"On your knees!" Rodgers shouted.
The men were going to have to crawl in another direction.
It would take the gunner an instant to re sight the weapon.
Rodgers pulled Apu onto his knees. The two men had to be somewhere else
when fire resumed.
The men were crouching and facing one another in the dark. Apu was
kneeling and half-leaning against Rodgers's chest. Suddenly, the farmer
clutched the general's shoulders.
He pushed forward. With nothing behind him, Rodgers fell back with Apu
on top of him.
"Save Nanda," Apu implored.
The gunning restarted. It chewed up the ice and then drilled into the
back of the farmer. Apu hugged Rodgers as the bullets dug into the older
man's flesh. The wounds sent damp splashes onto Rodgers's face.
He could feel the thud of each bullet right through the man's body.
Rodgers reflexively tucked his chin into his chest, bringing his head
under Apu's face. He could hear the man grunt as the bullets struck.
They were not cries of pain but the forced exhalation of air as his
lungs were punctured from behind. Apu was already beyond pain.
Rodgers brought in his knees slightly and kept himself buried beneath
Apu's body. He was thinking now and not simply reacting. And Rodgers
realized that this was what Apu had wanted. The farmer had sacrificed
himself so Rodgers could stay alive and protect Nanda. The devotion and
trust inherent in that gesture made them as pure as anything Rodgers had
ever experienced.
Rodgers heard several bullets whistle by his head. He felt a burning in
his right shoulder. One of the shots must have grazed him. His arm and
back warmed as blood covered his cold flesh.
Rodgers lay. still. Their flight and Apu's sacrifice had kept the
helicopter occupied for a short time. Hopefully, it had been long enough
for Nanda, Friday, and Samouel to reach the peak.
The gunfire stopped. After a few moments the sound of the helicopter
moved over Rodgers's head. The chopper was heading toward the icy
slopes. It was time for Rodgers to move.
Apu was still holding him. Rodgers grasped the elbows of the man's parka
and gently pulled them away. Then he slid to the right, out from under
the dead man. Blood from Apu's neck trickled onto Rodgers's left cheek.
It left a streak, like warpaint. The elderly man had not given his life
in vain.
Rodgers got to his feet. He paused to remove the dead man's parka then
ran toward the slope. The helicopter was moving slowly and the American
paced it. He stayed behind the cockpit and out of view. He was waiting
for the Mi-35 to get a little closer. That was when things should start
to happen.
The nose gun began to spit fire again. The red-yellow flashes lit the
slope like tiny strobes. Rodgers could see Nanda and the two men running
along the curving base, away from the aircraft. The gentle turn in the
slope kept the chopper from having a clear shot.
The chopper slowed as it moved closer to the slope. The guns fell silent
as the chopper tracked its prey. Flying this close the pilots had to
consider rotor clearance, winds, and prop wash Rodgers hoped those were
the only things the pilots were worried about. That would be their
undoing.
Rodgers reached the base of the ragged slope. He felt his way along.
The winds from the tail rotor were savage, like waves of ice water.
Rodgers shielded his eyes as best he could. He would be able to see as
soon as the guns resumed firing. He was going to have to move quickly
when they did.
The chopper continued to creep along the glacier. The throaty sound from
the rotors knocked loose powder from the crags. Rodgers could feel it
hitting his bare cheeks.
That was good. The plan might work.
A few moments later the guns came to life. Rodgers saw the cliff light
up and started running toward the others. As he expected, this close to
the slope, the sound of the guns and the rotor shook particles of ice
from the wall. The area around the helicopter quickly became a sheet of
white. And the flakes did not fall. The winds kept them whipping around
in the air, adding layer upon layer. Within moments visibility had
diminished to zero.
The guns shut down just as Rodgers raced around the front of the
helicopter. Even with their night-vision goggles, the crew would not be
able to see him or their quarry.
Rodgers had judged the distance between himself and the others. He
guided himself toward them by running a hand along the slope. Though his
legs were cramping he refused to stop.
"We've got to move!" Rodgers shouted as he neared the spot where he had
seen the group.
"What's happening?" Nanda cried.
"Keep going!" Rodgers yelled.
"Is my grandfather all right?" she demanded.
From the sound of her voice Rodgers judged the woman to be about thirty
yards away. He continued running hard. A few seconds later he bumped up
against one of the refugees.
