Rules of War

by Matthew Betley

  Logan strafed back and forth, adjusting the elevation of the barrel slightly each time to ensure he struck anyone on the floor, hiding on the benches, or standing up. The weapon chattered with its thunderous clack-clack-clack, a higher pitch than the M240G that the Marine Corps used as its crew-served 7.62mm death dealer of choice. The passenger car’s windows exploded outward on both sides, sparks showered from the metal roof, benches were shattered under the barrage, and several cries of pain rang out, only to end abruptly a moment later.

  Logan kept the trigger depressed, although he knew he might overheat the barrel. But who cares? This is a one-time-use weapon. He strafed across the car diagonally in both directions, creating an invisible X of machine-gun bullets, and the last of the ammunition belt fed into the weapon. The weapon went silent, and the sounds of the rushing wind and rolling train returned to the forefront of his hearing.

  Marcos immediately entered the car, his MP5 up and searching hopelessly for any targets left alive, even though he knew Logan had turned the passenger car into a mobile slaughterhouse. Nothing moved. “I got to tell you, man, that . . . was . . . awesome,” Marcos said at last, exhilaration still in his voice.

  Logan understood the sentiment completely. There was nothing quite like the display of overwhelming firepower delivering death and carnage to one’s enemies. It was primal, savage, and true. He’d just ended countless lives inside the passenger car, but he didn’t feel guilty. This was war, and he felt pride and satisfaction that none of his men had perished in this part of the battle. But it’s not over yet.

  “I feel you, but we’re not done yet,” Logan replied, shoving the spent machine gun to the side. “One car—or should I say engine—left to go.” He stood, unslung his MP5 off his back, and entered the car behind Marcos, who was already stalking down the center aisle.

  Logan heard the rest of the team follow him inside the passenger car, the only sound they made that of boots crunching on shattered glass. But it was the devastation that captured his attention. It had been complete.

  Several bodies lay along the walls, in between the benches, torn to shreds and missing large chunks of various body parts. Blood pooled on the floor on both sides of the car, and light twinkled on the shattered glass like diamonds in a dark sea of red. They never had a chance, Logan thought, followed immediately by, which was the entire point of the plan.

  The team reached the other end of the passenger car. Marcos turned back to Logan, who’d already formulated the final phase of the assault on the train. “What’s next? You’re running this show, and not half-bad for a Marine,” Marcos said.

  His adrenaline still fueled by the carnage he’d wrought, Logan allowed a grim smile and accepted the compliment. “Now the real fun begins.” He explained his intent and what needed to happen to take the cab of the train with minimal risk to them but the highest chance of capturing the vice president alive. When he finished, he asked, “Any questions?”

  As he expected, there were none, but Marcos added, “You’re a little crazy, you know that, right? Makes me wonder why we ever tried to go against you. Bad call on our part, I guess, but in our defense, you were still drinking at the time.”

  Taking it in stride, Logan replied, “Cain coming after me for the flag was probably the best thing that ever happened to me because I’ve been sober since that day. Probably never would’ve happened without the violent wake-up call. Regardless, I appreciate that, and now, the asshole at the front of the train is going to come to the realization you just had: he should’ve never started this fight.” Logan stepped past Marcos and opened the door to the outside.

  * * *

  Several minutes had passed, and yet Cole and the two assassins waited, motionless inside the forest, just out of view and cloaked in darkness. Doubt had begun to creep into Cole’s mind when the drone operator said, “Movement at the far end of the camp. Five signatures, moving toward your position from the large building south of where the track splits into three dead ends. They’re walking, not running, but their weapons are up.”

  A brief sense of triumph coursed through Cole, but he abruptly squashed it. Guessing right is only half the battle, and the smaller one at that, smart guy. “Roger. I don’t have eyes-on. Keep updating me every seven or eight seconds until I have them.”

  “Roger that,” the drone operator replied.

