Nerve Center

by Dale Brown

  The incumbent President, mouth drawn and eyes baggy, entered from the side door not far from where Minerva stood. He’d made the long trip from Brasilia to this regional outpost just south of the Amazon by car; his body seemed to have absorbed every dirt and dust particle along the way. When he glanced toward her, she saw not the hate she expected, nor anger, but simply sadness and fatigue. His expression shook her, and as the leaders of Congress entered, she worried that she had been tricked somehow, trapped here while Madrone was far away. There were no admirals, no one, in fact, from the Navy.

  Had they managed to obtain the upper hand again?

  Her guards were with the plane. She was defenseless.

  The general began dictating the terms of the President’s “retirement,” speaking with so little enthusiasm that Lanzas began to wonder if this was in fact a charade. Had she somehow been tricked again?

  Madrone would meet his doom in America. What would she do then?

  She steeled herself against them, stiffened her muscles. She would face them bravely.

  “Colonel Lanzas,” said General Herule. “Thank you for coming on such short notice.”

  She looked into his face. Herule flinched.

  Betrayal. The bastard!

  Minerva felt her heart fall into the pit of her stomach. Despairing, she cursed herself for being so foolish to rely on the two-faced bastard.

  Then she managed a long breath, put her head back and her shoulders flat, determined to meet destiny with dignity.

  “Colonel Lanzas shall be my Defense Minister,” Herule told the others. “She is well suited, both through training and her family.”

  “Agreed,” said Findaro, the head of the Army. A Congressman nodded near his side. “It is a wise choice.”

  “She will deal with the Americans,” added Herule. Now his eyes held hers for a moment.

  Lifted from the depths of despair, Minerva felt almost sexual elation. She had won after all.

  Madrone was responsible. Madrone—her dark self. She regretted letting him go, even though she knew it was better to be rid of him.

  The rest of the appointments, the rest of the meeting, passed quickly. Minerva gathered herself as the others started to get up.

  “Well done, my dear,” said General Herule, taking her hand and kissing it. “You almost seemed surprised.”

  “And you as solicitous as ever,” she told him.

  Herule laughed—then pulled her into a bear hug.

  “We cannot afford to anger powerful forces to the north,” he whispered in her ear. “There should be no trace of complications. If they or others could be blamed for complications, so much the better.”

  Minerva eased her hand down toward the general’s groin and squeezed gently. The table and chairs made it impossible for the others to see—but if they did, so much the better.

  “We won’t have any trouble, my dear,” she whispered.

  Herule released her, his face a little flushed. “I will arrange a meeting with the admirals.”

  “I’ll arrange it,” she told him. “In a few days. They will come to me. In the meantime, I must get back quickly.”

  “Yes,” said the general. “No complications.”

  “Of course.”

  Aboard Hawkmother

  Over the Gulf of Mexico

  7 March, 1540 local (1340 Dreamland)

  MADRONE SENSED THEY WERE AFTER HIM EVEN THOUGH the threat scope was clear. He felt them trail him out of Arizona, down the eastern Sierra Madres. They might be too far for the radar and too smart to use the radio, but he knew they were there nonetheless.

  Fear prickled along the back of his head, like an electrical current arcing from the spider.

  He welcomed it; it made it easy to focus.

  The bastards made their move as the Boeing crossed over the southwestern Caribbean. Two planes came for him at high speed, tickling the 777’s identifier. As they came on, he told Gerrias and Mayo to hold their course.

  He pulled Hawk One and Hawk Two closer to the 777, nearly touching the big plane’s wing. They would be invisible to the interceptors’ radar, but not their eyes.

  If the enemy approached within visual distance, he would kill them.

  “Brazilian Air 43, please identify your aircraft type and specify your cargo,” said an American voice.

  Gerrias answered as they had rehearsed—a benign cargo flight carrying medical supplies. The flight would appear on the international registries, synching with their IDs.

  There were two planes, F- l 6’s.

