Chimera

Pathanya sat with his one leg resting on the landing skid of the Dhruv helicopter while he held on to the hand rails along the edges of the sides. The cold air whipped them all inside the cabin. He looked to see five members of his team in the cabin as they applied streaks of white paint on their faces and checked their weapons and equipment. Pathanya looked back out again and saw the alpine vegetation of Bhutan whipping by as a blur…

“Waypoint five in thirty seconds,” the pilot said.

Pathanya grabbed the rails a bit harder. The pilots of Delta-Flight were the best when it came to special heliborne operations. Nap-of-the-earth flying was their forte. The only problem was that it meant that their passengers had to literally hold on for their lives while they fought nature’s attempts to turn them to pulp on a mountainside…

The helicopter dropped a dozen meters as they flew over the ridgeline and into the valley on the other side. Pathanya and the others felt the sudden sense of weightlessness and then a bump as they hit the floor of the cabin once again. Pathanya looked around at the horrified faces of his team-members. The second helicopter behind them carrying the rest of Spear was doing the same.

“Dear god! These fly-boys are going to make me lose my lunch!” Vikram shouted. Pathanya chuckled.

“I told you not to go for the tinned chicken those Paras were making!” Ravi responded from the other helicopter.

“Hey! It was going to be my last hot meal till we get back!” Vikram retorted. “It had to be special!”

“All right guys: easy on the comms. We are approaching the L-Z,” Pathanya interjected as he got the three minute warning from the co-pilot.

The helicopters came up on the reverse slopes of the ridgeline on the eastern side of the valley between Dotanang and Barshong to the north. That valley was currently occupied by the PLA Highland Division forces. Dotanang was currently being assaulted by paratroopers from the 11TH Para-SF Battalion. Spear was being inserted north of the Chinese Battalion at Dotanang.

Their job was to interdict the enemy’s supplies and logistical lines and generally to cause all sorts of mayhem amongst the PLA rear…

As the helicopters neared a clearing on the hillside, Pathanya and the others threw down ropes and began rappelling down. The dust and dead grass raised by the helicopters was blinding their view. All nine men were down on the ground within seconds. The helicopter crews dumped the ropes, increased power and dove back down the valley to the south.

As the dust settled on the ridgeline, Pathanya motioned his men forward and they started climbing up the slope…

KASHGAR AIRBASE

SINKIANG AUTONOMOUS REGION

CHINA

DAY 8 + 1900 HRS

Feng rubbed his eyes as he sat at the dining table, his food barely touched. His arms were weighing heavy now from mental exhaustion. His eyes showed bloody red lines, a sign of sleep deprivation.

But he had an easier war compared with the hundreds of pilots and ground-crewmen who had lost their lives under his command in eight days of brutal combat operations. Unlike many other senior commanders, he knew he had it easier…

He looked around from his seat at the long table in the officer’s mess to see a bustling dining hall filled with tired officers and men moving back and forth. A well-organized meal was simply not on the cards at the moment. People were grabbing their food as and when they got time. And for many of the younger pilots he saw, it might well be their last. He saw staff officers going through papers and reports while they ate. Under normal conditions this kind of behavior in the dining room was unthinkable. But right now these rules had been waived aside.

Chen had ordered the relaxations on normal protocol, much to the chagrin of the senior political officer at the base. The latter had objected to Chen on the grounds that such lax behavior acted as catalyst for the dilution of morale. Chen had dismissed the concern offhandedly. He trusted his pilots and knew that they would appreciate the flexibility given to them by their commander. It also enhanced effectiveness and efficiency. But such dismissal of the political officers was not something that officers junior to Chen could even think of.

Privileges of seniority… Feng mused as a waiter leaned over to ask him if he needed anything. Feng dismissed him with a wave and returned to staring at his meal in silence.

They were running out of time. Chen had made that very clear in his last meeting with him.

He looked at his wristwatch and realized that the 19TH Fighter Division would have begun deploying to three key airbases north of Tibet by now. The 55TH Fighter Regiment, part of the 19TH Division, would be deploying detachments of its three fresh J-11 squadrons between Golmud, Urumqi and Wulumuqi airbases.