Thunderbolt

by M. L. Buchman

  NTSB? Ha!

  They took years to analyze and conclude that some pilot had been an idiot and killed a couple hundred tourists. Airliners were such simple devices compared to what she did.

  The takedown of the A-10s over the Gulf of Mexico had been artful. First she’d had to spoof the 96th Test Wing’s training command system to order the A-10 practice flight. Then she’d hijacked real CIA drones, flown them to the right positions in time, and crosslinked them to the Eglin flight simulator with its own set of commands for the sim pilots: shoot ’em down, cowboys.

  And the sim pilots had used real world CIA drones to off a bunch of A-10 trainer pilots and their aircraft over the Gulf—without even knowing that’s what they’d done.

  Let’s see some NTSB chick do shit like that.

  Sure as hell, the fixer for the arms manufacturers, Client F, couldn’t do that or he never would have hired her.

  And there wasn’t a chance of the CIA ever admitting that three of their Reapers had gone missing.

  And since they wouldn’t even admit that the RQ-170 Sentinel existed, they weren’t likely to complain when she’d dumped it in the Bermuda Triangle—which she felt was a particularly nice touch.

  The NTSB was the least of her worries.

  No, the challenge was how to pull off the next stunt.

  That one was still a puzzle.

  38

  Jeremy spotted Colonel Campos rushing up to Miranda as they were getting ready to leave Davis-Monthan.

  Mike was preflighting the Mooney airplane. He and Holly were stowing their gear. Miranda was already done and dressed in her flight suit.

  “You don’t need to go to Nellis,” the colonel called out as soon as he stepped in front of her.

  “We weren’t going to Nellis.”

  Which was news to Jeremy.

  “But you don’t need to go to Nellis,” Campos sounded confused.

  “We aren’t.” Miranda, returned to donning her helmet.

  “Don’t you want to know why?” Campos leaned in.

  Miranda sighed and lowered her helmet once more and waited.

  “Well?” Campos sounded ticked.

  “I was assuming that you were going to tell me, so why should I ask?” Miranda was as cool as cucumbers. “Holly, Mike, do you know why people are so insistent on stating the obvious?”

  Jeremy wondered why she’d left him out. Not that he knew.

  Oh, because Miranda knew he didn’t know. He tried to figure out how she knew that he wouldn’t know, but all that did was loop him back around to not knowing why people stated the obvious.

  He actually hadn’t noticed that, until Miranda pointed it out. She was right.

  Holly raised her hands in denial, “Not a clue, pal.”

  “See? That right there. Your hand gesture had already communicated that prior to your speech. Mike?” Without even pausing, Miranda turned to Mike.

  “I think it’s twofold, Miranda. One level is perhaps communicating in multiple modes as Holly just did to amplify or reinforce a particular message.”

  Miranda tipped her head to the side for a moment and then nodded for him to continue.

  “Most of the time, I think the real reason is community. If I state something that others already know or believe, I become a member of that community. Through confirming a shared belief, I’m joining in the same side.”

  “So the fact that I don’t spend my time reiterating the obvious is what makes me the outsider?”

  “No, you’re not an outsider,” Jeremy cut in.

  “No more than you,” Holly patted Jeremy on the head and he pushed her aside. “Well, more than you, but we like you both anyway. Right, Mike?”

  Jeremy didn’t give him a chance to speak, “Miranda belongs more than any of you people.”

  “More than you, too?”

  Jeremy opened his mouth…and closed it again. He’d only ever “belonged” in two places. Graduating high school two years early hadn’t helped him fit in there. Just like Miranda, he’d gotten a double masters, but it had taken him two years longer at twenty-two.

  In college he’d always been too young and in grad school too driven.

  He fit in with his parents. He was their “little genius” and had given everything to live up to that. At least until he’d betrayed them in a way that could never be fixed.

  Jeremy had broken trust with them—something they could never know.

  And he’d belonged in the online gaming world.

