HOGS #5: TARGET SADDAM (Jim DeFelice’s HOGS First Gulf War series) (30 page)

But
as he ran with the boy over his shoulder behind Wong, BJ Dixon felt strongly
that God had saved him. It was the only explanation that made sense. His
miraculous recovery might be explained by wild luck and chance— not to mention
the heroic efforts of Wong and the other men who had landed here. But the Iraqi
heavy machine-gun had been aimed directly at him from less than twenty yards
away. Wong had distracted it, the Hog had finished it, but only God himself
could have sheltered Dixon and little Nabi from the fusillade. Dixon felt
gratitude and exhilaration— he literally felt grace.

By
the time Dixon reached Wong and the rest of the ground team, he was spinning
out a cable mechanism near what looked like a pair of football goal posts. Two
men in parkas were sitting between the poles, one slumping against the other.

“What’s
all this?” Dixon asked as Wong finished.

Wong
reached over to the ground and tossed what seemed to be a green sleeping bag at
him. “Into this suit.”

“What
is this?”

“The
suit is part of the harness system. We’re using a STAR retrieval system to
board an MC-130. Please, Captain, prepare yourself. It will keep you somewhat
warm and may help if you bounce along the ground.”

Another
man, short, somewhat fat, stood in another suit nearby; he watched Wong but did
not say anything.

An
airplane dipped nearly overhead. It had to be a Hercules— nothing else in the
Gulf had such a throaty, turbine roar.

“He’s
too high and we are in the wrong position,” said Wong. He held up a pencil flare
dispenser and fired, frowning as the small rocket disappeared. He stared
northwards as the drone grew louder, then shook his head. “I’ll have to tell
him to make another pass.”

He
ran to Satcom rucksack.

“Shit,”
said one of the men between the goal posts.

In
the next second the Hercules passed directly overhead, so low Dixon thought it
would land in the dirt a few feet away. He jumped on top of the boy, who’d
already thrown himself down. Above the roar Dixon heard the sound of a guitar
string breaking; there was a scream and a whoosh. The plane was gone— and so
were the two men, literally plucked from the ground by the system.

Wong
hunkered over the Satcom, shouting; his words were drowned out by the airplane.
Finally he jumped up and ran the few steps back to Dixon.

“Quickly,”
said Wong, gesturing at the suit. “We have six minutes while they recover the
men and turn.”

“We’re
getting snapped up?” Dixon asked, standing.

“Quickly.
The suit has the harness sewed into it.”

“Where’s
a suit for the boy? And where’s yours?”

“The
boy is not going. We cannot kidnap an Iraqi child,” said Wong. He went to a
large metal container and took out more poles. With a hiss, he inflated a
blimp-like balloon and began reeling it upwards.

“I’m
not kidnapping him. I saved him,” said Dixon, holding the boy to his side.
“Where’s your suit?”

“There’s
no time to argue, Lieutenant. I will order you into the suit if you wish.”

“Captain,
no way I’m leaving him.”

Dixon
threw the suit down on the ground, anger welling inside of him. As it landed,
the man who had been sitting on the ground in the other suit leaped up, pushing
Wong aside and slamming into Dixon.

Dixon
flailed back, unsure exactly what was going on. Worn down by everything that
had happened over the past forty-eight hours, tired and hungry, BJ pushed and
punched, but it was all he could do to simply hold on to the shorter man. He
jabbed the man’s chin, then his shoulder, anger exploding in him, anger and
instinct— he was fighting to save the kid. Dixon grabbed at the man’s head,
then saw his face in the shadows.

He
was wrestling Saddam Hussein himself.

Dixon’s
shock was all the man needed. He rammed his head into BJ’s chest, slamming
against his ribs. Jolted by the pain, Dixon reeled on the ground; in the next
second the man leaped back with something in his hand.

He’d
grabbed the other grenade BJ had taken from the dead Iraqi that afternoon.

The
Iraqi took three steps away. He pulled the pin, took another step, dropped the
grenade.

Wong
took one step forward.

The
boy dropped to his knees, three inches from the grenade, covering it with his
body, his short legs curled at his chest, his back to Dixon and Wong.

Time
became light. It became sound, a piercing cry of anguish that resounded in the
desert, drowning out the drone of the approaching airplane.

Dixon
saw himself at his mother’s deathbed again. He looked down at her, stared at
her face. The dead were supposed to find peace, but her mouth had contorted in
a last gasp of pain.

“Lieutenant.
Lieutenant. Quickly. We must go.”

Dixon
opened his eyes to find Wong over him. He took a hard breath, felt his ribs
flame. Wong disappeared; Dixon felt his head slip back, blackness beckoning.

Up,
he told himself. Save the kid.

He
opened his eyes again, took another breath. This time, the pain helped him
focus.

Wong
had pulled the suit over him.

“I
have to save Budge,” he said.

“The
boy is dead. So is the Iraqi,” said Wong. “Here, quickly. More Iraqis are
coming from the west.”

Something
flared to his left. Dixon turned, thinking he would hear the gunfire, but
instead he heard the cry again. He closed his eyes.

Wong
dragged him toward the pole, pulled on the harness.

“You’re
staying on the ground?”

“I
intended to before the Iraqi took matters in his own hands.” Wong looped
himself into the special suit, snapping the restraints. “The shock should be no
greater than a parachute opening. Of course, it depends on which parachute we
are referring to. In my experience –”

A
howl drowned out Wong’s words, dirt flying in Dixon’s face. As he blinked his
eyes closed, he realized the sound didn’t come from the Hercules but bullets
being fired a short distance away.

