Ghostmakers Chapter One

Chapter One

The air he was breathing was humid and heavy, it clung to the back of his throat like a bad smell. It almost choked him with every sickening intake of breath; the road ahead of him was rough and dusty; the journey would be long and difficult and it was crucial to the survival of millions. Millions of lives had been place squarely in the hands of him and his men, the supplies had to make it, undisturbed and unscathed from the formidable military force that lay in front of them. He lifted his M4 rifle from its leaning position against the side the Humvee bearing the U.N insignia, behind it were three flatbed trucks, canvas sheets over the backend, each bearing the identical U.N peacekeeping forces insignia and below that in the corner much smaller the single word “Phoenix”.
         “Mount up!” he called, grasping his rifle in one hand and opening the door to the Humvee in the other. The 21 or so Marines around him each did the same, wrenching open the unkempt doors of the flatbeds and jumping in, 5 marines jumping into the back under the baking canvas. He slammed the door of the Humvee shut turning to his driver and looking through the tinted frames of his sunglasses, “Just try to get us there alive Chris, I don’t wanna have to fight off a load of twats to get this shit to the people and then I don’t wanna have to fight my way home again; now lets get this show on the road.”
         “Come on Matt, when have I ever let you down eh?” Chris replied smiling a small knowing smile that had always made Matt uneasy even from before their military training as he turned the key in the ignition and gunned the engine, the two other marines in the Humvee forcing back their laughter at the look on their Commanding Officer’s face.  The convoy pulled off with a flurry of dust and sand, the heavy tires of the flatbeds cracking the sun baked earth beneath them.
         The journey was long and arduous the men sweating profusely in their heavy desert gear. The 50 calibre machine gun mounted on the top of the Humvee rattled with pothole and uneven piece of road. Matt checked the passenger side mirror to see that all of the convoy was still together; that the locals running alongside the trucks were keeping far enough back to ensure that none were suicide bombers, he hated the fact that in this country and all others li\ke it you always had to be wary of everyone and you could trust no one. Suddenly an RPG whizzed past the front of the Humvee barely missing the windscreen by an inch, Matt immediately grabbed the radio and began shouting orders to the trucks.
Chris yelled to the marines behind him as gunfire began to rattle off, “David on the 50 now!” One of the marines rose as Chris swerved again to miss yet another RPG. Chris quickly pulled his helmet from his head and threw it blindly into the back of the Humvee, his blonde hair glistening with sweat. Matt reached forward and flicked onto a different channel,
“Command, this is Captain Creston, I need gunship support on our position A.S.A.P, we are taking heavy enemy fire! Repeat we are taking heavy enemy fire!” The radio fizzled with white noise. No one responded. “Phoenix Command, I repeat this is Captain Creston, I urgently need gunship support, and enemies are flanking our position with RPGs!” The radio crackled into life. The incessant roar of the 50 cal drowning it out at first but then a voice began talking;
“Rodger that Captain, Gunships are inbound upon your position, be advised gunships will fire on anyone who is firing. I repeat gunships will fire on any potential threats, cease your fire. Phoenix Command out.” The radio went dead; Matt tugged on David’s combats signalling for him to get off the 50 cal. Matt then pulled the Humvee’s radio up and began shouting for his men to cease their fire. The RPGs kept coming at the convoy each one getting closer than the last. The sudden and heavy beat of helicopter blades filled the air around the convoy, Matt glanced in his passenger side mirror, and though a bullet had hit it during the firefight he could see two Eurocopter gunships were slowly shimmering on the horizon due to the heat. The blades beating rhythmically like a heart, the mounted guns on either side of the helicopters blazed into life, reigning down torrents of bullets as if it were a winter hailstorm. The RPG fire stopped suddenly and the marines could see the terrorists scattering either side of them, trying to find new cover in order to take a sneaky pot-shot at one of the helicopters. However the helicopters beat them down like the school bully preying on a smaller weaker classmate. The ground was in moments clear of enemy hostile forces; they had all crawled back into the woodwork from whence they had came. Matt’s earpiece crackled into life,
“Captain, your way is clear, we’re gonna hang around and escort you through the next few towns till we have to return to fuel up, Phoenix One out.”
“Rodger that Phoenix One, good to have you with us,” Matt radioed back, as the convoy assumed its continued crawl through the desert towards the next small cluster of burnt out buildings and mud-huts that would be classed in this country as towns. The desert was constant as was the occasional RPG flying past missing by sometimes a few inches, sometimes by metres. The helicopters’ blades were beating heavily above them, every now and then the mounted guns lit up and fired a few rounds to ward off the threats to the convoy. Matt looked out across the barren land; broken up by small clusters of huts and burnt out buildings, his mind began to drift into thought, a rare luxury for a soldier who was doing a tour of duty anywhere especially this god-forsaken hell hole of a country. It seemed silly to him that they as combined forces of all the countries in the U.N were now putting their lives on the line because of America’s mistake and all the Americans were doing was trying to rebuild their silly fallen economy. Matt’s train of thought was interrupted by the sound of gunfire crashing into the side and pinging of the bonnet of the Humvee.
