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Jerry lost his stoic battle with pain when the helo's vibration shifted his center of gravity, doubling him over his bleeding belly and causing the bullet fragments to tear through yet more tissue. His scream lanced into Juan as if he'd been pierced by a dagger.
Cabrillo regained his footing, looking into the cockpit. Mike had firm control of the helicopter, his eyes sca
Like all head wounds, it bled copiously. Juan grabbed a balled-up rag from the floor between the seats, pressed it to the wound, and held it while his other hand reached back. Mark Murphy knew what the Chairman wanted and handed over a roll of surgical tape. Like wrapping a mummy, Juan wound four loops of tape around the pilot's head to staunch the flow of crimson blood.
Mike, you okay? Juan asked in English. The need for subterfuge was over. The pilot would be unconscious for hours.
Yeah, but we've got problems.
Cabrillo glanced back to where Mark tended to Jerry Pulaski. Don't I know it.
We're losing fuel, and either this model doesn't have self-sealing tanks or they've failed. Add to that the rising engine temperature, and I think we might also have a broken oil line.
Juan turned aft and leaned out the window, holding his body rigid against the tremendous wind pounding his head and upper body. The sound was a roar in his ears as if he were at the bottom of a waterfall. Trailing the copter, like proverbial bread crumbs, was a greasy feather of smoke. He could see it stretching back from the rear rotor boom to the point in the sky where a round had severed the oil line.
The Argentines would be coming hard, and the smoke would last for twenty or thirty minutes because there was so little wind and the air was already so heavily laden with ash and soot.
Yeah, she's smoking pretty badly, he reported when he swung back toward the cockpit. After closing the door, they only had to shout to one another to be heard rather than screaming as they had been.
How's Jerry? Mike asked. The two were not only combat partners but best friends.
Juan's silence was Trono's answer. Cabrillo finally asked, Can we make Paraguay?
Not a chance. This bird had only half a tank when we started, and we've already lost nearly half that. If the engines hold together, the best we can hope for is maybe fifty miles. What do you want me to do?
Thoughts poured like an avalanche through Juan's mind. This is what he did best. He considered options, calculated odds, and made a decision all in the time it takes a normal person to digest the question. The factors hanging over his call weighed heavily. There was the success of the mission, his duty to Mike and Mark, the odds Jerry would be alive when they landed, and what they would do if he was. Ultimately, it came down to saving Jerry's life.
We go back. The Argies must have medical facilities at their base, and the other chopper will have the range to reach it.
Like hell, Pulaski said, finding the strength in his anger to speak. You're not going down because I wasn't fast enough on the draw, damn it.
Juan gave Pulaski his full attention. Jerr, it's the only way.
Mike, get this tub to the RHIB, Jerry shouted past Cabrillo. Chairman, please. I know I'm dying. I can feel it getting closer and closer. Don't throw your lives away on a dead man. I'm not asking, Juan. I'm begging. I don't want to go knowing you guys went with me.
Pulaski held out a hand, which Juan took. The congealed blood on his palm cemented their skin together. Jerry continued. It ain't noble, staying with me. It's suicide. Argies are go
I understand you copied that sentiment from Braveheart, Juan said. His lips smiled. His eyes couldn't.
I'm serious, Juan.
For Cabrillo, time stopped for a few moments. The steady beat of the rotor and the whine of the turbine faded to silence. He'd known death and loss. His wife had been killed by a drunk driver herself. He'd lost agents and contacts during his time at the CIA, and the Corporation had been visited by the Grim Reaper as well, but he'd never asked another man to die so that he could live.
He reached into his pack and handed the portable GPS to Mike. The RHIB's at waypoint Delta.
There's no place to land, Mike said. You remember how thick that jungle was. And there's no way I can ditch this thing in the river without killing us all.
Don't worry about an LZ, Mark Murphy shouted forward. I got that covered.
Cabrillo knew to trust the eccentric Mr. Murphy.
Swing us around and punch in waypoint Delta.
Not Delta, Murph said. Echo.
Echo? Juan questioned.
Trust me.
The Eurocopter's navigational computer was self-explanatory, so Mike punched in the coordinates from the handheld GPS, then swung the chopper around to a southeasterly bearing. So far, his flying had been smooth and controlled, just as he'd been taught. Gomez Adams would be proud.
Looks like we have enough fuel. Barely, he said.
Chairman, Mark shouted. Starboard side. Maybe three klicks back.
What?
I saw the flash of sun off the other chopper's windshield.
Juan looked out the side window. He didn't see anything but he didn't doubt Mark's eyesight. The Argentines were coming a lot faster than he'd thought. Then he should have realized it. With their helo burning oil, they didn't have the speed to match the other bird. And the Argentine Major would tear the guts out of his aircraft in order to get his prey.
Mike, he shouted. Give us everything she's got. Company's coming.
The turbines kicked up a notch but didn't sound healthy. Metal was grinding someplace in the engine compartment, and it was only a matter of time before they shut down.
Juan looked around the cabin for additional weapons. The door-mounted .30 caliber was a better option than their H&K machine pistols, but only if the other helo came up on the port side where the gun was mounted. He found a medical kit under the bench seat and a red plastic box containing a large-bore flare pistol and four stubby projectiles. Juan knew the script for this mission didn't include a billion-to-one shot with a flare, so he left it on the bench.
Mark, jury-rig a harness for me, he ordered as he set to work unbolting the old Browning machine gun from its webbing gimbal.
The gun was a thirty-pound, four-foot-long antique with a single pistol grip at the end of its boxy receiver. A belt of fifty brass cartridges dangled from the breach and made an almost musical chime when they clinked together. He was familiar enough with the weapon and knew it had a reputation for reliability as well as a recoil that could shatter teeth.
Juan stripped off his shirt. He wrapped the garment around the Browning's twenty-four-inch barrel and tied it off with the rest of the surgical tape.
Murph, meanwhile, shucked out of his combat harness and reconfigured the nylon webbing into a long loop that he clipped to a D ring just forward of the starboard door. He clipped the other end to the back of Cabrillo's combat harness. He used the strap of his backpack to make a second loop that would go around the Chairman's ankles. He would hold the other end to prevent Juan from falling into the Eurocopter's slipstream.