The Line

CHAPTER 12

Boomer slid the magazine on top of the housing and chambered a round.

He and Skibicki were at the end of the paved road that wound its way up the west coast of Oahu.

A sign indicated that the rest of the way was off limits to vehicles.

And, as if to reinforce the message on the sign, the road turned into a potholed dirt trail.

“Switch for the laser sight is here,” Skibicki added, tapping the side of the gun. “He handed Boomer his night vision goggles.

“Ready to go for a walk?”

“How far is it?” Boomer asked, shouldering the weapon and stepping out with Skibicki onto the dirt road.

“About three and a half klicks. We should make it in plenty of time.”

Skibicki pointed landward, toward the steep slopes that towered up.

“See those lights up there?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s the Kaena Point satellite tracking station. All that land on the high ground is military reservation.” He pointed down.

“Maps show this road going around the point and continuing on the north side, but as you can see, you can’t drive it. It’s washed out at some points. Hardly anyone ever comes up here other than some fishermen during the daytime. Coast Guard’s got a lighthouse on the point itself but it’s unmanned.”

Boomer remembered that detail from the DZ message.

“Sounds like they picked the one place off-shore of Oahu where you could do a water drop and not have civilians on the beach,” he continued.

“Roger that,” Skibicki said.

Boomer felt the warm night breeze, and reflected how different the coastal breeze was than the bitter arctic air he’d felt in the Ukraine.

He wasn’t quite sure what to expect this evening. His hope was that they would at least confirm that it was a jump and maybe find where the jumpers came ashore and camped out. It was still five, days before Pearl Harbor Day, and Boomer hoped that Trace would come up with something concrete so that the information he discovered tonight could be given to the proper authorities whoever they were.

The interior of the Combat Talon was illuminated by red light so that everyone inside could maintain their night vision.

The airframe was a modified C-130 Hercules transport, an aircraft that had served as the workhorse of the Air Force for four decades and was still going strong. The interior was large enough to hold five cars end to end, but the front half of the Talon cargo bay was blocked off by thick, black curtains, separating the flight crew from the jumpers in the back.

The Air Force men in the forward portion of the cargo body were button-pushers and screen-watchers. It was their job to defeat electronic threats to the aircraft, allowing it to perform its stated mission of penetrating deep inside enemy airspace without being detected. This mission was considered a milk run by both the screen-watchers and the pilots up front. There were no mountain valleys to be negotiated at low level, where they could look up and see trees and the slopes above them; no electronic threat from enemy anti-aircraft systems to be thwarted; no special navigating problems as — unlike electronic silent missions — they were linked into the Navy’s FLTSATCOM network and their computers could locate their position on the move to within five meters every one one-thousandth of a second.

The inflight refueling had been the most exciting event and it had gone off without a hitch.

As load master Master Technical Sergeant Johnson was the man who worked both sides of the curtain. He was a member of the aircrew, but his job was to ensure that whatever cargo or personnel was loaded into the rear half of the Talon got to its departure point intact. For him, this was no milk run. He had fourteen personnel packed into the cargo bay along with two Zodiac rubber boats and other gear.

The men’s parachutes and rucksacks were strapped down on the back ramp and they had mostly slept for the ten hours they’d been in the air.

“We’ve got a TOT of sixty minutes,” the pilot’s voice sounded in the portable headset Johnson wore.

“Roger that, sir. I’ll wake up our sleeping beauties.”

Johnson walked over and tapped the man who had identified himself as the leader of these men when they’d on loaded The men wore no insignia or rank or organization patch — just black wet suits — and they had not identified themselves or their organization when they’d boarded the aircraft in Okinawa. Johnson didn’t find that surprising. The Talon often flew missions for hard-eyed men with no indication of who they were or what their mission was. Johnson’s job was to get them out of the plane intact at the right place and time, not to ask questions. In fact, he knew if he asked questions, he’d be looking for a new job as soon as they landed, if he was not locked in the brig.