Judging from the height of the individual it was Friday. They had
stopped. Rodgers made his way around him. The general reached for Nanda,
who was next in the line. The woman was facing him.
"Grandfather?" Nanda shouted.
"Everyone move!" Rodgers screamed.
In a crisis situation, an individual's fight-or-flight mechanisms are in
conflict. When that happens, the shout of an authority figure typically
shuts down the combative side. A harsh command usually closes it just
enough to let the survival instinct prevail by following the order. In
this case, however, Rodgers's cry killed Nanda's flight response. Friday
stopped moving altogether as Nanda became as combative as Rodgers.
"Where is he?" the woman screamed.
"Your grandfather didn't make it," Rodgers said.
She screamed for the old man again and started to go back.
Rodgers stuffed Apu's parka under his arm then grabbed Nanda's
shoulders. He held them tight and wrestled her in the opposite
direction.
"I won't leave him!" she cried.
"Nanda, he shielded me with his body!" Rodgers shouted.
"He begged me to save you!"
The young woman still grappled with him as she attempted to go back.
Rodgers did not have time to reason with her.
He literally hoisted Nanda off her feet, turned her around, and pulled
her forward. She fought to keep her feet beneath her, but at least those
struggles kept her from fighting with him.
Rodgers half-carried, half-dragged the woman as he ran forward. She
managed to get her balance back and Rodgers took her hand. He continued
to pull her ahead. She went with him, though Rodgers heard her sobbing
under the drone of the oncoming chopper. That was fine, as long as she
kept moving.
The slope circled sharply toward the northeast. Samouel was still in the
lead as they rushed to stay out of the helicopter's line of sight.
But without the added drumming of the guns to dislodge fresh ice
particles, the pilot would soon be able to see them. Rodgers was going
to have to do something about that.
"Samouel, take Nanda's hand and keep going!" Rodgers said.
"Yes, sir," Samouel said.
The American held the woman's arm straight ahead as the Pakistani
reached behind him. He found Nanda's hand and Rodgers released her.
The two continued ahead. Rodgers stopped and Friday ran into him.
"What are you doing?" Friday asked.
"Give me the torches and the matches. Then go with them," Rodgers said
as he took Apu's parka from under his arm.
The NSA operative did as he was instructed. When Friday was gone,
Rodgers took one of the torches, lit it, and jammed it into a small
crack in the slope. Then he hung Apu's coat on a crag just behind it.
Removing his gun from his equipment vest, Rodgers moved away from the
ice wall. He got down on one knee, laid the torch across his boot to
keep it dry, then pointed his automatic up at a sixty-degree angle.
That would put his fire about sixty feet up the cliff. He could not see
anything above twenty feet or so but he did not have to.
Not yet.
Within moments the helicopter crept around the curve in the glacier.
The pilots stopped to kill their night-vision goggles.
Otherwise, the fire would have blinded them. They switched on their
exterior light, illuminating the side of the cliff. As soon as the
chopper opened fire on what they thought was one of the terrorists,
Rodgers also began to shoot. His target were bulges of ice nearest the
top of the chopper. The nose gun ripped up the torch, dousing the flame.
The roar also tore away more surface ice. At the same time Rodgers's
barrage sent larger ice chips flying into the rotor. The blades sliced
the ice into a runny sleet that rained down on the cockpit. The slush
landed on the windshield and froze instantly.
The chopper stopped firing.
So did Rodgers.
While the chopper still had its lights on, Rodgers briefly considered
taking a shot at the cockpit. However, since Afghanistan and Chechnya,
the Russians had equipped many of the newer Mikoyan assault choppers
with bulletproof glass to protect them from snipers. Rodgers did not
want the flashes from his muzzle to reveal his position.
The general crouched in the open, waiting to see what the helicopter
would do. He calculated that it had been in the air at least ninety
minutes. The pilot had to allow for at least another ninety minutes of
flying time to return to base. That would strain the Mi-35's fuel
supply. It would also put extreme stress on the chopper's thermal
tolerance, especially if the crew had to fight an ice storm each time
they fired their nose gun. Even though the windshield would defrost in a
minute or two, the ice would chill the external rotor casing.
Rodgers watched as the chopper hovered. His heart was thumping
double-time due to anticipation and cold. Except for being a hell of a
lot warmer, Rodgers wondered if the young shepherd David felt the same
after letting his small pebble fly against the Philistine champion
Goliath. If successful, David's gamble could result in victory for his
people.
