Ghost Target (Ryan Drake)

by Will Jordan

  No such luck. She shook her head, pointing up at the fouled canopy above. Though they couldn’t communicate verbally, it was obvious enough what she wanted. She couldn’t reach far enough back to detach the main chute by herself.

  Only one option left.

  Reaching down, Drake closed his free hand around the haft of the knife she’d given him, and yanked it free of its sheath. Sensing what he was doing, Anya wrapped her arms around his waist, steadying him enough so that he could use both hands to work.

  A tangle of different lines trailed from her pack, leading up to what should have been a full canopy above. But down by the base, they were clumped together into an almost solid mass. That was where he’d aim.

  Closing his left hand around the cables to bunch them together, Drake attacked them with the knife, sawing at the bundle with savage, powerful thrusts. Straight away the first few lines began to fray and pop, giving way under the strain.

  As he worked, Drake couldn’t help but glance at his altimeter, and immediately wished he hadn’t. Four thousand feet to go.

  ‘Come on, you bastard!’ he snarled, working the razor-edged blade back and forth with increasing urgency. More lines were snapping and whipping aside now as the knife sliced its way through the nylon fibres, but still the canopy above remained firmly attached.

  Three thousand feet.

  Almost there. More lines were coming away with every thrust, and the remainder had been stretched to their limits by the increasing load.

  Two thousand.

  It was at this moment that Anya’s grip suddenly released, forcing Drake to clutch at the bundle of lines itself just to stay in position. For an instant he wondered what the hell she was doing, but this confusion quickly gave way to stark realization. Anya, pragmatic to the end, was letting him go, forcing him to pop his own chute and save his life rather than die with her.

  Maybe she was right. He was out of time, out of options, and if both of them were killed in the drop, the mission was over before it had begun. There would be nobody left to stop Cain.

  ‘No,’ he said through gritted teeth, working the blade one more time with savage, desperate fury, as if he were locked in mortal combat against a hated enemy. He had no idea what his altimeter said now, and nor did he care.

  He wasn’t leaving her now.

  Then, with an audible snap and a sudden rush of movement, the canopy above finally tore itself free, vanishing into the night as the howling wind gusted through it. Robbed of his only handhold, Drake found himself tumbling head over heels in an uncontrolled spin, the world now frightening close whirling around him. He paid it no heed as he reached up for his ripcord, knowing there was no time left to try to stabilize his flight.

  Closing his fingers around the steel ring that marked the end of the cord, Drake closed his eyes and braced himself for what was coming. A single hard pull was enough to trigger the spring-loaded deployment mechanism for his main chute, ejecting it from the top of his pack.

  His last thought was to hope that he’d done a better job of packing his own parachute than Anya’s. Then he felt himself jerked to a sudden, violent halt, the straps of his harness biting into his flesh as the canopy above unfolded and air resistance worked desperately to slow his descent. Drake opened his eyes and looked down just as a rocky, undulating hilltop rushed up to meet him like a giant fist.

  One of the first things he’d learned in jump school was how to absorb the sometimes violent impact of a hard landing and avoid the broken bones that were all too easy to earn in situations like this. The instant he felt his boots make contact, he allowed his leg muscles to relax, falling forward and twisting slightly so that his right shoulder absorbed most of the shock. He was aiming to drop and roll, just as he’d done countless times before.

  The unyielding ground had other ideas, and he felt a stab of pain as sharp stones tore at his clothes and skin, and the rocky wind-scoured hilltop beneath slammed into him like a sledgehammer. Nonetheless, he managed to tuck his head in and transfer his momentum into a forward roll, which served to bleed away the last of his kinetic energy.

  For a moment or two Drake just lay there staring up at the darkened sky above, gasping for breath, his heart pounding. The sheer adrenaline surge of the last 30 seconds was making it hard to think clearly, but gradually this was easing off as he came to terms with the fact he was no longer in mortal danger. And as the adrenaline thinned out, so his body began to react to the punishment it had just taken. He was bruised and bleeding, and altogether felt like he’d just gone ten rounds against an opponent with bricks for fists.

