I Own the Dawn

by M. L. Buchman

  They might be known as the Night Stalkers, the fliers who ruled the night. But if they went down here, they wouldn’t be ruling the night for long.

  “Viper, this is Vengeance.” Major Beale, the first woman ever in the Night Stalkers, had long since proved her ability as a pilot and commander when fast decisions were needed.

  Helicopters never flew alone into combat, and tonight’s mission had paired them with Viper.

  “We’re losing a blade and running for home. Won’t make it.” Then she took one last turn, wide instead of her normal hard slam, giving Big John a final chance at clearing out the problem they’d been sent to solve. The copilot fired four rockets, and whatever they opened up, John drove home.

  The shock wave hit them hard enough that Connie half feared they’d lose the blade now.

  …Four, five, shudder. Still right on cue. Okay for the moment.

  She puffed out a breath she hadn’t known she was holding as the major turned south by southeast.

  They were through the smaller of two mountain passes while everyone on the ground remained distracted by the massive explosion that continued to roll skyward behind them. No one on the ground remembered to fire at the speeding helicopter until too late.

  “Roger, Vengeance.” The radio crackled in her helmet. “Heavy One is moving, thirty minutes.”

  Major Beale ran down the throttle to ease the load on the blade. They stayed low to avoid any stress from attempting a climb. That meant flying low through the next, dangerously well-defended pass, assuming they didn’t fold up and crash before then. With a good rotor, they’d already be straining the blades as they were flying up in high-hot limits. The combination of heat and altitude knocked the efficiency out of helicopters because the air was too thin. With a bad rotor, they didn’t dare attempt the climb out of harm’s way.

  The troops defending the pass less than a minute ahead were most unfriendly.

  Connie thumped the ammo can with her boot—barely a quarter full. She opened her gun and tossed the ammo belt loose, snaking it back into the can. She snapped down the lid and pulled out a fresh belt from a new can.

  Out of the corner of her eye she saw Big John, who sat back-to-back with her four feet away on the other side of the helo’s bay, making the same choice. Once again, they were in a sort of perfect synchronicity.

  …three, four. Not good.

  She leaned out the window to spot the pass ahead. They were down in the gut of it. Open to fire from all elevations of both sides.

  “Can I—”

  “No.” She and John cut off the major in unison, making Connie laugh—inside. No climbing, not on this rotor blade.

  Connie flipped the night-vision goggles down from the brow of her helmet. She’d raised them to give her eyes a moment of rest while switching ammunition belts. Now she needed any advantage she could find to see in the dark.

  A wash of the world gone green showed through the binocular-style apparatus. Leaning out the gunnery window to look ahead, she watched for the bright shimmer of gunfire or the sharp glow of running stick figures as fighters scrambled for position. They were there. Ten to fifteen on her side alone. And most were higher up the valley walls than they were. She couldn’t attack them, couldn’t shoot upward, unless she wanted to take out what remained of their own rotor blades. Helicopters were designed to shoot down at things, not up.

  “Major?”

  “Stop asking and speak!” Emily Beale was less steady than usual. Hard to blame her.

  Connie swallowed hard and pictured it again in her head. She saw no better answer. It was either bet on the poor aim of the many gunners ahead of them or bet that the major’s reputation as the best Black Hawk pilot in all of the US Army’s Special Operations Aviation Regiment had been earned, and not merely granted for being the first woman in SOAR.

  “A roll is a neutral-gee maneuver.” A slow barrel roll—flying straight ahead while rolling the helo over sideways, upside down, and back to right side up—actually placed minimal stress on the airframe or rotor blades, if done correctly.

  “Shit. She’s right,” John confirmed in that wonderful deep voice of his, making it sound rational as the major groaned.

  Was it an act like this by a crazy or equally desperate pilot that had killed Connie’s father? Was it too late to take back the idea and pretend she hadn’t said it?

  “John, you’ll be first. Then Connie.”

  Was this about to place her in the same unknown grave as her dad? Connie Davis. Another name on the Night Stalker monument at SOAR headquarters. A short note in a secret file: Lost. Pilot, copilot, two crew chiefs. No survivors.

  The major aimed for the right-hand wall of the pass, practically head-on. Moments before they would have hit the cliff face, the major slewed the helo back to the left. But not in a hard turn. In a long, slow roll.

  The ground was so close that they nearly thumped their wheels on the rock passing at a hundred and fifty knots. At a hundred and seventy-five miles per hour, death was only the slightest error away.

