Target of the Heart

Chapter 1-3

Pete’s Chinook and his two escort Black Hawks crossed into the mountainous province of Sikkim, India ten feet over the glaciers and still moving fast. It was an hour before dawn, they’d made it out of China while it was still dark.

“Twenty minutes of fuel remaining,” Nicolai said it like a personal challenge when they hit the border.

“Thanks, I never would have noticed.”

It had been a nail-biting tradeoff: the more fuel he burned, the more easily he climbed due to the lighter load. The more he climbed, the faster he burned what little fuel remained.

Safe in Indian airspace he climbed hard as Nicolai counted down the minutes remaining, burning fuel even faster than he had been while crossing the mountains of southern Tibet. They caught up with the U.S. Air Force HC-130P Combat King refueling tanker with only ten minutes of fuel left.

“Ram that b***h,” Nicolai called out.

Pete extended the refueling probe which reached only a few feet beyond the forward edge of the rotor blade and drove at the basket trailing behind the tanker on its long hose.

He nailed it on the first try despite the fluky winds. Striking the valve in the basket with over four hundred pounds of pressure, a clamp snapped over the refueling probe and Jet A fuel shot into his tanks.

His helo had the least fuel due to having the most men aboard, so he was first in line. His Number Two picked up the second refueling basket trailing off the other wing of the Combat King. Thirty seconds and three hundred gallons later and he was breathing much more easily.

“Ah,” Nicolai sighed. “It is better than the s*x,” his thick Russian accent only ever surfaced in this moment or in a bar while picking up women.

“Hey, Nicolai,” Nicky the Greek called over the intercom from his crew chief position seated behind Pete. “Do you make love in Russian?”

A question Pete had always been careful to avoid.

“For you, I make special exception.” That got a laugh over the system.

Which explained why Pete always kept his mouth shut at this moment.

“The ladies, Nicolai? What about the ladies?” Alfie the portside gunner asked.

“Ah,” he sighed happily as he signaled that the other choppers had finished their refueling and formed up to either side, “the ladies love the Russian. They don’t need to know I grew up in Maryland and I learn my great-great-grandfather’s native tongue at the University called Virginia.”

He sounded so pleased that Pete wished he’d done the same rather than study Japanese and Mandarin.

Another two hours of—thank god—straight-and-level flight at altitude through the breaking dawn and they landed on the aircraft carrier awaiting them in the Bay of Bengal. India had agreed to turn a blind eye as long as the Americans never actually touched their soil.

Once standing on the deck—and the worst of the kinks worked out—he pulled his team together: six pilots and seven crew chiefs.

“Honor to serve!” He saluted them sharply.

“Hell yeah!” They shouted in response and saluted in turn. It was their version of spiking the football in the end zone.

A petty officer in a bright green vest appeared at his elbow, “Follow me please, sir.” He pointed toward the Navy-gray command structure that towered above the carrier’s deck. The Commodore of the entire carrier group was waiting for him just outside the entrance. Not a good idea to keep a One-Star waiting, so he waved at the team.

“See you in the mess for dinner,” he shouted to the crew over the noise of an F-18 Hornet fighter jet trapping on the #2 wire. After two days of surviving on MREs while squatting on the Tibetan tundra, he was ready for a steak, a burger, a mountain of pasta, whatever. Or maybe all three.

The green escorted him across the hazards of the busy flight deck. Pete had kept his helmet on to buffer the noise, but even at that he winced as another Hornet fired up and was flung aloft by the catapult.

“Orders, Major Napier,” the Commodore handed him a folded sheet the moment he arrived. “Hate to lose you.”

The Commodore saluted, which Pete automatically returned before looking down at the sheet of paper in his hands. The man was gone before the import of Pete’s orders slammed in.

A different green-clad deckhand showed up with Pete’s duffle bag and began guiding him toward a loading C-2 Greyhound twin-prop airplane. It was parked number two for the launch catapult, close behind the raised jet-blast deflector.

His crew, being led across in the opposite direction to return to the berthing decks below, looked at him aghast.

“Stateside,” was all he managed to gasp out as they passed.

A stream of foul cursing followed him from behind. Their crew was tight. Why the hell was Command breaking it up?

And what in the name of f**k-all had he done to deserve this?

He glanced at the orders again as he stumbled up the Greyhound’s rear ramp and crash landed into a seat.

Training rookies?

It was worse than a demotion.

This was punishment.