They stopped hunting the pilot. They started waiting for the helicopter.
A fast-mover goes down in the low ground east of the river, and the machine that exists to bring men home starts turning.
But the enemy commander on that ridge has learned the pattern. He stops hunting the survivor and sets his guns around him instead, because the pilot is no longer the target — the aircraft coming for him is. By the time the Jolly Green crews understand what they are flying into, one of their own is on the ground with him, and the man who ran rescues across half of Laos is the man waiting on the hoist.
What follows is a fight measured in fuel states, minutes of light, and the length of a rock crest a wounded man has to be carried along. Two-Six goes up the road anyway.
Book 27 of the Airmen series. A standalone rescue novel in the long-running Vietnam air war series.
