Apocalypse Burning (47 page)

And in that moment, the sermon he knew he had to deliver started to fall together in his mind.

A knock sounded on the door. When Delroy turned to look, he saw George, the old man who had given him a ride to the cemetery, standing there.

“’Member me?” George asked.

Delroy stood and took the old man’s hand. “Aye. Of course I do. What brings you here?”

George grinned. “That bell. What else? Been a lotta years since I heard that bell ring. Never figured on hearin’ it again in my lifetime; I’ll guarantee you that.” He wiped his mouth with a calloused hand. “When your daddy shepherded this church, I never come in here. But I figured if you was gonna be here today, I was gonna come.” He jerked a thumb over his shoulder. “I brung some company too.”

Delroy poked his head out the door and glanced down the hallway. Six other old men stood there, each of them clutching an instrument case.

“Gentlemen,” Delroy greeted.

“Pastor,” they greeted.

“
Chaplain,
” George said. “I done told y’all he’s a chaplain. A navy man.” He looked back at Delroy. “This here’s one of the finest blues bands in the state.”

“Blues,” Delroy repeated.

“Yes, sir,” George said. “But don’t worry. They play gospel just fine. Gospel ain’t nothin’ but blues what’s got more hope. Same problems, just a little light at the end of the tunnel. I brung ‘em here ‘cause I figured you cain’t have a revival without some good ol’ gospel music.”

“A revival?”

“That’s what we done been tole.”

“A revival.” Delroy said it again, and the idea started to feel right. He looked at George, then at the men. “You want to play? Here?”

“Yes, sir. If’n y’all’ll have us.”

Delroy grinned and shook his head. “I’ll have you.”

“Thank you, Chaplain. You won’t regret it. We’ll do you proud.”

“I’m sure you will.”

“You gonna be along soon?”

“Aye.”

“Well, we’ll go an’ warm ‘em up for you.” George turned and walked back down the hallway. His hand drifted up to his bib overalls for his cigarette pouch.

“George.”

Turning, George said, “Yes, Chaplain.”

“There’s no smoking in this church,” Delroy said. “There was no smoking allowed back in my daddy’s day, and there won’t be any today.”

“Yes, sir. Been meanin’ to give ‘em up anyway.” George waved and went on his way, the band falling in behind him.

Delroy grinned, feeling better about everything. The thing that still bothered him was Glenda’s absence. He wished with all his might that she were here. He went back to the small office and knelt on the floor the way he had seen his daddy do so many times before. He held his daddy’s Bible in both hands, closed his eyes, and prayed.

“God, I’m going to need You with me now. Please make me strong enough to make a difference. And, Daddy, keep an eye on me and help me to make you proud. Amen.” Then Delroy pushed himself up and went to face his congregation, hoping he had the message they needed to hear. Hoping it was one
he
needed to hear.

16

Operation Run Dry
26 Klicks South-Southwest of Sanliurfa, Turkey
Local Time 2116 Hours

Dressed in black, his head covered by a watch cap and his face striped in black-and-green camo, Goose waited patiently atop the ridgeline over the line of warehouse-like structures across from the open pit where the Syrians had stored their forward fuel reserves. His nightvision goggles lifted the darkness from the surrounding area and turned the Syrian guards green.

Forty or fifty years ago, the buildings had housed archeological teams that had come to the nameless city and poked around in its remains for some forgotten prize that relic hunters and scavengers hadn’t already made off with. They’d left the buildings behind. If the archeologists had found anything, Remington hadn’t mentioned it in his brief. Goose reflected that it was interesting archeologists could leave things behind that would eventually be studied by other archeologists.

On the computer map, the target site where the fuel was kept was designated
Ruins
and the buildings were designated
Buildings.
The armored cav area was labeled
Armored Cav.
The Ranger captain liked keeping things simple. Complicating them for no reason tended to make missions run ragged in timing and in effective use of manpower.

Goose preferred his hit-and-git missions the same way. Down and dirty, quick in and quick out. That was why he and Remington had performed so well together as sergeants and now as captain and first sergeant. They knew each other, and they knew how to be the very best Rangers. When the time came, they could both be vicious and merciless against their enemies.

Back in the Revolutionary War, when Major Robert Rogers had first put together the rules that became his Standing Orders, Rogers had made it clear that the enemy should be taken advantage of. They weren’t to be fought fairly. They were to be encountered and put down as quickly as possible, with as little loss to a Ranger as possible.

“Let the enemy come ‘til he’s almost close enough to touch. Then let him have it and jump out and finish him with your hatchet.” Those SOs were grim and ruthless, but the men who had learned to fight with them against the British in those days had beaten the best land army around. And they’d done it by breaking the rules that had been in existence at the time.

Goose had made his peace with himself over the men he was going to kill tonight. He’d said his prayers and focused on the atrocities his enemies had done, judging them fit for no mercy if they chose to fight. The Syrian army had launched SCUDs into metropolitan areas, killing hundreds of men, women, and children. And they had attacked Sanliurfa on different occasions, killing civilians as well as brother Rangers.

Payback was coming, and it was dressed in Ranger black and wearing the bruised shadows of the night on its face.

Goose felt the wind blowing in from the east, mixed with the spitting rain that collected and slid down his features to soak the turtleneck he wore. He carried his M-4A1 slung over his shoulder, his M9 on his hip, and took up an MP5-SD3 machine pistol with suppressor as his lead weapon for the moment. His LCE was loaded with grenades and extra ammo for his weapons.

A shadow flitted along the ridgeline to Goose’s right. He picked it up instantly in his peripheral vision. He shifted the MP5 across his knees a little, getting his body ready to move and bring the deadly machine pistol up if he needed to.

