“It’ll be tight, but we can fit in the truck, all of us,” the leader of the Portuguese said, referring to the deuce and a half they had stashed in the hotel garage. His English sounded strange, and had probably been taught to him by an Afrikaner. “Who’s gonna cause enough problems to get a division of rebels to concentrate enough to let us slip out though?”
“We’ll need a diversion. Someone will need to cause enough resistance to stall the irregulars, here”—he gestured at the board—“long enough for them to call in the Cubans and the trained MLC. We’ll need someone who can fight, and then slip away once we escape, someone who can disappear, go to ground. Stealth will be their only chance to evade capture.” He looked right at me as he said it.
So he knew.
I should have kept my mouth shut after this operation went to hell. But I didn’t. I violated my own rule of always being the grey man, the one that didn’t draw attention, the thief in the background. I had let my emotions get the better of me. And Decker must have sensed my anger.
And over the last year, he had seen what happened to people who made me angry.
So this was how it was going to be.
“Ozzie,” he nodded toward me. “I think you would be the only person who would have a chance.” Decker was good, very good. He didn’t display any indication that he was disposing of me. Rather, he was just the good leader, picking the best man for the job. “We’re counting on you. Force them to pull their reserves; if not, we’ll have to try a frontal assault, and since they have those APCs, it would be suicide in the open.”
The only surviving radio in the room suddenly crackled with static. Every head in the room swiveled towards it. “This is Ramirez. Militia forces are moving into the south end of the city. Looks like they’re going to burn it all.”
The room was silent, then broken by a fit of coughing from one of the wounded mercs who’d caught shrapnel in the lung.
“Do you mind if we have a word about this, in private?” I asked, perfectly calm.
Decker made a show of looking at his watch. “Certainly.” He gave an imperceptible nod toward Hawk. They had been around, and knew what was happening. “But we’d best hurry.”
“No shit,” Sergeant Gomes said, as a mortar shell exploded somewhere in the city.
“It didn’t have to be like this,” Decker said, as he strolled into the side room. He had his back to me. The spot between his shoulder blades and the ALICE suspenders was an inviting target, and I could feel the heavy weight of the combat knife on my hip. But Hawk was trailing behind me, and as fast as I was, I knew that Hawk was that much faster with that big magnum revolver.
“It is what it is,” I replied, too damn tired to try to put on any sort of act. “We killed the president. We caused this. The diamond exchange used us, and you let them.”
“How long have you been with SWITCHBLADE?” he asked, already knowing the answer. “A year, yes, a year. And honestly . . .” he finally turned to face me, his eyes sad, his spirit injured by the events of the last two days. “I saw great things in your future. You were nothing but a common thief when you joined us . . .”
“I was an exceptional thief.”
He ignored that. “But I saw a leader, a man that could make a difference. I could see you taking over, and running this organization.” Decker was sincere, at least. That I could tell, but sincerity doesn’t make a rattlesnake any less venomous.
“If you haven’t noticed, half your organization’s dead, because you screwed up.”
“I know . . .” Decker said, his voice cracking, the pain obvious. “This is the end of SWITCHBLADE. Even if we make it out, the diamond exchange will have us hunted down like dogs. I’m sorry about the men. They . . . they were like family to me.” I could hear the creak of gun leather as Hawk shifted behind me.
Also true, but it didn’t make me hate him any less right then.
“And I know that’s why you’re going to do your best to slow down these rebels. Because I know that Ramirez, and Doc, and Cuzak are like brothers to you, and you won’t let them down,” Decker said simply.
“True,” I answered.
“You had better hurry.” Decker put his hand on my shoulder. “I’m sorry,” he said. And I believed him.
And that was the only reason I decided not to kill him.
The refugees were panicking now, turning from individuals into a deadly entity, discarding and crushing bits of itself underfoot. Screams filled the air. In the distance could be heard the boom of mortars and sporadic automatic weapons fire. The boards that had been blocking the front door flew into the street in a spray of dust as I booted them hard and pushed my way into the street.
