“Just keep your eyes open, guys,” Dave said. He didn’t voice his main concerns again — the fact that Jalaluddin Turabi had recommended this spot for an insertion — because Dave had already expressed his doubts several times already. He had insisted on, and Patrick had approved, several methods to ensure that their crews weren’t walking into a trap:
The powerful sensors on Armstrong Space Station had swept the area twice in three hours prior to landing and cleared the Black Stallion to land, which made everyone feel better. There was a constellation of small NIRTSats supporting surveillance operations over Iran, and one of those satellites passed over the area every few hours to update the strategic picture of the target area.
In addition, the second XR-A9 spaceplane, launched shortly after Boomer’s, had released a Meteor payload re-entry module which seeded four surveillance drones over the area and beamed streaming video images to the Air Battle Force commandos on the ground and back to Dreamland. The drones were positioned over the landing zone and three other key places in the area: central Ashkhabad, including the government center, Hall of Justice, and the Russian embassy; the Turkmeni army barracks south of the city; and Ashkhabad-Berzien Military Airfield west of the city.
Unfortunately two of the drones malfunctioned — one crashed someplace in the desert shortly after release, and the second was still aloft but not sending any video. Dave had carefully considered requesting that they abort the mission because of the lack of timely intelligence data on the target and the area defenses. But he knew Patrick wanted this mission to happen. So after scanning the Turkmeni air base for any sign of movement that might suggest the ground team had been discovered, Dave ordered that drone moved to the Black Stallion landing site. The drone had to fly south around the city, well away from Niyazov International Airport, to avoid discovery, so it would not be on station for several minutes — meaning the Black Stallion and its crew were on their own until the drone arrived.
“Stud Four is shifting to the south — I thought I saw headlights,” Army Sergeant Maxwell Dolan in Tin Man battle armor and powered exoskeleton radioed. “Genesis, are you receiving my video?”
“Affirmative, Four,” Dave Luger responded. Video and sensor images received by any of the Tin Men in the Air Battle Force ground team were uplinked via satellite back to the Battle Management Area at Dreamland, where they could be shared by any other member in almost real-time. “We didn’t see the lights, but proceed”—then he added—“with caution.”
That kind of chatter made Boomer very nervous — and at that moment he found himself unconsciously flicking the mode selector on his MP-5 up and down. Shit, he thought, he forgot which way the switch went for the “SAFE” position, and he didn’t want to radio the others to remind him — again — which was correct. He designed high-performance jet and rocket engines, he admonished himself, but for some damned reason he could never remember if flipping the switch up was “SAFE,” or the other way around.
Boomer moved toward a small concrete pump building a few dozen yards away from the Black Stallion, crouched down on the far side of the building, pulled a small LED flashlight from a flight suit pocket, covered the bulb as much as he could with his hand to avoid spoiling his night vision and startling Wil Lefferts, then shined it on the left side of the little submachine gun. Oh shit, he swore to himself, he had switched it to the three-round burst mode. For safety reasons there was no full-automatic mode on these weapons, just a SAFE, semi-automatic, and three-round semi-automatic mode.
OK, OK, he yelled at himself, pushing the switch down is bad — flipping it up is good. Push down to get down…that’s what the weapon instructor from Battle Mountain said when he…
Suddenly there was a tremendous burst of red and orange light, followed moments later by a tremendous “BOOOM!” so powerful that it knocked Boomer on his butt. “Stud Four, Stud Four…Max, how do you copy?” Dave Luger radioed frantically. “Come in!”
“Bastards!” Dolan radioed back. “I just got hit by a damned RPG round!” Boomer’s skin and fingers instantly turned cold. Were they under attack…?
“Are you OK?” Luger radioed.
“I’m going to blast those motherfuckers into the next century!” Dolan shouted. Boomer heard two or three sharp “CRAACK!” reports and knew that Dolan was firing his electromagnetic rail gun. “I see four armored personnel carriers and maybe one light tank approaching the area. I want…” Suddenly his audio report cut out.
“Stud Four, how do you copy?” Luger radioed. “Stud Four?” Still no response. “Stud Five and Six, Four is still on the move but I’ve lost his audio. I need you to…” At that moment the audio channel was completely blocked by loud squealing, hissing, and popping sounds so loud that Boomer found it hard to concentrate.
Wil Lefferts suddenly came into view, running over between Boomer and the Black Stallion, his MP-5 submachine gun upraised. “Boomer! Where are you?” he shouted.
“Over here!” Lefferts whirled around at the sound, aiming his gun at the voice. “Don’t shoot, you idiot!” Boomer ran over to him, then pulled him down to the ground and shoved the muzzle of the submachine gun away in a safe direction. “Are you all right? Are you hurt?”
“What’s happening?” Lefferts yelled. His voice, and indeed his entire body, was shaking.
“We’re under attack! Let’s get the Stud ready for takeoff!”
“Shouldn’t we wait for the ground force?”
“I’m not going to lose the Stud to whoever’s attacking us,” Boomer said. “Our safest place is in the air. We’ll come back for the ground forces once the attack is over. Let’s go!” Crouching low, Boomer ran over to the spaceplane and climbed aboard, hoping Wil was right behind him. He pulled on his helmet and his lap restraints, flipped on the battery switch, and motored the canopy closed. As soon as he sensed that Wil was aboard, he commanded, “Engine start procedures.”
“Stand by for engine start procedures,” the computer responded. “Beginning before power on checklist.”
“Override,” Boomer ordered. “Begin engine start procedures.”
“Override before engine start checklist. Beginning power on…”
“Override. Begin engine start procedures.” Boomer had to repeat the override command for each of the checklists he wanted to skip, having to wait for the computer’s warning and verification messages each time. It seemed to take forever, but finally the computer was on the right page.
The first human interaction step wasn’t for almost another twenty seconds, so Boomer securely strapped himself into his seat and made sure Wil was doing the same — and then he looked out to his right, and his jaw dropped. Sergeant Max — Boomer wasn’t sure of his last name — was standing less than fifty yards away from the Black Stallion’s right wingtip, the electromagnetic rail gun in his arm, firing into the darkness. Every few seconds he would shift positions, darting back and forth with amazing speed, occasionally going out of sight as he moved away from the XR-A9 or back toward it to block a round fired at it. Seconds after he’d fire there was a tremendous explosion off in the distance, and often several secondary explosions as well. Boomer couldn’t believe he was moving like that after already being hit by a rocket-propelled grenade round!