Dale Brown - Dreamland

Talcom gripped his SAW so tightly Danny thought he was going to snap his fingers through it. He reached over to the sergeant and gently put his hand on the machine gun.

“Nice and easy,” he told Powder.

Sand and pebbles began whipping against the body of the Osprey. Talcom and some of the others winced, obviously thinking it was rifle fire.

“Nice and easy,” Danny repeated to his men as the rear door began to open.

Breanna kept one eye on her instrument panel and the other on her commander. Cheshire was definitely tired, but she was on top of her game. She’d held Raven steady through the Flighthawk release, performing the launch maneuvers flawlessly and without help from either Rap or the Megafortress’s autopilot. She continued to work carefully, reviewing nav data and making a minute adjustment to her course.

The radar-warning receivers in Raven had several times the range and about ten times the selectivity of Fort Two’s. They were now within a hundred miles of two large ground-intercept radars just south of Tripoli; the threat screen showed that Raven could get within twenty miles and still look like a misplaced seagull to the ground radar; after that, the computer painted a ‘path of least observance’ that would take the EB-52 to within about five miles before it was likely to be detected.

The real value of the fancy gear would come when the assault started. Raven would put its custom-made gallium arsenic chips to work jamming the sensors, adding its fuzz to the electronic noise from a pair of Navy EA-6 Prowlers. Every radar and most of the TVs in North Africa would be toast.

“Hawks are zero-five from commitment. We’re green all around,” said Jeff.

Breanna, who always had a hard time thinking of herself as a copilot, began to click her mike button to respond, then let go as Cheshire acknowledged. The major gave her a smile, then turned back ahead, studying the clear sky.

Jennifer Gleason said something to Jeff about one of the computer readings. Breanna felt the muscles in her back tense at the girlish lilt in the scientist’s voice. If she ever washed out as a scientist, Gleason would have no trouble finding a job doing telephone sex.

“We’re picking up some interesting transmission,” said the weapons officer. “Have something in grid B-2 just beyond the mountains.”

“Radar?” asked Cheshire.

“No. Some sort of microwave, but I can’t quite pin down the source from this distance. It’s encrypted. Lot of data, like it’s a video feed. It’s coming from the middle of nowhere. You want me to record it?”

“Negative,” said the pilot. “Don’t waste your time.”

“I’m also getting audio for a video feed that’s being beamed out of Tripoli,” he added. “I think it’s our trial.”

God, thought Bree. Poor Mack. His parents would hear him, probably see him, on CNN. The tape would be shown over and over and over.

“Yeah, shit. I have a sound track. Getting a location. I can pinpoint it. Hang on.”

The sophisticated tracking in Raven allowed him to plot a radar source within .0003 meters – roughly a tenth of an inch – once he locked and tracked it. The process took anywhere from forty-five seconds to five minutes.

“You want to hear this? Damn, it is the trial. It’s in English.”

“No,” snapped Breanna.

“Neither do I,” said Cheshire. “Run through the emergency tanker locations and frequencies for me.”

It took Bree a second to realize Cheshire was talking to her. She turned her eyes to the right instrument panel, where the fuel burn as well as the reserves were projected. Personally serviced by Greasy Hands before takeoff, the ancient TF33-P-3’s were humming better than the day they left the shop in 1962.

“We’re running a few hundred pounds ahead,” she told Cheshire. “So I don’t think we need to –”

The major turned her head toward her without saying anything.

“I’m sorry,” said Breanna, reaching for the data on the tankers.

Danny hit the ground a few feet behind Talcom, not sure whether is sergeant had seen something or was just being cautious. They were still a good twenty feet from the plateau, approaching from the blind side.

“Team, hold,” he said, speaking softly but distinctly so the communicator pinned to his collar could pick up his command. Bison was about five yards behind him. Liu and Pretty Boy were working their way around the other side.

“Thought I saw something,” whispered Talcom.

Danny had contemplated sending the Osprey around from the front to draw the attention of any Libyans while they came around from the flanks. He’d rejected the idea, however – if the aircraft was shot down they were in serious trouble.

“I’m coming to you,” he told Talcom, raising his body. He took a crouching step toward the sergeant’s chocolate-chip fatigue, then another, then trotted ahead and slid in.

“I can get over them,” said Talcom, pointing upward. A jagged rock face rose above nearly fifty feet. There looked to be few if any handholds.

“Hell of a climb.” said Freah.

“That’s what I’m thinking,” said the sergeant. “We’ll trade weapons. You just cover my ass if they come for me.”

Danny eyed the rock wall doubtfully, but then gave Talcom the MP-5, which was shorted and much lighter than the SAW. He helped him snug it against his back.

“Wish I brought my climbing shoes,” said the sergeant, starting upward.”

“Powder’s going to try to get some height on them,” Freah told the others. “Liu, you and Floyd hold on until Powder’s up. Nurse, you on the circuit?”

No answer. The Dreamland-engineered radio system had a good range, but perhaps they were asking it to do too much with the jagged terrain.

“Hernandez, you read me?”

“Loud and clear, Cap.”

“You see Liu?”

“I can see them, but I can’t hear them,” Hernandez hissed into the miniature microphone. “Nothing, Captain,” he said finally.

“Can you get close enough to tell them to hold on until Powder’s in position?”

“Gotcha, Cap.”

Danny glanced at the firing mechanism of the gun, as if reorienting himself to the machine gun. Powder had already climbed nearly halfway up the rock. Slowly, Freah began to crawl to his right, coming around the face where he could have an angle at anyone trying to attack his man.

The communicator suddenly cracked with an ungodly noise. A submachine gun began firing from the other side of the hill and something exploded upward. Danny pitched up the barrel of his gun, and had already begun firing at the dark shadows above before he realized what was going on.

“Hold your fire! Hold your fire!” he said.

The crackle over the radio was laughter.

“Buzzards,” Powder was saying. “There’s a fucking nest of vultures on the ledge. Liu toasted three of them, but another got away.”

“I thought he had a marksman badge,” somebody said with a laugh as Danny’s hearbeat returned to normal.

Zen was in Hawk One’s cockpit now, barely twenty feet over the tallest building in downtown Tripoli. He flung himself back toward the outskirts of the capital, feeding live video back to the JSTARS and from there to the SEALS, already en route from the Mediterranean. The route had been carefully chosen, with intricate zigs and zags to avoid defenses; whoever had laid it out had done a damn good job, because he didn’t notice anything deadlier than a water pistol. Nudging his sticks left, Zen put himself on a direct line to the bunker, now less than three miles away.

As critical as the video was for the SEAL team following him in, a good hunk of Jeff’s attention was pasted on the threat indicator in the bottom left visor screen. He was whizzing through green and yellow fingers, ducking an array of radars as he came in. the jammers weren’t set to go on until the SEALs were almost overhead.