Chapter 50

Near the village of Soosin, Azerbaijan
April 13, 2006, 2255 Local Time

Pasco called out on the net. “Jackson, come in. Jackson, where are you, man?”

There was no response.

Pasco knew he was in deep trouble, an injured man who couldn't walk and almost a civilian, who might be able to shoot straight, but not much else, surrounded by terrorists with no chance of rescue.

Up until this point, he had been content to leave Jackson in charge, and follow his orders. That was how missions worked in Delta Force. The man, who was best qualified, got to lead the mission, irrespective of their rank. Now Jackson was gone and he was in charge.

Pasco turned to Herb. “What's further up the valley?”

A panting Herb replied. “There is nothing on the map, until you get to a waterfall, leading to an upland valley, about a kilometer away.”

It sounded to Pasco, like it could be a defensible position. He wondered whether he could make it that far. Every step on his injured ankle caused him severe pain. He turned back to survey the area they had come from. He could see half a dozen men through the night vision equipment, all at least three hundred meters away. He was sure the person who fired the RPG was closer.

Pasco turned to Herb. “We will head for the waterfall, but first I need your help to get to those trees ahead.”

The two started out, with the CIA man supporting the D man.

There were no more than three-dozen trees in the grove. Some were just a few meters high, which is what Pasco needed. He left Herb on the edge of the grove with orders to shoot anyone he saw.

He dropped his pack to the ground, and put his hand inside to find the first aid kit. Immediately finding a specific article in the dark, was something he had practiced a thousand times. His hand closed around the kit, and pulled it out. He extracted the foil-covered codeine tablets, and pushed the kit back into his pack. He tore two tablets out of the foil packaging, and put them into his mouth, shoving the rest into a pocket. He pulled a water bottle from his pack. It wasn't until he started to drink, he realized how thirsty he was.

Pasco searched for a branch that would serve as a crutch. He stopped next to a likely looking small tree, pulled out his knife, and used its sharpened serrated edge to saw at the trunk. He was intent on his task when a rocket-propelled grenade came within a meter of him. He felt the heat, and smelled the sharp tang of burning propellant. It exploded thirty meters past him, and he swore he heard the shrapnel whiz past. The guy with the RPG launcher was scarily good.

He pulled at the small tree, and it broke away. He used his knife to cut away the foliage above where the trunk branched. He tried the crutch. It was too short, but better than nothing. He used it to hobble back to Herb.

Herb's steady fire had stopped, and Pasco asked him why.

“I'm out of ammo.”

Pasco ignored the unemotional tone of Herb's response, and focused on the military situation. He had started out with ten magazines and another hundred loose rounds. He had used and discarded four magazines. A fifth was in his weapon. He took a magazine from a pouch at his waist, and gave it to Herb. “Remember, aimed shots only.”

Their cessation of fire seemed to have emboldened their attackers. Pasco could see seven or eight men, in two groups, moving toward their position. The approaching men fired occasional shots in their direction.

“We are going to the waterfall to find a secure location where we can call in the helicopter. Stay five meters behind me, and try to keep the enemy back. Let's go.”

Pasco resisted giving Herb a second magazine. Perhaps having just one would make him conserve ammunition. He steeled himself, and found he could manage a hobbling walk with the codeine deadening the pain.

He reached the far side of the grove, and searched the ground in front of him. There was no one in sight on this side of the trees. Without his injured ankle, they would get away easily at a dead run. He looked behind and Herb was there. Pasco started forward again using the stick more like a walking stick than a crutch.

After fifty meters, he stopped, and looked back. Herb was right behind him not attempting to fire at their pursuers. Pasco couldn't see any enemy, but the trees obscured his view. He decided there was no point in doing other than letting Herb follow him like a faithful dog.
Pasco again looked back. He could see four men to the left of the grove of trees coming in their direction.

Pasco dropped his crutch, and shouldered his weapon. He sighted on the leading man and fired. Pasco thought he had missed. The codeine was dulling his senses.

Several bursts of automatic weapons fire came from the direction of the four men. As Pasco dropped to the ground, he saw Herb go down. Pasco knew, from the way Herb fell, he had been hit.

“Herb, can you hear me?”

There was no reply. Pasco crawled across to Herb as the rounds snapped through the air above him. Herb was still breathing, but barely. His face and chest were covered in blood. He felt for where Herb had been hit. It didn't take him long to find the blood pumping out of his neck. A punctured carotid artery was close to impossible to treat in the field, even in the best of circumstances.

