The Warrior Code Read online

  The Warrior Code

  By M. L. Strong

  Copyright © 2019 M.L. STRONG

  All rights reserved.

  ISBN: 978-0-9994810-8-0

  DEDICATION

  To my wife Michele. She is my best friend, my life partner, and my swim buddy. Without her firm support, I could never pursue my dream to write.

  Chapter One

  The blast sent a massive shock wave in all directions, tossing the lead-armored Mercedes four feet into the air. The car twisted slightly then came down on its side, screeching and groaning as it slid a short distance on the hard, concrete surface of the street.

  Despite the car’s built-in protection, it was difficult to believe that anyone inside could’ve possibly survived the effect of the roadside bomb. The well-hidden attackers waited for a count of twenty, hoping the passengers would be foolish enough to exit and make their jobs much easier. A second team, stationed a few yards down the street, focused on the second target.

  The second car in the motorcade was also a Mercedes sedan. It was designed with special ballistic glass, effective against most military-grade small-arms fire; but the engineers had never intended for the special glass to stop a rocket-propelled grenade, especially one fired at point-blank range.

  The professional driver in the third and last sedan slammed on the brakes to avoid hitting the middle car. His moment of indecision was all the ambushers needed.

  The second attack team fired an rocket propelled grenade or RPG round from a distance of twenty feet, scoring a direct hit through the back windshield. The black Mercedes flipped over on its roof, spinning wildly like a child’s toy. No one would survive.

  The few pedestrians unlucky enough to be close to the attack scattered in every direction. Two bystanders, a mother and her young daughter, lay motionless on the bloodstained sidewalk. Acceptable collateral damage to the attackers.

  Chaos reigned on the narrow Colombian street. Suddenly the roar of automatic gunfire erupted from the flat rooftop opposite the smoking motorcade. The Russian-made, belt-fed PK machine gun pumped rounds into the first car then shifted fire to the last car.

  In the middle of the security motorcade sat the last untouched Mercedes sedan, wrecks in front and behind, blocked on the narrow street by the remains of the other two cars. One thing was certain: the attackers were experienced in the art of urban ambush.

  When it became clear there would be no counterattack from the first and third vehicles, the heavy machine gunner on the roof turned his focus to the middle car.

  The machine gunner had been too optimistic. Rifle fire cracked through the early morning air. The two US Army Special Forces (SF) operators firing at the roof were the sole survivors of the RPG attack on the lead sedan.

  They made their move as soon as the rooftop machine gun shifted its fire on the third sedan. The bodyguards climbed out of the lead car and crouched down together behind the upturned sedan, using its armored exterior as a shield. Their driver and another special operator lay dead inside the smoking Mercedes.

  “That’s covering fire. They want us to keep our heads down!” shouted the taller of the two soldiers, a career army man and veteran of six combat tours in Iraq. “Pete, I think they plan to rush the limo and grab the precious cargo.”

  Any car carrying a VIP in a motorcade was referred to as a limo. It distinguished the vehicle from the others in the mobile security package. The term “precious cargo” was well known among protection teams. It simply referred to the object or person a team was protecting. Special operations professionals were frequently used for this purpose.

  “I think you’re right, Jimmy!” responded the second soldier, a heavily built man in his early thirties with twice as many combat tours in Iraq and Afghanistan as his partner. “Should we get our ass over to the limo?” He pointed with the barrel of his German-made MP-5 submachine gun toward the middle sedan.

  “No, we need to scoot across the street. Get inside their position. If we’re lucky, we can capture that big gun on the roof and turn it back on these assholes!”

  They both knew their heavy gun team was in the third sedan. Their job was to bring a world of pain down on anybody foolish enough to engage the motorcade. Jimmy knew that was a moot point.

  The third sedan was upside down and on fire; the machine gun’s rounds had ignited the exposed fuel line under the car. Everyone was dead and there was no way to get to the heavy weapons located inside. Taking the PK machine gun on the roof made sense.

