“Good, drop it.”
Once again, the wind rose as the descent resumed. What was happening was that a disk somewhere overhead was drawing the TR upward. But every time its weight was changed, they had to adjust their tractor beam.
He threw open the access hatch. A patchwork of farmland spread below. “Where am I?”
“Maryland. That’s Maryland.”
“Get it on the ground.”
“I can’t put this down in some field!”
“Do it; we’ll send a protective unit.”
“Descent slowing.”
“Drop lift! Get me down, goddamnit!”
“I’m trying. I’m going to reverse the motor—hold on!”
Overhead, the wire-covered cylinder shrieked, then spread a pink glow through the confined space. The ground began getting closer, then rushing up.
He would not survive this. “Slow it down!”
“I’m trying! It’s not designed for this.”
A stink of hot wiring spread through the fuselage. “We have a fire onboard,” he said.
“I know it.”
“There’s flames appearing around the motor. Get me on the ground!”
“Descent arrested.”
“Blow the helium.”
“It’ll crash—you’ll be killed!”
“Blow it!”
There was a screaming hiss and the ground rushed up.
Blackness. So peaceful. He was floating, a man in a pool of dark water.
“Sir?”
He knew he needed to wake up.
“Sir!”
Fire was dancing along a dangerous road.
“Sir!”
What was he seeing? Hearing?
“Sir, it’s moving; you need to jump!”
He saw a silver object slide into view. At first he was confused, then he understood that it was a roof—and not only that, but in another two seconds it would be too far down to jump to with any hope of survival.
He rolled out of the access hatch and felt himself dropping like a stone. Wind shrieked, then he hit the roof, which sagged, breaking his fall. Overhead, there was a bright white flash, then a rain of burned plastic ash began sliding down around him like gray snow.
She’d run a destruct program. Hadn’t mentioned its existence, of course. Need to know. He moved to slide off the roof—which proceeded to give way. The next thing he knew, he was covered from head to foot in frantic chickens.
“What in hell, holy Christ, stop the line, stop the line!”
As he struggled to get out from under the clucking, scratching, flapping mass, he could hear machinery grinding down.
“Get outta there!” he heard a voice scream.
He saw why—just ahead was the black maw of an automated chicken slaughterer. He could hear its knives slashing, could smell the reek of chicken blood and hear the frenetic clucking as the massive, breast-heavy hens were drawn into its works.
It was slowing down, but the process was far from immediate. It became quickly clear that if he didn’t get out of this thing, he was going to end up in a grocery store. The sides were high enough that the chickens couldn’t flutter out, but not so high that he couldn’t jump to his feet, balance himself on the uneasy rubber conveyor belt, and leap to the floor.
“Where in holy hell did you come from?”
Flynn thought fast. How could he explain himself in a way that would sound reasonable? “Skydiver,” he said. “Sorry.”
“Skydiver,” the operator said scornfully. “You must be some kind of an idiot skydiving in country like this.”
“Winds aloft. Not predicted. Blown off course. We were diving in Virginia.”
“Yeah, yeah, whatever. Look, I gotta get the boys in here, get this operation running again.”
“Could you call me a cab?”
“Call yourself a cab; there’s a pay phone over by the dorm.” He gestured toward a narrow door at the far end of the huge room. As Flynn walked, he inventoried himself. Nothing broken, no question there. He hadn’t taken much of a hit, so no internal injuries. His pistols were still on his person. So he was intact, if you didn’t mind a few feathers. Or rather, quite a few.
He brushed himself off as best he could and called the number of a taxi company scribbled onto a rain-weathered yellow pad that was hanging beside the ancient phone. There came an uneasy moment as he dug in his pocket, but he had just enough change, a dollar fifteen.
Behind him, the plant started up again, filling the air with its huge roar. He wondered what Aeon thought of what had just happened. They were in hot pursuit, and nothing seemed to throw them off. Would this have done it?
“Red Ranger.”
“I need a cab.”
“Where to?”
“Langley.”
“Got it. You’re where?”
“Big poultry plant. I just dropped in, I’m not sure of the address.”
“No problem,” the dispatcher said. “That’ll be Peerless Chickens. Only poultry factory around here. We’ll be out front in five.”
The plant manager came running up. “Wait a second, here, I want some ID. I got a hell of a mess in there. Somebody’s gotta pay.”
“Of course.” He gave him the Grauerholtz ID. It was tight, and he still had some of the credit cards in his wallet. And why not? From the moment they had gotten word of the Doxy murder to now, just six days had passed. He’d been in the White House for an overnight, then in Iran for two days, then traveling for a day, in the White House another night, and then last night this part of the program had commenced.
As he walked out through the office structure, the manager followed him. “You understand it’s gonna be ten, twenty grand to pay for the damage you did.”
“I’m sure.”
“You don’t seem to care.”
“I don’t.”
“You must be pretty damn rich.”
Flynn stopped. “I am. But I also have excellent accountants and lawyers. Overcharge me one red cent and I’ll be down on you bastards like bird flu.”
“Hey, I saved your life!”
“You did, and I thank you for it.”
