on the western side of the elevator platform, while its semi
destroyed sister chopper, Nighthawk Two, and its cockroach
stood on the northern side of the platform, over by the personnel
elevator.
On the eastern side of the AWACS plane, however,
stood something entirely new: a team of ten 7th Squadron
commandos--Bravo Unit--positioned in between the elevator
platform and the internal building, standing inside a
semicircular barricade of wooden crates and Samsonite containers.
On a chair in the center of the barricade sat a familiar
Matthew Reilly
stainless-steel briefcase, folded open, revealing a series of
red and green lights, a keypad, and a flat-glass analyzer
plate.
The Football.
Captain Bruno "Boa" McConnell--the gray-eyed
leader of Bravo Unit--gazed at the crumpled AWACS plane
suspiciously.
The broken plane just sat there in the center of the enormous
hangar--silent, unmoving--a great big pile of junk.
More silence.
"HOW'S IT GOING DOWN THERE, MOTHER?" SCHOFIELD'S VOICE
whispered in Mother's earpiece, borrowed from one of the
dead Secret Service agents.
Down on Level 1, Mother surveyed the damaged electricity
junction box in front of her. Fully half the switchboard
had been destroyed by the missile impact. The other
half was a mixed bag--some parts were intact, others were
just mounds of melted wires. At the moment, Herbie
Franklin was tapping the keys on a computer terminal that
had survived the impact.
"Just a second," she said into her wrist microphone.
"Yo, Poindexter. What's the story?"
Franklin frowned. "It doesn't make sense. Somebody's
been here already, about twenty minutes ago at eight
o'clock. They cut the main power. The whole base is running
on auxiliary power ..."
"Can you cut the cameras?" Mother asked.
"Don't have to. They were shut down when the main
power was disabled." Herbie turned to face Mother.
"They're already off."
UP IN THE MAIN HANGAR, THE REGULAR ELEVATOR'S DOORS
opened.
Out of the lift stepped Kurt Logan and the three other
survivors from Alpha Unit. They met up with Boa McConnell
and the men of Bravo Unit.
area 7 177
"What's happening?" Logan asked.
"Nothing ..." Boa replied. "Yet."
"--control, this is charlie leader" python willis's
voice said over the control room's speakers. "There's no one
down here on Level 4."
"--Copy, Charlie Leader. Bring your team up to the
main hangar in the personnel lift. Echo, stay down there.
Caesar wants you roving around the lower levels. We've lost
all camera visuals and we need some eyes down there--"
on level 1, mother keyed her wrist mike. "scarecrow,
this is Mother. Cameras are down. Repeat: Cameras are down. We're heading for the aircraft elevator shaft." "Thanks, Mother."
"all right, we're in business," schofield said, turning
to the President, Book II and Juliet. They were in a dark
place.
He looked at his watch:
8:25:59.
8:26:00.
This was going to be close.
"Fox, Elvis, Love Machine, get ready. On my mark. In
three ..."
THE MAIN HANGAR WAS SILENT.
"Two ..."
Marine One stood about thirty feet away from the
wreck of the AWACS plane, shining in the harsh artificial
light.
"One ..."
The men of Bravo Unit eyed the shattered AWACS bird
cautiously, guns up, trigger fingers tensed.
"... mark."
Schofield pressed a button on a small handheld unit--it
was the remote detonation switch for one of the RDX-based
Matthew Reilly
grenades that he had found on the 7th Squadron men in the
decompression room. Pound for pound, aluminized RDX is
about six times more powerful than C4--it blows big and it
blows wide, a superblasting charge.
As soon as he hit the button, the RDX charge that he
had left in the cockpit of the AWACS plane exploded--blasting outwards, showering the hangar with a star-shaped
rain of glass and shrapnel.
AND THEN EVERYTHING HAPPENED AT ONCE.
the men of bravo unit dived away from the explosion.
Sizzling-hot pieces of the plane's cockpit shot low over
their heads, lodging in the barricade all around them like
darts smacking into a corkboard.
As they clambered back to their feet, they saw movement,
saw three shadows climb out from the air vent underneath
Marine One.
"There!" Boa pointed.
One of the shadows ran out from beneath the President's
helicopter, while the other two slithered up through a
hatch in its underbelly.
A moment later, Marine One's engines roared to life.
Its tail boom folded into place from its stowed position,
as did its rotor blades. No sooner were the rotor blades extended
than they began to rotate, despite the fact that the
President's helicopter was still attached to its towing vehicle.
Gunfire erupted as the lone Marine who had dashed out
from underneath the chopper—Love Machine—disengaged
the cockroach attached to its tail and climbed inside the towing
vehicle's tiny driver's cabin.
