Schofield rose into the air, his legs and arms spread wide, star-like.
He stood on the forward lifting prongs of a forklift, one foot on each horizontal prong, while his wrists were handcuffed to the vehicle's vertical steel runners.
The forklift was parked in a corner of the Richelieu's deserted main hangar bay, behind the exhausts of several Rafale fighter jets. Seated in a semi-circle in front of it were the three French military officers and the DGSE agent, Lefevre.
'Bring in the British spy,' Lefevre said to one of Schofield's guards.
The guard hit a button on the wall nearby and the steel wall beside Schofield suddenly began to rise—it was in fact a door, a great fighter-sized steel door—revealing darkness beyond it.
Out from the darkness came a second forklift, on which stood another captured individual, crucified in the same manner as Schofield.
There was only one difference.
The man on this second forklift had been thoroughly tortured. His face, his shirt, his arms—they were all covered with blood. His head hung limply over his chest.
Lefevre said, 'Captain Schofield, I'm not sure if you have met Agent Alec Christie of British Intelligence.'
Christie. From MI-6. And the bounty list.
So this was where Christie had got to.
'Over the last two days, Mr Christie has been a fountain of information for us regarding Majestic-12,' Lefevre said. 'It seems that for the last eighteen months, he has been well placed in Loch-
Mann Industries as a personal bodyguard to Mr Randolph Loch, the Chairman of M-12. But while Mr Christie was watching Loch, we were watching Christie.
'However, in one of his more lucid moments last night, Mr Christie told us something of concern. He stated that Randolph Loch has been most displeased of late with one of the younger members of M-12, our friend Jonathan Killian.
'According to Mr Christie, Randolph Loch commented several times that Killian was quote, "pestering him with this follow-up idea". It appears that Mr Killian does not think Majestic-12's plan goes far enough. In light of your own investigations, Captain Schofield, do you know anything about this "follow-up idea"?'
Schofield said, 'Killian's your friend. Why don't you ask him?'
'The Republic of France does not have friends.'
'I can see why.'
'We have useful acquaintances,' Lefevre said. 'But sometimes, one must watch one's acquaintances as closely as one's enemies.'
'You don't trust him,' Schofield said.
'Not an inch.'
'But you give him protection, sanctuary.'
'For as long as it suits us. It may no longer suit us.'
Schofield said, 'But now you're worried he's playing you.'
'Yes.'
Schofield thought about that for a moment.
Then he said, 'One of M-12's Chameleon missiles is aimed at Paris.'
'Oh, please. We know that. We are prepared for that. That is the very idea behind my country's involvement with Majestic-12. That was why we provided them with the bodies of the Global Jihad terrorists. For while America, Germany and Britain suffer catastrophic losses, France will be seen as the only Western nation to have defeated this threat.
'Where New York, Berlin and London will be lost, Paris will stand tall. France will be the only nation to have successfully shot down one of these terrible terrorist missiles.
'It took America three whole months to retaliate for September 11. Imagine how shell-shocked they will be when they lose five entire cities. But France, France will be the nation who beat off these heinous attacks. The only Western nation who moved fast enough. It will make us—strong and capable and completely unhurt—the world's leader in this new Cold War period.
'Captain Schofield, our friends in Majestic-12 want money out of all of this, because for them money is power. The Republic of France does not want that kind of power—we want something far more important than that. We want a global power shift. We want to lead the world.
'The 20th century was the American century. A sad bankrupt time in the history of this planet. The 21st century will be the French century.'
Schofield just stared at Lefevre and the generals.
'You guys are really messed up, you know that,' he said.
Lefevre pulled some photos out of his briefcase, showed them to the elevated Schofield.
'Back to Killian. These are photos of Monsieur Killian during his tour of Africa last year.'
Schofield saw standard newspaper pics: Killian standing with African leaders, opening factories, waving to crowds.
