There. He was no longer attached to the seat.
“Get him out!”
Rita grabbed his shoulders and pulled. Oh God, he was heavy.
She braced herself and gave a mighty heave.
The pilot came half out of the seat but he still kept his death grip on the cyclic stick.
His helmet, with the wires. She tore it off his head.
She grabbed him again, two handfuls of harness, braced her right leg against the back of the seat and pulled with all her strength.
He came out of the seat and Rita kept pulling and the two of them tumbled backward into the passenger compartment, the wounded pilot on top.
She fumbled for her flashlight. The beam showed blood. He was shot in the face. His eyes were unfocused, blood flowing.
“He took a bullet in the face,” she told the copilot.
“Five minutes. We’ll be on the ground in five minutes. Keep him alive.”
How do you keep a man alive who has been shot an inch under the right eye?
Then she realized that the convulsions had stopped. He was limp. Rita Moravia found a wrist and felt for his pulse. Still a flicker.
Since there was nothing else to do, she cradled him in her arms and hugged him.
How long Jack Yocke lay in the sandy dirt he didn’t know. The noise of the helicopters and the explosions and concussions that reached him through the earth finally subsided, so he levered himself from the ground and began walking. He walked until the exhaustion hit him, then he sat down in the sand beside a runway. He was sitting there unable to summon the energy to move when he heard the crunch of a boot in the sand.
Yocke grabbed his weapon and ran his fingers over the action, trying to brush off the sand.
“Hey, shipmate! What’re you doing out here?”
“Uh…” Relief flooded Yocke and he tried to collect his thoughts. He gestured toward the fence, back there somewhere behind him. “His chute didn’t open. Murphy. His name was Murphy.”
The man came over for a look.
“You’re one of the SEALs, right?”
“No, but I jumped with them.”
“Better get over to the hangar. We’re setting up a perimeter along the fence.”
“There’s mines on the other side.”
“You came down in town?”
“Uh-huh.”
“How bad are you hurt? You got a lot of blood on you.”
“Most of it isn’t mine.”
“Medic over by the hangar. Move along now, buddy.”
“Where?”
The sailor pointed.
“Thanks.”
Yocke placed his weapon in the crook of his arm and began walking. He had gone about ten paces when the man behind him called, “Better move it on out, shipmate, because the main wave of Blackhawks are overdue. They’re going to land right here. Fact is, I can hear ’em now.”
In spite of his exhaustion and all the gear he was still wearing, Jack Yocke dutifully broke into a trot. When he too heard the swelling whine of the oncoming engines his gait became a run.
Yocke paused by the door of the hangar and watched four Blackhawks settle in and disgorge more troops. The men came pouring out just before the wheels hit the runway, then the choppers were gone in a blast of rotor wash and noise. Choppers with underslung artillery pieces were next. When the slings were released, these machines also kissed the earth and more men came out running, then they were gone.
The choppers brought machine guns, ammo, artillery, antitank weapons, com gear, and men, many men. By the time the fourth wave came in, the artillery pieces from the first wave were banging off rounds toward the east.
Above him three huge choppers materialized in the darkness — Sky Cranes, with pallets under their bellies.
Jack Yocke turned his back and went through the hangar door.
The first things he saw inside were the missiles. The long, white pointed cylinders still wore red stars on their flanks. He stood for several seconds staring before he saw the warheads — yes, those things were warheads — sitting on wooden forklift flats. He began to count.
Thirty-two of them. And missiles sporting red stars.
And against the far wall, a missile on another truck, but this one was different — it had Arabic script on the side near the nose and sported a black, white and red flag. A Scud!
In front of the Scud launcher stood a row of Iraqis with their hands up. Several SEALs and U.S. soldiers guarded them.
He was still standing there inspecting the warheads, taking it all in, when a group of people came trotting through the door with Captain Collins in the lead. Yocke recognized the British soldier, Jocko West, who was carrying a box of something. Another of the men was Rheinhart. West and Rheinhart immediately opened and began unpacking the box they had slung between them. Jack stayed behind Collins and watched as the muffled noise of war thudded through the hangar.
“The hot stuff is still in these warheads,” Collins said to Colonel Galvano, who was busy with a radiation counter.
“There is much background radiation, Comandante.”
“I’ll bet these idiots didn’t even hose down these weapons when they brought them here,” Jocko West muttered, then added, “Let’s open the hangar doors and start loading these things.”
Yocke wandered over to look at the prisoners. Most of them were Iraqis, but several were Russians. They didn’t look happy. One of the Russians was trying to talk to an American soldier in English. “I go, da? With you? You take us?”
“Keep your hands where I can see them, Boris.”
“Seen Admiral Grafton, soldier?” Yocke asked.
“He’s in one of those offices behind the missiles,” the soldier said.
Yocke thanked him and walked in the indicated direction. One of the office doors was open. Yocke stepped in.
“Didn’t fit. They’re too big,” Spiro Dalworth was telling Jake Grafton. Three Russians sat in chairs. “They cannot be made to fit without completely altering the structure of the missile.” More Russian. “Hussein shot two of our men. Shot with a pistol, one bullet each. In the head. He told us we would make the warheads fit.”
“Are these all the warheads and missiles? Have the Iraqis taken any of the warheads anywhere else?” Jake asked this question and Dalworth spewed it out in Russian.
“Nyet.”
“All the weapons are here.”
Toad moved over beside Yocke. “You look like one of Dracula’s afternoon snacks,” Toad whispered. “If all that blood is yours you must be a couple quarts low.”
Jack Yocke just shook his head. “What’s happening?”
“It was screwed up from the beginning,” Toad muttered. “The warheads are out of bigger, heavier Soviet missiles. Saddam wanted them installed in the Scuds but they wouldn’t fit. World-class problem solver that he is, he wouldn’t take no for an answer.”
“So he shot two Russians?”
“To motivate the others. Terrific leadership technique, huh?”
“How about the missiles they have sitting out there? Why didn’t he roll them out and tell the world to kiss its ass good-bye?”
Toad leaned closer to Yocke’s ear. “Those missiles don’t have any guidance systems. Oh, the warheads are there, the fuel and all the rest of it. But without guidance systems…”
And Jack Yocke nodded. Russia, the land where nothing works, where shortages are endemic. It was sort of funny, really. Saddam, The Awesome, makes a sharp deal and the Russians give him the shaft.
“Can I print this?”
“That’s up to the admiral.”
“This whole…thing, a goddamn fuck-up?”
“Sometimes the best-laid plans…”