by Dalton Fury
The hard impact bounced the Bluetooth from her ear and threatened to knock her unconscious. She slowly rolled to her back. Blood ran down her forehead from underneath her blond bangs, blurring both eyes. Blinking rapidly to clear her vision, she fought to stay conscious as she stared into the clear blue sky. Shaking her head, unable to focus on anything in particular, she barely made out a small white plane, very small, like the hobby toys she thought of earlier, buzz the two buildings only fifteen or so feet off the ground directly above her.
Hawk felt the hands of two North Korean soldiers clamp to her ankles. She tried to kick free but the grips were viselike. They began shuffling backward, dragging her back across the line, into the North Korean sand. Hawk dug her hands into the gravel, but unable to hold purchase, she was at the mercy of the two stronger men.
She struggled, determined not to go easy, and tried to roll left, then right, hoping to break their grip. Hawk felt them yank hard on both legs as if they timed it perfectly. Her head slammed into the concrete curb’s corner edge on the gravel side. She felt for the wound. Broken skin. A deep gash.
That’s it. I’m done!
* * *
Breaker Four-One dove from its approach altitude like a monster roller coaster cresting the scary apex, the part of the track where it feels as if someone just ripped your heart from your chest. Leading the four-ship formation, Kolt’s helo hugged the ground as it maneuvered NASCAR fast just over the rotor wash–beaten trees.
The midday sun cast a menacing shadow on the yielding poplars, pines, and happy mounds below, clearly outlining the Killer Bee’s bubbled cockpit and tail boom as it sped to the target area. The distinct smell of human waste and muddy water filling the foot-deep rice paddies laid out in the fertile soil as far as the eye could see reminded Kolt of a string of portable shitters serviced by a battalion of marines in Kandahar.
By the angle, Kolt could make out the dangling lower legs of the two operators on the opposite side pods, Slapshot in the front with his ankles characteristically crossed and straddling the pod like a mechanical bull. Behind him, sitting sidesaddle, Kolt knew, was Master Breacher Digger. He wasn’t tough to spot, as the shadow of his narrow titanium prosthesis contrasted with the human form of his left calf.
Kolt turned back around and looked off in the distance past the thick poplar trees . Maybe a klick away at his nine o’clock, Kolt spotted where he knew the 72-Hour Bridge sat, the hallowed ground notorious for the ax murders of 1976. That incident was the impetus for the concrete pad between the blue buildings and the enforcement of the dividing line.
Now looking back in the direction of flight, Kolt spotted the large three-story Peace Hall, and farther, maybe another two hundred feet distant, the unique oriental-flavored roofline of the larger Freedom House. The highly buffed and polished concrete walls and custom glass windows in each were the pride and joy of South Korea and were considered engineering marvels. Not much had changed since he had visited the JSA many years ago.
Kolt reached up for the coiled black radio cable, traced his gloved fingers upward, feeling the connection between his MBITR and the electrical communications port embedded inside his SWAT black M50 protective mask. He pushed the male lead in again, expecting to take up the slack, but pleased the connection was solid. Communicating from under a gas mask, particularly if your audio amplifier was spotty, or cable connection loose, made for a cluster fuck on target.
Kolt thumb-pressed the mike, felt the marble-size voice meter with his lips, and spoke into the mini microphone. He knew it would be a miracle if all sixteen Noble Squadron members would clearly hear his call.
“We’re here to grab Hawk, nothing else. MAULs only, stay on the pods, nobody get off.”
Leading the formation of four MH-6M Little Birds, Kolt’s chalk had a clear view of the manicured sunken garden, a sea of blue-and-white tourist buses, and the large odd-shaped monuments below, whipping past them as they approached the target like a strong side linebacker with the perfect angle. Weeks maneuvered the lead in behind the south side of the Freedom House, and Kolt knew he was banking the three-story building would mask their approach as long as possible. Kolt tapped his Salomon assault boots together several times, pushing blood flow and ensuring his feet hadn’t fallen asleep.
Kolt turned around, looked to his six, past his hooked-in squadron communicator JoJo, and watched chalks two, three, and four pull hard right out of the staggered trail right formation, disappearing one at a time from his view, posturing for the aerial flanking maneuver.
