Standing in the Storm

by William Alan Webb

  Cheering, they split up and ran to the vehicles. After Tompkins had left with the headquarters company’s combat elements and veteran personnel, only three M4 Bradley command and control vehicles remained that had guns. Those had been retro-fitted to augment the brigade’s C and C capabilities, but in doing so gave up their TOW missiles.

  The rest were emptied supply trucks, their contents strewn on the ground. A total of seventeen trucks and Bradleys followed Angriff’s Humvee down the mountain.

  The stretch of desert on the north and northeastern sides of Badger Mountain offered no natural defensive obstacles. There was nothing to do except lager the trucks to block the highway and fight for as long as possible. Angriff positioned his Humvee at the center of the circle. It mounted the GAU-19/A fifty-caliber Gatling gun with a rate of fire of 1300 rounds per minute and 1500 rounds of ammunition. Any Seven who broke through the lager would see the face of Satan dealing multi-barreled death.

  Standing in the Humvee, hands on hips, Angriff inspected the improvised defensive position. He saw plenty of weak spots, but was out of time to fix them. From the east, a shining river of metal sped straight for the lager.

  “Enemy in sight, General.” The driver of his Humvee stood on the hood, pointing east. She was young and scared to death. “Looks like a lot of them.”

  Manning the Gatling gun was a skinny corporal. His dark skin shone with sweat. A rod fixed to the windshield flew the guidon Angriff had ordered, a duplicate of the one Custer had carried at the Little Big Horn. The irony did not escape him.

  “Get me General Fleming on the horn,” he said. She climbed back into the driver’s seat, and a few seconds later handed him the radio.

  “Norm, I need a favor. Tell Bulldozer One One Two that Nicholas is a helluva good name for a boy. Can you do that?”

  “You’re coming back, Nick,” Fleming said.

  Angriff took a cigar out of his pocket and stuck it in his mouth. “Yeah, I know. But just in case.”

  “Nicholas is a great name.”

  “Thanks.” He handed the radio back to the driver. “What’s your name, Private?”

  “Julianna Santos, General,” she said.

  “Supply?”

  “Yes sir, ordnance and ammunition.”

  “What about you, Corporal? What’s your name?”

  “Imboden, sir, Donald H.”

  “You ever shot one of those before?” Angriff pointed at the Gatling gun.

  Designed for occasions when a cannon was impractical, or the mission called for a smaller round with a higher rate of fire, the rotating gun barrels fired the NATO standard 12.7mm round. In U.S. parlance, it was a fifty-caliber. The Humvee version fired 1300 rounds per minute, a devastating blizzard of steel against man or machine.

  “Not before I went cold, General. Sergeant Major Schiller insisted somebody cross-train on the Gatling and he picked me to volunteer. I’m usually a Comm Spec.”

  “Either one of you ever fired your weapon in anger?”

  “No, sir,” Imboden said.

  “Private Santos?”

  “No, General.”

  Angriff reached over and stroked the top barrel of the Gatling. “This guy is a monster, Corporal. When you press that trigger, it will lay down the hate. I want you to remember those sonsabitches wanna kill me, you, Santos, and every decent thing left in this world. You are the last thing preventing that from happening; you are the last Spartan standing. If you don’t stop them, nobody will. Can you do that, Imboden?”

  “Aye, sir!” the corporal said, feeling a rush of adrenaline.

  “Good man. I know you can do it.”

  A light breeze swirled over the desert. Angriff lit a match and cupped his hands to light the Cubana. The rich smoke tasted better than ever. Once he had a nice ash going, he drew a Desert Eagle from its holster, gripped it in both hands, and pretended to draw a bead. It was a nervous habit before he went into combat; he might draw and re-holster the guns twenty times or more.

  Imboden seemed confident in his ability to handle the Gatling, but Santos couldn’t stop shaking. Angriff lowered the gun and looked at the worried soldier. Her rifle seemed as big as she was.

