Retribution (25 page)

T
HE
H
ARBIN
Z-5 H
OUND WAS A
C
HINESE VERSION OF THE
Russian Mil Mi-4, a 1950s-era transport that typically carried fourteen troops and three crew members. Though the Chinese versions were improved somewhat, the basic design remained the same, a thick, two-deck fuselage beneath a massive rotor and a long, slim tail. The aircraft were pulling 113 knots, close to their top speed, flying twenty feet over the landscape.

They were easy prey for the Flighthawks. Starship kept the two U/MFs in a trail and took control of the first aircraft, flying a head-on attack against the lead helicopter. On his first pass he raked the cockpit and the engine compartment immediately behind it with 20mm cannon fire, decapitating the aircraft. There was no need for a second pass.

The other chopper tried to get away by twisting to the west, through a mountain pass. But the pilot miscalculated in the dark. By the time Starship turned
Hawk One
in its direction, the aircraft was burning on the side of the mountain, its rotors sheered off by a collision with the side wall of the canyon.

“Choppers are down,” Starship told Colonel Bastian. “I need to refuel.”

“Roger that,” said Dog.

Dreamland Command
1100

T
O
S
AMSON’S GREAT DISAPPOINTMENT,
R
AY
R
UBEO HAD
left Dreamland Command to supervise some tests in another part of the complex.

Samson didn’t intend to fire him—not yet, anyway. Given the administration’s interest in the missile recovery operation, there was no sense doing anything that might possibly derail it.

Or give critics something to focus on if the mission failed.

But he did want to put Rubeo in his place. And he would, he promised himself, as soon as possible.

“I’m not here to interfere,” Samson told Major Catsman. “I want you all to proceed as you were. But let’s be clear on this—I am the commander of this base, and of this mission. The Whiplash order is issued in my name. Understood?”

“Yes, sir.”

Samson detected a note of dissension in Catsman’s voice, but let it slide. A bit of resistance in a command could be a good thing, as long as it was controllable.

“Update me on the process, please. Where specifically are our people? How many missiles have yet to be recovered? All of the details. Then I want to speak with Colonel Bastian, and finally Admiral Woods.”

“There is a bit of a time difference between Dreamland and the area they’re operating in,” said Catsman.

“I’m sure Colonel Bastian won’t mind being woken to brief me.”

“It wasn’t him I was thinking of, sir. Colonel Bastian is already awake, and on a mission. Admiral Woods, on the other hand…”

Samson smiled. He had tangled with Woods several times while deputy commander of the Eighth Air Force, and owed him a tweaking or two.

“Tex Woods and I go way back,” Samson told Catsman.

“Disturbing his sleep would be one of life’s little pleasures.”

Catsman gave him a tally of the warheads that had been recovered and a rundown on the overall situation; her briefing was, in fact, extremely thorough. And when she turned to tell a civilian at a console to make the connection to Bastian, the colonel came on almost instantaneously, his half-shaven face filling the main screen.

“General, I need to update you on a serious situation,” said the colonel from the cockpit of his Megafortress.

“Very good, Colonel. Fire away,” said Samson, noting the serious and, he thought, slightly subservient tone. Bastian was getting the message.

“We’ve engaged Chinese fighters,” Dog told him.

Samson felt his jaw lock as Colonel Bastian continued, explaining everything that had happened. The engagement surely was necessary—the alternative was to be shot down—but as Colonel Bastian freely admitted, it went against the standing orders not to engage the Chinese.

And then Bastian told him about the incident at the Pakistani farmhouse.

“Jesus, Bastian! What are your people trying to do?” bellowed the general. “Do you know how that’s going to look? Can you imagine when the media gets hold of this? My God!”

Dog explained that they had video of the incident that would back them up. Samson felt as if a sinkhole had opened beneath his feet.

“Admiral Woods knows about the incident,” Dog added. “He’s ordered our men back to Base Camp One. But I needed one to help check the lake where the warhead is.”

At least it’s not just my orders he disregards, Samson thought.

