by John Ringo
"Okay," Tammy said, half wonderingly. "That's an interesting proposition."
"I hate to ask this," Kacey said. "But I was raised to be practical . . ."
"I'd like you as permanent, or semi-permanent anyway, additions," Jenkins said, leaning back again. "The vig is two hundred fifty grand per year and combat bonuses. The bonus on this mission is fifty grand. If you don't make it, a half a mil goes to your beneficiaries. And let me be clear, there is a chance you won't be around to spend the money. There is a chance that I won't be around but there are other people to cut the checks."
"You're going on this op?" Tammy asked, still with that vague sense of wonder in her voice. Kacey could comprehend it; she felt like she'd stepped through the looking glass ever since the visit from Major Stang.
"This mission is tight any way you look at it," Jenkins said, shrugging. "I'm taking everyone I've got, including me. It's . . . very hairy. This area is going to be secured by a Ranger company in our absence."
"Well, the money's right," Kacey said, shaking her head. "But you've really got to work on your sales pitch."
"I'm not out to pitch you," Jenkins said, shrugging. "I want you here because you want to be here, because you love flying, because you love flying right at the edge of your ability and are hard, cold motherfucker combat fliers. I was told that was what you were, that you bitched unmercifully when the Marines pulled both of you off line duty and that you'd had serious experience in hot, hard, nasty flying conditions so you knew what you were going to be missing. I need that. But I don't want you here if you've lost that edge or you're not really what you seem."
"Well, we both ditched a bird in the Caribbean and that was about as hot, hard and nasty an operation as you could ask for," Tammy said with a chuckle. "I'll add that the bird going down really wasn't our fault. There were . . . extenuating circumstances."
"Oh, crap," Jenkins said, really leaning back and then grinning, hard. "Wait, were the extenuating circumstances a nuclear blast?"
"I can neither confirm nor deny . . ." Kacey started to say and then really looked at him. "Oh My Fucking God."
"I said I get paid well," Mr. Jenkins said with a grin. "And that's because I usually get my ass shot off and I'm very attached to it."
"That was you," Tammy said, really grinning now. "I figured you for dead; I've only seen that much blood one other time and that guy didn't make it even with a medic and a defibrillator in the bird. He wasn't unconscious and strapped into the seat of a cigarette boat."
"I'm a hard person to kill," Jenkins replied. "As any number of dead people can attest. I'll go ahead and add, since it's really germane and I've got to trust such sterling characters as yourself, that we're on the same track. Three or four Russian nukes. They're being traded to the terrorists, through the Chechens, for a sizeable sum. We have a location and time of the transfer. But it's right in Chechen territory. There's also a scientist, probably working under duress, involved. We need to get the nukes, the scientist and his daughter out, all in more or less functioning order. And, of course, this time keep them from detonating. I've got a hundred and twenty shooters and the Chechens have about four hundred, that we know about, in the area. From your POV, they have heavy machine guns, 12.7 millimeter and possibly some MANPADs. No solid evidence on the MANPADs but it's the way to bet."
"That is kind of adverse," Tammy said, shaking her head. "Blackhawks will take a fair amount of damage, but not a whole hell of a lot, trust me."
"Oh, that's one thing I forgot," Jenkins said. "We're not using Hawks, we're using Hinds. That's why you were chosen. You both did a transition stint with the 6th ACS. Frankly, I was delighted to get someone Hind-qualified."
The 6th Air Commando Squadron was an Air Force unit that flew several non-U.S. helicopter systems, including the Hind-D, a Russian attack helicopter. Unlike U.S. attack helicopters, however, it had a crew/cargo area in the rear that could carry five personnel plus a crew-chief or be reconfigured for aerial-ambulance duty. The Hind was heavily armored and generally referred to as a "flying tank." During the Afghan wars the quote used about the Hind by the mujahideen was "We do not fear the Russians, but we fear their helicopters."
Kacey started to reply and then couldn't help bursting into a half-hysterical laugh.
"What?"
"I'm getting Hinds," Jenkins said with a shrug. "They're cheaper than Hawks, more robust and I can get them, fast. Two birds are being retrofitted in Czechoslovakia, sorry, 'the Czech Republic' at the moment for high-altitude conditions. If you agree, and I'll give you the rest of the day to think it over, you're on a plane tomorrow for the C.R. You'll go to the factory, refresh and then, in the company of a couple of the company's pilots, ferry them back here. That will give you just enough time to brief in on the details of the op, get used to the local flying conditions and then do the op. We're on short time here."
"Look, you already said this was going to be tough flying," Tammy said, exasperated. "And you're talking about birds we've got no time in! We transitioned two years ago! I can barely recall where the controls are laid out!"
"You're going to be ferrying them over a thousand miles," Jenkins said, shrugging. "Practice."