Pasco could no longer see the four men. He was sure they were crawling through the grass toward him. Their tactic was to fire at muzzle flashes. Shooting at them would just make him a target. He would wait until they came into throwing range, and use grenades. If they fired at him, he would use the muzzle flash tactic against them.

Pasco tried and failed to find a pulse on Herb's neck. He was either dead or close to it. Pasco removed the ammunition clip from Herb's rifle, and started to crawl away, rifle in one hand and his stick in the other. He was the last one left, but he still might get out of here alive.

When he had moved about ten meters, he stopped crawling, and prepared to deal with the men coming after him.

Pasco checked all his grenades were in the right places. He had ten mini and two full-sized grenades. He considered whether he should stand for a moment to try to get a visual on the men. He decided to kneel. He was sure he could see a man's head fifty meters ahead of him, out of grenade throwing range for a kneeling man. Continuing to crawl away merely delayed the inevitable confrontation. He would do it here.

Pasco waited a minute, and again got to his knees. He could see the heads of two men. He got down, and took out three mini-grenades and one full sized fragmentation grenade. He got back to his knees, pulled the safety pins, and threw the three mini-grenades in quick succession, then dropped down flat on the ground, and waited for the detonations. He waited another twenty seconds, and threw the full sized grenade. After it exploded, he got back to his knees, his rifle at his shoulder. He could see one man sitting up with his hands to his face. Pasco shot him in the chest. He waited to see if anyone else appeared, but the others were dead, injured, or knew enough to keep down.

It was time to get out of here. He searched the area, and saw a man moving on the far side of the grove. Pasco targeted the man with his rifle, but had trouble getting a bead on him through the trees. As he tried to get a clear shot, he realized there was something familiar about the bulky outline of the figure that suggested body armor worn under a loose jacket. He wasn't sure, but he was unsure enough to hesitate.

Pasco got back down on the ground, and started calling over the net, “Jackson, come in.”

If the man was Jackson, why wasn't he responding?

The figure was moving directly toward his position of twenty minutes earlier. He could now see the man was unarmed, and had no helmet or pack.

Pasco was torn between getting out of his current location, and establishing whether the figure he could see was Jackson - and an unarmed Jackson at that. He got back down flat on the ground. He would wait a few minutes to see what the mystery man did.

The night was still with the faint whisper of a breeze through the trees. He thought, at least one of the men ahead of him had survived the grenades. If the man beyond the trees was Jackson trying to find him, he would run unarmed into the surviving terrorist.

Pasco thought this not knowing where the enemy was, and who was a good guy really sucked. He could handle shooting bad guys, and getting shot at in return, but not the possibility he might be killing a friend, a fellow D man. What a minute earlier had been a simple kill or be killed equation had now become a lot more complex.

Pasco knew you had to control the situation, and not let the situation control you. He had to take care of any enemy ahead of him before the unarmed man, who might be Jackson, got here. He began to crawl slowly forward taking a route wide of Herb's body, hoping to avoid running directly into anyone coming in his direction.

He estimated he was twenty meters away from the men he had attacked with grenades. Pasco cautiously raised himself off the ground looking around for any signs of movement.

He could see, what looked like, two men crawling away from him. The mystery man was now in the trees. He dropped down, crawled forward another ten meters, and slowly raised himself off the ground. He could see the same two men still crawling away from his position. They were passing to the left of the grove of trees. The mystery man was no more than twenty meters from the crawling men. Both might pass each other unseen.

A dead man was lying on the ground directly in front of him. He could see by the chest wound it was the man he had shot. That left one man unaccounted for. He had to find the fourth man.

The fourth man found him. Pasco felt the hammer blow of a round hitting the back of his body armor. He fell face down in the grass, his body screaming with pain. The round must have penetrated his body armor. Pasco tried to roll over to have some chance of defending himself, but his body refused to obey his commands. D men aren't meant to die, face down and helpless.

Pasco suddenly felt clear and calm, as his mind dissociated from his pain-wracked body. He knew, this was what people who had come close to death reported, but was unconcerned this meant he was dying.

After an indeterminate period in a calm detached state, he heard an explosion that sounded both near by and echoey, as if in the far distance, closely followed by a second explosion.

Chapter 51