Reflexive Fire - 01 (38 page)

   Surrounded by Kazakhs, he moved deeper into the hanger.  Coming face to face with something that his mind struggled to comprehend, his brain skipped a beat, trying to decide what he was seeing.

   “Holy shit.”

   Someone uttered a response, Adam shaking his head, trying to catch up.  Deckard walked passed him, a Kalashnikov cradled in one arm.

   “What did you say?”

   “Aurora.”

   “Aurora?”

   “That's what they call it,” Deckard said, motioning to the black craft.

   Adam was still trying to piece together what he was seeing.  It looked like something literally out of this world.  Roughly triangular shaped, it resembled a black porpoise designed for aerial flight.  The nose of the aircraft, where the cockpit was located, was slightly bulbous, and tiny wings swept out on each side.  It certainly didn't look like anything designed for use by human pilots.

   “What is it?”

   “The result of a thirteen billion dollar no-bid contract,” Deckard answered.  “The Air Force's last manned spy plane.”

   “But--”

   Deckard held up a finger as someone began transmitting over their radio frequency.

   “--objective Hammerhead secure,” a German accented voice said over the net.

   “Kurt took down the control tower,” Deckard said to no one in particular.

   Another hiss of static came over the hand mike.

   “--Objective White is secure.”

   “This is Six,” Deckard responded.  “Where is it?”

   “Bunker Number Two.”

   “Prep it for demolition immediately.  I want an ETA as soon as possible.”

   “Roger.”

   Deckard released the handmic and took a deep breath.

   “They found the trigger virus,” Adam said, voicing their thoughts.

   Samruk's commander nodded, “The catalyst.”

   “And this thing?” the intel specialist said, pointing towards Aurora.

   “Obviously they are planning on a war with whoever is left after their depopulation holocaust is complete.  Looks like we pretty much fucked up that part of their plan already.”

   Deckard craned his neck, looking around.

   “What is it?”

   “They probably have the strategic bombers and attack helicopters in another hanger.”

   “But what is the purpose behind Aurora?” Adam asked.  “I worked in intel and I never even heard of this thing.”

   “You've seen the high resolution pictures it took before.  You were just told they came from spy satellites to help keep the project compartmentalized.  This baby was developed about ten years ago to help fill in the black spots not covered by our satellite network.  Also, as you know, those satellite orbits are monitored and highly predictable.  Training areas get sanitized and sensitive equipment gets stored under over head cover when US spy satellites come in for a look, so they built Aurora as a counter.”

   “I've never seen anything like it.”

   “That's because there isn't anything else like it anywhere.  It actually functions in contrary of several known laws of physics.  Conventional scientists would never believe it exists even if told about it, which has helped keep it secret.  Aurora operates in the mesosphere where there is extremely little oxygen and most anti-missile and anti-aircraft systems are ineffective.  Aurora exploits that defensive gap by utilizing a plasma funnel in front of the intake valves to increase the intake of air.”

   “What?”

   “That's what I said.  This is a spy plane, but theoretically other models could deliver nuclear or other hypervelocity weapons on targets; that or drop out of orbit to put a free fall team over enemy territory.”

   “And you know this how?”

   Something came in garbled over the radio before a voice could be recognized.

   “Objective Thrasher secure.  Two WIA, one KIA, two prisoners.”

   “That's it,” Deckard said before keying his mic.  “All stations on this net; this is six, consolidate all prisoners at hanger seven.”

   Individual platoons began calling in to acknowledge Deckard's orders.

   “So tell me again how you got read on to something like this?” Adam reiterated.

   Deckard paused as the affirmatives coming in over the net slowed down.

   “I wasn't,” he answered.  “I was responsible for recovering the project's chief engineer.”

   “Recovering him from who?”

“The North Koreans who had kidnapped him in Pensacola.”

   Adam stood slack-jawed, shaking his head in bewilderment. 

   “You have no idea who you are fucking with,” the handcuffed enemy mercenary spat, coughing flecks of blood onto his lower lip.  “No idea.”

   Deckard was unimpressed.

   While his men were preparing the next stage of the operation, he oversaw the interrogation of prisoners to gain an edge up on what they would find at their next objective.

   The man kneeling on the tarmac in front of him was American.  He didn't know him by name, but Adam had recognized him from a previous operation during his military days.  The Serbs had been brought in to provide the numbers and muscle.  Former Delta Operators had been brought in to provide leadership and take care of tactical decision making.