If it failed, the boy faced an ugly, obscure death in the dusty Vale of
Elah.
The chopper's exterior lights snapped off. The glacier was once again in
darkness. All Rodgers could do now was wait and listen. It took exactly
fifteen heartbeats for him to hear what he had been waiting for. With a
sudden surge of power, the Mi-35 turned and swung back along the
glacier. The beat of the rotor retreated quickly behind the wall of ice.
Rodgers waited to make certain that the helicopter was really gone.
After another minute or so the glacier was silent.
Slipping his gun into his vest, he took the matches from his jacket
pocket and lit the torch. He held it ahead of him. The flame cast a
flickering orange teardrop across the ice. It dimly illuminated the ice
wall. And with it, the fallen torch and the shredded parka.
"Thank you, Apu, for saving me a second time," Rodgers said. Throwing
off a small salute, he turned and followed the others to the northeast.
CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE.
Washington, D. C. Thursday, 4:30 p. m.
Paul Hood watched the clock turn on his computer.
"Make the call. Bob," he said.
Bob Herbert and Lowell Coffey III were both in the office with Hood.
The door was closed and Bugs Benet had been told not to interrupt the
men unless the president or Senator Fox was calling. Herbert picked up
the wheelchair phone to call Brett August. Coffey was seated beside
Herbert in a leather armchair. The attorney would be present for the
remainder of the mission. His job was to counsel Hood regarding
international legal matters that might come up.
Coffey had already strongly informed Hood that he was very unhappy with
the idea on the table. That an American military officer was leading a
team consisting of a Pakistani terrorist, an NSA agent, and what
amounted to two Indian hostages. And he was taking them into what was
apparently a Pakistani nuclear missile site that had been erected in
disputed territory. The idea that this constituted an ad hoc United
Nations security council team still wasn't working for him.
Hood agreed that Ambassador Simathna's plan was not a great idea.
Unfortunately, it was the only idea. Bob Herbert and Ron Plummer both
backed Hood up on that.
The TAC-SAT number Herbert had to input included not just the number of
the unit but a code to access the satellite.
This made it extremely difficult for someone to reach the TAC-SAT or use
it if they found it. Hood waited while Herbert finished punching in the
lengthy number.
As Hood had expected, he had not heard from the president and the
members of the Congressional Intelligence Oversight Committee. Over
ninety minutes ago. Hood had e-mailed them a summary of the Pakistani
plan. According to executive assistants to both President Lawrence and
Senator Fox, they were still "studying" Op-Center's proposal.
After a short, angry debate with Coffey, Hood decided not to tell the
president or Fox what kind of Pakistani military facility Rodgers was
visiting. He did not want the CIA crawling all over sources in the
region to try to find out what was out there. Coffey argued that with
events moving beyond their direct control. Hood had a responsibility to
give the president all the facts and hearsay at his disposal. And then
it was up to the president, not Hood, to decide whether to call in the
CIA. Hood disagreed. He had only Simathna's say-so that there was a
nuclear site out there. Hood did not want to legitimize a possible
Pakistani ploy by routing it through the White House and thus making it
seem valid.
Moreover, Hews of a possible nuclear silo might trigger an Indian strike
while Rodgers was out there. That, too, could serve Pakistani purposes
by forcing the United States into a confrontation with India.
Even with the edited report he had presented. Hood did not expect to
hear from the president or Fox before H-hour.
If the
operation failed, they would say that Hood had been acting on his
own. It would be Oliver North redux. If the Striker mission succeeded
they would quickly jump onboard, like the Soviets declaring war on Japan
in the waning hours of the Second World War.
After all that Paul Hood had done to help President Lawrence, he would
have liked more support. Then again, when Hood saved the administration
from a coup attempt he was doing his job. Now the president was
performing his own duties. He was stalling. President Lawrence was using
the delay to create a buffer of plausible deniability. That would
protect the United States from possible international backlash if the
Kashmir situation exploded. The abandonment was not personal. It only
felt that way.
Hood did not have the luxury of time. He had told Mike Rodgers that he
would hear from Brett August in two hours.
Two hours had passed. It was time to place the call.
Op-Center's director had rarely felt this isolated. There were usually
other field personnel or international organizations backing them up,
whether it was Interpol or the Russian Op-Center. Even when he was
Clancy, Tom - Op Center 8 - Line of Control Page 38