“Lights!”
Danny heard the metallic percussion of a large electric switch and then a series of powerful fluorescent lights flickered on, flooding the interior with bluish white light. It took a few moments for his eyes to adjust to the change, but what came into focus was the polar opposite of the view outside. There was no hint of abandonment here; everything was clean and new. In the bright light the hangar looked even bigger than it had from the outside. It was clearly big enough to hold two stealth bombers.
“Gentlemen and Miss Navistrova, this is Romeo Seven,” said Colonel Walker with a grandiose wave of his hand. “I needn’t remind you of the sensitive nature of this facility, but I will anyway. This proving ground does not exist. You will all carry the knowledge of this place to your graves and beyond. If Saint Peter asks you about it at the Pearly Gates, you will deny everything. Is that clear?”
There were yes-sirs all around.
The colonel smiled. “Good, then let’s get started with the tour. Leave your gear here; we’ll come back and get it later.” He led them toward a large box painted on the floor of the hangar, a black outline with yellow hash marks. As they drew closer, Danny could make out a thin space cut in the floor along the edges. LIFT 3 was painted in the center.
“Everyone stand toward the center, please,” said Walker. “You don’t want to touch the sides as we go down; they’re covered in black grease that’ll never wash out of your clothes.” He pressed a button on a small pedestal and the lift jerked into motion.
Danny estimated that they’d traveled downward thirty feet before a small, underground world finally opened around them. None of them spoke. The revelation of a secret world demanded silent reverence.
“Back when the base was still called Biggs North One, Strategic Air Command built a large nuclear fallout shelter down here,” Walker explained, playing tour guide. “It has everything that a small force would need to survive for several years underground. There is a galley and dining facility with food and water storage. There are also medical facilities, and there used to be a small barracks, a jail, and a morgue. When the base was closed, some farsighted individual decided to capitalize on this Cold War relic and converted the space into a state-of-the-art testing facility.”
The group followed Colonel Walker off the elevator. Danny could see recognition in the faces of his engineers as they identified their individual workstations by familiarity with the equipment. The dominating feature of the room was a huge black screen on one wall. Large white polygon outlines covered the display and yellow and green symbols moved in and out of them. Danny watched the moving symbols, mesmerized, until the weight of a hand on his shoulder broke his awed stupor. He looked to his left and was surprised to see that the hand belonged to Amanda. She was trying to steady herself. She looked pale. “Are you all right?” he asked.
“Fine,” she replied. “I just stumbled a bit. It’s these new shoes.”
Danny looked down. The flats she wore looked well-worn.
“The screen to our right is called the TSD, or test situation display,” Colonel Walker continued. “We’ll track Dream Catcher and the mother ship from here using their GPS feeds. The polygons represent the boundaries of the restricted airspace. You can see several military aircraft operating there now, but I can assure you that not one of those pilots has ever heard of Romeo Seven, and we want to keep it that way. We can only operate when the airspace above us is clear, so we tend to work all night and sleep during the day.”
“Where exactly do we sleep?” asked Danny.
Walker led them past the screen and down a hallway. “There are no longer living quarters down here. For that you can take the tunnel under the flight line and then take lift one up to the barracks building. The quarters can hold thirty people. There are only two bathrooms, though, and Miss Navistrova gets one to herself.”
Cued by the comment, Danny glanced back at Amanda. A hint of perspiration glistened on her forehead. “You sure you’re okay?” he whispered.
“Of course I am. Leave me alone,” she whispered back.
When Walker finally dismissed them, the group surrounding Danny scattered, heading off to explore the facility, check out their workstations, or get topside and grab their gear. Only one other person remained. Amanda Navistrova stood motionless, her gaze lost in an endless void.
Danny touched her arm. “Hey, you don’t look so good. Tell me what’s going on. And don’t give me that shoe line again; I’m not buying it.”
Amanda winced. “Sorry, I didn’t want anyone to think I was the weak girl of the group.”
