The War After Armageddon

NINE

“We’ve got a parasite inside the Jihadis’ fire-control system,” the briefer said. The room with the portable screens bore the smell of weary men, of stale breath, sweat, and burnt circuits. “We were able to penetrate them at the corps level. The bug is programmed to activate at 1 ID’s LD time. When the first blue vehicle crosses the line, all Jihadi indirect fire assets netted for autocontrol will reprogram to impact three thousand meters short, with a thirty-degree left deviation.” He paused to make eye contact with the G-2 and the deputy G-3, who was sitting in for his sleeping boss. “We estimate it will take them fifteen to max thirty minutes to identify the problem and a minimum of two hours to fix it.”

“Morphing parasite?” Val Danczuk, the corps intelligence officer, asked.

“Yes, sir. That’s why we’re pretty sure we’ve got two hours.”

Danczuk turned to the deputy operations officer, wondering if Mike Andretti hadn’t made the right decision by catching some sleep. You could run on empty for only so long. “View from the Three side?”

“Two hours should get 1 ID into the Afula defenses. If they’re going to get there at all. What about the drones?”

The briefer shook his head. “Sir, we still haven’t been able to penetrate their network.”

“So the drones, like the poor, will always be with us?” the deputy G-3 said.

There was a slight pause, a half-moment of held breath, before the briefer responded. Mocking Scripture wasn’t safe, even in the Army’s inner circles.

“Sir, for now the only option on the drones is to continue working the spoofers against them,” the briefer told him.

“Which has not,” the deputy Three said, “been a raging success.”

“Best we can do, sir. We’re trying.”

The deputy shook his head and turned to Danczuk. Question mark on his face.

“We’re working it, Bruce. We all want to crack that particular code. But two out of three isn’t bad—indirect fire down and, if things go the way the we think they will, at least a brief window of safety from the antitank defenses.”

“I wish we had air, sir. Where’s the zoomie?”

“He turned in,” one of the staffers said.

“Christ.” The deputy G-3 held up his hands in mock surrender.

“Okay,” Danczuk said, eager to wrap up the briefing, “anything else?” He scanned the tired faces. Even the night-shift officers looked beat. Not much sleep to be had while the headquarters moved ashore.

“Well, I have one last question,” the deputy G-3 said. “Anybody here from commo?”

A major raised his hand.

“We going to be able to talk any better tomorrow?”

The major shook his head. “Sir, we’re doing the best we can. We’re getting jammed on every microfrequency. It’s a miracle we can talk at all. At least they’re getting intermittent comms at company and below.”

The deputy Three looked at Danczuk, who outranked him by one grade. “Sir, I feel like I’m in Korea with my great-grandfather.”

“Well, don’t get frostbite,” Danczuk said. He was getting tired of the deputy Three’s swagger. The man was far more subdued when his boss was present. “All right. A-Shift, get some rack time. B-Shift, back to work.” He looked at an officer who’d been sitting quietly against the wall. “Major Kim, if you still need to talk to me, hang back. But no epic poetry tonight.”

The younger officer nodded. Val Danczuk regarded him as the brightest analyst and reconnaissance officer on his staff. Even if he wasn’t a Steelers fan.

When the room had cleared, the G-2 said, “Watcha got?”

“Mind if I shut the door, sir?”

“Shut it.”

The major closed the door. It was ill-set and had to be forced. Like everything else in this rathole, Danczuk thought.

Major Kim spread a half-dozen imagery culls on the table in front of the G-2. “Sir, I’d like you to take a look at these.”

Danczuk glanced at them. Same target in each one, although the angles and shadows were different: a tented complex in a grove. Some hardstand. The main facilities bore the Red Crescent signature.

“Okay, Jim. Help me out. I’m too tired to play Twenty Questions.”

The major leaned in close enough for the G-2 to smell the last rations the younger man had eaten. “Sir, this site’s in the Upper Galilee. Way up, almost to the old Lebanese border. And if it’s really a field hospital, I’ve got three questions.”