  That was the moment Connie knew for a fact that Major Emily Beale had earned her reputation for being the best. Beginning the roll so close to the cliff wall reduced their availability as a target to those on either side of the pass. And it took advantage of the ground effect—that extra big of lift when air was compressed between the aircraft and the ground—decreasing the stress on the blades. The major had accepted the idea, planned the maneuver, and executed it all on fifteen seconds’ notice.

  As the right side of the helicopter lifted, John’s gun had a clear field of fire on the cliff face flashing by. He used the precious moments to rake the walls far and wide while Connie looked straight down at the ground racing by, going weightless in her seat.

  They were so close that she watched the tips of the thirty-foot-long rotor blades swinging past sharp rock with less than a yard to spare. She pushed back into her seat, her instincts taking control and trying to shove her body one more inch from impending disaster. The static electricity of the rotors striking dust in the air glittered in her NVGs, a green arc of brilliant sparks. They were so close to the rock that the sparks looked to be inside it.

  But with air-show perfection, the major continued the roll, edging clear of the wall without striking a blade. Now upside down, Connie had a disoriented moment to spot any fire John had missed. She only tagged one on the wall racing by so closely before she faced straight up.

  In the moment of rolling silence, as she stared at the heavens, she recalled hearing John’s gun fire a few short bursts while they were inverted. That meant any remaining dirty work on the left-hand wall of the pass was going to be her issue as they rolled back to level.

  Anticipating the moment, she leaned forward and drove down the triggers the moment she saw rock instead of sky. An arc of tracer-green fire poured from the six spinning muzzles. She swept her M134 back and forth as the helo rolled, taking her aim at the cliff face flashing by in the night. Enemy rounds spattered against the airframe with sharp thwacks barely detectable over the roar of her Minigun.

  The threat detector flashed target information on the inside of her visor, and with instinct born of a thousand hours of practice, she swept the gun over position after position, cutting them apart faster than they could duck and cover.

  And then the Vengeance was through the pass. The targets were falling astern at eighty meters per second.

  Beyond the pass, the front range of the Hindu Kush mountains broke like a thousand-meter-high wave, collapsing into deep rolls and turbulent clusters. The flat horizon of desert formed in the distance.

  …two, three.

  A distance they weren’t going to make.

  “Now, Major,” John announced. There was no questioning the man, not when he used that booming deep voice.

  He was so big that it was a wonder he could cram into the Hawk’s crew chief seat, but he did. Connie had never felt short, but the top of her head would fit under his chin, comfortably. Odd
thought.

  And he was right. Now, or they were going to fall from the sky.

  “This is Vengeance. Going down. Repeat. Going down. Beacon hot.”

  It was a risk. Lately, the bad guys were getting their hands on night-vision gear. A lot of it was first-generation crap, but they wouldn’t have any trouble finding the brilliant, infrared beacon now flashing atop their helo.

  …One, two. The ground was coming up awfully fast.

  Connie glanced forward. Best not to interrupt the pilot at the moment, but she wondered at the woman’s sanity. Major Emily Beale was a SOAR legend, but they were about to become another mere footnote in the bloody history of the Night Stalkers. At her current rate of descent, they were going to dig such a deep hole in the desert that the sand might cover right over their impact crater.

  Connie braced for the crash. This one was gonna hurt. And hurt bad. Assuming she was alive afterward to feel it.

  Fifty feet up, she felt the shudder as the major yanked the collective full up and cranked the throttle wide open. A calculated gamble.

  The Black Hawk’s twin turbines groaned in protest, then over five thousand horsepower roared to life. Connie heard them go right past redline, nearly six thousand. The blades clawed the air like mad beasts. She and John chanting a mantra to the damaged blade in unison, “Hang on. Hang on. Hang on.”

  Twenty feet. Ten. Slowing, five.

  Then the blade let go. Twenty feet of laminated polycarbonate arced off into the night. Three blades remained, horribly unbalanced, but before they could turn twice more, the Hawk slammed into the sand. Not even hard enough to ram the wheels’ shock absorbers against the stops.

  The major dumped power, and the turbines collapsed from scream to cry toward moan. But not fast enough.

  Another blade broke but didn’t fly free. Folded down, it slammed against the tail of the helo, then the cockpit, then the tail again as the rotor slowed. For ten seconds of held breath, they all waited while it dragged and beat the helicopter as it spun its way to a halt. The final scraping groan of wounded metal told Connie that half the bearings in the rotor head would need replacement and probably the swash plate as well.

  “Everyone okay?”

  “We’re fine.” Big John rolled free of his harness. “Now!” he called and snapped a monkey line to the steel loop by the cargo bay door.