“That’s our situation,” said Dog. “Things are a little busy here, General. If you don’t mind I’m going to get back to work.”

“Yes,” said Samson, not sure what else to say.

“Admiral Woods for you, General,” said Catsman as the
screen changed back to a large-scale situation map. “He’s a little piqued at being woken. I told him you wanted to give him an important update.”

“I might as well talk to him now,” said Samson sarcastically. “While he’s in a good mood.”

Aboard Dreamland
Bennett,
over Pakistan
2357

S
TARSHIP TOOK TWO QUICK PASSES OVER THE GROUP AT
the lake to get an idea of how many men were there and what other surprises they might have.

There were nine. He could see Kalashnikovs and one grenade launcher, but no more Stinger missiles. Two or three pack animals—from the air they looked like camels, though the pilot suspected they were donkeys—were tied together a short distance away.

Starship pushed the Flighthawk closer to the earth as he widened his orbit, trying to find supporting units that might be hiding in the jagged rocks nearby. There were no roads that he could see, and if there was a warm body in the neighborhood, the infrared scan couldn’t find it.

The mountains were as desolate as anyplace on earth, emptier even than the desert where most of the warheads had landed. The nearest village looked to be a collection of hovels pushed against a ravine about five miles to the east. A road twisted about a mile below the settlement; Starship spotted two paths connecting them but found no one on them.

“Should I take these guys out, Colonel, or what?”

“Let’s wait until the Osprey is a little closer,” Dog told him. “They may pull the warhead from the lake and save us some work.”

“Roger that.”

D
OG DECIDED IT WAS PRUDENT TO KEEP THE
B
ENNETT
WELL
above the ground, establishing an orbit around the area at 40,000 feet, high enough that the black Megafortress could neither be seen nor heard from the ground. With the Osprey still about an hour away, he had the two radar operators take short breaks, sending Sullivan back to monitor their equipment while they got some coffee and relaxed for a few minutes. It wasn’t much of a break, but it relieved the monotony a bit and let them know he was thinking of them. They were warming to him slightly, but he still wouldn’t have gotten many votes for commander of the month.

The Dreamland Command channel buzzed with an incoming message from General Samson.

“Colonel Bastian, good morning again.”

“It’s just about midnight here, General.”

“Woods is not particularly pleased, but I think he’ll accept the fact that you had no choice but to shoot down the Chinese. What the hell are they up to?”

“I’m not sure. I haven’t spoken to Jed Barclay about it. He may have an opinion.”

“Jed Barclay?”

Dog explained who Jed Barclay was and how he liaisoned with the different agencies involved in operations.

“Well, I’ll see what he knows,” said Samson.

“There’s one other thing,” said Dog, sensing that Samson was about to sign off.

“Well?”

“We still have two crewmen missing. The Navy has been doing the search but—”

“Where are they missing?”

“The mid-Indian coast. I’d like to supplement that. I’d like to dedicate one of our radar surveillance planes full-time to the mission.”

“Recovering the warheads takes precedence. The President wants that done. That’s where your efforts have to be concentrated.”

“They’re our people, sir. No offense meant to the Navy.”

Samson frowned. “I’ll talk to Woods. We’ll get a better effort out of them.”

“I don’t mean that they’re doing a bad job,” said Dog. “Just that we can help them do a better one.”

“I told you I’ll take care of it,” said Samson. “Keep me updated.”

The screen blanked.

“Nice to talk to you too,” said Dog.

Aboard Marine Osprey
Angry Bear One,
over western Pakistan
0130, 18 January 1998

J
ENNIFER
G
LEASON BALANCED THE LAPTOP BETWEEN HER
legs, squinting at the close-set type as she continued her doctorate-level briefing in rocket science.

Or more specifically, rocket-guidance electronics, and how they interacted with T waves.

While the T-Rays had fried most of the missile’s circuitry, one of the solenoid valves and two electronic level sensors—parts used in the rocket motor itself—had apparently escaped damage. The experts at Dreamland theorized that something had inadvertently shielded these pieces. Jennifer hadn’t spotted any sign of deliberate shielding, she could not see a difference between the unaffected solenoid valve and another unit that had failed.

