0710 HOURS.
WEDNESDAY, 15 AUGUST 2112.
PESHAWAR, PAKISTAN.
A loud metallic crash shook the entire building. They all heard it. It was so loud that it was no doubt an object that slammed into the building. The sound had interfered with the decent. What was a supposed to be a swift exit had turned into a confusing corral down a set of singer stairs. High above the glass windows already in place shattered and disintegrated into thousands of pieces of shrapnel fragments. Floating down like daylight stars, the glass shards collided into the ground below and spread for many city blocks.
Captain Oliver regained control of the situation; his voice reigned in control as he pressed his men to get out of the apartment building. What had hit the building was a missile. It had struck the northern side of the building, where the Rangers once stayed, and had created a large hole that billowed out black smoke into the pure blue skies above.
Reaching the back entrance to the apartment complex, Jacob was the first one through as he faced the locked door. Hitting the lock mechanism and pushing against the metal door, it failed to move prompting the PFC to step aside as Sergeant Malkovich stepped forward readying himself to kick open the door. Jolting forward and planting his boot where the bolt was on the door, the metal sheet snapped open, and the sergeant stepped aside letting the Rangers through.
“Clear!” Jacob shouted.
“Clear!” The others agreed as they stepped into an alleyway.
With Oliver stepping forward, some of the men gagged as they forced themselves to not look at the object that had blocked the door. The captain was shocked and stunned by the sight before him. The others had become disoriented by the fierce smell that emanated from behind the door, and Jacob was the one to instantly question why he never caught such a foul stench. Sitting just before his boots was a bloody mess. The subject mentioned was resting against the door. What laid before them was believed to be a result of the end of a torturing session or some form of psychological warfare; it was unbelievable, but such is war. Whomever was killed had his guts ripped out and strung around him. Pulps of red stained the asphalt, and it was as if someone had cut open the body and neatly folded their insides, out.
“Holy shit. He couldn’t have died more than a few hours ago.” Anthony commented as he eyed the maggots feasting on the scattered body parts.
“What the fuck is this?” Andrew aggressively asked as he narrowed his eyes with anger burning throughout his body.
“I think I’m going to be sick. Is that an SSG operative?” Jacob asked steading himself on a wall with a grim look plastered on his face.
“Keep your eyes off it. It won’t do you good to remember such a sight,” Mike ordered in a forceful tone. His eyes furrowed at the sight and a sick feeling settled in his stomach as he himself kept his eyes on the body and the natural horrors that followed through decomposition. “Respectfully, sir, it’s time to move. We still need to reach the sight in time. Those boys won’t last another minute under sustained fire.”
Oliver breathed heavily, “Move it out.”
“Watch your back. We’re walking into hostile territory.” Mike warned as he took point. He kept a steady jog, his mind going back to the last time he took a PT test to keep him distracted. Though it wouldn’t stay, the sergeant’s mind wondered to the questioning act of killing. He had long gotten past the questions of whether it was good or bad, or whether it was necessary. Only now could he question all the decisions he had made in his life. It was odd, such questions only now bothered to appear in one of the worst fights he had yet to be in.
This is going to get me killed. Mike thought to himself, and he was right, this was distracting him and would eventually lead to him making a fatal mistake if he kept on this train of thought. As a the second in his fireteam, he would need to remain sharp, and he took this mission in strive. Being a leader wasn’t something that came natural to the brown-haired man—he and fifty others had entered a special training program for new NCOs and yet here he was, one out of the seven that passed the class and was thrown into Ranger School at Fort Bragg. He needed to keep his mind together. No matter how tough he was, or how much he could run or lift, he would always be susceptible to a bullet.
Stepping through the empty, death-filled streets, the Rangers walked slow. The day had been chaotic, and time had begun to catch up to the tired men as they continued their trek to the target building. It would’ve been a short journey, yet as Mike continued to mumble to himself lost in his own thoughts his fellow Rangers had become alerted by a familiar noise.
“Hind! Hind!”
Simon shouted as he pointed to the sky. A Russian designed helicopter gunship was rapidly approaching their position, though they didn’t know if it was friend or foe. Up above the thumping of the rotor blades against the wind sharpened Mike’s mind as he instantly began to step away from the open street they were about to approach. His eyes flashed over a set of carcasses that were once functioning ATVs, LAVs, and APCs. He knew that they were inside of a kill zone that was regularly patrolled by attack helicopters.