"There's . . ." Kacey said, then paused. "We'll have to think about this. But there are a few things that any helo pilot is going to need in this sort of situation."
"Go," Mike said, leaning back.
Kacey suddenly realized that despite the strong appearance of focus and animation this guy was tired. Desperately tired. He didn't show it much, but something about the way he leaned back told her he hadn't been getting much sleep lately.
"We need ground crew," Kacey said.
"The Czechs are supplying a crew initially," Mike said, nodding. "I'm not sure if they can teach the Keldara women everything they need to know. They're going to be very much starting from scratch and I'm even running out of labor on that side. I may end up hiring some outside personnel. But for this mission you're going to have a supplied Czech ground crew, the team leader at least speaking good English."
"Well, we're going to need a good crew-chief," Kacey said. "What the Air Force calls a flight engineer. Somebody familiar with the birds. More familiar than we are would be best."
"That's going to be harder," Mike said with a sigh. "If you know anybody hireable I'll hire them, gladly. And if you can't find somebody, if I have to I'll tap the Uncle Sam well again. I'd prefer you find them. If you take the job and head to CR you'll be taking a sat phone. Feel free to use it extensively. Get two. You realize that it might become necessary to solo fly on one or more missions."
"Solo," Tammy said. "On a hot mission?"
"Two birds, two pilots," Mike said, stone-faced. "But I won't tell you to. If the moment comes you'll just do it. Or I've got the wrong pilots."
* * *
"Pierson."
"Colonel, this is Major Fowler in USAF Missions Tasking."
"Go," Pierson said with a sigh.
"Sir, your office has placed a tasking on us for two C-17s to loft a Ranger company to the country of Georgia and perform an airborne insertion."
"And we've got a high-level tasking number on it," Pierson said. "What's the problem?"
"The problem, sir, is that we're flat out of birds for that period," the major replied. "Sir, you can go through a general or the USAF chief of staff or the president, but the problem is that the tasker is in too quick of time. We don't have birds we can redeploy that fast that aren't on equal high-level taskers."
"Major, that was a JCS-level tasker," Pierson said, confused.
"Sir, you can look at my board if you'd like," the major said. "We shot this around for quite a while because it was such a high tasker. But you're talking about six days' time and most of our 17s are deployed over in the AOR. And if we turn two birds we're going to fail on equally high-level taskers. Sir, we're scheduled out two months not two weeks. Bitch about not having enough lift or whatever you'd like, sir, I fully agree. But we're out-taske
d at the moment. The only birds we could recall would be on the Azerbaijan relief missions and I note that you've already taskered one of our birds from that."
"Time to pound your nuts flat and find me two birds," the colonel said.
"Sir, I already got out the brick," the major said with a sigh. "You're not the first person I've had this conversation with today, just the highest tasker. We did come up with an OTB idea, though."
Pierson, who thought of himself as a master, even if he hated to admit it, of Pentagonspeak, locked up on "OTB" then managed to parse it. "How 'Out-of-the-Box'?"
"Sir, we can fly them commercial to Ukraine. The Ukrainians finally have those new AN-70s which are essentially identical to C-130s from a jumper's perspective. They fly and drop about the same, they just carry a bunch more troops."
Pierson rolled that one around in his head for a moment. It had a certain allure but a dozen problems jumped up immediately in his mind.
"Ukraine is registered as a friendly country, not allied," Pierson said, musingly. "They're going to want to get paid for the bird time."
"There's a coding for payments for air time to friendly nations," Major Fowler replied. "We already checked. The problem from our perspective is that their aircraft aren't mission-certified. The AF mil attaché in Ukraine is a former cargo pilot. I contacted him off-record and he says that he's seen enough of their ops to be able to do a prelim cert but he's not sure he could full cert them for airborne ops. He doesn't have a problem with them being able to do airborne ops, the cert paperwork is pretty complex, though. There's a way around that, though."
"Don't keep me waiting, Major," Pierson said, dryly.
"For TS ops, and I note that this op has a code-word class over the confidential attached to the op, there's a point at which we can skip the cert requirement due to mission confidentiality."
"That sounds like following the letter while violating the spirit," Pierson said. "I like it."
"Yes, sir, I thought you might," the major replied with a chuckle. "But here's a stranger one, sir. Brace yourself."
"Go."
"How about a press release? 'Elite U.S. military force uses Ukrainian Air Force for training operation.'–"
"Major, you just noted that this operation is TS code-word," Pierson pointed out.
"The drop, though, is Confidential. We can get low-level permission to open it to the PIO with certain mission data left out. We think it would be good press and the Ukrainian government would probably appreciate it. They've got problems with Russia and showing that their planes can carry American special ops . . ."
Pierson really had to pause at that one. The major in tasking didn't realize, because that side of the mission was totally black at a very high level, to just what extent it might tweak the Russians.
