Double back am-3

by Mark Abernethy

  ‘Now or never,’ said Bongo. ‘Guard changes soon.’

  Panting for breath, they scanned for unfriendlies.

  ‘Want to check the helo?’ asked Mac, wondering if Bongo needed a key or something.

  ‘We’re all in the helo,’ snarled Bongo. ‘Or none of us are. No one gets left behind. I need Jim in the front with me. McQueen, you’re in the back, with Tommy and Jessica. You guys are the shooters, okay?’

  Tommy nodded as Bongo handed over his M16 and, falling in behind the Filipino, they stealthed to the last Black Hawk.

  The side door creaked slightly as Mac pulled it back and realised the rear load space was almost entirely filled with a tank of the bio-weapon. Moving forward, he slid back the jump-seat door that sat between the pilot’s hatch and the main door. Helping Jessica up into the jump-seat, he shut the small door and squeezed into the small area in front of the tank, and then pulled Tommy up alongside.

  Mac and Tommy checked their weapons as Bongo and Jim clambered into their places in the cockpit.

  Tension rising, Mac looked Tommy in the eye. ‘Done this before?’

  ‘No,’ said Tommy, gulping down the stress. ‘But I was a baseball player in Brooklyn – I’m prepped for anything.’

  ‘Just wait for the action, make sure you get a good shoulder behind your rifle, and don’t get out of the aircraft, okay?’ asked Mac.

  ‘Sure,’ said Tommy.

  The sounds of Bongo powering up the avionics and muttering his instrument checks to Jim were muted but audible as Mac crouched in the back of the helo, watching through the glass of the side door to clock when the camp was alerted to their escape.

  Unlatching the door, Mac made a small gap to make it faster to remount the helo after his sabotage run was over. The situation seemed more hopeless the longer they waited. The sun was lighting the camp and Mac doubted that he’d have the time to grenade nine helicopters and leap into the one on the end of the line before being shot. It was long odds.

  ‘Okay,’ said Bongo, raising his voice from the cockpit. ‘When you throw the first grenade, I’ll spark the engine – then we see what we’re made of, right?’

  Slinging the canvas bag over one shoulder and the M16 over the other, Mac made to leap out of the Black Hawk when a hand grabbed him.

  Looking in Jessica’s eye, Mac felt almost breathless, as if he could float above the ground.

  ‘My note,’ said Jessica. ‘The love note?’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Mac, aware of Tommy being able to hear.

  You did read it, didn’t you? I left it on your bag.’

  ‘Um, well,’ said Mac, his mind elsewhere.

  ‘You didn’t read it,’ said Jessica, her face dropping. ‘Oh my God.’

  ‘I didn’t, I couldn’t,’ said Mac, trailing off as whining sounds started in the Black Hawk’s electrical systems.

  ‘It said that I think your parents did a really good job with you, McQueen, and if I ever have kids, I’d love to know their secret.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Mac, but no sound came out. She kissed him and Mac leapt off the rear load space onto the lime dust of the runway, and ran through the spooky light of early morning to the helo closest to the camp.

  Opening the pilot’s door as he caught his breath, he fished out a grenade, pulled the pin, dumped it on the pilot’s seat and ran for the next helo, forty metres away, where he repeated the action. As he ran for the third helo, the first grenade detonated and ripped apart the flight deck of the helo. Trying to keep his composure as the grenades flashed and sent concussion waves and debris along the runway, Mac dumped his sixth grenade, just as the first shots were fired from a military police jeep that accelerated away from the sentry post at the gate. Turning, Mac watched the last helo’s rotors spinning faster and faster and heard the telltale whining of the turbine spinning to its peak RPM. Running around the back of the seventh helo, he dumped a grenade into the rear load space beside the bio-weapon tank. As he ran the bullets hailed into the helo and the hangar as the belt-fed machine-gun on the jeep opened up.

  Mac crossed the open ground to the eighth helo, bringing the M16 up to his shoulder and waiting for the jeep to come parallel before popping the driver with a three-shot burst and then the machine-gunner. Careening out of control, the vehicle swerved out into the runway as the third soldier tried to grab the wheel.

