The 5th Amulet

by SJ Hailey

  Katherine could see the E3 just on the edge of its sensor range, and hoped that the storm would hide her for now, but she doubted it.

  ‘We have to leave, before that E3 brings down F16’s on our position.’

  Jacob agreed and La gente de la luz azul, Kevin and Katherine all secured themselves in the seats, when Katherine heard a voice.

  ‘Can you hear me enemy aircraft?’

  On the co-pilots seat was a radio, with an unfamiliar voice calling, Katherine pressed talk, ‘Who is this?’

  ‘I am Mr Jones, and I am very close.’

  Katherine went to start her engines, but the voice told her not too.

  ‘No, no Katherine, look at your rotors you will find I have left you a gift.’

  Katherine looked out to the side and back, and could see three small packages on the starboard nacelle, explosives she presumed.

  ‘If you wanted us dead Mr Jones, you would have blown these, what do you want?’

  ‘The amulets and instructions on their use, please.’

  ‘These bloody amulets, they are a blessing and a curse.’

  ‘I am sure they are, but I would like to decide that for myself please.’

  ‘How long do I have?’

  ‘Five minutes, then I detonate and get them anyway, blowing off your wings and any fuel you have left.’

  Katherine moved back to inform the group, Jacob knew something was wrong.

  ‘Jones has placed explosives on the engines, crude but effective. Says he will blow them if we do not give him the amulets.’

  ‘Well you know that’s not going to happen.’

  ‘Yes I do, but we need to get out of here.’

  ‘Can we disarm the bombs?’

  Katherine opened the side door, and walked over to the starboard nacelle, the radio clipped on her belt. She looked up at the improvised devices, just demolition blocks with a remote trigger; he had stuck them directly onto the rotors with double-sided tape. Her radio clicked, ‘Please do not touch them; I would like to avoid further loss of life.’

  Katherine knew he could not be in the jungle, too close, she looked around and saw the tell-tale spec of black near the surrounding mountains. She pulled up her binoculars and focussed on the object, seeing an attack helicopter hovering at some distance.

  ‘Hello Katherine, yes I can see you.’

  Katherine waved and re-entered the Osprey, addressing the group, ‘He is in a helicopter some miles away, but has line of sight. I suspect he cannot operate the weapons systems, otherwise he would have used them to threaten us, not improvised explosives.’

  ‘How far away is he?’

  ‘What you thinking Jacob?’

  ‘Is he closer to that E3 than us?’

  ‘Yes probably, and he is airborne, even with the dissipating storm, he will light up their threat displays.’

  ‘So we wait?’

  ‘We have maybe three minutes, then he will set them off. Of course, that’s if he can get a signal through.’

  Katherine went back to the cockpit, taking Jacob with her.

  Jones was comfortable flying the helicopter, but had no idea how to operate the weapons systems, concerned he would shoot himself down. He had quickly assembled the explosives on Katherine’s aircraft, using a crude detonator, a radio transmitter given him by Enzi, short range, but he had altitude for insurance. He had flown basic helicopters, the civilian ones he used in his country, but nothing like this. The threat control panel lit up, indicating an approaching airplane at high altitude to the west. He could not decipher the information it was delivering on the threat, but knew that it was heading in his direction. He radioed his quarry, ‘Come on Katherine, time is moving on, and I need an answer now, either yes or no.’

  He got no reply just static, he focused his binoculars on the plane, and could see Jacob Mathias dismantling his bombs, without hesitation he pressed the trigger.

  The E3 Sentry was truly omnificent, all vehicles and aircraft in motion for a two hundred mile diameter were visible to it. From the trucks moving along the treacherous jungle highways, to the combat helicopter hovering to their East, all were plotted with speed, direction, and threat assessment. The aircraft on the ground was showing cold, but the helicopter was identified as a KA52 Alligator, and was definitely not a civilian aircraft. The E3 crew were monitoring the radio transmissions and had not yet identified the pilot of the helicopter, but were cautious to approach within range of his weapons.

