Lewis Perdue's Blog, page 33

Evil In Amsterdam: Mira Longbow's Journey

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DIE BY WIRE -  CHAPTER ONE

Amsterdam

Debate thundered through the black iron gates of the Agnietenkapel and sprawled into the Oudezijds Voorburgwal.

Arguments about God, evil and religion shattered the university district's late-evening calm. Age-old questions with no answers ricocheted among the antique brick facades of lean, tall houses that stood shoulder to-shoulder along the elm-lined canal still bright with the long summer daylight that lingered into the evening at Amsterdam's northern latitude.

Surrounded in the academic scrum, Mira Longbow clung to her backpack, following her students through the gate. Her bright copper hair fanned across the shoulders of a jade wrap-over top with a chaste décolleté that did little to obscure the ample bust that rarely failed to attract men's eyes. Her tanned, well-exercised legs contrasted with a modestly above-the-knee white cotton skirt.

In moments, the enthusiastic assembly flooded a narrow, brick-paved lane lined with battered bicycles and sub-compact cars parked along the canal.

A tow truck lifted a tiny car from the canal, another athletic casualty of "Smart Car tipping." Beyond, a water taxi trailed a brownish-green wake through the dense murky water. Behind it came a skiff provisioned with an outboard motor, three dreadlocked adults, a spot-lit Jamaican flag and a small bale of dried vegetation mizzling off the unmistakable aroma of marijuana. A string of tiny white lights outlined a sign: "Mendocino Gold: 24-Hour Delivery." A mobile phone number followed.

Mira watched both boats slow at the Grimburgwal bridge, and marveled at the improbably fortunate disasters that had dropped her down right at this place at this moment.

Disaster one: the errant jihadi missile in Al-Kut.

The last time Mira had seen Jackson Day, he had already died and been revived three times by EMTs in the medevac Blackhawk. They told her Day would never have survived had she had not thrown herself over his head and neck. When she tried to tell them a third soldier had pushed her, they smiled knowingly.

"We've met the third soldier. Be thankful."

Falling debris smashed both of Day's legs. But the lethal roulette of falling concrete let Mira off with a separated left shoulder.

Back then, back when she still believed in God, Mira considered the third soldier a sort of guardian angel. During her brief recovery, she read books detailing the experiences of hundreds of people who had been saved by a mysterious third person: Charles Lindberg, John Muir, astronauts, mountain climbers, explorers. All testified that at times of ultimate peril, at the point of death, a mysterious stranger had arrived, helped them to safety then vanished along with the danger.

But now? Mira dismissed the third soldier — and God — as delusions of desperation.

Disaster two: The company commander recommended her for a Silver Star for her bravery in Al-Kut.

Disaster three: In less than 30 days, the Barrett .50 the Army had finally put in her hands had became so effective al-Sadr placed a $100,000 bounty on her head.

Disaster four: Her notoriety and 217 confirmed kills brought her to the attention of the Pentagon. A court martial convicted her of dereliction of duty for failing to perform her duties as an MP. The kangaroo court offered Mira a reduction in rank and an immediate honorable discharge.

Instead of contrition, Mira spoke her mind.

"Muqtada al-Sadr thanks you," she told a panel of rear-echelon officers whose closest encounter with a Purple Heart had come from paper cuts. "Will you be splitting Sadr's $100,000 reward among yourselves? Or will you share it with the families of soldiers who died because you get rid of people who could have saved their lives?"

A baritone voice now shattered Mira's reverie.

"Innocent babies are born with AIDS, good people are wiped out in tsunamis alongside rapists and murderers. What kind of God allows that?"

What kind of God, indeed?

The words knifed through Mira's heart.

Disaster five: She arrived home from Iraq just in time to watch her sister and newborn son die from a grotesque and painful flesh-eating infection from antibiotic-resistant bacteria.

"Karma," said a drowsy, demi-stoned voice behind her. "Like the Buddhists and Hindus say. Maybe the baby did something bad in a previous life."

Go to hell, Mira thought.

Disaster six: Two months later, Mira discovered her mother and father dead in bed, wrapped in one last loving embrace. Both had suffered for months. Unable to afford medical treatment, incapable of enduring the gathering pain and each unwilling to live without the other, they had found peace in an overdose of tranquilizers.

Mira buried them in a quiet Elmira cemetery.

For weeks, Mira drifted through life in a continual dark introspection that led her to conclude that God wasn't dead. Just absent, didn't give a damn.

But evil certainly did.

Evil was a certainty she could believe in. And something worth further study. So she transferred her college credits and uncanny language skills to Cornell and completed a bachelor's degree in Near Asian languages and a doctorate in philosophy.

Towards the end of her senior year, Mira also stopped believing she'd visit her post office box one afternoon and find a stack of letters from Jackson Day. She let go of that fantasy, but could not banish the faded-denim blue of his eyes, the irises all shot through with explosions of gold that radiated from the pupils.

"It rains on the just and on the unjust!" Someone in the seminar croud shouted.

"Why?"

Why indeed?

A well-received book describing how she had lost her faith led her to the University of Amsterdam to conduct a three-week seminar series that had filled the lecture hall with a standing-room-only crowd of the faithful and unfaithful, atheists and believers, agnostics and the intellectually curious.

"Verily we have created man in a life of pain, toil and trial," said a tall, bearded man in front of Mira. He wielded a green and gold leather-bound Qu'ran. Yaqub, a young Muslim whose decency and rational thought were not contagious enough. Dressed in a suit and tie as always, he craned his head back and said, "The Prophet

— peace be upon him — tells us that suffering is his way of testing our faith, our total submission to Allah." He

nodded confidently.

