The flaming drum of diesel oil flew over the ravaged wall like a fiery meteor and sailed high over the rear tank, striking the ground a considerable distance to its rear before exploding.
Pitt stood amazed. "This thing does the job better than I ever imagined," he muttered.
"Down 50 meters and 10 to the right," observed Pembroke-Smythe as nonchalantly as if he was relating a soccer score.
As Levant's men helped hoist another barrel in place, Pitt cut a new mark on the launch plank to adjust for the distance. Next, he engaged the forklift's hydraulics, bending back the spring bow again. The torch was applied, the trigger mechanism was unleashed, and the second oil drum was on its way.
This one struck a few meters in front of the rear tank, bounced, and then rolled underneath and between the treads before exploding. The tank was instantly enveloped in flames. The crew, in their desperation to abandon the vehicle, fought each other to be first to escape through the hatches. Only two out of four made it out alive.
Pitt lost no time in setting up the spring bow again. Another oil drum was manhandled into place and flung at the advancing tanks. Pitt scored a direct hit this time. The drum flew in an arc over the wall and dropped squarely on the next tank's turret where it exploded and turned the vehicle into a blazing incinerator.
"It's working, it's really working," Pitt muttered jubilantly as he readied the spring bow for the next shot.
"Jolly good show!" shouted the normally reserved Pembroke-Smythe. "You hit the bleeding wogs where it hurts most."
Pitt and the commandos who struggled to hoist the next oil drum on the launch plank didn't need any urging. Levant climbed to the only undamaged parapet and surveyed the battlefield. The unexpected destruction of two of Kazim's tanks had temporarily halted the advance. Levant was highly pleased with the initial success of Pitt's machine, but if only one tank survived to reach the fort, it was enough to spell disaster for the defenders.
Pitt triggered the release mechanism for the fourth drum. It flew true but the tank commander, now aware of the fiery onslaught from the fort, ordered his driver to zigzag. His caution paid off as the drum's trajectory carried it 4 meters behind the left rear tread. The drum burst, but only a portion of the blazing liquid splashed on the armored tail of the tank, and the monster relentlessly pressed on toward the fort.
To the fighters crouched amid the rubble, the approaching horde of Malians looked like an army of migrating ants. There were so many, so bunched together it would be nearly impossible to miss. The Malians, shouting their individual war cries, came on firing steadily.
The first wave was only a few meters from Levant's firing stakes, but he held off giving the order to fire, guardedly hopeful that Pitt could take out the two remaining tanks. His wish was answered as Pitt, anticipating the tank commander's next change in course, adjusted his spring bow accordingly and laid his fifth flaming missile almost into the driver's front hatch.
A sheet of fire covered the front of the tank. And then incredibly, it blew up. The entire advance halted as they all stared in astonishment at the tank's turret that was thrown whirling high into the desert sky before falling and embedding itself in the sand like a leaden kite.
Pitt was down to his last drum of diesel oil. He was so exhausted now with the physical effort in the body-sapping heat, he could hardly stand. His breath came in great heaves and his heart was pounding from the continuous strain of helping manhandle the heavy drums onto the launching plank, and then straining to shift the spring bow and its supports for aiming.
The huge 60-ton tank loomed through the dust and smoke like an immense steel gargoyle searching for victims to consume. The tank's commander could be seen giving orders to his driver and directing his gunner as his machine gun opened up at point blank range.
Everyone in the fort tensed and held their breath as Pitt lined up the spring bow. Many thought the end had come. This was his final shot, the last of the oil-filled containers.
No football place kicker ever had more riding on a field goal in overtime play to win a game. If Pitt misjudged, a lot of people were going to die, including himself and those children down in the arsenal.
The tank came straight on, its commander making no attempt to dodge. It was so close that Pitt had to elevate the rear of the spring bow to depress the launch plank. He kicked the trigger and hoped for the best.
The tank's gunner fired at the same moment. In a fantastic freak of coincidence the heavy shell and the flaming drum met in midair.
