Defender (14 page)

"You've got a nerve!" Arena yelled, her contempt shared by all.
"If
it wasn't for you, we would have been our of here long ago, and Alex and Sewa wouldn't be stuck out there."

John Stanley, Senior Foreman and possibly the biggest man on the site, reached through the tangle of huddled bodies from the back corner of the cargo hold and grabbed what he could of Turner's shirt collar. "Say another word and you'll be out there, you pompous twat!
If
we leave anybody behind, it'll be you."

Turner folded himself as far back into the cargo hold, and as far away from Stanley as he could, clutching his laptop to his breast. His eyes darted from face to face, searching for support. There was none.

Morgan caught up with Sewa. They were running neck and neck. The open cargo door beckoned them.

"We're there, Sir! We're there!" Ten feet to go.

Five feet.

Morgan and Sewa were rocketing forward. Three feet.

As they reached for the door, welcoming arms were outstretched to pull them inside to safety. A smile broke out across Sewa's exhausted face. He reached out for John Stanley's huge paw.

Suddenly, a hail of machine-gun fire erupted from the rebels. Rounds saturated the air in squadrons.
It
was all too close. Sewa fell down, and Morgan went down with him.

Mason could see the rebels closing fast upon the burning carcass of the buildings, firing wildly as they advanced on the run. There definitely looked to be a company's worth, 100 or so men, maybe more, all heavily armed and headed straight for the helicopter. Already on borrowed time, Mason knew if he waited another second, he would almost certainly be killed and with him dead at the controls, the others would be slaughtered.

'I'm shot, Sir! My leg. Help me!"

Sewa was in a heap on the red sand, clutching at his leg, the agony contorting his usually cheerful face. His hands were covered in blood, his dark eyes wide with fear and pain.

"I've got you, mate," Morgan bellowed. He dropped to his knees in a slide, reaching for the young African, slinging him across his back. Sewa screamed. With one awkward heave, Morgan hoisted him up. Sewa sank heavily onto Morgan's shoulders, a dead weight.

Morgan chanced a look back towards the rebels. They were everywhere, their rounds biting into the dirt at his feet. The distinctive crack of high velocity ammunition pierced the air, inches from his face. Morgan expected that at any second he would feel the unmistakable thump and burn of the bullet that would find him.
It
was inevitable. A quick death was preferred, but unlikely, especially if he was still alive when the rebels reached him.

In the midst of the firefight, Morgan looked across and caught Mason's gaze from the cockpit of the chopper, hovering above the tarmac. He knew Steve had to lift off, but Morgan's gaze implored the pilot for just a few more seconds. Mason's recognition was a mere flicker. A few seconds, that's all he could give. Morgan's eyes somehow found Arena, her stoic silence willing him to jump on board, but knowing that he could not leave Sewa behind.

Morgan shook himself free of the cloak of dread fast enveloping him and ran for the chopper. As Mason bounced the Super Puma down just inches from him, Morgan made the few vital remaining steps, then threw the AKM into the cargo hold. Inside, Stanley caught the weapon and immediately returned fire as best he could to cover Morgan and Sewa. Sewa was in a bad way. One booted foot flopped uselessly beneath him and Morgan could see a thick trail of blood that the man was leaving in their wake. His shin was bent at a repulsive angle, shattered by the gunshot.

"Ari!" Morgan bellowed from beyond the unstable platform of the cargo hold floor. "He's yours. Get ready."

Sewa howled in agony with every movement. Morgan would need all of his strength to get him on-board. But Mason was attempting to lift off and the aircraft was ascending.

There would only be one chance.

With a backbreaking heave, Morgan launched Sewa into the Puma, just managing to wedge the young guard's chest and arms over the lip of the rising floor. Arena, Stanley, and two other men grabbed Sewa, dragging him inside. Even above the howl of the engines, his screams were deafening. Blood gushed from his shredded leg and spilled over Arena, the floor, and the other evacuees.

The Puma was rising; its floor already level with Morgan's head. He turned to see the rebels advancing rapidly. They'd be on him in seconds. He reached out, grabbing at the hands of the other men. Arena's eyes were filled with anguish. Morgan's face, only a few feet from her, was etched with pain and exhaustion. Arena found herself grappling for him, trying to reach his hands; but it was hopeless.