“We all know you too well to think of you as weak—or as a girl, for that matter.”
The joke bought him a thin smile. “Funny. The truth is I have a problem with small places.”
“Don’t be ridiculous, I’ve seen you work in much more cramped environments than this.”
“But none of those were thirty feet underground.” Amanda shuddered. “The thought of tons of dirt and concrete ready to collapse and bury me alive is almost unbearable. I don’t know if I can do this. What if I miss something and cost us a test? The colonel will have my job.”
“If you can overcome the tight, closed offices of Wright-Patterson, you can work in here.” Danny glanced back toward the control center. “Listen, I know enough to configure the propulsion station for you. Get your gear and then get to the topside living quarters. Call it a night . . . or day . . . whatever. I’ll cover for you.” He gave her a reassuring smile. “And don’t worry, you’re going to do fine.”
Amanda took his offer and headed for the hangar to get her luggage. Watching her go, the smile fell from Danny’s lips. He wondered if he’d have to bring in someone new to take her place.
Chapter 27
Whiteman Air Force Base, Missouri
04 January 2003
An unmarked C-21 Learjet rolled to a stop at the north end of Whiteman’s unlit runway. The pilot activated the hatch as soon as the wheels stopped and looked back into the darkened cabin. “This is where you get off.”
Without a response, Drake shouldered his duffel and stepped out into the night. Drag was waiting for him on the runway.
“How’s the conference going?” Drag asked as the Lear taxied into the takeoff position. Drag had registered Drake for a tactical conference in Vegas to account for his disappearance from the B-2 squadron. Drake had flown in on a commercial flight, made an appearance at the conference, and then boarded the Lear back to Whiteman in the middle of the night.
“Better than most,” replied Drake with a sly grin. “I usually sleep through these thi—”
He was cut off by the noise of the Lear’s engines running up. The two stealth pilots sprinted for the grass as the jet shot past them.
“In a bit of a hurry, isn’t he?” asked Drake, turning to watch the jet climb into the night.
“He’s got to keep his ground time minimal, seeing as how he was never here.” Drag handed Drake an olive drab satchel, secured with a brittle wire seal. “In there, you’ll find all your navigational plots, your data disc, and a copy of the procedures I showed you last week. Fly this one lights-out and let the autopilot do the work. Your NVGs are on the jet along with the rest of your flight gear.”
“You sure you’re ok with me taking a B-2 out solo?”
“It’s been done before. Besides, you won’t exactly be solo. Your ride-along is waiting in the jet.” Drag turned and jogged toward a waiting pickup truck.
Drake trailed behind. “Ride-along?”
* * *
Nick watched the Lear climb into the sky through the B-2’s front windscreen, using the night-vision goggles he had found in his gear. Then he turned his attention to the truck heading his way. Drag had not told him who the other pilot would be, and in the sparkling green image presented by the goggles, he could not make out the face of the man that had stepped off
the aircraft. It didn’t matter. He would find out in moments.
He climbed out of the copilot seat to grab his flight gear. He was quite familiar with the aircraft. Though he hadn’t officially started training in the stealth bomber, he had accumulated hundreds of hours in the simulator during his year in the companion trainer program. He had also spent a few hours working on the real aircraft with maintenance crews as part of a flight-line supervisor program. But this B-2’s flight deck was different from any he had yet seen. Instead of the usual empty space behind the two pilots’ seats, this aircraft had a third crew position with a standard Aces II ejection seat mounted sideways. That seat faced a control station with a joystick, radio panels, and several touch screens.
“What are you doing here?”
Nick turned to see Drake Merigold eyeballing him suspiciously from the top of the crew ladder. The two pilots knew each other in passing. Nick had even flown with Drake once in the T-38 as his instructor pilot, but he had maintained a cool distance. He harbored no small amount of jealousy that the former tanker pilot was already qualified in the B-2—with a combat sortie and a Distinguished Flying Cross to top it off—while Nick had been stuck as a T-38 instructor for a year. They were the same rank, but tanker drivers built flight time much faster than fighter jocks, burning holes in the sky for hours on their refueling tracks. Drake had arrived at the unit seven months before Nick, with far more flight hours, and that made all the difference.