  Pete shifted to a position placing more of his muscular frame behind the burning car. He considered his partner’s idea for a moment and then nodded in the affirmative. “Yeah, you’re right. We’ll just get our ass handed to us trying to get to our big guns, and that shithead on the roof has the limo covered.” Pete gestured toward the middle car with his chin. He looked Jimmy in the eyes, his face set in grim determination. “Screw it, man! Let’s just do this thing.”

  Special Forces Sergeant Jimmy Ford stretched out his hand. Pete took it and squeezed. He understood deep down inside that the odds of surviving the surprise attack were heavily stacked against them. Both men knew it would be a miracle if they could pull this off.

  “Okay, Pete, let’s leapfrog as two fire teams. I’ll go first, find a good spot to cover you and then wave you over. We’ll aim for that alley right over there.” Jimmy pointed to a gap between two storefronts on the other side of the street.

  Pete first looked at the alley then scanned the street for an alternative. He didn’t see a better option, so he nodded his head. “Okay, Jimmy, make your move! I’ll cover you!”

  Jimmy gave his partner a thumbs-up. The two green berets initiated their planned maneuver. Jimmy jumped up and quickly moved around the trunk of the car, sprinting across the street toward the attackers.

  For a tall man, he moved deceptively quickly, weaving back and forth to present a more difficult target. Pete watched the tall sergeant make his move then opened up.

  He tried to give the sergeant a fighting chance by laying down a withering base of fire with his MP-5 submachine gun. The small nine-millimeter bullet was a good round, but it didn’t have the power to punch through the material the attackers were hiding behind.

  Pete wished he had his M-4 rifle, but it was too late now. He fired directly at the attacker’s rooftop position, spraying bullets all along the edge in an attempt to keep their heads down.

  The belt-fed weapon kept up a steady pounding on the middle car; the machine gunner wasn’t distracted from his primary mission as the two Americans revealed their presence down on the street. He kept a steady rain of lead on the middle sedan, just enough to deter anyone from attempting an escape.

  The sergeant’s sprint to the alley did draw the attention of several riflemen staged nearby. They opened fire on the American running across the street, trying to prevent him from reaching the entrance to the alley. Jimmy heard the rifles and saw the bullets hitting the street all around him. The ambush was only two minutes old; but to him, it seemed a lifetime.

  Pete pulled out the expended thirty-round magazine and dropped it on the street. He smoothly inserted a new magazine and slapped the charging handle down. It slammed forward loudly as it stripped the first round off the top of the magazine, sliding it into the chamber.

  He saw that Jimmy had reached the alley and was ready to provide covering fire. They made eye contact and Jimmy calmly waved Pete across.

  Pete marveled at the senior man’s poise. Sergeant Ford was definitely a pro. He was the kind of Special Forces or SF soldier they put on army recruiting posters. The kind of leader men wanted to follow.

  Pete hoped he could measure up. He waved back. It was painfully obvious that he and his partner were heavily outgunned an
d probably destined to end their lives in this dirty city. Oh well, he thought, he wasn’t getting any younger.

  Pete popped out from behind the car and fired at the roof. He sprinted toward the alley, shooting short bursts at the rooftop. It seemed like his partner was a mile away. Jimmy saw Pete start his run, then slid his body out and away from the storefront. He pointed his weapon straight up and drew a bead on the edge of the roof.

  The sergeant didn’t have an identifiable target, but he could place aimed fire along the edge of the building as a deterrent. Their combined efforts appeared to be working, as shredded stucco drifted down to the street below.

  The enemy riflemen ducked down to avoid the steady patter of nine-millimeter rounds. Maybe they stood a chance, after all, Pete thought as he wobbled to the right a little. Nobody was firing back.