  Unlike most people he wasn’t into the roles and the battles, he was into the tech. Not how to kill a charging knight, a demented wizard, or a spell-casting pink dragon with a taste for the heads of Ken dolls, but rather the most efficient way to do each of those—that the code allowed.

  But he’d left both of those behind and he was never, ever going back.

  And…

  “Hey!”

  “What?” Campos had been talking, but Jeremy had no idea what about.

  “I fit in a new place.”

  “Congratulations,” Mike shook his hand as if he’d just won the lottery, or a goldfish at a county fair.

  “Where?” But Holly’s smile looked as if she already knew.

  Jeremy risked stating the obvious and pointed at the ground. “Right here. Right now.”

  “Welcome aboard, mate.” It sounded like a tease, but Holly’s smile looked sincere.

  If he belonged here, he’d better start acting like it.

  He turned to Campos.

  “Why aren’t we needed in Nellis?”

  “Because—” Campos growled through gritted teeth.

  “Because,” Miranda spoke right over the colonel. “It doesn’t fit the pattern.”

  “No,” Campos didn’t look happy at being interrupted yet again.

  He took a deep breath, but Jeremy could see that his calm was shredding.

  “Because it was caused by a flight-line mechanic accidentally leaving a screwdriver in the wrong place. He confessed immediately to his section leader, who he was with at the time of the crash.”

  “And it doesn’t fit the pattern,” Miranda repeated.

  “What pattern? And if not Nellis, then where are you going?” Campos turned on her.

  “Eglin Air Force Base. I’d appreciate it if you would set up a clearance for our arrival.”

  “Why Eglin?”

  “Because the loss of the three pilots there fits the pattern,” Miranda sounded as if she was talking to a three-year-old. She began pulling on her helmet.

  “What fucking pattern?” Campos snatched the helmet out of her hands, banging Miranda’s head with the edge of it in the process, causing her to yelp in pain.

  Jeremy and Mike moved in at the same time, but they were far too slow.

  Holly, who’d been standing mostly behind Miranda, shifted sideways and stepped through the gap Mike’s movement had opened.

  Three gliding steps forward and her fingers closed around Colonel Campos’ windpipe.

  He made a surprised gurgling noise.

  In her other hand, she held Campos’ sidearm.

  “Jeremy,” Holly held out the sidearm.

  He reached out to take it, and she ejected the magazine, which dropped into his palm. Then she rested the weapon on top of it.

  After that, she took the helmet from Campos’ hands and held it out to Miranda without ever releasing the colonel’s throat.

  The colonel was beginning to really struggle. His face was bright red.

  Then there was a long, slick sound as Holly withdrew the big knife from her thigh sheath. It glimmered in the afternoon sunlight as she held it close to the colonel’s nose.

  “If I let you go, will you be calmer and listen to the lady?”

  The colonel gurgled.

  “Was that a yes or a no?”

  The colonel managed a microscopic nod.

  Holly let him go, then steadied him as he wavered on his feet.

  Jeremy made a mental note to never tick off H
olly Harper.

  39

  Miranda sighed and tried not to look at her watch.

  She could feel time slipping away from them. She held out her helmet and someone, Mike, took it.

  While she struggled for calm and focus, Holly did something with the colonel’s gun. It fell into pieces, which she proceeded to tuck separately into each of the colonel’s pockets.

  She patted his breast pocket after she slipped the barrel into it. “Just bein’ sure, mate.”

  Miranda held up a finger.

  “First, the loss of the A-10 in Afghanistan at 9:30 a.m. Afghanistan Time, because Afghanistan chose not to follow a simple hour zoning. That’s midnight Eastern Time.”

  “Second, the loss of your aircraft at 4 a.m. Mountain. That’s 6 a.m. Eastern,” she held up another. “Continued through the loss of the helicopter, but that was still related to the disposal of whatever evidence was attached to the A-10.”

