The Final Day (After, #3)(95)
“Now I know how my granddaddies felt.” Lee sighed, his features set and grim. He started to whisper, and John caught bits of the Ninety-First Psalm, what many called the soldier’s psalm, “Thou shall not be afraid for the terror by night; nor the arrow that flieth by day. Nor the pestilence that walketh in darkness, nor the destruction that wasteth by noonday…”
“Minute out!” the pilot shouted. “Doesn’t look hot; we circle while the others touch down first.”
John strained up to try to catch a glimpse. The mountain filled the windscreen before them, the pilot pitching up slightly to clear space beneath him for the Apaches that were already skimming along the face of the ridgeline. There was a paved runway at the base of the ridgeline, John noting that it had been cleared of snow. Between the airfield and the ridge, there were a half a dozen helo pads, cleared and marked as well. A Black Hawk rested on one of the pads.
So far, no shots were fired. The Apaches zoomed back and forth along the face of the mountain as the chopper with Bob in it skimmed in low, flared up, and touched down on one of the pads. Bob was the first one out before it had even settled down, followed by troopers with weapons raised.
Another came in, and then a third while a couple of hundred feet up, the Black Hawk that John was in turned in sharp sixty-degree banks, circling about. Lee, absolutely wired up, for once did not complain while Forrest, chuckling softly, hung on to his safety harness with one hand, M4 strapped across his chest.
“Shit, we’ve got incoming!” the pilot shouted, and he snapped the Black Hawk over into an opposite turn. For a few seconds, it looked to John as if he was about to go straight into the mountain before pulling around.
John caught a glimpse down and saw that a firefight was opening up, tracers arcing back and forth between where the Black Hawks were landing and bunkers set to either side of what appeared to be a massive steel door at least thirty feet wide and twenty feet high. What appeared to be orange tennis balls snapped past the Black Hawk’s windshield, the pilot cursing and going into sharp spiraling evasive turns.
“I’m putting us down before we get hit up here!” the pilot shouted, and he nosed nearly straight down. The helicopter pads were now all occupied by the Black Hawks, John’s pilot opting for an access road, plowed as well, that circled round the pads. He flared up sharply, the medic that was flying with them reaching up to slide a side door open. Even before touching down, he was shouting for them to get out, stay low, and hit the ground.
Forrest was the first up and in spite of his old war injuries was out the door. He ran half a dozen feet and flung himself to the ground, M4 up and ready to engage.
John had not done anything like this in more than twenty years, but training did kick in, as it did for Malady and even Maury, who leaped out and sprawled into the snow alongside Forrest. John looked back and saw Lee standing in the open doorway, Grace behind him.
“Lee, Grace, get out!” John shouted, and at that instant, a burst of shots laced down the side of the helicopter, shattering its forward windshield, hitting the pilot, and then stitching across Lee. He collapsed back into the Black Hawk, the long burst raking down the length of the helicopter, tearing across the turbine housings, and from there into the tail rotor, which disintegrated into deadly shards arcing out in every direction.
Smoke billowed out between the still-rotating rotor blades. John got to his feet and ran back even as the medic was grabbing hold of Lee, pulling him feet first out of the crippled bird. There was blood covering Grace’s face, but she was up, helping to push Lee out, John grabbing hold of his friend’s legs and pulling him to safety.
His friend was wide-eyed and gasping. It looked as if his vest had taken a shot, and for a few seconds, John thought he had just been stunned by the blow, turning to Grace and shouting at her if she was wounded.
“I don’t think I’m hit!” she cried. He then looked back at Lee, who at that instant started to cough up blood.
The medic frantically tore the Kevlar jacket open, cursing. There was an entry wound that had punched through his jacket just above his heart. The medic rolled Lee up onto his side, slipped his hand down the back, and came up with a bloody hand.
“Damn it!” the medic cried, and he looked at Grace, who had been standing behind Lee in the helicopter, her face splattered with blood.
“You hit?”
“No, not sure … no.”
“Then put pressure on Lee’s wound!” the medic shouted, pushing down hard with his own hands first and then grabbing Grace’s hand and guiding her to take over. He looked back to the front of the chopper. The pilot was staggering out, arm drenched with blood, copilot running around the front of the Black Hawk to help him get clear. The medic returned his focus to Lee.
John knelt beside Lee, not sure what to do other than hold his old friend’s hand. The medic was cutting through Lee’s parka and shirt underneath, stabbing the exposed arm with a syrette of morphine, and seconds later the look of panic in Lee’s eyes cleared a bit while the medic worked frantically to set up a bag of plasma.
“What’s his name?” the medic cried, looking over at John.
“Lee Robinson.”
The medic leaned down close to Lee’s face. “Lee, you are going to make it, but you’ve got to stay with me. I’ve got to keep you breathing, I’m going to work a breathing and suction tube down you; don’t panic. You got that? Stay with me. I’m going to get you through this!”