Noise was everywhere. The roar of supersonic speed.
BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!
TIME TO TARGET: 0:40 . . . 0:39 . . . 0:38 . . .
'Get me closer, Rufus!' Schofield called.
Rufus did so—and the nose-cone of the X-15 came alongside the tail of the roaring ICBM.
The CincLock VII unit didn't respond. They still weren't close enough to the missile's CPU.
The X-15 crept forward, edging up the length of the Chameleon missile.
'Closer!'
TIME TO TARGET: 0:33 . . . 0:32 . . . 0:31 . . .
Out through the cockpit canopy, Schofield saw the lights of a city down in the evening darkness below.
The holy city of Mecca.
TIME TO TARGET: 0:28 . . . 0:27 . . . 0:26 . . .
And the X-15 came level with the mid-point of the missile and Schofield's disarm unit beeped:
FIRST PROTOCOL (PROXIMITY): SATISFIED. INITIATE SECOND PROTOCOL.
'I'm gonna get you,' Schofield said to the ICBM.
The reflex response pattern on his unit began its sequence, and Schofield began hitting its touchscreen.
The two rocket-propelled aircraft carved a sonic tear through the sky, travelling side-by-side at astronomical speed.
And then the AMRAAM behind the X-15 made its move.
Rufus saw it on his scopes. 'Come on, Captain . . . !'
'I just. . . have ... to do . . . this first. . .' Schofield grimaced, concentrating on the reflex-response test.
TIME TO TARGET: 0:19 . . . 0:18 . . . 0:17 . . .
The AMRAAM powered forward, closing in on the tailflame of the X-15.
'It's approaching lethal range!' Rufus yelled. Lethal range for an AMRAAM was twenty yards. It didn't have to actually hit you, only explode close to you. 'You've got maybe five seconds!'
'We don't have five seconds!' Schofield shouted, not taking his eyes off the screen, his fingers moving quickly over it.
TIME TO TARGET: 0:16 . . . 0:15 . . . 0:14 . . .
'I can't take evasive action!' Rufus yelled desperately. 'I'll move us out of proximity! Jesus Christ! We can't come this far to lose now! Two seconds!'
Schofield kept hitting the touchscreen.
TIME TO TARGET: 0:13 . . . 0:12 . . .
'One second!'
And the AMRAAM entered lethal range—20 yards from the X-15's tailpipe.
'No!' Rufus yelled. 'Too late—!'
'Not if I can help it? a voice said suddenly in their earpieces.
Then, in a supersonic blur, something black and fast shot sideways across the wake of the X-15—cutting in between the AMRAAM and Schofield's X-15, so that the AMRAAM hit it and not Schofield's plane.
An explosion rocked the sky and Rufus whirled around in his seat to see the front half of another X-15 rocket plane go tumbling through the air, its rear-end vaporised, destroyed by the AMRAAM.
Knight's X-15.
He must have survived the death of his pilot and then stayed on their trail, catching up with them while they'd made their two time-consuming circling manoeuvres. And now he had flown himself into the path of the AMRAAM missile that had been about to take them out!
The shattered front half of Knight's X-15 fell through the sky, nose-first, before abruptly, its canopy jettisoned and a flight seat blasted out from the falling wreckage, a parachute blossoming above it a moment later.
TIME TO TARGET: 0:11 . . . 0:10 . . .
Schofield hardly even noticed the explosion. He was consumed with the reflex pattern on his touchscreen: white, red, white, white, red . . .
TIME TO TARGET: 0:09 . . .
'Whoa, shit! It's going vertical!' Rufus yelled.
With a sickening roll, the Chameleon missile abruptly changed course, banking downward, pointing its nose directly down at Mother Earth.
Rufus manoeuvred his control stick and the X-15 copied the move—and went vertical with the ICBM—and suddenly the two rocketcraft were travelling supersonically, side-by-side, heading straight down!
'Aaaaaaaaahhh!' Rufus yelled.
Schofield's eyes remained fixed to the touchscreen, focused, his fingers moving quickly.
TIME TO TARGET: 0:08 . . .
The X-15 and the ICBM raced toward the Earth like two vertical bullets.
TIME TO TARGET: 0:07 . . .
The lights of Mecca rushed up toward Rufus's eyes.
