"Son of a . . ." Bell started tc say as he began to raise his rifle.
Tiger Tanaka exploded into action, his right leg moving almost faster than the eye could see, swinging up and around, clipping Jim McAfee on the chin and dropping him like a stone. Continuing his spin, Tiger whirled around and with a spinning back-kick, caught John Rodriguez in the stomach, doubling him over and to his knees.
Before Bell"s rifle moved six inches, Jackie Malone stepped in and swung a straight right jab into his chin, putting out his lights and knocking him to the floor.
After handcuffs were applied all around, Jackie motioned with her head toward the chopper outside, still s"tting on the square with its rotors turning.
"Get them in here," she said. "We can use the Huey."
Tiger glanced at the name Bell on Tommy"s left breast pocket, then walked nonchalantly out the door toward the chopper.
When he was almost to it, he made a cutting motion across his neck to the pilot and waited until the engine had been shut down.
He walked under the slowing blades without ducking-at his height he had no need to-and called to the men. "Lieutenant Bell says for you men to come into the station and get some donuts and coffee. He"s gonna be a while."The men grinned and piled out of the Huey, a couple pausing to light cigarettes.
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"Follow me and I"ll take you to your lieutenant," Tiger said, suppressing a smile at the gullibility of the soldiers, who clearly were expecting no trouble.
He stepped to the side as they entered the station, and picked up Bell"s M-16, which he"d left there.
Jackie Malone was standing behind the desk sergeant"s desk, smiling sweetly at the men as they gathered before her. None had their weapons at the ready.
She pulled an Uzi from behind the desk and casually pointed it at the soldiers. "I"m terribly sorry, gentlemen, but I"m afraid I"m going to need your helicopter."
Two of the men at the rear made a motion to raise their rifles, until Tiger, who was behind them, c.o.c.ked his M-16 with a loud metallic click.
"Stand down, soldiers," he said in a gruff voice, pointing the rifle at them.
They all dropped their weapons and raised their hands.
"If you men would be so kind as to strip down to your skivvies, I"m going to need your uniforms too," Jackie said with a smile.
After the men were stripped down to undershorts and T-shirts, Tiger put them all in the drunk tank, along with Bell, McAfee, and Rodriguez.
He walked back to the office Jackie was using. "Not a bad morning"s work," he said.
She agreed. "Now, we can use those uniforms and that chopper to make a little trip to the Air National Guard base down the road. I"ll bet they still have a couple of choppers or airplanes we can use."
"I can"t wait," Tiger said with a savage grin.
The Huey, piloted by one of Jackie Malone"s men and containing fifteen men, most of whom were dressed in Tommy Bell"s squad"s uniforms, came in low out of the sun toward the landing field at the George W. Bush Air National Guard 189.
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Base in Peoria, Illinois, a little over a hundred miles northwest of Indianapolis.
The radio crackled to life. "Unidentified helicopter, this is the air traffic control tower at Bush Air National Guard Base. Please identify yourself," the scratchy voice commanded.George Grant, pilot of the chopper, keyed his microphone. "Search and rescue squad from Indianapolis under the command of Lieutenant Thomas Bell," he said. "One of our men has been badly injured and we need to land for immediate medical attention."
"We"re at minimal status currently," the voice answered. "Most of our troops have been sent south. Can"t you make it to Indianapolis?"
"Negative," Grant said, putting some urgency in his voice. "Our man is bleeding badly and we need to stabilize him before traveling further."
"Come in on Landing Field Z-22," the tower said. "We"ll have our medic standing by."
Grant grinned over his shoulder at Jackie Malone, who was standing in the doorway behind him. She returned the smile and gave him a thumbs-up sign.
Tanaka, who was lying on a stretcher in the cargo hold with ketchup and bandages on his uniform, laid his head back and a.s.sumed an agonized expression.
"Take it easy, Tiger," Jackie said. "You"re not trying for an Oscar here."
