SOAR: A Black Ops Novel

He did, too. He had to position the IEDs where they’d do the most harm. He’d already scanned the area, trying to put himself inside the head of the Chinese commander. The PLA wouldn’t make the same mistake again. No — they’d try to drop their force above or behind. So Rowdy’d use them on his flanks. They might not stop the Chinese, but they’d slow them down.

He peered down at the overturned truck and the destroyed shell of the HIP. He knew he’d have to move the Chinese corpses again, scattering them to make it appear that they’d died overcoming the terrorists. It wasn’t something Rowdy was especially anxious to do. But it was essential if the ruse was to work. He scanned the horizon to the east, saw nothing, then glanced reflexively at the watch on his left wrist. Not nearly enough time, dammit. Not enough at all.

0906. Six detonator wires. Six detonator wires ran from the capacitors into the explosive. Wei-Liu was certain. She’d painstakingly isolated twelve from the unmarked bundles. But six of those had to be either duplicates, dummies, or re-dundants, because this MADM’s circuitry was engineered for a six-point detonation. She pulled the schematic out of her pocket, checked it for the fifth time in eleven minutes, and confirmed once again that the J-12 device was triggered by a six-point detonation.

But what if she was wrong?

* * *

She’d managed to remove and then drain the capacitor block using an improvised ground to ensure there was no significant power left. Yes, the explosive was unstable. But she’d kept it from being unduly shocked or disturbed and, more important, protected from any sudden surge from the residual power in the capacitors. So, unless someone smacked it, dropped it, or put a bullet into it, the Pentolite wasn’t going to blow. And — as she’d explained so that Rowdy and the rest of them wouldn’t worry needlessly— once she’d disconnected the wires, even if it did blow up, the explosive wouldn’t trigger the MADM’s nuclear core, because the Pentolite wouldn’t be able to detonate in the precise sequence necessary to induce critical mass. There would simply be one hell of an explosion.

“How big?” the sergeant major asked.

“Big enough,” she said, “to bring a decent-sized apartment house down.” That had obviously impressed him, because he’d moved everybody even farther away from the device than they had been.

* * *

Six-point detonation. Wei-Liu looked at her handiwork and then glanced at the schematic one last time. Okay: all she had to do was cut twelve wires, and the bomb would be rendered safe. Snip-snip. End of story.

She sighed. After everything they’d been through, twelve wires seemed so, well, anticlimactic. But what if she was wrong …

Wrong? She? Not. Wei-Liu took the nonmagnetic needle-nose pliers, double-checked to make sure she had both knees on the antistatic mat, took one deep breath, exhaled, and then clipped the six red-taped wires one after the other.

Nothing. She took another deep breath and clipped the half-dozen green-flagged ones. She set the needle-nose pliers down on the antistatic mat but remained kneeling. Two immense and totally unexpected tears of relief rolled down her cheeks.

144 Kilometers East-Northeast of Tokhtamysh.

0906 Hours Local Time.

“TOC–Loner.” Still nothing. Ritzik went forward. He tapped Mickey D’s shoulder. The pilot glanced around for an instant, then returned his attention to keeping the aircraft level. “Mick,” Ritzik shouted, “you have to take her up so I can pull a signal from Almaty.”

Mickey D didn’t acknowledge Ritzik. But his left hand adjusted the collective, his right played the cyclic control, and the chopper’s nose dipped about three degrees. Mick’s left hand shifted again on the collective and the aircraft began to rise as evenly as an elevator. At one thousand feet, Mick slowed the ascent and the HIP began a gentle sweep to the south. Ritzik pressed the transmit button. “TOC–Loner.”

“Loner — TOC.”

Thank God. “Dodger — sit-rep.” Ritzik listened, tapping coordinates into his handheld and getting them repeated so he knew they were on the money. The Chinese were coming out of Kashgar from the northwest — still only two of them: one HIP and a HIND gunship.

“No sign of the other HIND?”

“Negatory, Loner. It departed Kashgar, but we have no position for it.”

Ritzik didn’t like that at all. But there was nothing he could do about it. Meanwhile, the imagery showed the remaining two aircraft were making a wide swing over the desert. That made sense: they’d make their attack from the east so they’d be coming out of the sun. “Keep me posted.”

Ritzik made his way aft, carefully picking his way around Ty Weaver, who was dry-firing through the open hatch from a sitting position. “How’s it going?” he asked the sniper.

Weaver looked up. “? — Okay, boss.” He watched as the officer moved past him, then slipped back into his shooter’s frame of mind. This sit was A-Okay, all right. It was an AOkay FUBAR.