“One hour out,” Johnson yelled over the roar of the engines.

The man cracked an eye and nodded, immediately nudging the man next to him, passing the signal down. Johnson was always impressed that men who were about to jump out of a perfectly good airplane could sleep so easily.

Johnson went to the back ramp and began unfastening the cargo straps holding down the parachutes. The men in the wet suits paired off into buddy teams and began rigging their parachutes. The dimly lit interior didn’t affect the men’s efficiency. Johnson had seen inflight rigs on routes through rough terrain where the constant jerking of the aircraft had thrown the men around like rag dolls, and the floor of the plane had been coated with slippery vomit from airsickness. He was glad for the smooth and level flight two hundred feet above the wavetops.

It took the men twenty minutes to put their chutes on, hook their rucksacks up underneath their reserve chutes in front, rig their weapons, and stuff their swim fins underneath the waistband of their parachutes and secure them with a safety line. Then they sat back down and started their wait. Johnson could feel the change in atmosphere inside the aircraft. The adrenaline was beginning to flow.

“Should be due north of us,” Skibicki said.

“Track will be from left to right.”

Boomer twisted the focus on his night vision goggles and surveyed the ocean. The cresting waves were glittering green lines with sparks flying off as the spray pounded the rocks. The ocean beyond was a greenish-black slate out to the horizon where stars glittered brightly in the computer enhanced image.

He and Skibicki were hidden in the sand dunes of Kaena Point on its north side’. The small Coast Guard lighthouse was to their right rear and unmanned as Skibicki had said.

Five hundred meters inland, the ground swooped up precipitously to Puu Pueo, the beginning of the mountain chain that was the backbone of the west side of Oahu.

“Do you think they’ll come ashore here?” Boomer asked.

“I wouldn’t,” Skibicki replied. He pointed with the muzzle of his Calico. “The shore here is rocky, and as you can see the waves aren’t very gentle.. They’d get pounded pretty bad trying to swim in here. If those two bundles they’re jumping are boats, I think they’ll go one of two ways: east and try to beach somewhere opposite Dillingham Air Force Base, which is an old abandoned airfield on the inland side of the Farrington Highway that runs along the coast there. The only problem with going that way is that the mountains are very steep and if they are trying to go inland, they got one hell of a climb.

“The other possibility is that they go south,” Skibicki continued, pointing to their left, and then to their rear, where the coast came in.

“Lots of beach they can land on.

Also, that’s the best way to eventually get to Pearl. Hug the west coast all the way around, then along the south, and into the harbor.

They could take a couple of nights to make the move and do it without getting spotted if they’re very careful. Going around clockwise to the east they’d eventually have to round Diamond Head and pass Waikiki — not exactly the most secure way.”

“The message said the RP for the jumpers would be marked by IR strobe,” Boomer noted.

“I don’t see anything out there.”

“Normally the strobe would actually be at the RP,” Skibicki said.

“However, in this case, they might track the aircraft from land and flash an IR strobe when the aircraft is at the RP. I got the impression that their was just a safe signal that the jump could proceed. Hell, those damn Talons got such good navigating equipment that they’ll release those jumpers within ten feet of the planned RP.”

Skibicki pointed at the mountains.

“If I was running this drop, I’d be up there somewhere, almost on level with the aircraft.”

Boomer glanced down at the glowing face of his watch.

“We’ll find out in twenty minutes.”

Four hundred meters to their right rear, on the other side of the lighthouse, two figures carrying rifles moved silently through the darkness, the snout of their night vision goggles centered on the lighthouse, beyond which Boomer and Skibicki lay.

“Charlie Papa Fourteen at my mark,” the navigator said.

“Five, four, three, two, one. Mark.” He checked the numbers on his screen.

“We’re two seconds ahead of schedule,” he announced.

“Roger,” the pilot said.

“What about electronics?”

His answer came from the countermeasures officer in the front half of the cargo bay.

