Firepower

by John Cutter

  He kept striding on. Twenty minutes, and he rounded a curve to see the two guards and the gate blocking his way.

  “Hello, Gunny,” said Vince, strolling up to the checkpoint.

  CHAPTER TEN

  “You were issued a uniform,” Gunny said, glaring at him with his one remaining eye.

  “I have it here in the bag,” Vince said. “There’s blood on it. I should have gotten rid of it. But… I figured I might need it so Gustafson would have some kind of proof.”

  “Proof of what?” asked the other guard. It was the ex-con with tattoos up his neck, Dale French. Carrying an AR-15.

  “That I carried out the mission. You two probably weren’t briefed.”

  Gunny shook his head. “No, I wasn’t. But you coming here like that — and on foot — no, you’re not going through this gate without authorization from Mac.”

  Vince smiled grimly. “Mac? I could tell you a story about Mac Colls.”

  “What story’s that?” French snorted.

  Vince shook his head. “Not for your inky ears, kid.”

  “What’d you say to me, dude?” French said, starting to come around the gate.

  Gunny reached out and grabbed French’s arm, holding him back. “You try it, he’ll wrap that rifle around your head.”

  Takes a professional to know one, Vince thought. Too bad he’d probably have to kill Gunny. The twisted old bastard.

  Gunny was on his cell phone now. “Need you out here, Mac. Question about a man at the gate.”

  He broke the connection, and Vince put down the shopping bag.

  “I should mention that I’m armed.” He lifted his shirt to show the Desert Eagle.

  French whistled. “That’s a big damn pistol.”

  “Better leave that with me,” Gunny said. “For now.”

  Vince thought about it. Then he nodded. “I guess it’s protocol.”

  He tugged the big pistol out of his waistband and handed it across the gate to Gunny.

  “Can I see it?” French said, putting his hand out.

  “No,” Gunny said, hefting the gun.

  They waited, Vince with his arms crossed over his chest, whistling that old Jimi Hendrix song to himself.

  A dark-green SUV came down the road from the base. Mac Colls was at the wheel. He pulled up just behind the checkpoint, got out, staring at Vince.

  “You look surprised to see me, Sarge,” Vince said mildly as Colls walked toward him, one hand on his holstered Glock.

  Colls looked at the two guards. “You men leave us here — I need to talk to this man alone.”

  “My orders don’t allow for that,” Gunny said. “The General said—”

  “This is coming from the General!” said Colls, drawing his pistol.

  “You’re lying, Mac,” said Vince — and he vaulted over the gate, knocked Colls’ gun hand aside, and hit him hard on the point of the chin with an uppercut.

  Colls grunted and fell flat on his back, the gun still clutched in his hand. He was out cold.

  “What the fuck!” French burst out.

  As the two guards stared, still trying to wrap their heads around what had happened, Vince picked up Colls’ gun, tossed it into the brush, and then lifted the unconscious man up. He slung Colls over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry and toted him to the SUV.

  “Gunny,” French said, “we can’t let him — I mean—”

  “Stop right there, Bellator!” Gunny called.

  “You two can shoot me down, but the General sent me on a mission and he’s expecting me back, so you’d better think about explaining that to him,” Vince said as he dumped Colls in the passenger seat of the SUV. He walked over to the open driver’s side door and got in. The keys were in the ignition.

  “Just wait here while I call it in!” Gunny shouted.

  “I’ll explain to the General in person!” Vince shouted, starting the car. He backed the SUV up, turning, swung around and floored it, roaring down the gravel road toward the base.

  It took him about a minute to get there. The gates of the compound were open.

  Vince pulled into the compound and up to the front door of the bunker complex. He turned off the engine and got out as a guard called to him from the fence.

  “Hey — No one said you could — whoa there!”

  Vince picked up the still slumbering Colls, carried him over his shoulder into the building, up the stairs — past Wynn Foster, who was gaping in amazement — and up to Gustafson’s door. “General!” He called out. “It’s Vincent Bellator! Little emergency here!”

