Tomorrow War (11 page)

The other six planes flown by the unit were known as B-6J3 “HellJets.” Technically this odd airplane was a medium bomber. It was three times the size of an AirCat and in some ways resembled the famous Mitchell B-25 bomber of another place. But instead of two propellers, the HellJet had four huge double-reaction engines slung beneath its wings. Each plane carried a crew of thirteen, had no less than nine gun turrets on its body, belly, nose, and tail, and could carry many pounds of bombs within its large internal bomb bay.

The HellJet was the size of a small airliner, but oddly, one of its fortes was the long-lost art of dive-bombing. To be on the receiving end of a HellJet’s dive-bombing run was indeed a hellish experience—and usually, the last for the victim. In other places a dive-bomber’s objective was to get just one bomb on a target. The way to do this was simple: find the target, go into a dive, release your bomb, pull up, and let gravity do the rest. If you were good, the bomb would more or less fall straight down and nail your objective.

The HellJet followed this same tactic, but on a much larger scale. Under the right conditions the stocky bomber was capable of carrying up to thirty thousand pounds of bombs, due mostly to its solid construction and its enormous double-reaction power plants. While the airplane could carry and drop this ordnance in the standard way—arrive near target, sight it, drop the load, and cross your fingers—the plane’s designers had built in an additional devilish element, which allowed the HellJet a second way to bomb something or someone into oblivion. The designers had worked a long trail of edge flaps into the HellJet’s wings. When deployed, they gave the huge airplane a degree of maneuverability while in a perilous dive—a plunge that usually started somewhere above 25,000 feet and reached high supersonic speeds on the way down. After this mind-bending drop, and once the bombs were let go, these edges were lifted slightly, giving the airplane the ability to pull out of what would normally be a fatal dive, hopefully in enough time to escape the blast effects of fifteen tons of high explosives hitting in a very concentrated area.

This was heart-stopping, stomach-churning stuff, but the AirCat mercenary group had never been accused of being shy about tactics or strategies. Just the fact that the air group had six of these airplanes, and the will to use them, was usually enough to make any potential opponent think twice about running up against them.

So it was with great anticipation that those gathered on the flight deck of the aircraft carrier awaited the air merc unit to come aboard.

Zoltan and Crabb were there, as were most of the Unit 167 guys, tug crew members, and even some hookers. In fact, just about everyone connected with the mission had come out to see the unusual air unit’s arrival—except Y, who had fallen back to sleep.

The scheduled time for the AirCats to come aboard was 0900 hours, and sure enough, at the stroke of nine bells, the sullen roar of an approaching aircraft could be heard.

It was the lead/scout AirCat, a slightly larger version of the fighter bomber. The plane came out of the morning clouds, dropping very fast, heading for the end of the stationary carrier. The AirCat was really a huge airplane and the carrier was actually a smallish air platform. But the Cats were known for landing and taking off in tight places. So just as this first airplane went into its final approach at high speed, there was a blinding explosion. To the astonishment of all on deck, the sky just below the falling airplane was suddenly full of yellow fire.

Those watching had to shield their eyes, so bright was this flash. But once the initial shock wore off, it became apparent that the airplane was not in trouble. This was, in fact, the standard procedure for AirCats landing in a confined area. The flash came as a result of six rocket bottles that had been lowered from underneath the AirCat scout plane’s wings.

The rockets served as a massive and sudden air brake, counteracting the AirCat’s forward speed and giving the big fighter bomber just enough of a kick in the ass to slow it down to a reasonable landing speed. The airplane hit the carrier deck a second later, bounced once, then came down hard again. At this point four more, small but brilliant, explosions went off—the rocket bottles were firing again, this time straight forward, serving as a ground brake for the aircraft. By the time the smoke cleared from these flashes, the bouncing aircraft had come to a stop, not far from where the deck gang had gathered. In all, the huge fighter needed but 175 yards in which to land safely. With the scream of its engines and the flash of its rocket bottles, it was made for a very impressive entrance.

