Lieutenant Mitchell's finger hovered less than a centimeter above the launch button, cold sweat sliding down his temples.
The red warning box on the screen flashed frantically, piercing alarms filled the control room.
"Locked! Locked! Locked!"
"Evade! Evade immediately!"
He shouted frantically, but the order came too late.
The SAM-6 missile tore through the air with its deadly tail flame, rushing towards the "Grim Reaper" in the sky at a speed of 2.8 Mach.
"Release countermeasures!"
Mitchell roared as he slammed the electronic countermeasure button.
On the screen, the MQ-9 "Grim Reaper" drone quickly dispensed a stream of magnesium flare decoy rounds, exploding dozens of brilliant sparks in the night sky.
But it was all too late.
To achieve a better attack effect, the drone had already dropped to a mid-low altitude of 3000 meters, the distance between the two sides was too close.
The radar guidance head of the SAM-6 remained unfazed—it had already locked onto the target's thermal signal characteristics.
The most fatal issue was that the drone was flying towards the direction from which the missile was launched—Song Heping had already estimated the general trajectory of the drone during the attack, deploying the air defense positions on the route it must take, truly a waiting game.
Now the rabbit has come, and escape is simply impossible.
Boom—
The first missile exploded less than twenty meters away from "Vendetta One."
Preformed fragments formed a thirty-meter death net, instantly shredding the drone's right wing into pieces.
The fuselage fiercely flipped and plunged towards the desert; the last footage from the camera showed the rapidly spinning stars and ground.
"One hit! One hit!" Technician Thom's voice changed, "Signal connection lost!"
Mitchell's fingers danced over the keyboard, trying to control the remaining "Vendetta Two" to ascend and retreat.
But the second SAM-6 had already launched from the same site.
This time, the missile fragment directly hit the fuselage center, blowing the $30 million MQ-9 into a fireball.
The control room fell into dead silence.
Eight screens simultaneously flashed with the red words "Signal lost."
Mitchell slowly took off his headset, his shirt back drenched.
Fifteen minutes ago, they were discussing where to grab a drink after completing the mission.
"Contact Langley."
His voice was as dry as desert wind: "Tell them... we completely messed up, the other side was well-prepared..."
On the sand of Atlon Oasis, Song Heping put down the binoculars, a cold smile playing at the corner of his mouth.
He turned to look at Jiang Feng beside him, who was holding a military tablet receiving data uploaded from various air defense observation points.
"Two MQ-9s, confirmed downed." Jiang Feng's voice carried a restrained excitement, "Radar shows that the reconnaissance UAV has turned to escape, should we also shoot it down?"
"Let it run, that sucker is too high, hard to hit, don't waste the missile."
Song Heping nodded with a laugh, pulling out the satellite phone from his tactical vest.
He pressed the preset number, that was the Northern Sudan Government's Ministry of Defense phone number.
The call was connected almost instantly.
"This is Song Heping." He said fluently in Arabic, "Tell your Defense Minister, the game has started."
Hanging up the phone, Song Heping raised his middle finger to the sky.
He knew that although the reconnaissance UAV at high altitude was retreating, it was definitely still filming the ground situation, including assessing the aftermath of the two attack "Grim Reaper" UAVs crashing, to be sent back to the headquarters for damage assessment.
After the call, Song Heping picked up the walkie-talkie, starting to call his missile commander.
"Alz, you guys need to stay on position a bit longer, the combat alert can't be lifted temporarily, I'll have someone send over food and water, so eat well."
"Received, Boss!"
Alz's voice sounded utterly ecstatic.
He probably hit a major U.S. military drone for the first time in his life.
Just this time, enough for him to brag for a lifetime.
"Boss, I did well, didn't I?"
The guy took the chance to claim credit.
Song Heping quickly gave him huge satisfaction: "Good, well done, Alz, your personal reward is $300,000, my personal additional reward. Work hard, in the future I'll expand for you to a battalion, even a regiment, make you the regiment commander."
"Thank you, Boss! Thank you, Boss!"
Alz almost got too excited to speak.
Since retiring, his financial situation had been dire.