Stop processing and start operating.
Kolt turned his HK over, two-fingered the charging handle, pulled it back a half inch or so, and eyeballed the ejection port.
Brass, check, weapon hot.
Kolt prayed he wouldn’t need it. A gunfight with North Korean guards was to be avoided at all costs. Hawk throwing shit at North Korean officials to protest human rights abuses was one thing, but buzzing the MDL with weapons fire was a definite precursor to World War III.
Lock and loading was the norm, he knew his squadron’s weapons were hot, but he also knew they would follow the rules of engagement and use the less-than-lethal munitions. Personally, though, Kolt wasn’t interested in another mental mistake like the brain fart he’d had on the Barrel Bomb Butcher hit in Syria, and unless the North Koreans made it hard, he wouldn’t be slinging brass.
Kolt made a conscious decision to breathe, feeling the chest area of his assault vest expand and contract. The headwind seeped between his ceramic chest plate and his combat shirt, cooling his sweat-covered pecs. He tried to relax as they approached the X, his exhales testing the de-mist properties of the smoke-colored lenses. Natural anxiety before any high-risk mission was the norm, but under a full protective mask where breathing is labored, the major worry was a fogged-up face mask. When that happened, it severely limited visibility, maybe forcing a guy to come out from under his mask, which, in a contaminated environment, was the sure-bet way to receive the ass clown award at the post mission hotwash.
Through his Peltors Kolt heard Weeks over helo common, amazed that one man could juggle multiple inputs and process what he was seeing for the first time. The skill set, talent, and cool demeanor might not be common in all army aviators, but were required in the Night Stalker ranks.
“One minute! One minute!”
Kolt keyed his assault net to relay to the boys. “All elements, one minute!”
Fuck me!
Kolt pulled the beer-can-size canister from a nylon pouch on his assault vest. He had been carrying this same Triple Phaser in his kit for months now, knowing one day he might have a good reason to shed its weight. He looked at the aluminum-colored body, identified the red lettering confirming he was holding CS gas and not a high-concentrate screening smoke that could blind the pilot, and grabbed the flimsy OD green 100 mile an hour tape quick-release tab. He tore it free and flicked it from his gloved fingers. He slipped his trigger finger into the pull ring and yanked the safety pin out, his left-hand full grip maintaining pressure on the grenade’s spoon.
“Smoke prepped, Slapshot!” Kolt said into his pro mask voice meter.
Breaker Four-One left the veiled protection provided by Freedom House’s long shadow only seconds after entering, slipped crazy close over the last parked buses, around the east side of the building, and shot head on into the bright sunlight. Kolt noticed they were eye level with the second-floor balcony and left of the giant auburn gazebo covering the Panmunjom bell. And now, Kolt indeed knew, in direct line of sight of the North Korean checkpoint perched on a low hill only a few hundred feet away.
Kolt felt the helo break, the nose rising a foot or so, before overcorrecting to nose down as if he was on a playground teeter-totter with the neighborhood bully.
“Roger, I’m purple and you’ve got the gas,” Slapshot confirmed, letting Kolt know he was holding a canister containing violet smoke.
Kolt braced as chalk one wobbled past the corner of the building. The
turbulence created by wind direction and terrain masking put the twenty-seven-foot-diameter main rotor blades perilously close to the building’s massive corner pillar. Kolt leaned his back against the thin sheet-metal skin of the aircraft, holding tight to help the pilot manipulate the pedals and control the torque, staring straight into the large glass windows just above the Freedom House front doors. He looked toward his boots and saw several brown streetlight posts seemingly flying past, inches from the bird’s tubular skids. Fleeting flashes of what Kolt knew to be South Korean, or even American troops, scattering for cover like a flash mob party busted by the law.
This is not good!
Kolt noticed he was holding his breath and exhaled slowly, trying to control his heart rate, concentrating on slow short breaths, desperately countering the anxiety inherent in assaulting under a full face mask.
Kolt heard Weeks again. “Ten seconds! Ten seconds!”
The lead helo crossed the spotless asphalt street, the white-and-yellow-painted lines a blur, before slowing to turn hard right, lifting Kolt and JoJo high in the air as the helo banked.
