“Yes, sir.”
Pruett and Cameron headed back to the relatively small aft cabin, where Marie quietly stared at the clouds through a small circular window. There was a phone on the wall. Pruett picked it up and dialed a White House number he had committed to memory. He had hoped he would hear the President’s calm voice answering, but instead Stice came on the line. Pruett frowned.
“Yes?” said Stice.
“The team is on the ground, sir. Two hours to target.”
“Time to launch?”
Pruett checked his watch. “Just under three hours.”
“Keep me posted.”
“Of course.”
“Good-bye, Tom.”
“Good-bye, sir.” He hung up the phone and stared at Cameron.
“It’s gonna be real close, Tom. Real close.”
Pruett massaged his chest and inhaled deeply. He reached for the pack of antacids and popped two in his mouth.
* * *
Ortiz finished stowing away the canopy under a large fallen log, one end of which dipped into the waters of a swamp. The area was filled with them.
“This is just fuckin’ great, Tito,” Ortiz heard Zimmer say as he approached him. “The word from Siegel’s that most of the terrain we gotta cover’s swamp. We’re gonna be up to our necks in shit, man.”
Ortiz smiled.
“What’s so funny? You enjoy having mud bugs crawling up your ass?”
Ortiz slowly shook his head. The smile on his face remained. “No, hermano. It’s just the way you said it that’s funny. Ever thought ‘bout picking up stand-up comedy?”
“Don’t fuck with me, Tito. I’m not in the—”
“All right, people. We ain’t got all day. Move out.” Siegel ordered. “Tito.”
“Sir?”
“Take the lead. Stay thirty feet in front. Tommy, you cover his rear. The rest of you follow single file. Ten feet intervals. Got that?”
“Yes, sir.”
Ortiz stood by the edge of the swamp. It extended ahead into the darkness. Somewhere on the other side was the target. Firmly clutching his Cold Commando, Ortiz stepped into the putrid waters. His thick camouflage fatigues were instantly drenched, but somehow it felt refreshing. The black water was cool. As long as his fatigues and sturdy boots kept leeches and other bugs away, Ortiz decided, he would be all right. Ortiz hated bugs, particularly leeches. Just the thought of them made him nauseous. Slimy, shiny creatures! As a kid he used to pour salt on them and watch them shrivel up. But now he didn’t have to worry. The Army had provided him with protective clothing to keep the leeches off and keep his mind on the mission. After all, he was the point man for Mambo. He was its eyes and ears. His unit depended on him.
He looked at the swamp and drew his lips in a tight frown. Fucking leeches!
U.S.S. BLUE RIDGE
Lieutenant Commander Kenneth Crowe of the U.S. Navy had just fallen asleep when he felt a hand on his shoulder.
“Go away! Don’t give a shit who you are!”
It didn’t work. The hand remained on his shoulder. Crowe didn’t move. He was just too comfortable. This was his first real rest period after a two-day rescue exercise with the Venezuelan Navy’s newly acquired Sea Stallion helicopters, to provide quick evacuation support to the region’s offshore oil platforms in case of emergencies.
“Sorry, Commander. The Skipper wants to talk to you.”
“Ahgg, fuck him!”
“Sure, sir. But the Skipper gave me strict orders to get you on the bridge in ten minutes.”
Crowe turned over and sat up. “Dammit! What in the hell’s going on? I’ve just busted my ass for one straight week teaching those damned pilots how to fly those damned helos they just bought. This is my break. My break, and the Skipper knows that! Damn!” Hastily, Crowe got up. He wore only his underpants and a white T-shirt. “Toss me that shirt, would ya?” He picked up the pants off the floor and put them on.
“Here you go, sir.”
Crowe exhaled and grabbed the white shirt. It had his name tag on the right side and several ribbons over the left pocket. A pair of silver wings above them marked him as a naval aviator.
“Have any idea what’s going on?” he asked as he buttoned up the shirt, which was a bit too tight on the arms. His bulging biceps were slightly out of proportion with the rest of his upper body.
