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    Boston Black Ops 2
    Boston Black Ops 2
    Boston Black Ops 2
    Ebook318 pages4 hours

    Boston Black Ops 2

    By Eric Meyer

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    About this ebook

    A new threat is menacing the streets of Boston. Artur Babayev is an immigrant from Uzbekistan. He has imported the middle eastern brand of brutal, wanton violence to his adopted city in his relentless drive for wealth; no matter how many lives it costs. The authorities seem powerless to stop this man who is skilled at hiding his activities from the law. The terrorized citizens have no choice but to turn to a man who has spent his career fighting in the shadows. Jack 'Tinlegs' Taylor is a former elite Navy SEAL platoon leader; the best of the best, and his former Seal buddy, Wes Harper.

    Yet it soon becomes clear they are fighting more than just Babayev. A new enemy is surfacing, one who is hidden deep in the shadows. An enemy who with a single masterstroke almost ends Taylor's life.

    This is the second thrilling story of the injured SEAL vet who is forced to take up his weapons again for a cause he believes in. The weapons are the same, the tactics are the same, but the action reaches from the formerly peaceful streets of Boston to the huts and villages of war-torn Afghanistan, and back again.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherSwordworks Books
    Release dateMay 2, 2013
    ISBN9781909149212
    Boston Black Ops 2
    Author

    Eric Meyer

    An internationally recognized expert on the subjects of HTML, CSS, and Web standards, Eric has been working on the web since late 1993. He is the founder of Complex Spiral Consulting, a co-founder of the microformats movement, and co-founder (with Jeffrey Zeldman) of An Event Apart, the design conference series for people who make web sites. Beginning in early 1994, Eric was the campus Web coordinator for Case Western Reserve University, where he authored a widely acclaimed series of three HTML tutorials and was project lead for the online version of the Encyclopedia of Cleveland History combined with the Dictionary of Cleveland Biography, the first example of an encyclopedia of urban history being fully and freely published on the Web.

    Read more from Eric Meyer

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      Book preview

      Boston Black Ops 2 - Eric Meyer

      Boston BLack Ops 2

      By Eric Meyer

      Copyright 2013 by Eric Meyer

      Published by Swordworks Books

      All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

      This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.

      Smashwords Edition License Notes

      This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the author's work.

      CONTENTS

      CHAPTER ONE

      CHAPTER TWO

      CHAPTER THREE

      CHAPTER FOUR

      CHAPTER FIVE

      CHAPTER SIX

      CHAPTER SEVEN

      CHAPTER EIGHT

      CHAPTER NINE

      CHAPTER TEN

      CHAPTER ELEVEN

      CHAPTER TWELVE

      Chapter One

      He'd never forget the screams. The pain of tortured souls. The cries that echoed around the rancid hamlets and squalid villages of Afghanistan, to haunt the memories of those who’d served in that war-torn country. He could hear another of those frightened screams, and the adrenaline surged inside his body. Until he remembered this was the City of Boston, and he was outside Citizens Law Center. Inside, yet another downtrodden client would have exploded, beaten down into an orgy of anger, frustration and despair. A family maybe threatened with the loss of their home. And their car, perhaps. Their job too, probably. And their pride, for certain. Poor bastards. He forced himself to calm his racing heartbeat, to allow the sudden energy-surge to seep out of his system. The clients of the Citizens Law Center needed only legal advice, not ammunition for their AK-47 assault rifles.

      But already, his mind was a long, long way from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The nondescript Law Center building did not exist. He was back in the bleak, threatening wastelands of Helmand Province. Helmand, a place forever associated with the Afghan warlord who'd fought a clever, running battle against the overwhelming strength of the NATO forces in Helmand. Ismail Masood, the insurgent leader who'd taken everything from him. The man he’d take a bloody revenge on, if only he ever got the chance to kill him. Just thinking of Afghanistan gave him a sour taste in his mouth. Acid, the taste of defeat. That troubled country was the place where his Navy Seal career had come to an abrupt end. As had the lives of many of the men in his platoon. He often wished his life had ended there too, so he could join his dead comrades on more time in the warrior's Valhalla. It would have been better that way. Instead, there’d been Helmand.

      * * *

      He shouldn't have been on that final patrol. He’d left his second-in-command, Ned Ryan, in charge of the platoon. Taylor was spending a few days at Bagram, sifting through hundred of recent intel reports. It was vital work. There’d been too many failures lately, too many casualties. His aim was to modify current tactics so as to sharpen up their search and destroy operations. And kill a whole heap more Taliban. Until that fateful call from the senior Seal commander. He hadn't known what it would mean. That it would be his last mission.

