War Hawk: A Tucker Wayne Novel (22 page)

Tucker took Diane from her, and they headed together to shore. Nora’s gaze kept sweeping the night sky. Tucker followed her example, knowing what she feared.

Had Tangent sent out more than one Wasp? Was a Shrike already in the air?

Tucker swam faster.

As he neared the bank, he spotted Frank and Kane running down the sandy shore toward their position. Frank helped haul Diane out of the water. The woman’s limbs were weak and wobbly. Tucker saw a long gash in her jeans, flowing with fresh blood. She must have cut herself on a jagged piece of the wrecked Suburban during her escape.

“We need to get out of sight,” Tucker said and urged everyone into the woods.

He knew this night’s hunt wasn’t over.

16

October 19, 2:08
A
.
M
. CDT

Lacey’s Spring, Alabama

Once deep within the woods on the far side of the river from the military base, Tucker called them all to a halt. It was time to regroup versus running blind.

He helped Diane down to a log and briefly inspected the handkerchief he had hastily tied around her upper thigh. Blood seeped through the cloth. They needed to get her medical attention, and the closest town was the little hamlet of Lacey’s Spring. Tangent would surely have eyes on that place.

Following Tucker’s example, Kane sniffed at Diane’s leg wound, then settled to his wet haunches with a huff, as if sensing their plight.

Though the night was warm, Nora shivered, soaked to the skin.

Frank pulled a fatherly arm around her and pulled her closer.

Nora leaned into him, but her eyes never left the skies. “They won’t give up, you know,” she muttered. “They’re just regrouping. Probably lost us in the water.”

Together they scanned the breaks in the canopy overhead. Tucker’s ears remained tuned for any telltale buzz of a drone’s engine. As encumbered as they were, with only the trees for cover, a Shrike would make short work of them.

But first it needs to find us
.

So far he had spotted no other Wasps in the air, but Nora was right. He knew more of the surveillance drones would soon be sweeping through the woods, followed behind by a Shrike. Nora said The Odisha Group had built a dozen Wasps and a pair of Shrikes. They also had something called a Warhawk, a larger wedge-shaped drone outfitted with a 20 mm cannon loaded with depleted uranium rounds.

So there was no telling what might be sent after them.

“We need to get back to our cabin,” Frank said. “Get to my cases.”

“Why?” Tucker asked.

He knew Frank had spent the downtime inside the rental cabin working on equipment nestled in the cushioned interiors of his cases, which included the CUCS module for the Shrike hunting them in the swamp. They had left the remote control at the cabin, powered off, guessing whatever protective frequency it broadcasted was likely recalibrated after Tangent had found it missing. If they tried to use it now, it would likely only serve to announce their position.

“It’s risky,” Tucker warned. “It won’t take them long to put two and two together and come searching that cabin.”

“Then we’ll have to move fast,” Frank said. “I can grab what I need and we can pile into the Durango and get the hell out of Dodge.”

“They’ll have the roads watched.”

“But maybe I can blind those eyes.”

Nora turned to him. “How?”

“I analyzed the signaling technology inside one of your CUCS units and found it’s a closed two-way system. The remote control not only communicates to the drone but
receives
feedback.”

Nora nodded. “It’s a looped system, so we can monitor the prototype’s functionality from the ground.”

“I built something that can track that signal, so we’ll know if a drone is nearby broadcasting its unique signature.”

“Is that possible?” Tucker asked.

Nora turned to Frank and peppered him with technical questions that were above Tucker’s head. She finally turned back to him. “It’s possible.”

Frank nodded. “And I think I might be able to tweak the device into broadcasting a jamming frequency up to the drone.”

In other words, blinding it
.

“But I haven’t had a chance to make those changes to it,” Frank warned. “Or test it, of course.”

“I can help him,” Nora said. Her eyes were glassy in the dark, her mind already working on this puzzle.

“We’ll have to be quick,” Tucker warned.

He got Diane back on her legs, but he had to practically carry her now, her breath wheezing fearfully in his ear. She was close to passing out.