“Get moving!” said a voice from below.
Nick could smell the impatience wafting up from his chain-smoking DO. “I guess that’s your cue,” he said, slapping a flight harness into Drake’s chest.
Drake worked quickly through the preflight checklists, and ten minutes later he accelerated down the runway for takeoff. He pulled the bomber into the air and turned west over the black abyss of the Missouri farmlands before relinquishing control to the autopilot. “So,” he said, removing his NVGs, “how did I get stuck with a copilot who’s not even qualified in the aircraft?”
Nick frowned. “I’m sorry, Captain America, I thought you were the youngest B-2 commander ever. You can’t handle this baby on your own?”
“It’s Drake. And of course I can. But I want to know why you’re here.”
“You’re the ‘ace of the base.’ Why don’t you tell me?”
“Hilarious.” Drake turned back to his console and started checking the navigation system. “You wanna be cagy, that’s fine. You’re a passenger for the next few hours, so just sit there, stay quiet, and don’t touch anything.”
Nick leaned back in his seat and stared out into the black. “Whatever.”
The bomber continued its climb to forty-seven thousand feet, well above the clouds. With the lights in the cockpit dimmed and no lights on the wings, the sky above was deep and full of stars, not just a few, scattered points of light, but dense clouds of them—luminescent dust suspended in black ether.
It all seemed so unreal to Nick—flying a blacked-out bomber in full stealth mode over their own country, heading to a test facility that didn’t exist. And who were they? There were so many more eminently qualified pilots in the stealth wing. He and Drake were just two lieutenants who hardly knew each other, and knew even less about what was going on.
Two lieutenants—the bottom of the military pilot barrel. Against what? Against whom?
Nick clenched his teeth, let out a short breath through his nose, and then abruptly turned in his seat to face his unwilling partner. “Look,” he said, forcing his features to soften. “Whatever this is, you and me are gonna have to stick together. We need to start over.”
Drake sat back from his console and folded his arms. “I’m still waiting to hear what you’re doing here.”
“And I’m honestly in the dark. Drag takes need-to-know to a level I’ve never seen. All he told me is that I’ve got a flying job to do during some test, and it won’t be on this jet.” Nick hesitated for a beat, then tilted his head. “However,” he said, dragging out the word, “I do have a hunch that there’s an operational side to this. And if this thing—whatever it is—goes operational, that will be my seat.” He gestured aft toward the new crew station in the back. “Right behind you.”
“What gave you that idea?”
“Earlier this evening, when I sat down back there to go through my gear, Drag said, ‘Get comfortable, kid. If this thing goes operational, that will be your seat.’”
“That’s a good solid hunch you got there.” Drake narrowed his eyes, apparently still not convinced that Nick’s olive branch was genuine. “How come you didn’t have to disappear like I did? I had to fly all the way to Vegas and back so I could show my face at a conference. I checked in to the officers’ quarters and everything.”
Nick shrugged. “I’m supposed to be attending a three-month air battle course at the Air University in Alabama, along with two hundred other lieutenants—just a number in the throng. I signed in to the course and the officers’ quarters online without ever leaving Whiteman. I don’t know why you couldn’t do the same.”
“That explains it,” said the B-2 pilot, nodding slowly. “My conference is only a couple of weeks. Yours is three months. Looks like you’re on the hook for something more long term.”
Drake returned his full attention to the aircraft, cycling the ten-inch displays in his console through animated diagrams of fuel tanks, electrical circuits, and hydraulics. After several minutes, he finally looked over, staring hard at Nick. Then he bent down to dig through his duffle, which sat on the floor between his seat and the center console. “You’re right,” he said, still buried in the bag. “We should start over. But we need to make it official.” He emerged with a small bottle of Coca-Cola, removed the cap, and then raised it up in toast. “I’m Drake Merigold. Here’s to working together on a black operation.”