TIME TO TARGET: 0:06 . . .
Schofield's fingers danced.
And the CincLock disarm unit beeped.
SECOND PROTOCOL (RESPONSE PATTERN): SATISFIED. THIRD PROTOCOL (CODE ENTRY): ACTIVE. PLEASE ENTER AUTHORIZED DISARM CODE.
TIME TO TARGET: 0:05 . . .
Schofield punched in the Universal Disarm Code and the screen beeped again:
THIRD PROTOCOL (CODE ENTRY): SATISFIED. AUTHORIZED DISARM CODE ENTERED.
At which point the crucial line appeared:
MISSILE FLIGHT ABORTED.
What happened next happened in a blur.
High above the minarets of Mecca, the supersonically-travelling Chameleon missile self-destructed in a spectacular explosion. It looked like a gigantic firecracker—a spectacular starburst of sparks spraying out in every direction.
It was moving so amazingly fast, however, that its blasted-apart pieces were just stripped away by the onslaught of uprushing wind. The charred remains of the cloned Jericho-2B would later be found over an area 100 miles in diameter.
Schofield's X-15, on the other hand, suffered a far different fate.
The shock wave from the Chameleon's blast sent it spiralling away from the explosion, completely out of control, rocketing toward the Earth.
Rufus fought heroically with his stick and by doing so managed one single thing: to avoid crashing into any of the inhabited parts of Mecca.
But that was all he achieved. For a bare second later, the X-15 slammed into the desert like a meteor from outer space, smashing vertically into the sandy landscape in a thumping, slamming, earth-shuddering impact that could be heard more than fifty miles away.
And for a moment its fiery explosion lit up the dark desert sky as if it were midday.
The X-15 hit the desert floor doing Mach 3.
It hit the ground hard and in a single flashing, blinding instant, the rocket plane transformed into a ball of fire.
Nothing could have survived the crash.
A split second before the impact, however, two ejection seats could be seen catapulting clear of the crashing plane's cockpit, shooting diagonally out into the sky—seats that contained Schofield and Rufus.
The two flight seats floated back down to earth on their parachutes, landing a mile away from the flaming crater that marked the final resting place of the X-15.
The two seats hit the dusty ground, rocked onto their sides.
There was no movement in them.
For there, lying slumped against their seatbacks, sat Shane Schofield and Rufus, both unconscious, both knocked out by the colossal G-forces of their supersonic ejection.
After a time, Schofield awoke—to the sound of voices.
His vision was blurry, blood seeped down his face, and his head throbbed with a terrible ache. Bruises were forming around his eyes—the natural by-product of ejecting.
He saw shadows surrounding his flight seat. Some men were trying to unbuckle his seatbelts.
He heard their voices again.
'Crazy sons of bitches, ejecting at that speed.'
'Come on, man, hurry up, before the fucking boy scouts from the Marines arrive.'
At the edge of his consciousness, Schofield noted that they were speaking English.
With American accents.
He sighed with relief. It was over. /
Then, with the whistling cut of a knife, his seatbelt came free and Schofield tumbled out of his seat onto the sand.
A man appeared at the rim of his vision. A Westerner, wearing military gear. Through the haze of his mind, Schofield recognised the man's uniform: the customised bat
tle outfit of the US Special Forces' Delta Detachment.
'Captain Schofield . . .' the man said gently, his voice blurry to Schofield's slow mind. 'Captain Schofield. It's okay. You're safe now. We're from Delta. We're on your side. We've also picked up your friend, Captain Knight, a few miles from here.'
'Who—' Schofield stammered. 'Who are you?'
The Delta man smiled, but it wasn't a friendly smile. 'My name is Wade Brandeis. From Delta. We've come from Aden. Don't worry, Captain Schofield. You're perfectly safe with me.'
Schofield dreamed.
Dreamed of being lifted out of his crashed flight seat. . . and flex-cuffed . . . then being loaded into the back of a private Lear jet . . . and the jet taking off . . .
Voices in the haze.
Brandeis saying, 'I heard it first from a couple of guys in the 'Stan. They said he turned up at a cave-hunting site and bolted inside. Said it had something to do with a bounty hunt.
