EVAN MCNAMARA

Chapter One

Sergeant Jeremy Bishop hated and feared the smell of jet fuel. He turned his back to the propwash of the big C130 cargo plane and tried to think about the mission, but the scent of fuel and power enveloped him. The four jet props belched heat and blew away the cool night air. The open rear cargo door summoned the small detachment of soldiers gathered on the tarmac. Bishop hefted his rucksack and strode purposefully to the ramp, but his gut still churned with the sense of dread ignited by the smell of JP8.

Sergeant Kinsella inspected Bishop’s parachute and rigging one last time. The jumpmaster slapped him on the shoulder and grinned, but Bishop did not share Kinsella’s delight. Bishop slumped in the sling seat closest to the rear of the C130 and closed his eyes. He willed the dread away, tried to shake the flashes of violence from his head. He feared they would remain until he left the ramp and felt the rush of fast air against his skin, finally released from the stinking aircraft.

The cargo door closed. The C130 powered up and rumbled toward the main runway. The loadmaster switched off the bright interior lights, washing the cargo bay in red light. The pilot turned and paused for a moment at the runway, then buried the throttle. The C130 hurled itself down the airstrip and vaulted off the ground in a surge of power and flight. As soon as the wheels slammed into the belly of the aircraft, the pilot banked sharply to the west but maintained his rapid rate of climb to the approach altitude of 13,000 feet. Bishop kept his eyes closed and let the violent motion of the aircraft rock and jolt him in his seat. The scent of JP8 lingered in the stale air of the cargo bay. It pricked his nostrils and burned his throat.

He could never place the fear, never pinpoint its origin. He hadn’t been injured on a jump, didn’t know anyone who had been. He had made over one hundred jumps in the line brigades without event, even the quick 500 foot combat drop into Panama. But HALO jumps—High Altitude, Low Opening—were different. Bishop would fall thousands of feet at 120mph before pulling the ripcord, but unlike the round chute he had jumped in the line, he controlled the freefall and guided the flight of the square MC-4 parachute.

He didn’t know if he could control his ruck, though, the eighty-pound lump of green nestled between his legs. The little packs they used in HALO School were knapsacks compared to the green anchors they carried on combat drops. It could catch the wind and threaten his life.

The C130 leveled out, and the cargo door reopened. High clouds made the night a black void, and few lights twinkled from rural North Carolina. Bishop wondered how they would find the drop zone with no points of reference, 13,000 feet down, and in the dark, They would jump into a postage-stamp tonight—a tiny open area with barely enough room for two helicopters to land. That wouldn’t be so bad if they weren’t jumping blind. Captain Birmingham had insisted that this jump be as realistic as possible. In combat, there would be no lighted markings of the drop zone, so there wouldn’t be any tonight, either.

Bishop had never jumped under such conditions, but he knew he had to prove himself. He was the first black team leader in the 82nd Airborne’s Long Range Surveillance Detachment, so he had said nothing and absorbed his anxiety.

Bishop looked over at Kinsella. The jumpmaster knelt at the edge of the ramp and stared straight down thousands of feet into inky blackness. The green light snapped on above Bishop’s head.

Thirty seconds to the release point.

Kinsella stood and signaled to Sergeant Bishop. Team Three rose in unison and turned toward the ramp. Before walking to the edge, each man spot-checked the jumper in front of him for loose straps or deployed pilot chutes. They chucked shoulders in sequence, and the six-man team waddled up to the platform. The impossibly heavy combat rucks dangled between their legs.

Twenty seconds to the release point.

Bishop smelled the cool air at altitude and felt instantly better. He knew his anxiety would fall away as his feet left the platform. He pulled down his goggles and turned to face his men at the edge of the ramp. They gathered in a tight huddle. Thin air swirled around them. Bishop reached out to Cathcart and Jones to steady himself. The last thing he needed was to fall backward before Kinsella gave the final signal. They all clung loosely to each other. The team would freefall together, deploy their chutes at the same altitude, and fly in a “stack”—a staggered line of canopies—down to the drop zone. They needed to stay as a unit from the aircraft to the rally point on the ground. If any soldier left the cluster, he could land hundreds of meters away from the others, costing precious time and wasted effort. The opposition force, or OPFOR, would destroy them, one by one, on the ground.

Ten seconds to the release point.

Bishop no longer felt apprehensive, no longer felt anything. He focused on the jumpmaster. Kinsella stood sideways on the platform as if in formation, ready to give the command precisely at the moment when the aircraft passed over the release point. He extended his arm to oblivion.

Bishop hopped backward, and the bottom dropped out. He arched hard and tried to guide the violent rush of air around his body. His rucksack ignored him and flew like a porcelain toilet.

The ruck caught the wind at odd angles and yanked him back and forth like a shark attack victim. Bishop had less than twenty seconds to right himself and pull the ripcord. If he didn’t pull the main chute by 1500 feet, the reserve would deploy automatically, set on an internal altimeter. The reserve would envelop him in a useless wrap of nylon, and he would plunge to earth. He arched so hard he knew his back would break.

Miraculously, he stopped buffeting. All became steady. He checked his wrist altimeter—3000 feet. His team still fell with him in the same loose huddle. At that moment, they pivoted away and pulled their ripcords.

Thanking God in a microsecond prayer, Bishop turned away from his team and pulled the large metal ring attached to his chest, careful to secure it in his hand. If he dropped it, it would be a case of beer for the rest of the team. He felt the pilot chute explode out of his pack and steeled himself for the horrendous jerk when the main canopy opened and stopped his freefall.

Bishop kept waiting. Bishop kept falling, his 120mph race to the ground unabated.

Panic threatened to overcome his reason, but Bishop was familiar with this emergency. Twice, at HALO school, his main chute had deployed in an ugly mess. Students packed their own chutes, and Bishop had packed a bag of garbage. He had remembered his training, calmly cut away his main, and deployed his reserve. He had made it safely to the ground in Yuma, and he would here, too.

He cut away his main chute with the familiar move of his left hand and pulled his reserve. Again, he felt the pilot chute spring away from his back, and again, he just kept falling.

Bishop clawed at his chest harness, desperately searching for another ripcord, another failsafe that would end his hurtling descent. Nothing but dead nylon webbing. He tried to reach around and yank his main out of the pack tray, but his fingers only grazed the sealed flaps.

Bishop looked once more at his wrist altimeter as the needle flew past 1000 feet, then he peered into the blackness below him, wondering how many seconds he had left. He was glad it was dark, so he couldn’t see the earth rush up to meet him.