It was hot. Muggy, sticky hot, and sweat rolled down my back and soaked my camouflage. The air stank of oil and smoke and fear.
The group had been low on ammo after two days of furious combat and retreat, but I had still commandeered every piece of hardware that I could carry. I had the RPK in hand, our last RPG slung over one shoulder, Cuzak’s Ithaca 37 over the other shoulder (he was in no shape to fight anyway), a Browning Hi-Power on my belt, and every spare round of ammo and frag grenade that I could scrape up. Any more munitions and I wouldn’t be able to move. Tsetse flies kept landing on my face to probe the dried blood patches.
Doc had tried to stop me. He understood what was happening, that I was a threat to Decker, and therefore expendable. I just shook my head and made him promise to get the wounded to safety. Cuzak hadn’t said a word, but he shook my hand solemnly, knowing what I was about to do. If I had one weakness, it was that when I occasionally made a friend, I was too damn loyal.
And it was about to kill me.
Decker gave me a brief nod. Hawk tipped his hat in my direction. Areyh spit on the floor.
So this was the end of SWITCHBLADE.
The others exited, fanning out, forming a perimeter around the hotel, where they would hold until Ramirez, acting as our spotter, could see that the road was clear. If I failed, their only choice was to attack straight into the Cubans and try to break through to the airfield. They would never make it. I walked away, the deadly mob of women, children, and old men parting before me like water, leaving the last year of my life behind, and knowing that I was probably going to perish in the next few minutes. The terrified Africans moved out of my way, my anger like an invisible plow.
The CAR was a blighted land. Torn by war for generations, poor beyond all comprehension, and I knew that probably half of these refugees would be dead in the next ten years from AIDS even if they managed to somehow survive the machetes of the approaching rebels. And we had come here, paid in blood money, to topple their corrupt government and install another corrupt government that the diamond exchange liked better. And even then, the exchange had sold us out.
What a waste.
Then there was someone pushing forward with me. Sergeant Gomes, the Portuguese mercenary, appeared at my side, his burly form cradling the Port’s PKM machinegun. A stubby Steyr Aug was tied around him with a discarded web belt serving as a sling. His oddball camouflage was ripped, blood-stained, and every exposed patch of skin was covered in caked-on mud. He looked hideous.
But happy. “Let’s kill us a bunch of these rebel sons of bitches,” he grinned, his beady eyes narrowing dangerously.
“What’re you doing?” I shouted over the chaos.
“My men? They’re in no shape to fight. So I figure, nothing I can do for them,” he shrugged. “You could use the help. Might as well go fight.”
I couldn’t argue with that.
He stuck out his hand. It was calloused and strong. “Call me Carl.”
I had been going by Ozzie for the last year, but I knew that I couldn’t go back. Even if I lived through this battle, it would be best if I disappeared. I knew that the diamond exchange could not afford to allow any of SWITCHBLADE to survive, knowing the things that we knew. And if they didn’t get me, then Decker might very well try, just to tie up loose ends. It was t
ime to start over, to disappear, to become grey again.
I said the first name that popped into my head.
“Lorenzo . . . My name is Lorenzo.”
Sweothi City, Central African Republic.
December 15th, 1993.
2:15 p.m.
THE CROWD thinned out enough for the two of us to break into a run, counterintuitively, toward the sound of gunfire. Normally I was the type that liked to plan, but there was no time for that.
This part of Sweothi City was rougher than the rest. Half the buildings were the stacked mud-brick type, but compressed between them was a maze of shanties built out of things like chicken wire, packing crates, and old tires. Some of them were already burning.
Carl grabbed me by the arm and pointed down the street into the emptying marketplace. Black smoke was rising from the neighborhood behind it. “The irregulars will come through here.”
“How do you know?”
“I’ve been fighting in Africa since my people lost Mozambique. They’ll come through here because they’re stupid rabble and it’s obvious. They’ll want to loot the shops, rape the stragglers.” He swept his hand to the right, and pointed down the other intersection. “When the Cubans come, they’ll move up this street, and then try to flank us through the shanties on the north. That’s how those commie bastards will do it.”