“Ah, no, sir. Just that I had to get you to the bridge in—”
“Yes, yes, in ten minutes.”
“Six.”
“Whatever.”
He sat on the bed and put on his shoes. “I love my job, you know,” he continued. “But every man’s got his limitations and mine are close to the edge. I need to sleep. I’m fucking exhausted!”
“Sorry, Commander, but the Skipper gave me—”
“Let’s go.”
Followed by the mate, Crowe headed for the bridge of the nineteen-thousand-pound amphibious command ship. U.S. Navy classification LCC, Blue Ridge performed a variety of surveillance jobs, including monitoring low-flying planes leaving Colombia and Venezuela in a northerly heading. Blue Ridge’s primary job was of detection only—the reason for a variety of communications aerials on the flat upper deck. Blue Ridge was not supposed to try to shoot down the planes; its job was simply to detect them.
There were two helicopters on board—two Sea Stallions, among the Navy’s largest and most powerful helicopters, capable of hauling fifty-five fully equipped troops for just over 250 miles.
There were three pilots on board. Two choppers and three pilots. That way there was always a rotation scheme worked out to prevent pilot fatigue, which was exactly what was occurring with Crowe at that very moment.
Still half asleep, Crowe yawned as he pushed open the metallic door to the bridge. He walked in and spotted the other two pilots standing in front of the Skipper, Captain John Davenport.
“What’s going on?” he asked. “I just got off duty and—”
“I know what’s on your mind, Kenny,” Davenport replied, and then he looked at the mate, who nodded, turned, and left the room, closing the door behind him.
“Sir,” Crowe persisted. “With all due respect, I am very tired and—”
“I won’t say it again, Kenny. Shut the fuck up! Blue Ridge has been called in to provide support to an ongoing covert operation. We’re supposed to extract a Special Forces team out of French Guiana in exactly one and a half hours. We’re two hundred miles away. That means we barely have time to make it there in a helo. I want to send both Stallions. One as backup.”
Crowe couldn’t believe it. Davenport was dead serious about sending him out without a break.
“Sir, please listen to me for the sake of the mission. I’m in no shape to—”
“No, dammit! No! You listen to me! See these two guys here?” He pointed to the two pilots nervously standing at attention next to Crowe. “They ain’t got shit for experience! You understand that? They’re good pilots but they’re both rookies right out of flight school. I want a veteran out there. This is the real thing, for crying out loud. I want someone out there who can make good split-second calls, and flight training doesn’t teach that. Experience teaches that. Kenny, you got the experience, and I need you out there in one of those birds. Got that?”
Crowe gave the two young pilots a quick look and took a deep breath, trying to come to terms with the simple fact that Davenport was right on the money. This was a rescue mission. He had the experience. Real experience, that is, picking up grunts from hot landing zones all over Southeast Asia, something he’d become quite good at. He nodded and stared into Davenport’s eyes. “Sir, two hundred miles each way. Our range is not—”
“We’ll refuel you in midair before you get there, Kenny. A KC-97’s on the way from Howard. You’ll intercept fifty miles off the coast. Besides, we’re steaming full spe
ed ahead toward the Guiana coast. We should be able to cut that distance to one hundred twenty miles by the time you’re ready to come back.”
Crowe frowned. The Sea Stallion’s range was only 257 miles. That meant that unless they got refueled before they went in, his craft would have no more than fifteen to twenty minutes of fuel after the pickup. “That tanker better show up, Skipper, otherwise we’re going in the drink.”
Davenport smiled. “Don’t worry. It will be there. Just make sure you’re there to meet it.”
“All right. Exactly where do we need to be…and by the way, where is the nearest coffeepot? Looks like I’m gonna be in for a long night.”
LIGHTNING
“Lightning, Houston. Wake-up call.”
Kessler rubbed his eyes as he heard Hunter’s voice coming through on the intercom system.
“We’re still here, Houston.”
“Oxygen content?”
“Still on the nominal side, but just by a dash. Looks like our original estimates were a bit optimistic. Status on Atlantis?”
