by fields of durum wheat and alfalfa, which would provide cover from ground searches but no cover at all from the air. “Our only option is to try to escape in the fields,” Zakharov said. “We have perhaps an hour or less before the roadblocks are set up on the highways and the searches can extend into the…”
But at that moment they heard the sound of a helicopter approaching. They took cover inside the truck. A gray HH-1N Huey helicopter with the words “U.S. NAVY” on the side could be seen flying at a moderate speed down Evan Hewes Highway, in the same direction they had been traveling. The noise from the Huey search and rescue chopper got steadily quieter…before becoming louder again. They did not need to get out and look to know the helicopter was coming toward them.
On Zakharov’s orders, one of the commandos unpacked the long green fiberglass box in the back of the pickup and hurriedly got the weapon ready to fire. It took less than a minute, and soon he had the SA-14 Strela antiaircraft missile launcher ready and was hiding with the Porta-Potty between him and the oncoming helicopter. Zakharov made sure the commando had the weapon powered up and steered him south and east toward the sound of the helicopter’s rotors, then stepped out onto the dirt road with his sniper rifle in his hands.
Seconds later, the Navy helicopter appeared, just a few hundred yards away. It had descended to just a hundred feet over the fields. As soon as he clearly saw the pilot’s white helmet, he raised his pistol and fired a round into the helicopter’s windscreen. He had aimed it quickly and didn’t expect to hit anything, but he must’ve hit the pilot because the helicopter veered sharply backward, wobbled from side to side, spun almost an entire revolution, and dove almost to the ground before the copilot managed to take the controls.
Zakharov raised a fist at the commando, hoping he knew that it was the signal to stop and that he would not waste a missile on the stricken chopper. They piled aboard the pickup truck, with Zakharov driving, one commando in the cab with Richter, and the other commandos in the back with the SA-14 MANPADS, and raced down the dirt road north. A few minutes later, a commando pounded on the roof, and Zakharov came to a stop. The missileer dropped down off the cargo bed, crouched below the front of the truck to conceal himself the best he could, and took aim on another helicopter coming toward them.
“If you get a clear shot at the engine exhaust, shoot,” Zakharov ordered, and he began jogging back down the road away from the truck.
This time it was a U.S. Marine Corps AH-1W Super Cobra attack helicopter chasing them. Zakharov could see its twenty-millimeter cannon sweeping back and forth along the fields as the crew looked for targets—but he was relieved to notice that the four weapon pylons were empty. He had to take a chance that they hadn’t had a chance to load an ammunition canister for the cannon either. Zakharov aimed and fired a round from his pistol at the helicopter. He didn’t expect any damage, nor did he get any indication of it, so he started trotting back south along the dirt road toward the helicopter.
As he surmised, the helicopter merely tracked him, but did not attack—it had no ammo. When he walked underneath the helicopter, it slowly pedal-turned around and began to descend, preparing to “dust” him—inundate him with sufficient prop wash that would stir up enough dust and dirt to make it impossible to move or see.
Zakharov could sense his man ready to fire, so before the swirling, blinding dust and dirt got any worse, he started running faster toward the highway—and as he did there was a brilliant flash of light behind him, followed by an incredibly thunderous
Zakharov jogged back toward his truck, dispatching the Super Cobra’s pilot with a shot to his chest as he tried to climb out of the cockpit. In moments his commandos had picked him up, and they raced northward along the dirt road deeper into the fields.
But soon the dirt road ended. Not daring to head west toward Brawley and Naval Air Facility El Centro, they headed east through the fields until they were stopped by the Coachella Canal. They turned north toward the nearest bridge they could see, about a half-mile away. Just as they began heading toward it, however, two more helicopters could be seen rolling in on their position from the south and southeast, another gray Marine Corps Super Cobra and a blue, white, and yellow California Highway Patrol H20 Aerostar patrol helicopter.
“What weapons are left?” Zakharov asked.
“None, except a couple grenades and our personal weapons,” one of the commandos said. Zakharov nodded grimly. They’d brought all the weapons they could gather on short notice and could carry, knowing they would have to fight the TALON robots—they did not expect to take on U.S. Marine Corps helicopters too. “What should we do, sir?”
“We stay together and fight,” Zakharov said finally, checking the ammo supply for his pistol: three rounds left in the magazine, plus two more ten-round magazines—not much at all, but perhaps enough. “They are not going to take us alive.” He motioned to the smoke and fire caused by the destroyed Super Cobra. “I am betting none of their helicopters are armed, so that is our chance. I will try to bring another helicopter down—the smoke and fires will intensify, and the confusion will grow as the authorities try to guess what weapons we have. We can jump across to…”
“Come and get us, filthy Americans!” one of the commandos shouted, and he pulled a grenade from a pocket and threw it toward the helicopters. But milliseconds later, the commando disappeared in an incredible cloud of red gore—and then Zakharov heard the loud, chilling
The grenade sailed in front of the CHP helicopter, missing it by several dozen yards, but the mid-air explosion had the desired effect—Zakharov could hear the helicopter’s engine whine louder and louder as shrapnel was sucked into the turbine and started to shred the compressor blades; the helicopter spun, then dipped, then smacked hard into the alfalfa field.
“Forget the robot!” Zakharov shouted. “Grab Richter! We’ll use him as a human shield!” Zakharov turned and started running toward the bridge across the Coachella Canal, but he hadn’t gone more than a few steps when he heard the Super Cobra’s cannon fire again. He waited for the slugs to pierce his body…but they were just a warning shot, the shells impacting the ground behind him where he had stood just seconds earlier, hitting so close that he could feel the ground shake. He froze, his pistol out of sight in front of him. He had one grenade in his coat pocket and if he could get a lucky shot off with the pistol…
Just then there was another warning burst of fire, just a meter to his left, the shells whizzing by so close that he felt as if he was being sharply patted down by a police officer. He had no choice: he slowly lifted his hands, the pistol still in his right hand. The cannon roared again, this time close enough to his right arm to blacken his sleeve. Zakharov screamed, and he sank to his knees, clutching his thankfully uninjured right hand, his arms and legs shaking so violently that he thought he would pass out if he didn’t fall down first. Off in the distance he could hear sirens—the police, moving in for the arrest.
It was over. Well, he had managed to avoid capture for many months; he had attacked the U.S. government in its own capital; he had caused untold thousands of deaths and trillions of dollars in damage—and it had finally taken no less than a U.S. Marine Corps Super Cobra gunship to stop him. Even Task Force TALON’s high-tech robots couldn’t…
Suddenly there was a bright flash of red and yellow light behind him, and moments later he was knocked onto his face by a tremendous blast of superheated air and a concussion shock wave. He thought that maybe the Super Cobra pilot had received orders to just kill him and not waste time and money on a trial—but he was still alive. Amid a series of explosions and the sounds of crunching metal and jet fuel–fed fires, Zakharov fumbled for the grenade in his coat pocket, then rolled onto his back, ready to toss the grenade at the approaching police cars…
…when he realized he was lying in the midst of an inferno. The Super Cobra helicopter had been blown from the sky—it had been completely
…and at that moment he saw two jets flying overhead, less than a thousand feet aboveground, both Northrop F-5 Freedom Fighter air defense fighters. Both were in green, brown, and gray jungle camouflage colors; the leader