I nodded quickly, trying to burn the layout into my mind.
“Stick and move. Don’t let them pin you down. Most of these shit birds can’t shoot, but they shoot a lot.” Carl hefted the massive PK. “Always attack. Make them react. Got it?”
“Got it.”
My pulse was pounding in my head as I turned and headed into the market and toward the rising smoke plumes of black tire-fueled smoke. The 75-round drum in the RPK was heavy and pendulous at the balance point as I let the muzzle lead the way. I moved in a crouch, Carl slightly behind me, gun shifting toward every sudden flash of movement. Several scrawny dogs ran past, tails between their legs.
Then I saw the first of the rebels. I raised my fist, signaling contact. We both crouched low and moved into the shadows beneath a meat stand. A thick black cloud of flies covered the hanging goats and chickens. A can of generic bug spray was under foot, surely used to spray the meat down to keep the flies off.
The first of the MLC were making their way through the bazaar, kicking over stands, and picking up anything left that looked shiny. They really were rabble. Nothing like the disciplined troops we had fought earlier. Most of them were scrawny, malnourished conscripts, wide-eyed with fear or barely coherent on khat. I hunkered down, waiting for more of them to come into view before I opened fire.
Then there was a scream to the side. A woman. Carl and I both jerked toward the noise, just in time to see two of the rebels dragging a young girl by the hair from one of the brick houses into the street. She was hysterical, with tears running down her dark cheeks.
Carl’s machinegun shifted toward the two men, but I grabbed his arm and shook my head. The rebels hadn’t seen us yet. I jerked my thumb toward myself, made a slashing motion across my throat, and then pointed at the two would-be rapists. Carl nodded and trained his weapon back at the rebels collecting in the market. We only had one belt for the machinegun, and needed to make the most use of it.
I put the RPG, RPK, and Ithaca on the ground, as quietly as possible, and drew the Vietnam-era Air Force knife from my belt. I slid under the booth and crawled through the dirt, brushing between hanging meat and half-gutted chickens, using every shadow and piece of cover. Luckily my Rhodesian camouflage was so crusted with filth that I was the same color as the earth. I covered the thirty feet to the first rebel in a matter of seconds. This was my element. No one could move quieter or faster than I could.
The men were distracted. The first had shoved the girl down and was trying to rip her clothes off as she thrashed and screamed. He was obviously inexperienced at this whole pillaging thing, and the girl was wailing on him.
The second man got tired of waiting, lowered his machete, and pushed the younger man aside. “Ashti sangha m’baka, dummy.”
I moved in a blur, my knife humming through the air. I hit the first man in the base of the neck. The knife jabbed in under his ear, and out in a flash of red. The second man had time to turn, shock registering on his face, just as I kicked his knee cap backward. He went down on top of the girl. I grabbed him by the hair, jerked his head back, and slashed him across the jugular.
Neither man was making noise now, but both were thrashing, spraying arterial fluids everywhere. They would be dead in seconds. The girl looked up at me in shock as I grabbed the rags that served as her assailant’s shirt and hauled him off of her.
“Run.”
She heeded my suggestion, leapt to her feet, and bolted, trying to hold her torn clothing closed. I heard motion coming from the open door of her house, and quickly moved against the hot brick wall, dripping knife held in a reverse grip, close to my chin.
Another rebel walked out of the house, AK in one hand, dangling uselessly; the other hand was holding some gaudy, cheap necklace up to the sunlight. He was grinning from ear to ear, pleased with his plunder.
Enjoy it, motherfucker.
He paused, realizing that his two friends were the source of all that blood, just as I grabbed him by the top of the head, jerked it back, and rammed the combat knife straight down, just above the junction of his neck and sternum. I used the knife against his ribs like a lever to force him to his knees as I sawed through his aorta. I yanked the blade out and let him thud, lifeless, to the ground. I wiped the knife on his pants, sheathed it, and grabbed his AK. The whole thing had taken less than twenty seconds.