To Mira's left, a woman, from Rotterdam, responded. "God has a plan; we're just incapable of seeing it."

Leslie, an Anglican priest, wrestled with her own doubts. "It's a mystery we must struggle with."

"Suffering comes from a weakness in our devotion to God," said a reedy, middle-aged man with a yarmulke. Ari.

"Well said, my brother of the book!" Yaqub agreed.

Yaqub stood out in remarkable contrast to the radical Islamists who dominated Amsterdam's Muslim community. Most had approved of the grotesque shooting, stabbing and near-decapitation mutilation murder of Theo Van Gogh. Imams in the Old South section of Amsterdam condoned the mutilation killing of a man who had obviously insulted Islam. Islamic organizations mostly followed their imams' leads, or remained silent, thus offering tacit approval of the killer's ranting letter left pinned to Van Gogh's chest with a dagger.

"Hund pook!" Cursed a lean, muscular Dutchman who towered over the group. Jan. "A baby with AIDS or one dangling from a bloody bayonet is pure innocent suffering, the pain and suffering of the totally righteous. What kind of God would allow that?"

Mira's mob roiled its way across the Damstraat, heedless of oncoming traffic. Horns and curses failed to bank the debate's rising temperature.

"But the Bible says Job — "

"If God created everything, then God created evil."

"Evil is God's equal!"

"Karma! We are our own evil!"

The moveable debate sent tourists and other pedestrians hustling for the safety of parked cars, doorways

and steps.

"God is testing us!"

The throng surged into Zeedijk, the red light district, then crossed to the northwest bank of the Oude Zijds Voorburgwal and made straight for Mira's second-favorite rijstafel restaurant.

Near the Oude Kerk, Mira stopped.

"Hold on!" She turned waved her arms. The crowd urged her forward several steps then stopped and fell silent.

"Tomorrow — " She looked around at the faces. "Change in tomorrow's last class."

Frowns and faces full of curiosity.

"An automatic 'A' for anyone who can reconcile the following three propositions:

One, Evil Exists."

"Two, God is benevolent."

"Three, God is omnipotent."

"To get your 'A' you must prove that all three are true or that all are false."

The throng fell silent. Implications played across the shadows of their faces. Into the vacuum of their ensuing silence, rushed the clatter of traffic, footsteps, nightclub hawkers and the shouted whispers of hash sellers.

Then, something new. A mounting chorus of footsteps. Running, sprinting, louder, closer.

Shrieks of righteous fury ripped through the evening.

Mira recognized the voice. She turned, saw the same hijab-clad woman who had disrupted the seminar's first day. When Mira had suggested the Qu'ran was not the inerrant word of Allah, the woman had unleashed a vitriolic tirade.

"Blasphemy!" The woman had screamed. "Blasphemers must die."

Then she stalked out and had not returned.

But now, the woman hurtled toward Mira, her eyes shone with an otherworldly, drug-induced glaze Mira had last seen through a Leupold scope in Al-Kut.

Instinctively, the crowd parted for the shrieking dervish.

Spittle dried at the corner of the woman's mouth. Light strobed off the well-honed cutting edge of a long, broad knife.

Die By Wire Genre: Silva, Berry, Rollins, Khoury, Thor

Die By Wire is a high-concept conspiracy thriller set on a broad international stage, dealing with significant present-day global controversies and driven by with powerful male and female protagonists who fall in love and eventually realize they cannot complete their urgent missions without combining their unique talents.

This book is in the tradition of Daniel Silva, Steve Berry, James Rollins (especially his Altar of Eden), Raymond Khoury, Brad Thor, and Graham Brown. Other similar suthors include Chris Kuzneski, James Becker, Charles Brokaw, Daniel Levin, David Stone, and Paul Sussman.

Unlike those authors, Lewis Perdue has created co-equal male and female protagonists who are evenly matched, lethal in their own unique ways, and comparable in their abilities to deal with any threat the world can throw at them … except for the demands of a relationship that neither one wants but neither one can live without.

The protagonists in Die By Wire are tough, strong, independent and successful people in their own rights.

Both are focused operatives who find themselves conflicted by the duty to their missions and the deep love and attraction they find for each other.

Fortunately, they bring lethally complementary skills and talents to bear and eventually realize that the success of their relationship is the edge they need to complete the mission.

The broad international scope and a ticking-clock race to stop a conspiratorial disaster of international significance all underpinned by the deeper issue of the nature of evil and its significance for our lives and our religious faith. Or lack of it.

Heroine Mira Longbow is strong, tall, built, brainy and bold. She's a college professor specializing in the philosophy of evil which she has seen first hand during an Army tour in Iraq where she established a reputation as a master sniper worthy of having an Al-Qaeda price on her head.

Longbow's strong. And feminine until she's threatened.And so far she's batting 1,000 against those threats.

No shrinking violet or damsel in distress. Mira's as good at giving as taking and capable of saving her hero's life as she is at being grateful at having him save hers.

Hero Jackson Day as always wanted to be a soldier. And his dreams came true in Iraq when he got command of a fire team in Iraq. Then things went nightmare wrong.

The squad under his command was was wiped out in an ambush and he died half a dozen times before he got to the surgeons who patched him back together. Sorta.

Now Day dreams only of avenging the deaths of his squad.

In pursuit of that, he roams Afghanistan and other nasty places in the world as a legendary one-man execution squad for the Asymmetric Warfare Command who's motto is "Never Fight Fair."

Day works alone, sets his own rules and lets his results speak for himself. Nothing else matters. Life's tough, harsh, and inevitably short – exactly what he signed up for. Until his mission crosses with Mira Longbow. Who ends life as he knew it.

