“The chopper’s lower, much lower,” Justin said.
The sheikh glanced out of a clear corner of the windshield. “Two of them.” He pushed open the passenger’s door. “First one, ten o’clock; second one, two o’clock. Seven hundred yards away at the most.”
By the time Justin slithered outside the car, Carrie had assumed a firing position, kneeling by the rear wheels of the BMW. Her C7 rifle was pointed to the sky. She was waiting for the moment when the helicopters would appear in her sight. Justin pulled his carbine’s retractable stock, adjusted its length, and set it firmly against his shoulder. Then he sat back on his right heel, two steps behind Carrie. His index finger rested on the grenade launcher trigger.
“Who knew about our meeting?” Justin shouted at the sheikh.
“Your gun dealing friends,” he replied.
The sheikh had fetched himself an RPK machine gun. He was stretched over the sandy ground, holding his fire until the helicopters drew nearer.
“My gun dealing friends are getting hammered just like us,” Justin said
A missile exploded about fifty feet away from one of the Land Rovers. A few men scurried away from the tents in all directions. Two or three of Ali’s gunmen were spraying volleys of bullets against the helicopters dropping over the valley. Two rocket-propelled grenades screamed through the sky. Their smoke exhaust tinted the sky with a grayish hue, but both projectiles missed their swift moving targets.
“Sudanese?” Justin asked.
“No clue,” the sheikh replied.
The helicopters swooped over their heads. Carrie took a deep breath and swung her rifle, following the movements of the helicopters. She squeezed a rapid burst, emptying the entire 30-round magazine. She fed the rifle a fresh clip and before the empty magazine hit the ground, she resumed blasting at the first helicopter.
Justin took a little longer before firing his single shot. He aimed about half an inch higher than the second helicopter then pulled the trigger of his grenade launcher. The high-explosive warhead whooshed toward the target. It struck the helicopter at its tail shaft, under the three-bladed rotor hub. Black smoke swallowed up the helicopter, then bright yellow flames began licking at its long brown tail.
The helicopter dropped a few feet but was able to complete a one hundred and eighty degree turn. It rushed back for a second sweep over the valley, following the other helicopter.
“Hide, hide, hide,” Carrie shouted, sliding underneath the sheikh’s car.
The sheikh kept drumming his machine gun. A torrent of bullets poured forth from the weapon against the incoming helicopters.
“Hurry up! Come here! Quick,” Justin shouted.
The helicopter rattle rose above his cries. Another missile flew out. Then came the shrill of the explosion. The warhead blew up at the base of a tall sandstone boulder. It smashed it into two large blocks ten feet away from the sheikh’s position. A downpour of rocks and sand covered him. Bullets from helicopters’ gunners began scraping away bedrock fragments around his position.
“Sheikh, Sheikh Ayman,” Justin shouted. Is he wounded? Dead?
No reply. The sheikh’s machine gun was silent.
“Is he dead?” Carrie asked.
“I don’t know.”
Justin turned around underneath the BMW, careful to avoid bumping his head against its rear axle. Bullets thumped against the doors.
“What’s Ali doing?” Justin’s eyes followed the helicopters. They had ascended over the cliffs and resembled two black dots against the background of a cotton-ball cloud. Justin had no illusions the attack was over.
“There’s three, no, four guys still fighting.” Carrie looked at the gunmen around the tents. “One Rover’s hit; a tent’s on fire. A dust cloud is around the cave… Looks like a missile landed there.”
“We need a heavy gun, an RPG will do.” Justin searched the clearing for the best vantage point. “There.” He pointed to his left toward the narrow opening leading into the valley.
Carrie followed his hand gesture. She saw a bullet-ridden Land Rover with two doors ajar. The front tires had caught fire. “Negative. Too far and too hot,” she said. “Rover by the cave is a better option.”
Justin shook his head. “We don’t know if there’s a mole in Ali’s band. Cover me.”
He began sprinting toward the Land Rover. Carrie turned her attention back to the cave. None of the gunmen scrambling by the tents were paying attention to Justin running bent at the waist. But the helicopters were taking notice. A long barrage of machine gun fire burst from the air. Bullets kicked up dirt as they struck a few feet away from him.
“Cover fire, cover fire,” Carrie shouted at Ali’s gunmen.
She blasted her rifle in rapid succession. Two gunmen followed her calls.
Justin was crisscrossing between clusters of small dunes. He rolled down a gentle slope while one of the helicopters circled over the clearing. Justin pointed his carbine toward the flying target, firing quick bursts before resuming his sprint. Seconds later, he reached the burning Land Rover.
Two gunmen lay sprawled beside it. There was nothing he could do for them. But they could still do something for him. An RPG-7 launcher was lying at the feet of one of the dead gunmen. He made sure the weapon was intact and the grenade was loaded properly at the launcher’s muzzle. Then he shouldered the grenade launcher with a swift gesture. Justin estimated the distance from the helicopter at about a thousand feet. The rotor blades and the dolphin nose shape of the fuselage were visible as his sight locked onto the closest target.
He pulled the trigger.
The grenade screamed, leaving the launcher at over three hundred feet per second. Justin’s eyes followed the diagonal flight of the warhead through the gray smoke curtain mushrooming around him from the weapon’s breech. The helicopter swung abruptly to the left. Justin bit his lip, thinking the grenade would miss its target. But the warhead hit the tail boom close to the engine mount.
The helicopter lost altitude, nose-diving into the valley. It dashed at full speed, straight for a head-on collision with the mountain ridge. A trail of black smoke followed its unstable course.
The helicopter struggled to soar up before reaching the sheer rocky walls. It seemed to succeed in scaling the two hundred feet high climb and almost cleared the entire face of the ridge. At the last moment, the two rear wheels banged against an overhanging cliff. The helicopter crashed over the peak. Black smoke clouded Justin’s view, just before an overwhelming explosion. Scorched debris from the wreckage rained over a wide area down in the valley.
Justin turned his attention to the second helicopter. Carrie and Ali’s gunmen had concentrated all their firepower on bringing it down. The helicopter began its retreat, gray smoke pouring out of its tail shaft. Its getaway flight was erratic, with constant dips and dives. He wondered if the pilot had little control over the helicopter or he was dodging rocket-propelled grenades exploding around the helicopter’s tail.
It was the latter. The helicopter rocketed high above the ridge and disappeared over the narrow pathway connecting the valley to the rest of the desert.
“The bastard escaped.” Justin let the grenade launcher fall to the ground, looking up at the empty sky.
A car engine cough startled him. He turned on his heels, drawing his Browning pistol from his ankle holster. A Land Rover stopped next to him.
“Get in,” Carrie called from the driver’s seat. A gunman was sitting in the front with her.
Justin noticed a bruise on the left corner of her lips and scratch marks on the right side of her chin.
“You’re wounded.” Justin walked to the car. “You OK?”