Luckily, the cabin was only a quarter mile away, and they reached it in good time, motivated and with a plan. Still, Tucker had them hold back, hidden in the woods behind the cabin. The place appeared dark, but he had Kane circle the log structure to make sure no one was around. Only then did he and Frank risk climbing into the place through a rear window.

As Tucker grabbed a first-aid kit, Frank secured his two hard-shell cases and tossed them through the window. They then both bailed out and retreated into the woods. The Dodge Durango was parked fifty yards away on the shoulder of a forest access road.

Before approaching the vehicle, Frank dropped to a knee at the edge of the forest and opened one of his cases. He pulled out the CUCS device recovered from the swamp and removed a metallic, spiral-shaped antenna, which he passed to Tucker. “Hold it up as high as you can.”

Tucker did as instructed, while Frank grabbed a dangling wire from the antenna and plugged it into his device. He also hooked a small laptop to it, which he balanced on his knee.

Nora bent over his shoulder, watching him while he worked. As the CUCS unit powered up, a tiny screen bloomed with what appeared to be a frequency map. Frank fiddled with dials, getting the occasional suggestion from Nora.

“There!” Nora said, pointing at the screen. “See that ping in the M-band. That’s from a Wasp hunting us.”

Tucker searched the skies, holding aloft the antenna like some mystical sword against that invisible threat. “Has it found us?”

Nora shook her head. “If it spots a target, you’ll see another spike in the X-band. That’s the signal for a Shrike or Warhawk to begin an attack run. From there, those killer drones will continue the hunt until they eliminate their target or are called off. You’ll know that by a strobing pulse in the S-band.”

Definitely don’t want that
.

Tucker continued to crane his neck. “Can you trace the Wasp’s signal? Find out where it’s at?”

“Turn in a slow circle,” Frank ordered as he opened the laptop.

Tucker obeyed, trying not to get tangled in the antenna wire, until Frank and Nora simultaneously ordered him to stop.

Nora bent closer to the laptop screen, her face illuminated by the glow from it. “See there? That pinpoint is the drone’s FLIR—its forward-looking infrared radar. Because of power limitations, the range isn’t particularly good.”

“How good?” Tucker asked.

“Max of five hundred yards. It’s probably sweeping along the river’s edge, trying to acquire us. But it looks like it’s being directed to come straight at us.”

Probably tasked with surveilling the cabin
.

“We’ve got maybe ninety seconds,” Nora said. She snatched the keyboard from Frank’s knee and began typing rapidly on it.

“What’re you doing?” Frank asked.

“Trying something. You just get the CUCS ready to broadcast.”

Tucker stared in the direction of the river. “Can you jam it before it gets here?”

“Better.” She smiled, typing even more swiftly while staring down at the screen in Frank’s hand. “I know the tracking software the Wasp employs. I wrote every line of that code. I think I can hack it on the fly and take control.”

Tucker frowned down at her. “And do what with it?”

“You name it.” She continued typing. “We can use it to call down a Shrike and rain hellfire upon those Tangent bastards and smoke them all.”

Tucker liked the sound of Nora’s plan, but he stared over at Diane, who sat slumped against a tree, her head hanging. Kane sat beside her, leaning against her, as though keeping watch on a wounded comrade. Tucker felt a swell of affection for the shepherd, knowing his big heart, that boundless well of compassion inside the dog.

He suddenly felt very tired, knowing he’d lost half of Nora’s team. But it was replaced just as quickly by that steely determination ingrained in all Rangers.

“As tempting as that is,” Tucker said, “we need to look down the road. To level the battlefield for the next fight.”

Which I know will come
.

He knew this was far from over, and they would need to gather every asset available.

“What did you have in mind?” asked Nora.

“Let’s grab it.” He faced Nora and Frank’s stunned expressions. “Do you think you two could commandeer that Wasp and recruit it to our cause?”

Frank shifted on his knees. “We can sure as hell try. We got nothing to lose.”

Nora nodded.

“Then do it.”

The two set to work. Unfortunately, hacking into the Wasp proved to be more difficult than Nora had anticipated. With it closing in, her fingers flew over the keyboard. Frank offered suggestions, which were met with expletives or nods of agreement.