  Cole had assumed, correctly, that the vice president would want to leave as soon as possible. They had three choices for their escape—on foot, in a vehicle, or by air. He knew which one he would’ve picked if he were in Baker’s shoes.

  “I told you they’d come for the Hind,” Cole said to the two assassins.

  “We’ll give you that one too, I guess,” the second assassin, named Thomas, said.

  “Jeez. Thanks. That means the world to me,” Cole replied drily.

  “Don’t get all mushy about it,” Frederico piled on.

  Cole looked from one to the other, and said, “What? Are you guys some kind of stand-up tag team? I get stuck with the killer comedians. Fucking fantastic.”

  The next update interrupted the exchange. “They’re approximately three hundred or so feet from you, passing the middle building.”

  “Roger,” Cole replied, and looked over through the scope on his M4 Commando at the space between the helicopter and the vehicles. Five dark figures began to materialize in the murky light in the middle of the camp. “I have eyes-on,” Cole said into the radio. “Go radio silent from here on out, unless you see something we don’t.”

  “Roger. Happy hunting. Skybird out,” the drone operator said.

  “Just like I said, guys. We wait until they get as close as possible, and when we have a one-hundred-percent positive ID on the vice president, we take out his protection, and then we take him. But do not engage if you do not have a clear shot. He has to live, no matter what. Are we clear on that?” Cole asked imploringly.

  “You got it, brother-man,” Frederico said.

  “No sweat, ’mericano,” Thomas said, smirking as he said it.

  Unreal. The fucking Abbott and Costello of hit men. “Okay, then. We shoot on my count,” Cole said, and watched as the group of five men stalked quietly across the dead camp.

  The jokes were over, at least for now. Cole looked through his scope as the other two did the same. There were two soldiers in front, one man behind them in the middle, and two men in the rear, creating a domino-five formation. “I’ve got the front man on the right,” Cole said.

  “I’ve got front left,” Frederico said.

  “I’ll take rear left once you drop your guy, Freddy,” Thomas said.

  Freddy? Are these guys serious? Cole thought, and pushed it out of his mind as he focused on his target.

  The group was now less than 150 feet away. Gotcha, motherfucker. “I have positive ID on Baker. I say again, I have positive ID on the package.” Dressed in khaki cargo pants and a dark shirt, the fugitive vice president wore a black baseball cap to conceal his salt-and-pepper hair, and shadows blurred his features. But Cole knew it had to be him, in the center. “On my mark,” Cole said, waiting for the optimal moment to take the shot.

  The group moved quietly and purposefully toward the helicopter, adjusting their direction toward the parked Mi-24. Not long now. Wait for it. Wait for it. Three. Two. One. “Fire,” Cole said, and slowly squeezed the trigger. Frederico followed suit a fraction of a second later.

  The front two soldiers dropped as if knocked to the ground by an invisible hand.

  Thomas fired immediately, and the rear left soldier crumpled.

  As the first three men hit the ground, Cole adjusted the dot on his reflex scope to center mass of the last soldier standing, squeezed quickly one more time, and sprang to his feet even as the last of the vice president’s guards fell. He launched into a sprint, emerging from the forest with the ferocity of a wild predator, intent on its kill.

  By then, the vice president had pivoted and begun to run toward the other end of t
he camp in the direction from which his group had originally emerged.

  Frederico and Thomas were already moving, when the drone operator started shouting into Cole’s ear. “Two more targets moving from the northwest corner toward the forest! I say again, two more targets moving into the forest!”

  The hat flew off the fleeing figure, revealing jet-black hair. Sonofabitch. He knew we’d be waiting, and he wanted to draw us out. This bastard is smart.

  In one motion, Cole stopped running, raised the M4 Commando, and shot the decoy vice president in the back of his right leg, the round tearing a hole clean through the right calf, missing his shin by inches.

  “Damn, boss. I thought you said not to shoot the vice president,” Frederico said, catching up with Cole.

  “That’s not him,” Thomas said. “Keep up, will you?”

