Both armored cars returned the fire of the helicopters. One of them dipped, struck the ground at full speed, and went cartwheeling along for a hundred yards, disintegrating into flaming pieces as it went. The other shivered, smoked, but kept on going and auto-rotated down out of sight behind the radio station.

The armored cars pulled up in front of the station door, training their guns on it and screening the radio truck and the jeep. The motorcyclists kept on, stopping and dismounting on either side of the building. A brief rattle of gunfire and smoke boiling up told Blade that they'd finished off the second helicopter.

Blade scrambled out of the jeep. The observation team climbed out the back of the radio truck and started toward one of the radio towers.

Suddenly a machine gun opened up from inside the radio station, followed by the sharp thumps of a grenade launcher. One grenade landed among the observation party, cutting down all four men. Blade threw himself flat on the ground as another grenade arched clear over the armored cars and exploded in his jeep. Fragments of the grenade, the jeep, and the driver showered down in all directions as the armored cars opened fire.

Blade saw windows and sections of wall disintegrate under the cars' point-blank machine-gun fire. Then two of the motorcyclists fired rockets through side windows. The blast blew off most of the roof from one end of the radio station and dropped the rest on top of the Russlanders inside. A wall of smoke boiled up from the wreckage. The dismounted motorcyclists moved toward it with fixed bayonets.

As they vanished into the smoke the radio finally came to life.

«Argus One to Nimrod. Argus One to Nimrod.» That was a call from the commander of Company A, assaulting the garrison's barracks on the left flank.

«Nimrod to Argus One. Go ahead.»

«We've got the ground opposition pretty thoroughly in hand. But there were six helicopters parked about a mile beyond the camp. One of them was an armed fire-support ship. It got our armored cars and mortar truck before we could get it. We're going to try getting a machine gun in range under cover of smoke.»

«Acknowledged, Argus One. Execute. Nimrod out.»

As Blade turned from the radio one of the cyclists ran out of the smoke. He was coughing and holding out a Russland helmet in one hand. He stopped and saluted. «Sir, I thought you ought to see this.»

Blade took the helmet. It was a standard Russland issue steel helmet, but freshly painted, varnished, waxed, and bearing the badge of the Fifth Guards Rifle Regiment. The Fifth Guards, Blade knew, was an elite Security unit. Its duties included providing troops for ceremonial occasions and bodyguards for traveling VIPs. From the amount of noise that was coming out of the radio station, it seemed the Fifth Guards also knew how to fight.

Blade was just about to call for reinforcements to help with the radio station when Argus One came back on the air.

«Nimrod, the other five helicopters have started their engines. They've also deployed a mortar platoon. Request permission to cancel moving the machine gun against the position without heavy-weapons support.»

Blade decided to give it. There was no point in pushing a company across open ground into the teeth of mortar fire simply to pick off a few more helicopters. «Argus One, this is Nimrod. Permission-«

Blade was interrupted by a growing whistle from high above. Then the ground shivered as a salvo of mortar shells burst fifty yards from the radio station. In seconds, white smoke swallowed half an acre of ground.

«Argus One to Nimrod. The mortars have opened fire. We-«

«This is Nimrod. We know. I think we're the target.» Another salvo, closer to the radio station, and more white smoke blotting out more of the landscape. «They appear to be laying down a smoke barrage around the radio station. Give me a mark when the helicopters take off, and also a direction.»

«They're taking off now, leaving the mortars behind.» A moment's silence. Then: «Nimrod, they seem to be headed your way, minimum altitude, slow speed.»

«Thank you, Areas One.»

As surely as if he'd overheard the enemy's orders, Blade knew what was happening here. Somewhere on the other side of the radio station was a Red Flame VIP and his bodyguards from Security's crack regiment. Over near Company A were the helicopters that had brought the man in. Now they were coming to try to bring him out, under cover of the smoke screen laid down by the mortars.

The Russlanders in the radio station would report all the enemy movements they could see. But the smoke that would screen the helicopters could also screen the armored cars. If he was willing to gamble-

Why not? One of the objectives of the raid was prisoners, and a Red Flame general would be a nice addition to the bag. Admittedly, this wasn't the sort of job a colonel should try to handle. He should delegate it to the man on the spot.

In this case, though, Colonel Richard Blade was the man on the spot.

He had no radio contact with the cyclists fighting inside the building. He could only hope they would keep their heads down, and that the Russlanders wouldn't use high-explosive mortar rounds so close to their own generals.

Quickly he briefed the armored car crews on his plan, then looked at his watch. The helicopters had about three miles to cover. That meant not more than five minutes' total traveling, and two minutes were already gone.

Blade climbed into the turret of the first car, watching the second hand clip away the seconds, listening to the endless thud of the smoke shells bursting on the far side of the radio station. He waited until he heard in the interval between two salvos the sound of the approaching helicopters. He raised his rifle in one hand and gave the signal.

Both drivers gunned their engines and the armored cars leaped forward. If Blade hadn't clamped one hand on the rim of the turret hatch, the sudden start would have thrown him clear. He crouched in the hatch as the cars roared around the building, squarely into what he hoped would be the path of the incoming helicopters. If there were five of them, they might outgun the cars. But the car, could take a great deal more punishment.

The first helicopter swept out of the murk so low that one landing skid nearly took off Blade's head. The gunner in the second car held his fire just long enough for the helicopter to pass over Blade, then fired. One burst did the job. At thirty yards the bullets must have gone right through the helicopter. The crash of its landing was lost in the roar of its exploding fuel. Blade ducked, knowing that a disintegrating rotor could lash about with enough force to slice a man in half.

His own car opened up on the second helicopter and he heard its engines die. But the third passed behind the second. As it came clear, its door gunner killed the second armored car's gunner with a well-placed burst. Then it landed, its rotors just clearing the shadowy wall of the radio station. Blade saw a door open in that wall and several running figures burst out. One of them wore a general officer's greatcoat and peaked hat and towered head and shoulders above the others. He must have been at least six feet eight.

The gunner of Blade's car opened up again at the helicopter. Blade saw the glass in the cockpit window shatter and the door gunner knocked backward into the cabin. He raised his rifle and sighted in on the running figures. He aimed low, wishing he had the marvelously precise Enfield 7. He wanted to disable, not kill. To have a prize like this snatched away by one misdirected bullet-

The running men went down, all of them still moving, still alive. Blade was changing magazines when he saw movement in the door of the helicopter. A dark egg shape flew out and rolled on the ground. Blade shot the man in the door, but the grenade had already rolled within reach of the tall general. He gripped it firmly, twisted the pin free, then heaved himself over to rest squarely on top of it. The explosion sounded just as the helicopter's fuel tanks gushed flame.