  Grabbing his eighth grenade, Mac threw it into the cockpit as the grenade in the seventh helo tore the front section apart in a shuddering burst of white heat. Falling to the ground as he escaped the blast, Mac struggled to crawl around the corner of the ninth and final helo as the previous helo now blew up. Gasping for breath, he realised his left leg was bleeding – he’d been hit by a piece of flying debris. Needing the last helo for cover, Mac limped to its nose, looked out to the camp, saw a silver LandCruiser approaching him at high speed, and pulled back to the load space. Behind him, he could hear Tommy and Jim screaming at him from the powered-up Black Hawk.

  Sliding back the large door of the ninth helo, Mac fished for the grenade, primed it and threw it in front of the tank.

  His left calf muscle now feeling like it was on fire, Mac turned and tried to run but resigned himself to not making Bongo’s helicopter. He couldn’t fend off the approaching shooters in the LandCruiser and also run for his ride. He’d have to make a choice. Feeling hopeless, yet also strangely powerful, Mac ran in a limp towards the hangar rather than Bongo’s helo. Stopping behind a wall, Mac looked around and fired two bursts of three-shot at the Cruiser, which veered into another hangar as its windscreen shattered.

  Turning to look at Jim, who gestured for Mac to get in the helo, Mac waved them away and turned back to face the shooters who now stealthed towards Mac – not Indonesian Kopassus, but Saffas and Aussies from Berger’s crew.

  The window smashed above Jim’s head and he ducked, and Bongo pulled the Black Hawk into the air as the steel cladding on the wall Mac was hiding behind was torn apart by bullets. Putting out more rounds at a soldier who ran around the flames from a helo, Mac dived behind a stack of oil drums as the final grenade made the Black Hawk rupture from the inside out.

  Mac tried to move back along the burning helo to where he now thought the shooters would be coming from. Ducking down, he looked under the burning aircraft and saw three sets of ankles about forty metres away, and one set of pale blue eyes below a head bandage that wrapped across the forehead.

  Shit, thought Mac, locking eyes with Pik Berger.

  The South African’s Steyr spewed rounds at Mac as he dived to the side. Landing, Mac aimed up and shot at one set of ankles which was quickly followed by a soldier falling to the ground and clutching his leg in agony. Then he aimed at Berger’s ankles as he ran into the hangar. Mac got off one round and the rifle clicked – out of rounds.

  Cursing, Mac looked back and waved away Bongo’s helo which was now hovering a metre above the runway, throwing lime dust and fine gravel for a hundred metres.

  Pulling his last grenade from his bag, Mac pulled the pin and threw it towards the hangar Berger had disappeared into. As the grenade exploded, Mac, losing blood, was vaguely aware of another helo coming in to land. And then Bongo’s helo was gone and, through the smoke and dust, Mac heard the soldiers approaching, their panicked commands clearly audible over the roar of fire, and Mac was running, but as in a dream, unable to reach top speed. He ran along the runway until he collapsed into the lime dust.

  Pushing himself onto his elbows and then his knees, Mac turned and saw Berger, Sudarto and a posse of the mercenaries – mostly in underwear and T-shirts – approaching out of the smoke and the dust. As Mac put his weight on his right leg and slowly stood, Pik Berger fixed him with a glare and screamed at the men not to shoot.

  ‘He’s mine,’ said the South African, handing his Steyr to a subordinate and approaching Mac like a big cat.

  In the periphery of his vision, Mac was aware of Bongo’s helo pulling away into the sky, but another helicopter alighting on
the airfield.

  ‘So, it’s Mr Jeffries – our kaffir-lover,’ said Berger, bare-chested and half of his face smeared with shave soap.

  ‘Actually, I’m a fighter not a lover,’ said Mac, as Berger kicked him in the solar plexus and followed with an elbow to the jaw.

  Teetering on his good, right leg, Mac stayed upright as Berger kneed him in the balls. Doubling over, Mac thought ‘what the heck?’ and launched a flying head-butt at the Saffa’s face.

  Turning slightly, Berger took a glancing blow on the cheek-bone and Mac lurched forward, hopelessly off balance.

  Swinging a fast right hook, Berger connected with Mac’s left jaw bone, instantly dropping him to his knees. Instinctively, Mac raised his arm in defence but Berger’s boot came through with such force that it connected with Mac’s chin. Feeling his teeth move in their gums, Mac’s head snapped back and he hit the ground face-first.

  Lying back, Mac tried to breathe as he felt unconsciousness beckoning. And then Pik Berger was kicking him in the ribs from one side and Amir Sudarto looked down from the other.