   They were aware of the virus.  He had already told Deckard as much.  Along with their families, they had been inoculated against it.  Their families had been moved to several designated safe areas on one of the less populated Hawaiian Islands.

   “You think I'm kidding,” the ex-Army Sergeant said getting overconfident.  “Check out what we got in Bunker Six,” he said with a laugh.

   “Wait one,” Deckard said, kicking him hard in the stomach for good measure.

   The Special Operations traitor buckled over, coughing his guts up on the tarmac as Deckard turned to speak with Adam who was stepping out of an assault truck even before it came to a full stop.

   “This is it,” his intel specialist said, handing a small bottle to Deckard.

   Turning it over in his hand, Deckard frowned.  It was nothing more than commercially available aspirin that could be found at any pharmacy.

   “This?”

   “Yeah, they have thousands of crates of this stuff in bunker two.”

   “This guy says that the 727 on fire over at the far end of the airfield was in the process of fueling up just when we arrived,” Deckard added.  “They planned on taking this stuff out in hours.”

   “I agree.  We didn't have to force our way into the bunker.  It was already open with several forklifts abandoned by the transport crew when Richie found the place.  They were moving this out when we showed up.”

   Deckard's jaw clenched.

   After everything he had seen and experienced, he was still shocked by the disregard these people had.

   “When people started taking this stuff thinking it was regular aspirin, the trigger molecules would combine with the dormant strains hidden in that swine flu last year.”

   “Then it would go airborne.  You remember the documents we recovered from Singapore.”

   “Tens of millions dead.”

   “And that was slated to happen tomorrow.”

   “Escalating to billions in a few weeks.”

   Deckard looked out into the sea.  The atoll itself sat atop a coral reef, the rest of the reef hooking around forming a lagoon.  In the center, several dozen naval ships were anchored, waiting for a war that he was determined to prevent from happening.  In the distance he could see the dark shapes of his men paddling smaller boats out into the lagoon to claim the larger ships.

   Another vehicle pulled up, Kurt Jager stepping out to report in next.

   “Did the tower get a warning out?” Deckard asked.

   “No, survivors told us the tower was empty when we arrived, the crews were not due to show up for another thirty minutes when that 727 over there was scheduled to take off.  Two of the air traffic controllers managed to get into the tower once we hit the ground, but it looks like our snipers took them out before they could transmit anything of value.”

   “Good work.”

   “Although we heard over the radio that they did see that fireball when the fuel blivet went up.”

   “Shit, they're close.” Deckard did the math in his head.  Due to the curvature of the earth they had to be within twenty five miles.  “What did you tell them?”

   “I had one of the survivors get on the radio and tell them we had an industrial accident.  We are not sure we can contain the fire, so we are moving critical personnel and systems to their position.”

   “You think they bought that?”

   “Sounds like it,” the German shrugged.

   “Next I need you to get one of the radar dishes operational and figure out exactly where they are.”

   “Already got men on it.” 

   It was better than any of them could have hoped for.

   “ETA?”

   “We should be ready to move to our follow-on objective in thirty minutes, provided we can get at least one of those ships operational.  We only have a few guys with that type of training.  A few prisoners have also volunteered to help with a little extra persuasion.”

   “Bunker Two will be ready for demo in ten minutes,” Kurt said, looking at his watch.

   “I guess that leaves just one more thing,” Deckard said, yanking his 1911 out of its holster.

   Sticking the toe of his boot under the captured mercenary's chin, Deckard pushed him over onto his back, sending him off on another fit of coughs and gags.

   Kneeling, he pressed the barrel against the side of his head.

   “What is in Bunker Six?”

Thirty One

   A lone ship crashed through the waves.

   White-capped swells slapped against the hull, rocking the ship from side to side on its keel, its nose arching upwards, almost vertical before suddenly dropping down into the cold spray.  In the distance a storm approached.  Lightning flashed through the sky, seen but not heard, not yet.  The crew grimaced, knowing that the rough waters were only a preface.

   Flanked by two Zumwalt class destroyers, a super-cruise-liner sat hulking in the water, its massive size unaffected by the roll of the ocean waves.  The name across the side of the ship read, Crown of the Pacific.

   The smaller ship powered right up to the stern of the super-liner.  It flashed the correct IFF signal, the meeting prearranged.  The Phalanx cannons retrofitted onto the civilian cruise ship remained silent as they scanned the horizons.

   Chad slammed a quarter ton of weights onto the ground.

   The steel plates crashed loudly, the bar flexing in the middle before rebounding back into the air for a moment.

