The legionnaires came to their feet and fired, laying down concentrated fire at the oncoming trucks. Another truck fireballed and rolled. The six remaining trucks sped by Vermullen’s DFP and into the deserted camp. Vermullen didn’t hesitate. He reached for a small green plastic detonator and flipped open the guard on top. He mashed the trigger. The line of Claymore mines behind the DFP erupted, each sending a cloud of over 700 steel balls into the trucks, ripping and shredding the men and trucks. The carnage was absolute.
“Those were meant for the bloody Janjaweed!” Thomas shouted.
Vermullen cranked the phone and called his command post. He ordered Mercier to send Bravo Company, half of his reserve, to the refugee camp to block access to the mission compound. “I estimate over 500 Janjaweed are in the camp,” he told Mercier.
“Please save some for us,” Mercier replied.
Allston stayed out of the way as Mercier ordered forty legionnaires to the refugee camp. No sooner had they left than all four lines to the listening posts along the river lit up. Mercier listened, his face grim. “Armored vehicles and APCs are fording the river,” he told the men in the bunker. “This is more than a reconnaissance in force.” He called Captain Bouchard over and quickly identified which DFPs on Charlie Ring to man. “Take every man you can find and hold until we can disengage from the refugee camp and reinforce you,” he told the young captain.
Bouchard actually smiled. “That won’t be necessary.”
“That is very fortunate,” Mercier shot back. Bouchard snapped an open-handed salute and ran from the bunker.
“Was the attack on the refugee camp a diversion?” Allston asked.
“Oh, yes. It was a classic maneuver, very well executed. But as you Americans say, we honored the threat.” He thought for a moment. “Sacrificing the Janjaweed could have been a mistake.”
A teen-age boy burst into the bunker. He was winded from a long run and his eyes were wide with fear. He babbled in Dinka, which neither man understood. Allston grabbed the phone to Outback, the security police bunker. “We need a translator,” he told Malone. “Send Williams here ASAP.” Now they had to wait.
Vermullen emptied his FAMAS at the Janjaweed thundering past his DFP. He jammed a fresh clip into the over-heated weapon and fired another burst. Beside him, Beck lobbed round after round of grenades at the horsemen as they swept by. The ground was littered with bodies and horses but still the Janjaweed kept coming. The green light on the telephone line blinked. In the chaos, Vermullen answered, still firing short bursts as he listened. “Excellent,” he shouted, breaking the connection. “Bravo Company is through the minefield and blocking them,” he told the four legionnaires. “We have them in the bag. Do we have any more Claymores?”
“Ten,” Thomas, the Cockney sergeant, answered.
“Good. You take four and give one to each DFP on the left. Tell them to position them to face south, away from our DFPs, and to only fire at the Janjaweed after they have passed by. Hans, take four and do the same on the right. Go!” Thomas handed Beck four small canvas bags. The English Legionnaire slung four over his shoulder and followed Beck. A storm of small-arms fire echoed from the side of the camp nearest the mission. “I believe the Janjaweed have met Bravo Company,” Vermullen said to the two legionnaires still in the bunker. “Place the last two Claymores there and there, facing each other.” He pointed to where he wanted the Claymores, one on each side of the kill box. “Go.” He didn’t have time to explain and the legionnaires reacted instinctively, leaving him alone in the DFP. He cranked the phone to the command post but it was dead, the line cut.
Beck and Thomas were back in time to see their comrades rig the last two Claymores. They snapped open the short legs that held each mine upright and placed the side with the Chinese markings facing outward. Each weighed less than four pounds and were extremely effective killing machines out to fifty yards. The legionnaires attached the detonator wires and ran for the DFP. “Brilliant,” Thomas muttered. “The Janjaweed are shitting their knickers and only know one way out, right through here. Those two Claymores are for traffic control and the others will collect the exit toll.” The pounding of hooves confirmed his guess.
Williams kept telling the teenager to talk more slowly. “He’s a volunteer manning a listening post,” Williams explained. He spoke to the boy and pointed to the chart at the same time. The teenager jabbed a finger at the chart and spoke rapidly. “He says an armored car and ten soldiers are stopped here.”
Where did they come from? Allston wondered. “Okay, who have we got left?”“Only your police,” Mercier replied. He cranked the telephone and called Malone. He quickly recapped the situation and listened for a moment. Then, “The boy is here and he can show you. We have a Shipon.” He broke the connection. “Malone will be here shortly.”
Malone and Sergeant Lee Ford made it in two minutes. “We’re it,” he told Allston. “I think you remember Sergeant Ford. He speaks Dinka and is wide awake now. I’ve got one guy left manning Outback. Everyone else is posted out with orders to fall back on the hospital. So how do you use a Shipon?”
Mercier opened a case and handed Malone the shoulder-held anti-tank missile. “It is good for 600 meters, but a shame to waste it on an armored car.” He went through the aiming and firing sequence. “Beware of the blowback. It can kill you.”
Malone gestured at the Dinka teenager. “Tell him to show us the way.” Airman Ford spoke a few words in Dinka and the boy nodded. “Let’s go,” Malone said. The Dinka understood and led the way out.
The horsemen came directly at Vermullen’s DFP, retracing their path through the camp in a desperate attempt to escape. Vermullen waited, trying to determine where they were the most concentrated. Deciding they were massed to his right, he triggered the Claymore on his left. The mine exploded, sending a hail of death into the leading Janjaweed, cutting and tearing into the horses and their riders. Instinctively, the survivors veered away, into their more densely packed comrades on Vermullen’s right. Again, he waited. At the last critical moment, he triggered the Claymore on his right. But now the carnage was more brutal as the Claymore’s fourteen ounces of C-4 explosive sent a cloud of steel fragments into the densely packed Janjaweed. The unhurt men and horses immediately behind piled into their downed comrades, adding to the chaos as the rest split around the DFP, racing for safety. The five legionnaires in the DFP came to their feet, firing into the retreating horsemen. They fired in short bursts, emptying their magazines and quickly reloading. Still the horsemen surged past, swinging wider and wider to avoid the slaughtered horses and riders.
The last surge of Janjaweed raced past the DFP, the riders frantically urging their horses on and not bothering to return fire. The last Claymores started to detonate as the legionnaires timed their detonations to max effect, cutting into the backside of the retreating horses and men. The sound of gunfire and running horses gave way to the bellow of baying horses and screaming men dying in the night.
Vermullen reloaded, careful not to touch the overheated barrel of his rifle. “An ugly business,” he muttered. “Hans, fire a flare.” Beck did as ordered and a single flare arced over the killing ground, illuminating the carnage around them.
“What now?” Thomas asked.
“We wait,” Vermullen answered. “If I am right, Bravo Company will be needed elsewhere shortly, and is probably withdrawing back into the mission.” A few minutes later, another green flare arced over the killing field, this one from Bravo Company. They were withdrawing into the mission. “Now you must mop up,” Vermullen said. He climbed out of the DFP and ran for the Panhard with Beck in hot pursuit.