He nodded as he slipped a .45 automatic under the bandages on his chest, and feigned unconsciousness as the chopper settled to the tarmac near a large hangar.
As Jackie and the other men jumped to the ground, an ambulance screeched to a stop next to the Huey and a young man who looked to be no older than eighteen rushed to the hatchway.
He motioned to two of Jackie"s men, and they picked the stretcher up and put it in the back of the ambulance.
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Just before the medic climbed in, Jackie asked, "The tower said you were at minimal staffing. What"s going on?"
The medic glanced at her lieutenant"s bars, then replied, "Most of the troops and aircraft have been sent down to Oklahoma to fight the Rebs.
There ain"t but a few of us left here."
"Exactly how many?" Jackie asked casually.
Sensing something was wrong, the medic jumped into the back of the ambulance, only to be met with Tiger"s .45 pointing at his face.
"The lady asked how many," Tiger said, a menacing scowl on his face.
The medic hung his head. " "Bout six, I guess."
"Okay, that"s better," Jackie said. "Now, where is your commanding officer"s office?"
Lieutenant Colonel Hadley Crow was sitting behind his desk when Jackie and two of her men walked in without knocking.
Crow jumped to his feet. He was unarmed. "What"s the meaning of this?"he barked, as if he were still in command of the situation.
Jackie gave a casual shrug. "You"ve just been invaded, Colonel. We are taking over your base."
"But . . . but . . . that"s impossible!" Crow sputtered, looking around as if he needed someone to explain further.
"No, it"s not," Jackie said patiently. "Now, if you don"t want your men slaughtered unnecessarily, you"ll get on the phone and have them a.s.semble here in your office."
"But what reason can I give them?" he asked.
"Tell them it"s a surprise inspection."
"They"ll never believe that."
"You"d better make them believe it, Colonel, or you"ll have the deaths of your entire command on your conscience," Jackie said in a voice that showed she wasn"t kidding.
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The colonel slumped back into his chair and reached for the phone.
Within twenty minutes, he had seven airmen standing at attention in the hangar below his office. Jackie accompanied him to stand before them.
"You men are all under house arrest," she said as her troops stepped out from hiding and surrounded the men. "If you"ll go with the colonel here, I"m sure we can find room for all of you."
After the colonel and his men were led off, Tiger and Jackie walked around the hangar, inspecting the planes that were there.
"Jesus," Tiger said, "here"s an A-10 Warthog, one of the best of the old ground-attack/strike fighters."
"Yeah, and over there"s an F-lll Aardvark," Jackie said, "one of the first fighter-bombers that could make low-level precision bombing attacks by day or night."
Tiger glanced at her, grinning. "You know, with these and the Huey, we could give President Osterman a real sleepless night."
Jackie nodded. "You"ve got a point there, Tiger. Let"s go get on the horn to Ben and see what he thinks of the idea."
192.
Claire Osterman was furious. She grabbed an ashtray on her desk and flung it against a far wall, narrowly missing General Bradley Stevens, Jr., who ducked and then, realizing how silly it made him look, stood back at attention.
"What the h.e.l.l do you mean you haven"t heard from the squad you sent out yesterday?" she screamed, making even Herb Knoff, who was more or lessused to her tantrums, wince.
"As I said before, Madame President, we haven"t been able to raise Lieutenant Bell or the pilot on any of our frequencies since they flew over Cedar Rapids, Iowa, yesterday."
"And just why not, General? Do you think they vanished into thin air?"
"No, ma"am. It could be anything from a radio malfunction to a simple plane crash. They were flying in a fifty-year-old Huey helicopter and it may have developed engine trouble . . . or something."
"I don"t believe that for a moment, and I have a sneaking suspicion you don"t either, General," Claire said, calming down somewhat.
Stevens shook his head. "No, ma"am. If they had a radio malfunction, they would have landed and checked in on a land-line, and if the chopper had crashed, we would have had a report of it by now from the civilian authorities."