“I’m getting atmosphere bounces off the radar from the International Airport but we could go up another six hundred feet and they wouldn’t have a clue we were here. No sign of ships or other aircraft.”

“All right,” the pilot said.

“Johnson, we’re twenty minutes out.”

In the rear of the plane Master Technical Sergeant Johnson relayed the time until drop to the jumpmaster, who turned to the other men seated on the web seats and extended both hands, fingers spread wide.

“Twenty minutes!” he screamed, repeating the gesture twice to give them the visual count.

The jumpmaster then turned to the two rubber Zodiacs and checked the cargo chutes rigged on each, hooking their static lines to the steel cable — one of which ran the entire length of the cargo bay on each side, ending far in the tail well. At loading, Johnson and his assistant load master had placed the Zodiacs in position, one on each side, nose facing the rear. Each boat rested on a metal pallet, and the attaching points for the cargo chutes were on each corner of the pallet.

The boat was attached to the pallet with cargo webbing, all centered on one quick release inside each boat so that once in the water, the pallet would release and sink, leaving the boat floating on the surface. The forty horsepower engine for each boat was tied down inside. The pallets were held to the inside of the aircraft with one length of cargo webbing attached to the back of each pallet, tied to an 0ring on the floor of the aircraft.

“Ten minutes,” the pilot’s voice announced in Johnson’s headphones. He gave the information to the jumpmaster who again relayed it to the jumpers.

“Break the chem lights,” the jumpmaster instructed Johnson. He obliged by cracking the two chem light sticks taped to each Zodiac — one on the prow, one on the stern.

“Six minutes.” This time the routine changed. The jumpmaster stood and hooked his own static line hook to the right cable, just behind the hook for the right boat. He then turned to the men.

“Six minutes!” he called out extending five fingers on one hand and one on the other.

“Outboard personnel stand up!” he yelled, pointed to both sides of the aircraft, then gesturing up with his palms.

Six men on his side of the aircraft and seven on the other stood, holding onto the side of the aircraft for support.

“Hook up!”

Each man unhooked his static line snap hook from where the jumpmaster had placed it on the carrying handle of the reserve parachute over his belly and attached it to the steel cable, open end facing out. The jumper then slid a slender metal safety through a small hole in the hook, insuring that the snap hook could not reopen.

The jumpmaster curled his fingers, thumb to forefinger, and moved them back and forth.

“Check static lines!”

Each jumper rechecked his hookup to the cable, then traced the yellow web of the static line as far as he could until it disappeared over his shoulder, making sure that it was clear and free. He then checked the man’s in front from where it appeared over his shoulder to where it disappeared into the pack closing tie of the parachute itself. The last man on each stick turned to face the front of the aircraft and had the next-to-last man check his. An improperly routed static line could cause the jumper great difficulties after exiting the aircraft and lead to him being hung up and battered against the aircraft.

Johnson felt his weight thrust slightly forward — he knew that was the aircraft slowing down from almost 300 miles an hour, to jump speed of 125 knots, and that the plane was three minutes out from the drop zone.

Johnson took the strap for the monkey harness he wore and hooked it into a 0-bolt on the side of the floor of the aircraft just short of the hinge where the ramp began. He played out enough slack so that he could make his way the end of the ramp and then cinched it tight so he couldn’t fall out once the ramp opened.

“Check equipment!” The jumpmaster waved his arms, palms toward his chest. Each man started from his head and worked down, making one last check on their gear, a few semi-squatting as much as the gear would allow to make sure that one of their legs straps was not routed over a testicle.

The noise level on the inside increased abruptly as the ramp began to open. A thin horizontal crack appeared, rapidly growing wider as the top portion of the ramp disappeared into the cavity that housed the large tail of the aircraft and the lower ramp began leveling out.

“Sound off for equipment check!”

The last man in each stick slapped the man in front on the rear, yelling “OK,” and the message was passed up until the front man in each stick looked the jumpmaster in the eye and reported “All OK, jumpmaster!”