  ‘Next time you come at me, kaffir-lover, you’d better put me in the grave,’ said Berger, chest heaving.

  ‘Consider it done,’ said Mac, pushing himself into a sitting position.

  ‘Still the smart lip – our Kakatua,’ said Sudarto, using the Bahasa Indonesia term for the cockatoo.

  ‘That bandage suits you, Amy,’ said Mac, nodding at the Indonesian’s broken nose. ‘Might be more where that came from, you play it right.’

  Sudarto lashed out with a kick and turning his head slightly, Mac took it on the ear and fell sideways.

  Waiting for death, Mac thought about a good life, a loving family and a lot of luck. He thought about the chances he’d had to show courage and how many times he’d failed, but also the times he’d prevailed – like the time he’d rescued a junior boy from the dorm bullies, the Lenihan brothers, at Nudgee College; how he’d been expected to back down to their threats like everyone else, but for some reason he’d found himself in the middle of a fight with both of them. He’d lost, busting his nose in the process, but that episode had seen him capped in the 1st XV as a fifteen-year-old. Not bad for a leaguey from Rockie, said his dad, Frank.

  ‘I’d do it all again, boys,’ said Mac, as Sudarto’s SIG levelled at Mac’s eyes. ‘Fuck youse all.’

  The SIG cocked but then Haryono’s voice was shouting. ‘Leave him, leave him,’ said the major-general, as the other helo depowered behind them.

  Suddenly, as Mac retched, they were surrounded by a mob of soldiers in darker greens – the 1635. Then, in his delirium, Mac thought Sudarto, Haryono and Berger were lifting their hands and dropping their weapons.

  Sitting up while reeling for balance, Mac saw the mess of his left calf and the burning trail of destruction leading back to the camp. A familiar-looking man with captain rank in the 1635, stepped forward and ordered the men arrested.

  ‘Under whose authority?’ demanded Haryono, who Mac noticed had not dropped his SIG.

  ‘By mine,’ came a voice from behind Haryono.

  Spinning, the major-general’s face dropped and he allowed a 1635 soldier to take his handgun.

  ‘Well, sir, this is a surprise,’ said Haryono. ‘But this is out of your jurisdiction – this is a Kopassus command.’

  Mac turned his head to see who was pulling rank.

  ‘Actually, Major-General,’ said General Bambang Subianto, fully dressed in his As and fruit salad, ‘this is an army base and I’m an army general. You’ll get a fair trial by court martial, but for now I order you to stand down your men and allow yourself to be taken into detention; Lieutenant Sudarto, too, and whoever these mercenaries are.’

  As the soldiers from the 1635 Regiment moved in to make the arrests, Mac took the hand offered by the 1635 captain.

  ‘Thanks, General,’ said Mac, standing up but not sure he’d be able to keep his balance.

  ‘Don’t thank me,’ said Subianto. ‘Thank Captain Setbal, here.’

  ‘Call me Mattias,’ said the captain, who shook Mac’s hand.

  ‘What’s up?’ said Mac, trying to shake out the wooziness.

  ‘The captain contacted me last night,’ said Subianto. ‘Seems your friend Mr Morales made quite an impression on the local soldiers while in the stockade. When Captain Setbal told me he wanted to lead an officers’ mutiny but needed the legal support, I decided I couldn’t sit in Singapore forever, doing nothing.’

  ‘Shit,’ said Mac, massaging his temples. ‘Glad you made it when you did.’

  Laughing, Subianto slapped Mac on the shoulder. ‘No – I’m glad you found me when you did. You reminded me who I am.’

  ‘And you,’ said Mac to Mattias. ‘Don’t I know you?’

  ‘Perhaps my brother,’ said Mattias, his facial features now clearer to Mac. ‘He sends his regards – just don’t ask where you going, or say where you been.’

  Joao! Mattias was Joao’s brother.

  ‘Wise words,’ said Mac, tears escaping as he tried to smile, ‘from a wise man.’

  EPILOGUE

  The Royal Australian Navy Seahawk landed on the rear decks of HMAS Sydney in light seas, and Mac took the arm of the loadmaster, who was lit up by the aft-deck floodlights.

  ‘Welcome back, sir,’ said the loadmaster, as Mac landed beside him with some pain in his left calf muscle, the soldiers disembarking around him and heading for the hatchway.

  Standing back, Mac allowed the ship’s medic team to remove his quarry from the hold of the helo, strap him in a rescue sled and carry him down to the medical centre.