OVER IRAQ

27 JANUARY 1991

2340

He
could see
it
all. His eyes were as good as they’d been twenty years ago. But Colonel
Knowlington wasn’t just seeing with his eyes— saw everything with his head,
knew where it all was. He could feel himself flying, feel the Hog following as
he banked five hundred feet above the ground, the big Hercules dipping back in
his direction as it came back for the second pickup.

Dixon
would be there. He knew he would.

Something
moved in the open scrubland beyond the rendezvous point. Knowlington pushed his
Hog to take care of it, knowing it was Iraqis, knowing he was going to nail
them just before the Herk got there.

“Herky
Bird, assets are taking fire,” Skull said over the radio. “I’m clearing them
out for you.”

The
MC-130 didn’t respond, but it didn’t matter. Knowlington had them— he could see
every little goddamn thing, A-Bomb in trail on the right wing, closing quickly
to help; the bastards on the ground, flailing at his men; his guys, Wong and
Dixon, waiting to get picked up; the Hercules coming in cool and calm like she
was landing at an airport in North Dakota.

He
aimed the nose of the Hog at the pinpricks of light on the ground and lit the
cannon.

OVER IRAQ

27 JANUARY 1991

2345

For
a moment,
everything was pitch black and quite, consumed by the flaring hum of a fire
burning itself out.

Then
Captain Lars Warren opened his eyes.

A
dervish slashed in front of him, spitting blood from its mouth.

Someone
shouted at him, screaming that he was a failure, a coward, that he’d blown it
big-time, that he’d wimped and screwed up and what the hell right did he have
being in the cockpit and who said he could fly a plane— who said he could lead
or even live, dare to breathe in a combat zone where millions of better men had
been killed and maimed?

His
hands trembled. Sweat poured from every inch of his body. He was on line, he
was right there, at the spot, the balloon materializing before him like a
bubble floating up in a glass of champagne. The whiskers snared it and it
smacked against the glass panel. It bounced in front of him, splattering and
growing, covering the entire forward area of the plane, a shroud thrown over
the entire plane. It was bigger than the earth itself. The only thing Lars
could do was hold the plane as tightly as he could, keep his hands on the
control column, shaking and all, hold the plane for an eternity, hold the plane
at a hundred knots, ninety-eight, ninety-six, its back-end wide open, men
screaming all around him, bullets flying. It was impossible to do this— it was
impossible just to breathe.

“We’re
good, Captain! We’re good!” said the navigator. “Shit yeah. Shit yeah.”

“Just
steady,” Lars said. “Just steady.”

The
men in the back humped their own bricks, grabbing the guide rope, winching, then
pulling their passengers aboard.

More
shouts. Someone brought the engines up. The rear bay snapped closed.

“We’re
good back here,” said the loadmaster over the plane’s interphone or internal
communications system. “We’ve got four happy passengers. Kick ass, Captain.
Kick fucking ass!”

Four
passengers?

Shit—
had he already done it twice?

Shit.

Four?
Not three?

Had
they done this twice already? He couldn’t remember.

Twice?

“Four?”
he said.

Someone
was cheering. Lars felt a hand slap him on the shoulder— the flight engineer.

“Looking
good,” said the navigator. “Looking A-fucking-one-good. We are on course and
heading home. Falcons arriving at two o’clock. There’s our escort. Oh, Mama,
this is great.”

“We’re
secure,” said Kelly, relaying information from the crew chief in the back who
had supervised the pickup. “We have an extra passenger aboard— Lieutenant
William Dixon, U.S. Air Force, assigned as a forward ground controller with
Delta, lost two days ago. Kick ass, we’ve rescued the dead. Dixon was KIA. Kick
ass. Kick fuckin’ ass. The guy’s a fuckin’ hero and we pulled him out. Lazarus
returns. Shit. Major DiRiggio says well done. He’s conscious; medic says he’s
doing better. Great going, Captain. Kick ass.”

But
sweat kept pouring from Lars’ hands and they wouldn’t stop shaking, even as he
checked his course for home.

OVER IRAQ

27 JANUARY 1991

2359

“They
got them!” screamed
A-Bomb over the short-range radio. “They got them! It’s what I’m
talking
about!”

“One,”
said Skull.

“Shit
yeah! Shit yeah!” A-Bomb shouted, his voice nearly drowned out by the blare of
rock music.

That
or one of his engines was going funky.

“Hell
of a call sign,” said Skull.

“You
don’t sound very enthusiastic,” said A-Bomb.

Skull
could swear the comment had been accompanied by a slurp from a mug.

“Maybe
I should get you to rig me up a stereo system,” said Knowlington. “Or a
refrigerator.”

“Just
drinking coffee,” said A-Bomb.

“All
right. We have about zero-five to the closest spot the tanker can meet us,”
Knowlington told him.

Wolf
had managed to vector the tanker further north than originally intended. A
flight of F-15s providing air cover had already flown ahead, a welcome
committee for a job well done.

Or
escorts for the SAR crew that would be needed if they botched the tank.

“Gonna
leave me with two minutes of fuel,” said A-Bomb. “Plenty of time.”

“Two
minutes? You’ve been holding out on me,” said Skull.

“Drop
back and I’ll drip some in your tanks.”

“Just
watch my butt,” Skull told his wingman. “I shaved it for you and everything.”

“See,
Boss,
now
 you’re talking like a Hog driver.”

“It’s
what I’m talking about,” replied Knowlington.

WARMING THE SOUL

OVER SAUDI ARABIA

27 JANUARY 1991

0130

Wong’s
shoulder had
been dislocated, but one of the Air Force medics had helped get it back into
position. Oddly, the jarring had cured his headache, as well as removed the
ringing in his ear.