Scorched Earth

Only five seconds had passed since the helicopter landed on the hilltop.

Colonel Gunther had lost six of his men.

As the troopship lifted away, a Chilean soldier clawed his way back aboard only to leap upward suddenly, a slug tearing straight up through the floor panels and continuing through his chest. Blood, pumping from the Chilean's through-and-through death wounds, poured over Colonel Gunther. Another slug careened through the troopship. The colonel grabbed the dying man's M-16.

The helicopter's gu

Lyons jammed in another Atchisson magazine. This one contained one-ounce slugs. He hit the bolt release to chamber the first of the seven rounds.

Standing up in the fighting hole, throwing aside the screen of camouflage, Lyons faced the belly of the troopship. He pointed the weapon at the engine area and fired.

Sheet metal crumpled. Each slug slammed the Huey's belly with thousands of foot-pounds of force. Through the Plexiglas nose window of the helicopter, Lyons saw the feet of the pilot operating the directional control pedals.

The Yaqui with the machine gun fired from his fighting hole, tracers sparking off a steel skid, tearing holes through the aluminum body of the helicopter.

Left hand gripping the airframe, his right hand holding the M-16 like a pistol, Colonel Gunther leaned from the cargo door and fired a burst into the Yaqui's face, killing him instantly. Then Gunther aimed under the skids, to execute the hidden enemy who had slaughtered the men of his squad.

A one-ounce slug smashed up through the Plexiglas nose window, the pilot's left leg exploding and spraying pulped flesh and bone. He convulsed with the shock and pain, losing control of the aircraft controls. The fuselage rotated violently counterclockwise.

G-force broke Gunther's grip. The Fascist International colonel fell out of the doorway.

"Colonel!" the doorgu

The helicopter spun out of control, the tail rotor roaring over Lyons as he dropped for safety. He saw a Fascist with a rifle crash into the brush.

Thrown from side to side in his safety harness, the gu

Now the gu

"Colonel!" the gu

"What has happened to the colonel?"

"He's out there! He's on the hill, fighting with..."

"Fire, kill the ones you can," the copilot ordered. "I'll circle. Who's left from the squad?"

The doorgu

"Only two."

"We must get the colonel."

On the hilltop, Lyons smashed the Fascist colonel again and again in the side of the head with his fist. But Gunther slammed an elbow into Lyons's gut, doubling him over.

Lyons fell back. He heard the rotor throb fading as the helicopter banked away. Then a fist smashed him. Stu

A Yaqui drove the steel butt of FN-FAL para-rifle into the Fascist's head, once, twice, then the Fascist tore the rifle out of the Yaqui's hands. Lyons slammed his knee into the colonel's groin.

Foul breath exploded into Lyons's face. He grabbed the colonel's uniform shirt and threw him to the side. A Yaqui clamped an arm around the throat of the colonel and choked him. Lyons struggled to pin Gunther's wrists.

The helicopter returned. From the opposite ridge, Blancanales and a Yaqui tracked the troopship with M-60 machine guns. Tracers arced over the canyon.

Lyons heard his Atchisson boom. Vato held the full-auto weapon at his shoulder and squeezed off another shot, the recoil jarring his slight body back. Then he brought the sights down and aimed again.

At a range of twenty meters, he did not miss. A one-ounce slug shattered the windshield of the helicopter and killed the wounded pilot. Vato aimed again, but the Atchisson did not fire. Empty.

Colonel Gunther threw the Yaqui away from him. He broke Lyons's grip and ran for the helicopter. The doorgu

"Vato!" Lyons yelled as he tossed a 7-round mag of 12-gauge shells to the Yaqui leader.

Autofire tore past Lyons's head. Throwing him-self sideways, Lyons snatched the Colt Python from the hideout holster at the small of his back and snap-fired into the door of the helicopter. Another burst of 5.56mm tore past him, then he saw a face, and he fired and saw the head explode with the impact of the hollowpoint. On a dead run, he tackled Gunther, pushed him down and smashed the Python against the Fascist's head again and again, blood spraying, hammering the man into unconsciousness.

The Atchisson fired in wild full-auto, Vato losing control of the recoiling assault shotgun. But the spray of steel projectiles swept the troopship's interior, punching aluminum and flesh. Blasts threw a soldier back. A headless man flailed the air. The doorgu

Unaware that he carried only dead soldiers, the copilot banked the helicopter to circle around again. The maneuver exposed the top of the troopship.

The Yaqui spotter shouldered his FN-FAL para-rifle. Taking careful aim, he fired at the center of the spi

Metal shrieked. The helicopter lost power, the banking turn becoming a dead fall into the mountain. Missing the ridgeline, the troopship skipped off a steep slope. As the fuselage disintegrated into metal and Plexiglas and plastic tumbling down the mountainside, the fuel tanks exploded into an intense fireball. Burning wreckage drifted, as if in slow motion, into the canyon.

Lyons pulled the loops of plastic handcuffs tight around the ankles and wrists of the unconscious colonel. As a precaution he put two loops around the huge man's wrists.

On the hilltop a dying Fascist groaned, his breath bubbling blood. Vato dropped the Atchisson and went to the Yaqui machine gu

Machine guns continued spraying out a river of lead death.

Lyons looked to the rocks where Blancanales and his Yaqui gu

The light plane circled, its napalm canister flashing with the morning light.

"The machine gun!" Lyons called out to Vato.

They heard the engine pitch change. The plane lined up with the hilltop and gained speed as it dived.

Lyons scrambled across the litter of corpses. He took the M-60 out of the dead Yaqui's hands. Vato untangled the cartridge belt from the bloody camouflage.

Shouldering the heavy weapon, Lyons sighted on the pilot and pulled the trigger. Tracers hurtled past the cockpit. Struggling to hold the bucking M-60 on line, Lyons did not release the trigger. A windshield shattered.

The pilot pulled back as he released the napalm. Lyons saw the canister tumbling through the air directly at him. But he didn't stop firing. Resolved to kill the man who would kill him, Lyons followed the plane with the M-60.