“It’s almost on us,” Frank warned.

Tucker searched through the canopy. At this point, there was no way they could outrun the drone, not in the SUV, certainly not on foot.

“It won’t let me in,” Nora moaned.

Frank put a hand on her trembling shoulder. “You can do this,” he said, his voice firm and calm. “Just focus. Put everything out of your mind.”

She took in a deep, shuddering breath and bent closer to the screen as code flew across it.

Frank suddenly pointed. “Stop! What about that?” He read a line of code aloud.
“Transmit autonomous run upon acquisition . . .”

“Maybe,” Nora said. “I don’t—”

A low whine echoed through the forest, silencing her.

They were out of time.

“Screw it,” Frank said and reached over and punched the return key.

They all held their breath—then the wall of code broke into two blinking lines:

CANCEL ALL TRANSMISSIONS
TRANSFER CONTROL TO CUCS 12958

“
CUCS 12958?” Tucker asked. “Is that us?”

Frank grinned triumphantly. “Damned straight.”

Nora returned to typing. “Lemme see what I can do from here.”

Moments later, Nora brought the Wasp over their heads and into a holding pattern above the access road. The drone was X shaped, a yard wide, and painted a matte black. It hovered six feet off the ground, humming with the soft whine of its four propellers, one at the tip of each crossbar.

“I’m sending a signal to the Tangent ground monitoring station,” Nora explained. “Telling them that the Wasp has incurred a propulsion malfunction. Making it look like it plummeted into the river.”

So it’ll be considered lost
.

Smart.

Tucker watched as she expertly lowered the Wasp to the road, making a soundless landing. They all stared toward the idling drone.

“What now?” Frank asked.

Tucker stalked toward it. “We make those bastards pay.”

7:17
A
.
M
.

By the time the sun was up, everything looked brighter—if not better. Tucker was headed east along Highway 20, having just cleared Tuscaloosa. He had stopped to refuel their SUV at a large truck stop and let Kane take a bathroom break. He left Frank to fill up the Durango, while he got an update from Jane on his satellite phone.

“She may lose her leg,” Jane said, reporting on Diane’s condition. “But at least, for now, her—”

An eighteen-wheeler sitting beside the diesel pumps started its engine, drowning her words out. He stepped farther away, pressing his phone to his ear. “Say again.”

“I said, at least her cover seems to be holding.”

He sighed.

So good news and bad news
.

Hours ago after leaving Lacey’s Spring, Tucker had made contact with Jane. He had everyone—and the acquired Wasp—loaded into the Durango. The original plan had been to take the evacuated members of The Odisha Group to Atlanta, where Jane had mobilized a team she trusted to take them off the grid. But with Diane in grave condition, they had shifted operations to Birmingham. Jane constructed a cover story for Diane, which included a fake Virginia license and the tale of an abusive boyfriend to help explain her injury.

“When will the doctors know more?” he asked.

“Within the next twenty-four hours. If they don’t get the sepsis under control, they’re going to take her leg.”

“How’s she holding up?”

“According to my guy out there—who’s posing as her concerned brother—she’s scared, but she knows to keep playing along.” Jane’s voice grew softer with concern. “How about you? How’re you doing?”

“As well as can be expected.”

He glanced over as Frank hooked the gas nozzle to the pump. In the backseat, Nora crouched over a laptop. He and Frank had tried to get the woman to stay behind in Birmingham, but she had refused. She warned them that they still needed her help, especially if they wanted to put the Wasp to use. Unfortunately, Frank couldn’t disagree with her.

Still, Tucker suspected Nora was driven less by a need to be useful than a desire to exact revenge upon those who had killed her friends, especially Sandy. As he drove through the night, he saw her tears as she looked out at the passing scenery, unable to sleep. With the adrenaline worn off, the weight of her loss must have finally struck her. He understood this reaction all too well. In the heat of a firefight, as friends were lost or wounded all around you, you kept moving. It was only later, in the dark of night, that you could measure those losses and try to make sense, to mourn, to find a way to live with your grief and guilt.

“Where are you headed now?” Jane asked, drawing his attention back.