"What the fuck ... ?" Kurt Logan said as the cockroach
skidded out from behind Marine One and swung around the
elevator platform, heading directly for the 7th Squadron
men guarding the Football.
"Open fire," Logan said to Boa and his men. "Open fire
now."
They did.
A barrage of P-90 fire assaulted the speeding towing vehicle's
windscreen, shattering it.
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Matthew Reilly
Inside the driver's cabin, Love Machine ducked below
the dashboard. Bullets tore into the seatback behind him,
sending the fluffy innards of the seat showering everywhere.
The cockroach careered across the hangar, bouncing
wildly, taking fire.
Then suddenly, behind it, Marine One rose into the
air--inside the hangar--the deafening thump-thump-thump of its rotor blades reverberating off the walls, drowning out
all other sound.
Inside its cockpit, Gant worked the controls while Elvis
hit switches everywhere.
"Elvis! Give me missiles!" she shouted. "And whatever
you do, don't hit the Football, okay!"
Elvis slammed his finger down on a launch button.
Shoom!
A Hellfire missile shot out from a pod mounted on the
side of the Presidential helicopter, a finger of smoke extending
through the air behind it, the missile shooting at tremendous
speed toward the internal building on the eastern side
of the hangar.
The missile hit the exact center of the building--right
above the Bravo troops guarding the Football--and detonated.
The middle section of the internal building blasted outwards
in a shower of glass and plasterboard. A section of the
gla
ssed-in upper level collapsed to the ground behind the
Bravo men guarding the Football.
The 7th Squadron commandos leapt clear of the falling
debris--only to have to roll again a split second later to
avoid a second source of danger: the oncoming cockroach
driven by Love Machine.
It was chaos.
Mayhem.
Pandemonium.
Exactly as Schofield had planned.
SCHOFIELD WATCHED THE CONFUSION FROM HIS POSITION inside
the destroyed AWACS plane. His watch read:
area 7 175
8:27:50.
8:27:51.
Two minutes left.
"Okay, Book, let's go." He turned to Juliet and the President.
"You two stay here until we've checked the status of
the Football. If we can get it, we'll bring it back to you. If
not, you'll have to come out."
And with that Schofield and Book II leapt down from
the gaping hole at the rear of the AWACS plane and ran out
into the open.
AT EXACTLY THE SAME MOMENT, A SIX-BARRELED VULCAN
minigun popped out from a compartment underneath the
nose of Marine One and began spewing out a devastating
stream of supermachine-gun fire.
The 7th Squadron men--already scattered everywhere
--were dispersed even more. Some dived behind
their barricade for cover, others found shelter among the ruins
of the AWACS plane and fired up at the President's helicopter.
Gant sat at the controls of Marine One as her enemy's
bullets left scratches on the Lexan windshield. And the
armor-plated walls of the big Sikorsky were built to withstand
missile impacts, so gunfire wasn't a problem.
Beside her, Elvis was yelling, "Yee-ha!" as he rained
hell on the 7th Squadron men with the minigun.
SCHOFIELD AND BOOK II RAN EASTWARD, SIDESTEPPING
quickly toward the 7th Squadron men guarding the Football.
They moved in tandem, guns up, firing--bizarrely--at
Love Machine's runaway cockroach and up at Marine One.
The fact that they were firing at their own people was
probably best explained by the fact that they were dressed in
the black fatigues, black body armor and half-face gas
masks of the 7th Squadron--slightly damaged uniforms
they had pilfered from the dead Air Force commandos in the
decompression area down on Level 4.
Schofield and Book danced sideways, edging toward
176
Matthew Reilly
the barricade in front of the Football, firing hard at their own
men--but missing woefully.
They reached the barricade, and Schofield immediately
saw the Football on the chair.
Then he saw the tether.
"Damn it!"
The presidential briefcase was anchored to a tie-down
stud on the floor by a thick metal cord. It looked like titanium
thread.
Watch.
8:28:59.
8:29:00.
"Shit," Schofield keyed his wrist mike. "Janson! The
Football's tethered to the floor. We can't move it. You're going
to have to bring the President out into the open."
"Okay," came the reply.
"Fox! Love Machine! I need another thirty seconds of
mayhem! Then you know what to do."
Fox's voice: "Whatever you say, Scarecrow!"
Love Machine: "Roger that, Boss!"
And then Schofield saw Janson and the President leap
out from the rear section of the AWACS plane--also dressed
in full 7th Squadron attire and brandishing pistols, which
they fired determinedly at Love Machine's cockroach.
Janson fired her SIG-Sauer with a firm two-handed
grip. The President wasn't as fluid, but he did all right for a
guy who'd never served in the military.
Marine One banked in a wide circle around the enormous
hangar, drawing fire, the roar of its speed-blurred rotor
blades thunderous in the enclosed space.
