“Have you got any good news for me?” Goose asked his captain.
“We’ve got additional backup that the Syrians might not have been counting on,” Remington said “Five minutes after the first SCUDs were launched, USS Wasp was cleared for action. President Fitzhugh didn’t hesitate about making the call. Wasp lost communication with us shortly after that, when the SCUDs took out our primary communications stations, but not with the Pentagon. Air support lifted from the Wasp’s flight deck and is on the way in right now.”
Goose checked his watch. He’d automatically logged the time of the attack as 0706 hours local time. The Wasp was nearly two hundred miles away. The CH-46E chopper was the slowest of the aircraft that would be in the reinforcement group. The Sea Knight helo class moved at something less than 170 mph. He did the math quickly.
“The ETA of those ships is roughly twenty-two minutes,” Remington said, showing that he still knew how Goose thought and when he thought it. “I confirmed that before I got back to you. Might go ten minutes earlier or later, depending on whether they run into any trouble with the locals.”
That news heartened Goose somewhat. USS Wasp was the lead ship in the seven vessel Amphibious Readiness Group (ARG). That team was designated as the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit/Special Operations Capable (MEU/SOC). Wasp was currently stationed on a 180-day float in the eastern Mediterranean not far from Cyprus, Greece.
The six other ships that supported Wasp carried more men, weapons, and materials, including Cobra helicopter gunships in addition to cargo helos that mainly transported Marine troops. Goose knew about the sea-based unit because he always made it his business to know as much as he could about anything that helped or hindered whatever mission he was currently assigned to.
In addition to nearly two thousand Marines and over a thousand sailors, Wasp also transported forty-two CH-46E Sea Knight helicopters and five AV-8B Marine Harrier aircraft. All of them were capable of making the jump to the Turkish-Syrian border. The aircraft could also be refueled in midair by KC-135 Hercules Stratotankers, so they could remain on constant patrol and provide support.
“How bad is our line, sir?” Goose asked.
“We’ve taken some big hits along the border. The casualty lists are going to be high.” The captain’s tone was somber but confident.
During his career, Cal Remington had seen down-and-dirty action around the globe, and he’d never been a man to knuckle down before a challenge. More than anything else at the moment, he would be planning on delivering a counteroffensive that would hurt the Syrians as badly as the Turks, Americans, and the rest of the U.N. peacekeeping effort had been hurt.
Goose heard the captain talking in a low voice to someone else, then Remington switched his attention back to Goose. “How much longer is your team going to be needed at that twenty?”
Goose swept the rescue effort with his gaze. All the wounded had been loaded onto the deuce-and-a-half. There were fewer than he had hoped and more than he had expected. News stations around the world were going to be in mourning, and international attention would be on the events shaping up between Turkey and Syria.
Smooth snake tracks that crisscrossed marked the paths the rescuers had made through the sand while using canvas sleds to pull people too heavily injured to move on their own. Smoke eddied and spun through the dust haze like pulled taffy, black against the deadly floating gold.
“Not long,” Goose answered. “We’re loading the survivors now. And the dead that we can manage.”
“Leave the dead,” Remington said. “They’re wasted time, effort, and space. Your wounded are going to have a hard enough time getting out of that area before the next attack launches.”
Goose bristled at the command. Remington’s order came across as callous, but Goose’s inherent rejection of the plan of action ran deeper than that. As Special Forces, as a Ranger, he was trained and committed to leaving no one behind—dead or alive.
“You don’t have time for anything more, Goose,” Remington said in a softer voice. He obviously knew the reservations Goose had about the order. “Sending you there was a mistake. At least, sending you there was a mistake in retrospect. Who would have guessed the Syrians would have attacked the border so quickly or without restraint?”
Goose silently agreed. He stared at the corpses littering both sides of the road that cut through the small heart of Glitter City. One of those bodies, he knew, belonged to the boy who had helped his father serve meals. They had never found the other boy.
Distancing himself from that image, Goose tried not to look too closely at the bodies that had been too disfigured to immediately identify. He didn’t want to carry those memories with him from the battlefield. He already knew that the nightmares from today would always be with him. That was one of the prices he paid for being a warrior in the service of his country.
Several of the reporters and cameramen walked along the lines of the dead, filming the bodies and commenting on the attack. Their stories went out live. When the military radio communications had come back on line, so had several channels for the media. Some of the satellite-equipped vans were still in one piece and a few of the media people had gotten them operational. The vehicles now pulled double duty as media relays and ambulances as more wounded and survivors were loaded onto them.
“I need you at the front line, Goose,” Remington went on. “Every minute you spend at that rescue op is a minute that I don’t have you where I need you most.”
Goose sighed and rubbed his jaw. His body ached from the physical demands. “I know, sir.” Despite the conversational tone Remington had adopted, Goose felt more at home keeping the line between officer and non-com clear and defined. “As
