A trail of carnage led to New Iberia. The highway was littered with shot-up vehicles, the countryside was pockmarked with shell craters, and it was deeply scarred wherever the main battle tanks had been.
The convoy was about ten miles from New Iberia when it came upon an increasing amount of traffic and the rear-echelon support units that were camped along both sides of the highway. Mac saw a variety of spray-painted signs, including one that pointed north to Chicago.
It wasn’t long before the convoy had to stop so that a couple of heavily laden tank carriers could enter the highway. Mac took advantage of the opportunity to jump down and chat with an MP. The rain had stopped, the distant thump of artillery could be heard, and rotors clattered as a Black Hawk helicopter passed overhead. “I’m looking for the 32nd Infantry Brigade,” Mac said. “Do you know where it is?”
“I don’t,” the MP replied. “But the folks at HQ would. Take the Damall Road exit and turn right. You’ll see the HQ compound right away.”
Mac thanked the soldier, climbed up into the MRAP, and passed the directions to Brown. And sure enough, the collection of vehicles, tents, and antiaircraft-missile launchers was right where the MP said it would be.
Rather than take the convoy into the already crowded encampment, Mac ordered her drivers to park along the edge of Damall Road. Then, with Green at her side, Mac made her way back to the compound. Both women were required to show ID before being allowed to enter the area.
A captain stood in front of a large tent performing organizational triage. As Mac joined the queue she noticed that very few people were getting through. It took fifteen minutes to reach the head of the line. “TGIF,” the captain said cheerfully. “And what, pray tell, can I do for you?”
The captain took notes as Mac explained her situation. “Got it,” he said, once she was finished. “I have good news, and I have bad news. The good news is that you came to the right place. The bad news is that the general and his staff are busy fighting the Mexicans. That means it might be tomorrow before we get this sorted out.
“But we need all the supplies we can get, so if you’d like to sign everything over to the Division’s supply officer, I can make that happen. And why not? The 32nd is part of the division.”
“Thanks but no thanks,” Mac replied. “I don’t think my CO would appreciate that.”
The captain smiled. “You may be correct. Feel free to pick a spot down the road and laager up. I’ll let you know if I hear anything. Otherwise, please check with me in the morning.”
It was an anticlimactic ending to a difficult trip, and Mac was disappointed. But there was nothing she could do other than thank the officer, return to the convoy, and give the necessary orders.
After days of torrential rain, the surrounding fields were far too soft for the semis to negotiate. As a result, Mac had to settle for a side road bordered by rows of badly shot-up manufactured houses. There was no parking lot. So Mac ordered the vehicles to park in a line, with lots of space between them. Then, after blocking both ends of the street, Mac felt reasonably secure. The problem was that she didn’t have enough troops to clear the houses and push a perimeter out beyond them.
That was one of the issues Mac discussed with her soldiers when she pulled them together. The other was the mine that had been planted the night before. “How about it?” Mac inquired. “Do any of you have a reason to believe that one of our drivers was involved?”
None of them did. So all Mac could do was to urge caution, set up shifts, and stress the need to perform routine maintenance on the military vehicles. The rumble of cannon fire could be heard in the distance—and an A-10 passed over at around 1500. But everything was peaceful other than that.
As afternoon gave way to night, Mac and Carey flipped a Confederate coin to see which one of them would take the first watch. Mac won, and that meant she got to sleep first. And rather than crash in a semi, Mac chose to stretch out in the back of the Stryker. And that’s where she was when the attack began. A rocket hit one of the big rigs, machine-gun fire raked another, and a flare went off high above. Road-Runner-Three was under attack.
CHAPTER 14
The darkest hour is just before dawn.
“Crank her up!” Mac yelled as she rolled off the seat and came to her feet. Corporal Larry Washington started the engine, while gunner Trish Vesey hurried to claim her seat and bring the truck’s weapons systems online.
Mac pulled the TAC vest over her head, put her brain bucket on, and stuck her head up through the forward air-guard hatch. A tractor-trailer rig was on fire, and the flames lit the area. Shadows flickered as soldiers fought the blaze with fire extinguishers. One of the firefighters staggered and fell as a Confederate resistance fighter shot him from a house on the north side of the street. “Use the fifties!” Mac ordered. “Suppress their fire.”
The volume of incoming fire lessened as the big machine guns began to chug. Mac opened the intercom. “Take us around the west end of the housing complex,” she ordered. “We’ll attack those bastards from behind.”
Then, on the tactical frequency, “Heads up in the MRAP… We’re going to cross in front of you.”
The Stryker produced a sound reminiscent of a city bus pulling away from a stop as it came up to speed. It took less than a minute to reach the end of the street and take a hard right. The vic crashed through a fence, sideswiped a storage shed, and demolished a playset before rolling into the field beyond. And that was when the insurgents were forced to back out of the shot-up houses and run. But Vesey could see them thanks to her thermal-imaging gear, and she fired a round.
The Stryker lurched, and Mac wished that she was wearing ear protection, as the 105mm cannon went off. Where the shell struck, Mac saw three bodies cartwheel through the air before landing hard. Vesey fired again—and with similar results.
“Give the fifties a rest,” Carey ordered, “and clear those houses. But be careful… Dead bodies could be booby-trapped.”
Good girl, Mac thought, before ducking below. Both crew members turned to look at her. “Watch the field,” she told them. “A follow-up seems unlikely, but you never know. Holler if you need me.”
Washington lowered the ramp as Mac paused to grab her HK submachine gun. “Don’t shoot me,” Mac said over the tactical frequency. “I’m about to appear at the west end of the street.”
She kept the HK ready as she passed between a couple of houses and made her way down a driveway. The truck fire had been extinguished, and a good thing, too, since all of the tractor-trailer rigs were carrying some of the ammunition. Sergeant Percy was speaking. “House two is clear, one body. Over.”
And so it went as Mac headed east. “Major?” Carey said. “I’m near the Humvee. There’s something I want you to see.”
A cluster of headlamps marked the spot where Carey was standing. A small crowd was gathered by the body of a driver named Jessie Jameson when Mac arrived. “The bastard had a radio,” the driver named Eason said bitterly as he toed the device with a boot. “He called them in.”
Mac looked at Carey. “How ’bout that, Lieutenant? Is Mr. Eason correct?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Carey replied. “I saw Jameson shoot Private Potter in the back. His body is over there.” Carey pointed.