“Which are?”

“The Jihadis have been taking serious casualties. But look at the imagery. We’ve got drone shots and two angles from the DSI-40 satellite. We got those this afternoon, when the downlink punched through for a couple of hours. The other shots are from this morning or yesterday—and there’s an infrared from less than three hours ago.” The major backed off slightly. “Where’s the ambulance traffic? Except for the shadows and the angles, the shots are virtually identical. Hardly any movement. Look at this one: exactly two ground personnel visible. But they’ve got fully manned guardposts down this road.” He pointed with a pen. “There. And over here. And here.”

“Second question?”

“If it’s a field hospital, why isn’t it closer to a main road? Why tuck it off a single-lane side road in the boonies?”

“Third question?”

“If it’s a hospital, why is part of the site camouflaged?” He pointed again. “What looks like trees over here is ghost netting.”

“Chinese?”

“Made in India, sir. Tech transfer from Dassault. If we’re reading the wavelengths right.”

Danczuk nodded. “And?”

“Sir, the J’s are short of ghost netting. It’s a prime commodity. Why use it on a hospital? Which you shouldn’t be trying to hide at all? And by the way, there’s no sign of air-evac activity in any shot. No sign of any patients at all.”

“And Major Jim Kim’s analysis would be?” Danczuk asked. Afraid he knew damned well what the answer was.

“Sir, I believe this is a nuke field-storage site. I believe they’re prepping nuclear munitions in that main tent complex, although I can’t say how many. Just look at those generators. Those aren’t for a hospital. And we don’t know what’s under the ghost netting. Could even be launchers, it could be—”

The G-2 held up his hand. But he didn’t speak immediately after cutting off his subordinate. He gave him a pay-attention stare first.

“Jim… You’re a first-rate officer. Best analyst I’ve got. You read that on your efficiency report. Your pre-landing estimates could be used as models at Ft. Leavenworth. But I need you to listen to me now. Unless you have proof—proof—and more than a hackles-up hunch about this, I don’t want to hear another word spoken about it. And that’s an order. Not a word. Not to anybody.”

“But, sir… General Harris—”

“You’re not listening. I want you to go on receive now. And this is strictly between us. You’ve got a great career ahead of you in MI. If you don’t fall into the trap that’s taken down more intel officers than straight-ahead bad calls ever did. Don’t get on a hobby horse. Don’t go into target-lock mode.” He gestured toward another man whom they both could envision beyond the room’s mottled walls. “We’ve got to protect General Harris on this one. Nukes are turning into his hobby horse. And every damned agency in D.C. agrees that the Jihadis have no nukes left. Based on the codeword evidence, I agree with the National Intelligence Estimate on this one.”

Exhausted, Danczuk sat back, looking at his subordinate again but not quite seeing him this time. Thinking. About the boss he’d served since he’d been a brigade S-2. Best commander he’d ever seen. Normally.

“General Harris is under a lot of pressure,” the G-2 said. “Not because he’s been wrong about anything, but because he’s been right about so many things. And it’s not just the MOBIC crowd we have to protect him against. Even in the Army, there’s plenty of jealousy toward Flintlock Harris, the general everybody laughed at because he made his lieutenants read maps without the benefit of GPS. Plenty of folks wouldn’t mind seeing him make a fool out of himself now, after he was so damned right.” Danczuk scratched a sudden itch on his scalp. “Even if that meant Sim Montfort becoming the hero of the day.”

“Yes, sir. But couldn’t we just hit the site? It’s obvious that it isn’t a field hospital.”

“Tempting,” the G-2 said. “It’s tempting. Have you considered that it might be their forward command post, by the way?”

Stubborn, Major Kim shook his head. “Not enough vehicular traffic, sir. It’s not a command post.”