      We need you back at Camp Leatherneck ASAP, Lieutenant. There's an urgent mission on the board. Your platoon is due to move out tomorrow, three hours before dawn, and you’ll be leading them.

      What’s the target?

      Ismail Masood. This time we reckon we can kill the bastard.

      Masood, the name on every most wanted list, the insurgent commander responsible for so many deaths. Some called him 'The Butcher’; some thought the nickname too melodramatic for a mass murderer. But they were all unanimous. They all wanted him dead.

      He’d cursed. His current assignment was supposed to take at least another week. Even then he’d have to work eighteen hours a day to get through all the data. Now they wanted him to throw it all away and come back. Even so, if they got Masood, it would be worth it. If.

      How come you want me back? I left Ryan with the platoon.

      Navy Seal Lieutenant (jg) Ned Ryan, his number two. Something had gone wrong.

      Ryan's sick. The Commander had anticipated him. He says it’s some kind of stomach bug. There's no way he can go out the way he is. I've sent a helo to pick you up. It's on the way, one of our Black Hawks. As soon as you get back here, report to me, and I'll fill you in on anything you need to know, but Ryan has done all the preparation, so you should have everything you need.

      Yessir, he’d responded automatically. He was angry, damned angry. All this work wasted, and it could have saved a lot of lives, and cost the enemy a whole heap more. But it was too bad. If Ned was sick, that ended any discussion. A few hours later, the Black Hawk dropped its wheels smoothly onto the tarmac at Camp Leatherneck, the 1,600 acre United States Marine Corps base located in Helmand Province. Wes Harper, the big, capable, black petty officer, was waiting for him as he stepped out. Although Lieutenant Ryan was technically in command when he was absent, the reality was that Wes kept the platoon running anytime Taylor was away. And unlike Ryan, he trusted Wes.

      Good to see you back, Lt. I got the mission brief. They told me to pass everything to you as soon as you landed, as time is short. As soon as you’re ready, we're set to go.

      Yeah, thanks, Wes. Anything special I need to know?

      Not really, Boss, he smiled. You can relax. It’s a done deal. For all his faults, the Lieutenant did a job on the mission packet. It’s Kajika, a small village fifty klicks from here. Our old pals the Taliban have worked hard to turn it into some kind of a regional administrative center. They brought in some of their best people, and they've been winning hearts and minds, setting up a school, a clinic, that kind of thing.

      A school?

      A school means kids. A complication I could do without.

      Yeah, a school. Well, you'd call it a madrassa. Boys only, and I guess all they teach them is how to read the Koran and murder our guys. But even so, for the local kids, it means some kind of an education.

      Taylor grimaced. Lessons in how to be a rabid, murdering, butchering scumbag suicide bomber?

      Wes grinned. Maybe so. For sure it's not your average Junior High. But forget the madrassa, it doesn’t concern us. It’s the other place. Masood’s people have set up a shop in the village making IEDs, so I guess some of the kids are getting an even more varied education. Roadside IEDs, suicide vests, you name it. Our leaders are losing more than a little sleep over the place. They want us to destroy it.

      To help out their insomnia?

      Wes grimaced and made no reply. Taylor read through the mission packet and had to admit, despite his faults, Ryan had squared off the paperwork pretty well. He'd just about time for a shower, a quick meal, and a couple of hours sleep. He thanked Wes, asked him to give him a call no less than an hour before take off, and went to find his bunk. But he didn’t sleep. He’d been thrown into the mission at short notice, and his mind ranged over the scores of details that are a part of every military operation. Besides, lack of time meant lack of preparation, and that could be a recipe for disaster.

      Two hours before dawn they were in the air, flying across the harsh Afghan landscape in a pair of Black Hawks, heading for the prepared RV five klicks out from the village. Their two snipers, Arthur Andersen and Bob Garcia, had been inserted seventy-two hours previously; their brief to try and pinpoint the location of the target, the factory manufacturing IEDs. With any luck, they’d find Masood there too. But there were also civilians in Kajika, and the nightmare of civilian dead and wounded was a scenario that hung over them like a dark shroud.

      Who is a civilian and who isn't, in this village that produces IEDs and suicide vests? How do we separate the innocent from the guilty? The eternal problem of asymmetric warfare, and one for which there will never be an answer.

