Ken Goddard - Chimera

Gavin cursed as he reached down, grabbed a small rock, and threw it in the approximate location where he thought the last of Kai’s pirates was hiding. He waited until the old man broke away from his hiding place in a desperate run for the water, dropped him with a pair of shots to the chest and head, and then raised the rifle and began firing at the Blackhawk just as the two anti-personnel rounds from Lanyard’s M109 detonated against the left side of the helicopter’s armored windshield.

Not designed to penetrate armored glass, the high-energy metal fragments simply scarred and blackened the Blackhawk’s windshield; shredding and disabling, instead, the unarmored searchlight mounted beneath the transport helicopter’s nose. But the pilots reacted instinctively, and understandably, by wrenching the Blackhawk away from the unexpected flack.

In doing so, they inadvertently exposed the Rangers in the main cabin — many of whom were already standing up, in anticipation of the helicopter’s imminent beach landing — to the incoming bullets from Gavin’s rifle.

Colonel Kulawnit and Major Preithat, intent on being the first Rangers on the beach when they landed at Tanga Island, were standing in the open doorway of the Blackhawk’s main cabin, holding onto safety straps, when the nose of the armored helicopter suddenly veered to the right in response to the M109 projectile explosions. The two men were still trying to regain their balance when the first bullet from Gavin’s rifle ricocheted off the titanium plate in Preithat’s armored vest, staggering him backwards into the arms of another Ranger.

The next four bullets hit Colonel Kulawnit’s Kevlar vest — in the high chest area, just to the right of his protective titanium plate, one bullet slicing in between the thick-meshed panels — and his unprotected left arm, sending him spinning him around and tumbling to the floor of the heaving helicopter next to the dangling body of the port-side crew chief who had been hit in the vest by the sixth bullet and then struck fatally in the throat by the seventh.

“Prathun!”

Gedimin Bulatt saw Kulawnit fall, yelled out as he released his seat harness, and dove for the sprawled body of his Interpol friend, trying to pull him away from the exposed open doorway. At that moment, two more anti-personnel rounds from the M109 payload rifle exploded against the tail rotor of the Blackhawk.

Built to withstand the glancing impacts of. 50-caliber anti-aircraft rounds, the Blackhawk’s tail rotor mechanism was no match for the explosive power of the M109 projectiles. Torn and jarred out of alignment, the tail rotors shuddered and then failed, wrenching the powerful transport helicopter away in an uncontrollable tail spin that flung Bulatt and Kulawnit out the door and tumbling down into the warm waters of the Tanga Island cove.

Gavin was in the reflexive process of reloading his rifle with a full 30-round magazine, his attention fixed on the wildly spinning helicopter as the Blackhawk pilots fought for control, when he realized that Lanyard was yelling in his earphones.

“What?” Gavin said.

“Get your arse down to the beach and into the bloody dinghy, you daft idiot! The Rangers are coming in with Blackhawks and machineguns. We’ve got to get out of here, now!” Lanyard repeated as he set the payload rifle aside, grabbed up his night-vision-scoped M4 carbine, and began scanning the water for more targets.

The first thing Bulatt saw after he thrashed to the surface — coughing and choking, with Kulawnit still grasped tightly in his left arm — pulled the inflation tabs on both of their vests, and then quickly readjusted the night-vision goggles over his eyes, was the Blackhawk helicopter crashing into the water a hundred yards away.

Then he turned and saw one of Kai’s low-riding outboard motorboats drifting in the water halfway between his position and the anchored Avatar with what looked like a pair of lifeless bodies dangling over the side.

After pulling a military bandage out of a pouch on his vest, and then tightening it as best he could around Kulawnit’s badly wounded arm — all the while struggling to keep the unconscious Colonel’s face out of the water — Bulatt quickly pulled off and discarded his armored vest, lifejacket and boots, and then started kicking and stroking the classic one-handed lifeguard tow in the direction of the drifting boat.

He was still a good twenty yards away, gasping for breath as he fought against the weight and drag of Kulawnit’s vest and armaments, when he first heard and then saw a small dinghy motoring out from the beach. As he watched, the small boat made a sharp turn toward the still-anchored fishing yacht whose engines were starting to rumble loudly in the darkness. At that moment, Bulatt saw the familiar outline of the night-vision goggles on the operator’s face, and realized the small boat would pass within twenty yards of his position in the water.

Bulatt’s first thought was to dive under the water, knowing there was little or no chance that he and Kulawnit would remain unseen on the surface. But then he remembered the colonel’s inflated life vest. He was fumbling for the vest’s plastic zipper when his hand brushed against the grip of the 9mm Beretta semiautomatic pistol strapped to Kulawnit’s armored vest.

Bulatt’s thumb was reflexively unsnapping the safety strap holding the pistol in the black nylon holster when Gavin — accelerating the small dinghy in the direction of the Avatar where Lanyard was now working feverishly to raise the anchor — spotted the two figures in the water, and grabbed for his rifle.

Cursing, Bulatt yanked the pistol loose from the holster, momentarily let go of Kulawnit in order to jack a round into the Beretta’s chamber with his left hand, and then began firing at the figure in the bouncing dinghy.

Gavin was still trying to bring his M4 carbine around one-handed, so that he didn’t lose control of the small watercraft, when the first 9mm round streaked past his shoulder and shattered the dinghy’s small transom windshield. The next two struck his armored vest, the high-velocity impacts of the mushrooming rounds staggering him backwards and sideways just in time to save his life.

Instead of hitting Gavin in the head — as Bulatt had been trying very hard to do while fighting against the currents, the swells, and the drag of Kulawnit’s still-unconscious body — the fourth 9mm bullet whipped past his right ear just before the fifth tore a deep gouge across the right side of his head. The last impact sent him bouncing off the dinghy’s rubberized-tube railing and tumbling to the narrow deck, at the same time loosening his one-handed grip on the carbine which spun overboard into the water.

Momentarily stunned, Gavin lay in the bottom of the dinghy until the thumping sounds of two 9mm hollow-point rounds tearing into the transom of the now-wildly-swerving craft’s outboard motor jarred him into action. Keeping his head as low as possible, he reached up, grabbed the steering wheel, and quickly accelerated the small boat toward the now-moving Avatar; realizing as he did so that a second Forestry Division patrol boat was rapidly approaching the distant spot where the Blackhawk had crashed, its searchlights sweeping across the water.

Moments later, Gavin came alongside the now-slowly-moving Avatar, cut his engine, scrambled aboard the fishing yacht, quickly tied the dinghy’s bow line to the Avatar’s stern rail, and then scrambled across the lower deck and up the ladder to the bridge, holding his hand tight against his head wound. “Bloody hell, Quince,” Gavin yelled as he came up onto the bridge, “can’t we go any — ?”

Then he froze in disbelief when his night-vision-aided eyes took in the degree of carnage. “Christ Almighty! What’d that Kai bastard do, lob a bomb up here?”