“Well, find out what it is, then. I don’t want you on a nuke trea -sure hunt, but if we can confirm that it’s not a field hospital—and I mean ‘confirm’—we can go after it. But I know Flintlock Harris well enough to be as certain as bedbugs in Baghdad that he won’t green-light attacking a Red Crescent site unless we have confirmation from multiple sources that it isn’t what it claims to be.”

“But… If it is a nuke site—”

“But… If it is a nuke site—”

“It’s not. “It’s not. Didn’t you hear one goddamned word I said?”

“Sir,” Garcia whispered to the new lieutenant, “we’re on the wrong side of the ridge.”

Garcia could barely see the other man’s eyes in the darkness. But he registered their flash.

“You telling me I can’t read a map, Sergeant?”

“Lieutenant… All I said is that we’re on the wrong side of the ridge. Please keep your voice down, sir. The men don’t need to hear this. Or the J’s.”

“Sergeant Garcia, I’ve been appointed platoon commander. Because somebody at battalion happens to believe this platoon needs one. You don’t have to like it. But I expect you to obey orders. You understand me?”

“Yes, sir.”

“We’re exactly where we’re supposed to be. This draw leads straight down to our objective. The only reason you can’t see the village is that it’s blacked out.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Get the men ready to move out.”

“Yes, sir.”

Garcia scuttled back along the trail. He would’ve preferred bushwhacking to the objective, but the lieutenant said he’d had a complete briefing from the S-2 and the trails were clean in the entire southern sector. The Jihadis had been surprised and hadn’t had time to lay mines or booby traps before they pulled back.

Second Lieutenant DeWayne Jefferson. East Coast. Probably D.C. or Philly, Garcia calculated. Whatever the Marines may have taught him at Quantico, they hadn’t taught him how to read a map.

Garcia couldn’t say why, but maps had always seemed clear to him. They just made sense. Like math. The counselor at Monte-bello had pushed him to apply for a scholarship, but Garcia wasn’t having any of that shit. Enough to get through high school and not be jerking off for a GED when you were thirty. He just wanted to be a Marine. Later, the Anglos at the community college he’d dipped into had given him a similar line: Get an education and dump the Marine Corps. But Garcia just wanted their piece of paper so he could make his ratings.

One thing he didn’t need some lecturer with a cheap tie and the whisky shakes to tell him: The lieutenant couldn’t connect a compass and map to his brain.

“Okay,” Garcia hissed. “Let’s go, Dev il Dogs. We’re moving out.”

“Hey, Sergeant. That lieutenant have any idea where the fuck we are?”

“Shut up, Cropsey. You’ve used up your shit ration for the day. Let’s go.”

They were all tired. And blistered. An hour of sleep here and there wasn’t enough. And when there were no gunshots, there was no adrenaline. Once they’d gotten off that mountain road, they hadn’t even heard a drone overhead.

“Maintain combat interval,” Garcia told them. They’d been stumbling into one another for the last two hours.

Garcia crept back up behind the lieutenant. Making just enough noise not to spook him. The new platoon commander was bossy and jumpy, a combination platter that was all beans and no tacos, as far as Garcia was concerned.

And this wasn’t no training exercise. You didn’t get a re-do. “Ready to move out, sir.”

The lieutenant turned toward the long file of Marines, shadows in the night, and asked, too loudly, “Who’ll volunteer to take over point? I want somebody who knows he’s a Marine.”

Nobody responded. Larsen had been walking point, but the lieutenant had bitched him out for being too slow. Garcia hadn’t had a problem with Larsen, though. Larsen was country. Garcia didn’t want him on point down on the block, but he was the best Marine in the platoon in Mr. No-Shoulders’ territory.

“I know you’re all tired, men,” the lieutenant said. “But we’re Marines. And we’ve got a mission. If I don’t have any volun-teers—”

“I’ll take the point myself, sir,” Garcia said.

“No. The platoon sergeant doesn’t walk point. You. What’s your name?”

“Private Barrett.”

“You’ve got point. Move out.”

