by Rob Jones
“We have to get back to DC in a hurry,” Brooke said to Lopez, the lead BDS man. “Those sons-of-bitches killed three of my men back at the cabin and they almost killed me, my daughter and Joe Hawke here. Whoever the hell they are we need the President to respond and…”
Lopez and the other men shared a glance. He turned to the Pentagon chief. “You mean you haven’t heard, sir?”
Brooke stopped dead on the asphalt and the entire entourage screeched to a halt around him. He stared at Lopez. “Heard what?”
“The President’s been kidnapped, sir.”
Brooke looked incredulous. “Kidnapped? That can’t be possible!”
“Sorry, sir, but it’s more than possible – it just happened.”
Anger flashed across Brooke’s face. “Well, how the hell did it happen?”
Lopez shrugged his shoulders. “We don’t have the details, sir. It’s total chaos everywhere right now. From what we can gather he was snatched when he was down in Louisiana.”
“This is unbelievable.”
“I know, sir.”
They started walking again, faster now, and reached the plane where they stood at the bottom of the airstair. A few hundred yards to their right a group of men were refuelling an Embraer jet and readying it for takeoff.
“We gotta get back to DC right now. I’m going to need to talk to Mike Thorn. Has he been sworn in yet?”
Another glance. “Sir, the Vice President was killed this morning.”
Brooke’s face changed from anger to an incipient fear. “Killed?”
Lopez nodded. “He was shot by a sniper when he was leaving his house.”
Brooke looked at his daughter and ran a trembling hand over his stubble.
“And they also got Speaker Tobin – when he was at a football game with his wife. I would have told you earlier but I presumed you knew.”
“We were under attack, Lopez! We had no time to read the news.” Brooke’s eyes widened like saucers as he shook his head in disbelief and horror. “We’re talking about the total decapitation of the US Government!”
The normally hardened BDS men began to look nervous.
“Doesn’t that mean you’re the President or something?” Hawke asked.
Brooke shook his head. “No, I’m fifth in the presidential line of succession.”
“So who’s number four?”
Brooke put his hands on his hips and stared up at the sky for a few seconds. “After the Speaker, the presidential line of succession goes to the President pro tempore of the Senate.”
“And who’s that?” Hawke asked.
Brooke sighed and returned his gaze from the heavens. “Teddy Kimble.”
Hawke looked from Brooke to Alex and then back to Brooke. “You sound unhappy about something.”
“It’s nothing, it’s just that…”
With his words still hanging in the air, Brooke stopped talking and looked over Hawke’s shoulder, his jaw dropping in horror.
Hawke spun around to see a rocket-propelled grenade racing toward them.
“Run!” the Englishman shouted.
The group scattered in all directions as the grenade struck the port engine of the C-32 and ignited the kerosene contained in the wing. A series of enormous explosions tore through the aircraft and sent a white-hot fireball into the air over the airport.
The shockwave lifted Hawke and the others from their feet and blasted them away from the plane like rag dolls. Hawke smashed into the side of a small utility shed and fell to the asphalt with a smack. He shook his head, blinked and looked up to see the Secretary’s official aircraft had turned into nothing more than a blown-out airframe of twisted blackened metal. Flames poured from every part of it. It looked like the burned carcass of some hideous, dead monster.
Hawke now watched in horror as the pilots tried to escape on rope ladders hanging out of their windows, only to be mown down by the submachine gun fire of the men who had fired the grenade.
By now, the BDS men were on their feet and helping Brooke back onto his.
Hawke ran a few yards to Alex and helped her up.
“What the hell was that?” she asked.
“Up there,” Hawke said, pointing to the roof line of an industrial unit a few hundred yards beyond the airport’s western perimeter fence. “I saw a puff of smoke rising into the air when we turned and saw the grenade. I’m guessing it’s our friends who borrowed your Dad’s Corvette, plus a few of their friends.”
“Well whoever the hell they are,” Brooke said, joining them, “they’re not going to give up after one shot so get after them, Lopez!”
Lopez and the others fanned out and returned fire, temporarily pinning the enemy gunmen down. As the fighting continued, passengers, pilots and cabin crews streamed from their planes and ran for the cover of one of the hangars.
The familiar wail of sirens rose up in the hot Idaho air from behind the departure building. “Fire trucks and police…” Brooke said. He looked at the burning jet and shook his head in anger.
Lopez ran back over. “We took a couple of them out, but there has to be more. We need to get you out of here, Mr Secretary.”
“Concurred,” Hawke said. “And that’s how we’re going to do it.”
He pointed to the United Express Embraer jet a few hundred yards behind them that he had seen the men refuelling.
“Our pilots are dead, Joe!” Brooke shouted.
“I can fly that thing no problem,” he said. “It’s the only plane here with the range and we know it’s fuelled.”
Brooke gave Hawke a double-take. “You can fly it?”
“Almost one hundred percent certain.”
