Condor

by M. L. Buchman

  “What just happened?”

  “Turn the jets around,” Zhang Ru told the base commander. “It was a false alarm. Well done, Colonel.” The fewer who knew about this the better.

  He hung up and turned to Zuocheng Li.

  “It would seem that the defector who called me was unable to deliver. She was shot down five kilometers from our border.”

  “Pity,” Zuocheng Li refilled both their glasses. “What about that girl in your office? Dandan? Dongmei?”

  “Daiyu?”

  “Yes, that one. What about her?”

  Ru considered. She was hardly a girl—she was thirty-three. But she was very athletic. Perhaps. Perhaps she had a sister or a girlfriend as well.

  It was an interesting thought.

  Almost as interesting as what his aide had described about the Russian Dagger missile the Russians at Vostochny had been forced to unleash. To intercept the defector’s plane, it had briefly crossed over a curve in the Chinese border. His people had acquired excellent infrared images and signals intelligence.

  Perhaps he could trade that to the Americans for help in stealing the design. He’d very much like to deliver that to the Central Military Commission himself.

  83

  “I can’t believe it worked! Bonzer flying, mate!” Holly reached out and grabbed Jon’s arm, careful not to shake it as he was flying.

  Tim was out of his chair and gave her a kiss on top of the head and a hard hug that hurt like blazes and felt wonderful.

  “Never. Not in a thousand years. I can’t believe you did it.”

  “Me? Took a mess of us to pull this off.”

  Tim laughed, let her go, and gave her a quick kiss on the lips. Then he turned and did the same to Jon.

  Though it did get Holly thinking. She hadn’t kissed anyone since…joining Miranda’s team? Since…leaving SASR? Too damn long.

  And it wasn’t Tim she wanted to kiss.

  Goddamn Miranda and her stupid question. This was not a moment Holly wanted to think about Mike Munroe.

  But she was, wasn’t she?

  “Awesome flying, buddy,” Tim was far less restrained about thumping Jon’s shoulder than she’d been. “Awesome. Definitely buying you a round at the next bar.”

  “That was nothing compared to what comes next,” Jon said calmly.

  “Yeah, right. We just cruise along and we’re good.”

  Jon’s glance at her said it wasn’t nearly that simple.

  “Spill it.”

  “Well,” Jon kept staring down at the instruments. It was just seven p.m., local time, not much to see out the window. “We burn a lot more fuel flying at five hundred feet than we do at thirty-nine thousand.”

  “And how much do we have left?”

  Tim went back to his seat. In moments she heard the bright tapping of his fingernail against various dials as if hoping they’d change.

  “Uh…”

  Elayne started to laugh. It wasn’t loud, but it was mean.

  Tim ignored her and looked at Holly.

  “Not a whole lot.”

  84

  “We’re not going to make Sapporo, Japan.” Tim announced.

  Jon rather expected that.

  “At least a hundred kilometers short.”

  “If I dared to climb to over twenty-five thousand feet, I could glide that far to Sapporo except, wait a minute, I don’t have the fuel to climb. As a bonus, as soon as we popped up on their radar, the Russians really would shoot us down.”

  “Okay, I vote against that,” Holly could always be counted on for a steady bit of humor.

  “Okay, Holly. Any bright ideas? I’m way out of practice on ditching massive cargo planes at sea without killing everyone aboard.”

  “I’ll vote against that one,” Tim joined in the game. “The Sea of Japan in March? No way, man. Just no way. I’d freeze my balls off.”

  Holly left her seat and began prowling through the cabin, opening drawers and cases behind him. Flying this low, he didn’t dare turn to see what she was doing.

  “Oi, this is worth a gander.”

  She and Tim were making a lot of hmm and ahh noises, clearly messing with him.

  “Careful, or I’ll crash the two of you and just save myself.”

  “He’s Air Force. I don’t know if we can trust him not to do that,” Tim spoke up.

  “So are you, jerkwad.”

  “Rishiri,” Holly cut them both off.