“Move into that building!” Andrew bellowed as he and the others broke into a sprint. Malkovich took the lead as he threw his body into the shut door making it slam open with a loud thud. The sergeant instantly snapped his rifle up as the others followed behind him and swept the room of an apparent shop, they had made entry into. Scanning the room through the sights of the rifles the room seemed empty, nothing more than pots and pans was strung about and a counter that hinted that the group had entered some small-time café. Moving to the opposite side of the shop, Mike began to inspect a nearby corridor, he waited for someone to provide backup.
Within a second a door busted open as an older man walked out wielding a handgun at Mike. Any scream that rang out in that second was suddenly drowned out as gunshots echoed in the shop. Simon was the first to react, he pulled the trigger of his M-5 four times sending the bullets crashing into the man’s chest spreading blood on the floor. The sergeant stumbled against the wall next to him as he clutched his ear and face. He was disoriented by the shock of the pistol firing no less than thirteen inches from his face and his eyes darted to the small hole within the drywall next to him.
The man was long dead as his body slumped over. Simon stood over the body. Malkovich pulled Mike away from the hallway and covered it alongside Anthony.
“Sarge!” Walking at a brisk pace, Corporal Ramirez stepped beside the sergeant, “Hey look at me!”
“I’m fine.” Mike coughed.
“Good.” Ramirez smirked as the captain walked beside him.
Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
“My boy hit?” He asked.
“No, sir.”
Oliver hummed gently, “Malkovich, Jacob, Anthony, Mike. Clear the hallway. We have the rest.”
“Fuck.” Mike said as he moved with the three waiting by the hall. The sergeant felt the air, it was beyond tense, but he supposed it was due to him almost losing his head form a nine-millimeter handgun. The heat that was beating down on the shop only seemed to be amplified by the stuffy environment and the lack of air conditioning, he considered himself lucky that he had yet to run out of water in his hydration pack.
As they cleared each room, Mike was always last in the stack, Jacob ordered him that he wouldn’t be taking point for a good while. On any normal day he would remind the PFC, yet this was not a normal day. His boots were muffled on the carpet below his feet and now he walked just behind Sergeant Malkovich. In just a few minutes did they clear the hallway except for a single side room, they were moving to clear it now. Walking up to the door and grasping the doorknob, Malkovich thrusted it open and allowed Jacob to storm inside with his rifle raised. The four men walked into a very tight and enclosed bedroom and before long the PFC and corporal had excused themselves leaving the two sergeants alone in the room.
Stepping on shard of shattered glass, the result of an explosion some unknown time ago, Mike quietly shifted within the small room. Behind him, Sergeant Malkovich noticed his counterpart’s movements, he questioned if Sergeant Randall was in a delirious state since he was disoriented by his near-death experience. Together, they remained silent with the confines of the small, dusty room where tattered clothes and destroyed clothes remained in place. Spotting a small frog plushie on the ground, Mike knelt and picked it up cradling the oddly intact plus.
“Have you seen anything like this before?” Mike suddenly broke the silence as he looked at Malkovich from the corner of his eye.
“Yes, I’m afraid I have.” Malkovich breathed lightly as he stepped over to a nearby closet and opened revealing nothing but clothes and spare blankets and pillows.
“God knows what happened to these people when this shit-show began.” Letting go of the frog plush and letting it fall to the dust covered floor, Mike stood up as he patted his gloved hands together.
“Were you able to catch a few hours of sleep earlier?” Malkovich changed topics much to the chagrin of Mike.
The sergeant paused a moment, “Yes.” He answered wearily.
Malkovich simply shrugged his shoulders. He turned his head to hide the tired expression in his eyes, and he was thankful for the half-face mask he wore over his face. Before Mike could comment on the silence, Malkovich interrupted him, “Let’s go,” he said as he walked out of the room leaving a very concerned and confused sergeant behind in the destroyed room. Mike soon followed, and as he walked back into the shop a conversation had brewed between Lieutenant Andrew, Baker, and Oliver.
“We don’t have any idea what the status of the SSG is. Our contact with the TOC has been cut off and the options we have are limited.” Andrew opened.
Baker seemed conflicted, “Our current objective should be to confirm the death of the target then get-the-fuck-out. We need to figure out what happened and get a report back to HIGHCOM, with the exception of seeing if our guys are alive, nothing else matters.”
His opinion had been voice. It grew the concern of the Rangers, but nothing was said in return.
“This place could act as a safe house in the event we fall back from the target building. Captain, we’re leaving this up to you.” Sergeant Malkovich added putting the decision on the captain who had remained silent throughout the conversation.
