Kevin Miller - Declared Hostile

“Mí general, your service to the Bolivarian Republic, and to me personally, is not yet over. I need you. And dying an inglorious death in a burning airplane does not befit a man of your station. So, no, Edgar, I cannot allow it, my friend. I enjoin you to delegate this task to younger men, men of greater honor than you . They will do battle with the Americans, perhaps giving their lives in the process but surely taking some yanquis with them. I mean, the Americans conscript women to fight for them—”

Daniel then lowered his voice and became the icy street thug of his youth.

“And, Edgar, if you defy me… know that I will take your family — roughly — from your home. I will show video, hours of video, to your long suffering mujer of the ways you’ve betrayed her over many years with my party girls. I will have her watch as my men, filthy and diseased, rape your crying daughter, repeatedly. They will then tie a rope, with a stone at the other end, around the neck of your son. As he pleads for his life, I will personally push the stone into the Paria Gulf. All this in front of her. Your women, Edgar, will live their days knowing of the betrayal and pain that you inflicted on them. So, mí general, there will be no more talk of glory and honor from you , a man who has none , until you turn back the American attack. Or… until you bring me the American pilot. Bring me the pilot — who can serve as ransom for both of us — and then, Edgar, I will let you die with glory. I will keep your shame from your family. You have my word as a man. Unlike you, Edgar. Succeed in this task, and then I will let you die.”

Hernandez trembled in horror at what Daniel would do to his family and how Daniel held his reputation, his honor , in his hand, a worse thought to Hernandez than dying. Either way, he was a walking dead man, and he figured Daniel would kidnap his family no matter what to ensure his obedience.

“I will bring you the American, señor.”

“Good boy, Edgar! Good dog! Now get to work!” Daniel snapped out the words and hung up.

The deal Edgar Hernandez had made with the devil so many years ago had come due.

After she recovered from the Río Salta strike and debriefed, Olive grabbed some food in the wardroom. She then met Shane in CVIC for what they both knew would be a long night. Olive was already mentally and physically spent from her four-hour brief and man-up, her four hours airborne, and the long post-flight debrief. With Skipper Wilson lost and XO’s tasking to find him, she would run on adrenaline past midnight. Her CO was out there, and Olive, as the lead investigator, had to find out where.

Shane had the satellite imagery that marked the geographic position where the emergency beacon of the ejection seat was activated. Olive called Ready 6 and summoned Kid to meet her in CVIC. Within minutes, Kid arrived and walked up to Olive.

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Kid, I’m trying to reconstruct where Skipper Wilson got out. I’ve plotted the lat/long from your mark after he ejected. Where were you in relation to him when he got out?”

Kid noted the position on the chart. “I was about at his two o’clock. I overtook him as we hauled ass out of there. About a mile. I tried to stay with him, but he was too slow. And he was rolling, like a barrel roll. It was weird. He was in a steep dive when he punched, and somewhere just above 10K.”

“You were on goggles?”

“Yes, ma’am, the whole time.”

“How could you tell the aircraft aspect?” Olive asked. “With lights out at night? No moon?”

“I was close enough, about a mile. And there was this cell behind him, to the north, that kind of backlit him with almost continuous cloud-to-cloud lightning. He was right next to it.”

“There was a cell next to him?”

“Yeah, it was almost like he was going into it.”

Olive checked the imagery time: The seat was activated 1932:34 local. The mark also showed Wilson got out over a small inlet leading into the channel. Another mile or two and he would have been feet wet with a better chance of rescue.

“What direction were you going when you saw him get out?”

Kid stroked his chin. “Northeast. We were all egressing northeast. Skipper was, too.”

“Did you see a chute?”

“It’s hard to say with the cloud background.” Kid shook his head. “I can’t say for sure.”

On a nearby console Shane had the weather radar video and stopped it at 1932:34. “Ma’am, here’s the radar showing the storms in the area. There’s the one they had to avoid over the target.”

Olive studied the image on the screen, noting the inlet and a large clump of radar return to the northwest of it. The clump had to be the cell Kid had seen. She brought the paper imagery over and placed it next to the screen.

“Can you fast forward please?”

“Yes, ma’am,” Shane said. The radar return moved toward the northeast.

“Fast forward,” Olive asked again.

The return moved across the channel into Trinidad. “Stop! What time is it?” The display time indicated 1958:20. Olive had a hunch.

“Shane, get with the guys in Metro. Find out what the winds at altitude were when the skipper got out — from 5K, 10K and 15K. See if you guys can overlay the weather radar display on top of the satellite imagery and synch up the times.”

Even though he was a nugget, Kid followed Olive’s line of thinking. “Ma’am, do you believe he went into that cell?”

“Yes. At least we have an area to search.”

Hernandez stuck his head outside the open door of the helicopter as it approached the crash site and entered a hover. A crewman pointed to a piece of wreckage. It appeared to be a wing flap, painted light gray. He could see the Columbus Channel just beyond a small peninsula. Nothing out here. Not even natives in dugout canoes. Nothing but briars and muck, snakes and gnarled bushes. Hernandez detested this part of the Bolivarian Republic. It wasn’t fair. Trinidad was visible in the distance across these beautiful Atlantic waters, but the Venezuelan shoreline was unlivable from Paria to Guyana. At least the oil underground made up for it. The beaches of Caracas would have to suffice for Venezuelans. Aruba. The Bolivarian Republic should have kicked out the damn Dutch and taken Aruba. We would have done it right , he thought, unlike the Argentineans against the Brits 30 years ago. That was the war he wanted, not Daniel’s foolish war against the fucking Americans!

The aircraft landed, and Hernandez stepped out with three of his officers. The Hornet was scattered about in pieces, few of them larger than one meter. The heaviest, the engines, were buried deep and circled by large crater rims made up of the spongy soil. He must have been near supersonic when he went in, Hernandez thought as he tromped in the brush, kicking at control actuators and pieces of aluminum. With the familiar smell of fuel oil in his nostrils, Hernandez took a moment to study one piece of gray aircraft skin stenciled with the words NO STEP.

The fuselage was buried deep… no way to know yet if the pilot got out or not. The pilot was one of their squadron commanding officers, James Wilson, highly decorated. A TOPGUN. Hernandez wished he had gone to TOPGUN.

Finding the ejection seat would confirm whether or not the pilot had gotten out. He prayed the seat would be empty, meaning the pilot could be alive. Conveying that news to Daniel would buy him time. Buy his family time. Chances were the seat, if the pilot did eject, was many kilometers from here. Still, they had to look.