Vortex Page 2

  The existence of the Gawamba operations center hadn’t even been suspected by South Africa’s security forces until recently. In fact, they’d first learned of it from Nkume, an ANC guerrilla who’d been captured while trying to run a shipment of arms across the border with Zimbabwe. In return for his freedom, and probably his life, Nkume had spilled his guts about this ANC headquarters inside Zimbabwe.

  Bekker scowled. Zimbabwe and the other border states had agreed to prevent the ANC from operating on their soil. The lying bastards. He didn’t care whether the ANC was operating here with or without the connivance of the Zimbabwean government. Blacks were blacks, and none of them could be trusted to keep an agreement or leave well enough alone.

  Now they would learn that defying Pretoria meant paying a high price.

  Bekker and his troops reached Gawamba’s outskirts and started working their way down a garbage-strewn dirt road, weapons out and ready. Houses lined each side of the narrow street, one-or two-room shacks with rusting metal screens covering their windows. A dog barked once in the distance and the South Africans froze in place. When it was not repeated, they moved on, staying in the shadows as much as possible.

  One block to go. Bekker felt his heart speeding up, anticipating action.

  His radioman leaned closer and whispered, “Sir, second section sends “Rhino.”

  “

  Good. Der Merwe’s men were in position-covering the north end of town, including the road, the rail line, and the police station. He kept moving, with his troops close behind.

  Suddenly, they were there.

  Bekker and his men found themselves facing the side of the building. a whitewashed wall that had no windows. Nkume’s information was right, so far. The radioman whispered another code word in his ear. Heitman’s third section was in place to the south.

  Bekker checked his rifle, took a quick breath, and scanned both sides of the street. No movement, at least not yet.

  He gestured, and the team crossed in a rush. Hopefully any observer would not recover from his initial surprise until it was too late and they were all out of view. Once across, his men took up covering positions while

  Bekker headed for the rear of the building. Nkume, flanked by his two escorts, followed.

  Reebeck met Bekker at the rear and pointed to the back door. It was solid steel, set in a metal frame, and had no lock or handle.

  “A little much for a small-town grocery, Kaptein, ” Reebeck observed in a low, hoarse voice.

  Bekker nodded abruptly. It was the first direct evidence that this building was more than it seemed.

  “Wire it,” he ordered.

  While a private laid a rope of plastique around the edge of the door,

  Bekker heard a low rustling as the rest of his men readied their weapons.

  Sergeant Roost, a short, wiry man with a craggy, oft-broken nose, crouched nearest the entrance and looked as if he couldn’t wait for the chance to go through it. Bekker waved him back and took his place.

  The private with the plastique finished working and moved away. Bekker nodded to his radioman. The man spoke into his handset, waited a moment, then gave him a thumbs-up. Everybody was ready. Bekker motioned to the soldier holding the detonator and buried his face in his arm.

  An enormous explosion lit the street for a split second, punctuated by a solid clang as the building’s steel door blew inward and landed somewhere inside. Bits of doorframe and concrete flew everywhere.

  Bekker felt the concussion rip at his clothing. Even as he held his breath, the blast’s acrid smell filled his nostrils. He dove through the still-smoking opening, followed by half the men of his first assault section.

  He found himself in a single, large room. Canned goods from spilled stacks, smashed boxes, and shattered glassware littered the floor. He was expecting, and saw, a stairway leading up. Seconds were precious now.

  “Two men to search this floor!” he shouted, and bounded up the stairs.

  He took them two at a time and coughed as the exertion forced him to breathe smoke-filled air.

  A wooden door blocked the stairs. Without stopping, Bekker fired a long burst into it, then hit the door with his shoulder. Shredded wood gave way and he landed on his side, rifle pointing down the length of the building.

  Nobody in sight. He was in what could only be an office, a room crowded with tables and desks. Doors in the opposite wall opened into other rooms and corridors. His mind noted a picture of Marx prominently displayed over a desk in the corner.

