Hot Blood by Stephen Leather Page A

pack, for the shoulders and the sides of the ribcage, but it added an extra five pounds in weight and limited the movement of his arms so he’d turned it down. It was all very well looking like Robocop, Manwaring figured, but it was no good if he couldn’t use his weapon effectively. Several of the guys in his unit had discarded the heavy body armour to save even more weight but Manwaring had heard too many stories about snipers for that.
    He and three members of his unit were on foot patrol, and their armoured Humvee rolled about fifty feet ahead of them. The top brass had decided that more troops should be out and about, mixing with the locals, winning hearts and minds. Manwaring considered it a waste of time: there was no way he could laugh with the locals when he was dressed in full combat gear and carrying a weapon that could kill a couple of dozen with one burst. All the chewing-gum in the world wasn’t going to change the view of ordinary Iraqis that the Americans were an occupying power. They just wanted their country back.
    A group of children in threadbare shirts and shorts ran over, their bare feet kicking up dust. ‘Hey, dudes!’ shouted one. He couldn’t have been more than seven. ‘High five!’ He held up his hand.
    Manwaring grinned. He held the AA12 against his chest and raised his right hand. The boy had to jump to reach it. ‘What’s your name?’ asked Manwaring, and took a swig from his water bottle.
    ‘Chiko!’ shouted the little boy.
    ‘Chiko? That’s a Mexican name, isn’t it? Are you Mexican?’
    ‘Chiko!’ yelled the little boy. ‘Chiko! High five!’
    Manwaring gave the boy a second high five, then called to the other guys in his unit, ‘Anyone got some gum?’
    ‘You getting soft in your old age, Rob?’ said the guy to Manwaring’s right. Ben Casey was a ten-year veteran: he had served in Afghanistan three times and was on his second tour in Iraq. Casey pulled an open pack from one of his vest pockets and tossed it to Manwaring, who fumbled with his gun.
    ‘Butterfingers!’ shouted Casey, as the gum bounced off Manwaring’s helmet. The sticks tumbled out of the pack and landed on the ground. The children yelled and scrambled for them.
    One of the older boys pushed Chiko aside and the little boy fell, scraping his knees. He rolled on to his back, sobbing.
    ‘Hey!’ shouted Manwaring. ‘Be careful!’ He bent down and reached for the child’s arm.
    As the body armour rode up to his waist, the Sniper’s bullet smacked into the base of his spine and ripped through his gut. Manwaring fell forward, on top of the now screaming boy, blood pooling around them. The AA12 fell from his grasp and clattered on to the road.
    The Sniper smiled as he watched the Americans run for cover. ‘ Allahu Akbar ,’ he whispered. God is great. The man’s name was Salam, but he no longer answered to that name. He was Qannaas, the Sniper. He had killed two hundred and thirty-seven Americans in less than three years, every one with a single bullet.
    The man next to him also smiled. ‘ Allahu Akbar ,’ he echoed. He was the Spotter. He had been with the Sniper for two years. Before that there had been another, but he had been shot by the Americans when the car he was in hadn’t slowed for a roadblock on the outskirts of Baghdad. In a perfect world the Sniper would have chosen to work alone. But the world wasn’t perfect and a sniper always needed a spotter. A sniper could be so focused on his target that he would no longer be aware of what was going on around him. And while the Sniper was concentrating, the Spotter could keep an eye on the wind. A palm frond swaying, a flag fluttering, a column of smoke dissipating gave clues to the direction and strength of the wind. The Spotter would whisper his estimation of its characteristics and the Sniper would adjust his aim accordingly. A good spotter meant the difference between a good shot and a perfect shot, and so far all two hundred and