'Then I get a call a few hours ago from a guy I know in ISS—he's one of those background guys, real old-school CIA, knows everything about everyone, so he's fucking untouchable. He's also ex-ICG. Good man. Ugly fuck, though. Looks like a goddamned rat. Name's Noonan, Cal Noonan, but everyone I know just calls him the Rat.
'As always, the Rat knows everything. For instance, he knows I'm working out of Aden. He confirms that there's a price on Schofield's head: eighteen million bucks. He also says that Schofield is on his way to Yemen. If I'm interested, he says, he can arrange leave for me and a few trusted men.
'He also says, wait for it, that Aloysius Knight is with Schofield, and that there's a price on Knight's head, too: two million dollars. Hell, I'd bring Knight in for fucking free. But if someone wants to give me two million bucks to do it, that's even better.'
• • •
The plane flew on. Schofield slept.
He woke briefly, uncomfortable. He was still wearing his utility flak vest, but all the weapons on it had been removed. The only thing they hadn't taken was the tightly-rolled Soviet chemical body bag. Not much of a weapon.
He shifted—and caught a glimpse of Knight and Rufus, also flex-cuffed, sitting a few rows back, covered by armed Delta operators. Rufus was asleep, but Knight was wide awake. He seemed to see Schofield rouse, but Schofield couldn't keep his eyes open.
He dropped back to sleep.
Another waking moment.
The sky outside the window next to him had changed from black to pale blue.
Dawn.
And then the voices came again.
'So where are we taking them?'
'Some castle,' Brandeis said. 'Some castle in France.'
FORTERESSE DE VALOIS
BRITTANY, FRANCE
27 OCTOBER, 0700 HOURS
It was raining heavily when Schofield's jet landed at Jonathan Killian's private airstrip on the coast of Brittany.
A quick transfer to a covered truck and soon—under the watchful eye of Brandeis and his five-man Delta team—Schofield, Knight and Rufus were taken down a steep cliff-side road, heading toward the familiar castle built on its rocky mount just off the coastal cliffs.
The mighty Forteresse de Valois.
The lone truck crossed the massive drawbridge connecting the castle to the mainland, shrouded by rain and lightning.
During the short trip, Knight told Schofield about his history with Wade Brandeis: about that night in Sudan and Brandeis's treacherous ICG links.
'Believe me, I know about the ICG,' Schofield said.
'I've been meaning to catch up with Brandeis for a long time,' Knight said.
As he spoke, Schofield saw the two tattoos on Knight's arm again: 'SLEEP WITH ONE EYE OPEN' and 'BRANDEIS' and suddenly realised that they were in truth a single tattoo: 'SLEEP WITH ONE EYE OPEN BRANDEIS'.
'The thing is,' Knight said, 'Brandeis isn't a bounty hunter, and it shows.'
'How?'
'He's just broken the first rule of bounty hunting.'
'Which is?'
'If you have a choice between bringing someone in dead or alive,' Knight said, 'dead is better.'
At that moment, the truck entered the gravel courtyard inside the castle and crunched to a halt.
Schofield, Knight and Rufus were all shoved out of it, covered by Brandeis and his Delta men.
Monsieur Delacroix was waiting for them.
The Swiss banker stood at the entrance to the classic-car garage, prim and proper as ever.
He was flanked by Cedric Wexley and ten mercenaries from Executive Solutions, Jonathan Killian's private security force.
'Major Brandeis,' Delacroix said. 'Welcome to the Forteresse de Valois. We've been expecting you. Come this way, please.'
Delacroix guided them into the garage and then down some stone stairs to the ante-room that Schofield had seen before—but instead of turning left toward the long forbidding tunnel that took you to the verification office, he turned right, through a small stone doorway that opened onto a tight medieval stairwell that spiralled downwards.
Lit by flaming torches, the stairwell went down and down, round and round, descending deep into the bowels of the castle.
It ended at a thick steel door set into a solid stone frame.
Delacroix hit a switch and with an ominous rumble the steel door rose into the ceiling. Then the dapper Swiss banker stood aside, allowing Brandeis and his prisoners to enter first.
They passed through the doorway—
—and emerged inside a wide circular pit, a dungeon in which sloshing seawater wended its way between an irregular series of elevated stone platforms. In the laneways of water, Schofield saw two sharks, prowling. And on the nearest elevated stage he saw . . .
