One Killer Force: A Delta Force Novel (43 page)

“Looking for the Yesong River corridor,” Weeks transmitted. “We’re a chip shot at this speed.”

Kolt knew Weeks was right. Overweight, practically limping home, they were sitting ducks for even the most unskilled North Korean marksmen, but Kolt wasn’t keen on the over-water route.

Kolt thought back to the
Queen Mary II
again, wishing now his men had the horse collars that inflate automatically in four inches of water. Or, truth be told, that there was at least one for the squadron commander.

He knew they had too much kit on to swim, and nobody had a wet suit with built-in buoyancy hidden under their Crye Precision fatigues. No, the safety precautions they enjoyed flying over the Atlantic weren’t available in North Korea and, at the moment, Kolt was willing to take his chances on a land-based crash landing rather than another dip in the drink.

Facing sideways on the pod, Kolt turned around to check on Seamstress and Gangster. Both were sitting shoulder to shoulder, backs against the rear of the cabin. Closest to Kolt was an odd sight, a mostly naked man with a dark-earth helmet and a heavy, oversize black assault vest like a man on a street corner wearing a two-sided advertisement. Next to Seamstress, on the opposite side and still under his Peltors, Gangster appeared calm, his head leaning back on the flat-black aluminum, padded by his thick hair. Gangster held his HK416 on his lap with both hands. Kolt looked back at Seamstress, quickly inventorying the radio, three pouched thirty-round magazines, a frag grenade, and Gangster’s Glock holstered on the chest area just below a small embroidered subdued American flag.

Up ahead, Kolt could easily make out the western edge of North Korea terrain, and in spots, revealed between the scorched-earth-looking rolling hills, could see the reflection off the glass-smooth Yesong River. Subconsciously, Kolt allowed himself to relax a little, blowing off his water demons and focusing on reaching the JOC and dropping off the precious cargo to competent authority. He wiped his nose again, happy to have cleaned his system of the last trace of CS and, for the first time in the last two hours, consciously released the straitjacket-like tension that had gripped him. He wondered about his wounded men on the other Little Birds and if they had returned to base yet. He thought of Slapshot and Digger, both wounded but alive, and how proud he was of their unvarnished courage. Kolt knew he’d get an earful from them at the hotwash. It definitely wouldn’t be the first time, but his skin was as thick as an elephant’s.

The vibration in Kolt’s right cargo pocket yanked him back to the present.

Hawk?

He pulled out his cell phone, careful not to drop it to the turf below, and held his off hand over the screen to locate the green Answer button.

“We’re en route,” Kolt said, correctly assuming it was Cindy Bird on the other end again. “How are you feeling?”

“Listen, Kolt, Seamstress is suicidal,” Hawk said. “Where is he?”

“Chill, he’s in our helo, right behind me, packaged and napping.”

“No, Kolt, we finished translating the letter. He is genuinely ashamed of betraying his country and family. He knows he is going to be fed to the dogs,” Hawk said.

“We’re good, Hawk,” Kolt said. “About twenty mikes out.” Before Hawk could answer, Kolt remembered the Glock and the frag grenade still on the vest now draped over Seamstress. Kolt turned quickly in panic, drilled down immediately to the vest to locate both tools of death that, if Hawk was right, Seamstress could use if he truly wanted to off himself.

Seamstress appeared calm, his head turned toward Slapshot and Digger, staring blankly out the starboard side of the helo.

“Just be careful, Kolt,” Hawk said.

“Yes, Mother.”

“Bingo, Bingo, Bingo!” Weeks reported.

Shit!

Kolt tensed and shoved the cell back in his cargo pocket, knowing their Little Bird was now flying on fumes, and wondered where pilot Chief Weeks’s head was at.

“We need to put her down?” Kolt asked over helo common. For Kolt, he’d rather set her down and wait on gas or hump it across the DMZ to the safety of South Korea. Ten times out of ten, it beat another water landing.

“Not yet,” Weeks answered after a short pause. “I’ll know when it’s time. Still RTB.”

Kolt didn’t like the answer, not one bit, but he understood the pecking order. On target, on the ground, it was the Kolt Raynor show. In the air, inside a heavier-than-specs Night Stalker Little Bird struggling to reach a safe area, it was the pilot in command’s show.