Carl was staring at me in slack-jawed wonderment as I slithered back through the hanging meats.
“Filho da Puta . . .”
“Yeah. I get that a lot,” I muttered as I slung the RPG tube and the shotgun. I now had a Kalashnikov in each hand. This was getting kind of extreme.
“Contact right,” Carl hissed.
Sure enough, there was the main body of the irregulars. Now they were clustered in the marketplace, fighting like dogs over the scraps of a ruined civilization. There were at least thirty of them, armed with everything from meat cleavers to grenade launchers, and they were not in the least bit worried about resistance.
“On three,” his voice was a whisper as he slowly extended the PKM’s bipod. “One mag, then run like hell back to the intersection.”
“One.” I proned out behind the AK, using the magazine as a monopod, and centered it on a knot of men. They were less than one hundred meters away.
“Two,” Carl hissed as he took up slack on the trigger.
“Three,” I moved the selector to full.
BBBBRRAAAAAAPPPPP . . . BBBBRRAAAAAAPPPPP . . .
The PKM was horrendously loud as it cut a swath through flesh and bone. Whole knots of the rebels disintegrated in clouds of red as the 7.62x54R tore into them in great piercing blows. As Carl was swinging the reaper’s scythe, I tried to pick out anything he was missing. I centered the front sight on a running rebel, and cranked off a burst.
The wall three feet to his side exploded under the impact.
“Damn it!”
The sights on this thing were so far off that aiming was useless. I held the trigger down and swept the muzzle across the market, emptying the magazine in one burst. I let go of the AK and let it flop to its side. I was to Carl’s left, and the steel cases from the PK hit me with brutal impacts. I scooped up the RPK and prepared to cover his withdrawal.
Carl was saying something repetitive in Portuguese with every burst. In seconds, our hundred-round belt was gone. “Moving!” Carl shouted as he jumped up from behind the smoking beast.
“Move!” I answered as I scanned for threats. Carl ran for the intersection while pulling the Aug from its makeshift sling. The market was a mess, with the dead and dying spread everywhere. The rebels were in disarray, but that wouldn’t last long. Alre
ady there was movement as more came in from the south. I sighted in on one charging man, and stroked the trigger. The Yugo barked, and the man pitched forward into the street. At least this one was sighted in.
“Go!” Carl shouted as he took up position behind a brick wall.
I sprang to my feet and leapfrogged past him, sliding into a position behind a bank of broken cinderblocks. The RPG on my back made it hard to maneuver, and damn near impossible to get low.
Several of the very brave, or very stupid, moved out into the open. In African warfare, you could often get away with this, as the fundamentals of marksmanship were not really known or taught by very many people here. For Carl and me, however, marksmanship was apparently not a problem. The rebels went down in a quick hail of gunfire.
The street was silent.
We had bloodied them, but I didn’t know what it was going to take to get those Cubans’ attention and get them off that damn road.
“Give them a minute to get puffed up, get over the shock, and then they’re gonna charge. Then it won’t stop until we’re dead, or they’re dead. So let the dumb ones get popped in the open, and then we’ll fall back into the houses and alleys”—he jerked with his head in one direction— “and counterattack. When we hear the commies’ vehicles, move so we can hit the intersection.”
And then it was on. Rebels poured through the marketplace. Some ran straight at us, firing from the hip; others hung their guns around corners and blazed away. It was chaos. None of them could shoot worth a damn, but they made up for it in volume. Bullets tried to fill all the empty spaces. The cinderblocks around me exploded into powder and clouds of dust, and I swear some of those guys must have been shooting black powder from all the smoke. I fired at everything that moved and put rounds through anything that looked suspicious.
“Reloading!” Carl shouted as I hammered a line of impacts through some shanties. “Move to the buildings! Go! Go!”
The whole world had gone insane. I was up and moving as fast as I could, hot lead all around me, sounding like angry bees. The RPK sparked hard and spun from my hands, torn nearly in half. The hot muzzle smashed me in the face and my feet flew out from under me. I crashed into the gravel as gouts of flame tore all around.
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