  They had standing orders they were not to attack any targets unless it was a direct threat to them, or authority had been granted from US Southern Command. The storm was still in the area, and provided an unusual amount of radio and sensor interference was also caused the pilot some issues. He was concerned that a lightning strike would irreparably damage his combat capacity, despite being protected against EMP and other potential threats. After gaining instructions from USSOUTHCOM, and his assessment of the situation, the aircraft redirected one of its two armed drones to investigate.

  The SVELTE drone was forty feet long, with a seventy foot wingspan, driven by a General Electric J97-GE-3-100 engine, officially scrapped by NASA after the cancelling of the Compass Arrow UAV program some years before. However very sensibly rather than waste the substantial investment in the engines, they stored them, and re-assigned them to the USAF Project SVELTE. The drone carried a large amount of analytical avionics to allow remote monitoring, this occupied one of its two weapons bays. The other bay was armed with AGM 114P Hellfire II missiles designed specifically for UAV use. The reliable AIM-9 Sidewinder air to air missile for direct threats and defence, and due to its low level functionality flare dispensers should a heat seeking missile be launched against it.

  The cost of the UAV was substantially less than a F16, and the risk to pilot was non-existent; they could also stay airborne for almost a day without refuelling. The UAV extended its wings, changing from the diamond shape to a more conventional wing design. It dropped from the wing of the E3, its engine idling until it reached safe distance, then the pilot sitting comfortably in the E3 operation centre banked and throttled up, accelerating to the target area. The pilot used standard controls copied from an F16 cockpit; however the instrumentation was substantially different. The vehicle was fitted with sensors designed to penetrate the heavy foliage of the area, something that Jacob and his team were not aware of.

  Jacob strode out to the nacelle, Katherine led the way, checking for tripwires and other booby traps Jones may have placed. Seeing none Katherine climbed onto Jacob’s shoulders and up onto the wing of the Osprey, walking down the leading edge to the port nacelle. While parked the rotors were locked for vertical take-off, as they would impact the ground in forward position. The three bombs were placed in the centre of the blade, probably where Jones could quickly and easily reach. They were linked in series; three detonators to one trigger, Katherine confidently reached over to the obvious trigger wire to cut it.

  Jones pressed the trigger again, and saw no explosion from the aircraft. Frustrated he pressed the trigger harder, hoping to kill all those below. He was prepared to risk the amulets surviving the explosion; they had been through storms, ice and fire already.

  Katherine quickly disarmed the booby trap, and tossed the explosives down to Kevin.

  ‘Nice job blocking his trigger signal Katherine!’

  ‘I knew that the electronic counter measures I had on board, were designed to block signals that may detect us, so I just rigged it to block everything around us.’

  ‘Stopping him from triggering the bombs?’

  ‘Apparently it worked!’

  ‘What do you mean apparently? You didn’t know for sure?’

  ‘You taught me nothing is for sure, so I took a gamble.’

  ‘Remind me not to play poker with you.’

  ‘Ah really, I could do with the extra cash.’

  Kevin laughed, carefully placing the explosives on the ground, while Katherine walked carefully over to the starbo
ard nacelle to disarm the other device.

  Jones put the helicopter into a shallow dive, he could not arm the missiles, but he knew that the 30mm machine gun under the nose would tear into the lightly armoured Osprey with consummate ease. He flicked up the master arm on the joystick, and selected high explosive fragmentation ammunition, as opposed to the armour piercing, wanting to cause the maximum amount of damage to the people as well as the aircraft. He was over six kilometres away, and after firing an opening burst, realised that he was out of range.

  The E3 Sentry saw the first burst of fire from the Alligator helicopter, and it’s intended but failed target below. The operator of the armed drone, marked on his screen that the helicopter was now a threat, and what action to take. The E3 carried two such drones, their official name was SVELTE, but the crew gave them call sign Raider One and Raider Two. The vehicle was on test with USSOUTHCOM testing sensors and tactical surveillance capability in a hostile environment, the rainforest is not forgiving.