  “What?”

  “Keep this heading. There’s an island called Rishiri just off the northern tip of Japan. Almost two hundred klicks closer. Tim thinks we have the fuel for that.”

  “Awesome. Tell me about it.”

  “Winter population under a hundred and we’ll be landing past ten p.m. local time. Elevation ninety-nine feet.”

  “Good.” Jon wouldn’t have to waste any fuel climbing.

  “Runway 7/25.”

  He’d have to check the winds before he decided which way to land, if he had time to choose.

  “Length is over a mile.”

  “How much over a mile?”

  “Five thousand nine hundred feet long.”

  “Oh shit.”

  “What’s wrong?” Tim and Holly crowded around him.

  Jon sighed. “I can land there. But if we add enough fuel to get to Las Vegas, where we’re supposed to deliver this mother, I can’t take off again.”

  “What?...Oh.” It didn’t take Holly long to see the problem. “Let’s get there. Then I’ll call Miranda. She’ll know.”

  85

  The solution was simple.

  Miranda was a little surprised the others didn’t see it. Perhaps they hadn’t made as intense a study of the world’s airports as she had.

  Based on the loading of the Antonov, especially if it wasn’t loaded to full fuel, taking off in a mile at sea level was easily achieved.

  Also, it was March in the northern Pacific, so the colder-hence-denser air was better for lift.

  At her direction, they took on just sufficient fuel at Rishiri to fly the eighteen hundred miles to Attu Island. The abandoned US Coast Guard station lay at the extreme end of the Aleutian Island chain.

  Several KC-130J tankers flew out to Attu Island to meet them. They were told a Russian plane had gotten in trouble and they were to assist its safe return. Holly's crew had stayed aboard the Antonov.

  It was convenient as well, as they had to wait out five hours of daylight on Attu so that it was after dark before they crossed over American soil. It wouldn’t do to have an overeager plane spotter posting pictures of a Russian military cargo plane arriving at a secret hangar in Nevada.

  The six hours to Las Vegas had them arriving just after eight p.m. local time.

  Hangar 33B lay at the far southern end of the Groom Lake runway, over a mile from the next nearest building.

  Miranda shivered and waited as the blacked-out plane arrived.

  She heard the distant screech of the tires before she saw the vague shadow of the massive Antonov.

  Groom Lake was used to handling unscheduled and top-secret flights. No airport lights shone toward the runway where it might reveal the aircraft that operated here: ones so secret they often only flew at night.

  The welcoming committee was very small.

  She and Mike had been flown in on a C-21A Learjet from DC. Jeremy on another from Seattle. The Lockheed engineers would be arriving tomorrow to begin studying the Persona satellite.

  An ambulance was waiting.

  Other than the technicians in charge of the hangar, the only other person there was one that Miranda hadn’t anticipated. Though in hindsight, she should have.

  Clarissa Reese.

  She had arrived in her own jet, with two very substantial bodyguards.

  Only after the technicians had placed wheel chocks on the Antonov, hooked it up to ground power, and closed the hangar doors had the Antonov’s passenger door opened and the ladder lowered to the ground.

  The two medi
cs hustled aboard.

  The first person to disembark was Tom, strapped to a stretcher and complaining about it to anyone who would listen.

  Tim was doing his best to make Tom laugh, even though it appeared to hurt both of them.

  Humor to deny pain?

  Humor to declare continued life sustainment against long odds?

  She didn’t have a chance to ask them before they were gone, and Holly and Jon came down the stairs.

  “We didn’t dare untie her. She’s in the cockpit.”

  The two bodyguards stalked aboard, closely followed by Reese.

  Now it was just the five of them.

  Holly was limping, her face was battered, and her arm was wrapped in bandages.

  “Oh, Holly.” Miranda wasn’t sure what else to do with everything that had built up inside her. All those hours of just sitting and waiting. Trying to imagine how she could have planned it differently. What might she have missed that would kill the team?