  Marco opened the door and Vince pushed past him, then dumped the groaning Colls on the floor. He was beginning to wake up.

  “Mac here had a mishap, sir,” Vince said.

  Gustafson, standing behind his desk, stared open-mouthed down at Colls. “What the devil is this?”

  “It started with his taking a shot at me when I was coming back to exfil, and then taking off in the heli without me,” Vince said. “Just now he tried to get me alone — and he had his gun in his hand. I left my gun and the bag with my uniform in it with Gunny Hansen.”

  “He hit me,” Colls said, rubbing his jaw. He tried to sit up. “Sucker-punched me.”

  “If you let someone sucker-punch you, you don’t know your job,” Vince said.

  Gustafson turned to Marco. “What’s this about? I was told Bellator didn’t come back from the mission!”

  “Well — the sarge ordered me to take off,” Marco said, wincing. “I did notice he took a shot at something through the door. But I didn’t see who…”

  “Stirner’s men,” Colls said, wobblingly sitting up. “Shot at them.”

  “There was no one left alive to follow me back,” Vince said. “I killed them. Stirner too.”

  “We got word that Stirner and a group of men were killed,” Gustafson said, sinking into his desk chair. “But… I don’t know who to believe.”

  “I figured the Ragnarins killed Bellator and came after the helicopter,” Marco said. “Because — why would the sarge shoot at Bellator?”

  “Why indeed?” said Gustafson, looking at Colls.

  “First he shot at me,” Vince said, “and then he left me there and didn’t pick up when I called from the burner. He figured it was his chance to get rid of me. Maybe he thinks I’m a rival. Maybe he’s with the feds. I don’t know why he did it, General. But I’m reporting in. Mission accomplished, sir.”

  “He’s lying!” Colls snarled. He stood up, still unsteady.

  “You hit him, Bellator, because — you said he pulled a gun on you? Where was this?”

  “Out at the checkpoint. But I hit him because he deliberately took off with me right there in view — with no enemy around me. And he took a shot at me. I have a strong suspicion he wanted to get me away from Gunny and French and shoot me.”

  “Oh, bullshit, he was under arrest for coming in like that without reporting properly, without… without…”

  Gustafson stared at Colls. “Mac — it seems to me the bullshit here is coming from you. You never said anything about having to shoot at anyone from that helicopter. You kept that from me. Well… it seems there’s some enmity between you and Bellator here. Why is that?”

  “I told you before, General — I don’t trust him!” Mac snapped, jabbing a finger at Vince. “He hasn’t been here long enough to be trusted!”

  “The whole point of the mission,” Vince said, “was for me to prove myself. Now I’ve done that. Half a dozen men are dead. I put my life and my freedom on the line for the Brethren!”

  Gustafson nodded. “Seems that you did. And you succeeded in taking out Stirner. My judgment is this — Sergeant Colls here is on probation. He’s been with me from the start and I’m not going to lose him now. He keeps out of your way, you keep out of his.”

  Vince nodded. It was as good as he could hope for. “Yes sir, that’ll work for me — except there’s one issue. He tried to kill me once already — maybe twice. He’s got a gun.
I don’t have one. I have the right to bear arms, General. I want to carry my pistol. The one I left with Gunny Hansen.”

  “Who the hell does he think he is?” Colls asked in disbelief.

  Gustafson took a deep breath. “Very well. I think you’ve earned it. And Mac’s feelings aren’t going to apply here. He seems to have deliberately compromised the end of the mission—”

  “He’s lying about that, sir!” Colls protested.

  “Don’t interrupt me! He gets his gun. Marco, you see to that.”

  “Yes sir.”

  “And Mac — leave my office! Go and get some ice for that swollen jaw. Decide if you need an X-Ray. Whatever you need to do. I’ll talk to you later!”

  “General—”

  “You heard me, Sergeant!”

  Colls growled, threw Vince a glance of burning hatred, and stalked out the door.

  “Marco,” said Gustafson, “go get that gun and bring it here. His uniform too. Inform Gunny of my decision. I want to talk to Bellator here alone.”