In his excitement, the gunner inside the tank had loaded an armor-piercing shell that bored right through the drum, causing a great sheet of fiery oil to spray all over the tank. The steel monster immediately became lost in a curtain of fire. In panic, the driver threw the tank in reverse in a vain attempt to escape the holocaust, colliding with the burning tank behind. Locked together, the great armored vehicles quickly became a raging conflagration, punctuated by the roar of their exploding shells and fuel tanks.
The commandos' cheers rose above the sound of the incoming gunfire. Their worst fears eliminated by Pitt's scratch-built spring bow, their morale at a fever pitch, they became more determined than ever to make a fight of it. Fear did not exist in battered old Fort Foureau this day.
"Pick your targets and commence firing," Levant ordered in a formal tone. "Now it's our turn to make them suffer."
One minute Giordino could make out a long line of four trains stopped dead on the tracks, the next, everything was blanked out by a sudden current of swirling air that whipped up a sandstorm. Visibility went from 20 kilometers to 50 meters.
"What do you think?" asked Steinholm as he idled the dune buggy in third gear, trying to nurse the last precious few drops of fuel. "Are we in Mauritania?"
"I wish I knew," Giordino conceded. "Looks like Massarde stopped all incoming trains but I can't tell which side of the border they're on."
"What does the navigational computer have to say?"
"The numbers suggest we crossed the border 10 kilometers back."
"Then we might as well approach the track bed and take our chances."
As he spoke, Steinholm threaded the vehicle between two large rocks and drove up the crest of a small hill, then braked to a sudden halt. Both men heard it at the same instant. The sound was unmistakable through the blowing of the wind. It was faint, but there was no mistaking the strange thump. Each second it became clearer, and then seemed to be on top of them.
Steinholm hurriedly twisted the wheel, shoved the accelerator to the firewall, and swung the fast attack vehicle in a wheel-spinning broadside until it had snapped around on a reverse course. Then abruptly, the engine sputtered and died, starved for lack of gas. The two men sat helplessly as the vehicle rolled to a stop.
"Looks to me as if we just bought the farm," grunted Giordino bleakly.
"They must have picked us up on their radar and are coming straight at us," Steinholm lamented as he angrily pounded the steering wheel.
Slowly through the brown curtain of sand and dust, like some huge beastly insect from an alien planet, a helicopter materialized and hovered 2 meters off the ground. Staring into a 30-millimeter Chain gun, two pods of thirty-eight 2.75-inch rockets, and eight laser-guided anti-tank missiles was an unnerving experience. Giordino and Steinholm sat rigid in the dune buggy, braced for the worst.
But instead of a fiery blast and then oblivion, a figure dropped from a hatch in the belly. As he approached they could see he was wearing a desert combat suit laden with high-tech gizmos. The head was covered by a camouflaged cloth-covered helmet and the face with a mask and goggles. He carried a leveled submachine gun as though it was an appendage of his hands.
He stopped beside the dune buggy and looked down at Giordino and Steinholm for a long moment. Then he pulled aside his mask and said, "Where in hell did you guys come from?"
Finished with the swing bow, Pitt grabbed a pair of submachine guns from two badly wounded tactical team fighters and took up a positio
n in a one-man stronghold he'd fashioned from fallen stone. He was impressed with the uniformed nomads from the desert. They were big men who ran and dodged with imposing agility as they swept toward the fort. The closer they got without encountering opposition, the braver they became.
Outnumbered fifty-to-one, the UN tactical team could not hope to hold out long enough for rescue. This was one time the underdog had no chance of pulling off an upset. Pitt quickly realized how the defenders of the Alamo must have felt. He sighted the incoming horde and pressed the trigger at Levant's command to fire.
The first wave of the Malian security force was met with a withering blast of gunfire that ripped into their advance. They made easy targets over ground totally denuded of cover. Hunched down in the rubble, the UN fighters took their time and fired with deadly aim. Like weeds before a scythe, the attackers fell in heaps almost before they knew what hit them. Within twenty minutes, more than two hundred seventy-five lay dead and wounded around the perimeters of the fort.