  Bekker kept moving, rolling for cover behind a desk and making room for the men behind him. He rose to one knee and leveled his weapon just as a black man carrying an AK47 came running into the office. Belcker fired a short burst, heard the man scream, and saw him crumple to the floor.

  Sergeant Roost crashed into the room in time to see the kill. He raised an eyebrow at Bekker, who pointed to the open door. Roost nodded and with a single, smooth motion, tore a concussion grenade off his webbing, pulled its pin, and lobbed it through the doorway.

  The sergeant dove for cover as his grenade exploded, sending a mind-numbing shock wave pulsing across the room. Both Roost and Bekker were up and running for the open door before the explosion’s echoes faded.

  Roost was closer and made it first. Jumping over the dead man in the doorway, he flattened himself against one side while Bekker took the other. Roost took a quick breath, then snapped his head and rifle around the doorjamb. Bekker heard a startled shout from down the corridor-a shout that ended in a low, bubbling moan as the sergeant fired a long, clattering burst.

  Bekker leaned out and saw Roost’s target lying twitching in a spreading pool of blood, hit several times by point-blank fire. The dying guerrilla had been caught coming out of the nearer of two other doors opening onto this corridor.

  Footsteps sounded behind him. The rest of his men had cleared the stairs.

  Keep moving, his mind screamed. Obeying combat-trained instincts, Bekker stepped carefully out into the corridor and covered by Roost, slid slowly along the wall toward the closest door.

  He was halfway there when another black leaped out, swinging a rifle around at him. Bekker, close enough to tackle the man, threw himself prone instead.

  Even before he hit the floor, he heard gunfire and felt bullets whip cracking overhead. The guerrilla’s eyes opened wide in surprise and pain, and stayed open in death, as the force of Roost’s fire threw him back against the wall. Bekker had time to notice the man’s bare chest and bare feet before fear and surging adrenaline brought him upright again.

  He dove over the bodies and into the doorway as he heard Roost running down the corridor. He felt exposed, knowing nobody could cover him but wanting to move quickly.

  Then he was through the door, rolling clumsily over the tangled corpses into a small room, and scrambling for any cover he could find. There wasn’t any within reach.

  Bekker fired blindly, scanning for targets behind the hail of bullets tearing up walls, mattresses, and bedding. There weren’t any. The room was empty.

  Roost crashed in behind him and the two men took a hasty look around.

  They were in a small bunk room filled with five or six neatly arranged cots and footlockers. Militant political posters decorated all four walls. A wooden weapons rack, empty, stood in one corner.

  More gunfire and grenade bursts echoed down the hall from other parts of the building. Roost paused just long enough to replace the magazine in his assault rifle and then dashed back out through the door. Bekker picked himself up and with one last look for concealed guerrillas, followed his sergeant.

  Dense, choking, acrid smoke swirled in the air. Bekker’s nose twitched.

  Even after more than a dozen firefigghts, he still couldn’t get used to the smell. He looked around for his radioman. It was time to start getting control of this battle.

  He found Corporal de Vries crouched next to a desk in the outer office, watching the stairwell.

  “Any word from
der Merwe or Heitman?” Bekker asked.

  “Second section reports activity in the police station, but no…

  They both heard ringing and turned around to stare at a phone on one of the desks. Belcker looked at his radioman, shrugged, and picked it up.

  The voice on the other end shook, clearly shocked and more than a little frightened.

  “Cosate? What’s going on down there? Are you all right?”

  Bekker’s lips twitched into a thin, humorless smile as he heard the textbook-perfect English. He slammed the phone down hard.

  The captain looked around.

  “All right, the town’s waking up.” He shouted,

  “Roost!” just as the sergeant trotted up with two other men, a half-eaten piece of chicken in one hand.

  “Last room is a kitchen. The floor’s clear. No casualties,” he reported.

  Belcker nodded.

  “Good. Now take your squad and start Phase Two. Search the rooms, collect all the documents you find. And get Nkume up here.