  But he was alive. That meant he could still move and act; both of which he needed to do now. Taking a deep breath, he clenched his fists and tensed up for a moment or two, focussing his mind on what was happening around him.

  Get up. Get up now.

  The canopy was settling around him as it descended the last few feet towards ground. Grimacing in pain, Drake heaved himself up from the ground and reached out to grasp at the material, bundling it into a ball so that it couldn’t unfurl again. It wasn’t unknown for a sudden gust of wind to catch fallen parachutes and drag their unfortunate owners along the ground like rag dolls. After surviving that landing he had no desire to die by being swept off the edge of a cliff.

  This done, he unclipped his harness and shrugged out of it, allowing the pack to fall away. He was alive and he was on solid ground – two things for which he was equally grateful at that moment. Now that the most immediate concern of landing was out of the way, it was time to focus on the next problem – reuniting with his team.

  Reaching behind him, he drew the Browning automatic free of its holster and pulled back the slide just far enough to make out the gleam of a brass shell casing in the chamber. With his weapon at the ready, Drake crouched down and took a couple of deep breaths to settle his heart and calm his body, allowing his senses to tune into his new environment.

  A light breeze sighed past him, carrying with it the lingering warmth of evening and the smell of juniper, spruce and cedar trees, while the air seemed to be alive with the clicks and chirps of cicadas and other night insects, their calls blending together into a background hum that served to mask small movements.

  With his eyes now adjusted to the low light, Drake scanned his surroundings. He had landed near the edge of a broad rock escarpment overlooking a wide, heavily forested valley below. There was more cover in the form of brush and small trees not far away where the escarpment met the slope of the valley wall, and instinctively Drake crept towards it, moving slowly and carefully, senses on constant alert as his booted feet picked a path through loose rocks and tree roots.

  Crouching down in the shade of a gnarled spruce tree, Drake powered up his tactical radio unit. Like the others, he’d left it powered down during the jump since the noise of the wind would render such communication devices thoroughly useless, but now was the time to put it to the test.

  ‘This is Unit One. All elements, sound off. Over,’ he said, keeping his voice low.

  Whispering was counterproductive at times like this as the high-pitched noise carried over great distance at night. In any case, the radio microphone strapped to his throat was designed to pick up the vibrations of his vocal chords rather than the sounds coming from his mouth, so he had no worries about being heard. The question was whether anyone would answer.

  ‘Two is on the ground. Over.’ That was Mason. There were no fancy code words at this stage – each member of the team had simply been assigned a number as their call sign, making it easy to sound off in sequence.

  ‘Three is all good. Over,’ McKnight reported.

  ‘Four is very fucking glad that’s over,’ came Frost’s angry sound-off. ‘Over.’

  Drake might have smiled at that remark, were it not for the fact that one member of their group hadn’t checked in.

  ‘Unit Five, sound off,’ he spoke into his radio.

  Nothing, save for the pop and hiss of static over the airw
aves. Drake felt a wave of foreboding descend on him like a pall as he replayed those last few moments before he’d released his parachute. Was it enough, or had he been too late?

  ‘Unit Five. What’s your sitrep? Over.’

  Still no reply. Had Anya been able to deploy her reserve chute, or had her body slammed into the ground with bone-shattering force before it could open? Was she lying out there at this very moment, broken and dying in agony?

  ‘Unit Five, come—’

  ‘Will you stop that?’ an irritated voice demanded from somewhere behind him.

  Drake whirled around and raised his automatic, instinctively thumbing off the safety catch as he brought the weapon to bear.

  Even as he did so, a figure emerged from the undergrowth not more than 20 yards away, dressed in black assault gear like himself and armed with a compact submachine gun that she kept up at her shoulder even as she approached.

  ‘Anya. Jesus Christ, why aren’t you answering your comms?’ Drake hissed, lowering his own weapon. Such had been his preoccupation with raising her over the radio, he hadn’t detected her approach over the sounds of nocturnal wildlife and the rustle of foliage in the night breeze. At least, that was what he told himself.