Kolt resisted the urge to look down at the water as Weeks maneuvered into the current like he was easing a hot rod off an on-ramp into rush-hour traffic. The air was different above the brackish river, moist and laced with the sulky odor of fish and salt.

Single-ship formation Breaker Four-One tooled along at roughly one hundred feet above the water level and holding to a tight 120 knots max air speed. Kolt looked at his communicator, JoJo. He was relaxed and focused on the coast buzzing by below them, certainly looking to spot trouble before a Red Guard paramilitary dished it out.

Be careful, Kolt.

Kolt thought again about Hawk’s last words, half grinning like the Cheshire Cat. Besides the fuel problem, he was confident their shit was tight.

Suddenly, Kolt felt pressure on his left shoulder. For a moment, he assumed it was JoJo trying to get his attention and turned around. As soon as he did, a blur of color flew past him, with something semi-soft slapping him in his face.

Momentarily stunned, Kolt shook off the surprise impact, and leaned over to catch a glimpse of what had just fallen from the helo.

Holy shit!

The weight of Gangster’s helmet and vest driving his naked and frail body to the dark blue waters below, Seamstress had jumped! As the North Korean impacted the surface like a man who no longer cared, Kolt realized Hawk was right. Seamstress had lost his marbles and was suicidal indeed.

Kolt watched Seamstress go subsurface, the impact jarring Gangster’s helmet off, and reached for his push-to-talk.

“Stew, turn around,” Kolt transmitted. “The PC jumped ship!”

“Roger,” Weeks said, “we’re pushing it, though.”

Kolt knew Weeks had to be staring at the fuel gauge needle, likely pegged all the way to the left.

Damn it!

Kolt felt Gangster’s presence behind him and to his left as Weeks banked a hard 180. Along with JoJo, the three were straining to get a look at the spot where Seamstress had gone in.

Kolt wanted to get on the radio and give Gangster shit for letting the precious cargo bail out. As the ground force commander, Kolt was responsible for Seamstress, but he’d figured he could count on Gangster to at least keep the guy from shooting himself with the Glock or swan diving from the Little Bird.

“Here’s good,” Kolt transmitted. “He went in directly below.”

Kolt felt Weeks slow to a steady hover, then wobble more than usual, likely due to the weight of the load and the last drops of fuel running through the Rolls-Royce.

“I don’t see him,” JoJo said.

Kolt didn’t respond, just kept looking at the river below, trying to determine the current and if the floating helmet was a good indication of exactly where Seamstress might be.

What Kolt saw next freaked him out.

Launching off the pod as if he was on a cliff-jumping vacation in Curaçao while Weeks fought the aircraft’s wobble, Gangster’s kitless body, light and athletic, arced upward toward the deadly spinning main rotor blades. Instantly, a red mist of blood and brains impacted Kolt’s face, covering the clear lenses of his safety goggles and speckling his face.

Gangster!

Kolt frantically wiped the crimson-colored blood spatter from his lenses, smearing them enough to just watch the ball of Multicam fall free to the river below, impacting only a few feet from the still-floating helmet. Fighting the shock of what just happened, Kolt clung to the Little Bird pod as if he was afraid of being pulled into the river next. That, he knew, wasn’t going to happen. Subconsciously, Kolt reached over to grab JoJo, the way a father reaches over to the passenger seat to protect a child when he has to suddenly slam on the brakes.

Kolt struggled to process the data points of the problem before him. In less than a minute, both Seamstress and Gangster had left the cabin of the helo, and neither appeared to be okay. Gangster was floating facedown but Kolt couldn’t be sure if he was dead, just unconscious, or what. And the reason they had come to North Korea—the first American troops, armed to the teeth, to set foot inside the isolated nation in sixty years—was nowhere to be seen.

A hard-won mission, one that cost Delta numerous wounded and the sacrifice of several high-tech helicopters, and potentially threatened a third world war, had vanished.

Kolt felt the helo steady out, certainly due to jettisoning two bodies from the cabin, as he studied the water below. Kolt ran the options as Weeks descended a little toward the water. Slapshot and Digger were both wounded; neither of them would survive a jump to help Gangster. Kolt turned to JoJo, the youngest of the Delta guys on Breaker Four-One. JoJo had a family, two kids not yet in grade school. Seamstress was just another mission, not someone to sacrifice your life for. It wasn’t personal like September 11th was. That had worn off the day we stepped on Iraqi soil back in 2003. And now, just like with chasing Saddam, it was just business.

