Target: Point Zero (43 page)

“I’ll wave as you go over,” she said.

And with that, Hunter turned around and quickly walked away.

Cape Canaveral

One month later

T
HE DAWN BROKE HOT
and hazy over the everglade marshes surrounding Launch Pad 37.

Glistening in the early morning sun, being laughed at by squadrons of seagulls, a huge spacecraft stood poised on the rusted platform. It looked very strange at first glance. A huge orange tank, filled with liquid hydrogen, was at its center, flanked by two thinner rockets filled with solid fuel. Attached to these multistoried firecrackers was the refurbished Zon space shuttle.

Clouds of steam were now pouring out of vents in both the Zon and its enormous main fuel tank. A scattering of launch workers—they were not yet experienced enough to be called technicians—were attending to last-minute affairs. Two miles away, inside the main control building, a small but harried group of men were checking a long laundry list of items, making sure that everything was flowing smoothly.

The resurrection of Cape Canaveral and its space facilities had been accomplished in what could only be described as “miraculous time.” Actually it had taken ninety-six hours of straight work by a small core of experts, men who’d been space workers before the Big War, just to get the essential computers up and running again.

From there the launch pad had to be cleaned up and made workable, the fuel tanks and solid boosters filled and tested and a billion other details attended to. The Zon itself had spent most of this time inside the massive VAB, the vehicle assembly building, getting flight-worthy again.

Like everything else pertaining to the anticipated launch, it was a question of omission rather than addition. Anything nonessential—from extra safety chutes to redundant toilet flush lines—had been eliminated from the shuttle. This philosophy, that less was more, had transformed the creaky Russian spacecraft into a lean, mean machine, one that would run almost entirely by computer once it left the pad.

If
it left the pad, that is.

Though security around the space center was extremely tight—no less than a division of UA troops had cordoned off the area, with a squadron of UA fighters patrolling the skies all around—word of the impending launch had spread far and wide. Just like the old days when NASA used to do this on a monthly basis, crowds of civilians had encamped on the beaches and along the roadsides nearest the cape. While they’d all come to see if the United Americans were really going to attempt to put a shuttle into space, most just didn’t believe it was possible. Not five years before, America was in ruins, the government nonexistent and daily life in shambles. To be reaching for the stars again, so soon, seemed almost too good to be true.

All through the long hot day, the preparations continued for the launch. At 3 P.M., a small bus-like vehicle left the main control center and began a long, slow journey out to the pad. A small contingent of workers was waiting for it. Gingerly, they helped six spacesuit-clad men out of the transporter and into the elevator and then rode with them to the top of the launch platform.

Moving very slowly, very carefully, the six crew members were loaded inside the Zon, each person taking as long as fifteen minutes to get into place and hooked up for launch.

Then, the preliminary countdown began.

Dusk came as quickly as the dawn had, and soon the long shadows around the cape faded and were replaced by a slight breeze and some bare mists. Activity around the launch pad was oddly muted now. All workers were gone, only the rockets, the shuttle and the crew within remained. On the beaches surrounding the platform and on the roads leading to the space center, vigilant troops and anxious citizens stood together, jackets and hats up against the chill, counting down the minutes to the early evening launch.

By 6 P.M., the secondary countdown was completed—all systems were go. The main computer program was working perfectly, all backup systems were, too. Only about forty-percent of the activity that would have been performed in a typical NASA launch had been initiated this day. If there was one thing the UA had proved, it was that launching the shuttle could be as complicated as its controllers wanted it to be—or as simple.

The sun finally went down for good at 7:01. Two minutes later the final countdown began in earnest.

It was cramped inside the flight compartment of the Zon.

One of the most radical modifications to the spacecraft was the placement of all the blast-off seats up in the flight compartment itself, rather than scattered around the interior of the ship as originally designed.

Two seats were positioned in front of the controls. Two more were located directly behind these, with the third pair facing each other, just inches away. Sitting in these two rear jump seats were Ben Wa and JT Toomey. Like the rest of the crew, both men were stuffed into Russian-style spacesuits that had been thoroughly deloused since being used by the members of the Zon’s last flight in space.

Strapped into the middle two seats were the spacecraft’s “flight engineers,” Colonel Frank Geraci of the NJ104 and Captain Jim Cook of the JAWS team. Both men had had a crash course in Zon operations during the past thirty days.

Sitting in the right-hand front seat, serving as the shuttle’s copilot was none other than Elvis Q, fully rehabilitated and anxious now to get back up into space, despite his previous vow never to return.

Sitting in the left-hand seat, and serving as pilot and overall flight commander, was Hawk Hunter himself.

At 7:05, the sixty-second countdown began. Hunter found the strangest thoughts running through his head. Their mission to gain orbit, rendezvous with the Mir and take Viktor by force was oddly removed from his mind at the moment. Rather, he was thinking about his father, ten years gone now, and what he would have thought of him at this moment, poised to either leap into space or the trying. He was sure his old man would have wanted him to at least try, as dangerous as this whole enterprise was.

In the shrinking countdown, Hunter’s thoughts also drifted to friends once close to him who had passed on. Mike Fitzgerald, “Bull” Dozer, General Seth Jones. Hundreds of others who had died to regain America’s freedom from the clutches of scum like Viktor. This was their day, too.