Goose stayed hunkered down, putting most of his weight on his good knee so he could save the injured one. The bad knee had swelled tremendously, filling his pant leg and promising days of agony to come.

But he was with his men in the field and that was where he belonged. Megan could never understand that about him. Not the warrior spirit, not the avenger inside him that lived to break the hold evil men had on others. For some people, being a soldier was a profession, but Goose had always felt it was a calling, something in his nature that he could never deny. He’d fought and would fight to protect those who could not protect themselves, and he would make the sacrifices necessary to see that done.

Tonight men would die because of his willingness to do that.

And the more he thought about all the terror and oppression that were coming in the next seven years, the stronger that spirit in him felt. The action against the Syrian army was a delaying tactic, a maneuver that would buy the armies occupying Sanliurfa a little more time. A chance at life or a slower death.

But what was he going to do after that? The question had hung heavy in his mind during the fifty-three-klick run through the rainsodden land. Even when the action was over in Turkey—and God grant that it would be—there would be new wars to fight. The Four Horsemen were coming. Nicolae Carpathia might be the Antichrist.

Goose wondered if he would recognize the evil in the man if he saw it, or if he would be pulled into it. And what if Icarus had it wrong? What if Carpathia wasn’t Antichrist? What if the Antichrist hadn’t shown up yet?

The possibilities made Goose’s mind dizzy. His father had always told him that sometimes a man could simply know too much. Wes Gander had always advised Goose to take each day as it came, to make a battle plan, then find out what mistakes were made the day before and correct those.

But that wasn’t possible now. No one knew what mistakes were being made.

“First Sergeant.” Corporal Tommy Brass hesitated in the brush ten yards away. The Rangers knew better than to creep up on each other unannounced.

“Here, Corporal,” Goose replied in a soft voice that didn’t carry far.

“Bravo Detail is in position. Lieutenant Keller says we’re go on your go.”

Keller was holding two Alpha squads back for the moment. Goose’s primary mission was the takedown of the four targets designated by Captain Remington for termination—all four were ranking officers in the Syrian army. Goose had seen the files on all of them. They were butchers, men who used the power of the military to further their own bloodlusts and desires.

The deaths of those four men were going to be a message. So far, the Syrian army thought of the Rangers only as peacekeepers. But when the Syrians had used the dead bodies of the men who had fallen during the border skirmish, they had crossed the line. Tonight, the Syrian army was going to learn a little about retribution.

“Gonna be readin’ ‘em from the Old Testament,” Wes Gander used to say when he talked about people he’d had confrontations with.

And that was what it was, Goose knew—an Old Testament reckoning right here in the holy lands where so much of that bloody history had played out.

“Affirmative, Corporal,” Goose said. “Stand by to go live on the sat-link when I call for it. When we hit the house, those four targets we’re after are going to scatter.”

When they left Sanliurfa, Remington had tagged all four men through the spy-sat recon. Once the sat-link kicked in, Remington’s specialty teams would guide Goose and his men to the targets.

And once that ball was in play, Keller would take the other two squads into the fuel dump site and destroy those supplies. Bravo Detail would explode booby traps they had on the armored cav, then proceed to the airfield and attempt to secure it. If everything went well, the marine wing from Sanliurfa could make a surprise strike and take out the remaining Syrian army.

“Yes, First Sergeant.”

Goose took a final deep breath, then took up the rope secured to a stake shoved deep into the mud. The drop over the ridgeline was steep, made even more treacherous by the mud clinging to the side. The roofs of the buildings were thirty feet below.

He held the MP5 in his right hand and used his left to rappel the steep descent Australian style, which put him face forward and ready to use the machine pistol. He kept his hops short and low, staying close to ground to absorb more of the cover provided by the irregular surface and brush that grew along the way.

Kicked free by the steel-toed boots he wore, muddy clods of dirt skidded downhill. For a moment Goose was afraid the dirt would crash across the top of the building below and alert everyone inside, but it tumbled into the space between the building’s back wall and the hill.

A moment later, Goose put his foot down on the roof of one of the buildings and took up a position in the shadows. Most of the Syrian guards around the building were more interested in staying out of the rain than in security.

“Go,” he called up.

Instantly, nine rappelling lines snaked down the hillside, followed immediately by nine Rangers dressed the same as Goose. Like him, they also carried suppressed MP5s as their lead weapon.

Goose gave hand signals, breaking the squad into the two predesignated five-man teams, taking charge of one himself. He stayed along the edge of the building where the support was strongest so there would be less chance of making any noise.

Movement caught his attention as he neared the edge of the rooftop. He threw out a hand, signaled, and brought the four men behind him to a stop, spread out on their stomachs on the roof.

Slithering forward on his belly, sliding easily due to the rain, Goose peered down at the Syrian soldier walking patrol below him. Taking shelter against the side of the building, the man reached under his raincoat and took out a pack of cigarettes.

From twenty-five feet over the man’s head, Goose saw that the lighter the Syrian soldier used was a Zippo and knew that it had probably come from one of the dead American or European soldiers who had been left at the border. He stilled the immediate surge of anger, going cold and placid inside.

He also knew the second half of his team was moving into position and expecting his team to do the same. Glancing back at the Ranger behind him, Goose signaled again, then shrugged out of his M-4A1 and MP5. He took off the NVGs. The other Ranger took Goose’s assault rifle, machine pistol, and the goggles.

Slipping his Ka-Bar fighting knife from his calf sheath, Goose held it point down along his right forearm, then slithered over the side of the building. He hung by his left arm, made certain the Syrian soldier still faced away from him, and dropped to the ground behind him.