SOAR: A Black Ops Novel

“Flew an MI-24P gunship, and a HIP. Except it wasn’t this model. This is a HIP-H — a hot-and-high. It’s a second-generation aircraft, configured for high altitude and hot climate. I flew the C version. First generation. A lot more basic.”

“All HIPs look alike to me,” Sam said. “How do you tell?”

“First-generation HIPs had their tail rotors on the starboard side,” Mickey D said. “These newer ones have theirs to port.”

“I’ll remember that,” Sam said, impressed. “Use it when I play Trivial Pursuit.” He toyed with the cyclical handle.

“You ever want to fly choppers?”

“Moi? No way. I hate flying. Besides, helicopters are far too complicated. Y’know, kinda like rubbing your stomach and patting your head at the same time. I could never do that. But I drove a T-72 tank, once.”

Mickey D turned toward the spook. “Why? Were you in the Russian Army?”

Sam gave the pilot a bemused look until he realized his leg was being pulled. “A guy I knew ran a mechanized infantry battalion,” Sam said. He pointed toward the snowcapped mountains to the west. “About a hundred miles that way. In Tajikistan. A lieutenant colonel. He let me drive one of his tanks for a couple of hours.”

“Sounds cool.”

“It was better than cool. I got to crush two cars driving on the training course. It was like being in a Die Hard movie.” Sam scratched his chin. “Funny thing: in the late eighties, I spent about eighteen months and about half a million tax dollars trying to convince a certain … group of people to let me photograph the inside of a T-72. It never happened. And then, all of a sudden, when I least expected it, I got an invitation to drive one.”

“You get your pictures?”

“All I wanted,” Sam said. “Of course, when I sent them off to Langley, no one was interested anymore.” He paused. “But that didn’t matter. Because you know what it cost me? Three bottles of vodka. Ten bucks’ worth of booze — and a two-day hangover.” He looked at the instrument panel and tapped the radio. “Hey, this thing work?”

“Dunno,” Mickey D answered. “I don’t do Chinese — neither does anybody on the team. So I didn’t bother to check.”

“I do a little Chinese,” Sam said. He saw the dubious expression on Mickey D’s face. “Well, enough to read a menu, anyway.”

“Read a menu, huh?” Mickey D examined the instrument console. “Wow — nothing but steam gauges,” he said.

“Huh?”

“Everything in this cockpit is analog. The chopper I usually fly is all glass.”

Sam tapped the wraparound windshield. “This looks like glass to me.”

“I’m talking display,” Mickey D said. “At the SOAR, our MH-47Es have TV screens — four of them. Everything is digital — attitude indicators, hover page, radar altitude hold.

You can even upload data from a laptop — flight plan, navigation, comms — and it’s all in front of your nose instantaneously.”

“You’re speaking a language I don’t understand,” Sam said.

“Not like Chinese, huh?” Mickey D flipped a trio of switches. Sam watched as a series of lights flickered to life on the instrument panel. The pilot took a headset from the deck between the seats, wiped the blood and brain matter off on his anorak, and pointed the big plug at a jack on the console. “R-842 high-freq radio,” he said, smacking the plug home. “Two-to-eight megahertz. Range is about a thousand kliks in good weather and no mountains.”

“Take a listen.” The pilot handed the bulky apparatus to Sam. He pointed. “That’s the transmit button. If you understand enough to read a menu maybe you could order us some takeout.”

0806. “Rowdy — Loner. Meet me at the truck.” Ritzik scampered down to the ravine floor. He saw Sam Phillips through the HIP’s windshield and waved at him to join them. He watched as the CIA officer’s index finger pointed straight up, indicating “wait a second.”

Sam pulled the headset off. “Thanks.”

“No prob.” Mickey D watched as the spook sidled out of the cockpit. “So, what’s on the menu?”

“Trouble.” Sam jumped out of the hatch and jogged to where Ritzik stood. He jerked his thumb toward the HIP. “You’re about to have company,” he said.

“I know.”

“How?”

“I finally reached the TOC in Almaty. They have satellite imagery.”

Sam nodded. “What’s the story?”

“Chinese are coming out of Kashgar. Two aircraft: a HIP and a gunship. According to what Dodger told me, the original flight was three transports and two gunships — run by some Special Forces general out of Beijing. Obviously he’s holding one of the gunships back.”

“From the chatter, they’re making good time,” Sam said. “They’re not holding anything back.”

“You heard them?”

“On the radio. Mick got it working.”

“What are they saying?”

“You gotta understand I pick up about every third word,” Sam said. “But the gist of it — at least I think so — was they think two of their choppers were attacked by a large terrorist element. They’re going to use the first two choppers to draw the enemy out, and use the second HIND to flank the tango position and attack from the rear.”