      The helos put down behind a series of hills that shielded them from the village, and they tumbled out. Anderson and Garcia were waiting for them. They were both surprised to see him, and he explained about Ryan's illness.

      Anything new on the target?

      That's a negative, Boss. We're pretty sure it's there somewhere. They have a lot of traffic going in and out of the village, mainly donkey trains, a couple of SUVs. They sure ain’t bringing in clothes and jewelry for the ladies.

      Copy that.

      They climbed to the top of the hill and entered the narrow trench the two men had dug. It was a tight squeeze, and it stank of human sweat and wastes. He shrugged inwardly. An OP so close to the enemy meant the men would be hidden inside, twenty-four seven. There was a good view of Kajika, and he was able to make out the dim shadows of the distant outlines of the buildings. No light showed, and he had to use night vision goggles to see any detail, but there was little to observe. A stonewall had been built around the entire village, enough to block the view.

      I need to see the interior, you got the overheads?

      Garcia handed him a tablet. The images onscreen are what we downloaded from yesterday’s UAV overflight. That was around 1600, but there's not a great deal to help us. They seem to be using all the buildings just like you’d expect. There's no surge of traffic into any particular place to suggest it's what we're looking for. Except for the madrassa, of course, but we know why people go there.

      Unless it has another purpose? Like making IEDs and training people how to use them.

      Next to the children? He thought about that, and then nodded. Yeah, okay, it’s a possibility. We hadn't thought of that one.

      That’s no surprise. The idea of using children as human shields doesn’t come naturally to Westerners, but to the Islamic terrorist, they’re a legitimate sacrifice. In God's name, of course, but still…

      It would make sense for them. If we destroy it along with scores of young kids, it would be an intelligence coup for them, he pointed out.

      And if we leave it alone, Wes growled, they'll keep killing our people with the stuff they make inside.

      Yeah, they got themselves a win-win. Even so, when we go in, we need to allow for the possibility of juveniles in there. He looked over at the village again. I can't see anyone moving down there. Has there been much activity lately?

      Garcia shook his head. It's strange. They were moving around up till late last evening, but since then it's been real quiet. Almost as if they cleared out, except we didn't seeing them leaving. There's that low range of hills right next to the village, so it’s possible they could get out without us seeing them go, but it wouldn't make sense.

      Unless they know we're coming, but Ryan's used secret, high-level intel. There's no way they could have found out what we're planning. No way.

      We'll have to assume nothing’s changed. Jerry, you're ready with the charges?

      His question was directed at Jerry Yates, who'd been part of the unit when he joined. Yates was their demolition specialist.

      All set. If it is a bomb factory, it'll only need a small charge to set it off. When the rest goes up, we can give 'em a real Fourth of July treat.

      They'll appreciate that, he responded drily.

      In the final moments, Taylor checked, double-checked, and rechecked Ryan's brief. He felt uneasy, but couldn't quite pin it down. The approaches to the village had been monitored almost continuously for the past three days, and there was no sign anyone had planted an IED on the main track. If Ryan's work were accurate, they'd be clear until they reached the first building. After that, it was anybody’s guess. He scanned the village yet again, and it looked quiet enough. Too quiet, for a place that was reported to be one of Masood’s major bases. Was he having an attack of nerves because this was all last minute, and he shouldn't have been here? He dismissed it. Men going into action were invariably superstitious, and he was no stranger to the phenomenon. Besides, the absence of any movement in the village was probably down to some perfectly innocent reason. A festival maybe, or some kind of vacation. But no matter what the reason, there was only one way to head. Forward.

      Let's move out. It's not long until daylight.

      He shouldered his HK 416, the German designed assault rifle that was the preferred choice of elite forces worldwide, although it wasn't his preferred choice. Lately, he carried an HK MP7, a shorter, lighter weight weapon packing a 4.6mm round which could even punch through light, personal armor, despite the small size of the bullet. This time, though, he'd been unable to collect his weapon from the armorer where it was undergoing maintenance, so instead he carried the HK 416. A superb weapon, without a doubt, but there was that superstition again.

      The 416 isn't my own weapon.

      He put it to the back of his mind and made a final check.

      Move out.

      He led the men down the hillside, and they followed a narrow path that paralleled the track. The danger of an IED on the main route into the village, one they may have missed, would spell disaster. To avoid taking any chances, Ryan's briefing had pinpointed the tiny, almost invisible footpath. The inhabitants, who avoided the road for obvious reasons, regularly used it. He grimaced.

      Whatever the streets and rough tracks in Afghanistan are paved with it sure isn't gold.