Serving as the makeshift deck crew, the Unit 167 members ran out to push the expended scout plane out of the way. It was a good thing they hustled, because sure enough, another Cat was coming in right on its tail. And there was another one behind that. And another behind that.

It went on like this for the next half hour. The thirty-six airplanes touched down at forty-five-second intervals, and it was all the deck crew could do to push each one out of the way before the next one banged in. It was a hectic operation but in the end, a successful one. The huge HellJets came in last. Landing in the same manner as the smaller brothers, there was just enough room left on the deck for the last bomber to come down.

Then all was quiet again.

Per Y’s previously issued order, as soon as the last AirCat was aboard and secured, word was radioed ahead to the huge Bro-Bird. Within seconds the big seaplane’s engines began turning and its towlines became taut.

Then the order went out to the accompanying tugboats. Those with lines began moving forward, flanking the monstrous seaplane. Those on the ass end nuzzled their noses up against the carrier’s rear. Slowly but surely, the whole conglomeration began to move.

Awake now, and somewhat coherent, Y watched this operation from the bridge. Their course was due south. In front of him was the map with the burned hole put there by Vogel the ghost. Y shivered every time he looked at it, but he knew that another map just wouldn’t do. Not that he felt this map was lucky or blessed in any way. Rather, he thought it would be very unlucky to get rid of it.

So here it was.

They were under way only twenty minutes before there was a knock on the bridge door.

Y called out to come in, and the twin commanders of the AirCats stepped through the door.

They surprised Y by saluting him. He returned it quickly, then shook hands with both men, though a bit nervously.

After receiving a brief report stating that all of their airplanes had come aboard safely and that they were looking forward to the journey, Y told the pair to sit down. They did, taking the navigator’s and engineer’s chairs, respectively.

Y studied them for a moment. In the daylight it was his first chance to get a good look at their mugs. Both men were in their early fifties, and their faces were full of previously unseen character. The lines and wrinkles on their cheeks and brows told of many air battles fought and won. The wrinkles around their mouths told of many glasses of liquor drunk and laughs that resulted. Their eyes also had a slight but identical twinkle to them.

“I just realized we’ve never been properly introduced,” Y told them. “I’m sure you know I work for the OSS, but we can dispense with formalities out here. My friends call me Yaz.”

“Jones,” the first pilot said, holding out his hand. “Seth Jones. This is my brother, Dave.”

Once again Y shook hands with both of them, but his head was spinning so fast now, he barely knew what he was doing.

These two guys—these two brothers. Both were generals. Both were pilots. Like everything else around him lately, they seemed so damned familiar to him.

Yet Y was sure he’d never met them before.

At least, not in this lifetime.

West Falkland Island

I
T WAS A LONG RIDE
down.

The elevator door was actually behind a false panel on the other side of a cupboard in the kitchen of the small farmhouse. The lift itself was very cramped, and there was no light inside. Just a dull red glow from the elevator controls, and the slow methodical clicking as the elevator passed down through sixteen separate levels, descending slowly into the middle of the earth.

The two men did not speak on the long journey down. The man who lived in the farmhouse was still in a slight case of shock. He had come so close to losing his wife of many years that he was still shaking from head to toe. In fact, he believed now that she had actually passed away only to be brought back to life. Snatched somehow from whoever calls the living to the other side. Snatched back by the man now standing beside him in this dark lift.

Who was he?

That was the question that had been going through the Man’s mind ever since the miraculous incident in the living room the day before.

A man washes up on a beach during a titanic storm, saving the lives of dozens of children in the process—and yet he can barely remember his name? The Man’s wife drops dead on their living room floor, and this same character lays hands on her and steals her back from death itself?