Garcia could feel the private’s I-am-seriously-unhappy vibes as he brushed past.

“Cropsey, Larsen. Close it up. You’re between the lieutenant and me now.”

The mood in the platoon needed fixing. And Garcia wasn’t sure how to fix it. He didn’t like the new lieutenant and realized he was carrying a grudge. He’d hoped to keep the platoon to himself. But the lieutenant was real as la migra at the kitchen door. You had to deal with it. Get along. One way or the other.

They moved down the trail, with Garcia certain that the platoon was headed almost ninety degrees off course. He’d done what he could. Now he concentrated on the darkness around him, the queerness of too much space. He was confident that he could work any block anywhere in the world. But operating in the Great Wide-Open still made him edgy.

The land mine that blew Barrett apart was only the start of it. The Marine rode a cushion of flames and came apart before their eyes. The night lit up with tracers: Jihadi stay-behinds.

“Charge!” the lieutenant screamed. “Charge into the ambush!”

That was what you’re supposed to do. But Garcia didn’t do it. The hillside was too steep to charge up. The manual didn’t talk about that. And it had taken him only an instant to realize that the Jihadis were overshooting, that they didn’t know how to lay their weapons. The platoon had time to get its shit together, to size things up.

Garcia watched the lieutenant’s silhouette stump up the steep grade. With no one following. Suddenly, the tall officer spun back-ward as heavy-caliber machine-gun slugs tore into him. He went down the slope like a one-man avalanche.

“Cropsey… You got a fix on them?”

“Yes, Sergeant.”

“Larsen. You with us?”

“Here, Sergeant.”

“Go with Cropsey. Cropsey, go back up the line and work them from the top. Take your time. Do it right. We’ll keep them happy.”

“Mama! Oh, my mama!” It was the lieutenant. “I can’t find my leg, Mama! Mama, I can’t find none of my legs…”

“Fuck him,” Crospey said.

“Shut up. Move out.”

Garcia moved along behind them, checking on the Marines. Who were firing up the hillside. Nobody else down.

“Corporal Gallotti. I want aimed fire from your squad. Keep them busy. And spread your men out, for the love of Jesus.”

The J’s were firing madly, their rounds plunging into the opposite hillside, igniting small brushfires. Garcia made it one crew-served heavy weapon and two men out on security.

“Mama, I can’t find my legs, I can’t find my legs…”

“Sergeant, you want—”

“No. Shit. I’ll get him.”

Garcia scrambled back down the trail, hoping there were no mines short of where Barrett had taken his last steps. With half a mind to let the lieutenant lie and bleed.

He found Barrett first. Or what was left of him. It was the Night of the Missing Legs. And almost everything else from the waist down. Whatever kind of mine it had been had done its job. The blast had sounded like a heavy mortar round.

“Oh, I’m sorry, Mama… Mama, I’m so sorry…”

Dude, shut up, Garcia thought. Stop begging them to lower their aim.

Behind him, Gallotti’s squad was laying down good fire. The machine gun had shifted its aim in their direction, but the tracers were still streaking high over the trail. If the lieutenant had just paused to get his bearings, he would’ve been okay. Instead of jumping up like the teacher’s pet and running right into the line of fire.

Goddamned asshole, Garcia thought.

“Oh, Mama, don’t let them take my legs away…”

Garcia followed the voice into a notch just below the trail. After being hit and going down, the lieutenant had rolled. Garcia scrambled down beside him. Praying there were no more mines.

“I’m with you, sir,” Garcia said.

“You tell my mama, you tell her I’m all right…”

“Yes, sir. She knows. Where are you hit?”

“My legs. I can’t find my legs. Where are my legs?”

Garcia felt down the torso, trying to figure out the body’s posture in the shadows. There was blood. Plenty of it. Sticky. Something stank. But he could feel both the lieutenant’s legs still joined to the hip.

Warily, he felt down the limbs. Feeling uphill, with the lieutenant’s head pointed down into the draw.