"Alex!"

Another deluge of machine-gun fire blazed across the concrete tarmac surrounding the water tanks, ricochets biting hungrily into the exposed flanks of the helicopter, narrowly missing Morgan and the passengers.
In
the cargo hold they all screamed as bullets sliced the air about their heads, the added horror of Sewa's mangled leg forcing home the reality of their plight. Now they were yelling at the pilot to take off.

Mason had no choice.

He dropped the nose, powering forward, away from the danger, away from Morgan, yet still low enough on the move to give Morgan every possible chance to grapple his way to safety, before Mason would be forced to arc skywards and abandon him. Morgan ran, sprinting for all he was worth, chasing his last hope across the tarmac whilst the rebels continued their wild shooting spree.

"He's not going to make it," Turner snapped, screaming. "For God's sake, leave him. Get us out of here!"

John Stanley lunged forward unexpectedly. Without a word, he tore the laptop from Turner's grasp and hurled it out of the open cargo hold door - narrowly missing Morgan - then crashed one huge calloused fist hard onto Turner's jaw. Turner passed out. Then Stanley struggled over the others, grasping for any available handholds as he moved until he was literally hanging out of the door, reaching for Morgan.

"Come on, son," Stanley roared, his big voice easily finding its way to Morgan through the noise: "Jump! Jump!"

"Jump, Alex!" Arena cried.

The chopper was moving fast across the open ground. Mason was a heartbeat from lift off.

Sprinting at his absolute limit, weighed down by ammunition, radio gear and utter fatigue, Morgan knew there were few options left.
In
that split second, if he failed he would be left behind to be butchered by the marauding soldiers of Le Conseil de la Liberation des Peuples Africains, the CLPA. Rebel gunfire and explosions rained around him, this rime close enough for Morgan to feel the shocking heat from successive blasts sear across his back. Whether he lived or died now was completely out of his control.

Morgan leapt at the helicopter.

Alex Morgan soared as if in slow motion as the chopper, inches from his grasp, was lifting off.

Inside the imperilled refuge of the cargo hold, the evacuees were all staring hopelessly out at him. As one, their faces willed him aboard, but could scarcely disguise their own desperation to survive. There was nothing anybody could do for him. Morgan saw tears glazing Arena's eyes. God, he could spot them anywhere.

Mortars peppered the tarmac and fuel farm, sending fists of shrapnel to punch through the helicopter's fuselage, striking at the passengers inside. A mighty ball of fire erupted from the first ruptured fuel storage tank, and columns of flame burst out dangerously close to the retreating helicopter. The force of the blast catapulted Morgan with an unexpected intensity mid-flight. Just short of the door, he crashed heavily on top of the metal cowling over the port-side rear wheel, as it scooped him from the air.

"Alex!" Ari felt her heart sink. It was all too much. The intensity and shock of it all, too immediate. "Oh God!"

Morgan's impact against the aircraft was sudden and severe, wrenching his torso viciously at the waist. The remaining AKM magazines in his ammunition vest rammed into his outstretched flank, cracking ribs. But somehow he had a grip. Morgan grappled desperately for a handhold on the anti-slip top of the wheel cowling as pain engulfed him. It was excruciating.
It
would get worse.

Avoiding the exploding fuel storage tanks at the very moment that Morgan made contact with the chopper, Steve Mason yanked the stick hard to starboard. The twin Turbomeca Makila IAl turbine engines of the Super Puma responded with a surge of power and height. The wounded Puma instantly leaned hard to starboard, bringing the port side, Morgan's side, around to face skyward for just a few precious seconds.
It
was what Morgan needed to stay on. He knew that this was his only hope to survive, and as he clung on tight, the G-force fought to peel him back off. Clawing at the smooth, polished metal with nothing but sunshine and the clear blue sky on his back, he found a foothold on the cargo-door step and kicked off, propelling himself upward, hard against the fuselage, but still curled across the wheel cowling.

