The Genesis Plague (2010)

wandering Afghani arms dealer, gave each man’s rifle a unique report that helped Jason to roughly keep a count on expended rounds. Jam was heavy on the trigger of his Cold-War-era AK-74 - more pull than squeeze. The others in the unit were far more judicious with their shots.
    Though the ten remaining Arab militants had superior numbers and a high-ground advantage, the art of the kill was heavily weighted in favour of Jason’s seasoned team. The dwindling ammo supply, however, couldn’t have come at a worse time. If the bad guys were to call for backup, Jason’s unit could be attacked from the rear in the open flatlands leading to the foothills. Worse yet, the enemy might slip through the nearby crevasse and head deeper into the Zagros Mountains - a rebel’s paradise filled with caves and labyrinthine, rugged passes.
    Over the border and into Iran.
    He whistled to Jam, made a sweeping hand motion that sent him scrambling up the hill and to the right. He fought the urge to scratch at the prickly heat beneath his scruffy beard, which, along with contact lenses that transformed his hazel eyes to muddy brown, a deep tan that could be the envy of George Hamilton, an unflattering galabiya robe, vest, and loose-fit pants combo, a keffiyeh headwrap with agal rope circlet, and sandals - had respectably passed him off as a Bedouin nomad. The other unit members had donned similar dress.
    It took less than a two-count before a red-and-white chequered keffiyeh popped up over the rock pile, a Kalashnikov semi-automatic sweeping into view an instant later. Sliding his index finger off the trigger guard while matching crosshairs to chequers, Jason squeezed off three successive shots that would’ve left a perfect dime grouping on a bullseye. Through the scope he saw a pink mist and red blobs spit out behind the headscarf.
    He adjusted the remaining target tally downward: nine.
    Ducking from sight, he grabbed his rucksack and scrambled away just as a pomegranate-shaped grenade arced over the boulder, landed in the sand and popped. A ten-metre uphill dash brought him to a rocky hillock covered in scrubby brush. More automatic gunfire burst in his direction as he dived for cover.
    While the militants screamed back and forth to one another in Arabic - not Kurdish? - Jason brought out his Vectronix binoculars and scanned the two enemy positions. The device’s laser automatically calculated GPS coordinates while recording live images on to its micro-sized hard drive.
    Dipping beneath the hillock, he flipped open a laminated field map to verify the correct kill box on the grid. From his vest pocket he fished a sat-com that looked nearly identical to a civilian cell phone. He placed a call to the airbase at Camp Eagle’s Nest, north of Kirkuk. A barely perceptible delay followed by a tiny digital chirp confirmed that the transmission was being securely encrypted, just before the command operator responded with the first authentication question: ‘Word of the day?’
    He pressed the transmitter button. ‘Cadillac.’
    Chirp. Delay.
    ‘Colour?’
    Chirp. Delay.
    ‘Magenta.’
    Chirp. Delay.
    ‘Number?’
    Chirp. Delay.
    ‘One-fifty-two.’
    Pause. Chirp.
    ‘How can I help, Google?’
    Even under fire, Jason had to smile. He’d earned his new nickname a few months ago, after joining the boys at the air-base for a drink-while-you-think version of Trivial Pursuit. Jason had circled the game board and filled his pie wheel without ever cracking open a beer. The other players weren’t as fortunate, but maybe that was their intention. Obtuse facts - ‘things no self-respecting 29-year-old should know’ - were Jason’s forte. What he wouldn’t do to have that beer right now …
    ‘We’re low on ammo. Copy,’ Jason reported loudly over the persistent rat-a-tat-tat-tat in the background. ‘Nine militants pinned down. Some light artillery. Need a gunship ASAP.’ He provided the operator with the kill box and INS coordinates. ‘Have the pilot call me on approach.’
    ‘Roger. I’ll have Candyman there in four minutes.’
    Noting the time on his no-frills wristwatch, he slid the sat-com back into his vest and mopped the sweat from his eyes with his sleeve.
    He needed to make sure that the others weren’t too close to the intended strike zones.
    First he glanced over to Jam, who was now a good fifteen metres further up the slope, curled up in a gulch, cursing at his weapon’s stuck slide bolt. Vulnerable, but he was