  “Frederico, stay with this guy. Find out who he is. Do not kill him, or even hurt him, for that matter. In fact, try to treat that wound and bandage it up. We may need him. Thomas, you’re with me. Now it’s your turn to keep up,” Cole said, and broke out into a trot, cutting a diagonal across the middle of the camp toward the northwest corner.

  “Skybird, keep eyes on the two targets. We’re on the move in their direction,” Cole said into his microphone.

  Shouldn’t have run. You’re only delaying the inevitable and pissing me off, and I don’t anger quickly like Logan.

  CHAPTER 33

  Logan crawled along the top of the train’s engine and worked his way forward, careful to avoid shifting one way or another. Unlike the boxcar, the GE engine didn’t have a walkway. Instead, several hatches that swung upward to allow engineers and technicians access to the multiple engine compartments ran along the length of the engine. He didn’t realize it until he’d climbed up to the roof, but the engine was actually several large components attached to each other to power the lumbering beast.

  The noise and rushing wind were amplified on top and created the sensation that he was insulated inside a tunnel of sound, even though he was exposed to the elements. Logan felt as if the descent down the mountain through the forest had decreased in speed, albeit slightly. He wondered how much longer they’d be in the mountains, as the base was less than ten miles from the outskirts of the city in a straight-line distance. He crawled faster, protecting the small package in his right hand. He wanted to end the chase before the train reached civilization in order to prevent the further loss of innocent lives.

  He glanced backward one last time and saw that the two SUVs had caught up to the train, one on each side of the tracks, inching forward. I’m sure they have no idea what the hell we’re doing, but they’ll figure it out soon enough.

  Twenty seconds later he was at the front of the engine, and he grabbed a handle that jutted up at the edge, stabilizing himself on the swaying train. Time to grab the golden ring.

  Logan pulled himself forward, looked over the edge of the roof, spotted the right half of the engine’s windshield, and slammed the small package onto it. The extreme adhesive held the charge in place, and he quickly slid backward several feet, a thin filament wire trailing behind, connected to the small detonator he’d clipped to a loop at the top of his Kevlar vest.

  One of the two remaining mercenaries had assured him that the small explosive charge was designed to breach only. It contained no shrapnel, and as the mercenary handed him the charge, he’d said, “They might get some cuts from the window, but they should live.” Logan was about to test that hypothesis.

  He grabbed the detonator, flipped the small curved cover protecting the switch, and flipped the switch upward.

  Logan felt as much as heard the detonation, the explosive force sending a shock wave along the roof of the engine. He grabbed the last smoke grenade off his vest, scurried forward, pulled the pin, and tossed it through the shattered window. He’d considered a flash bang grenade to initiate a breach, but he realized that to send anyone into the engineer’s cab would be tantamount to suicide. It was a cramped space with narrow doors, even if the occupants were temporarily incapacitated. No, he’d thought, better to flush them out.

  As the smoke filled the compartment, Logan knew that Santiago and Marcos were moving up the port side of the engine; the two mercenaries, who had worked together previously, had the starboard side. Each narrow walkway was made up of three long sections like steps that led up to the narrow doors. Once the occupants fled the safety of the confined space, they’d run right into the welcoming arms of Hunter Team.

  Logan’s last choice was which side to cover from above. Trusting in the competency of Marcos and Santiago, he crawled to the edge of the roof on the starboard side, positioned himself several feet away from the narrow door, and unclipped the Glock once again. The two mercenaries were stacked up below him a few feet back from the door to provide a minimal standoff distance.

  Smoke from the grenade curled over the lip of the roof, dissipating into nothingness in the fast-flowing air. Smoke obscured the glass of the small window at the top of the door. Can’t be much longer, now. It has to be suffocating inside, even with the window out, Logan thought, knowing the grenade could last up to fifty or more seconds.