The cab was at the end of the walkway, sitting beside the enormous, weathered PEERLESS CHICKENS sign. Flynn walked up and got in.
“Wait!”
“No.”
“Where’s your chute? ’Cause if it’s on the roof I don’t want it blowin’ in; it’s gonna cause a major megillah, it gets sucked in.”
“I left my chute in the plane.”
The plant manager gaped.
Flynn closed the window and leaned forward. “CIA headquarters.” As they pulled away, he watched the manager staring after him. Grauerholtz would get a nice, fat bill from the guy, probably double- or triple-padded. Fine. He had indeed saved Flynn’s life. And what a way it would have been to go, the alien hunter himself, sliced into nuggets in a chicken factory.
CHAPTER TWENTY
DETAIL 242’S bullpen was humming with activity, but what they were all doing was a mystery to Flynn as he headed for Diana’s office. By the time he reached her door, total silence had descended.
He went through into her outer office, then into the inner sanctum, where she was sitting with her father, Senator Glass; CIA director Boxleitner, and a thin, very pale man with powder-gray hair and, on his narrow lips, the gentlest of smiles. Flynn didn’t know this man.
“Flynn!” Diana said. “At last.”
The newcomer came to his feet. He extended his hand. “Flynn Carroll. I’m deeply grateful for all you do.”
“Yeah, well, who are you, a tourist?” He turned to Diana, eyebrows raised. “Who is this?”
“We’ve been back to the White House. Their attitude has been revised.”
“I need a bath,” he said. “I’m covered in chicken shit.” He strode into her private suite and started pulling off his clothes. She came in behind him. “That man is our supervisor. He and Boxy and my dad got with the president.”
Ori
ginally, the detail had been attached to the FBI as a specialized policing unit. Last year, very quietly and without Flynn’s being told a thing, that had changed. The fact that he wasn’t need to know on the meaning of the change had been a constant irritant.
“So we’re in the CIA chain of command now?”
“Not exactly. We rent this space from them.”
“Then who does our supervisor report to?”
“He and I direct the operation.”
“May I know his name?”
“You know that would compromise security. Flynn, may I ask why you smell like that? And the feathers?”
“Because Aeon caught up with that drone and I ended up in a chicken coop.” He peeled off his undershirt. “They’re running after me, all out. They’re doing this because this thing is going down fast, and I’m an irritant.”
He showered quickly, threw on some jeans and a pullover that he kept here, and returned to the outer office.
“Sorry about that,” he said. He looked from face to face. “We’re out of time, folks.”
“We still haven’t put it together completely,” the nameless supervisor said in his quiet voice.
Flynn dropped into a chair. “Can you give me a name? What do I call you?”
He smiled. “What about I take over the Grauerholtz identity? It’s about blown anyway. Call me Stephan.”
“That ID is mine, and what if I need it? I’ll name you if you won’t.”
“It’s George. Now, you tell us what you’ve discovered. Brief us.”
“OK, here it is. The missiles we tested did not contain hydrogen bombs. What they have done to those weapons I don’t know, but they are not going to destroy infrastructure, they’re going to destroy population.”
“Like a neutron bomb?”
“So it would appear.”
“How could they do that to hydrogen weapons?”
“Fascinating question. But whatever it is, they’re doing it now. This is what all the flyovers of missile bases have been about. And when they’re finished converting them all—at that second—they are going to trigger a nuclear paroxysm. Every converted warhead will be launched toward its target.”
George leaned forward. “The result?”
“Obviously a huge number of people killed outright. Followed by social breakdown, infrastructure collapse, more dead. My guess is that they’ve got it figured out to the man. Once we’re gone, they’re going to show up in droves, turn the lights back on, and settle in.”
“There will be people left,” the senator said.
“A hundred million? Two hundred? They’ll be hunted down. Aeon is very good at that, you have my word.”
Diana jumped up and tore out of the room. Standing in the doorway to the bullpen, she said, “I want eyes worldwide on every known missile silo or launcher of any kind outside of the ones we’ve already looked at. Give me India, Pakistan, Iran, China, Israel—I want it all. I want a report on my screen detailing all bogey activity picked up around those sites for the past week, and I want it at once.”
She came back and dashed through to her suite. A moment later, he heard gagging. She was tossing her cookies.
“I didn’t understand the scope,” she said hoarsely as she came out. “I thought—”
“Look at the world stock of nuclear warheads as a single gigantic neutron bomb. The only question left is, what’s the fuse? And I think we have our answer. Bill Greene is the fuse.”
Senator Glass said, “How do we fix this?”
“I hate to say it,” George said, “but we need to neutralize Bill.”
“That was my initial thought,” Flynn replied. “But think about it. Aeon will go to Plan B and we’ll once again be in the dark about what’s happening. As things stand now, we know their plan. They’re going to cause Bill to launch Minuteman, probably our undersea nuclear force as well. This will result in an all-out Russian response. They’ll hit Britain, too, so the British will launch. I assume the rest of the nuclear powers will get pulled in, too.”
A map came up on Diana’s monitor, covering the east from Pakistan to China, with all of its 480 known missile sites showing as pulsating red dots. There were white dots near three quarters of them.