"So, like me you think Ben Raines had something to do with this disappearance of one of my helicopters?" she asked, glancing at Herb to make sure he was paying attention.
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"Either that, or possibly a group of our own rebels, supporters of Otis Warner or General Winter," Stevens said, choosing his words very carefully so as not to trigger another outburst from Claire.
"Son of a b.i.t.c.h!" she hollered again, slamming her hand down on her desk so hard the phone jumped in the air. "First those b.a.s.t.a.r.ds try and kill me and take over the country. Then they set traitors on my soldiers and kill them." She looked at the ceiling as if speaking directly to G.o.d himself. "Will I never be quit of those a.s.sholes?" she asked rhetorically.
"What would you like me to do, Madame President? Send another squad to check on the first?" Stevens asked diffidently.
She glared at him. "You"re the f.u.c.king general, General, do whatever you think best."
He nodded and turned to leave.
"But," Claire continued before he could reach the door, "if it were me, I"d be very careful about sending more men and expensive equipment to try and find men who are already undoubtedly dead. Otherwise, you may end up sending yet another squad to check on the checkers." She paused, a deadly look on her face. "Do you get my drift, General?"
"Yes, ma"am, I understand."
"After all," she said with a shrug, "even if rebel forces have captured the helicopter, how much damage can a fifty-year-old machine do to us?"
Stevens was afraid to tell her just how awesome a fighting machine a Huey with a fifty-caliber machine gun mounted in the hatchway could be, even if it was fifty years old. If she hadn"t seen films of the VietnamWar or Desert Storm, who was he to risk his stars by reminding her?
Ben Raines threw back bis head and laughed out loud. "Jesus, Jackie, I sent you up there to do a little guerrilla warfare and maybe recruit some rebels. I didn"t expect you to invade the U.S. and capture their bases one by one."
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"Like they say, General Ben, never send a woman to do a man"s job. She may just surprise you with the results."
"You can say that again," Ben said, still laughing. "Now just what do you have in mind to do next? Charge Indianapolis and make Sugar Babe Osterman surrender?"
"Something like that," Jackie purred.
"What?" Ben asked, sitting up straight in his chair. "Now, Jackie," he reasoned, "don"t do anything foolish."
"Too late, Ben, I"ve already joined the Army."
Ben chuckled. Jackie was one of his best commanding generals. In spite of her good looks and youthful appearance, she was known as Ironsides by her troops. When given an objective, no matter how tough or impossible it seemed, she drove her men, and herself, unmercifully until the goal was accomplished. There was not one of her troops who wouldn"t throw himself on a grenade to save her life.
"Seriously, what are your plans?" Ben asked.
"Well, I thought you might give that b.i.t.c.h Osterman a call and demand she draw her troops back from the border."
"And just why would she do that?" Ben asked, intrigued at the way Jackie"s mind worked.
"Because you might remind her that if she crosses us again, there is no place on earth safe for her to hide in, and if we coordinate it just right, at that exact moment my troops and I can hit her base with a few bombs and rockets."
"You"ll never hit her," Ben said. "From what our intel says, she"s dug in deep underground in fortified bunkers."
"That"s not the point, Ben, darlin"," Jackie continued. "I"m not trying to kill her, just to show her she can run but she can"t hide. Can you imagine the paranoia she"s gonna feel when you tell her you can get her and seconds later my attack bombers. .h.i.t her base? I guarantee it"ll scare the s.h.i.t out of her to be so vulnerable in her own home base."
Ben hesitated a moment while he thought it over. "That"s a great idea, Jackie, but do you think you can pull it off with 195.
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minimal casualties? I"d love to put a scare into Sugar Babe, but not ifit means risking your life to do it."
"Sure, it"ll be a piece of cake. From takeoff to strike, our time is fifteen minutes. She won"t have time to scramble an egg, much less her defense fighters. I figure we can make two or three quick pa.s.ses, then get the h.e.l.l out of there before they know what"s. .h.i.t them."