Legend egt-2

by David L. Golemon

  Jack quickly ran to the case and opened it. The brightly glowing numbers were still locked at thirty minutes. He reached down, pulled his knife from its scabbard, and was about to smash the readout face, stopping the timer forever, when a stray bullet hit the case in the side. A momentary array of sparks shot from the housing of the weapon. Now a second set of numbers appeared to the right of the minutes. The seconds started tumbling down as the minutes digits went to twenty-nine. The countdown had been activated. The designers of the weapon had placed a fail-safe in the warhead that would not allow an enemy to try to destroy it by doing what had just happened. A bullet in the case would start any command previously placed into the central computer.

  The major quickly rolled away from the case and gained his feet as the Colombians stopped firing at the animal and turned their weapons on him. Rounds ricocheted off the floor and walls as Jack ran toward the waiting boat. As he did, he gathered up an XM-8 and quickly fired into the stone-faced dam that held the flow of water at bay. The bullets struck, producing nothing but chips at first, then as the magazine of the XM-8 emptied the stone with the large handle in it cracked and disintegrated. Then, in quick succession, the dam split inside the wall and a torrent of water escaped into the canal system.

  Farbeaux watched in horror as the first wave of water smashed into the aluminum case before it reached the canal. The weapon was washed away and was carried by the rush of the water into the canal ahead of the Americans as they shoved off in one of the boats.

  Jack jumped into the boat with the fourteen people inside, and of course he fell on Jenks, who screamed out in pain.

  "I can't take any more of these roller-coaster rides!" Jenks yelled as the students around him yelled in terror. The large treasure boat sped into the main shaft and disappeared into the darkness.

  BRASILIA CAPITAL OF BRAZIL

  The Brazilian military chief of staff hung up the phone. He stood and paced to the open window of his residence. The man he had just spoken to had called his private line. His soul had been sold to the devil, the American who would soon become the president of the United States. His future was being planned by others outside of his country. But the deal he had made with the foreign devil was struck, and he had to keep his word. Now there was a supplemental order to the one that sent fifty mercenaries into the valley to stop the American rescue effort — he had to kill to protect his assault force.

  He walked back to the nightstand, picked up the phone, and called the Forca Aerea Brasileira (FAB), the Brazilian Air Force; he said he wanted fighters scrambled immediately. He gave the duty officer the orders and the coordinates that had been given to him by his American caller. That done, he placed the phone in its cradle and then picked up the presidential line, to inform the president that the airspace above Brazil was being invaded by military forces of the United States and that he was duty bound to shoot them down.

  ANAPOLIS AIR FORCE BASE BRAZIL

  Two Dassault Mirage 200 °C fighters lifted into the sky and headed west. Used to attacking ground targets consisting of production and distribution sites for the cocaine trade, the two pilots were stunned to learn they had been ordered to intercept and down an aircraft that had been identified as a civilian airliner that had invaded Brazilian airspace. It wasn't until ten minutes after they went to afterburner that they were informed by the chief of staff personally that the invader in question was actually a military variant of the American Boeing 747, and that the aircraft's intentions were hostile.

  THE WHITE HOUSE

  The president had been upstairs with the First Lady, awaiting any word from Nevada, when the national security advisor called. The president went downstairs in his white shirt and went directly to Ambrose's office in the West Wing, but was met by him in the hallway before he could reach the office.

  "Mr. President, maybe you'd better inform me what operation is running in Brazil, since it seems to no longer be a secret."

  "What do you mean?" he asked as he took a piece of paper from Ambrose.

  "The Brazilian Air Force has scrambled two Mirage fighters, and they are heading in a westerly direction. Fort Huachuca in Arizona has picked up radio chatter that says they have orders to shoot down a 747 overflying their airspace with hostile intent."

  The president read the handwritten note Ambrose had jotted down while talking with the intelligence-gathering station in Arizona. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath.

  "Get me the secretary of state."