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Three FREE days worth of non-stop, fast-paced, global conspiracy, evil geniuses, heroism and creative mayhem and murder in Amsterdam.

As usual, the action and conspiracy are wrapped around a solid superstructure of non-fiction research and a few deeper thoughts on what motivate people to do good or evil. Or both. Or neither.

Conspiring Minds Want To Know:

Got an opinion about women in combat?
Do you know how easy it is to hack the fly-by-wire computers in a modern aircraft and make them drop out of the sky?
Can you reconcile all three of the following statements to make them true?

God is all-powerful.
God is benevolent.
Evil exists.


And can you figure out how they all come together in Amsterdam?

Why Die By Wire's Heroine Thinks The Military's "New" Women-In-Combat Policy Still Stinks

Pentagon to Loosen Restrictions on Women in Combat – NYTimes.com

"This is nothing more than one more pat on the head and a 'don't worry your pretty little head and get your nails messed up' piece of misogynistic stupidity," said Iraq Army veteran Mira Longbow.

Longbow, the heroine of Die By Wire, was court-martialed for willingly, repeatedly and effectively serving as a combat sniper in the Al-Kut region during the early stages of the war.

She now serves as a guardian sniper with the Pleiades, an international women's organization that protects innocent civilians caught in the crossfire of war and other violent conflicts such as the current Syrian uprising. Longbow has previously served in the Russian invasion of Chechnya and three other conflicts since then.

It was during the Chechnya invasion that Longbow's 17 confirmed kills of Russian conscripts raping and looting the civilian population, gave rise to Moscow's diplomatic protests against "White Tights."

Longbow has completed many missions since Chechnya, but none have prepared her for the awesome responsibility of her latest one in Die By Wire.

In Die ByWire, Mira is sent to Amsterdam to take out the head of a global child-smuggling ring who has eluded international authorities for decades. But she quickly stumbles across a diabolically creative, high-tech jihad that will bring the West to its knees unless she can make the record-setting shot of her career.

LONGBOW & GUARDIAN SNIPERS RECOGNIZED BY RUSSIANS & THE ECONOMIST

The deadly effectiveness of Mira Longbow and her sharpshooting sisters — whom the Russians believe to be former women biathletes from the Baltic republics — has given rise to a number of articles in mainstream publications like this one from The Economist:

"The blonde Baltic snipers, who are called beliye kolgotky (white tights) by the Russians, after their supposed favourite costume, are even more puzzling. Estonia has twice sent diplomatic notes to Russia, asking for the evidence behind the claims. So far, no answer. "They exist. Military intelligence says so, and they don't make mistakes," says Mr Yastrzhembsky's office."

However, the women's elusiveness and the fact that none has ever been captured, has led to a legend of near mythical proportions and even mentions in stuffy journals of military analysis like this one from Global Security.

COURT MARTIAL GAVE LONGBOW OPPORTUNITY, LEFT LASTING IMPACT

For her part, Longbow remains as contentious now as she was following her court martial.

"I suppose that I should be grateful for the pinheads who court-martialed me for being too good behind the scope," Longbow said. "If not for them, I might not have gone on to get a bachelors degree and a doctorate. And I probably would not have met the women of the Pleides.

"But it's impossible to get over the stubborn stupidity of the fossils that still control the military," she continued. "I have proved that my sisters and I can out-run and out-shoot any man we've been ever come up against. And while that is not an across-the-board case for every woman in the military, the fact that the military refuses to give women a chance to prove themselves is a stupid waste of resources.

"The fact is that a whole lot of men in combat are too fat, too out-of-shape, too wasted by cigarettes and simply too unprepared to haul a wounded comrade to safety. I can kick those guys' butts all day. And yet, a woman like me gets relegated to 'women's work' which severely hinders our advancement in the ranks."

 

A SNIPER IS BORN: DIE BY WIRE CHAPTERS CHRONICLE LONGBOW BEFORE THE COURT MARTIAL

PROLOGUE

Al-Kut Iraq , April 23, 2003

Mira Longbow followed Jackson Day and the Bravo fire team up a crumbling flight of debris-jammed stairs that offered temporary shelter from small-arms fire and a glaring sun that could bleach the world white in seconds.

Minutes before, she had been frisking Muslim women as part of the squad's house-to-house search for weapons and jihadis. Then came an urgent mission to rescue a sniper-scout team pinned down on the roof by Muqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi Army thugs.

At the third floor, an arched window framed a brilliant, heat-warped panorama of palm trees, chunky white and chamois buildings and a greasy brown bend of the Tigris River. Glare spilled from the window silhouetting Sergeant Day's broad shoulders and lean, six-foot-two physique.

Mira indulged herself with a quick flashback to the base cafeteria. The image of taut, cut muscles that sculpted his linebacker shoulders and made him a recruiting poster hunk worth knowing. Biblically.

"Gimme a SAW!" Day pointed to a jagged opening recently punched through the wall by an RPG, Rocket-Propelled Grenade. "There!"

Machine gunners Gold and Rivera set up their Squad Automatic Weapon and responded instants later.

From below, AK-47s crack-crack-cracked from a bomb-flattened ruin across the alley. Slugs smacked into the third floor ceiling, showering them with fine debris.

"Suppress those fuckers," Day barked.

Gold and Rivera loosed a long ripping burst from the SAW. The incoming AK-47 rounds paused for reflection.

"Alpha team! Roof!" Day shouted.

Mira's heart raced and senses sharpened. An unreal sense of immortality coursed through her then and made her skin tingle. Baptism by combat.

Hustle! Hustle! This is what you asked for!

A chance to prove herself in combat.