... a 12-foot-tall guillotine. He froze, caught his breath.
This was the dungeon that Knight had told him about before. The terrible dungeon in which Libby Gant had met her end. This was the Shark Pit.
Once they had all stepped out into the Shark Pit, the steel door behind them slid back into place, sealing them all inside.
Monsieur Delacroix, wisely, had remained outside.
Someone else, however, was waiting for them inside the Pit.
A man with carrot-red hair and a sinister rat-like face.
'Hey, Noonan,' Brandeis said, stepping forward, taking the man's hand.
Schofield remembered Knight's horrifying description of Gant's death, and how a man with red hair and a rat face had pulled the lever that had ended her life.
Schofield glared at the murderer.
For his part, Rat Face turned and glared insolently back at him.
'So this is the Scarecrow,' Rat Face said. 'Resilient little fucker, aren't you. I went to a lot of trouble to arrange that little mission in Siberia yesterday. Set the scene. Sent ExSol to wait for you. Then made sure that it was McCabe and Farrell and you who were sent into the trap. Then I cut your comms from Alaska. McCabe and Farrell weren't good enough. But not you. You survived.
'But not now. Now, there's no escape. In fact, you're gonna buy it the same way your girlfriend did.' Rat Face turned to the Delta men holding Schofield. 'Put him in the guillotine.'
Schofield was shoved over to the guillotine by two of Brandeis's D-boys. His head was thrust into the stocks, while his hands stayed out, flex-cuffed behind his back.
'No!' a voice called from across the Pit.
Everyone turned.
Jonathan Killian appeared on a balcony overlooking the Pit,
flanked by Cedric Wexley and the ten men from Executive Solutions, plus the just-arrived Monsieur Delacroix.
'Put him in face up,' Killian said. 'I want Captain Schofield to see the blade coming.'
The Delta men did as they were told, and rolled Schofield over so that his face was pointed upwards. The 12-foot guide rails of the wooden guillotine stretched away from him to the stone ceiling. At their peak he saw the glistening blade, suspended high above him.
'Captain,' Killian said. 'Through courage and audacity, you have saved the
existing world order. Spared the lives of millions of people who will never even know your name. You are, in the true sense of the word, a hero. But your victory is at best temporary. Because I will continue to live—continue to rule—and ultimately my time will come. You, on the other hand, are about to discover what really happens to heroes. Mr Noonan. Drop the blade, and then shoot Captain Schofield's protectors in the head—'
'Killian!' Schofield called.
Everyone froze.
Schofield's voice was even, cold. 'I'll be coming for you.'
Killian smiled. 'Not in this life, Captain. Drop the blade.'
Rat Face strode to the side of the guillotine, and looking down at Schofield, gripped the lever.
At the same time, Wade Brandeis raised his Colt .45 to Knight's head.
'I'll see you in hell, Scarecrow,' Rat Face said.
Then he yanked the lever, releasing the blade.
The guillotine's blade thundered down its guide rails.
And Schofield could do nothing but watch it rush down toward his face.
He shut his eyes and waited for the end.
Chunk!
But the end didn't come.
Schofield felt nothing.
He opened his eyes—
—to see that the guillotine's diagonal blade had been stopped a foot above his neck, its deadly downward rush halted by a five-bladed shuriken throwing knife that had lodged itself with a loud chunk in the vertical wooden guide rail of the guillotine.
So recently had it been thrown, the shuriken was still quivering.
Aloysius Knight was also saved as—a split-second after the shuriken had hit the guillotine—a bullet slammed into Wade Brandeis's gun-hand, sending his pistol splashing into the water, blood gushing from his hand.
Schofield turned ... to see an unexpected but very welcome apparition emerge from the waters of the Shark Pit.
It was a fearsome image—a warrior in grey battle uniform, scuba gear and bearing shuriken throwing knives and guns. Lots and lots of guns.
If Death exists, he's afraid of one person.
Mother.
Mother exploded from the water, now with an MP-7 in each hand, firing them hard. Two of the five Delta men dropped immediately, hit in their chests.
Then things started happening everywhere.
For Knight and Rufus, Mother's entry had been distraction enough to allow them to king-hit their captors and, together, leap
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