'A goodwill tour to promote his charitable activities,' Lefevre said. 'During that tour, however, Killian attended meetings with the leaders and defence ministers of several strategically significant African nations: notably Nigeria, Eritrea, Chad, Angola and Libya.'
'Yes . . .' Schofield said expectantly.
Lefevre paused, delivered the punch. 'Over the last eleven hours, the Air Forces of Nigeria, Eritrea, Chad and Angola have all scrambled, with over two hundred fighter planes converging on airfields in eastern Libya. Now, taken individually, these air forces are relatively small. Taken together, however, they make up a veritable aerial armada. My final question for you, Captain, is what are they doing}'
Schofield's mind raced.
'Captain Schofield?'
But Schofield wasn't listening. He could only hear Jonathan Killian's voice in his head, saying: 'Although many don't know it, the future of the world lies in Africa.'
Africa . . .
'Captain Schofield?' Lefevre said.
Schofield hlinked. Came back.
'I don't know,' he answered honestly. 'I wish I did, but I honestly don't.'
'Hmmm,' Lefevre said. 'That is exactly what Mr Christie said, too. Which might mean you are both speaking the truth. Of course, it might also mean that you need some more persuasion.'
Lefevre nodded to the driver of Christie's forklift.
The driver fired up the engine and drove the vehicle a few yards to the left, so that Christie—raised up on the forklift's prongs—was positioned right behind the thrusters of a nearby Rafale fighter jet. The driver then quickly jumped out of his seat and ran away.
A moment later, Schofield saw why.
ROOOOAAAARRRRR!
The fighter's engines rumbled to life. Schofield saw another French soldier standing in its cockpit.
The battered and ragged Alec Christie looked up at the sound of the colossal noise, and found himself staring into the yawning rear thruster of the Rafale fighter. He didn't seem to care. He was too beaten, too weary to bother straining at his bonds.
Lefevre nodded to the man in the cockpit.
The man hit the plane's thrust controls.
Instantly, a shocking tongue of white-hot fire blasted out from the rear thruster of the Rafale, engulfing the immobile Christie.
The heat-blast battered the British agent's body like a wind-fan—the piping-hot air blasted his hair backwards, ripped the skin off his face, burned his clothes in a nanosecond—until ultimately it tore his body to pieces.
Then, abruptly, the burst stopped and the hangar was silent again.
All that remained of Alec Christie were four grisly quarters, charred and disgusting, dangling from the forklift's prongs.
'This is very bad,' Schofield swallowed.
Lefevre turned to him. 'Does that refresh your memory at all?'
'I'm telling you, I don't know,' Schofield said. 'I don't know about Killian or the African countries, or if they have anything in common. This is the first I've heard of them.'
'Then I am afraid we have no further need for you,' Lefevre said. 'It is now time for the Admiral and the General to have their wish and watch you die.'
And with that, Lefevre nodded to Schofield's forklift driver. Schofield's vehicle moved forward, stopping alongside Christie's charred forklift, in front of the Rafale's second rear thruster.
Schofield gazed into the dark depths of the thruster.
'General?' Lefevre said to the old Army officer, the man who had lost an entire paratrooper unit to Schofield in Antarctica. 'Would you like to do the honours?'
'With pleasure.'
The General stood up from his chair, and climbed up into the Rafale's cockpit, glaring at Schofield all the way.
He leaned into the cockpit, reached for the flight stick, his thumb hovering over the 'afterburn' switch.
'Good-bye, Captain Schofield,' Lefevre said matter-of-factly. 'World history will have to continue without you. Au revoir.'
The General's thumb came down on the 'BURN' switch.
Just as a gigantic explosion boomed out from somewhere above the main hangar.
Klaxons sounded.
Warning lights flashed to life.
And the entire aircraft carrier was suddenly awash with the red lighting of an emergency.
The General's thumb had frozen a millimetre above the burn
switch.
An ensign ran up to the Navy Admiral. 'Sir! We're under attack!'
'What?' the Admiral yelled. 'By whom!'
'It looks like a Russian fighter, sir.'