While a lot of military old farts loathed having "the weaker sex" in combat situations, they had no choice. In a Muslim culture only women could search women and that meant bending the regulations.

Before Iraq, straight-arrow Mira Longbow had always gone "by the book," first in her criminal justice studies at Corning Community College, then afterwards with the New York State Police.

9/11 changed that.

On 9/12, she enlisted in the Army, which assigned her to the Military Police.

"Charlie Team, cover the rear," Day barked.

"Corporal Longbow! See if you can manage to cover the flank without getting yourself hurt." Day pointed.

Can I cover it? Just watch!

Mira hustled through the debris.

On the far side of the room, she wrestled away the twisted remains of a bed frame blocking access to the window. She shouldered her M16, thumbed off the safety and swept the demolished alley below with the iron sights. Nothing but an avalanche of debris, trash and crows picking at a dead something that might once have been a dog.

She risked a quick glance in Day's direction. He was a misogynous bastard, but he moved like a total stud: pointing, directing, issuing orders. Totally in command. Totally alpha.

Day was definitely hot.

Some other time, some other place, some other life.

She had a mission and no inclination to screw that up.

Day turned to follow Alpha team up stairs.

A mortar round detonated on the roof.

Hell rained down. Day vanished in a firestorm of shattered concrete and shrapnel.

The shockwave slammed Mira to her knees. Slugs swarmed through her window.

White-hot pain hot slashed at her left shoulder.

Concrete debris careened off her helmet. Brilliant blue pinpoints shone through the blackness that gathered behind her eyes.

Hang on!

Mira cradled her M16 and rolled away from the concrete and slugs.

Show the bastards THIS is women's work too!

Two years into her enlistment Mira had been buried with public affairs assignments — women's work

— until the night she took down bad-ass Master Sergeant Dan Brown who'd been big, bad and disorderly. She single-handedly dropped him in a matter of seconds with her bare hands: no baton, no pepper spray, no sidearm.

Respect came immediately. Some joked about the Xena in their midst. But Mira was no Amazon, just an intensely motivated, highly fit, five-foot-nine redhead. She ran, worked out, fought smart and did her best to keep her generous curves out of the equation.

Shortly after taking down Master Sergeant Brown, company brass attached her to Day's squad. Not a member of the squad. Just attached, tolerated to handle the culturally explosive task of searching Iraqi women.

Day had quickly let her know that, given a choice, he'd certainly have nothing to do with women in the infantry. "Follow my orders to the letter. Try to keep up with us. Don't do stupid things that'll get people killed."

Mira quickly discovered an innate ability to pick up Arabic. That quick fluency connected her with the women she searched. They women confided in her, told her the locations of weapons caches, men, booby-traps. And that they hated al-Sadr and his jihadi perverts.

WHUMP! The shell-shocked structure shuddered. Gold's machine gun banged a comforting tattoo that hammered past the ringing in her ears. TAK! TAK! TAK! TAK! TAK! TAK! "Eat shit and die you fucking assholes!"

Not Gold's voice.

Mira frowned. TAK! TAK! TAK! TAK! The SAW rattled out a hailstorm of 5.56 slugs. From outside came the softer replies from a trio of AKs. "C'mon futhermuckers!" Sergeant Day's voice.

What happened to Gold?

TAK! TAK! TAK! TAK! TAK! TAK! TAK! TAK! The AKs stopped.

"Gotcha! Motherfucking Mahdi assholes." Then the sizzle-roar of incoming RPGs filtered through the dust cloud. WHAM! Next door. WHAM! The floor shook. The next rocket hit the wall one floor down. THUD! A dud clattered off concrete somewhere to her left.

Move! Move!

Stoked by an adrenaline rush that lit her insides, Mira rose to her window. In the alley below, two militiamen with RPGs.

Mira aimed. Squeezed the trigger. The first gunman's head snapped back. She'd gone for the head shot because jihadis often wore body armor the Iranians had given them.

And because I'm that good.

Before the first insurgent hit the ground, Mira took out his buddy.

"Longbow!" Day barked. "Here!"

Mira hustled. One floor below, Charlie team's SAW opened up with a long sustained burst accompanied by the report of a couple of M4s.

But nothing from the point fire team that had gone up to the roof.

And why was a squad leader manning a machine gun?

What happened to Gold? Damn!

Mira hustled through wrecking-ball debris that littered the floor. A gust of 100-degree wind blasted through the battered building and swirled away the dust revealing walls scorched in more shades of black than she had ever seen. One corner of the roof cambered down in a curved slope that might have been graceful but for the tortured rebar along the edges.

To her right, a finger lay on top of a jagged concrete piece the size of a Candie's shoe box. Just a single, disembodied digit, ragged and bloody at one end, pale as concrete dust elsewhere.

Mira checked out her own hands, then scanned the area. Spotted a hand at the end of a bloody kibble trail. She realized why no one had heard from the point fire team.

Damn!

Anger seethed in Mira's belly as she approached Day. To his left lay Adam Gold's catastrophically damaged remains. Private Javier Rivera, the fire team's assistant SAW gunner sat to Day's right, feeding the machine gun's ammo belt. Rivera's sienna skin had bled to a pale yellow; shock glazed his dark eyes. A pulsing thigh wound left him sitting in a shimmering pool of blood

Day fired the last shot in the belt, and opened the feed cover. Rivera fumbled a fresh ammo belt toward the feedtray.

Then collapsed.

Mira took over. Leaned her M16 against the fractured masonry wall, nimbly positioned the first round against the SAW's cartridge stop.

"C Team," Day barked down the stairs. "I need a SAW gunner!"