  “Third, the training flight over the Gulf of Mexico.” Three fingers. “Ten a.m. our time, noon Eastern.”

  “Every six hours,” Jeremy breathed out in surprise. “You’re right, the A-10 at Nellis happened approximately half an hour later than the Gulf of Mexico, so it doesn’t fit.”

  “Right. Each event happened by itself. In isolation,” Miranda nodded to him.

  “It’s so obvious,” Jeremy thumped his palm against his forehead and Miranda was suddenly glad that he wasn’t holding his hammer.

  “Three’s not much of a pattern,” the colonel’s voice was weak as he protested.

  She waited for Colonel Campos to stop massaging his neck and really look at her.

  And he wondered why she didn’t want to explain things during an investigation.

  “There’s a secondary pattern. There is also a trend of increasing severity. First, the death of a single pilot in combat in Afghanistan. Second, the intended death of the commander of the largest A-10 Thunderbolt II Wing, the 355th, you. Third, the downing of three trainers over the Gulf of Mexico.”

  “But still—”

  Holly slapped a hand down on the colonel’s shoulder hard enough to stop him.

  Miranda continued. “There is no evidence remaining in the first and third events. It is only because of your exceptional piloting skills that this wasn’t also true of the second event. The likelihood of identifying an extra trim control motor among the wreckage after a major crash and fire would have been very low. However, the takeoff at Nellis was most likely a simple FOD—foreign object debris—case. As it indeed turned out to be. Again it didn’t fit the pattern.”

  The colonel just blinked at her.

  “I can’t afford more time explaining this, Colonel.” She retrieved her helmet and climbed up into her Sabrejet, then called down to him, “Each event occurred precisely six hours apart. Eglin and Nellis occurred just twenty-three minutes apart. I have less than six hours to get to Eglin and prevent the next event if the pattern holds. I expect it will be much worse.”

  “There will be another attack?” Colonel Campos voice was still husky and still stating the obvious.

  She climbed the ladder and strapped herself into her seat.

  The ground crew already had her plugged into external power so she checked that her gear lever was indeed set to Down and throttle to Idle. She signaled she was ready and they turned on the power. Her starter motor began cycling up the jet. She flipped the pressure gauge switch to Alternate for alternate power. Once the pressure hit three thousand psi, meaning the engine was fully engaged, she flipped to Normal and flagged the ground crew to disconnect.

  She focused on bringing the various avionics and radios online.

  Flashing her thumbs outward had them pulling the chocks away from her wheels.

  Perhaps she’d been too abrupt with the colonel.

  Had she hurt his feelings?

  How was she supposed to tell?

  She looked down at him and the others backing away from her jet as the engine noise continued to climb. Barely noticeable through her helmet, more felt through her seat as she was sitting directly above the intake fan.

  Colonel Campos had been nice to her, despite starting his day with ejecting from a crash and ending it with Holly choking him.

  For lack of anything better to do, she offered him a salute.

  It was a civilian one, but she gave it.

  He saluted sharply in return. Then he may have smiled as he waved her forward.

  Two hours to Eglin.

  It was time to hurry.

  40

  “She likes you,” Holly told Colonel Campos.

  Jeremy twisted around in surprise, “She who?”

  “Miranda,” Mike nodded toward the departing jet, “likes him,” he nodded toward the colonel.

  “Really?” Jeremy spun back to the departing jet as if he could somehow see what Holly had seen.

  “When was the last time you saw her thinking about anyone else once she was in her plane?”

  Jeremy tried to think, but he couldn’t remember her even waving goodbye except with a waggle of her wings when she blew by them on the way home from some investigation.

  Then he studied the colonel, who looked surprised as well.

  At least Jeremy wasn’t the only one in the dark.

  “What’s she like when she doesn’t like you?” Campos was watching Miranda’s plane as it raced along the runway and headed aloft with a roar that was almost comically small compared with the heavy two- and four-engine aircraft that swooped in and out of Davis-Monthan all the time.