The second wave stumbled over the bodies of the first, hesitated as their ranks were devastated, and fell back. None, even their officers, had expected anything resembling hard-core resistance. Kazim's hastily planned attack unraveled in chaos. His force began to panic, many in the rear firing blindly into their own men in front.
As the Malians fell back in confusion, most running like animals before a brush fire, a brave few walked slowly backward, continuing to shoot at anything that remotely looked like the head of a fort defender. Thirty of the attackers tried to take cover behind the burning tanks, but Pembroke-Smythe had expected that tactic and directed an accurate fire that cut them down.
Only one hour after the assault had begun, the crack of gunfire faded and the barren sand around the fort became filled with the cries of the wounded and the moans of the dying. The UN team was stunned and angered to see that no effort was made by the Malians to retrieve their own men. They did not know that an enraged Kazim had given orders to leave the injured to suffer under the blistering Sahara sun.
Amid the debris of the fort, the commandos slowly rose from their rifle pits and began to take count. One dead and three wounded, two seriously, Pembroke-Smythe reported to Levant. "I'd say we gave them a good drubbing," he said jauntily.
"They'll be back," Levant reminded him.
"At least we cut the odds a bit."
"So did they," said Pitt, offering the Colonel a drink from his water container. "We have four less able-bodied men to repel the next attack while Kazim can call in reinforcements."
"Mr. Pitt is right," agreed Levant. "I observed helicopters bringing in two more companies of men."
"How soon do you reckon they'll try again?" Pitt asked Levant.
The Colonel held up a hand to shield his eyes and squinted at the sun. "The hottest time of the day, I should think. His men are better acclimated to the heat than we are. Kazim will let us fry for a few hours before ordering another assault."
"They've been blooded now," said Pitt. "Next time there will be no stopping them."
"No," said Levant, his face haggard with fatigue. "I don't guess there will."
"What do you mean," Giordino demanded in white hot anger, "you won't go in there and bring them out?"
Colonel Gus Hargrove was not used to being challenged, especially by a cocky civilian who was a good head shorter than he was. Commander of an Army Ranger covert-attack helicopter task force, Hargrove was a hardened professional soldier, having flown and directed helicopter assaults in Vietnam, Grenada, Panama, and Iraq. He was tough and shrewd, respected by his subordinates and superiors alike. His helmet came down and met a pair of blue eyes that blazed with the hardness of tempered steel. A cigar was stuffed in one side of his mouth, which was occasionally removed so he could spit.
"You don't seem to get it, Mr. Giordano."
"Giordino."
"Whatever," Hargrove muttered indifferently. "There was an information leak, probably through the United Nations. The Malians were waiting for us to cross into their air space. Half their air force is patrolling just beyond the border as we speak. In case you don't know it, the Apache helicopter is a great missile platform but no match for Mirage jet fighters. Certainly not in daylight hours. Without a squadron of Stealth fighters to fly protective cover, we can't go in until after dark. Only then can we take advantage of low terrain and desert gulches to fly under their radar screen. Do you get the picture?"
"Men, women, and children are going to die if you don't reach Fort Foureau within the next few hours."
"Rushing my unit over here with advance notice to the other side, without backup, and in the middle of the day was bad timing and ill advised," Hargrove stated firmly. "We attempt to go into Mali from Mauritania now, and my four choppers will be blasted out of the sky 50 kilometers inside the border. You tell me, sir, just what good would that do your people inside the fort?"
Properly pinned against the wall, Giordino shrugged. "I stand rebuked. My apologies, Colonel. I wasn't aware of your situation."
Hargrove softened. "I understand your concern, but now that we've been compromised and the Malians are chafing at the bit to ambush us, I'm afraid chances of saving your people are out of the question."
Giordino felt as if his stomach was squeezed by a vise. He turned away from Hargrove and stared across the desert. The sandstorm had passed and he could see the trains standing on the track in the distance.
He turned back. "How many men under your command?"