Day closed the feed cover and racked the bolt to chamber the first round.

Next to him, Rivera struggled to sit. "I … need to … "

"You need to take it easy," Mira said.

Rivera let her press him firmly back. Day fired a short burst.

Rivera could bleed out any time from the leg wound. More AKs opened fire below. Mira used her K-Bar to slash Rivera's pant leg open from thigh to cuff.

She whipped the Quik-Clot packet out of her IFAK, ripped it open and sifted the fine, clay-like powder over River's wounds. Then she strapped on an H compression bandage and pressed hard. She felt the heat as the Quik-Clot went to work.

Charlie Team's assistant machine gunner Mac MacCarthy lunged up the steps and took over the machine gun.

Day surveyed the situation. He looked first at Rivera.

"Nice work."

Then Day looked at her. "That your blood? Or Rivera's?"

Mira followed his gaze. A red splotch soaked the left shoulder of her shirt.

"Must be contagious." She shrugged it off.

Day raised his eyebrows, shook his head. Never thought a woman could joke away a battle wound.

Then he turned to survey the room.

Mira watched his face fall.

"Fuck al-Sadr," he mumbled, turned to face the stairs leading one flight down.

"Grady!" Day's voice cut through the noise of battle. "Medevacs. Now! And air support."

Incoming AK rounds lanced through the air. Day crab-crawled to the remains of the stairs leading to the roof.

"A Team report!" Day yelled up the shaft.

No reply.

With his M16 slung at his back, Day clambered through the ruins with the grace of a rock-climber.

Mira bent over to assist McCarthy on the SAW, but Rivera struggled into position.

"I can do it now," he insisted.

Mira hesitated, nodded, then moved the ammo containers closer to him.

Just then, a metal storm of incoming slugs jack hammered the masonry into dust and shards.

"Oh shit!" McCarthy mumbled, then opened up with the SAW. "Sarge! They're swarming like cockroaches down there!"

Mira grabbed her M16. Down below, the street crawled with insurgents, some with AKs, others with RPGs. Just beyond them, three Toyota pick-ups slewed to a halt and disgorged more jihadis.

McCarthy opened up with tight, accurate bursts, scything at the approaching onslaught.

Mira set her M16 to semi-automatic, sighted in on an insurgent ready to fire his RPG. She pulled the trigger once. The man fell as he pulled the trigger. The RPG's rocket hit another insurgent and blew him into ballistic bits.

For an instant, the extravagant explosion froze nearby insurgents. During that short lull, Mira pulled the trigger three times. Three more insurgents fell.

"Nice shooting," Day shouted behind her.

The surprise in his voice severely pissed her off.

Mira continued to shoot. Insurgents continued to fall. A daughter can learn much from a crack-shot, deer-hunting Dad. Science had proved that women's hand-eye coordination made them better shots than men. Which was why she could outshoot her dad by the time she turned thirteen.

"Time for tea with Allah, mofos!" McCarthy shouted. He walked the machine gun's rounds up the back of the closest pick-up. The slugs blasted past a cache of RPG rounds, shattered the back window then decorated the cab's interior with the fine red and gray debris of the driver's most intimate thoughts.

The SAW's tracers ignited the truck's gas tank.

Mira killed jihadis one after another, so they zeroed in on her. She ducked, lunged. To her left, Day crouched near the base of what had been the stairs. At his feet lay a bloody canvas pack splotched with blood. Next to that lay a rifle she immediately recognized as an M82A1A.

This variant of the Barrett .50 caliber sniper rifle could fire Raufoss Mk 211 armor-piercing, incendiary rounds typically used against vehicles, and to breach walls and other fortifications.

The incoming fire grew more intense. Mira reloaded and turned back to the firefight. Insurgents fanned out, advanced. McCarthy's SAW would chew one of them up and he'd get up again. Hit again, up again.

Wired on amphetamines and every other sort of chemical enhancement, you had to decapitate the bastards or cut them in half before they'd stop.

Or hit between the eyes.

Mira sighted through a crack in the wall, brought her M16 to bear on another RPG carrier. Squeezed the trigger. Dropped him like a sack of pork chops.

Then she did it again. And again.

Half a dozen RPGs zeroed in on her. Mira took out two of them then tucked and rolled away. A moment later other rockets took out the entire wall that had protected her.

"Fucking A!" Day yelled. Debris hailed down. "The hell you learned to shoot like that?"

His voice now conveyed respect.

Before Mira could enjoy his attitude change, the battle schooled her in rule number one: in a war zone, life can go from bad to worse faster than a UN Peacekeeper can throw down his rifle.

The building trembled.

RPGs silenced Charlie Team's machine gun on the floor below.

"Jesus! We're the fucking bait. Look!" Day yelled.

In the distance, maybe 900 yards away, Mira watched a pick-up disgorge three jihadis with shoulder-launched missile tubes.

"Grady!" Day barked. "Warn off air support. Tell 'em an ambush. They got Iglas! SA-18s it looks."

No reply.

"Shit!"

The unmistakable thwack of Apache gunships grew closer. Mira scrambled to the remains of a window.

"Comms!" Day shouted. "Who's got fucking comms?"

The only reply came from McCarthy's SAW still hammering away.

Mira watched the jihadi missile carriers in the distance.

Too far for the M16.

An M16 had an effective range of 550 yards. The missiles — any one of which could bring down an Apache — were almost twice that distance away.

Must try.

Mira braced her M16 on the window sill and sighted in. They were within range of an "area shot" meaning the slug could reach the area but was unlikely to be accurately aimed by the average infantryman.

I am not average.

Day's voice filtered through the distance of her concentration. "Comms? Radio? Anybody with a fucking radio?"

