Buchanan turned around and looked down and back from the cockpit. What he saw made him realize the helicopter might roll over on landing. The entire wheel and structural mounts were missing. Fuel streamed along the underside of the S-70’s fuselage, vaporizing as it departed the tail assembly.
The copilot donned a headset, then switched to “hot mike,” freeing his hands. “Major, we’re in for a rough landing.”
“Yeah,” Buchanan said grimly, inspecting the damage, “if we have anything left to land.”
The coast was only minutes away for Scarecrow One and her crew. Buchanan glanced quickly at his engine instruments, still overtemped, then looked at the small chart strapped to his thigh. The map was highly detailed, narrow, and folded accordion style to facilitate monitoring.
Buchanan’s flight path was clearly defined, including known obstacles circled in dark rings. The chart extended only five nautical miles on either side of the planned egress route.
“How close are those—” Buchanan was cut off as another missile flashed by the right side of the helicopter. The pilot punched the chaff button again, then watched the missile arch into the ground with a brilliant flash and explosion.
“Ho, Sweet Jesus,” Buchanan swore out loud. “How close are those bastards?”
The copilot leaned out the side door as far as he dared, holding onto the overhead. The windchill was rapidly numbing his appendages, and he couldn’t see clearly in the haze of snow whipping by his frozen ears. “Can’t tell for sure. Maybe a half to three-quarters of a mile.”
Buchanan looked at his chart again, then casually spoke to his new copilot-gunner. “Well, I guess now is a good time to let ’em close up.”
“What?” the young pilot responded, shocked by Buchanan’s intention. They would surely die if the Russian gunships got any closer. “You gotta be kiddin’, Major.”
Buchanan checked his chart again, adjusted the cockpit map light, then dropped the nose of his gunship to descend even lower into the black, snowy night.
“Just watch,” Buchanan answered the bewildered copilot. “Stand by with the sixty, and hang on to your jockstrap!”
There was no reply as Buchanan started a turn to the right. The maneuver would allow the Soviet gunships to turn inside the S-70, closing the range between the combatants in a matter of seconds.
“Here we go,” Buchanan said soothingly, then rechecked his chart. The INS indicated only seven-tenths of a mile to the four eight-hundred-foot communications towers. Towers with many supporting guy wires fanning out in every direction.
“Come on, you Communist bastards,” Buchanan said quietly over the intercom, concentrating deeply on the task at hand. “Come to the bait.”
Buchanan looked at the INS, then glanced quickly at the knee chart. Three-tenths of a mile. Seconds away in the racing gunship.
“Be there,” Buchanan said softly as he momentarily flicked on the landing lights.
“Hot damn!” the pilot said over the intercom, while watching the INS. “Perfect!”
Buchanan stared to his right, counting. “One-thousand-one,” he said under his breath as he waited for the S-70 to be precisely abeam the towers.
“One-thousand-two,” Buchanan continued, looking at the faint image of the steel towers. He could barely see the bases of the structures and their associated buildings in the blinding snow.
“One-thousand-three,” Buchanan said as he began to slowly tighten his turn around and in front of the massive towers, almost invisible under the dark, snow-laden clouds. The blinking lights on top of the tall towers were obscured in the low coastal overcast.
“Major,” the copilot shouted into the intercom, fingers flexing on the M60 trigger, “they’re closin’ in fast!”
“Good,” was the only reply from Buchanan as he concentrated on flying the arc around the tower complex. “They’ll have a real sweet surprise.”
Six seconds passed as Buchanan’s mouth turned dry. “Come on …” the pilot said to himself, beginning to have a shadow of a doubt.
A brilliant flash, followed in a nanosecond by another blinding flash, marked the end of two Russian gunships. They had flown into the first two towers and supporting guy wires.
The thundering roar of the dual explosions reached Buchanan’s ears as night turned into daylight. Wreckage from the two Hind-Ds was tumbling across the ground, igniting everything in reach, including the support buildings.
“Goddamn,” the copilot yelled, inadvertently firing a short burst into the towers speeding past one hundred feet away. “You knocked two of th—”
A deafening report interrupted the copilot.
Another Soviet gunship, the crew shocked and blinded by the first two explosions, flew into the guy wires of the fourth tower. The third explosion added flaming wreckage, raining down with secondary explosions, to the huge conflagration enveloping the complex. The tall towers were collapsing in a slow-motion ballet.
Buchanan twisted around and saw another chopper pull straight into the vertical, narrowly missing tower three, and enter the overcast at a high rate of speed.
“We’re out,” Buchanan whooped, turning back on course. He looked down at his shaking hands. “Calm down,” he said to himself, then eased off the power from the straining engines. “Stay together, baby,” he coaxed. “We’re going to make it to the ship.”
A bright flash shocked Buchanan back to the moment. “What the hell …?”
“Another one,” the copilot shouted. “Another chopper went in! Think it was the guy who pulled up in the clouds. I mean he went straight in.”
“No doubt,” Buchanan answered. “They don’t receive much instrument training.” The pilot looked back at his copilot. “Probably got vertigo in the overcast, goin’ straight up, and fell through the bottom out of control.”
“Jesus, Major.” The copilot paused. “I’ve seen a lot, but I’ve never seen anything to top this. Unreal …” the copilot remarked, then added, “I don’t see any more gunships, sir.”
“Well, we ain’t home yet,” Buchanan responded, eyes darting to the instrument panel for the thousandth time.
“Damn,” Buchanan shouted over the intercom. “We’re losin’ gas at a hell of a rate.”
The copilot, stepping over the shocked Dimitri, leaped forward to the cockpit. “Bet a line got punctured when we took the hit.”
“Yeah… Shit!” Buchanan swore again, mentally calculating the distance to the recovery ship compared to fuel-loss rate. The gauges were dropping rapidly.
Dimitri clamored to his feet, then approached the cockpit. “Sir?” Dimitri asked tentatively.
Buchanan, having forgotten about his passengers, was startled by the agent.
“Yeah,” the irritated pilot said in a harsh tone, “what can I do for you?”
“Sir, I need … I have been ordered to send a priority message to the White House, or …to the Central Intelligence Agen—”
“Christ,” Buchanan interrupted tersely, “which is it?”
“I guess I better send it to the White House,” Dimitri stammered, still shivering.
Buchanan leaned closer to his copilot. “You gotta be kiddin’ me. This guy was a CIA agent in Moscow?”
The copilot cracked a small grin, then busily strapped himself into his seat.
“We’ll send it Top Secret, scrambled.” Buchanan looked over at Dimitri. “Best we can do from the helo.”
“Yes, sir,” Dimitri replied earnestly. “That will be great.”
The young agent was exhilarated at being alive, but deeply saddened by the death of his friend, Steve Wickham. Dimitri knew he would have died, on more than one occasion, if it had not been for Wickham. The senior agent had sacrificed himself for the Kremlin operative.
“What’s the message?” Buchanan asked Dimitri.