  He winked and grinned. “Private Santos, I want you to remember everything you can about this day. You see, today is a day you’re gonna tell your grandkids about, when you and Nick the A kicked Islamic ass side by side in the Arizona desert.”

  Map Copyright © 2017 Google

  1805 hours

  A once-yellow Z-28 led the pack, when the driver spotted something five hundred yards ahead — a bunch of trucks blocking the highway. Not knowing what to do, he rolled to a stop. More cars pulled over, and then some trucks, and soon Highway 169 became a parking lot that spilled into the adjoining desert. The afternoon was passing and night wasn’t too far away. If they were going to get into Prescott before darkness fell, they had to keep moving.

  Sati Bashara couldn’t believe what he saw. After the vicious fight to break through Patton’s defenses to the south, here were even more of the cursed infidels. How could it be? Where had they all come from?

  He climbed on the roof of the Z-28 and inspected the heap of trucks in the middle of the highway. The angle of the sun interfered with his focus, but he saw an older man standing on a vehicle and wondered if that was the infamous General Patton.

  He called for a volunteer. Dozens of young men stepped forward. Selecting one of the youngest, he gave the boy instructions to drive one of the larger trucks at the enemy barricade as fast as he could. The boy smiled as if Allah himself had picked him. Bashara ordered a battered Ford F-650 with a bent flatbed brought forward.

  “May our beloved Caliph be with you,” he said, patting the boy’s cheek.

  “He is a brave warrior.” Haleem reached over and wiped dirty sweat from Bashara’s face and neck.

  “Yes, he is filled with the spirit of the New Prophet.”

  “Your eyes are better than mine, Sati, but even I see two Bradleys blocking the road, and after the events of this day, we must assume their weapons work. That boy will never get within one hundred yards of them.”

  “We cannot presume to know the wisdom of the New Prophet or the will of Allah,” Sati said. “But even if you are right, we must know their firepower. He will draw their fire, and then we will know. And if his truck burns, perhaps the smoke will mask our approach.”

  Haleem gave him a strange look. “You were not always this cruel.”

  Bashara had learned how to command by studying his uncle, and his tone left no room for dispute. “Did you not hear the Emir before we left? Life is cruel. The New Prophet gives us the tools to complete the work of Allah, but it is up to us to use them. Too many of our men have already died this day. If by his death this young man can save more, then he will have his heavenly rewards. What more could anyone ask for?”

  The eager boy climbed into the truck and its previous driver gave him a quick lesson in how to drive it. Then, grinning at Bashara, he gunned the engine and started forward on the uneven pavement. After going a hundred yards, he had the feel of the truck and accelerated. By the time he had gone three hundred yards, he was at close to thirty-five miles per hour, a dangerous speed with so many cracks and holes in the asphalt. Bashara had heard stories of Japanese kamikaze pilots, and this seemed identical. The boy was intent on ramming his truck into the Bradley blocking the road. For a brief instant, Bashara thought he might make it.

  Then American gunfire raked the truck at two hundred yards from the perimeter. A 25mm shell smashed through the windshield and decapitated the driver. Several others penetrated the engine, and another blew off a tire. Flames spouted as the careening truck flipped over and over again before coming to a fiery finish eighty yards short of the perimeter. But with little wind to diffuse it, the oily black smoke hovered over the highway and obscured the Americans’ vision.

  “You see?” Bashara said to Haleem, pointing at the burning wreckage. “The boy is with Allah in paradise,
and we have a smokescreen to hide our advance. Without his sacrifice, that could have happened to us all. Learn, Haleem. Kindness is often cruel, and cruelty is often kind.”

  1819 hours

  Scattered cheering broke out as the truck blew up, but Nick Angriff had seen this before.

  “They were measuring our guns,” he said to Colonel Walling. The two men strode among the troops, giving encouragement and patting backs. “The next time they come, it will be in force.” He stopped beside a tall, lanky kid who gripped his M16 like a drowning man holding a life preserver. “What’s your name, son?”

  “Oresco, sir. Corporal Harold B.”

  “Where are you from?”