Mira sighted, adjusted for the distance, elevated the muzzle, took the wind into account as the dust swirled around the men. She cleared her mind, willed everything she had through the M16.

I am the weapon.

She took a deep breath, let it almost out.

Took up the slack in the trigger. Felt herself one with the rifle.

Squeezed the trigger.

A quarter of a second later, the missile carrier spun and fell.

Area shot my ass!

The missile tube skidded on the ground. She tracked it.

The missile tube stopped. Another jihadi bent toward it. She shot again. Missed.

"Shit!"

Mira watched the tube spin, hit by her slug. Disabled?

The tube came to a rest. The remaining jihadis scattered for cover behind the corner of a bullet-pocked building.

Now what?

The Apaches grew louder, the ambush more certain. Day threw himself into the debris next to her. In the next instant, he rested the Barrett on the sill. Took a moment to aim. Fired.

His shot wandered wide and obliterated the front end of a Toyota pick-up. The high-explosive Raufoss round stirred up a hailstorm of hot shrapnel that dropped half a dozen nearby jihadis. Not the ones with SAMs.

"Damn," Day mumbled.

Mira glanced at the massive 30-pound rifle.

"Scope's damaged," she said.

Helo thwacks grew louder, gunships nearing the ambush. An Al-Jazeera clip of bringing down two Apaches would make for priceless recruiting propaganda.

"Give it," Mira said.

Day hesitated. Mira watched a quick flash of skepticism in his pale blue eyes.

She wrested the Barrett from his grip. And enjoyed the flash of anger from his eyes.

In one swift motion, Mira wrenched away the damaged scope and wrestled the Barrett into firing position. Using only the standard iron sights on the barrel, Mira fired an armor-piercing, high-explosive round at the building concealing the insurgents. The corner crumbled.

Beyond the shattered wall, one insurgent rolled on the ground, hands covering his face.

"Much better," she said.

Day mumbled an astonished expletive, his tone shot through with admiration.

Another jihadi scrambled to his feet, shouldered the SA-18.

Mira inhaled, exhaled, prayed, squeezed. An instant later, the high-explosive round chummed the man into a fine red mist.

The lead Apache thundered overhead. Instantly, the ugly, bulging, intimidating, beautiful, lethal helicopter began to plow jihadis into the ground with its 30-millimeter chain gun.

The remaining insurgent settled his SAM into firing position.

Apaches were awesome, not invulnerable.

The jihadi stood rock-still, aimed the Russian Igla.

He sighted.

She sighted. Aimed, fired, missed.

Calm. Concentrate.

Mira focused the world away, wrapped herself in the zone. Nothing existed but the Barrett sights and the man with the missile. Just as she squeezed the trigger, an RPG round blew a hole in the wall to the left of her window.

The concussion rocked her. Mira watched the Raufoss round detonate at missile man's feet, peppering him with shrapnel.

Day shouted.

"Oh hellfuckdamnshit!"

Mira turned.

Day slumped to the ground, his right hand clutching at a bright fountain erupting from his armpit.

Down below, the jihadi missile man sank to his knees, struggled back up.

Bastards!

Mira re-aimed. With no conscious thought, she squeezed the trigger.

A single pale instant after the jihadi triggered the missile, Mira's Raufoss round vaporized his midsection.

Smoke and fire erupt from the missile tube.

Her heart sank.

The missile spun drunkenly from the launch tube. It pitched and yawed erratically a meter or so above the ground.

"Move it Longbow! Move! Move!"

A command from behind her.

Mira turned toward the voice. Halfway across the shattered room stood a soldier straight and tall half-obscured by the dust and flying debris. She didn't recognize him, his voice or his unit markings.

What the hell?

A moment ago, there had been only her and Day. Now a third soldier had materialized.

The whine of Apache engines mounted like the end of the world, then blades battered the air with a beat that transcended hearing and thudded in her chest.

She turned, watched the Apaches jink and yaw to avoid the SA-18.

The missile stabilized, climbed just enough to make straight for Mira.

At that instant, she felt a shove.

And words that came clearly to her ears despite the din beyond.

"I said move!"

She looked back. The unknown soldier again.

But even with his face just inches from hers now, she saw the unknown soldier's features no clearer than before.

He shoved her again. Hard.

Mira fell face first on top of Day.

The missile exploded.

NEXT POST: A KANGAROO COURT MARTIAL ALTERS THE TRAJECTORY OF LONGBOW'S LIFE

Stop The Global Horror Of Child Brides

One of Die By Wire's most horrifying and heart-breaking NON-fictional threads is the issue of young girls — some as young as nine or ten years old– who become virtual sex slaves to men often in their 40s to mid 50s.

Not only do these girls have their lives ruined by brutal and sustained sexual molestation, but they frequently die in childbirth because their birth canals and hips have not matured sufficiently.

And the girls who die are the lucky ones.

I've just started a new blog — Stop Child Brides — to bring attention to the issue of child brides and international child abuse.

 

GLOBAL PROBLEM RECOGNIZED BY THE UN, OTHER INTERNATIONAL GROUPS

I conducted extensive research on the subject before writing Die By Wire and found that the United Nations along with a growing number of international organizations and activist groups are struggling to stop the practice.

Sadly, they are meeting with scant success. This is because this form of brutal pedophilia is culturally, ideologically or religiously sanctioned in the countries where it it most widely practiced.

In Afghanistan, for example, a law is on the books outlawing the practice. In reality it is not enforced. Women are meat, property to be disposed of as men see fit. Girls have an even lower, sub-human status.

