Mozambique

 

Lat = 19 degrees, 28.6 minutes South

Long = 30 degrees, 22.0 minutes East

 

Wednesday 16th march 1988

 

The helicopter had been traveling at under two hundred feet in an easterly direction, after fifteen minutes it had crossed into Mozambique, a further five minutes and it was touching down in the middle of nowhere.

Shakira and the six men jumped down and quickly fanned out to secure the area, the helicopter immediately dusted off and headed back west, in the direction it had just come from.

Once they were satisfied the area was safe, Shakira gave a hand signal and they began to double time towards their objective five miles away.

One of the men took point two hundred yards ahead of the main group, which had spread out at five-yard intervals; another man trailing two hundred yards behind them covered their rear.

All these men were hardened mercenaries and had proved them self’s on many previous occasions.

Their objective was a camp of raiders whom were making incursions over the border into Zimbabwe, attacking settlements, robbing, killing the locals as well as attacks on the white farmers.

Shakira’s intelligence source had put this group at around thirty in strength.

As they neared the camp, the point man was waiting for them, near some shrub land.

The smell of the cooking fire’s drifted over towards Shakira’s men; the group spread out and crawled the remaining distance through the scrub which was surrounding the camp.

Shakira used his field glasses to scan the camp, there were no obvious sentry’s or lookouts; amateurs he thought to himself.

He scanned the rest of the camp, which consisted of several large bivwak’s, a dozen long wheeled base Landover’s and a spit with the carcass of a wild animal being roasted.

The camps occupants were scattered around the camp, some were resting, some were cleaning weapons and ten were playing football, Shakira counted twenty-five in all, they obviously thought they were safe.

Shakira gave the thumbs up signal to his men, he removed a hand grenade from his webbing and pulled the pin lobbing it into the camp, several more grenades followed as his men copied his actions.

The silence was broken as the grenades exploded the shrapnel was indiscriminate tearing through tents and flesh, Shakira and his men immediately laid down a blanket of gunfire and the distinctive sound of the AK47’s raked the camp.

Two of the Landover’s burst into flames as their fuel tanks exploded, the camps troops were running trying to collect their weapons but they were mercilessly cut down, their bodies torn, flesh and bone were ruptured and smashed by this hail of bullets; they had no chance.

Shakira stood up from his prone position and the firing seized from the commencement of fire to its end had been less than thirty seconds; the after action silence made it feel like the attack had never happened.

As the dust began to settle the wreckage of bodies could be seen strewn around the camp.

Shakira gave a signal and his men quickly entered the camp, as they reached the bodies a single shot was put into the head, just to make sure!

The body count was twenty-five.

The attackers began looting the bodies and camp, providing it was portable and would not hinder their evacuation, it was taken, watches, rings as well as cash.

All the weapons and munitions were placed in a pile, doused with fuel and set on fire.

The remaining land rovers had a single grenade rolled underneath, nothing was left that could be used by anyone else.

Shakira looked up at the sky; the vultures were already circling. He looked over at his men and shouted, “Lets RTB,” (return to base).

They began to double time back to the pickup zone, upon their arrival they set up a secure zone with lookouts.

Shakira pulled a short wave radio from one of his pockets pressed the transmission button.

“Humming bird, humming bird, this is wolf pack come in.”

There was a moment of static followed by, “Reading you five by five wolf-pack.”

“Transport required ASAP, LZ secured, over.”

“Roger wolf-pack ETA zero five minutes, out.”

Five minutes later the distinctive Wap, Wap sound of the helicopter rotors could be heard from the west, thirty-seconds later it landed.

Shakira and his men climbed on board, within seconds the helicopter was returning back to Shakira’s base camp.

The men were in a joyous mood and a tribal war mantra was being chanted.

As soon as the helicopter landed back at his camp Shakira could see Sahem waiting; he jumped out and walked over to him.

“We are ready to conduct the first test with the device,” said Sahem.

“Good, give me half an hour to shower and I’ll meet you at the test area,” replied Shakira.

Twenty-five minutes later Shakira met Sahem at the test area, a couple of hundred yards from the camp.

Sahem was standing in a trench; the device was another one hundred yards away, with two-lab technicians preparing the device.

Upon their return to the trench, Sahem explained to Shakira that the device had been programmed to detonate in ninety seconds and that the globe contained two water based solutions colored yellow and red representing the Ricin and Lanate, which would turn orange and vaporize into the atmosphere.

Shakira watched through his binoculars with eager anticipation, exactly on time the top of the device opened like the petals of a tulip flower.

There was a bang like a firecracker, followed by a whoosh sound from the ejection system.

A cloud of orange mist appeared fifty feet above the device, it rapidly began to spread through a three hundred and sixty degree pattern into the surrounding atmosphere, within seconds the mist passed over Shakira and the others in the trench.

For a moment there was a silence from everyone, as the implications of the weapon hit all of them.

Shakira broke the silence, “Excellent work Sahem we deploy the devices in five days.”

He quickly walked back to his hut, Suki was waiting with a cold beer, he sat down and she began to massage his neck and shoulders.

Shakira’s thoughts drifted to Hussein, he had five days to return back to the camp, and prepare for the operation.

Hopefully he would have the information about Mustapha’s killer.