  Reaching down, Anya held up her radio unit. Even in the low ambient light he could make out the shattered casing and the exposed wires and circuit boards within.

  ‘Took a hard landing. Not that I needed a radio to find you,’ she added with a disapproving look. ‘A blind man could have found his way here.’

  ‘You know, some people actually show a little gratitude when someone saves their life,’ he pointed out none too gently.

  ‘I didn’t need saving, Ryan. And I have never had a chute fail before. Never,’ she contended, though her voice was lacking its usual air of authority. If anything, she actually seemed a little embarrassed.

  That was when the puzzle seemed to come together in his mind. She’d come perilously close to dying up there, and though the experience had left her shaken up, she didn’t crave comfort or reassurance in the way a normal person might. Those feelings were as alien to her as the surface of the moon. Instead her instinct was to lash out, to go on the offensive just as she always had.

  ‘Really? Tell that to your radio,’ Drake hit back. ‘I’m fine too, by the way. Thanks for asking.’

  Anya opened her mouth to retort, but seemed to think better of it. Perhaps for once she recognized when not to argue her case.

  His radio earpiece crackled with an incoming transmission. ‘One, this is Two. What’s your sitrep? Any sign of Five?’

  Giving Anya a meaningful look, Drake keyed his transmit button. ‘Roger that. Five is with me now.’

  ‘Good to hear, One.’

  Now it was time to bring the rest of the team together. ‘All units, rally on my position. Stand by for visual reference. Over.’

  Reaching into a pouch in his combat webbing, he pulled out a metal object roughly the size and shape of a ballpoint pen, though considerably heavier. Pointing it skyward, Drake pressed the single button moulded into its side, and watched as a thin beam of green light shot up into the night sky.

  High-intensity laser emitters weren’t exactly popular with aircraft pilots these days on account of the assholes who shone them at cockpit windows, but there were few better ways of marking a position from the ground. Drake kept the beam pointed skyward for a good five seconds or so, allowing his teammates to get a solid fix on his position.

  ‘All units, converge on my reference now,’ he instructed. ‘Over.’

  ‘Copy that, One. En route,’ McKnight replied, quickly followed by her two comrades.

  ‘Unit One, acknowledged. Out.’

  Clicking off the radio, Drake reached up and felt the torn fabric of his tunic, damp and sticky with congealing blood. He’d taken a beating during the landing, and although the lacerations were unlikely to slow him down, they would likely need tending before they went much further. Rolling his shoulder experimentally, he was rewarded with a stab of pain that caused him to tense up involuntarily. Hopefully it was nothing but bruised muscle, and not something more serious.

  ‘You’re hurt,’ Anya said, moving towards him.

  ‘I’m fine.’

  ‘You’re not. Let me look at it.’

  ‘I said, I’m fine.’ Drake gave her a look that warned he would debate the matter no further. Instead he unstrapped his radio unit and tossed it to her, which she caught out of instinct rather than desire. ‘Just get on stag, and keep the comms open in case they need another signal. Can you handle that?’

  She didn’t reply, which was probably for the best. Leaving her to keep watch, he moved off a short distance to tend his wounds and await the arrival of his friends.

  Chapter 30

  Despite his fears of the team being dispersed over miles of mountainous terrain, Drake was relieved that his teammates were able to answer his summons without difficulty. Frost and McKnight arrived at the rendezvous point together, having exited the plane within seconds of each other and likely reunited shortly after landing.

  Unsurprisingly, Anya spotted their movement amongst the boulders and wind-sculpted trees that littered the hillside. Instinctively she crouched down and trained her weapon on the approaching figures.

  ‘Red,’ she called out in challenge, awaiting the countersign that would confirm the two arrivals were friendly.

  ‘Dwarf,’ McKnight replied, emerging from cover with Frost by her side. Anya lowered her weapon in response, though she didn’t seem any less wary.

  Frost shook her head as she approached. ‘You must be a closet geek, Ryan.’