'A Russian fighter? One Russian fighter! This is an aircraft carrier, for God's sake! Who in their right mind would attack an aircraft carrier with a single plane?'
The Black Raven hovered level with the flight deck of the Richelieu, raining gunfire and missiles down on the fighter planes parked there.
Four missile smoke-trails extended out from the Sukhoi's wings and then separated to pursue different targets.
One Rafale fighter on the deck was instantly blasted to pieces, while two anti-aircraft missile stations were obliterated. The fourth missile whizzed into the main hangar bay and rammed into an AWACS plane, destroying it in a billowing explosion.
Inside the Raven, Rufus flew brilliantly.
In the gunner's seat behind him sat Knight, swivelling around in the plane's 360-degree revolving rear chair, lining up targets and then blazing away with the Raven's guns.
'Mother! You ready?' Knight called.
Mother stood in the converted bomb bay behind the cockpit—armed to the teeth: MP-7, M-16, Desert Eagle pistols; she even had one of Knight's rocket launcher packs strapped to her back.
'Fuckin'-A.'
'Then go!' Knight hit a button.
Whack!
The floor of the bomb bay/holding cell snapped open and Mother dropped down through it, whizzing down on her Maghook's rope.
Inside the French aircraft carrier's control tower, chaos reigned.
Comm-techs were shouting into their radio-mikes, relaying information to the captain.
'—damn thing got under our radars! Must have some sort of stealth mechanism—'
'—They've hit the anti-aircraft stations on the flight deck—'
'—Get those fighters to the catapults nowV
'Sir! The Triomphe says it has a clear shot. . .'
'Tell it to fire!'
In response to the order, an anti-aircraft missile streaked out from one of the destroyers in the carrier group—heading straight for the Black Raven.
'Rufus! I hope you fixed our electronic countermeasures when we were in Archangel!'
'Taken care of, Boss.'
The missile zoomed towards them at phenomenal speed.
But at the last possible moment, it hit the Raven's electronic jamming shield and veered wildly away . . .
. . . and slammed into the outer hull of the aircraft carrier!
'Escorts! Cease fire! Cease fire!' the captain yelled. 'That plane is too close to us! You're hitting us! Electronics Department—find out what its jamming frequency is and neutralise it! We'll have to destroy it with fighters.'
Inside the main hangar bay of the carrier, Schofield was still quasi-crucified in front of the thrusters of the parked Rafale fighter.
Abruptly, the deck around him banked steeply as the immense carrier wheeled around in the face of the Black Raven's surprise assault.
Lefevre and the French generals were now all on radios, looking for answers.
All, that is, except for the Army General in the cockpit of the Rafale.
After the initial distraction, he now glared back at Schofield. He wasn't going to miss this opportunity.
He reached for the 'afterburn' switch again, gripped the control stick just as—sprack!—a bullet entered his ear and the cockpit around him was sprayed with his brains.
In all the confusion, no-one had noticed the shadowy figure that had landed on the open-air starboard elevator adjoining the main hangar, a figure that had whizzed to the bottom of a vertical rope like a spider on a thread, a figure bearing arms.
Mother.
Carrying an MP-7 in one hand and an M-16 in the other, Mother stormed through the hangar bay towards Schofield. She was like an unstoppable force of nature.
The squad of French paratroopers that had been guarding Schofield came at her from all sides—from behind vehicles, from around parked fighter jets.
But Mother just strode forward, nailing them left, right and centre, never once losing her stride.
She loosed two shots to the left—hit two paratroopers in their faces. Swung right—firing her M-16 pistol-style—and another three bad guys went down.
A paratrooper rose from the wing of a Rafale above her and Mother just somersaulted, firing as she rolled, peppering him with bloody holes.
She threw two smoke grenades next, and in the haze that followed, she moved and hunted like a vengeful ghost.
Four French paratroopers went down, sucked into the smoke-haze—so, too, the French Admiral. Not even the spy, Lefevre, could escape her. A four-bladed shuriken throwing knife whistled out of the smoke near him and entered his Adam's apple. He would die slowly.