  "He's already on the line, sir."

  The president walked past Ambrose and into his office. He picked up the receiver and the secretary was waiting.

  "Get to the presidential residence and get him to rescind that order, now!" the president said angrily, not bowing to diplomatic formality. His patience was starting to wear thin after hours of consoling his wife about their daughter.

  "Mr. President, Brazil insists it has every right to down that aircraft, and will do so if it doesn't turn away from their airspace."

  "To hell with it. Tell him that aircraft is there to suppost a rescue operation and has no intention of harming any Brazilian nationals. They are support only."

  "I will try once again to get through," the secretary lied. He knew the president had ordered the fighter groups onboard Nimitz and John C. Stennis to stand down and and that they should in no way come to the aid of Proteus.

  The president hung up the phone and addressed Ambrose. "How did the Brazilian Air Force get the information on Proteus?"

  "The weapons platform?" Ambrose asked, acting innocent of the knowledge.

  "Someone passed them information. Find out who, and do it yesterday! Also, get me a direct line to COMMSURPAC; I can't leave them boys hanging out there with nothing to protect them."

  Ambrose had never seen the man lose his temper before. He watched as the president turned and walked quickly to the Oval Office. If he called in protection for Proteus, there would be hell to pay, and their tracks would be covered by an overt act of war.

  Ambrose relaxed as he saw the secretary's makeshift plan take shape.

  BLACK WATER TRIBUTARY

  Newly appointed Second Lieutenant Will Mendenhall swallowed when he adjusted the magnification on his night-vision scope. Ten Zodiac-type rubber rafts entered the lagoon on the opposite side of the falls from where he had set up position. He removed his right hand and shook it, trying to get some feeling back into it after the long climb up the side of the falls. He had used the rough-hewn archway that covered the falls most of the way, and then he had to use the natural features of the terrain to ascend the rest. His hands had been severely cut and scraped from the jagged rocks and bushes. But he had finally made it only five minutes before he spied the first boat. He lowered the goggles and looked at his watch; it was 0515 in the morning. He hoped Ryan was in place, or else the team below in the mine was about to have a shitload of company. Neither Night Rider nor the major had answered his first three calls.

  Mendenhall quickly removed the radio from his belt and made sure the frequency was set on channel 78, and then he took a deep breath.

  "Night Rider, Night Rider, this is Conquistador, do you copy? Over!"

  OPERATION SPOILED SPORT SOMEWHERE OVER BRAZIL

  The converted 747–400 was cruising at twenty-eight thousand feet in clear skies. The pilot had been on the radio for the past hour talking with the Brazilian civil authorities and explaining that they had rudder difficulties and were circling while their flight engineer checked out their hydraulic systems. They were screaming bloody murder but what else could they do, allow an air cargo plane for an influential international company like Federal Express to crash because they couldn't allow some extra time over their airspace?

  Inside technicians were cursing and shouting at one another as they furiously worked on the system that wasn't supposed to be fully operational for three more years. The megawatt-class, high-energy chemical oxygen iodine laser system had malfunctioned four different times that day,
causing fires in two of those incidents.

  Ryan was watching the fiasco develop alongside two of his six-man Delta team when an air force major tapped him on the shoulder.

  "We have Conquistador on the horn; he's asking for Night Rider One," the major said over the noise in the cargo bay.

  Ryan nodded and followed him. "Tell those monkeys they're on," he said to the Delta sergeant, indicating the laser technicians. "And remind them that American lives are at stake."

  Ryan entered a separate area that was closed off and quiet. He leaned over the radio operator's ejection seat, careful to avoid the ejection handle looped at the top. He picked up a headset and pushed the button on the long cord.

  "Conquistador, this is Night Rider actual, over."

  "Night Rider, we have bandits approaching our pos, are you tracking, over."

  Ryan leaned over and whispered to the satellite officer, a lieutenant colonel who was looking at a real-time infrared image downloaded from Boris and Natasha.