“I don’t want to get stuck in between what is clearly a rebellion against the government of Pakistan, and I don’t know what the Russians had planned in the event that the US failed its response.” Oliver said firmly making the final call, “We’ll check the target building, and if we’re lucky enough we’ll find any survivors of either team. Priority is the evacuation of Peshawar. If we find anyone, we’ll move back to the vehicles and go to rally point Hotel. The 1st ID should be there to provide aid in the evacuation.”
“Sir with all due respect, and I damn mean it, we don’t have the fire power to drag everyone out in one piece. I’m not saying we should leave them behind, but someone will be here to recover them dead or alive.” Simon spoke out making eyebrows arch amongst the riflemen.
Oliver shook his head as he pressed the magazine release on his rifle. “You’re right. But we’ll do things my way.” He said slamming the three-fourths full magazine into the gun. “Any objections?”
No one made any attempt of resistance. They had all silently agreed with the plan that was thrown together hastily, and all were willing to throw their lives to make sure any of their own made it out alive. “Get to work.” Oliver said as he stepped towards the doorway only stepping back to allow someone else to take point as per protocol. He hated it, he wanted to lead from the front again.
Walking under the heat of the sun, each Ranger was beginning to see the resulting fatigue that had formed over the last twenty-four hours. It wasn’t uncommon for the men within the battalions to go days without proper sleep, and luckily their adjustment to such a harsh lifestyle kept them on their toes and aware of their surroundings: flocks of bird flew overheard in between the distant cries of gunshots and helicopters maneuvering throughout the tight-packed skies. Bullet holes, blast shadows, and destroyed vehicles littered the grounds the birds flew above, and the men traversed. Passing by a destroyed American Stryker Mark V, Oliver directed his men to investigate the wreckage, and fortunately all the doors were open and no bodies or lose tear were found.
“Hope they made it out in one piece.” Lieutenant Andrew said in a low voice.
“I wouldn’t doubt they did.” Mike responded keeping a healthy amount of optimism. He kept his carbine in the low-ready and he glanced towards the men ahead of him. The bolder ones, Oliver, Baker, Malkovich and Anthony pressed forward through the ghost town not bothering to spare a glance to the myriad of bodies and destruction that laid all around. No matter what branch, no matter what unit, there would always be those looking to lead from the front and get into the thick of the danger. Mike himself was somewhere in the middle; he was both frightened by the sight of war, yet he wasn’t one to succumb to fear during a mission, he had a responsibility to get all his men home safe, something he had took from the legacy of his current captain.
Jacob was one of the men that had a difficult time keeping his composer. “Keep it together.” He said that over-and-over seemingly as a way to distract himself and clam his rattled nerves. By all accounts this was the PFC’s first deployment, and by extension his first time acting in an active combat arena. Mike wanted to watch out for the young private. He wanted to make sure that if anything, Jacob and the others would return to the homeland in one piece.
“Target building, eighty meters, front.” Malkovich announced making the men ready themselves as they stepped out into an open street.
Their boots echoed in the empty streets. The weight of their gear pressed upon their backs as they soon reached the target building in complete silence. There they stood on the hot asphalt and looked upon the wreckage and destruction that had occurred over the span of eight minutes. Laying under the sun’s rays, the squadron of Pakistani SSG, ten to be exact, laid dead. Their bodies were riddled with bullet holes and their blood had spilt onto the asphalt and dried creating a purple-red hue.
“Hey, weren’t there supposed to be eighteen of them?” Andrew asked breaking the uneasy silence.
A light cough came from Jacob as he resisted the churning in his stomach. Andrew walked over to one of the bodies that had slumped against a street barricade. He lifted the body towards the ground and his face grimaced at the sight of the bullet that had made the SSG operator’s face unrecognizable. He reached towards the man’s neck with his gloved hand. The lieutenant let out a quiet sigh as he looked at the name on the pair of dog tags he had pulled from the body, Farid Ahmed.
“We need to check the building.” Oliver ordered as he directed the Rangers at the rear entrance of the building away from any prying eyes, “Target Brutus and the others could very well still be in play.
One by one the Rangers walked slowly towards the caved-in building. The entire roof and the second floor had been turned into mere ruble only to crater into the main foyer. The main entrance was completely covered by debris and the stench of death, gunpowder, and explosive residue emanated from the building.
Mike held his breath as he was the last man to step off.
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