Then suddenly, Mother burst out of the cloud haze right next to Schofield on his forklift.
'Hey, Scarecrow. How's it hanging?' she said.
'Feeling much better now that you're here,' Schofield said.
Two of Knight's pitons made short work of his handcuffs. In seconds he was on solid ground again, free.
But before Mother could hand him some guns, Schofield dashed over to Lefevre's body lying on the ground nearby.
He picked up something from the ground beside the dying Frenchman, returned to Mother's side. She handed him an MP-7 and a Desert Eagle.
'Ready to do some damage?' she asked.
Schofield turned to her, his eyes catching the RPG pack on her back.
'I'm ready to do some serious damage,' he said.
They ran towards a jeep parked nearby.
In rapid two-by-two catapult launches, four state-of-the-art Rafale fighters shot down the runway of the Richelieu and took off.
They wheeled around in the sky above the carrier, turning back in deadly formation, heading for the hovering Black Raven.
'They're coming!' Rufus yelled.
'I see them!' Knight called.
He whirled around in his revolving seat, hammering on his triggers like a kid playing a video game.
Two Rafales shot toward them, cannons blazing.
A phalanx of orange tracer bullets sizzled through the air all around the Raven. The Raven banked and rolled in the sky, dodging the tracers, at the same time returning fire from its own revolving belly-mounted gun.
Then the first two planes overshot them—twin sonic booms. But that was only the first act, a distraction to hide the main show.
For the other two French fighters had swung around low, skimming over the ocean waves from the other direction, coming at the Sukhoi from below and behind.
Still hovering above the carrier's starboard elevator, the Sukhoi swivelled in mid-air, faced these two new planes head-on.
'Damn it,' Rufus said, eyeing his countermeasures screen. 'The bastards are screwing with our jamming frequency . . . it's flicking on and off. We're losing missile jam.'
The two new Rafales fired two missiles each.
Knight blasted away wit
h his cannons at the missiles, hit two of them, but the other two missiles ducked and rose and swerved too well.
'Rufus . . . !'
The missiles roared toward them.
Rufus saw them coming, and a moment before it was too late, saw the answer.
The missiles rushed forward, zooming in for the kill . . .
. . . just as Rufus swung the Black Raven inside the massive doorway that opened off the aircraft carrier's starboard elevator, manoeuvring his airborne fighter inside the ship's main hangar!
The missiles—unlike the shots from the destroyer, he Triomphe— were fitted with electronic detection systems that didn't allow them to strike their own carrier. As such, they ditched into the ocean, detonating in twin hundred-foot geysers.
Inside the carrier's tower, radar operators stared at their screens in confusion, shouted into their radio-mikes:
'—Where the fuck did it go?—'
'—What? Say again—'
'What happened?' the captain asked. 'Where are they?'
'Sir. They're inside us!'
The Black Raven now hovered inside the cavernous hangar of the French aircraft carrier.
'I like your style, Rufus,' Knight said as he started firing indiscriminately at the array of parked planes, helicopters and trucks.
Like a giant bird trapped inside a living room, the Black Raven powered over the interior of the hangar, overturning entire planes with its backwash, flinging fuel trucks into the walls.
It shoomed across the hangar causing untold mayhem and destruction, its two high tail fins even scraping against the ceiling once.
Knight called into his radio: 'Mother! Where are you?'
A lone jeep shot towards the aft end of the elongated hangar bay, driving at full speed, zooming under tilting planes and bouncing fuel trucks, with Mother at the wheel and Schofield crouched in the back.
Mother yelled. 'I'm at the other end of the hangar bay, trying to avoid your mess!'
lDo you have Schofield?'
'I've got him.'
' Want us to pick you up while we're in here?'
Mother turned to Schofield, bent over in the back with her—or rather, Knight's—RPG pack. 'You wanna be picked up in here?'
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