  Just as Pete made it to the safety of the alley, a group of armed men burst onto the scene near the burning lead car and directly across the street from the two SF soldiers. For half a second Jimmy thought the newcomers were Colombian police officers coming to help; then a burst of gunfire from the new arrivals changed his mind. Pete crossed the alley to stand behind Jimmy along the wall.

  “Hey, sarge! What’s the next move?” Pete yelled, trying to get his partner’s attention over all the racket.

  Jimmy didn’t answer right away. The alley didn’t afford the two operators an easy way to the rooftops. This was taking too long, he realized. They were both running low on ammunition, and the bad guys now were reinforced.

  The new arrivals maneuvered around the lead sedan and came to the same side of the street as Jimmy and Pete. Jimmy leaned out a little and aimed, taking the first two men in the chest. He watched the third man drop, exposing the man behind him. Jimmy shot him, too; then his MP-5 bolt slammed back and stopped locked into place. He was out of ammo.

  Cursing loudly, Jimmy rolled around Pete and shouted. “Five assholes along the storefront. I got three. Go!”

  Pete stepped up to take Jimmy’s place and immediately dropped to his knee. He leaned out and nailed two attackers as they were just about to reach the alley. “Only three left! You got any of those Belgian cherry grenades on you?”

  Jimmy knew most of the go bag extra shit was still back in the sedan, but he had a habit of carrying a few extras of everything on him just in case.

  “Hell, yes! Only four though.”

  Pete popped out and dropped another armed attacker. The last two ran back across the street and used the burning Mercedes as cover. He ducked back into the narrow alley and pulled his magazine out. He had five rounds left plus one in the chamber.

  “Four will have to do. The last two assholes skedaddled back across the street. I have six rounds left. So, as I said, do we have a plan?”

  Chapter Two

  Jimmy didn’t have an answer. There was no way they could get to the limo; and if they did, then what? Expose the precious cargo to all the threat ringing the ambush site? No, they were better off bottled up in the armored car.

  Jimmy reached into his leg pocket and pulled out a green plastic strip about an inch-and-a-half wide. The center was perforated and there were four evenly spaced bulges under the plastic. Each was a small fragmentation grenade. The kill radius was only four to five feet, but this fight might get that close before it was over.

  He started pushing the bulges against the perforation and continued this until all four mini-grenades were out of their plastic tube. He dropped three of them into his front right pants pocket and held the fourth one in the palm of his hand.

  “Jimmy?” Pete was still waiting for an answer.

  “Look, Pete, we can’t get to the limo and we can’t get to the rooftop. We’re out of ammo, so we can’t take on all these guys. We’ve done all we can do here. Time to haul ass and bunker up somewhere, high vantage point, like a multistory building. Find a landline and tell someone who gives a shit that we are alive and need extract.”

  Pete kept scanning every doorway, window, and corner as he thought through his partner’s idea. “Well, as much as I’d love to stay and see this thing through, we can’t fight without bullets. I’m all in, Jimmy. Let’s get the hell out of here.”

  Jimmy gave his partner a thumbs-up. “Okay. Let’s move out!”

  Pete returned the gesture then froze. “Jimmy, look out!” His warning was too late. Jimmy’s eyes followed the other soldier’s gaze upward to the rooftop. The fragmentation grenades seemed to drift down in slow motion. The two men watched frozen in horror as they realized what was going to happen to them. There were at least four grenades in the air now. Dropped by the riflemen who’d found a way to move three buildings over and get to the roof.

  Both men attempted to react in some smart tactical way, but it was too late. Two of the grenades exploded with a devastating blast right at head level. The others made it all the way to the ground before bouncing once or twice then exploding. When it was over, the two Americans lay dead, ripped apart from head to toe by the vicious steel casings of the grenades.

  The three men sitting inside the limo were trying to assess what was happening outside the car by listening to the sounds of combat outside on the street. The State Department Diplomatic Agent-in-Charge, referred to as the AIC, sat in the front passenger seat. He was a veteran of the post-invasion insurgency in Iraq in 2004 and 2005 and had lost fellow agents to attacks just like this one. He knew the odds of surviving here in Colombia were slim to none.

