Mack Maloney - Chopper Ops

Zim’s eyebrow went up another half inch—a sign he was almost overjoyed.

“I hate to part with it,” he finally said. “But we cannot turn down such an offer. The man in Room 6 has indeed served us well.”

“He has, sir,” Qank parroted.

Zim thought for a few moments.

“What about our camouflage?” he asked Qank.

The intelligence man was slightly confused. “Excuse me, sir.”

“You know, for the media—in case word of this ever gets out.”

Qank thought a moment—then it hit him.

“You mean the ‘cover story,’ sir?”

Zim just nodded. Qank had come dangerously close to correcting him.

Qank began flipping through the previous handwritten pages.

“Our friend says: ‘If this transaction ever makes it into the public eye, our story will be that it was a secret third-party purchase of ten MiG-29 Fulcrums from an unnamed former Soviet republic.’”

Zim gave a little shrug. “Plausible, I guess,” he said. “Now, what about the gunship’s crew—the surviving ones anyway?”

Qank turned to another page. “They will be given a cash payment and then dispersed to the four winds.”

Zim showed agreement with this also. “And these odd special operations people?” he asked. “The ones in the funny helicopters. The ones so easily fooled. What will happen to them?”

Qank hesitated a moment. It was true. The chopper-borne special operations troops had fallen for the fake-airplane ruse perfectly and completely, filling in several holes the man in Room 6 said had to be filled before the gunship could be sold off.

And although the present location of the American chopper unit was not known at the moment, finding them would not be much of a problem—again, according to the man in Room 6. Indeed, since they had learned the chopper unit was in-country, they had followed the instructions of Zim’s special hotel guest to the letter, and so far his plans and information had been flawless. Why would they doubt him now?

So Qank said: “The man in Room 6 has come up with a rather creative solution as to what to do with these helicopter people. I can tell you his idea now, sir, or wait until it has been completed.”

“I’ll wait,” Zim replied. “It will make more pleasurable listening that way.”

Now came several long minutes of complete silence. All Qank could hear was Zim’s labored breathing.

Finally the big man came back to life.

“All right, accept the offer,” he declared. “I will miss my lovely gunship. But it has made us substantial sums in the past two years, and has served us well. Now, even in getting rid of it, it is giving us a big return. I think it’s a good deal.”

“I agree, sir,” Qank toadied. “Shall I let the man in Room 6 go ahead with the final arrangements then?”

Zim simply nodded. “Yes, and be sure to thank him profusely for me. Send some nonalcoholic champagne to his room. I know he just loves that stuff.”

Qank did a deep bow. Time to get out.

“As you wish, sir,” he said, backing up.

He was almost out the door when Zim cleared his throat—a signal that Qank should freeze.

“One last thing,” Zim said. “How is that cash payment going to be made?”

Qank began sifting madly through the handwritten notes. He just hoped he could find the answer before Zim lost his notoriously short temper.

He finally found the right page; it was covered with scribbling, obscene doodles, and many, many numbers. But at the bottom was the information Zim wanted to know.

“The payment will be secured through a series of wire transactions,” he began reading. “Through the usual avenues in the Cayman Islands, Hong Kong, and finally on to Zurich.”

To Qank’s amazement, Zim actually laughed. A full, burst-out guffaw from the huge man was rather frightening.

“Do you realize how I was paid the first time by these people who are now buying the gunship?” he asked Qank.

The intel man numbly shook his head. Was Zim actually going to reminisce with him?

“No, sir,” Qank whispered.

“It was back in the late seventies,” Zim began, looking at the ceiling. “A minor transaction. An exchange of a SCUD missile for F-14 parts, coincidentally enough, with some money on the side. And those fools actually sent me a check! And a birthday cake! Can you believe it?”

Qank started laughing now for real—not so much that some government would make payment to Zim for a back-alley arms deal by check, but that they would send him a birthday cake along with it.

“I’m sure that won’t happen this time,” Qank told him. “After all, they are just buying back what was once theirs in the first place. I have to believe they will want to cover their tracks better than that.”

Zim laughed again.

“Never underestimate the U.S. Government, Major,” he said. “You never know what they’ll do next.”

Over central Iraq

Considering what it had been through, Truck One was flying just fine.

The troop-carrying Halo stank of aviation fuel—the entire unit had smelled of gas since the mad rush to refuel the four choppers on the cliff. But the chopper was cruising along without a hint of trouble now, and for that Gene Smitz was grateful.

He was shoehorned into a seat at the back of the chopper jammed up with half of the Team 66 Marines, most of the air techs, and two of the SEAL doctors. Most of his fellow passengers were asleep; the others were crowded around the chopper’s windows, looking out for any trouble that might be following them.

Meanwhile, Smitz was trying like crazy to get his NoteBook to work.

They’d been airborne for about a half hour now, and it had been aces since their daring escape from the mountain. No one was following them. They’d received no SAM warnings or any warnings of hostile intent from the ground or the air.

But Smitz knew this was definitely a temporary situation. Thus the wrestling match with his laptop.

Since the mission began, he’d been receiving his orders directly from his office via the NoteBook. That was one of the beauties of the highly advanced machine. It had a remote modem and could connect him with his office no matter where he was in the world.

Of course, he didn’t know who was on the other end of the pipeline. He never received any direct replies to his situation reports—and that was slightly troubling. But his missives were always followed by more orders. That was why Smitz was so anxious to get through to his office now. He had to apprise them of the new situation, and ask for immediate orders in extracting the unit—something he just didn’t have the authorization to do himself. He’d been waiting for a small green light to start blinking in the upper left-hand corner of his screen, telling him a line to Langley was secure and clear. Yet in nearly thirty minutes of trying, that little light was still solid red.

He was distracted for a moment when he looked out the window to see Norton’s Hind pull up in a protective position next to the Halo. Though they’d only been in-country two days, Smitz thought the Hind looked somewhat battered, used, as if it too was getting tired of this game. He also knew that its guns were nearly empty of ammo—the same with Delaney’s machine. What’s more, both Hinds were running on only half fuel. The rushed refueling job back on the mountain had given each of the four remaining choppers barely enough gas to get airborne and out of the immediate area, but not much more. Certainly not enough to reach friendly environs.

That was another reason why Smitz had to get new orders very quickly. There would be no more fuel to be had for them—not with the Hook gone. And they couldn’t just fly around Iraq forever. They needed an extraction plan now.