Jack Coughlin - Running the Maze

The thudding sound of an incoming helicopter did not allow time to catch her breath. She jumped up, but instead of going back the way she had come, she decided to cut off some distance by angling up the hill, as if drawing the hypotenuse of a triangle. In the sky, to the east, she could see the white and orange helicopter coming on fast and shedding altitude.

Swanson was on her heels and did not correct her, because she was already realizing her mistake. A thick tangle of thorny growth blocked her path, and it only got thicker as she fought through it. She looked up and saw Arvis Taylor smiling down at her. He shook his head, and Beth knew that she was not going to make it.

The helicopter landed with the engine at full throttle, but the bird never stopped. Had Beth been there, she could have just flopped through the open hatch. She wasn’t, though, and Taylor’s orders were to make it a touch-and-go, never coming to a full halt. Just as Ledford fought her way free of the clinging thorns, he finished the touchdown less than a hundred feet away and was lifting off, unwilling to wait an instant longer than ordered, even for one of his closest friends.

Beth Ledford’s shoulders sagged in disappointment, and she sat down hard on the dirt. Unscrewing the canteen, she drank some water while she listened to Swanson on his radio, reporting failure. The blades of the bird overhead were beating retreat.

“Ferrybird One. Ferrybird One. This is Swanson, over.”

“Swanson, this is Ferrybird. Send your traffic.”

“Roger. Looks like our girl missed the pickup. Divert to LZ Two.”

“Roger that. Ferrybird out.”

She bristled at hearing him call her a girl and was about to say something when Kyle was in her face. Drill sergeant time again. “You’ve blown the LZ, Ledford. Now the enemy knows where you are, so you just added three kilometers to the day and are in escape and recovery time. Get off your ass and read your map. You’ve got ten minutes to cover three klicks to the alternate LZ. This time don’t go wandering off course.”

Beth pushed herself erect, checked the map, blew out puffed cheeks in determination, and set out for the listed grid coordinates of the new LZ. The blades of the departing helicopter were still loud in the air.

Swanson did not let up but stayed right in her ear, yelling. “Move out, Petty Officer. It pays to be a winner, Ledford. Because you screwed up, now we may have to walk back. I wanted to eat some Greek food in Q-Town tonight, but if you mess up getting to the alternate LZ, I will be stuck on this damn little hill with you walking around lost in the dark.”

A bright flash drew their attention, and the smoky white trail of a surface-to-air missile lanced upward from the far treeline and drove straight for the low-flying helicopter. There was the shaking clap of a loud explosion as the missile struck the brightly colored helicopter, blowing off the tail rotor section. The front of the bird hung momentarily motionless in the air, then was engulfed in a massive fireball as another explosion ruptured the fuel tanks. It crashed to the ground, burning.

“Oh my God!” Ledford screamed and started to run toward the crash site.

Swanson saw a glitter of sunlight flashing on glass, thought scope, and tackled her in midstride just as a bullet banged overhead. He pushed through the tackle, driving them both forward and down to the ground. “Ambush, Ledford. For real!” Kyle slithered forward on his stomach, with Beth at his heels. A cluster of boulders provided some temporary protection.

“Let’s flank him,” Beth said. “Split up, circle around, and come in from the sides.” She was breathing hard, her mind still reeling from seeing the helicopter destroyed and then being shot at almost simultaneously. Her hands were raw from skidding through the gravel and dirt as she had broken her fall.

“Negative. This is no coincidence, Beth. You were supposed to be on that helicopter, and the shooter was backup in case you were not. We’re unarmed out here, and we don’t know how many guys are after us. My job is to get you out of danger.” He grabbed his radio and tuned it to an emergency frequency as the crack of another rifle shot was followed by a whining ricochet of a bullet off the edge of the rocks. It showered them with splinters.

“Quantico Tower. Quantico Tower. This is Gunnery Sergeant Kyle Swanson. Mayday. Mayday. Mayday.” Kyle had his radio at his lips and fumbled his map open with the other hand.

The calm voice of an air traffic controller responded immediately. “This is Marine Corps Air Facility Quantico Tower. I read you, Gunny. What is your emergency?”

“A Coast Guard helicopter was just shot down by a SAM missile on a training exercise,” he said, reading off the coordinates. “Now my partner and I are under fire in an ambush by at least one individual and are evading. Send anything you have in the air to buzz this site to keep their heads down.”

“Roger that, Gunny. Be advised we are diverting a fast-mover for a flyover, and it’s on the way. A Cobra should be right behind him. The Quick Reaction Force is being alerted.”

Kyle responded, “We’re moving at one hundred ninety-eight magnetic azimuth. Swanson out.” He stuffed the radio into a pocket and turned to Ledford. “We’re heading for that clump of trees about fifty meters down the slope. It will take between six and seven seconds to get there, with minimal cover. I will go first, at an angle to draw his fire, then you run like your life depends on it, Beth. Somebody wants you dead real bad.” With that, Swanson broke from cover and headed downhill, dodging sharply to his left. Ledford raced out a moment later, her arms windmilling for balance on the treacherous slope.

MAJOR CHARLES MARSHALL JONES saw the spiraling black smoke from the downed helicopter, then the bald spot of the landing zone. He had been only a few miles away, approaching the air station in his Lockheed Martin F-35B Lightning when the controller issued the emergency orders. Instead of setting up for a slow vertical landing, Jones peeled away and punched the Pratt & Whitney turbofan engine into afterburner. The stubby wings and the speedboat lines of the latest generation fighter jet had him climbing and turning at five hundred miles per hour in seconds.

He had no idea what was going on down there. Incredibly, someone was attacking American troops inside Quantico, one of the nation’s premier military installations. The tower only wanted him to buzz the LZ, which was good because he had no missiles on the hard points, nor anything in his cannon. As a Marine aviator, he had been trained to fly low and fast in support of the ground troops, and he coaxed the Lightning down to two hundred feet above the deck as he sped into the area.

Jones saw two figures running down the hillside on the same azimuth he had been given, scrambling away from the LZ. They had to be the people he was to cover, and he scooted lower as the terrain rose up higher. The Lightning passed with a sonic boom, and a concussive wave of displaced air churned the LZ into a noisy dust storm. The major hauled hard back the stick and bored a hole straight up into the sky, bent his plane into a 5-g turn, and came back in for another run from the opposite direction. Another sonic boom slammed the hillside.

That ought to let whoever is fucking around down there know that we’re watching, he thought, as he listened to the radio calls. Jones carved high to fly tight circles around the LZ in plain view of anyone below as a Cobra helicopter came hurtling in from the west for an even lower sweep. The QRF was no more than five minutes out. Soon, the place would be crawling with combat-ready Marines.

BETH LEDFORD AND KYLE Swanson hustled downhill on parallel courses through the pine trees, their boots crunching the carpet of brown fallen needles, twigs, and cones. Her lungs were on fire, and her legs were barely under control.