Christopher Buckley - Wet Work

"Vehicles approaching," said Rostow. "Six, seven of them on the river road."

"Hot Stick!"

"Watch." Hot Stick turned Slow Boy around toward where the vehicles were pouring into the compound.

He didn't know what to make of it. It looked like a plane, and there was something following it. Jesus Christ! "Off the road!" he shouted at Virgilio.

" Tora! Tora! Tora! " shouted Hot Stick, putting Slow Boy into a dive.

Slow Boy and the Stinger punched into the ground fifty yards in front of him. The explosion blew Sancho's Toyota high into the air. The next thing he knew, his windshield had blown out and he and Virgilio were suddenly in the back seat.

"Nice going , son."

"Dragonfly, he's getting ready to fire another one. You better move away."

"Bundy, what's the situation with the house?"

"Nothing. No one's home. It's like Son Tay."

"Mac, Felix, start dropping mortar where the river road comes in. There's vehicles."

"Dragonfly, he's fired another missile. Get out of here, Dragonfly."

"Hold on," said Charley. He pushed forward on his stick, dropping the Hughes so hard the shoulder straps dug into their collarbones. Hot Stick's controls flew up out of his hands and banged into the overhead bulkhead, then came down and bounced off his flight helmet.

Charley pulled back on the stick a little late. The chopper hit the ground hard and bounced back up into the air, vibrating like a washing machine on spin cycle. The Stinger shot by the small clearing overhead.

The lower limb of the sun was now over the eastern horizon. The Stinger, seeking heat, turned toward it and set out dutifully to annihilate it, crashing to earth, some miles later, like Icarus, dismally short of its objective.

"You all right?" said Charley, regaining control of the Hughes and bringing it up out of the clearing.

"Shit," said Hot Stick.

"What is it?"

"The computer cable. They're off computer."

"Well, get back on manual."

"I can't fly three at once on manual."

"Never mind the F-18s, then. Concentrate on Fat Albert. We're going for the house."

"My transmitters-"

"Dragonfly, where do you want the next mortar?"

"Dragonfly, what is your situation? Over."

"We're going for the house. Bundy, what do you see?"

"Still nothing."

"Rostow, what about the cars?"

"Looks like two down. There's men all over, twenty or thirty of them."

"All right, stand by, I'm coming up. What about the Stinger man?"

"I'm looking for him. I'm in range now, I'm close enough for a shot if he-there he is, I see him."

"Well, shoot him."

"Fuck, he ducked behind a building."

"Stay on him. I'm coming up, we got a problem with the planes. They're flying on their own."

"Jesus-"

"You boys clear the area around the white house, repeat, clear the area."

"Roger, Dragonfly."

"Bundy, how far are you from the house?"

"About two hundred meters."

"Okay, stay low, you understand? Hot Stick, you got Fat Albert?"

"I can't find him, he's, he's-I don't know where he is."

"Where's the other two?"

"I don't know where they are. Brazil, they're in fucking Brazil!"

"Well, let's get them back to Peru. We ain't finished here."

He pulled himself out of the Toyota and ran to where the Stinger made a crater of Sancho and Luti and-it looked like-half a dozen others. He counted three fires around the compound, one in the barracks, an area near-Christ, the chemical shed. He directed Virgilio to take some men and start hosing down the area by the chemicals. He shouted at Mirko to locate Beni and tell him to stop firing Stingers at the billonario drogues. He turned toward the house, distant across the field, and saw the girl standing on the porch.

"I got it I got it I got," said Hot Stick. "I got Fat Albert."

"Good. We're going in."

"I can't find the others-"

"Never mind the others. Commence arming sequence."

"Primary safeties, off. Secondary safeties, off. She's hot."

"Turning final. Rostow, you let me know you see that guy with the missiles."

"Roger, Dragonfly."

Fat Albert whooshed by them leaving a smoky contrail.

"We're going in. Five hundred meters, four hundred meters-"

"Dragonfly," said Bundy. "There's a girl on the porch."

"What?"

"Repeat, a girl."

"Three hundred meters-"

"Abort."

"What?"

"Abort!"

"But-"

"ABORT!"

He saw the flash. It took a half second for the sound to reach him. He covered his eyes instinctively, and when he looked back he saw it, a perfect, insolent parody of a mushroom cloud, rising leisurely into the morning sky.

"Bundy, acknowledge, acknowledge."

"What the hell happened up there?"

"Bundy, this is Dragonfly, acknowledge. Hot Stick!"

"You said abort."

"Not into Bundy!"

"I wasn't aiming for him."

"Shut up. Don't say a word. Bundy, speak to me."

"Must have been an aileron."

"Felix, Mac, Rostow, can you see Bundy anywhere? I'm going in to take a look." Charley hovered over the smoking hole in the jungle behind the white house and craned his head out the window. The force of the blast had knocked over trees in a concentric pattern. Everything was on fire. Charley hovered as low as he could, flames licking up at the Hughes. It was dead in there. An armadillo couldn't have survived.

"Aren't we kind of low?" said Hot Stick.

Charley pulled his.45 out of its holster and pointed it at Hot Stick.

"What are you doing?"

"Take it!" Charley shouted at him. Hot Stick took the gun, looking confused. "Now shoot yourself!"

"What?"

"For incompetence!" He brought the helicopter up into cooler air. Below he saw the compound. Men running, vehicles, smoke, confusion. He saw a girl running across the wide field in front of the white house. She was without clothes. He heard a sound beneath his feet, like pebbles kicked up by a car's wheels.

"They're shooting at us, Mr. Becker."

"All right, everyone listen up. Get back to the ship. Get the anchor up and get going. I'll join up with you."

"What are you doing?" said Felix.

"We're going to stay here awhile, look for Bundy."

"We are?"

Charley flew a wide circle along the rim of the compound.

"They're shooting at us, Mr. Becker."

"'Course they're shooting at us!"

Charley flew off into the jungle. A quarter mile from the compound, he brought the Hughes into a stationary hover. He reached down and picked up a small Orvis bag off the floor and unzipped it, took out a grenade and handed it to Hot Stick.

"You know how to use these? "

"Uh-"

"You pull the pin, open the window and drop it out. Can you handle that? "

"What are we doing?"

"We're going flying." Charley took out a grenade with his left hand, put the pull pin in his teeth and gave a yank, chipping a crown. He put the chopper's nose down and gathered speed.

"Niño! The helicopter!"

He'd grabbed an AK from the weapons shed and was standing in the middle of the field with Soledad, who was evincing strange calm, under the circumstances, watching with childlike serenity the events around her as if they were taking place in another world. She said to him, "I love you."

The helicopter broke over the edge of the trees. He aimed the AK and fired off a burst, swinging the barrel with the deftness of a practiced trap and skeet shooter.

The helicopter disappeared over the far side of the compound. As it did he heard two explosions. The Range Rover lay on its side. Just bought it, too.

Charley eased back on the stick and brought the chopper to another stationary hover over the jungle.

"You all right?" he said.