"Major, begin the tasking but final authority is probably going to have to come after consultation with higher," Pierson said after a moment's thought. "Certainly the press release will have to hold. I'll get back to you. But get working on the tasking and I'll get back on the rest."
"Yes, sir," the major said, deflated. He clearly was enjoying playing at that level.
"Major, I'm not just being an asshole," Pierson said. "There are parameters to this mission, the reasons that it is code-worded at such a high level, that may be risked at a higher level by some of these actions. The truth is, I'm not qualified or knowledgeable enough to decide. But I can contact those that can better eval the risks and rewards."
"They want to do what?" the secretary of state said.
"Mike needs the Rangers to ensure security and for a maskirova," Pierson said, sighing. "Rangers or somebody like them. I'd actually considered Polish GROM commandoes, but that was just too complicated to set up. So the Rangers are going. But then SOCOM noted that the entire company is just about out of jump pay status due to deployments, one of the reasons they're back in the States besides to get some down time. So we were going to throw a jump in as a sweetener and to keep them on status. But we are tasked out for birds. I double-checked that one and we really are flat tasked out. There are actually a couple of ARNG units we could call up for it, but they're out of cert on airborne ops and damned near undeployable or they'd be tasked. So that left looking outside the box. Which means the Ukrainians. They have indicated a willingness, hell an eagerness, to do a drop with our Rangers. But then I got to thinking about how the Russians would react, given what the op is all about . . ."
"Vladimir Putin is going to be livid," the secretary of state said. "We've been treading very carefully on military contact with the Ukrainians because the situation is so delicate. And this jumps right past half a dozen normal steps. The press release . . . Brilliant. Just brilliant."
"Yes, ma'am," Pierson sighed. "We'll just fly them commercial to Tbilisi, then. Mike has ammo; they can draw on him. The mission won't be all that long and by the time they're on their way back we'll probably have taskable birds so they can get their jump in . . ."
"Colonel, at what point did I indicate that I don't want Vladimir Putin livid?" the SecState asked. "You were right to bring this to my attention. Here's what we'll do . . ."
Chapter Eighteen
As soon as the door closed to the office, Kacey shook her head.
"That man is insane," she muttered. "Totally, completely and utterly insane."
"Yep," Tammy said, still in that strange voice. "So insane that he'd swim ashore on an island overrun by terrorists, kill them all and still come rescue us and the Marines with a boat. Even though he looked like a colander at the time."
"Sure, but that doesn't mean I want to attach myself to his coat strings," Kacey said, biting her lip. "I mean, he survives but what about the body count around him. Doing this sort of shit for SAR, with FAST, that's one thing. God and country and all that. But we're doing it for money, Tams. Is that worth getting our ass shot off?"
"Okay, great," Tammy said. "We say 'no thanks,' take our showing-up bonus and head back to the States. Wait on one of our many solicitous phone calls. Eat high until the money runs out and then get a job at the 7-Eleven. What are we waiting for? Sounds great. Get a cat."
"Very funny." Kacey was allergic. "I'm serious, Tammy. This is serious. I mean, so we don't get a flying job. We're both Naval Academy graduates. We don't have to work at the 7-Eleven."
"Sure," Tammy said, her eyes wide. "You've got a creative writing degree, I've got one in English lit. You write them and I'll critique them and we'll make a mint."
"Oh, God," Kacey groaned. "The guy's obviously American military of some sort, although you notice he didn't mention what sort. But if he's got a harem, he's bound to have a bar. We'll find it. You get drunk. I'll watch."
"I'd rather check this place out," Tammy said. "It's really cool."
"You're in love," Kacey said. "Mystery and romance and castles in the sky. As always, I've got to keep you grounded."
"Which is just what we're both going to be if we don't take the gig," Tammy pointed out, walking down the corridor. "First we find the harem girls. They'll lead us to somebody who speaks English. I mean, they've been taking classes."
"Pillow classes," Kacey snorted but she followed.
When they got to the front room, though, the cluster of girls had disappeared. Tammy was standing with her hands on her hips when the front door opened and a big bald guy in digi-cam, clearly directly off the range from the smell, stepped into the area and paused, looking them over.
"Oh, Christ, not more harem girls," the man muttered in an annoyed tone. "That boy's got a serious problem."
"Fuck you, asshole," Kacey snapped back.
"We're not harem girls," Tammy replied at the same time. "We're pilots."
"Pilots?" the man said, his eyes flying wide in joy. "We've got pilots? Halle-fucking-lujah! We've got PILOTS!"
"Not yet," Kacey said, angrily. She was still pissed about the harem-girl crack. She also wanted to know more about the "harem." She was hoping, at a certain level, that it was a joke b
ut she suspected it wasn't. "We're still considering it. Carefully."