The jumpmaster immediately turned toward the open ramp and gingerly made his way around the side of the right Zodiac. He held onto the hydraulic arm that had lowered the ramp and stuck his head out into the slipstream, peering ahead to try and make out the island of Oahu which should be approaching on the side of the aircraft. Satisfied, he came back in and took his place at the front of his stick.

“One minute,” the pilot radioed to Johnson.

“You got the secure signal?” he asked the co-pilot, who was wearing night vision goggles. The co-pilot leaned forward and peered down to the right, where Kaena Point protruded into the ocean. He spotted a flash of light from their strobe in the sand dunes near the lighthouse.

“Roger. We’re good to go.” The pilot relayed the information to the load master

Johnson grabbed the jumpmaster’s shoulder and gave him both the time warning and strobe information, then wedged himself in between the bundle and the skin of the aircraft.

“One minuter” the jumpmaster gave his last time warning.

The eyes of all the jumpers were wide now, the adrenaline flowing freely. The red light high up above the ramp glowed brightly.

Johnson felt his knees buckle and knew that meant they were thirty seconds out and the pilot was bringing them up from 200 feet above the waves to jump altitude at 500 feet.

“Stand by!” the jumpmaster called out, edging forward until he was as close as he could be to the Zodiac. Johnson drew his knife from its sheath, making sure that his assistant load master on the other side of the plane had his out and was watching him. He then focused on the red light.

“Go!” the pilot yelled in the headset at the same moment the light turned green. The razor-sharp edge on Johnson’s knife went cleanly through the webbing holding the Zodiac’s pallet. The pallet slid off, the chute deploying almost immediately and the chem lights disappearing into the darkness below. The jumpmaster was right behind it, waddling off the edge of the ramp and disappearing from sight, the only reminder of his presence the deployment bag fluttering the air behind the aircraft, still held by the static line.

The other six jumpers in the right stick followed, less than half a second between each man.

As the last man in the right stick cleared the ramp, Johnson chopped his arm down, indicating for the other load-master to cut his boat free. The other stick was gone in less than four seconds. Johnson stood and walked to the edge of the ramp, feeling the tug of the safety harness pulling him back. A row of chutes were deployed behind the path of the Talon, the first jumpers already in the water. Johnson turned back and activated the static line retrieval system. A large bolt on each of the static line cables slowly pulled the deployment bags back in. Once they were clear of the ramp, Johnson informed the pilot, and they closed the ramp and dropped back down to 200 feet, pulling a hard left turn at the same time to head for home.

“I counted fourteen jumpers and two Zodiacs on pallets,” Boomer said, the sound of the MC-130 Talon fading into the noise of the surf. The darkened aircraft turned left and disappeared, but not before Skibicki and Boomer had had a chance to positively identify it — there was no mistaking the “whiskers” on the nose for the Fulton aerial recovery system unique to that aircraft.

“Same here,” Boomer edged up on the sand dune until he was kneeling on top in order to be able to see out into the ocean. He caught sight of one of the Zodiacs as it rode a wave then it disappeared again. The chem lights made it easy to pinpoint the boats. Each chem light, almost invisible to the naked eye at this distance, showed up like a spotlight in the night vision goggles. Boomer knew the men out there weren’t happy about having to use the lights, but it was a better alternative to splashing around in the water and not being able to find the boats. As the waves moved he could make out figures moving over the sides of the boats — the jumpers climbing on board. Boomer knew the routine well; he’d done it himself numerous times.

The first man in would check for gas — at night by smell — to make sure the fuel bladder hadn’t ruptured. As soon as the second man was aboard, they would free the engine from its place on the floorboards and mount it with the engine’s clamps on the rear center of the transom. They would also secure it with a retention cable that was anchored on one side of the boat, so they wouldn’t lose the engine in case the boat capsized. It was secured to only one side so they would be able to right the boat from the water.

“Hear it?” Skibicki asked.

“Yeah.” Boomer caught the cough of the engine starting.

The sound of its running was lost in the surf and distance.

