“Do you have it?”
The pilot spoke without turning. “Rog. Thirty seconds to pickup.”
The MC-130 skimmed above the tree line, not twenty feet above the top of the highest branches. Lutler wouldn’t be surprised if the mechanics found leaves lodged in the underbelly.
Pop pop pop pop pop!
“What the hell!”
The cockpit lights blinked, dimmed, then went completely off. The IR panel cracked, and the sound of breaking glass cascaded throughout the cockpit; smoke rolled through the air. Lutler steadied himself against the left-hand seat.
“What’s going on?”
The copilot leaned forward, his head in the maze of electro-optic sensors; screams came from the back of the craft.
“What!”
“I’ve lost GPS, all IR sensors!”
Global positioning system down? What was going on?!
“Ten seconds to pick up!”
“Can you see it?”
“Rog, rog — oh, shit! All I’ve got are hydraulics!” The pilot’s voice sounded hysterical; he reached up and snapped an array of levers. “All electronics are down! They must have used the HPM!”
“Abort, abort!”
“NO! You’ve got to pick him up. Inform Blackcave they have the HPM.”
“We can’t even navigate, reel him in! We’ll kill him — abort! Radio’s out.” The MC-130 tipped a wing to the right, barely missing the balloon. A crashing sound came from outside the right window as the wing swept into the tops of the trees. The pilot fought to keep the lumbering craft under control. “Keep it under the clouds — we’re going VFR!”
Lutler sat unsteadily back in the jump seat, his heart racing. VFR — visual flight rules. Twenty feet above the trees and zero-zero visibility. Great. Make my day.
Bruce stared in horror. The MC-130 roared over the trees, its wing scraping the topmost branches as it missed the balloon. The Combat Talon looked as if it might crash, wheel around on a wing, and impact the ground, but it straightened and flew to the east.
The cord wobbled from the near miss. Adleman kept his head rolled up in his arms.
Bruce pulled out the walkie-talkie. “Mother Hen, what’s your status? The pick up — are you coming around?” He wet his lips and surveyed the clearing. Still nothing. The clearing seemed eerily quiet. Except for the faint sound of a diesel engine, nothing drifted from the plantation.
Adleman peeked up at Bruce. It seemed to take an effort. “What …”
“Mother Hen, come in, dammit!”
Motion. Bruce caught a glimpse of something move out of the corner of his eye. “Mother Hen! Where the hell are you?!” He swung the M-16 up and kept the clearing covered.
Adleman relaxed his head, dropping back down to the soggy ground. He still held on to the Fulton cord, but his shoulders had slumped back, no longer ready for the pickup. Adleman whispered, “What … next?”
Bruce ignored him and brought the walkie-talkie to his lips, still sweeping the rifle barrel around. “Mayday, mayday! Mother Hen … anybody! Come in! Fox One — can you hear me?”
Silence.
Bruce set the M-16 down and flipped through the frequencies. Still nothing. He shook the small radio. “Come on!” Turning the gain up as high as he could, he placed the tiny speaker up to his ear. Nothing — not even a hiss. He threw the walkie-talkie aside. “So much for high tech.”
“What … next?”
Bruce scanned the area. There was still no sight of Yolanda and Pompano. Picking up the M-16, he debated what to do. He didn’t look at Adleman as he spoke. “I don’t know. If anyone’s still alive out there, we’re sitting ducks if we stay here. But if the ’130 comes back, this is the only way to get you out of here.”
“The … radio?” Adleman coughed.
Bruce placed a hand on the vice president’s chest as he continued his surveillance. “It stopped working. Water probably got to it.” Come on, he thought, think! What would the Combat Talon do — come back? But why did they break away in the first place? Did they see something on the ground?
It had been at least a couple of minutes since the MC-130 had departed. Bruce strained to hear a noise — anything — that might give him a clue as to what was going on. But all he heard was the faint chugging of the engine, and the muted dripping of water in the jungle behind them. In the distance the diesel engine coughed, then abruptly stopped. The clearing grew even quieter.
What next? He set his mouth — staying here was out of the question. Everyone on Clark probably knew where he was by now — they’d send somebody after them. But right now the highest priority was to get out of sight.
Bruce shifted the M-16 to his left hand. Favoring his ankle, he used his right hand to fumble with Adleman’s harness. “We’re going to get back into the jungle — wait things out.”
“The plane … is it coming back?”.
“Someone will.” He unfastened the harness and threw it back, pulling the vest off of Adleman. He squatted and placed an arm underneath Adleman’s arm. “Can you walk?”
“I don’t think so.”
Bruce pulled up Adleman’s pant leg and drew in a breath. The vice president’s leg bent at a crazy angle. Bruce debated if he should try to set the bone back in place but dismissed the thought. Their first priority was survival.
Barguyo scrambled down from the operator’s seat on the high-power microwave weapon. He squeezed past the dish antenna and climbed to the rear of the truck. Faint light from the house illuminated the generator, sitting dormant. Barguyo ran a hand over the generator. Nothing appeared wrong.…He unscrewed the top gasket. Maybe the fuel?
He turned and found a canister lashed to the side of the truck. Heaving the five-gallon can up, he refueled the generator and tried to restart it. Nothing. He suddenly remembered the cartoon-like operator’s manual that came with the weapon.
Barguyo lowered himself to the ground and climbed into the truck cab, rummaged through the glove box, and pulled out the manual. Flipping through pages, he came to a cartoon of a soldier refueling the generator. He mouthed the words written in large English letters: Wait Ten Minutes for Engine to Cool before Restarting.
He closed the manual and smiled to himself. And he never thought that learning English back in the barrio would come to any use.
Captain Head pulled the Black Hawk up from the tree-tops. “Did you catch that?”
Gould scanned the instruments. “Yeah. It was just like what happened back at the runway, right before our electronics crapped out.”
“Think it’s that HPM stuff?”
“Beats the hell out of me.” Gould flipped various switches back and forth. “Whatever it was, we were far enough away not to get zapped.” He shuddered. “Imagine going down in the jungle?”
Head didn’t answer. He flipped on the mike. “Mother Hen, Fox One.” No answer. “Mother Hen — come in. Have you picked up Lonestar? Mother Hen, Fox One.” He waited some seconds before throwing a glance at Gould. “I don’t like it.”
“What do you say we take a look?”
“We did it once. What if Mother Hen is keeping radio silence?”
“What the hell for? What if she got zapped by the HPM?”
“Look, Dick — I don’t care if they’ve got phasers. What if they got the ’130? They could have brought the plane down.”
“If they got them, they could get us.”