“We just finished rolling it up to the launchpad. Thirty hours to launch, but you’ll get help before that.”
Kessler pulled himself out of the horizontal sleeping station and briefly checked on Jones. He was still unconscious, peacefully snoring. ‘What do you mean, Houston?”
“Our Russian friends are on the way. They should be there much faster than us. You will transfer to their space station until Atlantis gets there and we provide Lightning with enough juice to close the doors and patch up the tile problem. What’s Jones’s situation?”
“Stable, but he’s still unconscious. Any news from the spooks?”
“Ah, no. Nothing yet.”
“What are we telling the public about this? How much do they know?”
“We’re telling them the mission’s proceeding as normal and that all systems are nominal.”
“What about the fact that Atlantis is on the way?”
“A joint shuttle mission to practice emergency rescues.”
“And they’re buying that?”
“So far.”
Kessler smiled at Hunter’s response as he floated toward the food galley, where a variety of meals packed in different forms were carefully stored. He was starving.
“Well, Houston. Doesn’t sound like there’s much I can do up here but wait, so I think I’m gonna grab a bite.” He opened the food galley and roamed through the selection of dehydrated, freeze-dried foods in easily identifiable plastic containers. All he had to do was add water and heat it up. He recognized scrambled eggs, and chicken and noodles.
“Go for it, Lightning. I’ll keep you posted of any new developments.”
Kessler smiled once more and closed the lid on the freeze-dried foods. Nothing looked appetizing, and since this could be one of his last meals, Kessler decided to make it count. The next container in the galley housed irradiated foods, preserved by exposure to ionizing radiation. He found bread, rolls…and a few rib eyes—brought on board at Jones’s request. Bingo! He grabbed the plastic pouch that contained what looked like the largest of the four steaks, and heated it up by using the galley’s food warming unit, which heated food by thermal conduction using a hot plate enclosed in an aluminum suitcase. As he heated up the steak, Kessler went through the galley’s other compartments and snagged a plastic pouch of dried peaches, a plastic container with ready-to-add-water lemonade, and some chocolate chip cookies, which to Kessler’s relief were sealed in a plastic pouch but had not been dehydrated or irradiated. They had been packed in their natural form and were ready to eat.
Kessler opened the cookie pouch and took a few hearty bites, careful not to let any crumbs float away. The cookies were still fresh. He added water to the pouch containing the dehydrated lemonade, shook it to mix, and put a straw through the opening on top. Because liquids in space did not slide down the edge of a glass, all beverages had to be consumed through straws. He put the straw to his lips and sucked the light-yellow liquid. It tasted relatively good and sweet.
Kessler checked his watch and frowned. Time was running out. The seriousness of the situation began to really sink in. For the first time Kessler felt the fear of dying reaching out from within him. For some reason he had been too busy before to think too much about it, but now with Lightning’s oxygen level slowly dropping, Kessler began to wonder if they were going to make it after all…Stop it, Mike! he told himself. You start thinking that way and you just might as well put a gun to your head and pull the trigger. You are the mission commander, dammit! Act like it!
Kessler briefly closed his eyes and inhaled. He had to fight. There was no other way. If he didn’t want to do it for himself, he had to do it for Jones. Kessler owed him that much. He couldn’t let him down again.
KOUROU, FRENCH GUIANA
Frederick Vanderhoff looked outside the window and stared at the floodlit Athena V rocket nearly a mile away on the launchpad. All they needed was the right time to enter space at the appropriate window to intercept Lightning. He smiled, walked back to his desk, and grabbed a cigarette from the pack of Camels. He lighted up and took a long draw, exhaling through his nostrils. NASA was doomed. Of that he was certain. As long as the rocket reached its designated target. After that the American news media would handle the rest. By bombarding the American public with “investigative” reports, by giving new life to tales of NASA’s failures, the American news media would drive the nails in NASA’s coffin.