  Jones closed on the Osprey, firing as he did so, but still just out of range, the bullets hit the ground with substantially reduced momentum. His anger was overriding his sense as he advanced on the stationary aircraft, had he used his binoculars he would have seen the nacelles and rotors turning.

  Raider One was fully online and feeding real-time data to the team on-board the E3, showing the helicopter, and now where a group of people had walked through the cold rain soaked jungle, their heated footprints still showing on the surrounding cooler land. The Osprey began to light up as the engines warmed, and the cluster of people now on-board gave a clear heat signature. Raider One automatically identified what it perceived to be a threat, but could not fire without pilot authority, the descending helicopter was the primary target. The Osprey was emitting a known signal identifying it as a Special ops aircraft.

  Katherine had re-enabled the transponder in the aircraft, it had been turned off by Mastasson to prevent identification of his stolen equipment, but now Katherine needed everyone to know exactly what and who the Osprey was. She got the engines to full speed and launched as the first bullets from Jones hit the ground as he came into lethal range.

  Jones could see the Osprey about to launch and fired another volley at the unarmed aircraft, and then after a few seconds it stopped. The display flashing red on the weapons panel showed no ammunition, he had expired all four hundred and sixty rounds in his frustration.

  Katherine rotated the nacelles for horizontal flight, and turned the aircraft to fly low hard and fast towards the sea, it was faster than the Alligator, she just had to get up to speed before he could catch her. Her threat warning was sounding again, and the instruments showed a small high-speed aircraft coming in behind and below Jones.

  Jones could see the Osprey accelerating, and knew he had to stop them, he had missiles, just how to use them? He began trial and error pushing of buttons to arm all of them, any of them, just stop that plane. He did not see Raider One coming up below him, exploiting his blind spot.

  The E3 pilot had seen the Osprey beginning to outrun the attack helicopter, but he knew one missile launch at close range could down the Osprey it was pursuing. He had already requested authority to fire, stating that the helicopter was threatening a known US aircraft. ‘Confirmed, Raider One permission to fire on hostile.’

  The operator of Raider One responded and ordered the drone to fire on its intended target.

  Jones found the button he was looking for, and the display showed the air-to-air missile was armed, he manoeuvred the helicopter to lock it onto the Osprey, but it was not easy.

  Katherine was turning the Osprey as best she could, it was manoeuvrable but she missed her Apache, she would have already looped back on the amateur pilot and shredded him and his aircraft. She was working on all countermeasures to ensure that Jones could not lock onto them, as he would figure out the weapons system soon enough. She could still see the smaller aircraft pursuing Jones and wondered why it had not fired.

  Raider One opened its weapon bay, the Sidewinder missile rotated around ready to launch, and fired. The smoke trail streaking away from the drone as it banked away from the target. The computer silently confident in the outcome, the pilot watched his sensors to confirm the kill.

  The Alligator was built for punishment, and had two engines spaced widely apart to take damage and survive. The sidewinder did not lock onto the engines, despite the heat signatures from them, the suppressors on the exhaust ports working effectively. However the cannon on the belly of the aircraft was still red hot from the continuous fire that Jones had performed, and the Sidewinder slamming into it in seconds.

  Jones saw the warning light briefly of the missile, but as he turned all he saw was the smoke trail behind him, and then the impact of the missile underneath him. Even with the heavy armour the helicopter was fitted with to survive ground fire, the damage was substantial. The helicopters sensor array, cannon and other instruments were destroyed, a small fire, but the aircraft was still airborne. Jones looked around trying to view his attacker, but nothing was visible. Presuming the missile had come from the Osprey he pressed the pursuit.

  Katherine had opened the rear hatch of the Osprey, the wind rushing in and blasting the occupants. She called over the intercom for them to open fire with the 50 cal. on the helicopter behind, as Jones closed on them. The team were taking aim, when they witnessed the missile hitting the underside of the aircraft. A shocked silence and then Debra opened fire, and they all followed suit.