  Let’s move.” He turned to de Vries.

  “The building’s secure. Send “Rooikat.”

  “

  As his soldiers started tearing the office apart, BeIcker heard the rattle of machinegun fire off in the distance. From the north, he judged.

  Der Merwe’s second section must be earning its pay. Their job was to keep the local garrison busy and out of the fight. They were supposed to shoot early and often, pinning the Zimbabwean police in their headquarters and hopefully holding casualties on both sides to a minimum.

  Nkume appeared at the top of the stairs, looking tense and reluctant.

  Bekker put on a friendly smile and motioned him into the room.

  “Come on,

  Nkume, we’re almost done. Show us your hidey-hole and we’ll be out of here.”

  The black nodded slowly and went over to the right-hand door, leading to one of the rooms Bekker’s men had cleared. He stepped in and then backed out, tears in his eyes.

  Bekker moved to the doorway and looked in at a large apartment, complete with its own bathroom. A middle-aged black man with gray pepperingbis close-cropped black hair lay half in, half out of bed, his chest torn open by rifle fire. The captain stared hard at Nkume and jerked a thumb at the corpse.

  “All right, who’s he?”

  “Martin Cosate. The cell leader here. He was like a father to . , . ” Nku me choked up.

  Bekker snorted contemptuously and shoved Nkume into the room with the barrel of his assault rifle.

  “Don’t worry about the stiff, kaffir. He’s just another dead communist. If you don’t want to join him, show us the safe.”

  For just a second, the informer looked ready to resist. Bekker’s finger tightened on the trigger, Then Nkume nodded sullenly and walked over to a wooden chest in one corner of the room. He pushed it to one side, knelt, and ran his hands over the floor. After a moment, he pressed down hard on one of the floorboards and it pivoted up, revealing a small steel safe with a combination lock.

  “Open it, Nkume. And be quick about it!” Bekker was conscious that time was passing fast, too fast.

  The black began turning the safe’s dial, slowly, carefully.

  Scattered shots could still be heard from the north side of town. A sudden sharp explosion rolled in from the south, and Bekker swung toward his radioman for a report.

  The corporal held up one hand, listening.

  “Third section reports a police vehicle tried to enter town. They destroyed it with a Milan, but a few survivors are still firing.”

  That meant Zimbabwean casualties. Bekker shrugged mentally. He was only supposed to try to minimize collateral damage. Nobody at headquarters expected miracles. Besides,

  a few of their own people killed might teach Zimbabwe’s ruling clique to be more careful about allowing ANC operations inside their borders.

  Nkume finished dialing the combination and turned the safe’s locking handle. Bekker’s soldiers pulled him roughly away from the hole before he could finish opening the door.

  “Get him outside,” Bekker snarled. He looked for the leader of his attached intelligence team and saw him standing nearby.

  “It’s all yours now,

  Schoemann. Take your pictures quickly. “

  Schoemann’s men, one with a special camera, knelt down next to the hole and carefully removed inch-high stacks of paper from the safe. Bekker watched for a moment as they took each page, photographed it, and laid it in the proper order in a pile to one side.

  He felt a warm glow of satisfaction at the sight. This was the prize, the real payoff for a month of hard training and intense preparation. The information contained in this one small safe-ANC operations plans, equipment lists, personnel rosters, and more—would be a gold mine for

  South Africa’s intelligence services. And with luck, the ANC wouldn’t even know that these once-secret files had been found and copied.

  More firing sounded outside and shook Bekker out of his reverie. Der Merwe and Heitman must be running into more resistance than they’d anticipated.

  Schoemann, on the other hand, clearly had everything under control, so he sprinted down the stairs and out into the clear night air. Reebeck, Roost, and the rest of his troops were there waiting for him, listening to the fighting still raging at either end of town. Every man knew that the clock had been running since they first entered Gawamba, and from the sound of the firing to the north and south, it was running out.

  Bekker stopped near Reebeck.

