“Lieutenant Siegel tells me that all your paperwork has already been filed. Your selected beneficiaries will receive the proceeds from a CIA life insurance policy equal to your military policy, in case some of you don’t make it back. For those of you who do choose to go, you will be temporarily removed from the Armed Forces’ records until you get back. As far as the outside world is concerned you do not exist. As far as the U.S. Government is concerned you do not exist. Any questions?” He paused. “All right. Carry on, Lieutenant.”
“All right, people!” Siegel said. “You heard the general! Everyone outside. Those of you who are coming along line up behind your gear. The rest back to the barracks. Fall out!”
Ortiz and the others got up and headed outside. As he reached for his Ray-Ban Wayfarers he noticed that every single member of Mambo stood at attention behind his packed gear. Ortiz’s chest swelled and he raised his chin. He was Mambo, the best of the 7th U.S. Special Forces Operational Detachment Delta. He snapped to attention next to Zimmer as Siegel and Olson came outside followed by the civilians. Olson looked at Siegel and then eyed the troops.
“Make us proud. Good luck.”
“Thank you, sir,” responded Siegel as he did an about-face and scanned the platoon. “Let’s move it. Fall out! Everyone grab your gear and get in that truck. Move it!”
Ortiz followed the line of soldiers walking across the tarmac to a waiting truck. Things were happening too fast. He felt carried away by the emotion of the moment, by the possibility of combat. He’d always heard that when the call came, there was hardly any time to react, hardly any time to think. Trained instincts, honed to a fine edge by Mambo, took over. He now understood the reason behind the exhaustive drills, the constant hell he and his fellow soldiers were exposed to daily in the inhospitable jungles of Panama. It had prepared him for this moment, for what his country now needed him to do. Ortiz smiled. He felt ready, capable, qualified to do the job, but the smile quickly vanished from his face. Although his instincts told him he was prepared, his logical side told him to beware of overconfidence, not to underestimate the enemy. Ortiz had learned two important lessons in the barrio. First, never underestimate the enemy. Always expect the unexpected. Second, do the unexpected, surprise the enemy, avoid predictability. Anyone who consistently followed his credo increased his or her chances of survival tenfold.
Ortiz jumped last into the back of the truck, pulling the tailgate up behind him. The truck started and headed down to the ramp. The trip took less than a minute. Ortiz didn’t even have time to get comfortable.
“Fall out!” Siegel screamed as he came around the back.
Ortiz and Zimmer pushed the tailgate down and jumped off, hauling their gear. Ortiz looked over his right shoulder and stared at the blurry shape of the light-gray Lockheed C-141 StarLifter parked a few hundred feet away. The scorching plume of the four large turbofans, combined with the hot air rising off the blistering tarmac, made the StarLifter a wavy mirage in the sun, but Ortiz could still make out the open paratrooper door at the aft end of the cabin. A military police jeep carrying the CIA contingent rushed past them and stopped next to the aircraft.
“All right, let’s go!” Siegel screamed.
Ortiz picked up his gear and followed Zimmer toward the waiting craft.
Cameron got out of the jeep and watched the line of soldiers approaching the StarLifter.
“So, what do you think of Mambo, Cameron?” asked Pruett from the passenger side.
Cameron glanced at his superior, then at Marie sitting in the rear seat, and back at Pruett. “They look young and unseasoned. None of them have experienced real battle before. Not even their commanding officer.”
“General Olson seems to think they’re the best.”
Cameron sighed. “We’ll see.” He continued to stare at the soldiers now climbing inside the aircraft. The sight brought back memories. Funny, he thought.Some things never change. Regardless of how much military technology advances, the real work is still done by the grunts.
Nothing could replace boots on the ground for this type of mission. No fancy helicopters, armored vehicles, or fighter aircraft. The soldier in the field was the one who got the job done, Cameron firmly believed. He had learned that lesson in Vietnam. Sure, Air Force planes came in low and dropped load after load of napalm to clear the way for the advancing troops, but a hill was not assumed captured until the infantry took it.
As the last of the soldiers disappeared behind the opened paratroop door, Cameron felt the old adrenaline rushing through his body — the uncertainly, and the fear of battle — a unique feeling experienced only by those who participated in war. But beneath it lay grief, sadness. Boys would die today.
“Ready, Cameron?”
Cameron shifted his gaze back to Pruett and Marie.
“Yep. Let’s go.”
The three followed the soldiers into the plane.
The ear-piercing sound thundered through the entire vessel. Kessler jumped up and hit his forehead against the ceiling of the horizontal sleeping station. He felt momentarily disoriented. His head stung and his ears still rang, but not from the explosion. Alarms now blared in the flight deck as interior lights flickered off and on.
Now what?
Kessler bolted from the mid-deck up to the flight deck, where after a brief scan he realized the seriousness of their situation. The control panel warning lights indicated that two fuel cells had failed. Lightning had a total of three fuel cells. During peak and average power loads, all three cells came on line; during minimum power loads only two fuel cells were used. A profound sinking feeling rushed through Kessler. Lightning’s fuel cells generated electricity through the electrochemical reaction of liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen. Each fuel cell had its own set of oxygen and hydrogen tanks, and an independent combustion chamber. Coolant flowing through the fuel-cell stack controlled the temperature inside the chamber. As the coolant left the stack, Lightning’s General Purpose Computers measured its temperature. No alarms or warning lights came on as long as the coolant temperature remained between 170 and 240 degrees Fahrenheit. The warning lights told Kessler that the cells somehow had overheated. The explosion that followed had not only destroyed the fuel cells, but had also resulted in the loss of all the oxygen from the tanks that supplied the damaged fuel cells, the same oxygen used by Lightning’s life-support system.
Puzzled that the GPCs hadn’t automatically shut down the overheated cells to prevent an explosion. Kessler quickly switched from the two damaged cells to the third fuel cell, which they’d been holding in standby mode. The lights inside Lightning stabilized. Kessler knew that one fuel cell operating alone could not adequately power the on-board environmental-control and life-support system. The system was composed of three main subsystems: the atmosphere-revitalization subsystem that controlled the crew module’s atmospheric and thermal environment; the food, water, and wastewater subsystem; and the active thermal-control subsystem, which maintained Lightning’s sensitive electronic components within manufacturer-specified temperature limits.