“Captain, this is Phoenix One, you and the other Humvees peel off and eliminate any sign of threats, we’ll escort the convoy from here,” ordered the Phoenix One co-pilot over the radio.
“Rodger Phoenix One,” he replied reluctantly, he then tapped his headset “All units, this is Captain Creston peel off and follow me, supply trucks you are with the choppers, Creston out.” Immediately after the order had been given the trucks peeled off and began following the choppers. All the Humvees now had one of their occupants on the mounted 50 calibre guns, the ends lighting up like candles as round after round was fired.
“Matt, I fucking hope you have a plan to get us out of here, otherwise we’re screwed,” Chris said, swinging the Humvee to the right to dodge a reasonably well aimed RPG.
“I’m working on it, take a left here and head for the burnt out car park!” Matt yelled over the chattering 50 cal. Chris responded immediately throwing the Humvee into the turn so tightly that the passenger side wing mirror flew off and shattered on the ground. The other two Humvees responded in the same way barely missing losing their own wing mirrors. Chris gunned the Humvee down the straight road to the car park entrance; he flicked it round the corner and onto the cluttered ramp leading to the next level, dodging a pile of sandbags and a mounted gun which lay at the top of the ramp. He headed for the other end of the car park; this building had obviously been the site of a battle, the whole place was littered with spent ammunition, gun emplacements and blackened spots where grenades had exploded. Matt noticed at the far end of the car park were dried blood stains, probably where the government had executed the rebels who had most likely been fighting for a worthwhile cause. The battle materialised in Matt’s head 20 or so men running from the army who were storming the building, some gallantly making a last stand in order to give the others time to run. Their bravery rewarded by the army with bullets being shot into their torsos and their bodies being trampled under the harsh boots of the soldiers as they lay bleeding to death. At the end of the battle maybe 10 or so survivors surrendering throwing their weapons to the ground and hoping for a lenient sentence, the army grabbing them, dragging them to their feet and throwing them face first into the concrete wall. The soldiers stand behind them; the last things that those men ever will ever hear would be the eruptions of gunfire and the whimpers of their companions.
Chris slammed the breaks on as he hit the middle of the roof, the other two Humvees pulling in behind, Matt was jolted from the images that had been consuming his mind as Chris wrenched open the driver’s side door which creaked like an ancient floorboard. Chris beckoned Matt to get out of the car. The 12 men assembled in the middle of the roof, the hostile fire now being aimed directly at them from below; some clipped the sides of the concrete and pinged off, others went wide and headed for the sky. One of the marines did a quick sprint around the perimeter of the car park checking which side had more hostiles on, he returned completely out of breath.
“The hostiles….are……encircling us on all sides,” he panted almost doubled over. Matt’s face furrowed, he was obviously planning how to get the men out of this situation the chopper pilots had left them. Or possibly it could have been the question of how this marine had passed the rigorous fitness tests that had been required to come out on this tour of duty, if he could not survive a quick sprint of no more than 400 yards.
The plan formulated in Matt’s head, he would move two of the Humvees to opposing corners of the roof. Then two of the marines would sit on the 50s, the rest taking up strategic positions around the rooftop and try to prevent the hostiles from getting close. He would then go down a level and affix the remains of their claymore mines to the pillars in hope that if they were overrun then they could take those bastards below with them. Then they’d have to hold tight and hope to God that the hostiles ran out of men before his team ran out of bullets.
         Matt quickly briefed the marines of his plan. The marines sprang into action moving two of the Humvees out of formation and over to the far corners of the rooftop. One of the other marines span the other Humvee right around so that if needed they could make a run for it if they got pinned down badly. Matt then ordered every marine to take up firing positions; after the marines had finished preparing themselves, Matt ran down to the lower level and began affixing the claymores to the pillars. Then it hit them. From all sides, not slowly but all at once; from every side there was an explosion as RPGs hit the concrete, the rattling of gunfire erupted on all sides. The marines began firing at the hostiles, some throwing grenades down hoping to take out more than they could with one magazine. Matt reappeared up the ramp, he ran forward and slammed into the wall next to Chris, giving him a quick nod and then popping up to survey what was going on below. From the look on his face when he dropped back down, it wasn’t good.