  Connie had to blink a few times. Was she fine? They weren’t dead. They hadn’t been killed by the failure of one of these hell-spawn machines. What next?

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  Wait Until Dark

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  I Own the Dawn

  About the Author

  USA Today and Amazon #1 Bestseller M. L. “Matt” Buchman began writing on a flight from Japan to ride his bicycle across the Australian Outback. Just part of a solo around-the-world trip that ultimately launched his writing career.

  From the very beginning, his powerful female heroines insisted on putting character first, then a great adventure. He’s since written over 70 action-adventure thrillers and military romantic suspense novels. And just for the fun of it: 100 short stories, and a fast-growing pile of read-by-author audiobooks.

  Booklist says: “3X Top 10 of the Year.” PW says: “Tom Clancy fans open to a strong female lead will clamor for more.” His fans say: “I want more now…of everything.” That his characters are even more insistent than his fans is a hoot.

  As a 30-year project manager with a geophysics degree who has designed and built houses, flown and jumped out of planes, and solo-sailed a 50’ ketch, he is awed by what is possible. More at: www.mlbuchman.com.

  The Emily Beale Universe…so far

  Also by M. L. Buchman

  * also in audio

  Thrillers

  Dead Chef

  One Chef!

  Two Chef!

  Miranda Chase NTSB

  Drone*

  Thunderbolt*

  Condor*

  Ghostrider*

  Raider*

  Chinook*

  Havoc*

  White Top*

  Start the Chase*

  Romantic Suspense

  Delta Force

  Target Engaged*

  Heart Strike*

  Wild Justice*

  Midnight Trust*

  Firehawks

  Main Flight

  Pure Heat

  Full Blaze

  Hot Point*

  Flash of Fire*

  Wild Fire

  Smokejumpers

  Wildfire at Dawn

  Wildfire at Larch Creek

  Wildfire on the Skagit

  The Night Stalkers

  Main Flight

  The Night Is Mine

  I Own the Dawn

  Wait Until Dark

  Take Over at Midnight

  Light Up the Night

  Bring On the Dusk

  By Break of Day

  Target of the Heart

  Target Lock on Love

  Target of Mine

  Target of One’s Own

  White House Holidays

  Daniel’s Christmas*

  Frank’s Independence Day*

  Peter’s Christmas*

  Christmas at Steel Beach

  Zachary’s Christmas*

  Roy’s Independence Day*

  Damien’s Christmas*

  Christmas at Peleliu Cove

  Henderson’s Ranch

  Nathan’s Big Sky*

  Big Sky, Loyal Heart*

  Big Sky Dog Whisperer

  Tales of Henderson’s Ranch

  * * *

  Shadow Force: Psi

  At the Slightest Sound*

  At the Quietest Word*

  At the Merest Glance*

  At the Clearest Sensation*

  Dilya’s Dog Force

  (formerly: White House Protection Force)

  Off the Leash*

  On Your Mark*

  In the Weeds*

  Contemporary Romance

  Eagle Cove

  Return to Eagle Cove

  Recipe for Eagle Cove

  Longing for Eagle Cove

  Keepsake for Eagle Cove

  Love Abroad B&B

  Heart of the Cotswolds: England

  Path of Love: Cinque Terre, Italy

  Where Dreams

  Where Dreams are Born

  Where Dreams Reside

  Where Dreams Are of Christmas*

  Where Dreams Unfold

  Where Dreams Are Written

  Science Fiction / Fantasy

  Deities Anonymous

  Cookbook from Hell: Reheated

  Saviors 101

  SF/F Titles

  The Nara Reaction

  Monk’s Maze

  The Me and Elsie Chronicles

  Non-Fiction

  Strategies for Success

  Managing Your Inner Artist / Writer

  Estate Planning for Authors*

  Character Voice

  * * *

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  www.mlbuchman.com

  Originally published in 2012. Re-edited 2021 for improved reader experience but still the same great story.

  Copyright 2021 Matthew L. Buchman

  All rights reserved.

  This book, or parts thereof, may not be reproduced in any form without permission from the author.

  Receive a free book and discover more by this author at: www.mlbuchman.com

  Cover Design: Melody Barber

  Cover images:

  Set of crosshair scope target © thaneeh.gmail.com

  Helicopter landing in cloud of dust © yeti88

  Sunset over volcanoes Licancabur and Juriques, Atacama desert, Chile © zhuzhu

  Beautiful young couple hugging on grey background © kiuikson

  Black Hawk Helicopter, Guyana © DoD

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