SOAR: A Black Ops Novel

The pilot had turned him down cold. “You have helped my cousin Talgat,” he explained. “You brought him to the United States. You provided him training, and materials. You treat him as more than your ally. You are loyal to him. You are his friend. And therefore, I am loyal to you, Major. I am your friend.”

And from that point on, whenever Ritzik needed anything to do with an aircraft, Talgat would get hold of cousin Shingis — and whatever equipment Ritzik was looking for would suddenly appear.

It was Rowdy, who had become an avid student of Central Asian society, who explained things to Ritzik after they returned to Bragg. “In that part of the world, boss, you don’t just recruit an individual. You recruit the whole clan. In Central Asia the society is totally family-oriented. It’s friggin’ tribal. By trusting Talgat’s cousin, you demonstrated to Talgat that you trusted him. And they both respect you for it.”

“The old friend-of-my-friend-is-my-friend way of life,” Ritzik said.

“You got it, boss.”

“But you and I know that wasn’t why it happened. It was just easier to go through Talgat than it was to do all the stupid paperwork.”

“I understand,” Rowdy’d spat Copenhagen into his omnipresent plastic foam cup. “But this was one of those times when all you should do is thank the God of War for serendipity and take yes for an answer.”

1731. Ritzik looked at his watch and was horrified to realize that he wasn’t on oxygen yet. He backed out of the cockpit and waddled to seat 3-B, where he grabbed one of the three walk-around bottles seat-belted down. He coupled the spring-loaded bayonet connector from his mask into the regulator, turned the knurled knob until he sensed the O₂ flowing into his mask, and hung the bottle over his shoulder. Then he one-handed the other two walk-around bottles, careful not to damage the attached mask units, and made his way back to the cockpit.

He handed one of the walk-around bottles to Umarov. “Strap this on, then make sure Shingis gets his mask secure and his O-two turned on as soon as we’ve leveled off.”

The Kazakh pressed the mask to his face, hooked the straps, pulled them tight, and gave an upturned thumb to Ritzik’s back. But the American was already shuffling aft.

13

12,000 Feet Above the Shilik River, Kazakhstan.

1738 Hours Local Time.

Ritzik disconnected the walk-around bottle and plugged his O₂ rig into the prebreather unit. Then he plucked the pilot’s map out of Rowdy’s hand.

“Point of contact still make sense to you?”

The sergeant major’s head bobbed up and down once. “Target’s moving at a more or less constant twenty kliks an hour.” Rowdy tapped the handheld screen on his right wrist. “That puts them at the northern end of Yarkant Köl in six hours thirty minutes — just after midnight. We’ll have a workable margin of error if Shingis gets us to here”—Yates tapped a spot on the big map slightly northeast of Kashgar—“and we exit the plane. It’s a fifty-mile glide, almost due southeast. A little long — and a bumpy ride for the first half hour. But the winds will be behind us and we’ll make it in plenty of time to position ourselves.”

“Are you sure about the winds?”

Yates tapped the map. “It’s a law of nature, Mike. Winds flow upslope on warm days in mountainous terrain — it’s called a ‘valley breeze.’ In the evenings, the air masses cool, and the flow reverses downward, into a ‘mountain breeze.’ The weather has been constant: warm days and cold nights. The satellites don’t show any anomalies. So if Shingis turns south, running along this ridge… “ Yates’s finger traced a rough route. “ … it’s just over seventeen thousand feet here, and the ridge where we’ll be exiting is nine thousand feet above sea level … we should be in good shape when we jump.”

“You’re the jumpmeister. I’m the overpaid RTO.” Ritzik folded the map, disconnected from the prebreather console, plugged his hose into the walk-around bottle, and waddled forward to the cockpit. “Shingis—”

The pilot was speaking on the radio. He raised his hand and Ritzik waited. The Kazakh completed his transmission and banked the plane slightly to the south, still in a gentle climb.

“It is okay now,” he finally said, his voice muffled by the oxygen mask. He swiveled his head toward Ritzik. “What is up?”

Ritzik handed him the map. “Here’s how it works.” The tip of his index finger tapped the runway at Almaty. “We came out of here, then turned west, correct?”

Shingis’s head bobbed up and down once.

Ritzik’s finger moved in a big circle across the map. “We’re coming around now, and we’ll head east, parallel to the Kyrgyz border.”

“Affirmative.”

“That takes us between the mountain ranges.”

The pilot’s head bobbed up and down. “Yes.”

“And we finally cross into China just north of Tekes, right?”

“Affirmative.” Altynbayev tapped a wristwatch hanging next to his vent window. “Do not forget — the time changes by two hours.”