  The AIC frantically worked the car’s blue force tracker system, trying to communicate their situation through the use of brevity codes. The attack was five minutes old, but any response would take at least twenty minutes to ramp up and getting to the ambush site required the same amount of time.

  He’d tried his cell phone first, but it wasn’t getting reception in this area of the city. He took some comfort in the fact that the tactical operations center in the embassy still would be able to track their exact location.

  He pictured the watch officer going through the protocols once he or she determined that the motorcade was static and way off schedule. The protocol for an unscheduled motorcade stop was simple.

  After two minutes to eliminate the possibility of traffic being the cause for the stop, the tactical operations center would attempt a call via the encrypted radio. If that didn’t work, they would switch to the encrypted cell phone to determine the status of the motorcade.

  If the AIC still did not respond to the communications attempts, then the tactical operations center would alert local police, directing them to move their assets to the motorcade location with sirens blaring and activate the quick reaction force. He gritted his teeth. There wasn’t enough time; they were fucked.

  His attention was disrupted by the rapid succession of grenade blasts nearby. He had no idea the sound marked the death of two men in the SF detail. The smoke was thick in the street, billowing from the trail sedan, which had turned into a blazing, white-hot torch.

  The smoke blocked the AIC’s view of the surrounding environment. It had been impossible to follow the gun battle outside. They could only listen and wait.

  “Any chance the boys back at the embassy are rolling in soon?”

  In the back seat, Senior Chief Auger was just as confused and disoriented as the AIC. He played the scenario out in his head. The timing of the ambush, the lag before anyone might know they were in trouble, and the additional delay in making hard decisions to launch a heavily armed quick reaction force into the streets without confirmation of the facts on the ground.

  “No, we’re pretty much on our own for the next ten to fifteen minutes. That’s if everybody had their shit together and moved fast, which I doubt.”

  Auger nodded in agreement, brushing his long brown hair out of his eyes. The hair was supposed to make him look like a State Department guy, but his muscular frame and his demeanor conflicted with that portrayal. Anyone watching him move knew he was a hunter. Diplomatic types move like cattle, not like panthers.
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  He kept losing focus. Auger had tried and failed to determine how many of the personal protection team members had unassed their vehicles to engage the attackers directly. He heard the sounds of a running gunfight outside on the street, so somebody was engaging the ambushers. But who and for how much longer?

  The elite navy commando was the body man for this particular VIP protective mission. His job was to stay in close contact with the precious cargo, no matter what happened. Get him from the embassy to the meeting venue in the city and safely back to the embassy.

  He didn’t want to put more pressure on the State Department security officer in the front seat. These guys were good, better than most; but they were not trained special operators. Stress was their enemy. SEALs, on the other hand, enjoyed the challenges of combat. Taking risks and winning was what being a SEAL was all about.

  He held his questions and listened to echoes of the multiple grenade blasts bouncing off the buildings and then fade, dispersing until there was no sound at all. The machine gun had stopped putting rounds into the limo two minutes earlier. Were the attackers on the run?

  The senior chief was frustrated. He needed to know the situation in order to deal with the new reality. The rules stated that you never broke the seal on the armored sedan. The sedan was a rolling sanctuary. Stay put and place your faith in the security protocols; help was always coming.

  The heavily-armored windows couldn’t be rolled down even a tiny bit to allow him to see outside, but he could open the door a crack to survey the street scene.

  He ran over the risks of breaking the State Department’s cardinal rule. If the sedan remained locked and sealed, then it could take a considerable pounding from a wide range of small-arms fire. Maybe long enough for help to arrive. But the sedan’s protective system wasn’t designed to protect against a close-range direct hit from an anti-tank rocket. He sighed in resignation. He knew the right call was to stay put and protect the general.