The first reaction at Dreamland was that she must have missed something, and they forwarded her reams of technical data. Having now read six different papers explaining how the systems worked, she had enough background to be as confused as the experts.

One of the T-Ray experts believed that whatever had shielded the parts simply vaporized during the crash. This seemed plausible, especially if what shielded the components had actually been part of something else, such as a temperature monitor for one of the fuel tanks. The shields used by
the Megafortresses were not thick pieces of lead or other heavy metal, but a thin mesh of wires that ran current when the T-Rays hit. The shields were “tuned” to catch the radiation in the way a sound-canceling machine “caught” or neutralized sound; the shield’s trough effectively neutralized the T-Ray’s mountain peak. A thin-wire temperature sensor, or perhaps a radio antenna, might have accidentally provided a partial shield.

Jennifer thought it more likely that there wasn’t enough information about how the T-Rays worked, and that they were interacting with something else. If this were the case, it could take years before the problem was actually solved. In any event, she had to gather as much data as possible.

The Osprey jerked as it hit a bit of turbulence, and the Marine sitting next to her brushed against her. Jennifer shot him a glance. His eyes were fixed on the mesh deck between his combat boots. He looked young, nineteen or twenty at most, and very tired.

None of the men aboard the aircraft—she was the only woman—had slept much in the last forty-eight or seventy-two hours. Even Captain Freah, who ordinarily never looked tired, seemed beat.

She knew there was a good chance she looked as tired as they did. She brushed back a strand of hair from her ear, then turned her attention back to the laptop, bringing up another technical paper to read.

Sergeant Liu glanced around the cabin, nervous for the first time in as long as he could remember.

The sergeant didn’t consider himself a particularly brave man. On the contrary, he thought of himself as prudent and careful, not much of a risk taker. While others might view his job as exceedingly risky, in Liu’s view, working special operations was a good deal less hazardous than most combat jobs in the service. He continually trained and practiced, and worked with only the most qualified people. Missions were generally carefully planned and laid out. As long as you re
membered your training and did your job, the odds were in your favor. There was no reason to be scared.

But he was nervous tonight, very nervous.

The image of the little kid being born stayed in his head. Possibly—probably—the child was dead before he was born, but he had no way of knowing.

Why had God sent them to the house if He intended on letting the child and its parents die?

A Catholic Chinese-American, Liu had always felt some solace in his faith, but now it seemed to raise only questions. He knew what a priest would tell him: God has a plan, and we cannot always know it. But that didn’t make sense in this case—what plan could He accomplish by letting a child die? Why go to such extraordinary lengths to send help to the baby, then snuff its life out? And the lives of its parents?

Liu looked up. Captain Freah was staring at him.

“You ready, Nurse?” Danny asked.

“Ready and willing,” said Liu, shrugging.

Aboard Dreamland
Bennett,
over Pakistan
0201

W
HEN THE
O
SPREY WAS TEN MINUTES FROM THE LANDING
zone, Dog gave Starship the order to take out the guerrillas on the ground.

Starship had the two Flighthawks moving in figure eight orbit over the lake. He took them over from the computer and brought them down so they could make their attacks from opposite sides, catching the men on the ground in the middle. With a split screen and left and right joysticks, he felt briefly as if he were two people, each a mirror image of the other.

Green sparkles flashed on the screen of
Hawk Two
—tracers, fired by someone on the ground unit reacting to the sounds of the airplane.

The targeting box on the screen for
Hawk One
began to
blink, indicating that the computer thought he was almost close enough to shoot. Starship held off for another few seconds, then opened fire just as the tracers turned in his direction.

The effect was brutal and efficient, lead pouring into the men who’d tried to shoot him down little more than an hour earlier. Only two of the men on the ground seemed to escape the first pass, running to the north and throwing themselves on the ground as the Flighthawks passed east and west.