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“CAT?”
“Sorry, clear air turbulence.”
“Yes, it is a bumpy, dangerous ride all the way with ‘CAT’. As Cal would say, the wind will take no prisoners. I have ridden this route many times in a helicopter. You get tossed around like a ball in a fifty-gallon drum. Everyone has bruises all over them. One time, one soldier received a very serious concussion. It is a hard flight.”
“Crap.”
“I vote you encourage Gage to let us meet the Black Hawk at 0300 tomorrow morning. If the pilots do not want to risk it, then we lay low until we are sure Petrov and his team have left town. Then, we will fly up to our area during the day and avoid CAT.”
CHAPTER 9
Lauren put herback to the Black Hawk coming in for a landing on the large grassy field, that they called an airport, outside of Aguas Calientes at 0300. The eighty-mile-an-hour blasts from its blades might have tumbled her, if not for the sixty-pound canvas gear bag she carried slung across her body. The roar of the twin engines of the Hawk drowned out everything else. Twigs, leaves, hunks of mud, all flew up, splattering against her body like fists, her eyes shielded by safety goggles. Turning toward the bird, she heard the copilot give them the radio order to get on board. Alex gripped her upper arm, pulling her forward, the wind buffeting her to a near standstill. Crouching over, head down and forward, Lauren broke into a trot, the blades whirling swiftly above them.
The night was dark. Alex wore NVG’s. She did not, trusting him to get her to the deck lip of the Hawk. They both staggered forward, climbing into the bird on their hands and knees, the tread plate of the hard metal deck biting into their knee joints. An aircrew chief who was standing nearby, pulled them onboard by the scruffs of their necks, dumping them on either side, and quickly shoved the sliding door shut.
Instantly, before Lauren could even roll back over onto her hands and knees, the Hawk was breaking the earth, the upward acceleration shoving her downward. She struggled to move, crawling to the bulkhead and sitting down, drawing her boots up toward her body. Alex sat down next to her. He handed her a helmet and she quickly pulled it on. The shaking and shuddering of the helo vibrated through her. The roar of the twin engines atop the bird were deafening. Quickly, Lauren jerked off her protective glasses and let them dangle around her neck. She strapped on the helmet and found the rail at the top of it. Pulling her NVG’s up over her eyes, she flipped them on. Everything in the dark cabin became a grainy green color, her view limited, as if she were looking through two toilet paper rolls. Locating the ICS, “inter-cabin system”, radio cord, she inserted it into her helmet and brought the mic close to her lips.
“Welcome aboard, ladies and gentlemen,” the pilot drawled in a slow, syrupy Texas accent. “I’m Captain Jake Curtis. Y’all must be wantin’ some excitement here in Peru? Callin’ us out on a hellacious night like this? Even horny toads wouldn’t volunteer to do this…” and he chuckled.
Already, Lauren could feel the helicopter, as it soared to altitude, fighting the controls that the pilot was manning. She looked forward into the cockpit. “Captain, is this going to be a rough flight?”
“Yes ma’am, it’s sorta like riding through one of those frog-stranglin’ thunderstorms we get in West Texas. Ever been through one?”
Grimacing, Lauren muttered, “Yeah. Once. That was enough.”
“Well,” Curtis drawled, good-humoredly, “you’d best try and keep your butt nailed to that deck. No seat belts in this girl, as you know, for those in the rear cabin. Yore pardner looks pretty big. You might feel a hankerin’ to let him hold onto you. You’re liable to bounce around back there in the cargo bay like a BB in a boxcar.”
“Great,” Lauren muttered.
The air crew chief sat down, his back against the rear of the pilot’s seat. He had his knees up, boots heels against his butt, and was hanging onto the door railing with his gloved left hand, his other wrapped tightly around the leg of the pilot’s seat. That was not a good sign. Lauren cast around, looking for something to hold onto, the vibration in the Hawk deepening. They’d already gained over two thousand feet of altitude.
The Hawk suddenly sank like a rock.
Lauren gasped. She felt herself rising off the deck and she threw her arms out. Alex caught one of them.
The helo jammed to a midair stop. The g-force was crushing. The engines’ noise changed; deepened and growled.
Lauren slammed into the deck, landing on her left hip. She grunted, pain shooting up into her back. Alex had kept ahold of her arm. If he hadn’t, she’d have been tossed to the ceiling, and then bounced around the cabin.
“Alex,” she panted, struggling to sit up as the Hawk baubled violently again. She heard the blades thunking harder, pulling air. Struggling mightily. It was impossible for the helo to remain stable.
She felt Alex’s long arm move around her shoulders.
“Hold onto my waist belt with your left hand,” he told her. “Slide your right arm behind me and hold on tight.”
Lauren had barely done what Alex had instructed when, suddenly, the Hawk was flung upward like someone had shot it out of a damned cannon. A gasp tore from her. Lauren felt the brutal g-forces crushing her downward. Alex’s arm tightened painfully around her.
Curtis cussed in Texan, “Shhheeeeiiiiiittttt….”
The Hawk suddenly stopped its wild elevator ride up into the black sky.
The blades floundered, thudded and flapped at the tips.
The bird suddenly heeled over and fell unnaturally to the left.
Lauren wanted to scream, feeling as if the helicopter was out of control. Alex’s arm drew her tight against him. She buried her face into his chest, feeling the g-forces now trying to tear them up off the deck once again.Holy shit!Alex hadn’t understated how dangerous this flight was going to be!
And then, suddenly, the Hawk was flying straight and normal. Breathing raggedly, Lauren felt Alex draw his hand around her left shoulder, holding her even harder against his chest. It felt good. Safe. Safer than anywhere else at the moment at least. Her bruised hip was throbbing. Alex hadn’t overstated getting tossed around like a beanbag, either. Lauren heard the captain talking to his copilot. Their voices were too quiet to overhear what they were saying, but she picked up the strained tones between them.