      He checked his wristwatch; they were making good time and should be in position well before dawn. Wes was right behind him. He carried an AG36 launcher fitted to his HK 416, a lethal combination. Arthur Andersen, the sniper, brought up the rear, along with another trooper who carried an M249 SAW. The squad automatic weapon, their machine gun. The other sniper, Garcia, followed behind Wes, and after him another man carrying a second M249 SAW. Taylor was satisfied they carried sufficient firepower to deal with anything they were likely to meet. The Taliban had no armor, and no Air Force. The drone was back and cruised overhead, giving both him and the controllers a bird's eye view of the attack zone; ready to direct air support if they came up against an unexpected enemy force. He checked the tablet he carried, linked to the UAV. The lookdown into the village was clear of any movement, no infrared return from a sentry, nothing. He wished the drone was armed, but when he'd asked Garcia, it turned out there'd been some kind of a SNAFU, and the Predator was unarmed, purely a reconnaissance vehicle.

      Why is there no sign of anyone down there? If it really were an important base, they'd be sure to have a sentry. More than one. Wouldn't they?

      He put aside his misgivings and carried on. Whatever the reasons for the place being deserted, the enemy wasn't about to impart any of them to him. They reached a waypoint only fifty meters before the first stone building, and he held up his fist to hold them while he took a last look around, a last scan of the tablet. Nothing. He mentally shrugged and clicked the commo.

      We're going in.

      He reached the first stone building and pushed on further into the miserable cluster of dwellings that constituted an Afghan village. Nothing. He led them further forward, and then his whole world disappeared.

      It was a maelstrom of smoke and flame. At first, there was no sound. He had the sensation of his body being tossed through the air, almost as if he'd been jumping from an aircraft into a massive slipstream. But then he felt the punch that smashed into his body, as if a giant had taken hold of him and dashed him against a heap of rocks. He was tumbling, falling, and for a moment he panicked. He wasn't sure which way was up and which was down. But then he smashed into the ground with a jar that he felt must have broken every bone in his body. He was aware of screams and shouts, and knew they came from his men, but he also knew he could do nothing to help them. He was underneath a shower of rocks that hammered down on him, relentless, harsh, beating him into a helpless ruin. He couldn't see, and then he realized it was still dark, and the night was filled with black daybreak, dust, and small stones mixed in between the larger rocks that pummeled his body. He looked around, trying to make sense of the nightmare that had in an instant turned his world from sanity to madness. He had a glimpse of a leg. It must be one of his men lying close by. Using the last reserves of strength and fighting to ward off unconsciousness, he dragged himself toward it. But when he reached the leg and pulled it, the limb was already detached from the body. With a sickening feeling, he knew they'd been caught in some kind of ambush, a blast so huge it could inflict serious damage on his men. He realized he still had hold of the leg, and he went to toss the bloodied limb away from him, sickened by what it represented. But his arm had no strength, and all he could do was open his fingers to let it drop. Something in his brain told him the limb belonged to one of the men who wore the same custom boots as he did. And then he was laughing hysterically with the absurdity, with the triviality of that thought.

      Wes! Where are you? Jerry! Anderson, Garcia, report in.

      But although his lips were moving, he wasn't making any sound; no words came out of his mouth. He realized the leg could easily belong to one of those men, and he could be dead. A couple of meters away, he saw another leg. He wanted to puke, not just for the carnage, but also for the almost contemptuous ease with which he'd walked into a Taliban trap. Was he injured? He went to reach down but debris was still raining down, and a block of stone almost a half-meter long smashed into him, hitting his shoulder and glancing off his head. His last thought was of failure.

      I should have done better, should have avoided the trap.

      He was dying, knew he was dying, and when he finally recovered consciousness, after he was medevacked back to Bagram, his biggest regret was that he hadn't died. For the man brought back from the village of Kajika was not the man who'd entered the Taliban stronghold at the head of his platoon. Only part of the man came back.

      * * *

      He forced himself back to the former storefront on the edge of Roxbury, only two miles from his new apartment in the bustling and gentrified North End of Boston. Part of the original sign was still in evidence, ‘Fine Drapery & Yarns’. The text had faded, almost as if it was hiding in shame at the change of use. At the building’s new occupants. Lawyers.

