Parallelogram : Day Two : Chapter 84
Five Days, Five Hours, Fifty Minutes
Shaking his head, Ramsey refused to believe it: here he was … back in the air again. Gripping the strap from the ceiling overhead, he watched through the port window as the vast white plains soared by not far below the Havoc. To his right stood two of Nash's soldiers with Nolan Murphy, and two his left were Trace Hightower and the other two men. Yuri had radioed – only a few minutes ago – that the advance ground force were taking limited gunfire. As predicted, snipers were positioned along Zulu's northern edge. From his Mi8 Hip, the Russian guessed that not one but two gunmen were on point. With the distance that would need to be covered between the opposing sides, he confirmed that two were more than adequate to keep the soldiers away. If the first gunman went down, the second would clearly step up his efforts. In any event, Zulu appeared impenetrable by land. All that was left was the Havoc and her mission.
Squeezing past the other men, the director made his way to the archway separating the rest of the craft from the cockpit. Svetlana Ivanov stared straight ahead, piloting her helicopter closer and closer to the drifting snow.
"You may want to give us a little more breathing room," he advised.
"I don't want to show on their radar," she argued.
"I don't want you to plow this bird into a snow bank."
She smiled back at him. "Mr. Ramsey, back home I am called 'The Hummingbird.' Have you ever watched a hummingbird fly, no?"
"I have."
"Then you should relax, American," she teased.
Yuri was right. She was one helluva pilot. She was also confident. Ramsey only hoped that she wasn't too confident.
"All right," he conceded. "But you might want to come in with your nose down, Hummingbird. It'll give you a better look of the compound. Watch out for any gunmen who may've taken a position on any of those roofs."
Turning her face forward again, she relied, "You worry about your men. I will worry about my Havoc … if it becomes necessary."
They soared over the airfield's safety fence, and Svetlana did as he had suggested. She dropped the nose of her Mi-28 down and swooped in over a few parked aircraft, barely scraping past the communications tower.
Over her shoulder, she cried, "Prepare the doors!"
Shuffling back into position, Ramsey reached up and grabbed Murphy by the shoulder. As the doors were thrown open and the gush of air cried, he leaned closer to the Secret Service agent and said, "Nothing fancy, soldier! You get down there! You give us the clear sign! You get Hightower to cover! And keep your head down!"
"Yes, sir!"
The space around them darkened quickly, and the director realized that Svetlana had performed her requisite task with great ease. She slipped the chopper with grace – like dropping a coin into a slot without kissing the metal – and she leveled out the descent. Once she brought the vehicle to a stop, she yelled, "In position!"
"Go!" Ramsey cried. "Go!"
Before he could turn to watch, Hightower was over the edge. The director poked his head out of the doorway, and he saw the President's son-in-law flying toward the ground. Gritting his teeth, he finally exhaled when the found the man slowed to a halt in what clearly must've been inches above the concrete.
"Damn," he mumbled, "that boy's good."
Murphy touched down one second later. Throwing the rope loose, he quickly pulled the assault rifle one of Nash's men had supplied, and he started for the corner of the nearest hangar. He was there in a flash, craning his head left and right, and then he turned back to the helicopter. He held up his hand, gave them a thumbs up, and …
… then Ramsey saw the tip of a rocket launched at them from an alcove between two buildings opposite them!
"Get us up!" he screamed toward the cockpit. "Get us up!"
Svetlana had already seen the weapon's fire. She pushed down hard on the stick, and the Havoc lurched upward and to the right side. In the bay, all of the men grabbed their respective straps, and then Ramsey realized that they were leaving Murphy and Hightower behind, an outcome he had promise Chief of Staff Stoddard would never come to fruition.
Pointing toward the approaching rooftop, he ordered the soldiers, "Go for the tops, boys!"
Despite the thunder of the rotors, even Ramsey heard the whoosh of the rocket sail underneath the carriage. One soldier leapt from the Havoc, and he pounded down onto the hangar's roof, his legs folding, his body rolling across the surface. A second soldier soared out across the open space as a wave of heat and ash – the rocket had struck the building and exploded – overtook them. Waving his hand in front of his face, Ramsey leaned toward the cockpit and shouted, "Svetlana, please tell me that your guns are loaded!"
"This bird can sing!" she cried.
"Then let that sonuvabitch have a song!"
Dipping the nose again, she gripped the firing arm, and the front cannon erupted with a hot, bitter stream of lightning lead. The director dropped to the floor, hanging his head out the door to glance down at the intended drop point. Murphy was running – with arms pumping – back toward Hightower. Ramsey saw another flash out of the corner of his eye – a second rocket had launched – but the agent dove through the air, smacking into his young colleague, and the two hit the ground hard as the missile trailed smoke over their fallen bodies, whisked beyond the buildings, and found impact with a snow mesa beyond the airstrip. The explosion rocked even the Havoc, as Svetlana dipped even closer toward the ground, her guns spitting and belching into the dark space where she now was certain her enemy stood. Sparkles of ricocheting bullets lit up the hiding space, and she saw the two soldiers – only two of the secret strike team – as they were torn into bloody halves with startling efficiency.
Somebody turned the lights on, Ramsey realized, as the Havoc finally pulled into the open space, beyond the safety of the alleyway between the two hangars, and he glared out into the bright open airfield to find that the black Apache helicopter was hovering there, waiting for them, anticipating the chance to deliver a massive killshot at any furious second.
"SVETLANA, GET US OUT OF HERE! GET US OUT OF HERE!"
He heard the crack of large weapon's fire. A missile had been leased. Reaching out, he took the other two soldiers under his arm instinctively, pulling them to the floor as he felt the Havoc under him lurch with deftness to the left. They might die from a missile, but he sure as hell wasn't going to allow any man to fall overboard.
That's when he caught a glimpse of fire bursting from behind the Apache, showering off her tail. The missile was meant to cripple an aircraft, but it wasn't intended for the Havoc.
"YURI!"
The Mi8 soared into view. Its cannons opened fire – blazing white saucers of metal death – and the Apache swung about quickly, its pilot obviously trying to draw a bead of his attacker.
Like the hummingbird of her namesake, Svetlana continued with her hard left, gracefully circling her Havoc around, dipping her nose, and then stopping on a dime, with the Apache in her primary gunsight.
"LEAVE MY FATHER ALONE!' she screamed.
Ramsey heard the cannons, and he reached up to cover his ears. He rose, and, through the port, he watched as the Apache suddenly ignited from the hail of bullets and then exploded, its hull cracking in half, its rotor buckling, fire pouring through each of its seams. The wreckage hovered in the open air for a half-second, and then broke apart, rocketing in every conceivable direction, and raining down over the nearest hangar and the solid concrete. What was left of the covert weapon crashed to ground, thundering to rest under the crackling flame.
Quickly, Svetlana glanced backward over her shoulder at him. "Is everyone okay?" she asked.
He nodded. The director wiped the sweat from his forehead. He felt his heart pounding in his chest. Taking an overhead strap in hand, he said, "Well, that didn't quite go as planned." Studying her expression, he added, "What the hell do you call that in Russia?"
She smiled. "Improvisation."
END of Chapter 84