Feeling the Little Bird slow to line up with the correct buildings, Kolt turned around on the pod, testing every bit of his safety line’s tensile strength. Stretching his neck to see, and ping-ponging his head to find a needle-head view, Kolt hoped to get a visual on Hawk.
Weeks shot his approach and flared, forcing the 4,300-hundred-pound bird’s nose abruptly up and tail rotor toward the gravel side of the MDL. Kolt could tell the winds were adverse, quartering from the rear and driving up the power requirement and the resultant torque value needed to hold steady. They were on target, on time, but at a power setting that high an uncoordinated pedal movement, or a brief gust of wind, could drive the torque off the chart, busting the maximum continuous torque and putting them way outside the operational margin. If that happened, they might as well brace for impact. But this time, unlike the assault on the Queen Mary II in the Atlantic Ocean, the crash and burn would definitely leave a bruise.
Kolt could feel Weeks struggling to hold the hover out of ground effect as the downwash of the six-bladed main rotor assembly pounded the corrugated steel covering the open gabled roof of the three light blue buildings. Spinning at close to 375 rpms, the composite blades generated a wind pressure that threatened to tear the metal screws from their settings. Sand on the North Korean side erupted into a massive dust ball, engulfing the front half of the MH-6M, but the gravel of the South Korean side was holding in place, not affected by the rotor wash.
“I’ve got eyes on,” Slapshot sent over internal comms, “she’s just below us.”
Kolt grabbed the running end of his safety line, tug-checked it, and leaned out as far as he could to look past the skids and under the helo. He wasn’t questioning Slapshot, but had to be sure, because winging it wasn’t one of the approved contingencies.
There she was, lying on her back, arms out to her sides, her mauve top torn wide open exposing her black strapless bra. She seemed at peace, not fighting it, as if she’d frozen in time while making a snow angel at the beach. Several uniformed men were kneeling next to her, four, maybe five, all but one holding their saucer caps on their heads as the rotor wash pounded them. Kolt quickly sized them up.
North Koreans! Check!
One hatless soldier with a black pistol, aiming it right at Kolt maybe fifteen feet away, his black hair flapping violently in the down blast.
Shit!
Kolt tried to pull himself back toward the helo’s skin, hoping the guy would choke, maybe jerk the trigger just before breaking the shot. Kolt heard at least three shots fired, and twice felt the blunt trauma impact of Thor’s hammer against his level IV ceramic chest plate. The plate was heavy, a tad over six and a half pounds, but designed to stop multiple AK-47 hits. A plate sucks ass, until you fall in love with it.
Kolt buckled in pain, and his bladder released, involuntarily showering his legs with his own urine.
A nanosecond later, unable to control his voluntary skeletal muscles, he felt a sense of paralysis grab him underneath his Multicam. His grip on the Triple Phaser broke, the spoon disengaged and flew off, and the canister fell to the ground. Kolt was unable to hold on, and his ass slipped off the cornered edge of the pod. Gravity pulled him two feet below, just above the skid, his safety line the only thing still tethering him to the hovering Little Bird.
“Smoke out!”
Kolt thought he heard someone call his smoke, maybe JoJo, maybe the pilot, Weeks? Something grabbed him from behind the neck area of his assault vest, steadying him as the rotor wash turned the CS and sand violently over and over.
JoJo.
Kolt’s torso rotated as JoJo tried to pull him up, causing his body to fall to the side and turn his chest toward the helo. Kolt hugged the skids with both arms, his rifle still slung but jabbing him uncomfortably in the groin.
Kolt noticed purple smoke lifting into the air, mixing with the sand and the CS gas’s off-white shade.
Move Hawk, move!
Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted movement behind the four-blade tail rotor, back in the road. Two ranks of helmeted South Korean troops, a dozen in each, maybe more, were short-stepping toward the X. Decked out in clear face shields and larger riot control body shields, they looked like they could have been handling an Occupy Wall Street callout.
Kolt’s attention was drawn to the other pod, where he knew Slapshot and Digger were postured. A green nylon rope uncoiled past the starboard-side skid, only a few feet from him, as it fell heavily to the ground, landing only an arm’s length from Hawk’s right arm.