  ‘You’re just as bad for knowing what it means,’ he reasoned. He’d decided on the sign-countersign combination himself, reasoning that if anyone in this remote part of the world knew of the old British sitcom that had spawned it, they deserved to get the better of his team.

  McKnight, however, was in no mood for jokes, particularly when she saw Drake’s shoulder. ‘Ryan, you okay?’

  ‘Never better,’ he lied, brushing aside her concerns. He’d applied a basic dressing to the lacerations to stop the bleeding, and was busy clipping his webbing back into place.

  ‘Does it hurt?’ Frost asked, looking uncharacteristically concerned.

  ‘A little.’

  She flashed a satisfied grin. ‘Good.’

  ‘Keira, quit it,’ McKnight warned her. ‘What happened, Ryan?’

  Drake glanced over at Anya who studiously avoided his gaze, concentrating instead on keeping watch. ‘Had to open my chute a bit later than planned. It was a hard landing.’

  ‘Why? Something go wrong?’

  ‘My parachute failed,’ Anya said without turning around. ‘Ryan stayed behind to cut it away so I could open my reserve.’ She paused for a moment or two before continuing. ‘Without him I would be dead.’

  Well, shit, Drake thought. Finally an acknowledgement, albeit a grudging one.

  ‘Sounds like a lovely fuck-up to kick things off,’ Frost remarked unhappily. She seemed to have inherited a superstitious outlook when it came to operations like this, viewing early difficulties as a bad omen. ‘Who packed your chute?’

  ‘Ryan did, just as he packed all of yours.’ Anya glanced around then, fixing her eyes on McKnight. ‘And she checked it for me.’

  For a couple of seconds, not a word was exchanged amongst the group as the weight of her words, and their implications, settled on each of them.

  Typically, it was Frost who reacted first. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

  ‘How did it look, McKnight?’ Anya asked. ‘You seemed to take your time over it.’

  McKnight for her part had remained silent throughout, watching Anya as if she expected the woman to pounce on her at any moment.

  ‘You’d better think real careful about what you’re implying,’ Frost warned.

  ‘It is a question.’ Anya’s deceptively calm tone was in stark contrast to the baleful look in her eye
s. ‘One that McKnight has not answered.’

  Drake had heard enough of this. ‘Stop it, both of you. Shit like this can and does happen, so stop bitching at each other and deal with it. Just be grateful nobody got killed.’

  Anya said nothing, merely turning away to resume her watch.

  ‘You,’ Drake said, pointing a finger at Frost. ‘Check your gear. I need you thinking with a clear head.’

  She shrugged unhappily. ‘Whatever.’

  ‘Say it,’ he ordered her.

  ‘I got it!’ Frost snapped. Throwing him an irritable look, she removed the equipment pack she’d been carrying slung across one shoulder, and crouched down to check the contents.

  Satisfied that this would keep her occupied for a while, Drake turned away to deal with the next problem. As he did so, McKnight approached him. ‘Thank you, Ryan,’ she said quietly. ‘For what you said.’

  ‘The minute we stop being a team, Cain’s already won.’ Drake exhaled, offering a tentative smile. ‘How’s that for a cheesy motivational quote?’

  She shrugged, but he saw his smile reciprocated. ‘Not bad.’

  ‘Contact,’ Anya called out from her vantage point. Once more she had her weapon up and ready. ‘One man, approaching from the north.’

  Sure enough, about a minute later the last member of their team responded to Anya’s challenge in similar fashion to McKnight, and appeared at the crest of the slope, weapon in hand. He was a little out of breath after what had likely been a strenuous run, but otherwise appeared to have survived the jump and the journey here without so much as a scratch.

  ‘You all right, dude?’ he asked, noting Drake’s injuries.

  ‘Caught a rough landing, that’s all.’

  Mason frowned, sensing the simmering hostility in the group. ‘Why does this place feel like an awkward Thanksgiving dinner?’

  ‘You’re here now, so get ready to move out,’ Drake said, eager to focus on the mission. ‘Anya, the clock’s ticking. We need to find your contact and get out of here.’

  ‘That won’t be a problem,’ the woman replied, staring past him into the darkness.