He knew the two boats were holding in place, waiting to collect all their swimmers. Then they would be off, but which way?

Skibicki twisted around and glanced inland.

“I didn’t see any IR strobe,” he noted.

“Maybe there wasn’t one, or maybe there was another message.”

“Could have been down in the dunes,” Boomer noted.

“They could see it from the cockpit.”

“I didn’t see any coverage either,” Boomer said.

“They could be out there blacked out,” Skibicki said.

The lights on one of the boats suddenly went out. All were aboard.

Boomer focused his attention on that spot, maintaining its location through his goggles, catching sight of the lowlying silhouette as it crested each swell. He was unaware of the wavering red dot of light that had suddenly appeared in the center of his back. The dot shifted, moving over to Skibicki, at first also centering on the back, then slowly moving up toward his head.

“I think they’re turning east,” Boomer said, turning to Skibicki. He threw himself forward and grabbed the sergeant major, the two of them toppling down the beach side of the sand dune as a shot rang out.

Boomer flipped off the safety on the Calico.

“He’s got laser sights. Somewhere up near the lighthouse. Must be security for the jump and our IR strobe man.” He was calculating rapidly, assessing the situation.

“We need to break left.”

“No,” Skibicki said.

“We got to get back to my jeep.

We got to go right.” He jerked a thumb over his shoulder.

“The rocks are slippery, but if we get down in them, we can circle around.”

Boomer accepted that this was Skibicki’s terrain and that the older man had more combat experience. Skibicki moved out, crouching low, keeping the sand dune between them and the lighthouse.

Boomer was glad he was wearing running shoes as they started moving across algae-covered rock. His sneakers were soon soaked, but he maintained a degree of traction.

He kept the Calico ready for use in his right hand, using his left hand to steady himself. He felt exposed, knowing that someone with a night vision scope and laser sight was out there in the dark, waiting and watching and that the bullet would hit before he even heard the crack of the rifle.

The roar of the waves crashing onto the rocks thundered in his ears.

Boomer kept his neck craned inland, watching the nearest dunes. He crabbed sideways behind Skibicki as they made their way around the tip of the point and started moving down the southwestern shore.

As Boomer hopped from one large rock to another, he slipped, falling into a large tidal pool. He kept his face up, desperate to keep the goggles from getting soaked and shorting out. He stood up in waist-deep water, and gained his footing, only to be knocked over as the next wave rushed in, and then sucked back out, dragging him with it.

He slammed the edge of the telescoping stock of the Calico between two rocks and grabbed hold with both hands to keep from being pulled out into the ocean.

Skibicki clambered up onto a tall rock to Boomer’s right and held out his left hand, holding on precariously with his right, his weapon hanging free on its sling.

“Come on!”

Boomer reached, but there was a two foot gap between their extended fingers. He was inundated up to his neck as the next wave roared in.

With a hiss, the water poured out, pulling him down to his knees. In the pause before the next wave came in, he unhooked the Calico and slapped the barrel into Skibicki’s hand. With the sergeant major giving a hard tug. Boomer got to his feet and climbed up onto the rock, escaping the wall of water that cascaded in.

Boomer was soaked to the skin but the goggles still functioned.

Skibicki moved inland about ten meters to avoid a repetition of the experience. They continued for twenty minutes, then Skibicki halted.

“The road’s right ahead.”

Boomer remembered that when they had come up the” road, it had cut close in to the west shore, leaving no space for them to maneuver between the ocean and the steep cliffs.

They sat still for ten minutes, searching the darkness with their goggles, waiting for any sign that the unseen sniper was aware of this choke point The thunder of the surf continued unabated and there was no movement in the dunes to the left, where the sniper would have a clear field of fire up the road.

“I’ll go first,” Skibicki said.

“Cover me until I get about twenty-five meters down the road. Then I’ll return the favor.”

Boomer scooted up to the edge of the road on his stomach, then snuggled the butt of the Calico into his shoulder.