  Jones did not know his canopy was built of armoured glass, so when the hail of small arms fire began to ricochet off the helicopter, he banked right and moved away from the Osprey, presuming that he could be damaged. Jones was wrong and instead moved into the path of the drone, which unleashed two more sidewinders both locked onto the fire beneath his feet.

  The Osprey continued to evade the Helicopter, but the team stopped firing as it banked away, and then gasped as the sidewinder hit the nose, and the front of the aircraft exploded in a ball of flame. It was not completely destroyed by the impact, but the front of it was pulled back, like a peeled banana, as it spun uncontrollably to the river below. It landed in the shallows, striking the riverbed, and the ruptured fuel tank igniting, sending a fireball out for hundreds of metres. Katherine knew she was safe and that the drone should leave them alone, and she turned back towards the complex.

  Raider One displayed that the threat was eliminated and the Osprey was turning back towards the land. The E3 had no orders regarding the CV22 and considered it not to be a threat, they were sure it was most likely a special ops team, and they were not involved so turned back towards base. Raider One accelerated and moved to join the surveillance giant, accompanying it back to base. The pilot of Raider One left it on automatic, the small drone would fly itself back to base, land and taxi to its hangar for analysis, he could get a cup of fresh ground Ecuador coffee.

  The E3 crew were unaware of the two men about to cause an almighty explosion a hundred miles away.

  FORTY SIX

  Jacob had seen the Osprey ascend rapidly into the sky, with the Alligator pursuing, he could hear the cannon fire as he ran through the undergrowth, back towards the complex. He knew Katherine would be able to deal with Mr Jones. She was an experienced combat pilot, easily outclassing the thug from Mabalia.

  Jacob climbed up the wall, his legs and arms aching, he was sure that he could skip the gym for a month after the workout of the past few days. He called out for Osvaldo Roderigo, confident that none of Mastasson’s goons remained to interfere. A response came and Osvaldo looked down from the top of the complex wall, ‘My friend why did you come?’

  ‘You want to protect this place, so do I.’

  Osvaldo Rodrigo waited for Jacob, getting his breath back, then both men strode down the inside wall with renewed intent, heading for the hatch.

  The hatch opened as before, and their necklaces protected them as they moved down into the black chamber. The humming that had b
een present before was absent, the complex no longer required to protect the world, for today. Osvaldo Roderigo moved down into the lower chamber, where Mastasson had placed himself, unwittingly saving Texas from a dire fate. The cylinder that had been elevated in the air above the floor, was now sitting on the centre of the walkway. On the top side, where no one could see when it was elevated was five holes, not similar to the others, but spread out around the edge.

  Osvaldo Roderigo approached the cylinder, placing his bag down on the ground, and began to place the four crystal amulets into the holes on the cylinder. He had placed the fourth one, pushing it home, and was turning to reach for the fifth, when something unexpected happened. Jacob could see the fourth amulet rising back out of the cylinder. Osvaldo Roderigo paused looking at the amulet, ‘Well that is unexpected, I am sure I put that in correctly.’

  ‘I am sure you did to, but I think it does not belong here.’

  ‘What do you mean Jacob?’

  ‘Could you pass it to me?’

  Osvaldo Roderigo extracted the amulet, and passed it across to Jacob, who squinted at the glyphs on the metalwork.

  ‘The symbols on this amulet, appear to be a different style to the others, the lines are more flowing. I cannot read them, but it is like handwriting from different cultures or times.’

  ‘Like the Chinese symbols, the Han dynasty and Ming dynasty styles?’

  ‘Exactly, same meaning, but executed in a different way.’

  Osvaldo Roderigo took the amulet and retried it in the cylinder, but again, it was pushed out.

  ‘Now what Jacob?’

  ‘Would you normally put the fifth amulet in place last?’

  ‘Yes but I am not sure this will work with one missing?’

  With a shrug Osvaldo Roderigo placed the fifth amulet into the central hole, holding it by the sides, and not the central bar. The cylinder accepted the amulet and it moved inside, and a seamless lid slid closed over the top, preventing removal.