  “Dublin, Ohio, General.”

  “Where’s that?”

  “It’s a suburb of Columbus… well, it was.”

  Angriff’s smile was sympathetic. “Well, Oresco, Harold B., this is a good spot, but you might want to move over a little, put the engine block between you and the enemy. And remember, once you start shooting, don’t stop until there aren’t any more targets, got that? Keep firing no matter what.”

  “Yes, General. Thank you.”

  Walling waited to take notes or carry out orders, but the only thing left to do was fight.

  “The first thing they’re going to do is fan out left and right to put pressure on our flanks.” Using his index finger, Angriff traced a flat arc in the air, indicating the ground on either side. “That’s the obvious move. Sending that truck in alone was smart, but I don’t think the guy over there is a pro. So once they’re in place on our flanks, they’ll come straight down the highway with big stuff. Trucks, semis, anything that can take a hit and keep going. And that’s how we’ll hold them.”

  “I don’t follow, General,” Walling said.

  “The Bradleys will chew them up before they get to the perimeter, then they’ll block the highway with their own wreckage. The smaller cars and trucks in the rear won’t have anywhere to go. It’ll take a while for the infantry to get here and punch a hole in our defense.”

  “And then?”

  “Then we kill the bastards and hope reinforcements get here before we’re dead.”

  Chapter 45

  Man, man, your time is sand, your days are leaves upon the sea,

  I am the eyes of Nostradamus, all your ways are known to me.

  Al Stewart, “Nostradamus”

  1824 hours, July 29

  It happened exactly as Angriff described, only faster. Each minute brought salvation closer, so he hoped his enemy would delay to consider his next move. But as the sun sank toward the horizon, thirty light vehicles full of men fanned out on either side of the lager. If he commanded those vehicles, he’d coordinate with the main attack and then have them race to the perimeter, disgorge their men, and attack. On Highway 169, he would select a dozen of the largest trucks to smash into the Bradleys. Direct on their heels, he’d send in the infantry, with the first wave carrying any RPGs they still had. Finally, the rest of the vehicles would be in reserve, to exploit an opportunity if one arose.

  Angriff cursed the oily black smoke boiling from the shot-up Ford. Hanging low over the highway, it obscured visibility. A Caterpillar dump truck wasn’t spotted until it was less than three hundred yards away.

  Standing in the passenger seat of his Humvee, Angriff raised the radio mike and spoke to the Bradleys. “Don’t fire until you’ve got a clear shot. Then make it count. You’ve got to take out the leaders.”

  Santos stood beside him. She rested her rifle on the top bar of the windshield and licked her lips.

  Angriff nudged her. “You good, private?”

  “On fleek, sir.” Her voice wavered.

  He nodded, as though he knew what ‘on fleek’ meant. She looked up and their eyes met, and Angriff could see she was fighting back tears.

  “You’re gonna be fine, Santos. I promise.”

  The first two vehicles were heavy trucks, the Caterpillar and another dump truck, and they sped forward side by side, racing to hit the Americans first. Several times one or the other almost ran off the road. They rammed the burning truck and knocked the wreckage completely off the highway. On either side, the vehicles in the desert spewed dirt from their back tires and sped straight at the perimeter.

  The Bradleys opened up and 25mm high explosive rounds smashed into the twin dump trucks. As chunks flew off in their slipstream, they absorbed the damage and kept coming. The hood flipped backward on the right hand one, smashed the windshield, and fell off. Shell impacts shattered glass on both and the engines spewed steam from penetrating hits to the radiators. But the trucks hurtled forward anyway. One hundred fifty yards, then one twenty, one ten, one hundred… finally, at ninety yards, the left-hand truck caught fire and the engine exploded. The dying driver tried to hold it on the road but couldn’t. It skidded sideways, flipped, rolled over three times, and slid to stop within fifty yards of the lager.

  The other truck weaved to avoid the killing cannon shells. The driver lost control and it ran off the road, smashing into a boulder thirty feet from the highway. The gas tank exploded, spewing flaming gas all over the road.