  "We currently count fifty-four targets and ten craft. The information has already been fed to the targeting computer," the lieutenant colonel said.

  "Roger, Conquistador, we are tracking, over."

  "Start the music, Night Rider, they are in our laps. Operation Spoiled Sport is on! Execute, execute, execute!"

  Ryan knew it was Will Mendenhall on the radio so he decided to chance it. "Conquistador, you find a safe location. I don't trust this thing. Over."

  "Been warned already, Night Rider, just get the bad guys. Conquistador is beating feet. Out."

  Ryan nodded to the lieutenant colonel who was in charge of the operation and also that of targeting. His system relied on Boris and Natasha, whose infrared cameras locked onto the ring of balloon-carried heat emitters that circled the lagoon. Once that location and exact coordinates were fed into the targeting data, the KH-11 locked in on the individual heat sources of the men inside that target area or, more precisely, their body heat. The chemical oxygen iodine laser (COIL) would use the reaction of chlorine gas with liquid basic hydrogen peroxide to produce electronically excited gas-phase oxygen molecules. The oxygen would then transfer its energy to iodine atoms, which would emit radiation at 1.315 microns, producing a beam that would cleanly slice through solid steel. Assuming it worked.

  The lieutenant colonel alerted the laser technicians — who actually worked for Northrop-Grumman — to activate in thirty seconds. Then he casually adjusted the mirror based inside the open barrel to disperse fifty-four separate high-energy beams that would target even moving objects — the mirror would separate and bounce the one main beam and split it into the individual killing lasers — all in theory, of course.

  "Stand by to initiate," he said into his headset.

  Ryan frowned as he watched the targets getting closer to the falls. "Stand by to initiate" usually meant "stand by with the fire extinguishers," he thought, as he closed his eyes in silent prayer for his friends.

  Outside of the command center, the power grid went to maximum as the main generators kicked in. They reached 100 percent power without exploding, at least this time. At the same time on the targeting screen, ten illuminated circles centered around each individual target on the surface of the lagoon.

  Outside the 747, a large port spiraled open fifteen feet below the cockpit. The pilot closed a specially made blind that would protect them from the intense light that would escape the port just feet from where he and his copilot sat.

  "Stand by, system at one hundred three percent power and targets are acquired. FIRE COIL!"

  Jason Ryan flinched as nothing happened.

  "Wasn't there supposed to be a power surge about right now?" he shouted angrily.

  Outside the soundproof cabin and in the cockpit, the pilot saw thirteen alarms all start flashing at once. The red blinking lights showed power loss in the 747's main power systems. The four massive engines were powering down as if the pilot had slid the throttles back, and the nose of the giant 747–400 started dipping. The pilot immediately announced an emergency.

  Ryan held onto one of the computer consoles and threw off his headset.

  "Goddammit! We're going to lose people down there!"

  The lieutenant colonel in charge of the COIL called, "We're about to lose the aircraft, Mr. Ryan!"

  "This piece of shit needs to be lost! Goddamned technology, we can make fantastic video games but we can't get one piece of military hardware to work as fucking designed!"

  Ryan's words were drowned out by the whine as the giant Boeing aircraft started to fall out of the sky.

  * * *

  Mendenhall was about to try the radio to raise Ryan again when suddenly the night around him lit up with large-caliber tracer fire from the lagoon. Someone in one of the Zodiacs had caught him on night-vision. Fifty-caliber rounds struck the rocks and bushes around him as he raised his nine-millimeter with one hand and tried the radio with the other. He fired down into the lagoon as he attempted to raise Night Rider.

  * * *

  Ryan was holding onto the same console, only now it was at an angle that clearly said the 747 was heading for the deck. He was calm as he had been though a similar situation before during his last days in the navy. You just had to know how to handle it, he thought.