  He would roll out from under Hawkmother as they approached. The only possible attack would be head-on.

  Climb with the gates flooded, cannons blazing.

  Madrone’s body relaxed. He waited, absorbing the sky around him, feeling the vibration of the wind buffeting off the wings of the Boeing above him.

  The interceptors acknowledged Gerrias’s transmission. They continued toward them, closing to within eight miles, seven.

  Then they turned northward, pretending to be satisfied with the explanation.

  He avoided the temptation to go after them.

  “They’re gone,” said Mayo finally.

  “No,” Madrone replied. “They trail behind still. Be alert.”

  “Yes, Commander,” said the copilot.

  They would never rest now that he had killed Glavin. Colonel Glavin had been the jaguar. Such a clever bastard—he’d pretended to be so concerned about Christina, apologizing after denying Kevin leave to go to the X-ray session that afternoon.

  “If only I’d known what it was for,” Glavin had lied. “Why didn’t you say so? Kevin, all you have to do is ask.”

  The bastard. He had set everything up. That very day he’d suggested Livermore and the experimental treatment facility connected to the lab. He’d done it all so smoothly, so matter-of-factly, that Madrone had been bamboozled.

  Maybe Christina hadn’t even had the cancer until then. How clever these bastards were.

  Eventually, they would get him. But not before he made them bleed.

  Aboard Galatica

  7 March, 1545

  “TWO DEGREES DUE SOUTH. WE’RE STILL SEVENTY-FIVE miles behind,” Jeff told Breanna.

  “F-16’s have broken off,” said Chris.

  “Copy.”

  “They didn’t get close enough for a visual,” added the copilot. “But the identification checked out.”

  “Yeah, I know, I heard the whole thing,” said Zen. The F-16’s had flown south out of Texas, and were at the edge of their range when Jeff finally managed to vector them toward the Boeing. Since there was no way to protect the radio transmission, Zen hadn’t told them more than absolutely necessary—the plane flying south had to be identified.

  If he’d ordered them to shoot it down, they wouldn’t have. No Air Force pilot in his right mind would target what seemed to be a civilian plane—hell, even a military plane—without serious authorization. Even then, most would hesitate unless they had some clear indication that the plane was a threat and the order lawful.

  Jeff didn’t have the authority to give the order. Colonel Bastian had authorized them to trail Hawkmother and find its location; nothing more. The colonel had boarded Raven and sent a message that he would rally other forces to help. But they were so far away from Bastian that they couldn’t directly communicate; unlike Raven, Gal lacked a SATCOM system.

  “Where the hell do you think he’s going?” Breanna asked more than an hour later as they continued southward, heading for Panama.

  “Damned if I know,” said Jeff. “I thought Cuba, but he should have cut east by now.”

  “How’s your fuel situation?” Breanna asked.

  “You’re reading my mind. Let’s tank while he’s flying a straight line.”

  They refueled as quickly as possible, but still fell gradually behind as Hawkmother continued onward, making landfall over Cartagena in Colombia. Flying at forty thousand feet, the stealthy Galatica and her Flighthawks
passed undetected by the local air defense and civilian radars.

  “We’re not going to be able to follow him indefinitely,” Breanna said as they approached Colombia, “especially not at this speed.”

  “We should be able to tank off someone in Panama.”

  “Negative,” Bree told him. “There are no tankers available. Chris already checked. No tankers, no fighters. We’re trying to get somebody out of Texas. I’d like to check back with the colonel as well. We haven’t heard from him in a while.”

  “He said we might not.” Jeff saw the 777’s image start to blink—the plane was diving toward the ground.

  “Maybe we can turn this over to one of the—”

  “Bree—hold on.” Jeff stared at the radar; Hawkmother had disappeared. “I’ve lost him.”

  He returned the Flighthawks to computer control, directing them into Trail One, then tried to work out the spot where Hawkmother had disappeared. Chris, working with the GPS and the CD map library, pinpointed the spot as a pass in the mountains just beyond the Orinco River in central Venezuela.

