The fighter pilot pulled the nose up, and the jet shot into the sky until it was lost from sight and sound. Which is where it would remain, at high altitude, out of visual range from the ground, for the entire mission. The fact that it was a stealth plane would keep it off radar screens. The pilot would never even see the island where the target was located. It was Vaughn's job to target the bomb the pilot would drop at the planned moment.

With a shudder, the Huey lifted its skids exactly on time. Vaughn turned to the Filipino commandos in his bird and gave them the thumbs-up. He noted that none of them returned the gesture, nor did they seem particularly enthused. They were going into the mouth of the dragon to rescue foreigners, not a high priority for any of them. The raid was headed to Jolo Island, controlled by Abu Sayef rebels, who he knew had a long history of kicking the Philippine army's ass. He'd worked with the Philippine army before, and found their enthusiasm level for combat muted at best. Most were in the army for the pay, three hot meals, and a bunk. Not to get killed.

Eight days ago, eighteen tourists, most of them Americans, had been kidnapped by the rebels off a sailing boat as it passed by the island. Six days ago, a video of the rebels executing one of the tourists, an American man, had been sent to a Philippine news station in Manila. The next day, Vaughn and his small group of Delta Force operatives were on a flight from Fort Bragg to the Philippines. Their participation in the raid was a violation of both Philippine and American law; thus the extreme requirements for secrecy.

He would have preferred that the entire raiding force be American – not out of any prejudice on his part, but because the Filipino commandos were not trained anywhere near the level of his men, especially at the most difficult military task of all: rescuing hostages. But compromises were a political reality that often crept into missions such as this one.

Vaughn leaned back in the web seat and closed his eyes. He could sense the fear coming off some of the commandos, especially those who had not experienced combat before. They were going to "see the elephant," the age-old military term for experiencing combat. He wasn't sure where the term came from, although he suspected it might stem from as far back as Hannibal crossing the Alps, elephants in tow to engage the Romans. He was a student of military history, and that explanation seemed to make as much sense as any other.

He mentally ran through the sequence of upcoming events, war-gaming the plan. It was too late to change anything, but he wanted to keep his mind occupied. He'd learned that it could drift to bad places if left to its own devices. The helicopters cleared the edge of the island they had been on, and the pilots dove toward the ocean until they were flying less than five feet above the waves.

Vaughn pulled the LLDR out of its pack and checked the small screen on the back to update their position, then he looked at his watch. Exactly where they were supposed to be at the exact time. He had worked with Nightstalker pilots before, and they were meticulous about their flight routes and timing.

"Ten minutes."

Vaughn relayed the time warning to the Filipinos while he flashed the number ten with his fingers.

The commandos nodded glumly and pulled back the slides on their M-16s, chambering a round. His own MP-5 already had a round in the chamber and the safety was off – the rule in Delta was that one's finger was the safety.

It was dark now, and he reached up and turned on the night vision goggles, letting them warm up but keeping them locked in the upright position for the moment.

"Five minutes," the pilot announced.

"Landfall in sight."

The flight plan called for them to hit the north shore of Jolo Island, fly close to the terrain over the island, then split formation when they cleared a pass between two peaks. Vaughn's helicopter would go to the left, while Jenkins and the other four birds would go right, taking twenty seconds longer to get to the target. The reason for the delay was because Vaughn had the laser designator.

Satellite imagery had given them the location of the camp where both American and Filipino intelligence believed the hostages were being held. There were two tin buildings set in a treeline on the southern shoreline of the island, about twenty meters apart. The one to the east, according to intelligence, was the barracks for the guards; the one to the west, the prison for the hostages. The beach itself was about fifty meters wide at low tide, a factor they had taken into account while planning the mission since it was the only place in the area where they could land the helicopters. Intelligence also said there were only a pair of guards on duty at the holding building at night, while the rest – estimated at thirty to forty men – would be in the guards barracks. Vaughn had to wonder how intelligence had come up with this estimate, but the mission was based on it, so he hoped it was correct. He also had to trust that intelligence had the two buildings labeled correctly, because he'd hate to designate the one with the hostages in it.

He leaned forward in his seat and could see a dark mass ahead – Jolo Island. It was among the most southwestern of the thousands of islands that encompassed the Philippines. Not large, and not particularly important, except for the fact that the Abu Sayef made their headquarters somewhere on it and had expanded their sphere of influence over the entire island. There was no government presence on the island, and from what Vaughn had picked up from his Filipino counterparts, the two sides existed in tense pretend-ignorance of each other – that is, until the terrorists went out and kidnapped foreigners, bringing intense pressure on the powers-that-be in Manila. All in all, no one was happy with the current situation.

"Formation is breaking," the pilot announced as they passed between two black masses. The announcement wasn't necessary, since Vaughn could see that himself. But it was standard operating procedure for the pilot to call out all checkpoints, and he was a big believer in SOPs. Without them, little details tended to get screwed up, and enough little screwed-up details added together could lead to big mistakes. The other four helicopters, Jenkins's in the lead, vectored off to the right. They would arrive from the west twenty seconds after the bomb exploded. Vaughn watched the dark form carrying his brother-in-law disappear around the mountain.

It was hard for him to believe that Frank was retiring. They'd worked together for six years. Vaughn had introduced him to his sister five years ago, when she'd stopped by Fort Bragg for a visit. The two had hit it off, which had surprised him. Since her first husband died, she'd been raising her two boys on her own. Vaughn had tried to help, but he was deployed so much with Delta Force, his presence had been spotty at best.

He had not been happy about the blooming romance between his team sergeant and sister, primarily because he knew Frank's presence in his sister and her sons' lives would be as infrequent as his own had been. But he'd kept his unhappiness to himself, partially because he had always lived in fear of his older sister. She'd bossed him around as long as he could remember, and that had never changed. But after seeing them together enough, he'd given in, realizing there was something special between the two. He was going to miss Frank, but was glad that in retirement his friend would be with his sister full-time.

Vaughn shook his head, clearing it of the stray thoughts. He had to focus on the mission. His chopper was swinging wide so they would come to a hover over the treeline next to the beach about a kilometer east of the target. The Stealth Fighter would be coming in from farther to the east and much higher up on its targeting vector.