The QRF fighters knew it would take between 120–180 seconds for the Apaches to clear every enemy vehicle assaulting the White House, Capitol Building and Pentagon. Perhaps another 5-10 minutes for the SF to fast-rope down and mop up any loose terrorists. These weren’t idle boasts either, but the average performance on their daily drills.
Their skills aside, the incoming Floridian mortars needed only a ten-second time of flight.
A mile away, four insurgent 120mm mortar teams burped out shells with unholy speed, stopping only when the tubes glowed red. Each mortar lobbed eight rounds airborne before the first even struck.
The first blast missed an Apache by twenty yards. Which didn’t matter. The overpressure wave rocked the helicopter at the exact second the pilot tilted the nose down to gain airspeed. Only a few feet off the ground, he didn’t have enough time to compensate for the sudden wind shear. His bird tilted perpendicular to the concrete. Before he could shout “May Day,” his rotor blades sparked across the cement and snapped off completely. The Apache bounced across the crowded helipad, snout over tail, before landing on top of a fully loaded Blackhawk. Both helicopters vanished in an explosive embrace.
Another heavily laden Hawk took a direct mortar hit, liquefying all 16 men inside instantly. One transport pilot skipped his checklist and just yanked on the stick while giving max rotor power. They’d gotten ten meters in the air before a near burst flung a chunk of shrapnel into his neck. The copilot did his best, but the beheaded pilot clung to the controls with zombie strength, tilting them over on their back.
The troopers in the cargo bay took their chances and dived out the door while the chopper flipped upside down. All survived the fall, but few made it through the fireball when the out of control transport slammed into another Blackhawk just getting airborne.
Fifty mortar rounds and a minute later, there wasn’t much left of the QRF. A lone, shrapnel scarred Apache came out of the maelstrom and headed towards DC. Several flashing lights on the dashboard and a strange vibration forced the pilot to crash land across the street from the Holocaust Museum.
There was no other dedicated quick reaction force within a half hour’s travel, in any direction.
Washington was on its own for a while.
Kadush!
Even prone on the ground with all the civilians, Brown flinched as the heat washed over him. He raised to an elbow just in time to see a small tank turret come crashing down about 50 yards away. Was that the last LAV?
“Stay the fuck down!”
All the other guards had run off to the fight on the South Lawn or disappeared inside with the president. One of the two remaining Secret Service agents in the Rose Garden didn’t take his own advice. He slapped Brown on the back as he ran past, but then popped his head over the hedges ringing the garden. The bushes might have been good concealment, but were terrible cover. He found that out the hard way.
Brown caught the agent as he stumbled back, three holes in his gut. Just below the body armor. He took the time to strip off his dress uniform top and shove it against the exit wounds.
“You might make it, if you stay still.” The agent’s dilating pupils grew wider as Brown stole his radio and microphone… then his Glock and extra two magazines.
One of the least banged up Medal of Honor awardees low-crawled over. “What are you doing?”
“Whatever I can. Keep the pressure on this guy’s wound.”
Jessica reached over and snagged his leg. “John, what is really going on? Are you a part of this?”
“Of course not!”
Jessica sighed in relief.
“My plan was much more surgical. Stay down and don’t come inside no matter what!”
Jessica, too shocked too move, merely gaped as Brown slithered away without another word.
All the shooting over his head died down. He shoved the earpiece in to find out why.
“There are mortars sprinkling the North Lawn. Keep POTUS in the central house until we’ve cleared the intruders.”
An older voice chimed in. “Negative. We have at least six attackers unaccounted for and a big gap in our perimeter. Get POTUS out the West Wing entrance, while we still have it under control. Move!”
Caught up in the radio chatter, Brown didn’t notice the second agent spot him. “Drop it or I’ll drop you!”
Before Brown could comply, a 40 mm grenade detonated against the Roman column the agent crouched behind. The mostly marble shrapnel shredded his face. Without hesitation, Brown sprang to his feet and ran to the patio. He dived headfirst into the open door in the West Wing, rolling up to a shooting crouch.
Four agents in tactical gear breached the interior door at the same time. Brown dropped his weapon and fell flat as they all aimed MP4 submachine guns at him.
At him, and not the assassins on his heels. From the steps of the Rose Garden a few feet away, six of the Florida rebels raised their weapons in unison. In five seconds, they shredded the room and everyone standing in it with more than a hundred rounds.
Brown didn’t have time to thank his Creator for still being in one piece.
His borrowed radio crackled. “Presidential secretary’s room is breached, but we’ve got it sealed off. I’ve got men stacked on every door. We’ll plug the leak in ten seconds.”
Brown slid behind the desk in the far corner and flopped one of the bodies over his chest. Before he could move another, five of these mysterious intruders barged in from the garden. A flash bang grenade sailed in from the interior hallway door. On his back, Brown plugged his ears and shut his eyes.
Even through the ringing in his bones, Brown was impressed. The bangs didn’t slow down any of the attackers. Sure, they had range shades on and ear plugs, but there should have still been some reaction. These were clearly fanatics on a mission.
A final mission.
Three of the assassins rushed to each door, tossing their own grenades around the corners without pause. One grenade each into the Oval Office to the left, main corridor ahead and Cabinet Room to the right. These were no flash toys like the Service, but real frag grenades. The two machine gunners of the bunch took a knee, tucked their weapons deep in their elbows, and held the trigger down. They spun their flaming machine guns in back and forth arcs from north to west, struggling to keep the automatics firing at knee height.
With nothing but plaster walls, furniture and human bones to slow them down, hundreds of 5.56 mm rounds violated every room of the West Wing. Both gunners emptied their 200 round belts in twenty seconds. While they paused to reload and swap barrels, Brown’s radio chirped to life.
“POTUS is still secure.” The agent sounded weak. His voice faded in and out, but clearly had nothing to do with signal strength. “Pinned down…Press Room…have to move…”
There was a short break before a second, grimmer voice took over. “This is Doyle. I’ve got POTUS. We’re making a break for the West Entrance and aren’t stopping for anything. If anyone’s still out there, cover us!”
A handful of shots rang out, suppressing the entrances to the little closet, but not nearly as many as there should have been. The machine gunners raised their weapons to repeat their performance.
One of them collapsed under a hail of fire, holding his hands to a spurting wound in his neck. The other took two rounds to the back of his bulletproof vest, throwing him forward. He rolled with the hits and sprayed his weapon out the open door to the Rose Garden… at the same time another burst of fire struck him in the crotch.