The red dot from his laser sight showed clearly in his goggles, allowing him to easily aim it. He picked the center of mass of the largest dune.

“Go.”

Skibicki leapt to his feet and sprinted onto the dirt road, immediately turning right. Boomer caught the flash of the rifle firing, a hair before the sound of the rounds going off reached him. He fired on automatic, directly at the muzzle flash of the sniper. The Calico worked just as Skibicki had promised, the muzzle staying smooth and level, the empty brass flowing out of the bottom ejection port.

Boomer was rewarded with the muzzle flash of the sniper’s weapon abruptly going up, then silence.

“Skibicki!” he yelled.

“I’m all right,” the sergeant major called back from his prone position on the far side of the road, where he was nudged up against the cliff face.

“Son of a bitch missed me.”

“Think there’s more than one?” Boomer asked, sweeping the muzzle of his weapon along the dune.

“I got the one that shot at you.”

“I don’t want to wait around and find out,” Skibicki replied.

“I’ll cover you. Move!”

Boomer didn’t need to be told twice. He got to his feet and ran, feeling the skin on his back contract and his shoulder hunch in anticipation of a bullet slamming into him. He was almost abreast of Skibicki when he heard the sound of firing to his rear. He dove right, rolling off the edge of the road and slamming into the wet rocks, feeling the jagged edge of one leave its painful imprint on his right side.

Skibicki returned fire with a long stutter of rounds from his silenced weapon.

“You OK?”

Boomer wedged himself between two rocks and sucked in a painful breath.

He felt along his side and winced as his fingers touched.

“I think I busted a rib.”

“If you’re breathing you’re OK,” Skibicki returned.

“I hit the second one. Let’s book.”

“I’ll cover,” Boomer said as he edged up and peered over the edge of the road.

Skibicki didn’t bother answering. He got to his feet and ran down the road, disappearing where it bent inland, the cliffs covering him.

“Set!” he yelled.

Boomer jumped to his feet, ignoring the stab of pain that jabbed into his side. He joined the sergeant major and leaned over, trying to draw rapid shallow breaths.

“Fuck, that hurts.”

“Pain is weakness leaving the body,” Skibicki said, peering carefully around the rock face to see if they were being followed.

“Let’s make like a duck and get the flock out of here.”

They started out at a steady jog and Boomer stoically bore the pain.

They reached Skibicki’s jeep and stowed the weapons under the seats.

Boomer leaned back in the passenger seat, bending slightly to the right. Skibicki started the car up and they headed down the highway.

As overhead lamps flashed by. Boomer tenderly opened his shirt. The skin was broken and blood was slowly oozing from a jagged tear in his chest. He felt through the blood and torn skin.

“It’s cracked,” he announced.

“First aid kit’s in the back,” Skibicki said, checking his rear-view mirror.

“Stop the bleeding, and I’ll put a wrap on it once we get a chance to slow down.”

“What about the cops?” Boomer asked.

Skibicki snorted.

“Fuck the cops. We’re in deep shit here and I don’t think we’re on the side with the bigger firepower.

If this Line exists, you can bet your ass they’re wired in deep at all levels of bureaucracy. We call the cops and tell them we just shot some people out at Kaena Point, and all we’re doing is turning on a searchlight and pointing it at ourselves and we’ve already done that twice. Three times and they’ll lock us up.”

“Where are you going?” Boomer asked, tearing off a piece of tape to put some gauze over his wound.

“Maggie’s,” Skibicki replied.

“I’ll drop you off there.

You’ll be safe. I’ve got some checking to do on other things.”

“Like what?” Boomer asked.

“Listen,” Skibicki said.

“Whoever these guys are who just parachuted in, they had security here on the beach and that security damn near wasted our ass. The shit’s starting to hit the fan, and I’m going to go around on shit watch.

Seeing where it hits. I know people all over this island and I want to find out what they know. Particularly about the President’s visit.”

Skibicki taped his watch.

“It’s two December.

We only got five days to get to the bottom of this.”