  As if reading his thoughts telepathically, a soldier flung the door outward, allowing smoke to pour out of the cab. Unfortunately for him, he held a pistol in his left hand, raised at a forty-five-degree angle. Logan and the two mercenaries fired simultaneously, striking the Venezuelan in the top of the head and the chest, killing him instantly. He fell face forward onto the narrow walkway, his head resting near the top of the step that led to the middle section on which both mercenaries knelt.

  The second man through the door realized the error that the first soldier had made, and he started screaming in Spanish. Logan assumed the two mercenaries understood him—Logan had never learned a second language—as they both shouted back authoritatively.

  The soldier emerged, his hands raised in the air, and he stepped forward toward the mercenaries. He stopped near the feet of the dead soldier and waited for instructions. No one appeared behind him.

  “Ask him where the vice president is!” Logan shouted down from the roof.

  After a quick exchange, the mercenary in front looked up and yelled back, “He says he’s the last one out. The other two went out the other side. There’s no one else.”

  What? Bastard must have gone out the other side. “Zip-tie this guy up. I’ll be back in a second!” Logan yelled over the roar of the wind.

  Logan pushed himself up on his hands and knees, crawled backward, turned, and hurried to the other side. He looked down and saw Marcos securing the zip ties on a Venezuelan soldier. Further back, Santiago held the arms of another they’d already secured.

  “Where’s Baker?” Logan shouted.

  Marcos looked up, shook his head, and said, “Not with us. Thought he came out on the other side.”

  Oh no, Logan thought, a sudden sinking feeling hitting him. He grabbed a handle on the side of the roof, hung over the side, and dropped to the top level of the walkway. Not uttering a word, he entered the cab, unsurprised at what he found—a dry hole. The cab had cleared of smoke, but the acrid stench lingered in the air. Sonofabitch stayed on the base. This whole thing was a fucking decoy so he could slink away into the forest. At that moment, Logan West detested Vice President Joshua Baker more than any other man or woman alive, and the fact that he’d been duped once again only added significant insult to injury. He knew I’d take the bait because he knows what my friends mean to me.

  Logan hurried to the other side of the cab and said to the mercenary who’d already secured the smarter of the two soldiers, “Bring him in here.”

  Moments later, the Venezuelan soldier and the two mercenaries stood inside the cab. Marcos entered the impromptu meeting a moment later from the other side and realized immediately what had happened, cursing in disgust. Logan pointed at the stainless steel handle that jutted out of the control panel horizontally. He gestured as if pulling it toward h
im, and asked, “Does that slow it down?”

  A mercenary translated, and the Venezuelan nodded eagerly.

  “Good,” Logan replied, and pulled the lever backward. He felt the train’s brakes engage, screeching loudly, and the train gradually decelerated. The red digital readout ticked downward: 51 kmph . . . 46 kmph . . . “Time to get off this ride and get back to the base.”

  “This was a major head-fake, wasn’t it?” Marcos asked.

  “Yup,” Logan answered. “It’s the sonofabitch’s MO, and I should’ve seen it coming.”

  The earth began to tremble, increasing in intensity, as a major aftershock hit for the third time that day.

  Logan looked out the ruined window of the cab. The train’s triangular configuration of headlights illuminated the stretch of track in front of them. The ground shook violently, as if the earth were outraged at the train’s presence and threatened to shake it off the tracks. A large mass of boulders and several trees tumbled from a hillside on the left and covered the tracks approximately one hundred yards ahead.

  “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me,” Marcos said.

  “Nope,” Logan stated matter-of-factly. “This is about par for the course.” The train continued to slow, but there was nowhere near enough distance to stop.

  Logan ran to the other door. “Santiago, get in here now! Bring those two if you can, but if you want to live, get in here now. We’re about to crash!”

  Seconds later Santiago dashed into the cab, looked out the window, and said, “Mother of God.” He followed Logan’s lead and sat on the floor of the cab, as the rest of the team followed suit, bracing their legs and holding on to any surface they could.

  The first of the two prisoners appeared in the doorway, a look of pure panic on his face.