The three female Coats screamed as they were dragged away from Jon who laid in a pool of blood slumped over his steering wheel.
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Gary and the Bradley arrived at the FOB base. They wondered why the convoy had stopped transmitting on their agreed upon schedule. They checked with the Army’s communication people who confirmed the convoy had stopped communicating and if their tracker was correct, hadn’t moved in ten minutes.
Gary knew something was very wrong. He asked to see Colonel Spivey who agreed something had happened to the convoy. Spivey ordered the quick reaction group to check on the convoy. He asked Gary if he wanted to go with them. Gary asked if he could borrow a weapon. Colonel Spivey smiled, “Weapons we have plenty of, I’ll have the sergeant equip you. I think it’s those snowmobile raiders. I wish I knew where they were getting their fuel and food.”
“Colonel, thank you. We should leave as quickly as possible if we’re going to have any chance of catching them.”
The snowmobile raider leader knew the Army would send their quick reaction to check on their missing convoy. He had someone watching their base, as soon as the reaction force left, he planned to attack the base. They still had a warehouse full of supplies. His lookout reported the reaction force was leaving the base. The leader smiled and he clicked his handheld radio three times which was the code for his people to strike the supply base. Their first target was the supply depot and the cheating supply officer who they were told to capture alive.
The raiders rode their modified snowmobiles to the supply depot which was located at the rear of the FOB. Nine of them caught the supply officer who screamed he didn’t cheat them as he begged them to listen to reason. They zip tied the officer and one of the raiders took him into the storm to their leader.
The leader smiled at the supply officer, “You tried to cheat us. I don’t like anyone cheating me. We had a deal and you broke it. I have the perfect punishment for you.”
“No, wait. I’ll give you whatever you want.”
The leader laughed, “You have nothing to give me. My people already took your supply depot. We have everything we need to kill all of you pretty soldier boys and girls.” He looked at the man holding the officer. “Strip him down to his boots, leave him his boots, then bare ass naked throw him outside.”
The supply officer’s screams were drowned out by the wind. The snowmobile leader smiled, “Tell everyone to go to point A, once we’re all there, we’re going shopping at the little Army base.”
“Calling them now.”
“Pack up whatever we have here, we ain’t coming back. We’re going to move into the Army base. We’ll let people come to us.”
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The three Coats women were gagged and had their wrists zip tied behind them. They were then tossed into a hidden SUV and driven away. Erin prayed for Jon and the lives of her daughters. The snowmobilers left their positions and headed towards the Army’s FOB. The Army’s quick reaction force headed towards the unmoving convoy leaving the base with less than thirty people which included the cooks and medical staff. One of the young sentries saw the line of snowmobiles approaching the base. He placed the base on alert. Everyone grabbed a M4 and prepared to defend the large base. Their problem was they were now outnumbered, and they had a huge base to defend.
Their colonel ordered them to defend the supply depot which was most likely the target of the attack. The soldiers were surprised when they arrived to find the supply depot already had raiders in it. The colonel organized an attack into the front and rear doors. They leapfrogged each other and while they were outnumbered, their training was the force multiplier. The soldier’s suffered two wounded while killing all of the raiders.
The colonel positioned the few people he had along the approaches to the depot. He ordered them to install claymore mines which, when exploded, shot out hundreds of steel BBs cutting down anything that got caught in their path. The handful of soldiers set up machine guns on their Humvees and on the roof of the depot. They knew the snowmobilers were faster and could maneuver better in the snow, but machine guns had a tendency to equal the odds. The wind carried the sound of the few unmuffled snowmobiles before they could see them. The colonel ordered them to get ready and shoot as soon as they saw one. He reminded them they were very quick, and they’d have to lead them if they had a chance of hitting them.
The snowmobilers had a few tricks up their snow parkas. The first were a group of snipers who fired on the soldiers from out of the range of the M4 rifles. The snipers targeted the machine gunners on the depot’s roof. They were able to hit two of them before they swung their guns around and targeted where they saw the gun flashes. The machine gunners fired long bursts at the snipers. The battle went back and forth for twenty minutes before the line of snowmobilers reached the line where the claymores had been planted. The claymores exploded sending thousands of steel BBs shredding the riders and destroying their snowmobiles. Only a handful of riders survived, these were attacked with rifle mounted 203mm grenades. When the smoke cleared only three riders survived, they stood with their hands up waiting for the soldiers to arrest them.
While the battle for the base went on, the