  One of the Northrop-Grumman technicians in the bay knew what had happened. He suspected it during the last test and was prepared for it. The main command console was patched into the Boeing power grid and when the targeting computer sent the command electronically to the COIL itself, the entire system shorted out. He pulled open the panel and found the wires he needed, and jerked on them. They came free and then he pulled the command wire and routed it through another power circuit. He quickly reattached the cockpit throttle input cable. Immediately, he was rewarded with the increasing whine of the four General Electric engines as they sparked back up to full power. The technician leaned over and struck the intercom.

  "Power restored to aircraft systems. Power restored to COIL targeting!" The tech slid down along one of the interior bulkheads. Man, are heads going to roll when they find out they had routed one of the weapons systems through the platform power systems. Shit!

  Ryan felt the nose come up as the power from the engines clearly indicated they were once again climbing.

  "Rider, we're taking heavy fire, over!" Ryan finally heard Mendenhall's firm but harried call.

  He was about to initiate the order to fire once again when the radar intercept officer at the front of the 747 called over the headsets: "We have two inbound bogies at fifty miles and closing fast. They snuck up on us. They're squawking Brazilian Air Force and they are ordering us out of their airspace or they will open fire."

  "Time to firing sequence on Proteus?" Ryan asked loudly into the radio.

  "Five minutes to bring up power," the lieutenant colonel said as he quickly retargeted the scattered boats.

  "Damn it, we'll be a fireball in two minutes!"

  * * *

  The two Mirage 2000 fighters finally saw the anticollision lights of the 747 after the giant plane made a sudden dive for the jungle below. They adjusted their pattern to take up station one mile behind the large jet. The lead fighter armed his weapons. His orders were clear: down the Americans.

  He used his thumb to select his weapon, two South African-made MAA-1 Piranhas, a short-range air-to-air missile relying on infrared passive guidance, which seeks the target's heat emissions coming primarily from the engines. He immediately received guidance lock from the seeker heads of the two missiles themselves, which were poised on the launch rails beneath both wings just waiting for the electrical signal that would send them on their deadly way.

  * * *

  "Goddammit, they have missile lock on us, Ryan!" the pilot called over the radio.

  "I don't give a damn, we have our orders! Now get us back into position and fire the damned weapon before we lose those people down there!"

  * * *

  The Brazilian fighter pilots wer
e relieved to see the giant aircraft start a slow turn back to the east. Then they watched and followed the 747, hoping they were about to leave the area from the direction they had come. They didn't know it was only starting to make a long and slow circle as their targets were reacquired. When the lead pilot saw they were commencing another attack run, he became angered at the perceived deception and quickly spurred the French-built fighter back into its optimum firing position. He knew the 747 was ten minutes away from a sure death as it slowly turned.

  THE WHITE HOUSE

  Ambrose nodded to the Secret Service agent outside the Oval Office and then walked in. The president was standing at his desk with his hands placed firmly on its top.

  "What's happening?"

  The president didn't answer. He was looking down in thought as the muscles in his jaw were clenching and unclenching. Then the phone buzzed.

  "The president of Brazil is returning your call," his secretary said from the outer office.

  "Mr. President, what are you doing?" Ambrose asked nervously.

  "Something I should have done from the beginning," he said as he picked up the phone.

  Ambrose froze. The man was calling the president of Brazil personally, circumventing the secretary of state.

  "Mr. President, thank you for taking my call. I need to ask you to stand down your forces. The aircraft in question is on a mission to support a rescue operation only. There is no hostile intent on their part."

  Ambrose slowly tossed a file folder on the coffee table in the front of one of the couches and sat. He closed his eyes as he felt his career, even his freedom, slipping out of his grasp.

  "Yes, Secretary Nussbaum has undoubtedly explained to you the circumstances surrounding the—"

  The president fell silent as the conversation became one-sided. He listened intently for three minutes and then angrily pounded his fist on his desk. He thanked the president of Brazil and hung up. He then pressed the button on his intercom. "Get me Admiral Handley at COMSURPAC headquarters in Pearl Harbor, now!"