Reyes said nothing. Did that mean something had happened to Michael, or did Reyes just not know?
“Are you talking about the lieutenant colonel with a limp?” the Marine spotter asked, gazing through his NVGs.
“Yes.”
“He’s okay,” the spotter said. “I see him right now.”
Gold smiled, felt stickiness on her lips. Her own blood.
She relaxed her mind, let perceptions and memories wander. A stray thought came to her—Mullah Durrani’s storied ancestor, Ahmad Shah Durrani, was also a poet. He wrote of his devotion to Afghanistan:
Gold did not necessarily love Afghanistan. But she loved many of its people as much as she loved her comrades in arms.
“I wish I could give you something for pain,” Reyes said, “but narcotics might suppress your respiratory function.”
Nature did what drugs could not. Gold’s vision turned hazy; her hearing dulled. She let herself pass out again.
Where was that damned Pave Hawk? An eternity had passed since Parson learned Sophia was hit. He paced outside the cave entrance, cursed, condemned himself for bringing her here at all. He wanted to climb to that knoll, go to her right now. But it was too steep to scale without gear, even for someone without a slash wound to the arm and a bad leg. The quickest way to see her was to wait for the HH-60. The waiting hurt worse than the cut.
A few Marines watched over the other injured—Rashid, Blount, shotgun man, and a half dozen wounded Afghan troops. The rest of the jarheads manned a perimeter, waited for the Osprey to pick them up. The six rescued boys sat on the ground, chattered in Pashto with Rashid. Gutsy of him, Parson thought, to find the strength to comfort those kids with his hand nearly blown off. The corpsman had given Rashid a fentanyl lollipop. Maybe that helped. Now the corpsman was taping dressings onto Blount’s bleeding palms and fingers. The gunnery sergeant made no sound.
Rashid turned to Parson, pointed with his good hand to one of the boys.
“That one Mohammed,” he said.
So what? Parson thought. He felt relieved some of the kids had survived. Blount’s sanity might depend on that. But he was too worried about Sophia to care about their names. Half the boys in this part of the world were named Mohammed. But then he remembered.
“You mean that little girl’s brother?” Parson asked.
Rashid spoke in his own language again. The boy nodded. He wore a round hat, along with a woolen vest over a ragged and oversize shirt.
“Fatima his sister,” Rashid said.
Well, that was something. Sophia would be happy about that. At least Parson would have some good news for her. Dear God, please let her live to hear it.
“What about Lieutenant Aamir’s son?” Parson asked. “What was his name?”
“Hakim,” Rashid said.
Mohammed uttered a few syllables, began to cry.
“They give him bomb,” Rashid said.
And sent him out to Blount’s rifle, Parson thought.
The faint thump of helicopter rotors sounded from a distant valley, grew louder. Finally. Blount rose and stood beside Parson, opened his mouth to speak. He hesitated, had trouble with the words. Eventually he said, “Sir, if you gotta report what you saw me do in there…” Paused again. “I mean, there ain’t gon’ be no hard feelings. You just do what you think’s right.”
“We did it together, Gunny,” Parson said. “I was the highest rank there. And our orders said dead or alive. Let’s just not do it that way again.”
Blount pressed his lips together, thought for a moment. “Yes, sir,” he said. “Unless it needs doing.”
Good point, Parson thought. Unless it needs doing.
Parson listened to the Pave Hawk’s approach. Looked down at Mohammed and the other boys. Up at the dark knoll where Gold lay wounded. She was in critical condition because of Chaaku and Black Crescent. Yeah, Parson considered, Blount did what needed doing. Damn straight. Parson wished he’d done it himself.
The helicopter circled Kuh-e Qara Batur. Parson watched through his night vision goggles as it descended toward the knoll. Within several meters of the ground, the main rotor kicked up dust. Arcs of green formed at the blade tips. From his vantage point about a half mile away, Parson watched the corona effect shimmer into a full halo as the Pave Hawk touched down to pick up Gold.
Reyes and the combat controller lifted her. Sophia’s arm swung from the litter as they carried her into the aircraft. The sight looked far too much like images of the dying Parson had seen all over Afghanistan, and it worried him sick.
The helicopter lifted off, gathered speed. It banked, then descended toward the cave bunker where Parson stood with the Marines and Afghans. The broken Mi-17 remained on the LZ, and the Pave Hawk had little room to land. But Parson had seen choppers put down in less room.
Grit flew into Parson’s eyes as the Pave Hawk settled next to the Mi-17. Without waiting for a signal, Parson ran to the HH-60’s open door. Sophia lay on a litter, IV in her arm, some kind of needle in her chest. Dirt and dried blood across her pale skin.
“How is she?” Parson shouted to Reyes over the engines and rotors.
“She got shot real bad,” Reyes said. “But with this kind of wound, if they make it this far, they usually hang on.” Matter-of-fact. Like she was just another patient. Reyes arranged a blanket across her torso, kept the fabric clear of the needle. He rolled up another blanket and propped her feet on it. Treating her for shock, Parson realized.
Parson kneeled beside her, took her hand. She did not open her eyes or respond in any way. But her fingers felt warm, and he took that as a good sign. Maybe she wasn’t in deep shock.
Reyes and the corpsman helped load some of the other wounded onto the aircraft. They placed Rashid on a stretcher, put him down across from Gold. One of the other Afghans had a bloody bandage covering most of his head.
When the corpsman motioned for Blount to board, the gunnery sergeant waved with a hand wrapped in white. “I can wait for the Osprey,” he said. “Take some of these boys. They been here longer than I have.”
“Bring that one,” Parson said. He pointed to Mohammed. Reyes and the corpsman collected Mohammed and two other kids. Buckled them into web seats at the back of the Pave Hawk.
The Pave Hawk’s flight engineer slid the door shut, took his seat behind his gun. Two turbine engines above Parson’s head howled in unison, and the helicopter lifted off. Kuh-e Qara Batur dropped away, receded in the darkness.
A few minutes after the helicopter leveled at altitude, Gold opened her eyes.
“You did good,” Parson said.
She blinked, inhaled and exhaled as if getting ready to expend great effort. Parson leaned close to hear whatever she might say amid the noise of the aircraft. Finally she asked, “The kids?”
Parson nodded toward Mohammed.
“That’s Fatima’s brother,” he said. “They got five other boys out, too. You did it. You and Blount and the Marines.”
Gold closed her eyes, clasped his hand. The strength of her grip encouraged him. She took another deep breath. Then she said, “We did it.”
Parson shook his head. “I never should have brought you back here, Sophia. It wasn’t fair.”
She gathered herself to speak again, inhaled deeply. That made Parson feel even more regretful. He realized he shouldn’t encourage her to talk right now.
“Michael,” she said, “this is what I do. This is what we do.”
Reyes adjusted the blanket covering her. The effort revealed pallid flesh, heaving torso, and in the pale light, bandages soaked in the color of rust. Loose blond hair spread across her bare collarbone, some of the strands clotted with blood.