"Not counting the chopper crews, I have a fighting force of eighty men."
Giordino's eyes widened. "Eighty men to take on half the Malian security force?"
"Yes," Hargrove grinned as he removed the cigar butt and spit. "But we have enough firepower to level half of western Africa."
"Suppose you could cross the desert to Fort Foureau without detection?"
"I'm always open to a good plan."
"The inbound trains for the Fort Foureau hazardous waste project, have any been allowed through?"
Hargrove shook his head. "I sent a team leader to check out the situation. He reported that the train crews were instructed by radio to halt at the Mauritania/Mali border. The engineer for the first train said he was told to sit idle until ordered to proceed by the superintendent of the project's rail yard."
"How strong is the Malian check point on the border?"
"Ten guards, maybe twelve."
"Could you take them out before they gave an alarm?"
Mechanically, Hargrove's eyes traveled over the train's cargo cars, lingered on the five flatbed cars and the canvas covers that protected new freight vehicles bound for Fort Foureau, and then moved briefly to the Malian border guard, house sitting beside the track before returning to Giordino. "Could John Wayne ride a horse?"
"We can be there in two and a half hours," said Giordino. "Three on the outside."
Hargrove removed the cigar from his mouth and seemed to be contemplating it. "I think I've got your slant now. General Kazim would never expect my force to come charging into his playground on a train."
"Load the men inside the cargo container cars. Your choppers can ride on the flatbed cars undercover. Get to the objective before Kazim sees through the facade, and we have a good chance at evacuating Colonel Levant's people and the civilians and beating it back to Mauritania before the Malians know what hit them."
Giordino's plan appealed to Hargrove, but he had doubts.
"Suppose one of Kazim's hotshot pilots sees a train ignoring instructions and decides to blow it off the tracks?"
"Kazim, himself, wouldn't dare destroy one of Yves Massarde's hazardous waste trains without absolute proof it had been hijacked."
Hargrove paced up and down. The daring of the scheme sounded outlandish to him. Speed was essential. He decided to lay his career on the line and go for it.
"All right," he said briefly. "Let's get the Wabash Cannonball rolling."
Zateb Kazim raved like a madman in frustration at failin
g to bludgeon Levant and his small team from the old Foreign Legion fort. He cursed and ranted at his officers almost in hysteria, like a child who had his toys taken away from him. He dementedly slapped two of them in the face and ordered them all shot on two different occasions before his Chief of Staff, Colonel Cheik, soothingly talked him out of it. Barely under control, Kazim stared at his retreating troops scathingly and demanded they reform immediately for a second assault.
Despairing of Kazim's wrath, Colonel Mansa drove through his retreating force, shouting and berating his officers, accusing them of shame that sixteen hundred attackers could not overrun a pitiful handful of defenders. He harangued them into regrouping their companies for another try. To drive home the message there would be no more failure, Mansa had ten men who were caught trying to desert the battlefield shot on the spot.
Instead of attacking the fort with encircling waves, Kazim massed his forces into one massive column. The reinforcements were formed in the rear and ordered to shoot any man in front of them who broke and ran. The only command from Kazim that was passed down the lines from company to company was "fight or die."
By two o'clock in the afternoon, the Malian security forces were reformed and ready for the signal. One look a t his sullen and fearful troops and any good commander would have aborted the attack. Kazim was not a leader his men loved enough to die for. But as they looked out over the body-littered ground around the fort, anger slowly began to replace their fear of death.
This time, they silently vowed between them, the defenders of Fort Foureau were going to their graves.
With an incredible display of casual indifference to sniper bullets, Pembroke-Smythe sat under the torrid sun on a shooting stick, a spiked cane that opens into a seat, and observed the Malian formations as they lined up for the assault.
"I do believe the beggars are about to make another go," he informed Levant and Pitt.
A series of flares were shot in the air to signal the advance. There was no dodging with covering fire like the previous assault. The Malian force raced over the flat ground at a dead run. Shouts erupted and echoed over the desert from, nearly two thousand throats.
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