Five minutes later Jake was startled by another alarm tone in the cockpit.
“That’s not good.” Wiley said. “They just launched fighters from Sana’a. Time for us to say goodbye to our tow. Gregg? Are you ready?”
“Let’s do it.” Kaplan said.
“Remember don’t light up until you see me light up. Heading 3-3-0 and do not exceed 120 knots. It’ll seem like you’re going straight up.” Wiley said. “Oxygen nose clips on. Got it?” Wiley asked.
“Got it.” Kaplan said. “Oxygen on. Ready to go vertical.”
“Jake, hold on tight here we go.”
“Mr. Wiley? Won’t the fighters see our jet exhaust or heat signature?” Jake asked.
“Not with my custom exhaust shroud.” Wiley explained. “Unless they’re directly behind us, we’ll be invisible.”
Jake couldn’t see Wiley’s face, but he was sure the old man was smiling.
Wiley seemed to be enjoying the adventure. The thrill. He didn’t disconnect, he waited. The fighters got closer. Jake squirmed in his seat. According to the electronic screen, ten miles and closing.
“Sir, shouldn’t we disconnect now?” Jake asked.
“Not yet.” Wiley said. “Let them get closer. We need to eke out as much altitude as we can before we break away.”
Five miles and closing.
“Sir?” Jake wanted to question Wiley’s judgment. Maybe the old man was, in fact, too old.
The fighters were at three miles and closing when two bright flashes appeared.
“Missiles.” Wiley shouted. “Disconnect, disconnect.”
They had reached an altitude of 10,430 feet when Kaplan disconnected from Wiley’s glider. Wiley released Kaplan’s towline then disconnected from the tow aircraft.
“Jake, turn to heading 3-3-0, nose up, activate JATO bottle on my mark.” Wiley sounded off in perfect cadence. “Now.”
Jake was slammed against the back of his seat from the sudden increase in thrust and acceleration. The JATO rocket, an acronym for jet-fuel assisted takeoff, was a system designed to provide overweight aircraft with additional thrust for takeoff. Wiley’s adaptation was a sixty-second burn of a single small rocket bottle that would automatically jettison after burn.
“Nose up, nose up.” Wiley commanded Jake. “Speed 120, no faster. Control your speed with your angle of climb — it’s very steep.”
“Roger that.” Jake replied.
“Kaplan? How you doing back there?” Wiley asked.
“I’m right on your tail.” Kaplan shouted. “Behind and to the left. Whoa, what a ride.”
The two gliders climbed higher and higher.
The sky grew bright below them followed by the reverberation of the explosion, louder than the JATO rockets.
“I can’t believe they shot down the tow plane.” Jake yelled. “We just got those two killed.”
“Collateral damage.” Wiley said.
“Who were they?” Kaplan asked. “Yemenis?”
“No. I’m afraid not.” Wiley lowered his voice as the JATOs burned out and automatically disconnected from the gliders. “The young men were from the Delta unit you worked with in Sana’a. Bentley had trouble finding local pilots so they volunteered. They understood the risk, I explained it to them personally.”
“Son of a—” Kaplan started.
“Nose over slightly.” Wiley interrupted. “We have a mission to complete. Best glide speed. Stay on heading. We have 55 miles to go. Even with the tailwind, it’ll take nearly an hour. We are, oddly enough, right on schedule. Gregg, I need you to stay focused.”
“I’m focused. I’m focused.” Kaplan said. “Just really pissed off.”
“No more pissed off than I am.” Wiley said. “Like I said earlier, you can’t trust the Yemenis.”
Jake looked at the altimeter, 19,670 feet above sea level. With a landing elevation of 5700 feet, they had roughly 14,000 feet to lose in 55 miles.
He did the calculations in his head.
They weren’t going to make it.
CHAPTER 27
“I don’t want to be an alarmist.” Jake said. “But we have a bigger problem. Based on my calculations, we can’t make it to Hajjah.”
“Mr. Wiley?” Kaplan asked. “Is Jake right?”
“Jake doesn’t have all the facts.” Wiley said. “It’s going to be tight. No margin for error.”
Jake felt a pit in his stomach grow. He looked out the window at the Earth below. Nothing. Nothing but a black void. He knew the terrain was rugged. He confirmed it when he switched on his night vision goggles.
The JATO bottles had rocketed them upward thousands of feet. During all the excitement, he’d forgotten about their main objective — rescue Isabella Hunt. Landing safely on the ground in Hajjah very well might be the easy part. No telling what awaited them upon arrival. If they made it.
The visibility was nearly unlimited beneath the cirrostratus layer of clouds that hovered above them. To the northeast, he could see the city lights of Sana’a. They looked close but he knew they were at least thirty miles away. Using his NVGs, he could see the outline of the coast of the Red Sea to the west. After they extracted Hunt that would be their next stop.
For the next thirty minutes, Jake watched the altimeter as the gliders gradually drifted toward the mountains below. He planned to switch off his night vision goggles so at least he wouldn’t see it coming. They’d just plow into the side of a mountain and death would be instantaneous.
Jake gazed at the GPS display and compared it to the darkness. The display showed Hajjah to be fifteen miles ahead. In the distance, Jake could see a sparse smattering of lights. They were too low. Flying a glider in Yemen. At night. In the mountains. A hell of a way to die.
He thought back to all those aircraft accidents he’d investigated. The wreckage. The carnage. He never dreamed he’d be part of one himself. Of course, they were going relatively slow in comparison to the accidents he investigated in his prior life. A life that seemed so distant. And yet, it had only been seven months.
Their speed might make a crash survivable. So instead of instant death, he could expect to be maimed for life. Maybe captured alive in Yemen and tortured. Great. This just gets better every second.
The glider jolted hard. A wave of fear passed over Jake. “What was that?”
“What I’ve been waiting for.” Wiley answered. “With this wind, we’ll get to take advantage of some ridge lift. Not a lot, mind you, but enough to get us to our landing site. I’ll take it from here, Jake.”
“It’s all yours.” Jake watched Wiley gently maneuver the glider along the lift line. The altimeter started rising. The angle from the glider to the lights ahead continually increased to a comfortable margin.
“Kaplan, you doing okay?” Wiley said.
“No sweat.” Kaplan said. “I’m probably a good hundred feet above you now.”
“Yeah.” Jake said. “You think it’s due to less body weight?”
“I have a visual on the landing site.” Wiley announced. “Kaplan, can you confirm a visual?”
“Yes sir. In sight.” Kaplan said. “But I’m too high so I’m going to swing a little wider and line up for a straight-in.”
“That’s fine. Just don’t get too far out.” Wiley said.
“No sir.” Kaplan said. “I’ll keep it a little high and slip it in if I need to.”
Jake was nervous. How good was the old man, he wondered? It didn’t take him long to find out.
With expert precision, Jake watched the old man bank the glider on a final approach to the landing site. With his NVGs on, the site looked small — too small an area to safely land the glider.