“That’s a live feed?”
“Those white dots are reported unidentified objects. This means that they’re finishing up the last few warheads. When those bogeys pull out, they’re going to make their move.”
“We need to figure out what to do about Bill,” Boxleitner said.
“I think they’re pulling out right now,” Flynn replied. “Fewer every minute.”
“Oh, Christ.”
George stood up. “I’m too old for this.” He looked toward Flynn. “I trust you’ll get it sorted out.”
With that, he left. “That man has confidence in you, Flynn,” Senator Glass said.
“I hope he’s not a damn fool,” Flynn replied.
Diana said, “We need to move.”
“I have another challenge for you, love. Getting me to the White House alive. That’s what we need to concentrate on right now.”
She reached toward him, touched his hand. “‘Love,’” she said, “don’t say that to me unless you mean it.”
In that instant, he realized that Abby was now, finally and absolutely, part of the past. Diana, all five foot nine of her, the dark hair, the bright, hopeful eyes, the loveliness of her and the sense of loss that clung to her—she was here, now. She was real.
He said again, “Love.”
For a moment, she was silent, but only for a moment. “We’ve got to do this now.” She strode out into the bullpen, Flynn behind her.
Boxleitner and Glass followed. “What’s going on?”
Flynn turned to them. “We’re heading for the White House. We need to make certain that Greene is unable to do anything rash.”
“By what means?”
“By whatever means, Senator. Of course, we want to avoid assassination. That’s a last resort, but it’s going to stay on the table.”
Boxleitner said, “I don’t see why you’d be safe going to Washington. Or anywhere.”
“We can’t do this on the phone, obviously.”
“No.” But the DCIA was right. How would they get to the White House alive? But then he thought, how had he gotten here safely, and why hadn’t they just blown hell out of the place and been done with him?
At some point, after the destruction of the TR, they had changed their approach. They had backed off hunting him down—but why?
When it hit him—when he truly understood—his guts gave an enormous, sickening heave. He said, “Car’s fine; we’ll make it. Let’s go.”
“Car? Are you nuts?”
“We’ll make it.”
“Flynn!”
He was halfway down the hall before he heard her running behind him. “Oh, God, Flynn, please let’s do the bus-and-train thing. We can take the Cheverly Line, I know how to do it, we’ll be at the White House before six.”
“We’ll take my car. You’ll need the Highway Patrol to clear us in.”
“What? What are you saying? Your car’s gonna be loaded with tracking. Talk about a death trap.”
“They want us in Washington.”
“Why?”
“So they can be certain we’re spinning our wheels while they do this thing.”
“I’m lost.”
“Trust me.”
They went along empty corridors to the underground garage where specialized vehicles and those requiring high security were kept.
When they arrived at the guard post, it became necessary to check the car out. They weren’t on the guard’s list, so he was very careful and very slow. Flynn was tempted to just hit the gas and breach the barrier, but he didn’t need the hassle.
“Get us rolling,” he said to Diana.
She got out, leaned into the guardhouse, then returned to the car.
The barrier went up.
“What did you do?” r />
“Scared him to death.”
As they pulled out toward the parkway, she got on the phone and ordered up a Highway Patrol escort.
This had to look to Aeon’s agents exactly as they expected it to look or they’d kill Flynn in an instant. They were conservative; they would always err on the side of safety. They possessed spectacular predictive algorithms, though, and had probably gamed his every move, right down to the moment he would fail.
She twisted in her seat, tried to look up, then opened the moon roof.
“No.”
“We need to watch for disks!”
“They’re going to let us through.”
“You keep saying that, but why?”
“They’ve misled themselves.”
A trooper car pulled past them and switched on its light bar and siren. The traffic ahead melted as they accelerated through a hundred miles an hour. As they headed into the city, Diana worked the phone.
They were pulling up to the private gate when she said, “It’s a no.”
“Shit.”
“Lorna.”
“Give me the phone.”
“Flynn, Lorna’s not gonna even talk to you.” She handed him her iPhone. There was no reason to use a secure instrument, not when the other end was substandard, and Lorna wasn’t going to be making any effort to secure the call.
He called Cissy. “Where are you?”
“Flynn, where are you? We need you!”
“At the gate. Lorna won’t let us in.”
“She’s a fool! Boxy and that weird guy were here with Senator Glass. Daddy’s not doubting you now.”
“Can you get us in?”
“I don’t know, I can try.”
He returned the phone to Diana.
“What did she say?”
“She’s gonna try.”
“So we wait.”
“Yep.”
“What do we do if we get in? What do we say?”
“Tell Lorna that she needs to believe Boxleitner and your dad.”
“Why doesn’t she already? That’s what’s so strange.”
Diana’s cell phone vibrated. “Yes?” She listened. “OK, got it.” She said to Flynn, “Cissy’s waiting for us at the West Wing Entrance. The marine on guard at the moment is a friend of hers.”
The gate began to open. Whatever Cissy had done, it had obviously involved getting the perimeter guard to stand down as they drove in. He swung around to the West Wing Entrance. Cissy was there, standing with the marine guard, sharing a smoke.