  The Americans shifted fire to the following vehicles. This took a few seconds and the range had closed to less than one hundred twenty yards before the Bradleys lined them up in their targeting sights. The first dump truck blocked part of the highway. The Sevens either had to detour into the desert, or skirt around the massive roadblock in a single line. They did both.

  A refrigerator truck got within eighty yards before the 25mm shells did their work and it blew up in a fireball. But while the gunners concentrated on it, a fire truck picked up speed and burst out of a smoke cloud. It crashed less than twenty yards from the Bradley on the left. Two tractor trailers that skirted the shoulder of the road roared forward. A Bushmaster ripped the lead one into bits. The largest fragments slid to a stop ten yards from the perimeter, but the second one slammed into a truck and pushed it backward thirty feet. As the tractor trailer hissed steam from a ruptured radiator, the driver fell out. Bleeding from a cut scalp, he shouldered a rifle and aimed at a wiry soldier. But as his finger moved to the trigger, a bullet smashed into his back and left a hole the size of walnut. It severed his spinal cord, cut through his chest, and exited below the sternum. The impact knocked him five feet backward.

  Standing in his Humvee twenty yards away, Nick Angriff still had his sights on the man when the body fell face down in the dirt.

  “That’s one,” he said.

  “Good shot, General,” Santos said, although her face said she wanted to throw up.

  As the main attack down the highway penetrated the lager, the wave of cars and light trucks reached it on the flanks. A few took hits from small arms fire and spun out of control, but most got within ten yards of the perimeter and unloaded their cargoes of screaming men. Climbing over, under, and through the trucks, the Sevens shot it out with the Americans at close range. Six of them wriggled under one truck and came out inside the perimeter. Angriff saw them and tapped Imboden on the arm. The corporal swiveled the gun and pressed the trigger. A burst of fifty-caliber shells spattered the trucks with their bodies.

  Meanwhile, other vehicles had run the gauntlet of gunfire and smashed into the Bradleys. Enemy troops began coming through the lager. Angriff picked off targets all around the perimeter. He was methodical and deadly; Nick Angriff rarely missed. Spotting a man scooting over the hood of a truck, he waited for him to land on his feet and put one round between his eyes. Another Seven climbed through a truck cab, peered out the driver’s window into the lager’s interior, and got a bullet in the eye for his trouble. Santos fired, too, while Imboden swung the GAU this way and that.

  Colonel Walling had been with the Bradleys and ran back to Angriff’s Humvee, dirty and bleeding. His rifle still smoked from firing its last burst.

  “We can’t hold, General. There’s too many of them!” he shouted over the din of explosions and rifle reports.

&
nbsp; “No, we can’t,” Angriff said. Hits ripped into the Humvee all around him, but he ignored them. He pulled the trigger and the Desert Eagle recoiled in his hands. A stocky man in a red shirt and jeans flipped onto his back from the impact of a fifty-caliber round smashing into his chest.

  Standing in defiance of danger, with the standard of the 7th Cavalry beside him, Angriff took aim and fired, again and again and again. When both pistols were empty, he leaned close to Walling’s ear and said, “Our mission is to buy time, and that’s what we’re going to do. Pull everybody back to here and this is where we’ll make our stand.” He began reloading one of the Eagles.

  “How are you holding up, private?” he said to Santos.

  But the young woman was crumpled in the seat, although she tried to mumble in response.

  Angriff went to his knees and saw the wound immediately. He slid one arm under her and put his other hand over the hole in her throat. Her blood soaked his uniform. “Medic!” he screamed. “Medic! You’re gonna be fine, private, you hear me? Medic!”

  Glide and Nipple were on the perimeter and heard his call. Both had trained as field medics.

  Angriff saw them running his way and locked eyes with Glide. “She’s got a throat wound. There’s a first aid kit in the back.”

  Glide grabbed the kit while Nipple leaned in to see the wound.

  “I want her doing this,” he said, indicating Glide.