The ground was sinking below, rushing by in an endless blur of rusty powder. Mason pulled the chopper from the centre of the firefight. Morgan dragged himself upright on the wheel cowling, knees bent, body braced, with only the white-knuckled fingers of his outstretched left hand curled tenuously inside the lip of the cargo door. His legs were spread wide and his chest pressed hard against the fuselage. All he could do was hang on. A few feet above him, the hu.ge rotor blades sliced relentlessly through the air, buffeting his body with every deafening, pulverising revolution. The force of the downwash battered and tore at his grip, determined to prise him free, while exhaust fumes from the engines denied him the precious few gasps of oxygen needed to fight back. His face began to ripple, his raw eyes and ears blasted by the onslaught. Morgan forced his face away from the engine exhaust port just enough to catch his breath and, with the helicopter hurtling along at breakneck speed, his head bounced against the red-hot steel of the fuselage. Through the menacing blades of the tail rotor set against the retreating sky, Morgan saw that they were finally free. He could also see the burning wreckage of Pallarup, and the swarming green and brown mass of rebel troops congregating to bring down the fleeing chopper.

Then the pain in his ribs attacked, agonizing in its intensity. Morgan could feel the viselike grip of dizziness and nausea slowly reaching for him, dragging him down towards unconsciousness.

Jesus! Morgan thought. There's got to be an easier way to earn a living. He shook his head to clear his thoughts, bracing himself against the aircraft with all that remained of his rapidly depleting strength. But as Mason was forced into wildly evasive manoeuvres to evade the rebel guns, Morgan knew it was only a matter of time before he would lose his purchase and be thrown to his death.

"Alex!" Stanley yelled from the door against the overpowering chaos of engine noise, rotor slap and gunfire. "Step across and get your leg inside the door, son. I'll pull you in." With that, Stanley reached out to Morgan from the door and with a hand the size of a baseball catcher's mitt he clamped down hard, gripping the ammunition vest on Morgan's left shoulder. ''I've got you," Stanley cried, "step across."

"Right!" Morgan yelled back, rousing his senses, "On three."

Stanley nodded. Morgan felt the big man's paw bite even more securely about the vest at the top of his arm as they both braced for the move. Inside, two other men held onto Stanley.

"One!" they yelled together.

"Two!"

With the practised discipline of a professional combat pilot, Mason was instinctively looking for an answer to a sudden eruption of warning lights and sirens on the instrument panel. Despite his immediate concerns over remaining airborne with rapidly failing hydraulics, now the 'low fuel' warning light was flashing along with clear signs that the transmission, too, was failing. Mason knew that the machine would soon lose all ability to function and there was little time to get the once state-of-the-art Eurocopter back on the ground in one piece.

"Three!" came the simultaneous bellow.

Morgan lunged at the door, releasing the tenuous hold he had found, and for that split second of transfer from the wheel cowling to the door, he lost all contact with the helicopter. He was suspended in space, his life literally in John Stanley's hands. Just then, a rocket-propelled grenade ripped through the sky, directly across the path of the helicopter.

Mason saw it just in time.

Averting disaster with no flares or any other counter measures on-board, Mason knew this was where the serious flying part started. Spotting the rocket, he put the Puma into a 70 degree bank to port, dumping the collective and heading for some dirt. He knew the ground was his best chance. Steve pulled three G's and using aft cyclic, he established an arc in the opposite direction of the rocket attack. What the pilot didn't know, was that as the helicopter was already passing through an altitude of just over 1000 feet, the spent rocket was at the limit of its range and, having reached the apex of its trajectory, was now tumbling uselessly back to earth. But the extreme manoeuvres he'd used to avoid it almost put his prized beast out of her final misery. With the added Gs and loss of hydraulics, the big machine was becoming increasingly difficult to fly, taking all Mason's effort just to keep the dying Puma alive long enough to get them to safety. Turning his attention to the instrument panel, Steve Mason caught sight of a man flat on his belly in the cargo hold, hanging from his waist outside of the door with the rest of the evacuees on him like a rugby scrum.

"What the fuck's going on back there?" Steve barked. "It's Morgan," somebody cried, "he's fallen."

Underneath the chopper, Morgan dangled from Stanley's arm. Stanley, straining above him, held on firm to Morgan's arm, trying to pull him up to the edge of the door.