  Unable to keep it all in but at a loss for words, she simply stepped up to Holly and wrapped her arms around her.

  “Whoa!” Holly sounded shocked.

  Miranda could feel the vibrations of Holly’s exclamation as much as hear them.

  Holly hugged her back.

  “Never again, Holly. Never again. We investigate crashes. We make things safer. That’s what we do.”

  She could feel Holly’s nod. “Absolutely never again. It’s what we do.” And Holly held her even harder.

  Miranda stayed there a moment and decided that she liked this.

  It was firm.

  And solid.

  And good.

  “Hey, I just returned from the edge too. Can I get a hug?” Jon was smiling at her. He looked just as weary, if not as battered, and just as pleased.

  Miranda released Holly and considered.

  “Hmm. If you have to think about it, then I suppose the answer is no.”

  But Miranda decided that she was pleased to see Jon back safe.

  Very pleased.

  So she hugged him as well.

  He didn’t sound surprised like Holly, he simply pulled her in and held her tightly.

  That too was very nice.

  She rested her forehead against his chest and just let herself be held. Miranda had never been comfortable being held but she could learn to like it.

  He kissed her on top of the head. She could feel the scratchiness of his two-day beard along the part in her hair.

  “Are we going to have sex now?”

  “What?” Jon put his hands on her shoulders and stepped her back a pace. “Miranda!” He said it like she’d been a bad girl.

  “I asked if we’re going to have sex now.”

  “Like right now?” He looked around.

  Holly, Mike, and Jeremy were still gathered around and looking at her very strangely.

  “Maybe we should talk about this later? After we’ve had our first kiss? In private?” He emphasized the last word strongly.

  “Oh. Is sex supposed to always be a pinkie-swear secret?” She turned to Holly. “Like when you’re going to have sex with Mike?”

  “Miranda!” Holly practically shrieked.

  “Excuse me?” But Mike’s grin was so big that it was hard to imagine he was asking a question.

  “Oh, that was supposed to be a pinkie-swear secret. Without naming the secret. I see that. Perhaps if we were to name our pinkie-swear secrets we could talk about them without having others know. I could come up with a simple codeword generator that would search for relevant but unrevealing codewords for sworn secret topics. Would that be better?”

  Mike squeezed her shoulder. “You just keep thinking, Miranda. That’s what you’re good at.” Mike gave it a Western drawl like he was a character in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. She’d liked that movie.

  “We all are. The only times people cease thinking is when they’re sleeping, though dream state might argue otherwise, and after we die. Perhaps in certain drug or alcohol-induced states. And—”

  Then Jon kissed her. Hard. With his arms wrapped once more firmly around her.

  She didn’t like having the incomplete sentence dangling from an initial conjunction.

  But she kissed Jon back.

  Maybe she’d think about the interrupted conjunction later.

  86

  Mike nudged Holly’s shoulder.

  “What? If you think what Miranda said—”

  Mike nodded toward the Antonov AN-124 Condor looming large in the shadowed hangar.

  As a group they’d all drifted away from the plane.

  Now, Miranda and Jeremy were asking Jon about the flight characteristic variations of the C-5 Galaxy versus the Condor. She noted that Jon and Miranda were still holding hands before she turned to look at the plane.

  Apparently it no longer mattered what she thought about that, which was something of a relief.

  Two guards appeared on the stairs.

  Elayne Kasprak walked between them. They had locked her in a set of chains that cuffed her hands to a thick leather waistband and her ankles close enough that she could just manage to hobble down the steep stairs.

  Her hair was matted.

  Her clothes were wonked every which way by the removal of the layers of duct tape they’d used to pin her down. She was just as bloody as Tim and Holly herself had been.

  Elayne looked right at them without saying a word.

  Not a blink or a nod.

  Nothing as she passed by.

  Clarissa followed from well behind, with a gun drawn.

  Together, Elayne, the two guards, and Clarissa climbed aboard the Gulfstream Clarissa had arrived in.

  Holly watched until the jet had been rolled out of the hangar and the doors were closed once more.

