James Becker - The Messiah Secret

He had to make the shot count.

He turned to John Cross. ‘I need a clear shot at that gunship, and the only way I’m going to get it is if the crew are lookin’ somewhere else. Can you exit the cave with your hands up, and then move over to the left?’

Cross looked shocked. ‘Sounds like a hell of a bad idea to me.’

‘If you can think of something better, just tell me right now.’

Cross stepped forwards and peered cautiously out of the cave entrance. The Hind was quartering the area, the crew apparently looking for anyone else outside the cave.

‘OK, Nick,’ he said at last. ‘This had goddamn better work.’

Lowering his Kalashnikov to the ground he walked slowly to the mouth of the cave.

A sudden noise from his left attracted his attention. Another helicopter, this one a small utility aircraft, was approaching. As he looked, the pilot flared and landed it about a hundred yards away, keeping the rotors turning.

Cross stepped forward and raised both arms above his head in a clear and unequivocal gesture of surrender. He just hoped that the crew of the gunship hadn’t been instructed to sanitize the area, and that they would be prepared to take prisoners.

Well, he reflected, as the nose of the Hind swung around towards him, he’d soon find out.

The moment the Dhruv touched down, Michael Killian released his seatbelt and fumbled for the door handle.

‘Wait,’ Tembla instructed. ‘We haven’t secured the area yet.’

‘They’ve surrendered,’ Killian retorted, pointing at the man standing outside the cave entrance. ‘It’s all over. I need to see what they found.’

He pulled off his throat mike, stepped out of the helicopter and started walking quickly over towards the cave.

‘Your orders, sir?’ the pilot asked.

‘We’ll stay here, just in case,’ Tembla said. ‘We’re not carrying weapons, and I’m still not satisfied this situation’s under control. There were six men in the area, plus Bronson and Lewis, but all I can see are three bodies and one man who’s got his hands in the air. That still leaves four people unaccounted for. Until I know their locations, I’m not moving. And if the mercenaries are still at large, maybe one of them will do me a favour and shoot that irritating priest.’

As Masters had hoped, when Cross walked out of the cave entrance and over to the left, the Hind moved slightly to follow his path. The pilot brought the gunship to a low hover about fifty feet off the ground and perhaps seventy yards away from the cave. He then selected the public address system and keyed the microphone.

‘Step forward five paces, then lie face down,’ he ordered.

Cross obeyed, keeping his movements slow and deliberate.

In the cave, Nick Masters took a deep breath, and concentrated on the sight picture. The Hind had swung round slightly clockwise, and he could now see most of the port side of the aircraft.

Helicopters have several weaknesses, but the big three are those parts of the machine that keep it in the air — the main rotor, the tail rotor and the gearboxes that drive them. The gearboxes were probably hidden behind armour plate — Masters didn’t know enough about the design of the Hind even to be sure where they were — and because he was looking at the helicopter from the side, the main rotor was almost invisible. So his target of choice — in fact his only target — was the tail rotor.

Slowly, carefully, Masters adjusted his aim, settled down until the sight picture was absolutely clear, then gently squeezed the trigger.

The Barrett kicked into his shoulder — he’d almost forgotten how hard the weapon’s recoil was. When he’d recovered, he checked the view through his telescopic sight. There was a neat hole drilled through the rear of the fuselage about six inches forward of the tail rotor disk. Damn, he thought. The chopper had obviously moved very slightly at the moment he’d fired. But the Hind was still in the same position, so he guessed that the bullet had simply passed through a part of the fuselage without armour plating, and the crew had felt nothing and were still unaware what had happened.

Masters settled his breathing — the weapon was semiautomatic and another round was already in the chamber — and again concentrated all his attention on the view through the telescopic sight. Moments later, he squeezed the trigger once more.

Travelling at supersonic speed, the half-inch bullet hit almost the exact centre of the tail rotor disk. The rotors were designed to withstand the impact of rounds from small-arms fire and even bullets from assault rifle, but the Barrett M82 was in a different league.

The bullet tore one blade completely off the hub and splintered and twisted the one next to it. That in itself would probably have been enough to cripple the helicopter, but the round hadn’t yet completed its journey. It ploughed on, smashing through the thin aluminium skin of the fuselage into the tail rotor gearbox. The bullet crumpled and deformed as its kinetic energy was spent, and the effect on the gearbox itself was catastrophic. The casing split, driving fragments of metal between the spinning gears and cogs. In a little under a tenth of a second after the bullet hit, the gearbox seized solid.

As the gunship lurched sideways, Masters saw a portion of one of the tail rotor blades spin away from the fuselage. The nose of the helicopter lifted as the pilot struggled to control an aircraft that suddenly wasn’t responding the way it should. He tried to gain height, which was exactly the wrong thing to do, because it made the situation worse. As the nose pitched even higher, the gunship started to spin on its own axis.

And then there was nothing the pilot could do. The moment the tail rotor gearbox seized, he’d lost all directional control. The spin became even more violent and suddenly the Hind was plummeting to the ground, the main rotor blades smashing into rocks, debris flying in all directions as the fuselage impacted. There was a brief moment of silence, and then the fuel in the helicopter’s ruptured tanks ignited, turning the wreckage into a massive fireball.

Masters stepped back into the cave feeling drained. It was over. The crew inside the Hind could not have survived the impact — or the fire. There was nothing more for him to do.

* * *

Sitting in the rear seat of the Dhruv, Tembla watched the catastrophe unfold in front of him. He had to get out. The overwhelming tactical superiority afforded him by the presence of the Hind had gone, and he was suddenly uncomfortably aware that he was sitting in a thin-skinned and extremely vulnerable helicopter, and less than a hundred yards away was a group of mercenary soldiers armed with assault rifles.

‘Abort! Abort!’ he yelled. ‘Get us out of here now!’

The pilot reacted immediately, hauling up on the collective and swinging the aircraft in a tight climbing turn away from the cave, accelerating as hard as he could towards the edge of the valley.

Killian was standing open-mouthed, staring at the scene of devastation in front of him. Then he heard an escalating engine note from behind him and glanced back to see the Dhruv taking off.

He watched helplessly as the man who’d walked out of the cave — and then apparently surrendered — stood up and drew a pistol. Holding his weapon ready, he started to work his way across the slope towards him. Killian looked around, but there was nowhere to run, and nowhere to hide, a cliche come hideously to life. He raised his arms and waited.

But even as he watched the armed man approach, he smiled slightly. Whatever happened now, he was content. If the Lord God had not wanted him to be here, in this place and at this time, he would not be here. God clearly still had a task for him to complete. He closed his eyes. ‘Thy will be done, oh Lord,’ he prayed.