  “You’re invisible,” Jeremy had seen her do it to any number of onerous officials. Not just officials. Once a team member was assigned a task, it was like she ticked some checkbox in her brain and they no longer existed until that task was complete.

  Why the colonel? Because he’d been nice to her? At least up until the moment he’d banged her head while grabbing her helmet.

  Most women scared the crap out of Jeremy. He was always finding out too late that someone had been attracted to him—after he’d missed every opportunity.

  Mom often accused him of being too much like his father. “I finally had to drag him by his nose to go on a date with me. He never caught a single hint.”

  Was it really as easy as a woman waving at him?

  God he hoped not, or he was even denser than he’d thought.

  Then he thought about the female helicopter pilot. Was that why she’d been sticking by his side and talking to him? Because she liked him? The more he thought about it, the more certain he was. Again he considered whapping himself on the head with the hammer now tucked deep in his pack.

  “Jeremy,” Holly jostled his arm. “Come on. By the time Mike gets us to Eglin, her deadline will almost be here.”

  “Past,” Mike shook his head. “The Mooney is quick, but it’s still five hours away.”

  “We’ll take a C-21A Learjet,” Colonel Campos strode away into the hangar where the Mooney was still parked and called out for assistance.

  “I guess he’s going with us,” Holly was watching after the colonel.

  Jeremy had never been in a Learjet, so that would be good. And getting there in half the time was excellent. The C-21A was fast. Not as fast as Miranda’s Sabrejet, but they’d only be about twenty minutes slower across the country, rather than three hours.

  “The commander of the 355th Wing is flying with us…” Mike echoed Holly’s thoughtful tone.

  “Does that mean that he likes Miranda?” Jeremy guessed.

  Holly rolled her eyes at him and Mike laughed a little as he slapped Jeremy’s shoulder.

  He’d take that as a yes.

  Jeremy wasn’t sure how he felt about that.

  41

  Clarissa hated waiting.

  Almost as much as she hated the Kryptos sculpture that perched in the CIA headquarters’ courtyard—a sculpture garden between the New and Old Headquarters Building.

  But ever since that Miranda Chase bitch from the NTSB had fo
rced a meeting in front of it last summer, it had become the best place to get some hard thinking done. And while the courtyard was a popular summer lunch spot, cold November evenings she had it all to herself.

  If she went inside to her office, there would be messages, emails, project leads, and more, all wanting a slice of her time. Here it was just her and this stupid sculpture.

  The eight-foot-high and sixteen-foot-long folded S-shape of thick copper had stumped cryptanalysts for decades. Three of the four panels built by James Sanborn had been solved, but the last eluded everyone despite the three separate clues given by the artist over the last fifteen years.

  Damn him to hell.

  But the location had helped her solve any number of problems.

  So, here it was, falling evening with the temperature already nearing the thirties and she was pacing circles around the damn thing.

  Clark still wasn’t back from the White House.

  Harry Tallman still hadn’t given her dirt on Ramson.

  With her last major project scrubbed, despite its successes that really should have earned her—

  Clark was right. She really had to let the MQ-45 Casper drone project go.

  But she needed a win and she needed it badly.

  Her phone buzzed with a message.

  Not from Clark.

  Nor her pet programmer.

  When she unlocked her phone, she saw that she’d missed an earlier one as well.

  The first one was because of that former Casper drone project; she was still on the notification list for any status changes or mishaps with CIA aircraft.

  Three MQ-9 Reapers and an RQ-170 Sentinel had gone missing.

  How in fuck-all did forty-five million dollars’ worth of Reapers and another thirty for the Sentinel just go missing?

  A sudden chill froze her in place.

  The three Reapers had been stationed in the southeastern US. The Sentinel always flew out of Groom Lake in Nevada, but with its range, it could be anywhere in the country within hours.

  She tapped for the older, missed message—thirty-four minutes ago.

  Gulf of Mexico three.