“Are you kidding me?” Alex said. “Almost one hundred percent?”
“It’s me or them!” Hawke said. He pointed as another one of Lopez’s men was shot through the chest and collapsed on the hot asphalt.
“Let’s get out of here!” Brooke said, and the four of them ran up the airstair and into the Embraer. From the top of the airstair, Brooke called out for Lopez to get on board, but he stayed behind to pin some approaching gunmen down behind a maintenance shed.
“Get in here, Lopez!” Brooke screamed.
“Yes, sir!”
He sprinted up the airstair, but as Special Agent Lopez began to close the heavy door behind him, one of the shooters fired a bullet through his neck. The round ricocheted off the far cabin wall, causing no damage, but Lopez was gone. He clutched at his neck in horror as he fell from the Embraer and landed with a sickening wet smack on the asphalt below.
Horror flooded through Jack Brooke, but he wasted no time in securing the door and joining Hawke and his daughter in the cockpit. It was time to take the fight to the enemy.
CHAPTER TEN
The Secret Service agents bundled Senator Edward D. Kimble into the black Cadillac SUV that was idling outside his office on Capitol Hill and made the short journey to the White House. As they headed west, Kimble looked along the National Mall in horror at the devastated Washington Monument directly ahead of them.
They made a sharp right turn and skidded onto Pennsylvania Avenue. With the curfew now in force across the city for all non-approved journeys, the journey took a few short minutes and they arrived at the east entrance of the White House in double-quick time. The Cadillac swept through the gates and accelerated along the drive around the South Lawn. Seconds later Kimble was being rushed into the south entrance of the Executive Residence.
They were met by Scott Anderson, Charles Grant’s Chief-of-Staff. “Welcome to the White House, sir,” he said hurriedly to Kimble. He was out of breath as they paced through the residence toward the West Wing. The nervous faces of junior staffers peered up at him as he raced past them. “This won’t take long, sir.”
As they moved along the plush corridor, Kimble said nothing.
And then they reached the Oval Office.
Teddy Kimble was speechless for the first time in his life. He had been in the impressive room ma
ny times before, but all those times it was someone else’s office, and that someone else was the President of the United States. Charles Grant had always been in here, standing behind the desk, and the rest of the room orbited around his powerful gravitas. Now, Grant was gone, and the room was his.
Or soon would be.
But what had seemed like a good idea at the time was now starting to feel very wrong.
Anderson stepped forward. “Sir, this is Mark Paton, a lawyer and also of course a federal judge. He’ll be swearing you in.”
Kimble nodded grimly. “Where’s the Chief Justice?”
Paton pulled a copy of the Bible from his suitcase. “Chief Justice Owens is on a fishing holiday in Montana, sir, but there’s no legal stipulation that he has to administer the oath.”
Grant’s Chief-of-Staff turned to Kimble. “Senator, with the exception of Jack Brooke who’s missing and presumed dead, the cabinet has convened by secure video-phone and approved the use of the Twenty-Fifth Amendment. Congressman Mitchell, USSS Agent King and the Secretary of Labor are here to act as witnesses. Are you ready to take the oath, Senator?”
Kimble glanced around the room at the men, and then above their heads at the portraits of George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. History started to weigh heavy on his shoulders. “I am, Mr Anderson.”
Mark Paton stepped forward with a copy of the Bible in his hand and spoke. His words were solemn and quiet in the hushed, grim atmosphere of the Oval Office.
“Then please raise your right hand and repeat after me…I, Edward Dupont Kimble do solemnly swear…”
Kimble cleared his throat. “I, Edward Dupont Kimble do solemnly swear…”
“That I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States…”
Kimble repeated the words slowly, a slight wobble in his voice. “That I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States…”
“And will to the best of my ability…”
He paused for half a second to ask himself if this was really happening. “And will to the best of my ability.”
Paton’s voice didn’t waver. “Preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”
“Preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”
“So help me God.”
Kimble swallowed hard. “So help me God.”
Paton lowered the Bible and shook Kimble’s hand. “Congratulations, Mr President.”
*
Hawke strapped himself in the pilot’s seat and moved his hand up to the overhead panel. He clicked the two battery switches and a computerized voice began to squawk.
“What the hell does that mean?” asked Alex as she sat down beside him and strapped herself in.
“It means we’re on battery power,” Hawke replied. “But battery power’s not going to get us to Washington.” He switched on the fuel tank pumps and started up the auxiliary power unit. Suddenly they heard a whining sound as the APU powered up and began to run the electrical systems.
He activated the avionics, emergency lights and APU bleed. “Yeah…” he said to himself. “I’m pretty sure that’s right – now engine start up.”
“Well make it quick!” Brooke said, poking his head through the cabin door. “A sniper killed Lopez and look over there!”
Hawke glanced through the cockpit window and saw an intense fire-fight taking place on the perimeter fence between local police and airport security on one side, and the men who had fired the grenade on the other.