Further, the misguided concept of "cultural equivalence" in Europe has resulted in authorities turning a blind eye toward the practice among immigrant communities from Turkey, Morocco, Pakistan, Somalia, Yemen and similar countries.

The Western media are guilty of accepting the cultural equivalence argument and have neglected to cover the issue. The fact that "child bride" is a phrase that does not convey the actual horror keeps the issue from seeming important. It seems like an antiquated, backward, undesirable but only remotely unpleasant cultural artifact along with arranged marriages and dowries (both of which often have their own unacceptable consequences.)

Instead, the world must recognize "child bride" as a synonym for sexual slavery, institutional pedophilia, female child abuse, physical battering and horrible medical consequences often ending in slow, agonizing death.

WHY IS IT LUCKY TO DIE?

Those young girls that do survive childbirth are beaten, sometimes to death, abused and often killed when they try to escape.

And even as unfortunate as those girls are, they're luckier than the girls who suffer from fistulas  caused by difficult and near-fatal childbirth.

Fistulas are caused by horrific tissue damage that leaves openings through which urine and feces can leak through the vagina. The damage can usually be surgically corrected. Unfortunately, needed medical care is usually lacking in tribal villages or in European immigrant communities where the girls cannot be taken to state clinics and hospitals because they are illegal.

WHAT CAN FICTION DO?

The men responsible for perpetuating the horror of child brides escape punishment in real life.

That's why I sent guardian sniper Mira Longbow to Amsterdam.

I hope that my fiction can bring awareness  — and action — in the real world. Otherwise,  justice remains only imaginary.

In Die By Wire, guardian sniper Mira Longbow is in Amsterdam to take out the head of a human smuggling ring that sells young girls as child brides to the highest bidders. Her mission in fiction is what eludes international authorities in real-life: to stop the monsters behind the practice and bring them to justice.

NEW BLOG DEVOTED TO CHILD BRIDES AND INTERNATIONAL CHILD ABUSE

Stop Child Brides is a new site so the content is sparse as I work to write more. I'm also open to outside contributors. If you're interested, please contact me at lperdue@ideaworx.com.

PubWeekly "Clarification" On ABA Boycott of Amazon: Anti-Trust Concern Is Reason For Deleting Comments

Yesterday, Publisher's Weekly issued a clarification that looks designed to get the American Booksellers off the anti-trust hook with their much-discussed (Indie Booksellers Tell Indie Authors To Go To Hell) Amazon book boycott (ABA's IndieCommerce Site Dropping Amazon Publishing Titles) .

It also appears to show why PW deleted numerous comments on the subject.

The PW Clarification said the site had changed the original article, "at the request of IndieCommerce director Matt Supko, who said that the policy change was made by IndieCommerce personnel. Because the ABA is a nonprofit, it can't tell its members to carry or not carry a book or books."

This is certainly a positioning to get ABA off the anti-trust hook.

It's clear from the statement why Publisher's Weekly deleted all the original comments on the article, especially those dealing with ABA's anti-trust position.

ABA HAS RESPONSIBILITY FOR ALL PARTS OF ITS ORGANIZATION

But no matter how willing Supko is willing to fall on his sword for the ABA, the legal and practical effects of his statement don't hold water.

The ABA is a non-profit, its board (elected by members) has responsibility for the organization's actions. That responsibility cannot be denied even for a subsidiary since that, ultimately, reports to ABA.

Thus: ABA members delegate organizational responsibility to -> ABA Board, responsible for -> ABA policy and actions which has responsibility for setting direction for ->IndieCommerce.

Even beyond direct boardroom resolutions, the ABA board in both formal and informal communication with its employees and subsidiaries sets the tone for their actions and statements and must accept the responsibility for them.

INDIECOMMERCE STATEMENT SHOWS AMAZON-LIKE RESTRAINT OF TRADE

The IndieCommerce statement on this seems to try and avoid responsibility for restraint of trade with this paragraph in their Feb. 9 announcement of the Amazon boycott:

"All retailers using the IndieCommerce platform are free to stock any published books from any publisher in their stores and/or to fulfill any customer orders through another source. This policy change in no way affects that ability. Bookstores using IndieCommerce have the option of adding any title to their individual store's online database and/or fulfilling orders through other means."

While this seems even-handed on the surface, what it means is that each book store will be required to manually input each and every banned Amazon book into its database. Given

the short staffing at many indie bookstores,
the fact that most indie booksellers are more into books than computers, and
the huge numbers of new books available from Amazon

This amounts to a total boycott of Amazon and its indie authors.

The ban will not affect Amazon in any substantial way. It will, however, negatively impact the ability of indie authors to make a living. And like it or not, each author is a small business.

Thus, the IndieCommerce decision does what the ABA accuses Amazon of doing: it raises barriers designed to restrict intra- and interstate commerce.

 

 

 

Something Constructive for ABA To Ponder

This post began as a comment I made here: ABA's IndieCommerce Site Dropping Amazon Publishing Titles. And that comment ultimately came from this post: Indie Booksellers Tell Indie Authors To Go To Hell

ABA should compete rather than whine and obstruct.

Competing means having a new idea, one that uses existing expertise and resources in an effective and creative way. And you have to start somewhere. So, here's one way that ABA could start to compete with Amazon.

First of all, indie book stores need to look at what sells … and stock what people want to read … and not what they THINK people OUGHT to read.

Second, with that mindset, they should mine their local indie authors and readers. Sponsor a contest among readers about their favorite indie authors. Then use loyal customers and/or bookstore personnel to read those books with an eye toward discovering good reads that other ABA members would like and which are likely to sell in their stores.