      ‘Boston Citizen’s Law Center – All Welcome’

      The poor, the sick, the dispossessed, all those who came in hope to this place, all had one thing in common. It was their last hope. Maybe they hadn’t reached the awful depths of despair familiar to war-weary Afghanistan, but things would sure seem bad enough when people ventured through that door. Before he entered, he took a precautionary look around, a habit he’d acquired long before and never lost. He admired his car, as he always did. He’d parked the bright red Camaro across the street. A local kid, Alvin, who spent most of his life on the corner, was watching out for it. Taylor knew the kid ran errands for the local gangbangers when they needed to send out for cigarettes or booze, or to deliver the little Baggies that were the currency of their criminal empires. Alvin couldn’t have been more than sixteen, maybe less, yet it wasn’t his age that deterred would-be thieves and vandals. His harelip and squinty eyes were ugly enough to intimidate most people he came across, and there was no doubt the boy looked pretty frightening. It wasn't the only disadvantage that blighted his life. He was a scrawny white kid, living in a tough black area. Kind of like ‘A Boy Named Sue’, the Johnny Cash song, where the boy had to toughen up or die. His scrawny physique and white skin sure were a damn good reason to become a tough and cruel fighter. It was that or go under, a simple choice. Alvin had made his choice and acquired a reputation for being very tough and cruel, so not many tangled with him. Taylor normally paid him a few bucks to keep an eye on the car, with good reason. His 1967 Chevy, the four-speed, stick shift model with the modified 428 cubic inch engine, stood out like a shining beacon in the tired and dusty neighborhood. To some, it was a beacon of strangeness, out of place in this area that had long lost the will to hope, let alone to live. To others, it was a symbol of ambition, fast wheels to make a fast exit from a neighborhood that had long given up the fight. To the bottom-feeders, it was a thing of envy, to be kicked, dented, vandalized, and stripped of its parts for cash. Except Alvin watched, and waited. The car was safe. And the street was clear.

      He smiled to himself, it was tactical thinking. Here in Boston there were no groups of ragged, gnarled, Afghan tribesmen with weapons hidden beneath their robes. No need to duck from volleys of 7.62mm bullets that spewed out from crude cheaply produced Russian and Chinese versions of the AK47, not yet, anyway. The occasional drive-by shooting, during the odd war between the gangs, but they were rare, despite the opinion of the paranoid rants of the network newsies. He looked up at the sky. It was clear blue. Pure. Cold. He shivered; the air was sharp and crisp. The sun had put in a tardy appearance, but the day was no less cold. He wondered if it would snow.

      At least it would mask the shabbiness of the litter-strewn streets, with a clean, white blanket. Damn, it’s cold.

      He turned to go inside, only to curse as sharp pain lanced through his body. It was worse lately, much worse. A permanent legacy he’d brought back from Afghanistan, a constant reminder of the brutal war in the forgotten wastelands of that savage country. He gripped the handle. The door looked grim after a weekend’s abuse. It was obvious they were losing the crusade against the graffiti artists. He opened it, went inside and was immersed in the eye of the storm of human despair.

      Taylor pushed his way through the crowded office, past shouting people and phones ringing off the hook. Most of the clients were victims of the recession that had cut a swath through American society, slicing out its still-beating heart. Bank debts, mortgage debts, sickness, legal problems, and unemployment, more often than not all of the above. Those were the tiny tragedies they brought in day after day. Yet to these people, the tragedies were anything but tiny. They saw them as the very end of life as they knew it, and the beginning of a perilous journey into the hostile unknown of poverty and homelessness. It was only 09.20 on an icy Monday morning, yet already the numbers threatened to overwhelm the hard pressed lawyers and paralegals who gave of their time for little reward. The place stank, as it always did, unwashed bodies and an accumulation of dirt. Worst of all was the fear. Fear had its own peculiar odor, an unmistakable metallic tang. He threaded his way past desks that were gouged and chipped. Outdated computers and dented filing cabinets were the only office equipment on display. Sagging chairs the only furnishings, flotsam rejected by its previous users. Much like those who sat on them.

      One of the lawyers, Kate Donovan, nodded a greeting, which he returned. Until recently, they'd been close, an item. She was still the woman he loved more than anything else in the world. Nothing would change it, but the relationship was impossible. The problems with his legs meant he had to push her away. Not just any legs. Prosthetic legs, that seemed at first to resolve all his problems, but he found they were no solution to the agony that periodically dominated his body and his life. It was a miracle he could walk again; walk like a normal man. He could run, jump, and live a normal life. Dr. Hermann van Rhoos, the prosthetics genius at MIT, had fitted him with replacement limbs that were years ahead of anything else in the world. He’d spent hours modifying

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