Every man wore the latest 5th generation full-field, color night vision goggles which allowed them a complete field of view in near total darkness. The goggles looked like large wrap-around sunglasses with thick lenses. Rather than rest on the tops of their ears, the night vision glasses were held on by a custom-fitted, over-the-head strap that contained micro-technology to translate the slightest light waves and heat signatures into visible objects. They were equipped with anti-flash technology that registered unexpected bright flashes, such as vehicle headlamps and gunfire, and instantly suppressed the area of the lens where the flash occurred to avoid eye damage. In the light of tonight’s three-quarter moon, the visibility was as good as if it were noon on a sunny day.
They gunned the machines quickly up Johnson Road to the trail Marcus had taken earlier. Without having to stop to check traps, it would take less than an hour to get to the spot where Marcus had earlier taken his lunch. Silently, they stalked through the night in an eerie, snow-covered replay of the Ride of the Valkyrie.
Chapter 15
Thursday, May 14th, 1998
Airfield Loading Area
Plymouth Naval Base, England
01:00 AM
The men sat quietly around the tarmac, awaiting the final preparations of the C130 crew that would transport them, with the assistance of two in-flight refuelings, to a wide jungle airstrip four miles outside the village. They would be inserted via a touch and go maneuver wherein the aircraft descends to the runway, slows enough for the men to run out the back ramp, then ten seconds later is pulling up again and leaving the area.
This maneuver, while being highly effective, is also quite dangerous. The pilots have to work within the constraint of a minimum runway length of 5000 feet. The airfield the Royal Marines would be using for this operation was exactly that long, according to intelligence records. Just in case, the C-130 they were flying in was equipped with JATO, or Jet Assisted Take Off, propulsion tanks. These fuel-filled canisters reduced the minimum runway length to less than 4000 feet, as long as the Marines disembarked without incident.
The tactic, successfully employed by the American Army Rangers during the invasion of the island of Grenada in 1983, allows for a fast-moving aircraft to drop a large number of troops without parachutes and leave the area before the opposing forces can figure out exactly what is happening.
Operation Brothers Keeper, as it was being called, would insert the Royal Marines of 2nd Troop, Mike Company, 43 Commando, and Gunnery Sergeant Marcus Johnson USMC, in that manner. The Marines would then move on foot three miles to the orphanage. Once there, they would offer to extract the British nationals and any other Europeans in the immediate area, then move everyone willing to go to a field two miles to the west of the village. A squadron of Sea King helicopters would then pick up the entire group. The helicopters were already on the way to Guinea from a Royal Navy fleet based in the South Atlantic.
Once the extraction was complete, all persons would be taken to a safe airfield in Guinea, loaded aboard the waiting and refueled C-130, and returned safely to England. That was the plan as laid out in the briefing room. Plans seldom happen as intended.
While the Marines waited on the airfield tarmac, Marcus took advantage of the downtime to pull out the letter Pops had brought him in the mess hall. He examined the envelope for clues as to where it was from. It was remarkable that the letter had made it to him at all. The whole thing was a smear of ink and forwarding labels that rendered it almost double its original thickness.
Unable to determine from whom it came, he pulled up a corner of the glued-down flap, pushed a finger in, and ripped the top open in a smooth, sliding motion. Inside was a single-page letter written in ink, by hand. It took him several minutes to recognize the script. It was not his mother’s handwriting, full of big looping letters that rolled across the page. This handwriting had a more regular, almost squarish, appearance to it. Marcus glanced over the front of the letter, then turned the page and saw in the bottom corner the name and signature of Lonnie Wyatt.
Marcus,
I know it’s been a long time. I’m sorry in every way you can imagine for the things I have done and not done over the years. I wish I could make up for the mistakes I’ve made and the pain I’ve caused you. I’m writing this letter to let you know that things have changed. I have changed.
I love you.
I always have, but in my own selfish understanding, or lack of understanding, I could not comprehend how you could want to stay in the Marines and claim to still love me. It hurt me so much because I thought you loved your precious Marines, and the violence of that lifestyle, more than me. I couldn’t understand how you could reject me like that. When you wouldn’t leave the Corps, I was so angry and broken that after I returned home, I would yell and scream at my parents or my students, then break into tears for days.
That has changed now—my understanding, that is. I don’t know if you were aware of it, but I am now an Alaska State Trooper, stationed in Palmer for the time being, but soon to be sent out for a bush assignment. I left the school district about two years ago and started this new career in order to help change the world in a more active manner. About the middle of the academy in Sitka, something clicked in my mind and I had a sudden