Third, ABA as an organization can (if they would prefer not to work with Createspace) sign up a high-quality print-on-demand vendor to publish the hard copy of the book. Pay the author the same (or better) percentages of the cover price as Createspace. Allow the author similar choices as CS on pricing, cover etc. Make the author work just as hard on promotion and other items as they do for CS.

Make sure the ABA system can accept the same digital file uploaded to CS. If new covers or an outside editor are necessary, then provide those, and give the author the choice of paying up front or out of royalties (with a "bump" up for the delayed payments) There are other details, but you get the point.

ABA can then ink its own deals with Ingram and B&T to distribute the books and then promote the books widely. Make sure the bookstores that nominate successful books get a royalty on top of their retail margins.

Do not make this an exclusive club. In order to compete with Amazon/Createspace, many books should be available, otherwise your author base and its enthusiasm for the service will never take off.

ABA can then try and urge B&N and other online book stores to get creative and competitive in their own thinking. Right now, authors who make their books available in all formats (like I do) find that Kindle outsells Nook and every other reader better than 50-to-1. Until that changes, Amazon will continue to dominate a market.

There are many other ways that ABA, B&N and others can compete. But they must be creative and must execute well. Booksense was not a good execution and IndieBound is an awkward child that assures customers will continue to click over to Amazon.

The book industry is never going to return to the old days. And those who continue to cling to that will continue to have their lunch eaten by Amazon … or whatever new company is out there right now gearing up to take on the giant of Seattle.

Indie Booksellers Tell Indie Authors To Go To Hell

Yesterday, I mentioned one of the dumbest things in the world of books: Hey Barnes & Noble: Stop Bitchin' and Start Competing!

But today comes an even dumber Amazon-bashing: ABA Says 'No' to Amazon Publishing

QUIZ! Find the disconnect here:

Ebooks and Amazon have hurt book stores, especially independents.
Amazon has helped authors, especially independents.
Amazon develops a program so book stores (especially independents) can profit from Amazon books.
Independent book stores refuse to deal with Amazon, thereby screwing themselves and independent writers … all the while having no effect at all on Amazon.

This is especially significant when it comes from Amazon's Createspace service that offers print-on-demand, dead-tree books. Die By Wire is available in both Createspace and Kindle versions. And a few weeks ago I ordered a number of them to take into my favorite independent book store to see if they  wanted to sell them.

Then, Amazon announced that it would be making Createspace books available through standard hard-copy book distributors like Ingram. So, I thought, I'll wait because now I can get distributed and sold into physical stores without having to call on them one by one.

But, not-so-fast! Everyone is trying to pile on Amazon … and totally missing the target. Indie authors are the only ones getting hurt. And that just strengthens my ties to Amazon.

There was a time when independent book stores could count on authors to stand up for them, to support local book sellers and to help neighborhood stores.

It goes both ways, folks.

All of you are looking more and more like the evil behemoth you think Amazon is.

All  of you have acted like an illegal cartel, breaking the laws against restraint of trade and unfair competition … not against Amazon, but against me and my indie colleagues.

You have all conspired to take a shot at how I — and thousands of other indie writers make a living. And that runs afoul of anti-trust legislation. Think about it.

 

Hey Barnes & Noble: Stop Bitchin' and Start Competing!

I got an email from a friend this morning:

On 2/8/2012 9:47 AM, Eric  wrote:

Good morning, Lew.I just got a Nook Tablet and tried to purchase Die By Wire.What's up and when will I be able to get it?

Eric

Dear Eric:

Attached is a free ePub of Die By Wire.

Sorry you can't get it on Barnes & Noble right now because Die By Wire is in Amazon's "select" program which offers financial incentives and promotional opportunities to Kindle authors … but requires that the book be available for the Kindle only.

I enrolled Die By Wire in the program because more than 99% of all my book sales come from Amazon Kindle. I sell thousands of books through Kindle and only one or two here and there with B&N.

I'd love to do promos with Barnes & Noble, but they have totally nothing at all when it comes to working with ebook authors. B&N bitches and moans and groans and rages against Amazon, but has yet actually to compete.

Competition! A concept that has escaped B&N and way too many other non-Amazon companies.

Anyway, please enjoy the free epub version of Die By Wire. Hope you enjoy it!

My other books are available in epub and other formats on B&N, iStore and, most handily here: https://www.smashwords.com/books/search?query=lewis+perdue&adult=on

It would be nice if B&N and the other chains and retailers would get their heads out of a very dark and anatomically southern place and realize that they could compete with Amazon by offering incentives and tools to promote books. Instead, they come up with Dog-In-TheManger crap like this:

Books-a-Million & Indigo Bookstores Will Not Stock Books Published by Amazon
Barnes & Noble Stores Will Not Stock Books Published By Amazon

So, they think they are striking back at the mighty AMZN … well, what they"re doing is striking back at ordinary authors and small publishers and not the Seattle behemoth. Smooth move, Ferguson.

In addition to being an anti-trust, restrain of trade action that deserves a class-action lawsuit, all this does is deprive B&N's customers of books and enrage the very authors they might want on their side if they ever decide to compete instead of just whining.

Lew

Airbus A380 Inspections: Wings or Die By Wire Computers?

Airbus to inspect all A380 superjumbos for wing cracks

"Aircraft maker Airbus has been ordered to check all A380 superjumbo planes currently in service after cracks were found in wing components. The European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) has ordered all 68 Airbus A380 superjumbo planes currently in operation to be checked."

Some chatter on the web suggests that the wing cracks are a cover to being aircraft in to have fly-by-wire computer problems looked into.

This is the second Airbus inspection alert for a possibly bogus reason since Die By Wire was published. Are they taking this seriously?