  “No airport there,” said Chris.

  “I don’t know that he landed; I think he just dropped closer to the mountains,” said Jeff. “Hold this course, Bree.”

  With no way to refine the powerful radar in Gal’s belly, Jeff decided he would use the Flighthawks as scouts, scouring the river valley and mountains. It was difficult, however, to fly both planes and still look at the T/APY; its plot took up too much space in the viewer and he could only toggle it in and out. He accelerated the U/MFs into a spread formation at Mach 1.2, gradually swinging them apart. Their optical viewers showed only a thick cloud deck until he dropped below five thousand feet at the very edge of his communication range.

  Beautiful country. No airport, no Boeing.

  He knew Kevin was out here. He’d get him back—then they’d get ANTARES back on track. And then he’d have his legs again.

  “Hawk Four disconnect in zero-three—” warned C3.

  “Zen, we’re going to have to get approval from the colonel to land in Panama or someplace if we can’t arrange a tanker,” Breanna told him.

  “We’ve come too far to lose him now,” Jeff said, dropping his speed and nudging the U/MFs a little higher, strengthening the connection. “Give me more speed.”

  “We only have enough fuel for two more hours of flying time. And that’s stretching it. We have to talk to Colonel Bastian.”

  “We can land without approval,” he said.

  “Jeff, that’s not the point.”

  “Just do what you’re told, Captain,” he barked.

  She didn’t answer.

  He toggled the radar screen back. Maybe something, seventy miles ahead, almost in Brazil. Very low.

  “Stay on course,” he told Rap.

  “Gal.”

  She was trying to sabotage him, though. Chris was trying to raise Southern Command.

  Why?

  He was being paranoid. They were trying to find a tanker.

  “Bree,” he said, flipping on the interphone. “Listen. I didn’t mean to snap at you.”

  “We’re on course, Major,” she said sharply. “Brazilian border in zero-six minutes.”

  The Boeing disappeared again. He jumped back in Hawk Three, skimming along the rugged terrain. The 777 needed a good-sized runway to land; it ought to be easy to spot.

  Nothing.

  Flight of F-5Es approaching from the east. FAB interceptors, Brazilian Air Force. Approximately fifty miles away, they were most likely patrolling the border, looking for smugglers. They weren’t quite on an intercept, but would draw within five miles in three minutes. Their APQ-153 radars could detect a standard fighter at about twenty miles; the Megafortress and her brood would be invisible to the radar until well within visual distance.

  The 777, on the other hand, ought to be on their screens already.

  “Rap, there’s a group of FAB F-5’s flying near their border to the east of us. They’re about fifty miles away. What do you think about hailing them to see if they’ve spotted Kevin?”

  “Gal,” she snapped, still plenty pissed.

  Breanna was right about the fuel. Maybe they could use the base of the F-5’s.

  If Bastian approved. They’d have to get his okay. Breanna was right about that.

  The Boeing flitted into the corner of the radar plot. He’d turned ten degrees north.

  Where was he going?

  BREANNA TOLD CHRIS TO GIVE THE FAB FLIGHT THE Boeing’s course even though they did not immediately acknowledge.

  “Maybe they don’t speak English,” said Chris when they still didn’t respond.

  “You speak Spanish?”

  “Portuguese,” he said. “No. Hold on.” He leaned to one side, putting both hands over his helmet as if that might somehow make the transmission clearer. “Repeat?” he asked.

  “What’s up?” Breanna asked.

  “F-5’s are challenging us,” Chris told her. He turned toward the multi-use display at the far right of his dash. “Shit. They’re trying to tickle the ident gear.”

  “Activate it. Standard mode,” said Breanna. The Megafortress’s friend-or-foe identifier could be manipulated from the dash. Standard mode presented Gal as a B-52G.

  “Still not acknowledging. Ten miles off, nine, eight,” said Chris. “Should be within visual range, but I can’t pick up any lights.”

  “Can they see us?” Breanna asked.

