EndWar

There in the darkness of a dark, damp alley in Moscow lay his old friend Zack with a gaping bullet hole in his head.

Zack’s eyes snapped open. “Vatz, man, it’s not so bad here. If you want, we could hang out.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean you’re just delaying the inevitable. Those boys from the Tenth probably won’t get here in time. Maybe you’ll weaken this recon force, but once their BMPs come rolling down, you guys are all dead. Unless, of course, you run for it.”

“We won’t leave these people.”

“I know. So I guess I’ll be seeing you soon.”

“Sergeant!”

Vatz took a deep breath, heard the sound of an engine.

“Sergeant?” cried Band-Aid.

Vatz snapped awake with a chill. He immediately hoisted the captain in a fireman’s carry, then rushed around the corner, toward the street, where a pickup truck was waiting.

TWENTY-NINE

Sergeant Raymond McAllen, Sergeant Scott Rule, and Khaki rushed up to the idling Ka-29. McAllen held up the grenade, as Khaki had suggested.

Meanwhile, Rule was on the other side of the helo, pointing his weapon at the co-pilot on the other side of the canopy.

Both pilots were in their late fifties and seemed more annoyed than scared. They raised their hands, and McAllen motioned for the pilot to go to the back, open the bay door.

“You smell that?” cried Khaki. “That’s fuel.”

The pilot reached for the side door and inched it open, just as McAllen seized it, glanced up, and aimed his SIG P220 pistol, screaming in Russian, “Don’t move!”

With a gun to his head, the pilot was most accommodating, and McAllen climbed up into the helo, took the pilot’s sidearm from his holster, then motioned him back toward the cockpit.

“Something’s wrong with this helo,” hollered Khaki.

McAllen ignored him for now. “Rule, get everybody else in here,” he ordered his assistant. “Khaki, come on up, get in the co-pilot’s seat. But I don’t think you’re flying.”

After ordering the co-pilot to turn over his sidearm, McAllen moved back, allowing Khaki into the cockpit. The co-pilot vacated his chair and slowly headed into the troop compartment, Khaki’s pistol trained on him until Rule got back inside and took over.

McAllen and Khaki donned headsets, then Khaki spoke quickly to the pilot in Russian, his language skills even better than McAllen’s. In fact, the two spoke so quickly that McAllen only picked up a word here and there.

“All right, he doesn’t care, he’ll fly us where we want to go so long as we don’t shoot them, but it’s no coincidence they were just sitting here.”

“How bad?”

“He says they’re having trouble with the gear. And there’s an electrical problem along with a fuel leak somewhere. Remember, these Russians have some new gear, but the old stuff is very old.”

“So we just got into a flying bomb.”

“Pretty much.”

McAllen lowered his voice, even though he didn’t need to. “Don’t tell the other guys.”

Khaki winked and said, “We’re screwed.”

“Less screwed than before. At least we got a ride now. How’s the fuel?”

“They filled it up before leaving Behchoko, but we’ll find out just how bad this leak is.”

McAllen spoke slowly to the pilot, asking him more about the fuel problem.

The pilot threw up his hands, shrugged.

Bastard wasn’t telling.

“It’s about a two-hour ride up to your pilot’s last known coordinates,” said Khaki. “We might make it there, but if we don’t refuel, this won’t be our ride home.”

“Just get us there. My CO’s working on the rest.”

Friskis, Gutierrez, Palladino, and Szymanski piled into the bird, and Rule shut the door behind them.

Then the assistant team leader rushed up, slapped a hand on McAllen’s shoulder, and shouted in his ear, “Do we have to take the co-pilot?”

“No, you’re right. Good call. Ditch him.” While Rule took care of that, McAllen ordered the pilot to take off.

The rotors began to kick up as Rule shoved the co-pilot outside, then slammed shut the door.

After jogging a few yards away, the co-pilot whirled around and raised his middle fingers.

“He’s not happy!” Rule cried.

“He’s lucky we didn’t shoot him,” added McAllen.

As the engine began to roar even louder, and the floor began to vibrate, McAllen grabbed onto the back of the pilot’s seat as the gear left the ground.

“This helo is a piece of crap!” shouted Rule.

McAllen smiled darkly. “But it’s all ours!”

While Khaki ordered the pilot to bank away and head north, McAllen wrestled with the idea that they could use the helo and its weaponry to assist the SF guys.

What a surprise that would be, seeing a Ka-29 swoop down to take out Spetsnaz infantrymen on the ground, not Canadians and Americans.

But they didn’t have the fuel, might need the weapons later on, and there was always the chance that they could be accidentally taken out.

So there it was. Despite the pure, unadulterated frustration, they would stick to the plan.

Of course, those Special Forces boys weren’t about to let him live down that decision. “Outlaw One, this is Black Bear, over!”

“Go ahead, Black Bear.”

“Is that you in that Russian helo, over?”