He shifted his gaze back toward the windows as he watched a patrol helicopter take off from the dual helipad between his building and the launchpad. He had ordered an around-the-clock surveillance of the grounds until launch time. Vanderhoff had to assume the worst, that somehow Stone had managed to reach the appropriate authorities and make known the suspicions brought to him by the former Athena scientists, before Chardon’s team silenced them. Vanderhoff was not sure how the U.S. government would react to such aggression. His logical mind told him to expect the worst, whatever that may be.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
OWNERS OF THE NIGHT
Night, when words fade and things come alive.
—Antoine de Saint-Exupery
NORTH OF KOUROU, FRENCH GUIANA
The putrid yet cool swamp had suddenly turned into a thick, muddy mass that made every step an extreme effort. Perspiration covered most of Ortiz’s face as his muscular legs burned. Rolling beads of sweat washed away the insect repellant he had rubbed on his hands, neck, and face. But perhaps it’s better to be in thick mud, Ortiz thought, recalling a section of the intelligence report that mentioned the possibility of alligators—or rather caimans, their close cousins—in the region. He had not been very pleased in reading about that, but since the chance of finding caimans went down dramatically as the swamp thickened, Ortiz was not as concerned as he’d been at first. Thus he became more focused on the mission rather than wondering about being surprised by one of the prehistoric-looking beasts.
About two hours had passed since they had landed, yet it seemed like an eternity as Ortiz struggled to move his body forward. He kept his Colt Commando pressed against his chest, left hand under the barrel, right hand by the trigger casing. The weapon was covered with a thin plastic wrap to prevent its jamming if it accidentally fell into the swamp. Just the sensitive sections were covered, providing Ortiz with enough control of the weapon to fire it at a moment’s notice.
Long gone was the soothing feeling of satisfaction he’d felt when he’d first stepped into the swamp. He forced himself to ignore the extreme burning pain in his legs as he struggled to maintain him momentum in the waist-deep waters. The night was moonless and dark, forcing him to strain his eyes as he scanned a cluster of trees twenty-some feet ahead of him. He estimated they were less than a mile from the objective. The possibility of sentries became all too real.
Ortiz had a fairly good idea
of the opposition’s force from Marie’s information, but he knew he shouldn’t get overconfident. Given recent events, security around the complex could be much tighter than she had described. Ortiz had to assume the opposition could be everywhere, more reason to be glad that night was moonless because, unless the enemy also had access to night-vision gear, Mambo would have an edge over them. Actually, Ortiz decided, that would be the second edge Mambo would have over the enemy, the first being the element of surprise. Ortiz knew the importance of that edge. Now technically inside enemy territory, Mambo operated under an important disability—they lacked a home-court advantage. Mambo’s hardware was limited to the automatic weapons each man carried plus the Javelin missiles on the two-man raft being pulled by the two trailing men. The enemy, on the other hand, could not only have hundreds of men available, but also an unlimited supply of firepower. Ortiz shook his head at the thought of their position being discovered by the enemy before the rescue helicopter arrived.
He reached the cluster of trees and twisted his body to correspond with the bends in the heavy foliage. Ortiz had never been anywhere else besides Panama, California, and the southeastern United States, but based on what he had read and what he had been told by veteran soldiers, Guiana was definitely one of the most inhospitable places on--
Damn!
He reached with his right hand and scratched the back of his neck.
Fucking mosquitos!
It had not taken long for the flying invertebrates to figure out that the repellant had washed off.
Ortiz placed the Colt under his left armpit and reached with his right hand into the Velcro-secured pocket on the camouflage gear vest he wore over his fatigues. He squeezed some repellant into his hand, stowed the tube away, and gently rubbed the cool paste all around the back and front of his neck. He frowned when he felt a few lumps already growing on his skin. His annoyance with the insect bites only compounded a growing headache. Ortiz reached for another pocket and grabbed a small plastic bag. It held six extra-strength Tylenol caplets. Ortiz popped two in his mouth and replaced the bag. He took a small sip from his canteen to swallow the caplets.
Siege of Lightning Page 21
