“Ought to have an electronic eye on it,” said Freah as Zen rolled into the foyer.
“That’s not necessary,” said Zen, fighting against his embarrassment.
Freah seemed t sense the awkwardness, and opened the inside door quickly.
“Heard you nailed that tanker sim this afternoon,” said Freah. “Good going.”
“I didn’t realize that’d be big news,” said Zen.
“Hey, Major, relax.” Said Freah. He pulled his hands back as if he’d touch a hot stove. “I happened to be in the control tower when you got it. they were applauding.”
“Yeah,” said Zen. Hadn’t meant to snarl. He pulled his wheelchair around, starting down the hallway for the room. It was automatic – he didn’t think about the stairs at the far end the hall.
The flight down was only six steps deep, the suite door barely ten feet beyond that. But there was no way he could get down the steps without help. He’d have to go back through the lobby and around through the back wing, where there was a ramp. As he started to wheel backward, he saw the door to the suite open.
Mack Smith popped his head out, then turned back to say something before leaving.
Smith skipped up the stairs, disappointed with Breanna and maybe himself. He hadn’t gone there to seduce her.
So why had he gone then?
He hadn’t found an answer before he reached the lobby. Coincidence of coincidence, who was just arriving but Bree’s husband Zen.
That was close.
“Hey,” said Knife, grabbing Zen’s chair as he was rolling down the back hallway. “Hey, Zen, what are you up to?”
“What are you to?” snapped Stockard furiously.
Smith let go of the wheelchair. Captain Freah and a Spec Ops security guard were standing near the front door a few yards away.
“I’m sorry,” said Smith.
Paralyzed and all, Stockard looked like he was going to bolt out of the chair and strangle him. Mack knew better than to say anything about Rap, even though nothing had happened, but he wasn’t sure what to say.
“I was just making my rounds, saying good-bye,” said Mack, taking a step back. He hadn’t had a chance to say anything about Zen’s legs, but this sure as hell wasn’t the time.
And anyway, what the hell could he say? Tough break?
He’d already said something like that in the hospital.
“I’m saying good-bye,” Mack repeated.
“Good-bye for what?”
“Hell, Zen, what’s up your ass?” Smith took a step backward and stuck his hands on his hips. For a second he thought Stockard was going to put his head down and ram forward with his chair.
“Uh, Majors,” said Freah, coming toward them with the air of a kindergarten teacher. “Can I be of some assistance?”
“I’m fine,” said Zen.
“Me too,” said Knife, starting for the door. “Good-bye, Zen. Tell your wife I said hello.”
“Tell her yourself,” said Stockard.
Smith spun around and headed through the lobby door, letting it slam shut behind him.
Chapter 3
A matter of conscience
Two weeks later
Ethiopia
21 October, 0400
“All right Marines, listen the fuck up.” Gunnery Sergeant James Ricardo Melfi gave the small handpickedplatoon one of his best sneers, even though it was difficult for them to see in the dim light from the nearby flare. “That means you too, Goosehead,” he told one of his sergeant. “Jack, you close your fuckin’ mouth or I’m puttin’ a boot in it. You want to yawn, you go to the dentist. All right, girls, here’s the deal. We come off the Chinook, we split into the two squads, we hit the buildings the way we laid it out. We take out missile one and missile two, we call in the fuckin’ Air Force. We give the weenies two minutes to get here because they’re not Marine aviators.” He paused to allow his men the appropriate contemptuous snort, then continued. “At that point, we take the administration building, which should be defenseless, assuming the Air Force has done its job. if they have not, then Fire Team B, following my lead, will do it for them, wiping out the tank with their bare hands if they have to.”
Actually, they would be using a Russian-made SPG-9 piece of shit. The light antitank gun fired a 73mm missile that had a fairly good chance of destroying the ancient M-47 – but only if it hit it. The weapon wasn’t particularly known for its accuracy.
“Team A, meanwhile, will be taking care of the machine guns on the east side of the building. Prisoners and wounded to be evacuated to the Chinook rendezvous point, blah-blah-blah. You girls got that?”
“Oh, we got it, Sergeant Honey,” said the Team B point many, Jerry Jackson.
“Listen, Swishboy, you just make sure you don’t trip going out of the helicopter,” Melfi told him. “I’ll boot your black ass right into the sandbag post.”
“Oh, I wish you would, Gunny.”
The others laughed, and so did the sergeant, even as he shook his head. He thumbed toward the two green unmarked Chinook standing on the dirt pad behind him. The flare he’d lit behind him made the aircraft look almost purple in the early morning twilight. Looming beyond them were jagged hills, their sharp shadows and shapes making the place look like the far side of the moon, rather than the ragged hinterland of northeastern Ethiopia.
“Okay, let’s run this like we’re under fire, all right?” said Gunny. “Check your gear and move out.”
The Marines quickly gave their rifles and gear the onceover as they silently lined up to board the helicopters. They’d been issued plain-Jane M-16A1 rifles that had been bought on the black market. Beside the Russian antitank gun, they were carrying two French machine guns – AA52’s, which were actually quite good, though they used odd-sized bullets. The Chinooks that were to carry the Marines ostensibly belongs to Zaire. Their uniforms, which had an Army puke-green tint to them, bore no insignias or markings.
In Gunny’s opinion, these and a dozen other elaborate precautions designed to camouflage the group’s identity weren’t going to fool anyone if the Marines were actually called on to do the job they were practicing to do. in Gunny’s opinion, they’d be better off admitting they were Americans and, hot damn, taking a real Marine Expeditionary Force – Cobras, Harriers, Ch-53’s, SAWs, M240’s, the whole shebang – against the damn Somalian SAM site and blowing the living shit out of it, foreign politics be damned.
But of course, Gunnery Sergeant James Melfi had been in the Marines long enough to not have an opinion in these matters. If Madcap Magician wanted to pretend they were merely pissed-off mercenaries hired by a pissed-off and jealous African dictator who wanted to get back in power in Somalia, so be it.
“All right, girls, let’s move it out,” said Melfi, prodding his men to board the double-bladed Chinook transport. Captain Peter Gordon, who’d been conferring with the pilots, frowned at him – he’d already bawled Melfi out twice today for using ‘inappropriate language.’
“Sergeant?” snapped the captain.
“Pussies are all hot and wet for you, Captain,” said Gunny with as straight a face as he could manage.
“Helos bearing three-niner.”
“Confirmed.” Mack Smith glanced at the way marker on his INS an put his plane into a bank away from the path the two helicopters were taking. “Posion Flight, prepare to break. Let’s do this the way we drew it up.”
“Three.”
“Four.”
The four F-16’s now split into two different flights, Mack and his wingman staying southeast of the helicopters while the others flew north. Mack scanned the glow of his instruments in the Viper cockpit, then snapped his APG-68 radar into ground-attack mode. He was ahead of schedule, but had had trouble picking out the target during last night’s exercise and wanted to take no chance this time.