  “I think it’d be kind of hard, even with this bright moon,” said Chris. “But they know we’re here. They’re correcting, maybe coming on our radio signal. I’m going to try and hail them again.”

  Breanna started to answer, but Chris cut her off. “Shit—they’re charging their weapons. Shit—I think those idiots think we’re Hawkmother. They want to shoot us down.”

  Aboard Hawkmother

  Over Northwestern Brazil

  7 March, 2220 local (1820 Dreamland)

  “YOU WERE RIGHT, CAPTAIN,” THE F-5E PILOT TOLD Madrone. “We have the B-52 in range. He has two escorts.”

  A B-52? The plane must actually be a Megafortress, with two Flighthawks.

  So Jeff had finally shown his true colors.

  “Shoot him down,” Madrone said. “Ignore the escorts—they are unarmed.”

  “Captain?”

  “Ignore them. They’ll flail at you but they won’t strike.”

  “Understood.”

  Aboard Galatica

  7 March, 2223

  ZEN SLAMMED THE FLIGHTHAWKS AROUND, CURSING himself for concentrating so hard on finding the Boeing that he had left their flanks uncovered. There was no reason for the damn Brazilians to attack—but here they were, pedals to the metal, slashing in.

  He tucked Hawk Four into a dive as she came out of her turn, building back her momentum. C3 took Three in trail as he slammed forward, trying to get between the Tigers and Galatica. He had no shells in his cannon, but he activated the targeting radars anyway, figuring that even the limited avionics in the F-5Es would realize they were being cued for a shot.

  Hopefully, that would make the pilots break off, or at least concentrate on the U/MFs.

  Of course, it might only make them mad. The lead plane didn’t seem to be turning, even though Jeff was homing in on his nose.

  THE NEED TO STAY CLOSE TO THE FLIGHTHAWKS CUT down on Breanna’s options, and her fuel situation would make a rip-roaring climb to sixty thousand feet a Pyrrhic victory. Besides, they’d never outrun the Brazilians’ missiles.

  “Their weapons are charged!” warned Chris. “Still not acknowledging our hails.”

  “Trying to wave them off,” said Zen.

  “Hang with me, Hawk Leader,” she said, punching the plane into a sharp roll as the first two-ship of Tiger IIs came on.

  “They’re going to send the second wave onto our tails as we turn,” warned Chris.

  If Gal had been armed, that would have been fatal for the Tiger IIs—the Megafortress’s Stin
ger air mines would have turned them into flying spaghetti. But with no weapons and no diversionary flares, Breanna had only her wits and the EB-52’s ability to zig in the air going for her.

  She flailed left as one of the Tiger IIs closed to range for a heat-seeker. The Megafortress wallowed a little, held back by the trim flaps that compensated for T/APY’s rotation momentum.

  “Power down the T/APY,” she told Chris.

  “Powering down.”

  “Shit!”

  Breanna looked up to see the nose of an F-5E looming in her windscreen. She plunged right, trying to swirl into a controlled roll, but briefly lost the plane as the wings inverted.

  “Missiles in the air,” said Chris.

  His voice was so calm she knew they were going to get hit.

  IF EITHER OF THE HAWKS HAD BEEN CARRYING ammunition, Zen would have made short work of all four F-5’s. But the pilots seemed to know that he was unarmed, and paid no attention to him even as he dove for them. Hawk Three closed on one of the F-5Es as it spun toward the rear of the Megafortress. He saw its cannon begin to flash, and pushed Three close enough to break the cockpit glass in two, slamming his stick with a flare of body English to hold on to the Flighthawk. The Brazilian plane pirouetted away, breaking up: C3 said Hawk Three had not suffered any damage.

  As he swung toward the F-5E’s wing mate, Zen was pitched sideways by gravity. Breanna swirled the EB-52 into a hard spin trying to escape a fresh attack.

  “Tell them we’re not Madrone,” Zen said.

  “I’m fucking trying,” said Chris.