  “Rough one?” Mike asked softly.

  “Yeah. Real close. Too close. I don’t know what I was thinking.”

  “I do.”

  Holly looked at Mike. He stood at ease; his thumbs hooked in his pockets.

  Seeing him and the others alive and safe was almost worth the last forty-eight hours.

  “Thinking about sharing it with me?” Holly wasn’t sure she wanted to know.

  His smile was as easy as the rest of him. “If you’d like.”

  “I’m guessing I won’t, but lay it down anyway.” Holly hadn’t slept since Kentucky. She’d been around the world in two days and definitely fought one battle too many.

  “You’re chasing a demon you’ll never catch.”

  “And why’s that? I caught one demon today.”

  She hadn’t been a killer like Elayne…had she?

  Holly had killed on assigned missions only. She’d been a weapon, not a…what? Elayne would spend the rest of her life paying for her willingness to sacrifice anyone to protect her homeland. Had Holly really been so driven? So ruthless? She didn’t know, but she hoped not.

  “You’ll never catch this one, Holly. Because it’s from your past. You talk like you don’t have one, but it drives you even harder than Miranda’s drives her.”

  “I’ve got a past. I just don’t talk about it.”

  “We’ve all got pasts, but yours is eating you alive. Until you do talk about it. If you don’t somehow purge it, it’s going to keep—”

  “I killed my brother. You happy?” It just came out. She didn’t know how or why, it just did.

  Maybe because she was tired.

  Maybe because she just needed to tell someone.

  She checked, but it was still just her and Mike.

  “Didn’t mean to, but I did.”

  Mike kept his silence. Didn’t give her anything to react to—good or bad.

  “There was this flood. In the Outback they’re like the Arizona arroyos, only a hundred times worse when they happen. They come out of nowhere. From rain a hundred klicks down some track. Outta the sky blue, suddenly there’s a kilometer-wide river runnin’ across the land. Just one or two meters deep, it doesn’t even look lik
e its moving but it’s faster than any joolaroo can ride her horse.”

  Though it hurt to walk, she couldn’t tolerate standing still. Mike walked with her as she slowly circled the big Antonov where she’d nearly lost her life to a Russian Zaslon agent.

  “My brother, he was teaching me to drive his ute, that’s a pickup to you, and I insisted we could make it across this one flood. I drove into it even as he was yelling at me to stop. I was always a contrary bitch—at sixteen I was even worse, insisting that I could do whatever I was told was impossible. Halfway across, I was laughing at his fears when the car simply floated sideways.”

  They circled under the massive tail section, which felt as if it was going to fall from the sky on her.

  “I swam free as we neared a bridge along the Stuart Highway. The arroyo there is a half kilometer wide and twenty meters deep. You can drop a six-story-tall city block in there and it will wash away…and then the whole world will be drier than a month-old roo carcass twenty-four hours later. He shoved me out and told me to swim for the bridge deck. Made it by a nick.”

  She leaned against one of the massive wheels of the Condor and tried to stretch out her leg—the knee was badly swollen where Elayne had kicked it.

  “He didn’t?” Mike asked softly.

  “Almost. We clasped hands for an instant, but he let go when he saw it would drag me in with him. My sorry butt landed on the deck, his got washed off the edge. We found his battered ute five kilometers downstream. Found what the dingoes left of his body a week later. My family disowned me. I was sixteen and I lost my whole family in a single day. After my parents made it clear I wasn’t welcome back, I hitched out on the first ride I could catch. Two years odd jobbing out at the Mt. Isa mines in the middle of the Barkly. Talk about back o’ Bourke; that’s real nowhere.”

  Holly hated the feeling of a pity party thrown for herself and hurried to finish the story.

  “Finished high school. Army to SASR until I killed my team on another nowhere bridge to hell. Not much to tell.” And definitely less to think about. She did her best to pretend that she’d been born the day she joined Miranda’s team. And now she’d almost died on it. Would that be such a great loss?