Beaman hated jumping into a cloud cover. There was no way to tell how thick it was. He might break through into good visibility and have plenty of time to orient himself if the computer should happen to pick that particular time to go on the fritz. On the other hand, the clouds might reach all the way to the ground. The first time he would know that the computer was wrong would be the millisecond before he experienced how very hard the frozen tundra could be.

Beaman couldn’t see the rest of the team. They were too tiny against the vast expanse of the sky. He knew they were there, spaced out above and behind him, each following the computer to arrive at the same frozen pond over eight miles below and a hundred miles to the east.

There was no sense of speed as he fell. The thick padding of the jump helmet dampened the sound of the wind whistling by. The altitude reeled off on the tiny LCD readout as he followed the jump profile. It read right at fifteen thousand feet when he hurtled into the top of the thick cloud layer.

Instantly, any sense of orientation was gone. His one connection with the real world of gravity and frozen earth was the tiny readout on his left wrist. Everything else was lost in swirling gray mist.

Beaman intently watched the altitude and the countdown timer. Somehow, he knew that it must be time by now to open the chute. It seemed that he had been falling for far too long already.

Damn altimeter had to be busted!

Every sense he possessed screamed at him to reach for the D-ring and yank. His body was telling him the ground was rushing up too quickly. At any second, he would be smashed into an unrecognizable pulp somewhere in the frozen wasteland of northern Russia.

Still, Beaman fought the impulse as he had done so many times before in other HALO jumps. If he opened the chute too soon, he would drift miles from the landing zone, maybe into some camp or village where he would be discovered. At best the mission would be delayed for days or more while the team regrouped. At worst they would be discovered, then killed or captured. With all else that was going on in the world nowadays, SEALs parachuting into Russia would be gasoline on an already very hot fire.

He knew in his gut that he had been falling for too long. Never mind how, he knew it. Beaman realized that his subconscious was taking over, that he should rely on his instruments. He was reaching for the D-ring when the chute opened automatically.

He drifted down the last few hundred feet, using the time to settle his raging emotions. God, he hated jumping into clouds!