For someone who preferred activity over idleness, the last several hours had been tantamount to torture for Sargent Lowry. Their trip towards rally point Bravo had started out well. The route between their hide site and the rendezvous area was mostly wooded so he and Dickerson had covered a much further distance than the other team after the abortive airstrike.
All had gone well until a patrol of Peacekeeper's had stumbled on them. There was no indication that they had spotted Lowry and Dickerson, but they'd spent hours slowly searching the area and generally had the two men pinned into place. With little chance of being discovered unless a Peacekeeper stepped on them they simply had to wait out their opponent's before moving forward.
Even as darkness fell the men had stopped patrolling and set up a small defensive perimeter in the area. Lowry thought he'd explode from boredom.
Dickerson glanced at him after the men quickly mounted their vehicles and suddenly sped off in a southerly direction.
“What the hell was that all about?” asked Dickerson.
Stretching out his cramped limbs, oddly sore from doing nothing, Lowry replied, “Beats me. They camped out because they knew they had us pinned. They were either waiting for reinforcements or for one of us to do something stupid. No clue why they saddled up and bolted.”
“Either way,” he continued, “we gotta beat feet if we want to reach the rally point before morning. Its going to be tight.”
The two men resumed their escape at a careful, but quick pace.
****
Saxon knew he was a goner. The Peacekeeper, rifle at the ready, took and steady aim at his head.
He knew he'd never registrar the sound of the gunshot before the 5.45x39 round punched a hole though his skull and covered the homeowners barbecue grill with his brains.
“Oh well,” he thought, “it was a good run.” Despite his best efforts, he couldn't help but close his eyes. It was as if a subconscious defense mechanism had been activated deep within his mind.
There was nothing he could do but await the inevitable.
The sound of the solider exclaiming “oh” and crumpling to the ground shocked him as he reopened his eyes and he tried to take in what had happened. Seeing the other man laying motionless before him he gingerly regained his footing.
Before he knew what had happened Reynolds appeared around the corner of the home, sound suppressed M4 carbine rifle in hand.
“You alright Sarge?” he asked pulling his team-leader to his feet.
Picking up his rifle, that had landed several feet away when he fell, he said, “Damn am I glad to see you. Let's get the hell out of here.”
Rounding the corner of the house Saxon saw the scene that had unfolded. The gunner lay lifeless in the turret of the small truck while the driver was equally unresponsive. One of the soldiers lay near the corner of the shed, head and helmet nearly torn from his neck while the other had clearly been shot by Reynolds. Caddy stood near the Hilux keeping a look out for any additional enemies.
Caddy asked, “you want to take this for a ride?” as Saxon and Reynolds returned.
It wasn't a half bad idea and would cut down on much of their travel time.
“As much as I'd like too, it'd stick out like a sore thumb. Come on,” replied Saxon as he motioned his team towards the drainage ditch. Let's get as much distance away from this as possible.”
The three men had covered the entire distance of the trench and disappeared into the maze of houses in the adjoining neighborhood when two Humvee's roared down the street and came upon the scene of the brief fight.
****
DeMetrie was worried. It was two hours before dawn and the choppers had just arrived. He scavenged two from an old Army buddy in Nashville. It took some cajoling but they had been in basic training together and the bonds still ran deep.
“Jones, I've already arranged for the birds to get refueled at the airport. Get the ready team over there and have them standby in the birds. That way they can get airborne the second we get the call.”
“Sir,” responded Jones as he spun and went to carry out his assignment.
Several more teams of soldiers had returned from their patrols and DeMetrie briefed each one on what had happened. Soon the men were rearming and making their way to the river. They would cross it and began making their way towards rally point Bravo. They'd never cover the distance to the rally point in time to be of any help, but DeMetrie liked to keep his options open.
Now all he needed was a signal from Saxon's team that they had reached the rally point. From that point the Blackhawk helicopters would be launched and would cover the minimal distance in a short period of time.
From there all DeMetrie could do was pray. For now, all he could do was wait.
