Following the DEA jet through his field glasses, Lieutenant Colomo saw the flash of impact. His soldiers cheered, their rifle fire dying away as they saw the rocket slam into the plane of the gringo assassins. The sound of the exploding warhead came an instant later. Lieutenant Colomo kept his binoculars focused on the plane.
Bits of metal fell from the fuselage. Smoke came from the right engine, the line of black tracing the descent of the plane toward the mountains. The wings of the plane wobbled as the doomed pilot struggled for control. Only when the plane fell behind a distant ridgeline did the lieutenant lower his binoculars.
The radio man called out to him. "Colonel Gonzalez wants the coordinates. He has the helicopters ready."
Lieutenant Colomo ordered his soldiers to the trucks, and they scrambled up the bumpers to congratulate the men who had launched the rockets. He allowed them their few minutes of celebration as he spoke with the colonel on the secure-frequency radio. The radio had been provided by their Argentine advisors to prevent the monitoring of communications between units on "special assignments."
"Sir! The plane is down."
Through the coding and decoding circuits of the radio, the colonel's voice sounded electronic, inhuman. "What are the map coordinates?"
"I do not have the exact coordinates yet. The plane crashed in the mountains."
"Are they all dead?"
"I do not know. One missile hit the plane and it went down burning. I will report again when we locate the wreckage."
"I am dispatching the helicopters immediately. What was the compass heading of the crash from your location?"
Lieutenant Colomo plotted the direction on his map and gave his commander the bearing.
"Is there any possibility," Colonel Gonzalez asked, "of a crash landing? Are there landing strips in that area?"
"No, sir! They went into the mountains. There is no hope for them."
"And you saw no parachutes?"
"No, sir!"
"And no radio calls, no distress calls?"
"They had no time for that. One moment they were flying, and the next moment they fell from the sky. They died alone and lost. Perhaps they will never be found. Planes disappear in those mountains."
The colonel laughed, the sound electronic and strange. "We will find them. Or what remains of them. We will burn what is left and bury the ashes. Then they will truly be the lost, the disappeared."
7
Fuselage shuddering, an out-of-balance turbine disintegrating in a continuous screaming, shattering roar, the Lear lost altitude. Automatic alarms whined from the instrument panel. Davis struggled with the yoke in one hand while he threw switches in a desperate effort to somehow compensate and maintain control for a few more seconds. The sky disappeared, a rocky mountainside loomed ahead. Lyons turned in the copilot's seat to shout back to his partners, "Strap yourselves in! We're going down!"
"No shit!" Gadgets shouted back. "Glad you told me! Put out a Mayday! A Mayday!"
As Lyons fastened his own safety harness, the disintegrating turbine died. The drone of the other engine continued, but with the damaged engine shut down, the plane seemed suddenly quiet. Lyons heard wind rushing through the plane. He felt the descent slow.
"Where's the radio?"
Davis didn't answer, didn't take his eyes from the desert and mountains. The mountainside went horizontal as Davis managed to bank the jet through a slow left turn. He jerked an emergency lever and leaned against the windshield to look back. Lyons looked back and saw jet fuel stream from a wing, the fuel instantly becoming a mist, then vaporizing.
Flipping a switch, Davis jerked the microphone from the instrument panel and passed it to Lyons.
"Just say 'Mayday, one hundred miles east of Obregon.' Keep repeating until we hit."
The plane maintained a slow controlled descent parallel to the mountain. They flashed over a ridge-line and Lyons saw the mountain curving away into the distance. Ahead lay a wide, flat plateau covered with mesquite and yucca and dry brush.
But beyond the plateau a range of cliffs and steep mountainsides walled the horizon. The plane did not have the power to gain altitude. They had only a few more seconds of flight.
Lyons chanted into the microphone, "Mayday, one hundred miles east of Obregon. DEA plane going down one hundred miles east of Obregon. We were hit by rockets fired by the Mexican army. One hundred miles east of Obregon. Repeat, we were shot down by Mexican army. Repeat, Mexican army."
In a gorge below, centuries of flash floods raging down from the mountains had formed an alluvial fan of sand and tangled brush. Davis eased the yoke slightly to his left, aiming the nose of the jet for a flat expanse of sand. To the right, a gully cut straight down from the gorge to the desert floor.
"This is it!"
"DEA plane going down one hundred miles east of Obregon. Shot down by Mexican army using SAM-7 missiles. We're going down..."
Davis reversed the power of the remaining engine, jamming the throttle past maximum. The plane lurched and shuddered with the deceleration. The sand and mesquite of the alluvial flat became a blur.
Metal shrieked. Lyons saw mesquite branches flashing past the nose of the jet at a hundred miles an hour and then he pulled his legs up and shielded his head in his arms. The plane jumped and slammed over the flat for an eternity of noise and shocks.
Finally it ground to a halt. Silence.
"Move it!" Davis shouted. "Get everyone out. We've still got fuel in the tanks. Get out!"
Lyons saw swirling dust beyond the spider-webbed windshield. He took a deep calming breath and checked himself for injuries. No blood, no broken bones. His joints moved. He found hair and bits of bloody skin under his fingernails. His own.
Davis crowded past him. Lyons unbuckled his straps and followed the pilot into the passenger cabin. Davis leaned over Gadgets and helped him with his seat belt. The Able Team communications and high-tech specialist had blood on his face.
"I'm okay, I can do it. Why didn't you radio those army guys that we were good guys?"
"He did," Lyons told his partner. "They knew this was an American DEA plane. They were waiting with SAM-7s. It was an ambush."
"What a world. Where's my gear?"
"Don't worry about it!" Davis shoved him toward the door. "Get out of this plane before it burns."
"Don't panic!" Gadgets said, trying to calm the pilot. "You did great. You're an ace. We lived through it. Now get all the gear out."
Blancanales and Coral struggled with the door release. Blancanales jerked the handle around, then Coral kicked the door until it swung open. Dust swirled into the cabin. Coral stepped out.
"No hay fuego!" the Mexican called in to Blancanales. "Alli esta la gasolina pero no prende."
"Bring everything to me," Blancanales called out to his partners. He passed one of the shipping cases to Coral outside. "Pilot. You go out there. Help Miguel get the equipment away from the plane."
Working together, Able Team emptied the plane of their gear in less than a minute. Davis shouted from outside, "The wing's leaking fuel! Get out of there! You could burn any second!"
Gadgets, his face caked with blood and dust, slipped on his aviator-style sunglasses and stepped out into the desert brilliance. He snapped a salute to Davis.
"Be cool, Mr. Wizard's on the scene."
Blancanales, then Lyons followed their partner out. They ran with their cases through the tangles of mesquite and desert weeds. Stepping into the gully, they slid down the sand walls and assembled at the bottom.