  “Lieutenant, take your team and cover the intelligence people. Send word as soon as they’re finished. I’m taking de

  Vries and going north.”

  Reebeck nodded and wheeled to his appointed task.

  STRIKE FORCE SECOND SECTION, NORTH END OF GAWAMBA, ZIMBABWE

  Bekker and five men double-timed north through the streets toward the police station, equipment clattering and boots thumping heavily onto the dirt. There wasn’t time to make a cautious, painstaking advance now.

  Instead, they’d simply have to risk an ambush laid by any ANC sympathizers still at large in the town.

  The South African captain didn’t believe there was much chance of that.

  He’d seen only a few frightened faces in the windows-faces that quickly ducked out of sight at his glance. The townspeople wisely didn’t seem to want any quarrel with the heavily armed soldiers running down their streets.

  He pulled up short at a corner and peered around it. Several soldiers of his second section were visible down the road, in cover and firing at the yellow brick police station not far away. One man lay sprawled and unmoving, while another sat white faced, trying to bandage a wound in his own side. The rest were locked in a full-scale firefight that wasn’t part of the plan.

  Bekker pulled his head back and turned to the men with him.

  “Set up an ambush two blocks down the main street.” He looked at his watch.

  “You’ve got three minutes. Go!”

  He belly-crawled forward to the nearest second-section position-two men crouched behind a low rock wall.

  “Where’s der Merwe?” he asked.

  Bullets ricocheted off the front of the wall and tumbled overhead at high velocity, buzzing like angry bees.

  One of the paratroopers pointed to the far side of the police station.

  “He headed over there a few minutes ago, Kaptein _. “

  Bekker risked a glance in that direction and sat back.

  “Right. Stand by for new orders.”

  The trooper’s helmet bobbed and Bekker crawled back out of the line of fire. Then he stood and ran to the right, past a row of tiny, one-room shops still shut for the night. Corporal de Vries followed. Once past the police station, he turned

  toward the sound of the firing, moving forward in short rushes from doorway to doorway.

  At last, he was rewarded by the sight of Lieutenant der Merwe, prone and firing around a corner at one of the police station’s
barricaded windows.

  Bekker waved him back into cover and went to meet him.

  The lieutenant, his least-experienced officer, was breathing hard, but didn’t look overly excited.

  “There are at least twenty men over there and they’ve got automatic weapons. We’ve got them pinned, but right now we’re just sniping at each other.”

  “And that’s what we don’t need.” Bekker scowled as the firing around them rose to a new crescendo.

  “We’ve got to get them out in the open and finish them before the Pumas come in. “

  He put his mouth close to der Merwe’s ear to make sure he could be heard over the fighting.

  “We’ve laid an ambush down the street toward Kudu. Pull your people out in that direction and we’ll give these kaffirs a nasty surprise.

  The lieutenant grinned and sprinted back to the rest of his men, already yelling new orders.

  Bekker, with two of der Merwe’s men in tow, dashed down a side street and over toward the ambush position. Sergeant Roost and his radioman met him there.

  “Schoemann’s finished, Kaptein. Everything’s back in the safe just the way it was. And the Pumas are on the way.”

  “Excellent. Now, all we’ve got to do is scrape these damned Zimbabwean police off our backs. They don’t seem willing to take no for an answer.”

  Shrill whistles blew behind them, signaling the second section’s withdrawal. Bekker grabbed Roost’s arm and swung him halfway round.

  “Take these two men and provide security one block back. Corporal de Vries will stay with me.”

  He moved forward and risked a quick look down the main street. Second section’s paratroops had thrown smoke grenades and were shouting, “Pull back! Withdraw!” loud enough to be heard in Pretoria.

  Bekker checked his rifle and slapped in a fresh magazine, then took a fragmentation grenade off his battle dress. He flattened himself against the wall of one of the houses and saw his troops run by in apparent headlong retreat. They were still dropping smoke grenades behind them, filling the street with a white, swirling mist.