Kruger’s men were inside each defensive ring, the paratroops were wiped out foxhole by foxhole-killed by soldiers firing from inside their Ratels, by point-blank cannon shots, or by dismounted infantry charging forward behind a barrage of grenades and automatic weapons fire.
COMMAND RATEL
Ian Sheffield hung to his seat strap for dear life as the Ratel canted upward, grinding uphill at more than twenty miles an hour. His ears were numb-deafened by the constant chatter of the APC’s heavy machine gun and by bullets spanging off its armor. Smoking, spent shell casings rolled back down the metal floor toward the rear.
Kruger’s staff officers crouched behind the vehicle’s firing ports, ready to open fire with their R4 assault rifles the moment they had targets.
Emily and Sibena were still in their seats, though only just barely. They both looked almost as scared as he felt.
The front end of the Ratel dropped downward as it roared over the crest.
And then the world blew up.
At first Ian was only aware of the blinding white flash that started outside the driver’s compartment and then rippled backward down the length of the Ratel. Then a shock wave punched the air out of his lungs and threw him out of his seat. The sound came last-a tremendous clanging, discordant thunderclap that tore conscious, coherent thought to shreds. As he blacked out, he felt the Ratel being lifted upward, twisting sideways in midair.
He came to on his knees, tangled in fallen gear and still hot shell casings. The Ratel lay tilted on its left side, no longer moving.
Foul-smelling smoke eddied in from the outside. Coughing and groaning men lay in heaps all around him.
Emily! Ian shook his head to clear it and regretted it right away. He must have slammed into something hard and unforgiving when the APC tipped over. He staggered upright and looked around.
There she was. Emily sat upright in a loose pile of canteens, medical kits, and assault rifle magazines. She seemed dazed but unhurt. His heart started beating again.
“You are wounded?” Kruger had to scream it into his ear to be heard. The
Afrikaner officer had a ragged, bleeding cut over one cheekbone, but no other apparent injuries.
“No!” Ian shouted back.
“What happened?”
“We hit a mine.” Kruger coughed as a thicker tendril of smoke curled in through the viewslits in his commander’s cupola. It smelled very much like burning oil. His eyes widened.
“We must get out! We’re on fire!”
Oh, shit. Ian whirled and lurched through the debris toward Emily. Sibena scrambled to his feet beside her. Behind him, he could hear Kruger rousing the rest of his crew and staff.
” Ian, thank God . She clutched at his arm as he helped her up.
“Yeah.” He turned to Sibena.
“Matt! Hit those clips!” He pointed to the metal locking bars holding the rear hatch shut.
“Right.” Sibena spun them up and away. Ian put his hand on the hatch handle and then felt someone grab his shoulder in a strong grip. He turned to see Kruger.
The South African had an assault rifle slung over his own
shoulder. His staff officers and vehicle crew crowded behind him with their own weapons.
“Let my men go first. We have enemies out there. “
“You got it.” Ian, Emily, and Matt squeezed to one side of the battered
Ratel-allowing the six men by.
The soldiers shoved the hatch open and threw themselves through the narrow opening one after the other. Staying low, they fanned out in a semicircle around the wrecked APC. A lieutenant stayed by the door to help the others out. Smoke and blowing sand cut visibility to meters at best.
Ian’s hearing was coming back. He wasn’t sure what sounded more dangerous-the staccato rattle of automatic weapons fire outside or the steady crackle of the flames now engulfing the Ratel driver’s compartment.
The young officer standing outside signaled him frantically.
“Come on, man.
Pass her through. I’ll get her to cover.”
Ian guided Emily through the hatch and turned to motion Sibena forward And an assault rifle opened up from somewhere close by, spraying rounds at full automatic. Several punched into the hatch door and howled off into the surrounding smoke.
Ian whirled round in horror. His vision darkened and then cleared. Emily and the lieutenant lay tangled together on the ground, bright blood staining the sand around them.
“No!” Without thinking Ian dived through the hatch.
She was still alive, though bleeding badly from one shoulder. The staff officer was dead. He’d taken most of the burst.
Ian scrabbled through the dead man’s gear looking for his medical kit. He needed bandages to stop the bleeding. He never even thought to look up.
Ten meters away, Staff Sgt. Gerrit Roost rose from his foxhole, cradling his R4 assault rifle. He yanked out the empty thirty-five-round clip and shoved in a full magazine. This one would be an easy kill. He started to raise his weapon, sighting straight at the kneeling civilian’s chest.
Three separate hammer blows knocked him off his feet. Astonished, Roost strained to raise his head and saw the ugly,
red-rimmed holes torn in his chest and stomach. Then he saw the man who’d shot him. His mouth dropped open. A kaffir! He’d been killed by a damned black!
The Afrikaner sergeant died with that look of shocked, unbelieving surprise frozen on his face.
Matthew Siberia let go of the trigger he’d squeezed and held down, threw the dead lieutenant’s rifle from him as far as it would go, and ran to help Ian.
EMERGENCY AID STATION, ON THE HILL NEAR SKERPIONENPUNT
Henrik Kruger stood looking at a scene straight out of his worst nightmares. Wrecked trucks and armored personnel carriers were strewn up and down the road and across the hillside in almost every direction. Most were still on fire, sending greasy plumes of smoke billowing up to stain the sky. Bodies sprawled beside the vehicles, some in heaps, others alone.
Others littered the hilltop.
Stretcher parties wandered through the carnage, looking for wounded they could carry up to the aid station behind him. He smiled bitterly. Aid station. That was an impressive sounding name for what was only a patch of bare rock and sand covered by a hastily rigged tarp.
Dozens of seriously injured men lay in rows behind him. His lone surviving surgeon and handful of corpsmen were completely swamped by sheer numbers. As it was, they were still frantically engaged in triage-the gruesome, though essential, task of sorting those who were sure to die from those who might be saved with the limited gear and supplies on hand.
Kruger clasped his hands tightly behind his back, trying hard not to hear the low, sobbing moans rising from the rows of wounded. Tears rolled slowly down his face, stinging as they dripped into his torn cheek. This isn’t a battlefield, he thought. This is a butcher’s yard. For both sides.
“Wommandant!”
Several of his men waved him over to a foxhole not far from his wrecked
Ratel. He sighed, wiped his face roughly, and moved in that direction.
They’d found the paratroop commander. Maj. Rolf Bekker lay crumpled near the bottom of his foxhole-wounded and only semiconscious, but still alive. Kruger stared down at the man. From the look of things, the paratrooper had taken a faceful of grenade fragments, been shot, and then left for dead when Kruger’s infantry overran this part of the hill.
The South African felt a cold rage building up inside him as he looked at Bekker. This was the bastard who’d murdered his battalion. The man whose soldiers had shot Emily. Kruger’s fingers brushed the 9mm pistol at his side. Revenge would be so simple. So easy. Too easy. He shook his head. There’d been enough killing.
He straightened up.