No! Don’t do it!
Too late.
A fast rope had been deployed and in an instant, he watched Slapshot drop to the deck. On his tail, Digger followed.
Fuck! Get down there!
Knowing he couldn’t reach his safety line snap link, Kolt reached for the straight blade cross-placed in a tan Kydex sheath on his chest, clipped on just over the American flag. He fumbled as he lifted it out and then reached behind him to catch the blade unseen on his nylon safety line.
On the ground, Hawk hadn’t moved. Kolt worried about her inhaling the CS.
He saw the tops of Slapshot’s and Digger’s helmets, the tops of their shoulders, the call sign patches, and the upper receivers of their assault rifles as they aimed them at the North Koreans. Half obscured by the rotor wash, most were now holding their hats over their mouths, rubbing their eyes frantically, victims of the CS gas.
Slapshot held his fire, appearing to cover Digger. Just then, Kolt recognized the MAUL Digger was holding, a moment before he engaged three of the closest North Koreans. Each 12-gauge less-than-lethal blunt-impact round hit them in the upper torso, the kinetic energy behind the rubber balls knocking them over like pop-up carnival ducks.
Good play, Digger!
Kolt felt the helo slipping backward, away from the sandy North Korean side. Immediately, the rotor wash lost its flying sand and the dirty color cleared out. Kolt stopped trying to cut his safety line, knowing he didn’t need to fall from the helo and add to the chaos. Pissing his pants was one thing, falling from a hovering helo was another story.
Kolt resheathed his custom Watson pocket fighter knife and turned to keep a visual on Slapshot and Digger. Kolt couldn’t tell, his vision still obscured by the smoke. It had dissipated enough, though, to reveal that the North Korean guards had cleared the area, probably crawling to cover behind the building, not wanting to deal with the volatile mix of CS gas, rotor wash, purple smoke, and rubber bullets anymore.
Slapshot, or maybe Digger, looked to have already lifted Hawk to his shoulder in a fireman’s carry. Yes, he saw Digger, heading toward the two South Korean ranks in riot control mode. Behind him, Slapshot was on a knee and bent over, appearing to pick something up. Whatever he grabbed, he shoved it in his right cargo pocket and turned to follow Digger.
Digger began to beat feet, his door-wide shoulders now square with
the MDL, Hawk draped over his non-firing shoulder. He stepped onto the concrete slab with his left foot and took his first step back onto South Korean soil with his titanium prosthetic.
Kolt watched Digger face plant, crumbling into the gray gravel. Kolt thought he heard a gunshot, but couldn’t be sure.
The leg!
Kolt saw it happen. He watched Digger’s prosthetic lower leg break away from his knee, watched him collapse, and watched Hawk heavily tumble from his shoulder.
Kolt keyed his mike to talk to Weeks. “Put us down! Down! Down!”
Kolt held his legs up above the skid as JoJo held his vest from above, allowing Breaker Four-One to set down in the center of the street, just behind the light blue MAC building and in front of the marble stairs leading up to the Freedom House. Kolt stood and reached for his snap link, unhooking as he watched JoJo do the same.
Kolt turned toward the cockpit and gave Weeks a clenched fist, the signal to hold what he had. Weeks would recognize the sign and stay in place, main rotor pumping in a ground hold, until the customer returned.
“Cover me!” Kolt yelled to JoJo while pointing to the easternmost building.
As Kolt cleared the outer edge of the spinning main rotor blades, he saw JoJo in his peripheral, moving to the closest corner of the building, the nearest spot of suitable cover and concealment.
Kolt took off, not at a dead sprint, but at a careful hurry as he approached the back side of the South Korean riot-control police.
“Make a hole!” Kolt yelled.
Kolt busted through the center of the two ranks, both hands on his HK at a low ready, and spotted Slapshot facing him on a knee. He hoped he wasn’t going to be clubbed in the back of the head with one of the riot batons, and spotted Slapshot helping Digger to his feet, both with their eyes off the North Koreans. Behind the two operators, he saw Hawk curled up in a ball but on her right side, her upper body bouncing as if she was fighting a deep cough.
