The driver’s door of the Ford opened and a figure got out. The individual moved over to the man lying face down on the road, a pistol could be seen pointing at the man.
It wasn’t discernible if the weapon bucked in his hand or not, but the general consensus was they had just witnessed a coup de grâce. Two other individuals exited the Ford and could be seen walking towards the executioner. They gathered the body up and disposed of it unceremoniously, off to the side of the road. One of the two men stood in the road and looked up to the sky. He seemed to be gathering his thoughts, his eyes closed.
Director Hall jumped at the opportunity. “Get facial recog on him! Looks like one of the two we’re after!
“What are you going to do now, Allan?”
Hall didn’t even look at her. “One Hellfire missile from the drone should do the trick, all over, end of story.”
“No… you can’t.”
Hall looked daggers at Director Lopez, who quickly qualified her response. “You can’t blow them up, the virus would become airborne.”
“Absolutely correct, Director Lopez.” Dr. Crawston made her way to the two directors. “Any release of the virus into the atmosphere, especially in the form of a pressurized spray, could be catastrophic. The virus can travel thirty-five miles or more over land.”
“Thank you, Dr. Crawston. We won’t be blowing them sky-high just yet, Allan.” Lopez looked triumphant.
“Sir, confirmation of facial recognition, the person is Yusuf al-Nasseri.”
“That’s one of our two terrorists.” Hall looked pleased to move on. “Get me Matt Lilburn.”
Matt Lilburn, flying en-route with three other heavily armed members of the interception team, took the call. The instructions were clear and precise. Lilburn passed the location to the pilot, then briefed the men. Five minutes to target.
Bomani looked into his side mirror, looking back on the roadside carnage he had just left, dust from his moving vehicle now obscuring most of the scene. It was unfortunate for the farmer that he drove his tractor into the road without looking for traffic, a mistake he would never make again. Bomani’s mobile phone rang, he glanced at the screen. “Yes.” The conversation was short and one sided. He ended the call without saying another word.
Yusuf and Bashir, watching silently from the back seat, could see that Bomani was troubled. Bomani looked upwards then brought the Ford to a stop. They watched intently as he entered a name into the GPS mounted on the dash. With a few more taps of his finger a line appeared on the screen. The line started from Albany and went directly to their own position.
The Ford Explorer didn’t stop at the wooden roadside gate leading into a grassed field; it plowed on through the gate splintering around it. Fifty yards away was a group of trees with large high canopies. Bomani chose his angle of entry carefully and brought the vehicle to a halt just out of view from the air. He told his passengers to leave the vehicle and lie down on the ground beside the Ford. Yusuf and Bashir did as they were told. Bomani remained inside the vehicle and crawled over the seats, pushing and pulling himself to the back of the vehicle, where he pushed a button and folded one half of the rear seat up then the other, giving himself more room to move. From the inside, he opened up the rear door. Unzipping the long nylon case he had stored in the back, he pulled out the sleek lines of a bolt action rifle with mounted scope. Making himself comfortable on the floor, he rested his back on the upturned seats and brought his knees up for support. Bomani looked through the scope and flicked the weapons safety off. He waited.
“Matt, the vehicle is stationary under some trees two clicks directly to your front in a field, we’re sending the coordinates to the pilot now.”
The pilot locked in the coordinates and could see the group of trees in the distance. “That’s their location, under those trees — just one click away.”
Lilburn studied the terrain and the situation. The vehicle appeared to be hiding in a field under trees, for what reason remained unclear. Off the road and in a field gave his team the edge, maneuverability would be harder for the vehicle on grass compared to the road, there were obstacles in and around fields, fences, ditches, so why would the driver go off road? Lilburn wished he had more information from the drone. It just didn’t add up. Why?
“Half a click till RV. Where would you like me to put Gracie down?”
From five hundred feet up, Gracie’s occupants could make out the outline of the rear of the Ford Explorer under the canopy. Lilburn saw the rear door was open. Uh-oh. I don’t like this, I don’t like any of this… the hairs on his neck stood on end.
“Change course, change course!” Lilburn yelled.
The first bullet struck the EC120 helicopter a glancing blow by the pilot’s feet, punching a hole in the windshield then traveled into the cockpit and embedded itself in the pilot’s seat. The pilot felt the impact. In the short time he had to react and take evasive action, the bolt on the rifle had opened, ejected the spent cartridge and loaded a live round into the chamber. The second round fired from the back of the Ford Explorer was more deadly, its trajectory ending up in the pilot’s left upper arm, mincing flesh. The pilot screamed out in agony as his body contorted. As his right hand involuntarily let go of the cyclic stick his knees knocked it, causing the helicopter to violently pitch and yaw out of control.
The pain was intense, so much so all self-preservation was lost as he had no choice but to ride where the pain took him. The pilot’s hands had closed tight as he struggled to override his natural inclination to roll up into a ball. A voice next to him was shouting, the shouting gradually penetrated his world of pain, and he understood what was being said. Get control, get control! Expert training kicked in and the pilot began to override his own body; grabbing the cyclic stick and applying pressure to the correct pedals, he leveled off.
Grunting with pain, he gasped: “I have to land this thing unless you can fly a helicopter?”
There was little Lilburn could do. “Best you land then. You going to be OK?”
“Yeah… aw shit that hurts. We still have forward momentum so things could be worse. The landing… Jesus… the landing may be a bit rough. Gracie baby — bring us down.”
The pilot let Albany know the predicament and grid reference then took the helicopter down. Lilburn watched as the pilot used his knees to control the cyclic stick while adjusting the collective with his good arm. Descending as quickly as he could, the pilot felt lightheaded, shock was starting to set in. Expertly judging his moves, he again juggled the cyclic while reaching across and down to the collective. “Hang on, boys.”
The helicopter hit the ground much harder than normal; the skids absorbed the shock of a more than usually abrupt landing but to the relief of everyone on board, the craft remained upright. The pilot shut the controls down, his job over. “Good girl.”
Bomani watched as his second shot appeared to fatally wound the helicopter flying directly towards him. He watched his handiwork as the helicopter swung wildly this way and that, then drilled down to the ground, the final impact obstructed by the contour of the land. The helicopter was one thing to take out, it had presented no difficulty. The drone overhead locked on to his position was another.
When Bomani fired the rifle, Bashir and Yusuf thought they were being attacked. It was Bashir who first saw the incoming helicopter and it was he who now praised Bomani’s marksmanship.
“Man! You shot it down… just like that! But… how did you know a helicopter was coming?”
Bomani didn’t respond, instead he packed away his rifle and told the others to put the rear seats up in the vehicle then get in. There was no time for self-congratulation. At the wheel of the Ford the driver input the route on the GPS to his next objective.