Turning, Josef looked at his wife. He was about to ridicule her for making such a silly statement, but then stopped. In this world of theirs, turned upside down, anything, including their worst nightmare, was possible. So instead of chiding his wife for making such a foolish comment, Josef walked across the darkened room, reassuring her as he did so. "No, it's only the Americans."
The high-pitched whine of a BTR armored personnel carrier racing up the road toward their position caused Ilvanich to turn his attention away from the echo of gunfire and grenade blasts coming from the tunnel and to the road outside the chainlink fence. It was the reaction force, finally. Looking at his watch, Ilvanich noted the time. Slow, he thought. They were too slow and now too late. A Russian reaction force, he reasoned, would have been there in half the time. How fortunate for the Americans, Ilvanich thought, that they are only pitted against Ukrainians and not Russians.
The American reaction to this new threat, however, was not slow. Along the perimeter fence, near the cinder block guard shack, one of the squad leaders shouted back to his platoon leader, "BTR on the road, coming up fast and dumb." At first Ilvanich considered the sergeant's report to be rather flippant and unmilitary. Then after thinking about it for a moment, Ilvanich chuckled. As he peered into the night beyond the glare of the bright security lights in an effort to spot the reaction force's BTR armored personnel carrier, Ilvanich decided that the American sergeant's report was in fact quite accurate. The Ukrainians were coming on too fast and in a manner that all but guaranteed their demise. Though dumb was not quite the word he would have chosen, Ilvanich reminded himself that the Americans had a unique unmilitary style that defied all logic and common sense.
Deciding that it would not be a good idea to stay next to the cinder block building once the shooting started, Ilvanich looked for a spot on the firing line along the chainlink fence that would offer both cover and a vantage point. When he saw what he was looking for next to a soldier with a squad automatic weapon, Ilvanich glanced down at his assault rifle to ensure that the safety was engaged before moving over to his new position. His pace was deliberate, not hurried, and he continued to look into the darkness for the approaching BTR.
Kevin Pape could feel himself getting excited. This was it! This was no bullshit, for a real enemy armored personnel carrier was coming after them. It wasn't a plywood panel like the ones they used on the squad assault range at Grafenwöhr. It wasn't a vismod, a mock vehicle with a fiberglass and sheet-metal shell made up to look like a BTR like the ones they went against at the maneuver training area at Hohenfels. This one was real, brim full of pissed-off Ukrainians who were coming after him and the rest of 2nd Squad. Pape didn't feel the cold. He didn't notice the Russian major settle down into a prone position next to him. All Pape's attention was focused where the road disappeared into the darkness as he listened to the noise of the BTR grow as it closed on their position. Flexing his right index finger, Pape lightly stroked the trigger of his weapon and waited.
To Pape's right, Sergeant Couvelha called out to his men armed with AT-4 anti-tank rocket launchers. "Billy, you fire first. And make sure you call out your range before you do." Couvelha twisted his head toward the second soldier. "Ned, listen up for Billy's range and watch where his rocket hits. Make your correction if you need to, then fire. Got it?"
Billy, intently staring through the sight of his rocket launcher, said nothing. He only nodded, a nod that Couvelha didn't see, not that he needed to. Billy was young but he was solid and dependable. Couvelha knew Billy had heard. Ned, a smile on his face, turned to Couvelha. "No sweat, Sarge."
Couvelha shook his head. Unlike Billy, Ned was a little too cool, too cocksure of himself for Couvelha, which is why Ned fired second. He was about to tell Ned that he had better pay attention to his front when Billy yelled, "RANGE, TWO HUNDRED METERS! FIRING!"
Billy's announcement gave everyone on the firing line a second to prepare themselves. Half of the men, looking elsewhere, hadn't seen the BTR as it emerged from the darkness. Even when he followed the road, Pape still could not see it. "WHERE? WHERE IS THE FUCKER? I DON'T SEE"
The snap that announced the ignition of the AT-4's rocket motor, followed by a whoosh as the rocket left the tube, cut Pape short. Watching the rocket, Pape was blinded when the shaped-charge warhead made contact with the BTR head-on. The jet stream formed by the explosion of the rocket's inverted cone-shaped warhead cut through the armor of the BTR's front slope just below the roof. Missing the driver's head by inches, the jet stream hit the BTR's gunner square in the stomach after cutting through the ammunition feed chute that fed linked rounds to the BTR's 14.5mm machine gun. The driver was startled by the sudden explosion on the BTR's front slope, followed by the spray of molten metal thrown off by the jet stream as it raced past his head, and the screams of the gunner accompanied by the pop, pop, pop of 14.5mm rounds going off behind him. His first reaction was to slam on the BTR's brakes and duck his head, a motion that caused him to jerk the wheel to the left.
Watching where Billy's round struck, and noting that it appeared a little high, Ned laid the two-hundred-meter range line of his rocket launcher's sight on the center of the BTR, now slowing and offering an oblique shot as it turned. Lowering the muzzle of his AT-4 ever so slightly, Ned yelled out, "RANGE, ONE EIGHTY. FIRING," then let fly with his rocket. Though it was not a catastrophic hit, Ned's rocket ended any desire by the startled BTR's crew and passengers to stay with their vehicle. They didn't even wait for the driver to bring the BTR to a complete stop before hatches and doors flew open.
Checking himself, Pape flipped the safety off of his weapon with his thumb and continued to wait until the Ukrainian infantry squad began to spill out before he opened fire. Using the range announced by Ned to sight his weapon, Pape opened with a killing burst, hitting one Ukrainian before he could completely emerge from the BTR's side door. The Ukrainian's forward momentum, assisted by the shoving of the man behind him, cleared the line of sight for Pape to fire on the next man coming out the door. The second Ukrainian never realized that his companion had been hit, a fate that he soon suffered himself as Pape squeezed off a second short burst.
From inside the BTR, a flame shot out of the opened door, followed by a muffled explosion. A secondary detonation, probably an anti-tank rocket stored inside the BTR just like the one that had stopped it, went off, ending the short anti-armor ambush.
Seeing no more targets, Pape eased up, noticing for the first time that the Russian major was staring at him. While holding his weapon steady, Pape twisted his head and looked at the Russian lying less than a meter away from him.
Ilvanich smiled at the American soldier. "You did well. That was excellent shooting. Two five-round bursts, two men dead."
Pape smiled. "Piece of cake, Major. Piece of cake."
Ilvanich continued to smile. "Yes, I am sure it was." These Americans, he thought, take this too casually. What will happen, he thought, when things begin to go against them. "Now you need to prepare for a deliberate attack, dismounted this time, that will come up, oh, over there, to your right."
Pape looked over to where the Russian major was pointing. "How do you know that?"
Ilvanich smiled. "Because, my friend, two months ago I was doing the same thing at a site like this. Those men out there may be Ukrainians, but they read the same books I do. There is a gully, three hundred meters over there, that leads almost up to the fence. It is mined near the fence, but the BTR will use it to close on us and dismount its troops."