The wind tasted of salt and diesel when the C-130’s ramp dropped at 28 000 feet.
Jax didn’t wait for the green light.
The moment the red bulb switched to green he was already moving—shoulders low, arms crossed over the reserve chute, eyes fixed on the black rectangle of night beyond the ramp. Behind him the loadmaster yelled something about wind-shear warnings. Jax didn’t hear the rest. The roar of four Allison turboprops ate every other sound.
