Somehow I managed to stay in the sky. My mind whirled in a blinding panic, my fingers numb, my hands raw nerves that gripped the stick to keep from shaking, but my body remembered its training and guided the chopper without thought. I could hear Bert’s voice through my headset, gentle as he read off coordinates. “Veer west, that’s it,” he was saying. My body responded to his prompts with no help from my screaming mind, my thudding heart. “Easy, Carl. We’re the cavalry here, we’re gonna bring him home. Just take her in low and steady. Keep her steady.”
Below us the land burned with fire and explosions, shells bursting so close that we felt the shocks thrown up from the bombs in waves. The helicopter bucked beneath me, the stick jerking in my hands. Tommy—it was the only word I knew. No. N