The Man had seen many things since coming to this world. Since dropping in himself. Strange wars. Strange potions. Strange theories proved. Fear conquered in the strangest of ways. He knew roads that no other man knew. He knew this place was just one of trillions, some almost identical to this one.

But never, not in his wildest dreams or his most fantastic waking moment, had he seen what had happened on his living room floor the day before—made even more astonishing that it was his wife who had been pulled back from the grave.

All by this man who could barely remember his name.

That’s why he was taking him down to the Sixteenth Level.

There were more than one hundred people working in this vast underground facility—this holiest place of secrets. Only the most trusted, the most brilliant, were allowed to visit the Sixteenth Level.

Even fewer were allowed to work there. And no one but the Man himself was allowed to enter the chamber located at the far end of the place. This was not a self-imposed rule—it was actually an ethereal request, given to the Man by the spirit who had first showed him the hole in the sky many years ago.

What would happen if more than one person knew?

That was another question the Man had pondered ever since he and his wife suddenly found themselves flying their Piper Cub in a sky above a place that was not the same place from which they had taken off.

That’s why the ghost had showed him the hole in the sky—
that
was the big secret. Only one person could know its location, its implications, and that person was now the Man, and it was he who would carry the weight of many worlds on his shoulders until … well, until he died. Then it would be up to him to come back to haunt someone of his choosing and pass the mantle onto them.

Or at least that’s how he’d always felt, and that’s how he’d vowed it to be, in keeping with the spirit’s bargain.

Until yesterday.

Now there was another voice inside his head. Heard rarely since he and his wife landed here in this other universe, but relied on many times back in his former place, this other voice was telling him that this guy Viktor, this wayward seaman with the power to raise the dead, should be made aware of the hole in the sky.

It was a big decision, and the Man supposed he would pay the penalty for making it some day.

That is, if the original ghost ever found him again.

The lift finally reached the bottom level, and the door opened very slowly.

Viktor was visibly nervous. He’d said nothing on the way down, having no idea what waited for him so deep inside the earth. When the door opened, would he see fire and the burning souls of eternity? He didn’t know.

But now they were here, and the Man brought him past the mystified British guards, down a very long dark corridor to a huge metal door that looked like something from a bad horror movie.

The man punched in some kind of code and the door opened with the appropriate
whoosh!

Beyond was a blue-hued chamber, which again looked like something from a movie set. All pipes and wires, it was a madman’s dream of a laboratory—yet there seemed to be a queer sensibility to it all. In the faint light several other scientist types could be seen working in cubbyholes, or at messy desks, or within thickly glassed rooms.

A few of these people looked up, and when they saw the Man, they nodded in a reverential way. The Man simply nodded back. He directed Viktor past many electrical things, until they reached another massive door.

Another code, another twist of the lock, and now they were inside a very small vestibule and facing … yet another door.

They both stepped inside, and the Man locked them in.

Viktor looked around the small metal chamber and saw some strange things. There were straps fastened securely to the sides of the walls. Why would they be here? he thought. What could their purpose be? There was also an ordinary bucket filled to the brim with ordinary-looking rocks.

Rocks? Why?

But even odder, in one corner of the vault was a box containing typical military-issue parachutes.

Parachutes?

“You’ll find out in a moment,” the Man told Viktor, reading his mind.

Then, without another word, he strapped Viktor into one of the harnesses and then did the same to himself. With a little flourish, he punched another code into the lock of this third door. The lock spun and clicked and then sprang open.

The next thing Viktor knew, he was looking out at the clear blue sky.

He was stunned. His mouth fell open. His eyes went wide. He felt a strange jolt of something go right through him.

“How … how can this be?” he finally was able to mumble.

The Man did not answer. He simply pointed down. And through the clouds that were sweeping by, Viktor could clearly see the ocean about a mile beneath them. It looked deep blue yet warm and inviting. A cruise liner was passing by. Viktor could see people on the deck of this ship, swimming in the pool, sunbathing, even shooting golf balls off the stern.