason Hall used their 7.62mm sniper rifles to keep the bad guys pinned down. AK-47 fire and 23mm machine cannon rounds answered. The Somali fighters appeared to be moving their small arms positions away from the machine guns. They were probably trying to work their way around behind where the SEALs lay hidden. Plus, as far as they knew, more Javelins were about to be sent screaming in the direction of the trucks.

Either way, Jim Ward had his suspicions confirmed. These guys were as well trained as they were armed.

Ward caught occasional quick glimpses of al-Wasragi as he directed his men, but he never had a clear shot. The man seemed to magically move from one position to the other between wisps of dust and smoke. The white-robed terrorist was a ghost-like wraith moving around the battlefield in the yellow light of dawn.

Ward had another realization. The firefight had become a standoff. The young SEAL lieutenant knew that his team could never win a standoff. This was al-Wasragi’s home turf. He almost certainly had help on the way already.

There was only one thing to do.

“Guys, hit the trucks,” he yelled into his boom mike. “And then let’s beat feet.”

The SEALs shifted their fire to concentrate on the Toyotas, hitting them both with 40mm grenades. Neither of the vehicles was going anywhere soon. Even so, their machine guns continued to blast away.

“Okay, let’s make ourselves scarce,” Ward called out. “Let’s muster at the crash site.”

The black-smoking wreck of the Warthog was the only