Hunt the Scorpion by Don Mann & Ralph Pezzullo

Author:Don Mann & Ralph Pezzullo [Mann, Don & Pezzullo, Ralph]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9780316209601
Publisher: Mulholland Books
Published: 2013-01-01T05:00:00+00:00

That night, after dining on roast goat and couscous, and watching the movie Iron Man dubbed in Polish, they retired to their quarters. Soon after Crocker lay down he heard the first mortar land and shake the ground. Shards of shrapnel rained onto the metal roof. Then the NATO troops returned fire with machine guns and artillery of their own.

Enemy shells continued to land intermittently through the night and into the morning breakfast of yogurt, goat cheese, figs, and tea. As Crocker and his team ate, Polish soldiers shouted instructions to one another as they prepared their weapons and put on body armor.

Akil: “Imagine being assigned to this place.”

Ritchie: “I’ve been in worse.”

Akil: “When?”

Ritchie: “November 2004, Fallujah, Iraq. The whole damn city turned against us. We were getting attacked from all sides.”

Sandra looked miserable. She said the percussion of the mortar shells hurt her head.

After breakfast a sweaty, heavily armed Ostrowski led them to a Polish AMZ Dzik armored truck parked in the courtyard. He leaned toward Crocker and said, “Today we’re going to have some fun with these asshole tribesmen.”

The major introduced them to a Polish corporal who said he knew the way to the chemical plant. But a half hour later, as they sped north on the highway through the dusty, sun-baked town of Toummo, Sandra told him she thought he’d missed the turnoff.

The driver turned the vehicle around and veered left on a dirt road that led them past a little school, primitive houses, a pen filled with camels and goats, and up a gradual incline where the road seemed to end.

“Keep going,” Sandra instructed.

When they reached an eighty-foot mound of rock, dirt, and sand, Sandra told the driver to steer around it. On the other side they met a ten-foot wall of rock and sand.

Sandra said, “Stop here. This is where we get out.”

Akil: “You sure?”

There was nothing but sand everywhere they looked. She walked ahead, all business, her tight black shorts accentuating her long legs and feminine curves.

Ritchie leaned toward Crocker and whispered, “What do you think?”

Crocker shrugged, “She seems to know where she’s going.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

They watched her climb the ten-foot wall of dirt, then turn back and wave at them to join her.

Upon reaching the top, Crocker looked down and saw a large compound that had been dug into the earth. The whole plant was surrounded by walls of sandbags. It contained at least a dozen buildings, distillation and cooling tanks, and a concrete road that ran the length of the site. The road and roofs of the buildings had been painted with desert camouflage so they would be hard to see from above. Reminded him of a scene from the movie Andromeda Strain: perfectly preserved buildings, but no people.

“Clever, isn’t it?” Sandra asked, her blond hair whipping in the wind.

“Very clever,” Crocker answered.

According to the thermometer on his watch, the temperature had soared to over 110 degrees Fahrenheit. Hot gusts of wind kicked up angry twirls of dust.

Ritchie spotted a snake resting in the shade of the fence and picked it up with the barrel of his MP5.

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