Nick raised a drink of his own—a bottle of Mountain Dew. “Nick Baron. May we team up for many more like it.”
They clicked their sodas together and each took a swig. Then they sat in silence once again.
Chapter 28
“Well, this is creepy,” said Nick as he stepped off the crew ladder. The crew chief who’d guided them into the hangar had disappeared and then the doors had closed behind them, leaving them in total darkness.
“Hello!” called Drake, his voice reverberating off the unseen walls. “At least it’s got a nice echo.”
Nick jumped backward as the lights flashed on. An Army colonel stood directly in front of him. The man’s expression was impossible to read. His eyebrows were set in a scowl, yet his lips were spread in a flat smile. “Welcome, gentlemen.”
Drake began to introduce himself, but the colonel cut him off. “No need for introductions, Mr. Merigold. I’ve read your file, along with your comrade’s. My name is Colonel Walker. Consider me your new boss.” The scowl took on a hint of amusement. “The truth is I became your boss the moment you signed on to Cerberus. Drag is just an intermediary.” He nodded toward a black and yellow box painted on the floor. “Get your gear on that elevator over there and I’ll show you the rest of the facility.”
While Drake clambered back up the ladder to get the flight gear, the colonel moved closer to Nick. “So you’re the chase pilot,” he said, leaving Nick to guess whether it was a statement or a question.
Nick eyed the colonel warily. “Actually, sir, I’m not sure what I am to you.”
Walker nodded. “I know that. I just wanted to see if you were the standard cocky young pilot, or if you were smart enough to admit that you’re out of your element.”
Nick glanced over at a small, alien craft siting on a rack in the corner of the hangar. Two men in lab coats appeared to be poking and prodding it with gloved hands. He felt like he had just stumbled into Roswell. “I’m a fish out of water.”
“Perfect. I like starting with a blank page.”
* * *
>
Down in the bunker, Walker led the pilots to the life support room, where they could unload their flight gear. There, he left Nick alone while he led Drake off to a safe to store the classified flight materials. Nick absentmindedly milled about the room until he noticed a felt board covered in unit patches hanging on the back wall.
The patch board formed a pictorial legacy of the individuals who had stood there before. There were a few patches from units Nick recognized, units that flew the F-16 Fighting Falcon or the F-15 Eagle, but there were also several patches with the silhouettes of aircraft he did not recognize, odd-shaped jets that looked like only a miracle would make them fly. One of them bore the title Bird of Prey, and depicted a small, strange aircraft with bent wings and no tail, drawn as the hilt of a sword. There were no A-10 patches, and Nick surmised that there had never been cause to bring the technologically deficient Hog to the secret test base. Feeling a bit slighted, he pulled an old 81st patch from his flight suit pocket and added it to the display. “There you go, guys,” he said quietly, “now we’re spoken for.”
The patch at the center of the display seemed set apart, as if there were a deliberate effort to leave a few inches of empty space around it, giving it a place of honor. It was a triangle with long sides and a short base. A T-38 climbed heavenward, woven from gray thread so dark that it nearly disappeared into the black background. At the bottom of the patch the number 777 was emblazoned in blood red. Gray, ribbon-shaped banners curled around the wingtips of the T-38 as if it had flown through them and was dragging them skyward, both ends streaming in the wind behind. The two tails of the ribbon hanging from the left wing bore the mottoes Triple Seven Chase and Third Time Lucky. The tails of the ribbon hanging from the right wing each held a name: Frank “Sideshow” Eubanks and Mike “Rat” Shaw.
A heavy hand clapped Nick on the arm, startling him. He turned to find Colonel Walker standing behind him. He was about to make a smart remark about the senior officer sneaking up on him when he noticed that the pat was not just a friendly gesture. Walker had stuck a patch to the Velcro on the right arm of Nick’s flight suit. It was the same triangular patch that he’d just been admiring.
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