Survivalist - 17 - The Ordeal by Ahern Jerry

Author:Ahern, Jerry [Ahern, Jerry]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twenty

Gunships rose ahead of him, a black wall only brought into existence, Kurinami realized, to give the appearance of impenetrability. It gave that appearance indeed.

“Retribution Three—this is Retribution Leader. Status report. Over.”

‘This is Retribution Three, Retribution Leader. Crew of Retribution Four safely aboard. Doorgunner sustained minor injuries. We are coming up behind you. Over.”

“Prepare to execute Attack Plan Three—I repeat, Attack Plan Three. Do all other elements copy? Over.”

“This is Retribution One, Retribution Leader. I copy. Over.”

“This is Retribution Two, Retribution Leader. Copy that. Over.”

“This is Retribution Three, Retribution Leader. Affirmative. Attack Plan Three. Over.”

“This is Retribution Leader,” Kurinami whispered into the teardrop-shaped microphone just before his lips. “Execute—I say again, execute. Retribution Leader out!” Kurinami changed main rotor pitch and banked the machine sharply to starboard, coming about ninety degrees and climbing, the phalanx of Soviet gunships breaking up into a less than imaginative-looking evasive plan if he read their maneuver correctly. “Retribution Two—on your tail. Do you copy?”

“I copy, Retribution Leader. Over.” Retribution Two

rotated a full one hundred eighty degrees and fired missiles from port and starboard forward-facing weapons pods, the Soviet gunship that had come up under it vaporizing in the instant the missile contrail crossed.

Strafing fire crossed the nose of Kurinami’s machine at the level of the chin bubble, Kurinami banking to starboard and climbing again, coming about one hundred eighty degrees and firing his starboard mini-guns, the enemy gunship’s tail rotor spinning away from its mounting, the Soviet machine rotating uncontrollably on its axis, climbing and diving. If the Soviet were a good pilot, he might be able to land it, but the machine was out of action.

Kurinami ignored the gunship. Killing was for assassins.

He banked his machine to port and dove, Retribution Three coming down into a hover at the center of the enemy gunship pack, rotating on the axis of its main rotor and firing fore and aft missiles, then changing pitch and diving to port, Soviet mini-guns firing into their own machines, others of the Soviet machines exploding.

Kurinami redlined his craft, banking to port, firing forward missiles from both pods. Another two of the enemy gunships were gone.

At the edges of his peripheral vision, he saw them coming, aerial mines hurtling downward on small parachutes from a Soviet craft above him. If one should contact even the tip of a rotor blade— Kurinami dove, changing pitch, banking to starboard, under two of the Soviet gunships, machinegun fire etching across the bubble, disabling one of the wiper blades.

The corporal who was his drafted doorgunner was firing, stitching machinegun fire into a Soviet gunship coming off the west rim of the canyon. A hit into the fuel system, the gunship exploding, consumed now in a black and orange fireball, the fireball rising in the canyon updraft.

Kurinami’s German gunship rocked as one of the mines contacted one of the Soviet machines.

Kurinami’s vision through the bubble obscured now, snow

icing over it, he started to climb, another of the Soviet gunships taking a hit from one

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