Thirty seconds to go. Though he tried to avoid it, Hunter then felt his thoughts coming around to Dominique, his long-lost girlfriend, who, as far as he knew, was still living at his farm,
Skyfire,
on Cape Cod. He had not tried to contact her since returning from Southeast Asia, simply because he didn’t know what he could say to her. She was used to him being gone for long periods of time—
too
used to it, that was the problem. He knew that even a trip into space would not make confronting her any easier; rather, it would simply delay it.

Down to fifteen seconds now and his mind was vibrating slightly at the irony of it all. If someone had told him a year before that he’d be in this position, ready to go into space, he would have replied that they were crazy. And if they had told him that someone other than Dominique would be on his mind as the seconds ticked down to lift-off, he would have probably suggested mental therapy for them.

But here he was, just moments away from the massive rockets being lit, and the one face that was flooding his consciousness was Chloe’s.

Life was very strange.

Ten seconds,
he heard Crunch’s unmistakable drawl tell him through his headphones. Repaired and rejuvenated, the Crunch-man was serving now as launch director.

Eight…seven…six…

Hunter readjusted himself in his seat and took a deep breath. What was Chloe doing right now? Right at that very moment? he wondered. Did she know he was thinking about her? Was she thinking about him? Did she even remember him?

Five…four…three…

His heart began racing. He felt Elvis reach over and tap his arm twice for good luck.

Dreams do come true,
Hunter thought as the entire world began shuddering with unbelievable violence. They just don’t come true in the way you think they will.

Two…one…
zero!

There was a strange pause, just a heartbeat or two, and then the rumbling increased, and the noise exploded, and the flight compartment began shaking, and the glow of flames filled the windscreens and the cockpit and the controls. And then it felt like a giant lined him up and gave him the swiftest kick in the pants imaginable.

The Zon began to rise, lighting up the landscape for hundreds of miles around, reflecting on the faces of the security troops and the launch workers and the civilians who’d come to watch, and scaring the gulls who’d been mocking it with their cries all day long.

The Zon cleared the tower with a roar that sounded like a million people cheering at once. Up it went into the darkening sky, the flame from its engines and solid-rocket boosters looking as bright as a comet, making the night turn into day. Up it went, past its own exhaust and smoke, past the thin cloud layer, past the heat of the day.

It quickly turned over just as it should have and began building momentum and velocity. The solid boosters commenced bucking and then separated perfectly. The message was flashed from below that the Zon was go for throttle up—the computer responded and pushed the engines to one hundred ten-percent. Very quickly the miles began passing by like they were feet. Soon the Zon was moving down range at Mach 3, then Mach 4, then Mach 5. Mach 10. Mach 20. Five sonic booms, right in a row, exploded across the empty sky and echoed all the way back to the cape. The crowds roared again; the shuttle streaked up and nearly out of sight until it was a bare light, racing to meet the stars.

Within minutes it would achieve escape velocity of eighteen thousand, five hundred miles per hour—seven miles a second—and break free of the Earth’s atmosphere and into that eternal region beyond.

And only then did anyone who cared to finally realize that what seemed impossible just a few months before was now a reality.

Hawk Hunter, the Wingman, was at last, going into space.

Six hours later

On the edge of the cliff at the top of the mountain called Ch’ayu, Chloe pulled her robes closer to her face and shook off the dark, early morning chill.

High above, the stars seemed to be twinkling with extra luminescence tonight. The wind was whipping through the valley below, causing a sprinkling of pure crystal snow to rise up and wash across her face. Through these sparklings, she saw a bright light pass overhead, speeding across the sky, leaving a faint trail mixed in among the stars.

She watched it sadly, a single tear rolling down her cheek. Then she raised her hand and waved to it as it raced over, watching until it passed out of sight to the east.

Then she gathered up her robes again and walked back to the temple.

Turn the page to continue reading from the Wingman Series

I
T WAS A CALM
night in the Himalayas.

Where usually the winds blew at 50 knots or more and snow fell almost continuously, this night there was no gale, no frozen precipitation, no sign of the elements at all.

At the top of the mountain called Ch’aya, known as one of the coldest, windiest, most inhospitable places on earth, an eerie silence had settled around the small Be’hei temple and its row of guesthouses nearby. It was close to midnight and the stars above were twinkling madly. The monks within the temple grounds were awakened by the lack of wind; they were so unused to the silence, it actually roused them from their slumber.

Concern quickly gripped the Be’hei monastery. Candles were lit, prayer bells began tolling. The monks had read about this sort of thing. It was a phenomenon that had been written down in their ancient texts by hands that had passed on centuries before. No wind. No blowing snow. The sky seemed as if on fire. Be warned, the ancients had written. You are not being spared from the never-ending tempest that makes Ch’aya the holy place it is.

Rather you are in the eye of the eternal storm.

In one guesthouse, however, no candles had been lit. This was the small hut at the far end of the temple grounds, the dwelling closest to the edge. Inside slept a beautiful girl. Blond, supple, and youngish in face and form, she was named Chloe. She was naked, her enchanting body covered with a single layer of lambskin. She did not realize that a frightening calm had come over Ch’aya Mountain. She was too busy having a dream.

Out beyond the orbit of Pluto, in a region of space millions of miles from the sun, there is a place known as the Oort Cloud. It is here, scientists discovered years ago, that comets reside—massive chunks of ice and space dust, some weighing trillions of tons. Most are caught in a gravitational netherworld, slaved to travel long, looping flight paths, just out of reach of the pull of the sun. They are orphans, second-class citizens of the solar system that if not for a quirk of fate might have formed into planets 15 billion years ago. Instead, they are eternal transients.