  “Yes sir.”

  Marco hurried out, closing the door behind him.

  “Sit down, Vincent.”

  Vince sat across from the desk. He waited.

  Gustafson gave him a slight smile. “Rather amusing, the way you carried Mac in here and tossed him on the floor like a sack of potatoes. But hereafter, treat him with respect. Despite everything. Maybe he’ll learn to respect you in return.”

  Vince nodded gravely. Playing the part. “Yes sir.”

  “And remember — we have chain of command around here. We honor rank. He outranked you. From now on, you will honor rank if you intend to stay with us.”

  “Yes sir.”

  “We’ll have to get you another uniform,” Gustafson said. “I think we’ll burn that one.”

  “Yes sir. There’s blood on it.”

  Gustafson tented his fingers. “Vincent — the US military has made black and brown men a significant part of the armed forces. The Pentagon appoints black generals and it kowtows to the Jews. In fact — the Joint Chiefs are traitors to the white race. Which means they are traitors to the true America.” He looked solemnly at Vince. “Do you agree?”

  The irony of a highly treasonous man calling the military treasonous made Vince want to shake his head in amazement. But instead, he managed to reply with a reasonable facsimile of solemnity. “Yes sir. They are traitors.”

  “Good. I knew that was what was in your heart. The gods have told me so; the Great God has told me so!”

  Vince didn’t know how to reply to that. He just nodded in agreement.

  Gustafson laced his fingers, leaned forward onto the desk and, almost whispering, he said, “I do things around here on a need-to-know basis, Vincent. You know the saying; three men can keep a secret if two of them are dead. We’re not quite so rigid as that, but close. When Operation Firepower unfolds, there will be six separate groups of men responding from six regions of the country. None of them know their full role. Few of them know the full plan. In fact, most of these men know very little — only that it’s a serious military action to be taken in D.C. They do know that they risk being killed or arrested. We’ve spent years getting men we could rely on, in those conditions. But they understand the need for secrecy. Hence, you’ll understand, I cannot tell you everything.” He took a deep breath and went on, “But I will tell you what your part in it is — at least, initially. On the day of the operation, your mission, Vincent, will be to go to a certain place, where the Joint Chiefs of Staff will be meeting with Defense Intelligence personnel. You will thereupon kill everyone in the room. You will assassinate the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the United States military…”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  “He wants you to do what?” Agent Deirdre Corlin had raised her voice a little, to go with her raised eyebrows.

  Vince glanced nervously at the door of the library. No one seemed to be passing. He was back in Germanic Brethren uniform, but he felt he stuck out like a sore thumb after what had happened with Colls. “You heard right. The Joint Chiefs. I think he figures even if I failed, I’d create so much chaos at the Pentagon it’d be another one of the decoys he prizes. It’ll draw more police and soldiers away from the real attack — and it’ll make a ‘Germanic Brethren’ point of its own. I don’t have a when or the target address. He’s being cagey with that.”

  “I’ve got to report this as soon as I can…”

  “You don’t have to bring my name into it. Let’s do that as little as possible. Just let ’em know it’s planned.”

  She nodded. “It doesn’t matter because we’re not going to let anyone do it.”

  “I wonder how much he thinks he can really accomplish for his idiotic cause with all this,” Vince murmured. “I mean, it’s not as if—”

  He broke off, hearing Wynn Foster and Shaun Adler talking in the hall outside the open door of the little library.

  “I don’t know when and I don’t know where,” Wynn was saying. “But we’re doing it. And it’s soon…”

  They kept walking past the library. After he was sure they were gone, Vince whispered, “You find out anything?”

  “I’m almost there. The guy you just heard saying he doesn’t know? He knows. He’s handling the dark web interface for the whole plan.”

  “You’re using feminine wiles?”

  “It’s my way into his head,” she said, sighing. “But he’s not going to get lucky.”

  Vince smiled. Looking at this strong, admirable woman, crackling with intelligence and energy, he could almost daydream of getting lucky with her himself. But that daydream was something he didn’t allow himself anymore.