  Going below himself, Mac let himself in to his private cabin, grabbed a cold VB that he’d saved from a buy-up at the ship’s canteen, and swigged on it as he slowly disrobed. Going over the snatch in his mind, he broke it down into pieces: the approach into Kota Baru barracks, the lack of serious security for the prison, the fast work that Robbo’s 4RAR Commandos made of grabbing the Canadian and getting him out without anyone getting hurt.

  Snatches were so dangerous that whenever he did a smooth one, Mac said a little prayer.

  Down the companionway, he could hear Robbo’s lads pulling the lids of a few beers and settling in for a drink. After ten minutes, the sounds of an improvised didge echoed, along with soldiers giggling. It made Mac feel good to be an Australian.

  Looking at the clock, he saw it was 2.48 am, and lay on the bed. He was asleep almost before his head hit the pillow.

  As they finished lunch at the Victoria Hotel in central Darwin, Davidson ran through the afternoon with Mac.

  ‘Technically, the Commonwealth offered Yarrow a resident visa and a fine-only penalty for the excise crimes,’ said Davidson, sipping at a beer. ‘But I’m thinking that we should throw in a deal with the Canadians, eh? I mean, the files I’ve seen suggest Ottawa wants Yarrow in the can for at least ten years.’

  ‘I saw that too,’ said Mac. ‘But let’s be fair, Tony. Yarrow was pulling some major frauds through Vancouver – it wasn’t a dodgy bottle of whisky at the bottom of the suitcase.’

  ‘Okay – point taken,’ said Davidson, standing. ‘Let’s see how the debrief goes and we’ll go from there. No promises yet, but I’d just like your support if we decide to throw him a line – not a good reputation to go around, that your intelligence assets are left to burn.’

  ‘By the way,’ said Mac, as Davidson turned to leave. ‘Just want to say thanks for making this whole operation happen. It means a lot to me.’

  ‘No worries, Macca,’ said Davidson. ‘In the end it worked the way it had to work – Indonesians holding other Indonesians accountable. Making the Indon Army move on its own corrupt elements was genius.’

  ‘You can thank a Filipino hit man for that,’ said Mac, smiling. ‘He’s hell when he’s well.’

  ‘We’ll debrief with Yarrow, find some of these supply networks,’ said Davidson. ‘It was a good call, mate – and the most important thing was stopping that Operation B
oa before it started.’

  The Larrakeyah Army Base hospital was bathed in light and Bill Yarrow’s bed caught most of it. Unfortunately, his injuries were so severe that he was still sedated while he was transferred to and from Darwin Hospital for facial reconstructions and chest surgery, and he was in no shape to speak when Mac and Davidson arrived.

  After two days, and still no chat with Yarrow, Davidson left for Tokyo, asking Mac to conduct the debrief.

  Using the balmy days to get fit in the pool and the gym, Mac recovered quickly and linked up with a regular rugby game between the army and navy. He ended up substituting for both – at fullback and centre, mainly, but also a glory stint at first five-eighth which featured a field goal from forty-six metres while some of the navy girls were watching.

  One morning a nurse found Mac lying beside the Larrakeyah swimming pool.

  ‘Mr Davis? Patient Yarrow is conscious, sir.’

  Standing, Mac detoured through his room to get dressed and grab his tape recorders and notebooks. Walking into Yarrow’s enclosure Mac was immediately aware that something was different. Sniffing, he realised it was the smell. Where did he know that from?

  Standing at the end of Yarrow’s bed, the bandages taken from his face but the bandages and splints still in place for his broken fingers, Mac could tell that this had been a good-looking man, accustomed to being smiled at.

  ‘Bill Yarrow?’ said Mac. ‘Richard Davis, Foreign Affairs – wondering if we can have a chat?’

  ‘Sure, Mr Davis,’ Yarrow mumbled, sucking something off the inside of his mouth. ‘But I have a guest – can we make it fast?’

  ‘Yes, it’ll be quick – or I can wait till we have a good piece of time.’

  Looking away and seeming confused, Yarrow looked back. ‘You got me, didn’t you?’

  ‘Well, I -’ started Mac.

  ‘You came for me,’ whispered Bill Yarrow, and then he was crying; big heaving child-like sobs, his bottom lip quivering and tears bouncing off it.

  ‘Look, it was more the army boys…’