Kolt realized Slapshot might have been right, back on the porch of the Notri. Maybe Kolt did have a death wish. Maybe he had always wanted to go down in a blaze of glory, assaulting an enemy bunker and trenchline singlehandedly, all Audie Murphy–like. He realized the only thing holding him back now was that debilitating fear of the water he had psychologically battled since he had drowned in the spent-fuel pool back at Yellow Creek Nuclear Power Plant.

C’mon, Kolt, deal with it!

Kolt looked back down to the water, saw Gangster still floating, then back to JoJo. They both locked eyes, sending unspoken signals that neither could understand. Kolt knew JoJo wasn’t expected to follow the circus act into the river, and he also figured JoJo wouldn’t expect his new squadron commander to take a dip either.

Fuck it!

Kolt yanked his HK416 rifle over his head and shoved it into the cabin. He pulled his Peltors off and unhooked the coiled cable to clear them from his vest before laying the headset near his rifle. Pulling the quick-release tabs to his assault vest, he controlled both the chest and back pieces as they separated, pushing them both into the cabin.

JoJo grabbed Kolt’s fatigue sleeve. The grip was hard, telling Kolt his partner on the pod thought what he was doing was stupid.

“Boss, don’t, man!” JoJo yelled, barely heard over the buzzing blades above them.

Kolt looked at JoJo, grabbed his communicator’s gloved hand, and lifted it from his arm.

“I’m good!”

Kolt pushed off the black aluminum pod and, from about sixty feet, dropped feet-first with his arms spread out to the sides to limit the distance he would sink on impact. He hit like a sack of wet shit on concrete. A vicious jolt ran up the length of his body as half a gallon of water shot up his nose. He surfaced a few seconds later, gasping for air. He immediately looked for Gangster, figuring Seamstress was gone. He needed to get Gangster the life-saving attention he needed or, barring that, recover his body so that he wasn’t left behind in enemy territory.

As he swam toward his Delta mate, something bumped Kolt from below.

Shark!

Kolt flailed at the air, trying to climb out of the river on an invisible staircase before he realized he was panicking. As he calmed down he realized it must be Seamstress.

Kolt dove to investigate, feeling left, then right, and then spreading his hands out to increase his chances. Kolt felt skin and rolled his hand over a bony forearm, dragging his grip up to a hand that seemed larger than life. With both hands, Kolt pulled on the arm, trying to prevent the current from pulling Seamstress deeper.

Kolt made some headway, and after a few seconds, was able to pop Seamstress’s head out of the water. The man looked like a train wreck, almost certainly dead by now.

Holding Seamstress from behind, arm over the right shoulder and grasping the left side of his chest, Kolt reached around with his left hand and felt for the quick releases to Gangster’s vest. They weren’t easy to find by feel, and Kolt could only find one. He yanked it, pulling the flexible cotter pin from its housing, separating the left side of the vest. Kolt fumbled with the vest, eventually pushing it off Seamstress’s body and letting it float away.

Kolt looked downstream, surprised to see he was still close to Gangster. He had a better view of his mate’s head now, the top of which was missing several inches at least, sliced clean off, and swathes of his long brown hair matted to the edge of the scalped wound and floating in the water.

Kolt dragged Seamstress toward Gangster, pulling long strokes with his left arm while scissor-kicking below the surface. Kolt struggled to stay above water, knowing his natural buoyancy wouldn’t be enough to keep all three of them above the surface. Kolt reached his right ankle first, and a few seconds later reached his head. Kolt worked to turn Gangster over, checked for a pulse. Nothing.

Something hit the water a few feet away. It was a black life vest, obviously thrown from the helo hovering above him, the rotor wash sending giant concentric ripples of water. Kolt reached long for the vest, retrieving it with two fingers, just as a second vest hit the water inches from him.

With one hand, Kolt shoved one of the vests underneath Gangster’s chest, then simply held the second one under his left armpit. For the moment, they were able to stay afloat, giving Kolt a spell of relief.

With Gangster’s fate decided, Kolt rolled Seamstress’s head back a few inches. He placed two fingers on his neck, feeling for a pulse. With the downward beating of the rotors, Kolt couldn’t be sure if he felt a pulse or not. If there was one, it was faint and weak.