Both legs were perfectly intact. Right down to the combat boots. The bones didn’t even feel broken.

“Mama, don’t you let them take my legs,” the lieutenant moaned. “Tell them they can’t take my legs.”

“Your legs are just fine, Lieutenant. Your legs are fine. I checked them out.”

“I can’t find my legs. Who’re you? Where’s my mama?”

“She had to go out for a minute. She’ll be back. Don’t move, sir.”

Garcia felt along the body. It wasn’t the lieutenant’s legs that were missing. It was his arms. The machine-gun rounds had caught him perfectly at the shoulders, tearing away both of his arms.

Hands covered in blood, Garcia didn’t know what to do. There was so much blood, he was slipping in it. The brush, the dirt, everything streamed with blood.

“Tell my mama… I need to tell her something… please…”

“Yes, sir. I’ll tell her.”

There was no way tourniquets were going to help. There was nothing to tie them around. For a moment, Garcia listened to the firefight above him on the trail. That was where he belonged, he knew. But he couldn’t leave this man he didn’t like. Who was bleeding to death. Who should’ve bled to death already. The wounds were catastrophic, with half of each shoulder torn away.

His fellow Marine.

“I can’t find my legs nowhere, Mama…”

” “Hush up, sir. Please. Just be quiet. It’s all right.”

Revolted by what he found himself doing, Garcia eased down beside the lieutenant’s torso and lifted the man’s head into his lap. Blood spurted onto him like a hose filled with hot piss.

“My mama, she… she…”

“Yes, sir. She’s here now. She’s listening. She’s come to help you.”

“Mama… I tried to do right. I tried to do right, Mama. I tried to do right…”

“You did right. Everything’s all right now, sir. You’re going to be just fine.”

“Mama, I’ll do anything you say… please…”

“She just wants you to be quiet now. Just rest, now. Your legs are fine. Everything’s going to be fine.”

“I don’t feel right.” Suddenly, the lieutenant’s eyes widened. They looked perfectly clear in the light of the tracers and stars. “Sergeant?”

“Yes, sir. It’s me. Sergeant Garcia.”

“It was my fault.”

“Sir, anybody—”

“It was my fault. I take full responsibility. I—am I bleeding?”

“You’re going to be fine, sir. Just take it easy.”

“You’re lying,” he said. “You can be court-martialed for lying to a superior.” And he died.

Garcia said the quickest prayer of his life, then clawed his way back up to the trail. Hoping his return trip wouldn’t collect any mines he’d missed on the way down.

He felt as though he’d been swimming in lukewarm soup. His wet uniform collected dust. Making mud-puppy fudge all over him.

“Corporal Gallotti?”

“Here, Sergeant.”

“Go up the line. Pass the word. As soon as Cropsey and Larsen open up from the flank, we’re going straight up that hill. Tell everybody to stay low but keep going. Tell them to keep their fires concentrated on the machine-gun position. Anything to the left is blue. Got that?”

“Yes, sergeant.”

“Go.”

Gallotti scuttled off. Garcia tried to dry his hands and his weapon so the slime wouldn’t screw him up. But the lieutenant’s blood had already gone sticky.

How long had the business been going on? Ten minutes? Garcia couldn’t judge. More like fifteen, he decided. He just hoped Cropsey had taken his time and worked well to the Jihadis’ rear. Larsen would do what Crospey said, Garcia knew.

A grenade exploded up the hillside, followed by another.

“Let’s go!” Garcia screamed. “Stay low. Let’s go, Marines!”

He scrambled up the steep slope, thighs burning, the muscles long tormented. A stream of tracers flirted above his head. But there was no more machine-gun fire.

Voices began to shout on the high ground. In Mussie-talk. At least two of them. The firing above them stopped.

Garcia heard Cropsey’s voice. “Stand the fuck up. Both of you.”

More Mussie-babble.

