Larry Bond - Vortex

“My God, man, but you gave me a shock there.”

Kruger laughed softly with him.

“I thought I might.” He turned serious.

“Tell me, can you speak freely?”

“I can. What’s up?”

As Kruger told him, Coetzee began to feel hope for his nation for the first time in months. Despite what he’d always been taught and believed, these Americans and British had guts.

JANUARY I O-QUANTUM STRIKE FORCE, OVER SWARTKOP MILITARY AIRFIELD, PRETORIA

From the outside the C-130 Hercules looked exactly like one of the three such planes left in South Africa’s inventory. U.S. Air Force maintenance crews had worked round the clock repainting the aircraft with the right camouflage colors and insignia. One of Brig. Deneys Coetzee’s conspirators inside the SAAF had even given them the side number for a real South

African C-130, currently undergoing emergency repairs at Upington Military

Airfield-more than eight hundred kilometers from Pretoria. The impostor was considerably closer than that, now just two minutes’ flying time from

Swartkop’s main runway.

The ninety grim-faced men riding inside the Hercules were also flying under false colors. All of them wore South African uniforms and carried

South African weapons-weapons and clothing provided by Cape Province units. Beneath their uniforms they were a mixed bunch-a reinforced Ranger rifle platoon, a British SAS troop, and several Afrikaans-speaking volunteers from Henrik Kruger’s 20th Cape Rifles. They had much in common, though:

physical and mental toughness, superb combat skills, and a driving determination to carry out their mission at any cost. Their commanders shared those same attributes.

From his seat near the C-130’s rear ramp, Col. Robert O’Connell checked the magazine on his R4 assault rifle and slid it back in place. His hands still shook, but only slightly. Not enough for anybody not looking closely to notice. He kept his hands busy by checking the rest of his gear: a pistol with a separate, concealed silencer, a sheathed knife, and two colored-smoke grenades for signaling purposes. Somehow it didn’t seem like enough. Then he shrugged. Even in battle dress, a South African officer couldn’t go waltzing about Pretoria looking like a walking arsenal.

Satisfied that he was as ready as he’d ever be, O’Connell glanced at the men seated to either side of him. Capt. David Pryce, the tall, mustachioed SAS officer he’d picked as his XO for Quantum, was making the same kind of last-minute personal inspection.

Major Cain, the senior SAS man in South Africa, had kicked and screamed to come along, too. But Craig had vetoed that on the sensible grounds that the Joint Special Warfare units being readied at Durban needed an experienced and battle-tested commander.

If Quantum failed, General Craig would need every Ranger team and SAS patrol he could lay his hands on. Those in country were already prepping for what would almost certainly be a series of desperate and abortive commando raids on South Africa’s radioactive-waste-filled mining facilities. O’Connell’s mind shied away from imagining what a bloody shambles those attacks were likely to be. Then he laughed inwardly, If

Quantum failed, he wouldn’t be around to see it all happening.

Beside him, Commandant Henrik Kruger wore a headset plugged into the

Hercules’s intercom system, listening as a former South African Air

Force lieutenant handled the C 130’s cockpit conversations with air traffic controllers on the ground.

As O’Connell watched, Kruger slipped the headset off with a decisive gesture.

“We’ve been cleared to land. One minute.”

The whining clunk of the aircraft’s gear coming down confirmed Kruger’s statement.

O’Connell sat back in his seat, trying to clear his mind of any thoughts or worries outside this mission. Total concentration on the job helped keep his fears at bay.

Touchdown . Coming in low and fast, the C-130 bounced once on Swartkop’s bomb-damaged runway and braked just enough to stay on the ground-rolling rapidly toward a small group of trucks and other vehicles parked at the far end. Once there, it braked still more, slowing as it swung through a 180-degree turn so that its nose pointed down the runway again.

Still in his seat, O’Connell felt a final shudder as the aircraft came to a complete stop. He unstrapped himself and stood up in a single fluid motion with his assault rifle gripped in his right hand. The men around him were doing the same thing.

A sliver of daylight appeared, growing larger as the C130’s rear ramp whined open. It dropped onto the runway and locked in place. Slinging his rifle, the Ranger officer trotted down the ramp with Kruger by his side.

The assault force followed him in a column of fours-emerging into a whirling chaos of turboprop-blown sand and dust.

Three uniformed Afrikaners stood waiting for them at the foot of the ramp, each holding his peaked cap on his head against the howling, artificial windstorm. Kruger went straight up to the shortest of the three and shook his hand, shouting to be heard over the noise.

“Deneys, man, you’re a sight for blery sore eyes!”

“You expected somebody different, maybe?” Brig. Deneys Coetzee grinned.

At Kruger’s gesture, he turned to 0”Con nell

“You are the American commander?”

O’Connell nodded.

“Good. I have the vehicles you need here.” Coetzee jerked a thumb at the ill-assorted collection of military trucks and jeeps visible behind him.

“I suggest you get your men aboard and we’ll talk later. In some place safer. Right?”

“Definitely.” O’Connell turned and waved his arm toward the waiting convoy. His troops scattered by squads, each jogging toward a different truck.

The group of six officers-the four South Africans, 0”Con nell and

Pryce-trotted after them at a slightly more sedate pace. The American kept his eyes open. The last time he’d seen Swartkop, it had been dark and most of the base had been on fire.

He was glad to see that the airfield still showed signs of the damage inflicted by his Rangers. Swartkop’s control tower stood silent-a burned-out, blackened ruin. Piles of twisted steel girders and warped aluminum siding were all that were left of maintenance hangars and storage sheds. For now, flight operations were being handled out of a small cluster of camouflage-draped tents set up next to a mobile radar van.

O’Connell frowned. Fuel trucks and ground crews were already rolling across the cratered tarmac-heading for the C-130. That was bad. The

Hercules looked fine from a distance. Up close might be a different story. He checked his watch. Three minutes had passed since they’d landed. So where were the F-15Es the Air Force had promised?

They were right on time.

Sirens started wailing, their eerie howling rising and falling all across the air base. In seconds the fuel trucks and ground crews were racing away, heading for cover. A lone South African Air Force officer pounded across the tarmac toward the C-130. “Air raid! Clear the field! Get off the ground! Go! “

The aircraft’s still-spinning props bluffed as it lumbered down the runway, picking up speed fast. With plenty of runway left to spare, the

Hercules roared off the ground and into the air.

Coetzee turned around to see him smiling.

“Your idea, Colonel?”

“Yeah. ” O’Connell trotted ahead and glanced back.

“Keep moving,

Brigadier. Our flyboys won’t be too choosy about what they drop bombs on.”

The South African chuckled and waved him aboard the lead Land Rover. its driver shifted into gear and pulled out onto the airfield’s access road while O’Connell was still struggling into a seat.