  Still — was there a sexual tension between him and Deirdre? He kind of thought there was.

  “What’s on your mind?” she asked suddenly.

  “Me?” He was a little startled. “Nothing — I mean, everything. We need to know where and when and we need to know it soon, Deirdre. We need to be able to get into the emails, the directives, whatever’s going out on the dark web.”

  She looked at him with her head cocked and her eyes narrowed, as if unsure of him. “I am still not committing to giving you what I find out. You’re a loose cannon, Bellator.”

  “I delivered Stirner to your people. Even though someone should have wrung his neck.”

  “Do I want to know how you did it?”

  “Probably not. Anyway, you’re stuck with me. I’m here. I’ve still got to get Bobby out of that cell. And whatever they’re planning — I’m not going to let it happen. Just tell me what you can. But I’ll be more help if I know what’s going on. All of it.”

  She shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe I should get permission. I’ll be going out after mushrooms tomorrow. I’ll make the call then.”

  “We’ve got some night training,” Vince said. “I’d better get out there.”

  *

  “Yeah, man, they’re installing a minigun on that helicopter,” Shaun Adler said as he and Vince moved into place in the woods. Each carrying an AR-15, they were trudging along in the trees around the range at the foot of the hill, both of them with night-seeing goggles on. The forest was an eerie shade of green and yellow through the night lenses. They could see the other men in their assigned approaches, coming from three directions to converge on the dozens of plywood outlines; silhouettes in the size and shape of men and women, set up in the center of the gun range area. They would converge their fire on the targets, and they were assigned to do it at shooting angles that weren’t directly across from another shooter. That was the theory anyhow. Vince knew it could go badly wrong if someone screwed up.

  The whole exercise gave Vince a sick feeling inside. Maybe this was just a rehearsal, but on a certain level, shit was getting real.

  Because tonight they were practicing shooting into a crowd of people.

  “What kind of minigun?” he asked. A “minigun” was not so mini. It was a very large and deadly serious machine gun. “NATO-style rotary
miniguns?”

  “Pretty much — an M134! I helped carry it up there — and the tools too. Marco’s up there installing it with Gunny Hansen. Seems Gunny used them back in the Gulf War. They’re having to cut into the deck and do some welding to retrofit that shit in there.”

  “That gun is old school. Vietnam era. Still some serious firepower to put on a civilian heli.”

  “Sure as hell is…”

  The 7.62 x 51mm rotary machine gun was a kind of modern Gatling gun; its six barrels, driven by an electric motor, spun around and fired six-thousand rounds a minute. Devastating firepower…

  A weapon like that in the hands of the Germanic Brethren, attached to a helicopter? The thought gave Vince a chill.

  They reached their position marked with dayglow spray paint on a tree trunk and aimed their assault weapons. Vince waited for the signal.

  A bullhorn voice called out, “Open fire!”

  Fifteen men opened fire using three firing trajectories, their select-fire, auto-enabled AR-15s tearing into the wooden replicas. The night echoed with gunfire, an avalanche of racketing sound, muzzle flashes lit up yellow in the night-vision as the men fired and fired, .223 Remington rounds tearing the dummies to splinters…

  These sons of bitches have to be stopped, Vince thought. Whatever it takes.

  *

  At lunch the next day, eating fried chicken and boiled vegetables, Vince glanced up to see Deirdre refilling his coffee cup. “Been to the library lately, Private Bellator?”

  “No I have not. Any new books?”

  “Yeah. You might want to pop in real quick after lunch. Something good came in.”

  She moved on and Shaun, sitting beside him, elbowed him and sniggered. “Dude you are so going to get some!”

  “What, in the library?”

  “That’s just the start, man. She’s so into you. ‘Something good came in’. Yeah right!”

  Vince shook his head. “We’re just studying German together is all it is.”

  “That’s how it starts, man.”

  “Listen to Mr. Experience here.”

  “Hey, you’d be surprised…”