Pirate Hunter
Joe Weathers and the Pirates
Joe didn’t hesitate as he detonated all the claymores at once. The explosives went off without failure, spraying thousands of small steel balls out into the rocky walls and ripping through the mercenaries. They waited for the shrapnel to subside. Then Joe stood up, turned and walked around the corner. He was immediately followed by Wes, with Chuck and Russell behind. The path was only wide enough for two men to stand side by side and both Joe and Wes began firing their weapons as they moved forward on the wiped out force. When they ran out of ammunition in their magazines, both men knelt down to reload and allowed Chuck and Russell to step around them and continue firing. When they had expended the bullets in their magazines they knelt down. Joe and Wes stepped around them with fully loaded weapons, but held their fire. Instead they covered the men reloading and when ready, they went to check the casualties. With the eight man strike force eliminated, Joe called out, “Clear.” Then each man did the same, after the last man called ‘clear’ Joe said, “Shooter, do you have eyes on our back trail?”
“It’s clear,” Shooter responded.
The leader of the second strike force heard the firefight and thought the other group had the assassins pinned down. He immediately gave the order to close the distance at a full run. It was his thought that they would either get to the position where the other force had the sniper pinned down so they could help take him alive for future torture or they would come upon the sniper from behind so fast they would capture him with little effort and they would be allowed to handle the torture.
“Danny, where is the other strike force?” Joe asked.
Danny was just as shocked as all the wives were at the coordinated brutality of the men. He had tears running down both cheeks just as the wives did and was not able to respond. Cindy pressed the talk button and said, “LT, the strike force of sixteen men are coming fast. They are running toward you and maybe five minutes out.”
“Thanks, Little One. Splash some water on Danny’s face and wake him up. We’re not out of this jam yet.” Joe replied in a cool calm tone.
“Will do, we’ve also shut down all computer links from the fortress and at the airport. Except for some hand held radios, both locations are in the dark.” she replied.
“That is good news. Now get Danny back in the action and keep me informed on the strike force.” Joe responded, looking at the grin on Wes’s face. Knowing Cindy and Danny could hear everything they said, he just returned the grin and nodded his approval. Wes didn’t comment either, instead he handed three fresh magazines to his best friend and made sure the other men had extra magazines.
The men instinctively took their positions behind the corner, this time their backs were to the eight dead men lying on the trail. They waited until Shooter reported he had the men insight. Wes tapped his best friend on the shoulder and held out his hand so he could work one of the detonators. Joe handed one of the devices to him, noticing that both Russell and Chuck wanted the other two. He handed the detonators over without complaint and waited for the word from Shooter.
Shooter wanted to blow the charges early as eight men had already cleared the kill zone, but he waited. Then when the last man stepped in he said, “Now!”
The three men didn’t waste a moment and each operated their detonator, blowing up the two claymores attached to it. Once again they waited for the flying debris to subside before engaging the remaining force. Joe was first, followed by Wes by his side and they opened up on the stunned men. Only this time, the assaulted men were able to return fire wildly toward where they thought the enemy was coming from. Shooter was also engaged and began taking out the men firing at the team.
The team worked in perfect unison and kept an uninterrupted string of precise and deadly fire on the strike force. They continued to move forward relaying each time they emptied a magazine. By the time they reached the first dead man, all four men stopped firing. No one spoke as they just looked at the carnage lying before them.
Back at the shop, no one was making a sound as they watched the third and most brutal engagement yet. The only sound made was the heavy short breaths coming over the comm. system from the men.
After a long pause, Joe said in a stressed tone, “Clear!” followed by each of the men including Shooter. Then he looked at his best friend and said, “Senior Chief, are you hit?” Then he began looking closely to make sure. Once it was obvious the man was alright he said, “I want you to check all the men just to make sure, it’s better to know now than find out later.”
While Wes checked the other men, Joe walked into the piles of dead bodies and shook his head. He knew these men didn’t have the skills to go up against a seal team. Even a retired seal team had wiped them out without much effort. Spending time thinking about this was not going to help, since right then he needed to get his men out of there and back home.
Wes surprisingly reported no injuries, but before he could say anything else a woman’s voice came over the comm.
Nikki had seen everything and realized that Joe had not been checked for injuries. She couldn’t stop herself and rushed to the microphone, pressed the button and said, “Wes, you check Joe for injuries.”
All the men immediately knew who the voice belonged to and for the first time realized that their wives had been watching the whole day. No one spoke a word as Joe looked at Wes. Wes gave him the nod and Joe angrily spoke, “Damn-it, Danny, shut off the video now! Keep the satellites off line, guys we’re off comm.”
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