The Kill Zone by Chris Ryan Read Free Book Online Page A

slung over his shoulder.
    ‘ Let them have it! ’
    Al didn’t need telling twice. He lowered his rifle. Getting down on one knee he rested the back end of the LASM over his right shoulder, took a moment to correct his aim, and then fired.
    A whizzing sound, then an immense bang as the thermobaric round found its target to the south. It had an immediate effect on the advancing enemy, who hit the ground and started shouting. Jack knew it wouldn’t keep them back for long, though, and they still had Taliban advancing from two other sides, over the brow of the ridges to the west and east. They were seventy-five metres away and swarming.
    A thumping sound.
    ‘ RPG! ’ Red shouted, and the three men standing hit the ground. Jack felt a sharp rush of air as the grenade whizzed over them, missing them by inches but starbursting twenty-five metres beyond them – sufficiently far away for its shrapnel to miss them, but only by a metre or so.
    Pixie’s whole body was shaking now. He needed attention, and fast, but they were pinned down, unable to move. ‘ We need that fucking chopper! ’ Al bellowed.
    And it was just as he spoke that the Black Hawk appeared over the brow of the hills to the north, a kilometre away. It sped towards them, skirting low above the desert – so low that it kicked up clouds of sand as it went. Seconds later it was hovering right above them, filling their ears with the noise of its engines.
    It hung in the air for a moment, thirty metres high. And then its gunner started firing in bursts.
    Thirty-cal rounds from the chopper’s minigun ripped through the air, accompanied by the orange light of tracer rounds like molten metal and the mechanical chugging of the weapon. The gunner fired first towards the westernmost flank of the advancing enemy. Then the Black Hawk spun in the air, moving in a semicircle so its weaponry hit the enemy to the south and then to the east, before going back on itself to give them all a second helping. The guns fell silent and the aircraft lowered itself down on to the sand, no more than five metres from where Jack was standing.
    Jack, Red and Al moved quickly. Jack handed Red his M16, then he and Al each grabbed one end of Pixie’s body while Red, a rifle in each hand, fired quick single rounds towards the enemy. The side door of the chopper was already open – Jack recognised a couple of lads from the Parachute Regiment inside. They helped him and Al get Pixie on board.
    Jack turned, just in time to see another RPG flying just forward from where Red was firing on the enemy still advancing from the west. Christ, these fuckers had been hit with thermobaric rounds from the LASM, thirty-cals from the Black Hawk and now Red was raining M16 rounds on them, but they wouldn’t lie down and die.
    ‘ Get in the chopper! ’ he shouted at his friend. ‘ Let’s get the fuck out of here! ’
    Red was happy to oblige. He and Jack launched themselves into the aircraft. As it rose into the air, Red continued to fire down on the enemy while the pilots spun the bird round, pointing it to the north – the only direction they could travel if they were going to get out of the range of the Taliban’s rockets.
    Jack turned his attention to Pixie. He was stretched out on the floor of the aircraft, his eyes were closed, but he was breathing – just. One of the Paras was fixing a tourniquet at the top of his shoulder just above where the round had entered. Another was inserting a saline drip into his good arm. His face was grim. ‘He needs a hospital!’ he yelled.
    But the hospital at Bastion was fifteen minutes away.
    Red had stopped firing and had his back pressed against the wall of the chopper, his face covered in sand and sweat, a picture of exhaustion. ‘They knew where we were,’ he gasped. ‘It was a fucking ambush.’
    Jack nodded. Red was right. He also knew that if they didn’t get Pixie back to base quickly, he’d pay for it with his life.
    He looked out of the side of the