“Cease fire, cease fire,” Garcia shouted.

“I said for you to stand the fuck up.” Cropsey’s voice again. “Raise your hands. Let me see them.”

Garcia saw two shadows rise, silhouetted against the sky. Hands high. Two English-speaking hombres. Good news for the S-2.

A weapon opened up. Two bursts. The Jihadis crumpled.

“Cease fire! Goddamnit.”

Breathing heavily, Garcia stumped the last twenty meters up the slope. Legs on fire.

Cropsey stood over the J’s. He watched the shadows where they lay, as if for signs of life. Weapon poised to fire again. He didn’t seem to register Garcia’s approach.

Garcia grabbed him by the upper arm. “What the fuck?”

“I thought they had weapons.”

“Their hands were in the goddamned air. I saw it.”

“I thought they had weapons, Sergeant.”

“Christ.”

“Anyway, they killed Barrett.”

“You just shot two men who were surrendering. The S-2—”

“Whose side are you on, Sergeant?” Cropsey demanded. “ They don’t matter. What? We got two squads’ worth left out of a platoon? You going to send Corporal Gallotti back with prisoners? And the lieutenant doesn’t even know where we are?”

“He’s dead. And you listen. Carefully, hombre.” Garcia leaned close. “You think you’re a bad motherfucker? My sister would’ve torn off your head and shit down your throat.” Garcia felt the other Marines approaching, and he lowered his voice. Without dropping his intensity. “You’re going to follow orders. Or you can go to the rear yourself. Under charges. You understand?”

Something in his tone of voice worked. He could feel Cropsey curling inward. Like a slug you tossed salt on. Maybe surviving Montebello was worth something, after all.

“Yeah, Sergeant,” Cropsey said. “I got it.”

Lieutenant General of the Military Order of the Brothers in Christ Simon Montfort stood on a ridge overlooking the flames as the suburbs of Jerusalem burned through the night. He could tell from the excited expressions exactly what his staff had come to report, but he let them wait a little longer. Illustrating his imperturbability, his destiny to command, his place in history. He understood the impression he made as the distant flames glinted off the three onyx crosses on his helmet. Tall, erect. The model of a Christian soldier.

At last, Montfort turned. Smiling calmly at his chief of staff. “What is it, James?”

“Sir, we’ve taken the Temple Mount.”

Montfort nodded. His smile neither widened nor weakened. The sounds of battle from the middle distance were, indeed, far weaker than they had been even an hour earlier.

Montfort fell to his knees, setting his right fist over his heart, in the attitude of a MOBIC soldier in prayer. Eyes turned Heavenward. Into the red-tinged darkness.

“Lord God of hosts, we give thanks unto You for the glory of this day. Accept this, Your city, as our humble offering. Amen.”

“Amen,” his staff echoed.

Montfort rose. Taller than any of his immediate subordinates.

All of whom had been carefully chosen. For a number of qualities beyond their zealous faith.

“When the sun rises,” he said, “I want no stone, no brick—not one splinter—left standing where the enemies of Christ erected their temple. We will erase the Dome of the Rock from history. Praise the Lord.”

“Praise the Lord!” his staff echoed. The Guardians, well-armed, repeated the phrase from the shadows.

“Go now,” Montfort said. “Each man to his toil in the vineyards of the Lord.”

And after each had gone but one, that man came to Montfort. His eyes asked if he might approach.

“What is it, James?”

“Sir… I need a decision about the locals. We’ve got at least twenty thousand of them on our hands. Maybe as many still hiding in the city. We can’t put it off any longer. We need to decide where to move them.”

“We’re not going to move them,” Montfort said.

“But… Jerusalem was to be purified…”

“It will be. And it shall be. Kill them all.”

His chief of staff recoiled. His mouth hung open, robbed of speech. At last, he stammered, “But… there are still some Christians… Orthodox, Syriac, Chaldeans…”

“Kill them all,” Montfort said calmly. “God will know his own.”