   “Chad Morrison, please report in,” the speaker system repeated a fourth time.

   With one large vein threatening to pop right out of his neck, he snatched up a nearby telephone receiver and spoke into it for a few seconds.  Snarling, he slammed the plastic phone into the wall, breaking it in two.  He was too busy to deal with bed-wetters, no matter how much they paid.

   Throwing a towel over one shoulder, he wiped his face off while walking out into the corridor.

   Chad had been hired under the euphemistic banner of Physical Security Specialist.  What that meant was that he was the man overall in-charge of security on the one and a half billion dollar super-liner, the largest ship ever built.  To simplify further, it was his job to kill anyone on ship who didn't belong there and ensure that his employers didn't die in the process.

   Even he was overwhelmed by the size and scope of the ship.  It had been purchased just a month prior and ran half a kilometer from bow to stern.  There were over a dozen decks, shopping malls, clubs, and five star hotels.  It was a floating city and a high class one at that.  That wasn't even getting into the rushed modifications made just before their current voyage.

   After getting kicked out of Delta, he had managed a small private military corporation startup, running operations from Iraq to Afghanistan, even a few in the Philippines and in Latin America.  His true employers were several steps removed, but it was always understood that he operated under the umbrella of Western intelligence agencies, guaranteeing that he'd never run afoul of the law regardless of how messy the job might get.

   He was doing just fine at throwing the company's earnings away on cocaine and prostitutes before being made an offer he couldn't refuse.  He and his men had received the vaccinations.

   Stepping into the control room, he looked more than just a little out of place in sandals and a cut-off t-shirt.

    “What is the problem?”

    “The GPS trackers just went dark,” one of the Pakistanis said looking up from a console.

   Buried in the heart of the ship, the control center made a half moon shape of desks where flat screen computers hummed.  The wall displayed a projection of the earth with a timer ticking down to zero.  The perfect place to manage the end of the world.

   “Check sonar.”

   “Sir?”

   “Do it,” Chad growled back.

   He thought he had settled the issue an hour ago.  Some idiot, undoubtedly one of the Serbs, had been smoking by the fuel point and set half of the atoll ablaze.  Now the surviving contractors on the island needed to displace critical equipment off the island and onto the Crown of the Pacific before the rest of the island was consumed by the fire.  Critical equipment meant the contents of Bunker Six, which the GPS trackers had been attached to.

   The technician across from him swallowed hard.    

   “What is it?” Chad demanded.

   “Um, all three units are stationary,” the Pakistani said with wide eyes.  “Fourteen thousand feet below the surface.”

   Turning red in the face, it took what little self-discipline he had not to rip the skinny Paki's head off.  All three units.  It was no accident.

   Whoever was arriving at their stern had just dumped three nuclear weapons over the side of their ship.

   Deckard was too exhausted to be surprised anymore.

   Richie had worked fast, cutting into Bunker Six with the thermic lance, the horsepower provided by a dump truck they found on the base, helping them pry open the doors the rest of the way.

   Inside were three Mk174 tactical nuclear weapons of the type that had become almost legendary in intelligence circles.  The United States and Russia were the only two nations to have successfully miniaturized nuclear weapons to the extent that they could be carried in a suitcase.  They were the prized possession of both countries' nuclear arsenals.

   Such weapons could be smuggled into an enemy country via commercial air travel or even strapped to a military free-fall parachutist to deliver to a key target.  These three were the latest models, with a yield of twelve kilotons apiece. 

   A military base run by mercenaries.  Black project spy planes.  Suitcase nuclear weapons.  The old men at the Grove that owned a controlling interest in Samruk, and in Deckard, also owned the United States Government, National Security Council and all.

   Their cargo boat bobbed and dipped in the ocean as heavy lines were thrown down to them from the stern of the super-liner.  Samruk's mercenaries grabbed the ropes and secured them to hard points along the side of the ship, mooring the two vessels together.

   As this was done, Deckard ordered the nukes rolled off the side of the ship.

   They had been his best shot at using a Trojan Horse to get close to the super-liner, and since he wasn't coming under fire from the two destroyers, it appeared to have worked.  The nukes themselves were in hard cases with multiple redundant systems.  They would be safest at the bottom of the ocean until the US Navy could recover them at a later date.  There was no way he was going to risk having them fall back into enemy hands.

   Deckard watched the three metal cases splash and disappear beneath the dark waters.

   His men fired several stunted, suppressed gunshots, killing members of the super-liner's receiving party.

   It was time to go to work.