The room glowed bright orange from the flames in the bay, bright enough to blot out the stars and illuminate the panic of the civilians on the vessels crammed together down there. Their cries and screams registered faintly in the small spaces between the crash and roar of battle.
‘Got a battalion-sized landing force in the bay, sir,’ the gunner shouted back. ‘They’ve split into two groups. One headed for the airfield, the other for your position. My Marines are scattered all over the base. It’ll take at least fifteen minutes to get everyone up.’
Musso carried the phone with him over to the window, taking care not to present an easy target. He could see a column of six-wheeled armoured vehicles and amtracs rolling out of the bow of the beached container ship. Muzzle flashes twinkled from their gun mounts as long ropey arcs of tracer fire reached out for targets unseen in the night.
‘Try to set up an anti-tank team and hit that column headed for headquarters,’ he called down the phone. ‘Colonel Pileggi’s organising a security force to handle the airfield. Give every swinging dick a weapon – I don’t care what branch they are or what their MOS is, I want everyone armed. Grab any willing civilians, too. Anyone who can and will pull a trigger. We’re in the shit deep, Gunny. You read me?’
‘Yes, sir, we are indeed in the shit,’ Price replied. ‘I’ll get on that anti-tank team.’
‘Okay. I’ll keep someone on this line,’ Musso promised. He turned to the navy lieutenant by the door. ‘Lieutenant McCurry, man this phone.’
‘Aye, sir,’ barked McCurry, taking the handset from him.
Tusk watched as Pileggi continued to yell into her phone. ‘No, hold those fuckers off the airfield, Sergeant!’ she insisted. ‘And if you’ve got civilians volunteering to fight, then let them. I don’t have time for any bullshit about whether or not it’s kosher – just do it!’
‘Can you hold it?’ Musso asked her as she slammed the receiver down.
‘I have no idea, sir. I’m not over there, I’m here,’ Pileggi said.
‘Grab a couple of Marines as close protection, and a personal weapon, and go, Susie. You’re my man out there.’
She stood to attention and ripped out a salute. Then she was gone, barking out orders at men in the hallway he couldn’t see.
Turning back to the shattered window on the second floor of his headquarters building, Musso watched tracer fire flickering across the airfield, some of it going astray into the bay, skipping across the water. A C-5 Galaxy was trying to climb off the runway and claw its way into the air. Ice water flooded Musso’s veins as tracer reached out from the perimeter of the airfield to pepper the fuselage of the massive cargo transport.
Climb, Musso prayed silently. Climb.
‘Sir!’ McCurry shouted over the chaos. ‘I’m getting reports of two additional columns outside the base perimeter. Estimated time to contact is five minutes.’
The tracer fire lost interest in the Galaxy and focused again on earthbound targets. Musso allowed himself a sigh of relief.
Just then a missile zipped into the flank of the cargo plane at the wing root and exploded. The lost wing folded up and back over the top of the C-5, shearing off the tail section as the fuel ignited, engulfing the dying aircraft.
‘Mother. Fucker…’ said Musso.
He watched the wreckage plummet towards a Carnival cruise ship, which was already burning from a number of bomb strikes. Musso knew he would never be free of the image of children falling out of the belly of that burning Galaxy as it careened towards the ship.
‘No,’ Musso whispered. ‘No, God…’
The plane hit the bow of the Carnival vessel, shearing it off completely. Burning fuel and white-hot shrapnel shredded the upper decks. Adding to the carnage, another aircraft, a Venezuelan jet, swooped in low, and began strafing the growing funeral pyre in the bay, catching some burning passengers in midair as they flung themselves from the cruise ship and tried to find safety in the waters of Guantanamo Bay. A second container ship pushed past the wreckage for the beach, only to be met by a couple of Navy Shore Patrol boats, gnats buzzing around a behemoth. Small-arms fire passed back and forth between the mayfly’s quick adversaries and their lumbering prey, chopping up the water around the smaller boats where civilians were mixed in the fray.
‘Got a fire fight between base police and some infiltrators at the McDonald’s, sir,’ McCurry reported. ‘Another engagement is taking place up at base housing. Gunny Price says he’s only got a third of his force under arms and maybe two-dozen civilians. That’s it.’
‘Where’s that army commo puke?’ Musso asked, as he stalked over to the doorway. ‘Captain Birch!’ he roared.
A scuffle of boots through the smoke-filled corridors produced a large, somewhat overweight man in army BDUs. ‘Sir?’
‘Do we still have comms with Pearl or the brigade in Panama?’
Birch seemed pale, a bit stunned.
‘Comms with Pearl, Birch. Or the Canal. Get with the fucking program,’ Musso said, resisting the urge to slap the man silly. ‘I need air cover over our AO.’
‘I’ll check, sir… right away.’ The captain turned to leave. ‘Specialist Gibbs!’ he called down the hallway. ‘See if Pearl is -’
Birch’s head exploded.
‘Sniper!’
Pileggi, shepherded by two Marines and a stray Coast Guard chief, made the airstrip on the bay’s western headland by virtue of a white-knuckle high-speed run in a little Trabant. The Cuban vehicle had been parked outside the headquarters block, and one of the Marines, Sergeant Gutteres, had hotwired it with practised ease. At times, tracer fire zipped and crackled all around them, while at others, on short stretches of road, everything seemed eerily still.
As they screeched around the last curve before the hangar buildings at the edge of the field, Gutteres pointed skywards and Pileggi’s heart sank as she saw dozens of parachute canopies popped open, high in the air. A few lines of orange and green fire flicked up to cross-hatch the descending paratroopers, but not enough. It was a feeble, poorly guided effort compared to the volume of fire on the ground.
Chief Lundquist, who had the wheel, swerved a few times to avoid burnt-out vehicles and hastily erected firing positions, before slamming on the brakes next to a long concrete pipe behind which a small group of Marines seemed to be directing the defence of the airfield. Colonel Pileggi, still dressed in her office uniform, scrambled out and hurried over with her bodyguards right behind her. She was protected from the worst of the enemy’s ground fire by the giant pipe, which stood at least six feet high, but she crouched almost double anyway, running to avoid getting picked off from above. A few of the Venezuelans were shooting from small handheld weapons as they came down. The fire was inaccurate, but getting heavier.