Love Machine's towing vehicle swung past the barricade
protecting the Football, then veered left, heading north, smashing through some broken pieces of the AWACS plane
and then disappearing behind it.
FROM THE FIRST-FLOOR CONTROL ROOM OF THE INTERNAL
building, Caesar Russell watched the chaos unfolding below
him.
area 7
He saw the Presidential helicopter performing death
defying passes inside the enclosed hangar. He saw the
speeding cockroach blasting through the remains of the
AWACS plane on the elevator platform.
And he saw his own men--scattered and dispersed--
firing wildly at both of these two crazy threats, as if they
had been prepared for any ordered attack but not a totally
insane one.
"Goddamn it!" he roared. "Where is Charlie?"
"Still coming up in the personnel elevator, sir."
And then, in an instant of total clarity, as he watched his
men down on the hangar floor, Caesar saw him, and his jaw
dropped.
"No ..."
Caesar watched in stunned amazement as one of his
own men raced over to the Football--which, of course, was
still surrounded by a few men from Bravo Unit, all of them
facing outwards--pulled off one of his black leather gloves,
and under the watchful eye of three other black-clad impostors,
the steel briefcase.
SCHOFIELD'S WATCH TICKED EVER FORWARD.
8:29:31.
8:29:32.
Amid the roar of the rampaging helicopter and the cacophony
of gunfire all around him, and guarded by
Schofield, Book II and Juliet Janson, the President stepped
up to the Football.
He yanked off his glove, took a final look around himself,
and then, as he strode past the Football, he inconspicuously
placed his hand on the palm-print analyzer, just as the
countdown timer on its display hit 0:24.
The briefcase beeped and the timer instantly ticked over
from 0:24 to 90:00 and started counting down again.
When Schofield saw that the deed was done, he and
Book II fell into step alongside Juliet and the President.
"Remember, guns up and firing," he said. He held his
Matthew Reilly
wrist mike to his lips, "Fox, Elvis, Love Machine: get out of
here. We'll meet you downstairs. Mother, the platform. Now"
mother stood inside the enormous hangar doorway
down on Level 1, looking up into the elevator shaft.
Two hundred feet above her, she could see the underside
of the massive aircraft platform, beyond which she
could hear the sounds of the battle.
She hit the call button, and immediately the giant elevator
platform high above her jolted sharply and slowly began
to descend.
UP IN THE MAIN HANGAR, THE SHATTERED REMAINS OF THE
AWACS plane--and the platform on which they stood-- began to disappear into the floor.
The elevator was going down.
Schofield, Book II, Juliet and the President charged toward
it, firing up at Marine One as they did so--acting like
good 7th Squadron soldiers.
IN THE CONTROL ROOM OVERLOOKING THE HANGAR,
CAESAR
grabbed a microphone.
"Boa! Logan! The President is there! He walked right in
among you and hit the analyzer and now he's heading for the
elevator platform. For Christ's sake, he's wearing one of our
own goddamn uniforms!"
IN THE MAIN HANGAR, KURT LOGAN SPUN AROUND WHERE HE
stood, and he saw them--saw four 7th Squadron people
leaping down onto the slowly descending elevator platform,
now completely ignoring Marine One and the runaway
cockroach.
"The platform!" he yelled. "Bravo Unit! Converge on
the platform! Alpha, take out the helicopter and kill that
fucking cockroach!"
marine one was already swooping toward the ground
again--her diversionary mission accomplished.
area 7 179
Gant landed the big chopper right where she had found
it--over the air vent in the floor on the western side of the elevator shaft--and with Elvis's help, she maneuvered the big
bird around so that her floor hatch stopped directly above the
ventilation shaft.
Once the helicopter was stopped, she leapt out of the
pilot's seat and headed for the floor hatch, while Elvis
dashed for the rear left-hand door and threw it open for
Love Machine.
love machine was in a world of pain.
His Volvo towing vehicle wasn't as bulletproof as Marine
One and he was taking all kinds of shit from the 7th
Squadron men.
Tires squealed, bullets impacted, glass shattered.
And now he had to get over to Marine One.
His biggest problem, however, was that he had just
swung his cockroach around for another pass at the 7th
Squadron men on the eastern side of the platform when
Schofield's call had come in.
He was now on the other side of the shaft from Marine
One, heading northward, and the elevator platform--now
sinking slowly into the shaft--was no longer there to drive
on.
He'd have to go around.
More bullets hit his cockroach as three 7th Squadron
commandos appeared right in front of him and assailed his
vehicle with a harrowing wave of gunfire.
Bullets riddled the driver's compartment.
Two slugs slammed into Love Machine's left shoulder,
spraying blood.