****
Glancing at his watch, Saxon realized they were running out of time if they wanted to be pulled out before daylight. The team had just gotten to rally point Bravo. Much like a scene out of South East Asia in the 1960's, there was a large clearing in the midst of heavy woods where the helicopters could land and pull the team to safety.
They had about forty-five minutes before dawn and already the night sky was already starting to lighten.
The three men huddled in silence near the edge of the woods while they awaited their ride to safety. Reynolds and Caddy set up a makeshift perimeter while Saxon contemplated his next step.
Saxon had a tough decision to make.
If he waited for Lowry and Dickerson to arrive before calling for the extraction it could be too late for the chopper to arrive before daylight. They'd be forced into waiting for darkness to fall again before another attempt. While they were in a fairly remote area, the battle with the Hilux made clear to the Peacekeepers that the enemy was in the area. They were certain to pour in troops and every minute the team spent on the ground they risked detection.
If they did have to wait another day they could move on to the next rally point which would also move them closer to the river. But this would do nothing to minimize the chance of getting caught.
The other option was to call for the extraction now and hope the other men made it to the landing zone in time. The risk here was that they wouldn't make it and Saxon would have to call them off at the last second. Not only would this pin point there location to the enemy, it forced the choppers to make a difficult run through enemy territory for no reason.
There was no way he was leaving without them.
Looking at his watch for the fifth time in as many minutes Saxon decided he'd give them ten more minutes before calling for the extraction.
****
As they moved through the woods Lowry and Dickerson were doing the mental calculus of their own. They'd make the extraction with just enough time to spare, or so they hoped, before daylight.
“I guess we better let them know we're on the way,” said Lowry. On the prearranged schedule they had been quickly clicking the microphone's on and off to signal they were still moving to avoid communications. Although on scrambled frequencies, there was a good chance the Peacekeepers would be using radio detection equipment in an attempt to track them down.
Nodding in agreement, Dickerson keyed his microphone, “Raven 1 this is Raven 2, over.”
Expecting a quick reply Lowry kept moving without looking back. It took him nearly fifteen seconds before he realized none had come.
“Raven 1, this is Raven 2, over,” repeated Dickerson.
The only sound heard heard in reply was that of the men's footsteps.
Keying his own microphone, Lowry repeated the same message with no avail.
“Looks like maybe going with the lowest bidder wasn't such a great idea after all,” quipped Lowry.
“Now what,” asked Dickerson.
Repeating the call, and again getting no reply, Lowry replied, “let's pick up the pace. They clearly have no idea if we're coming or not.”
Both men began moving more quickly. They still moved deliberately and so as to minimize noise, but their pace increased noticeably.
****
Looking like a scene out of popular American movie Star Wars, the room was a sea of lights. Some blinking, some steady. Some red, some green. Dials and switches seemed to have been sprinkled across the face of the console like toppings on an ice-cream cone. Both of the soliders faces were illuminated by the dull green glow of the equipment.
The shift had been tiresome. In additional to their normal duties, the Colonel had assigned the the task of monitoring for any strange radio signals. Their ordered were to determine the location of their source and alert him at once.
For weeks their had been various drills of the same nature. For hours they would twist the dials, move the levers and listen for any sort of incriminating radio traffic. Other than some short-wave transmissions from civilian radio operators, which had been outlawed by Crutchfield, not much had been noted in their log books. They simply reported the short-wave activity so that a team of soldiers could be sent to arrest the transgressor.
They had both nearly fallen asleep as the gentle buzz through their earphones combined with the warmth of the equipment, lulled them into a trance like state.
One of the men, the younger one, bolted upright.
Knocking his coworkers arm he grunted out, “channel seventeen.”
The coworker heard it too. The signal was scrambled but was definitively a high frequency burst type transmission and most definitively not civilian.
Both men, jolted from their near slumber began wildly typing on their console keyboards and adjusting their equipment.
“Got em,” exclaimed the younger one as he wrote down the coordinates for the grid map.
“Good work, get that to the Colonel,” he instructed his young partner. “Go.”
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