Brooke clenched his jaw. “If they get through that fence we’re the next target!”
“So no pressure, then,” Hawke said, and checked the powerplant section on the overhead panel to ensure the ignition switches were on auto. He flicked open the safety covers and moved the control switch for Engine One to the start position.
Alex raised an eyebrow. “You seem to know your way around.”
“That’s what all the girls say,” Hawke said.
“And so modest, too.”
He ignored her and watched the instrument panels spring to life as the aircraft began pumping fuel to the engine.
“Oil temperature and oil pressure rising,” he muttered, and did the same procedure for engine two. “Now we’re cooking with gas!”
“And so are those maniacs!” Brooke said, pointing at the fence. The men had overwhelmed the local police force and broken through the perimeter. They were just under half a mile from their jet.
“They’re heading this way, Joe!” Alex said. “They want to kill my Dad!”
She felt Brooke squeeze her shoulder in reassurance, but she knew he would be scared too.
Hawke ignored everything and focussed, flicking off the APU bleeds now the engines were up and running and powering the aircraft. He checked the hydraulic electrical pumps were set to auto and glanced over the panels one last time, rubbing his hands together.
“Don’t you have to tell this thing where it’s going?” Alex said.
“Probably, but we’re just going to fly east and hope for the best.”
Before she could answer, Hawke pushed forward the throttles and the engines roared to life. The plane began to taxi toward the runway. “This is your captain speaking,” Hawke said. “I recommend a strong drink followed by strapping yourselves into your seats, in that order, and as fast as possible.”
He taxied the Embraer to Runway 13 as the gunmen climbed into an airport fire truck and raced toward them. Seconds later they were almost alongside them and began firing at the aircraft.
“Now that is just not cricket!” the Englishman muttered.
Hawke pushed the throttles forward and the powerful aircraft quickly gained speed. The runway grumbled angrily beneath them and the fire truck now fell far behind as they raced toward V1 speed.
Hawke pulled back on the yoke and the jet’s nose rotated. They lifted into the air high above Hailey and he retracted the gear. They were already flying at nearly two hundred knots as they passed the mountain line and shot up into the blue sky, tearing through a handful of cumulus clouds on their way up.
Hawke spoke quietly into the headset. “Ladies and gentleman, no one is more surprised than your captain that we are actually safely airborne, but pleased be advised to stay in your seats with your seatbelts on until we have reached cruising altitude and I’m absolutely sure I can keep this thing in the air. Thanks.”
Alex smiled. “You’ve done this before, right?”
Hawke smiled. “Yes and no. I’m properly trained to fly light aircraft but I’m a rotorhead really. The good news is I did take private lessons in these for a few weeks until the money ran out, so I know what everything is and what it all does.” He paused and narrowed his eyes with confusion. “Except that one,” he said, leaning toward a bright red button which read ESSENTIAL POWER. “I wish I knew what that one did.”
Alex rolled her eyes and sighed. “Very drole, Mr Hawke.”
Hawke said nothing, and set the autopilot to fly at a course of sixty-one degrees with a vertical speed of fifteen hundred feet per minute. When they hit their cruising altitude of thirty-five thousand feet, he began to relax for the first time, glancing over the controls with a mix of awe, respect and pride.
“Should be in Washington DC in around four hours,” he said, tapping the top of the instrument panel as if the aircraft were a faithful dog.
“Do we even have enough fuel?” Alex asked.
“Shit – I never checked that.”
Alex looked panicked. “You’re kidding, right?”
“What do you think? We have enough fuel, but the flight to DC is at the far end of this little baby’s range, so we won’t have much to spare if we’re pushed out of Washington airspace because of the attacks.”
“We’ll deal with that right now.” They both turned to see Jack Brooke standing in the cabin doorway once again. “I want you to radio whoever the hell you have to and tell them what happened back there, and that I’m coming ba
ck to the Pentagon to straighten this shit out.”
“On it,” Alex said.
Brooke leaned over the pilot’s seat. “And Hawke?”
“Yeah?”
“Back there, at the house when we were getting attacked.”
“Yeah?”
Brooke paused a beat. He looked like he was trying to remember something important. “Did you call my daughter a septic tank?”
“Er, well...”
“Get outta here, Dad!”
Without saying another word, Brooke turned and walked back to the passenger cabin.
“That’s my Dad, by the way,” Alex said, and offered half a smile. “Did I ever tell you that?”
“Come to think of it,” Hawke said, fixing his eyes on her. “I really don’t think you did.”
“I guess now you know why,” she said.
Hawke guessed it was supposed to be a joke comment, but her words were tinged with sadness, and she turned away from him to look out the window as they raced over Caribou Mountain and crossed into Wyoming.
“I need to stretch my legs,” she said. “Sometimes they kind of hurt.”
Hawke looked at her, concerned. “Are you okay?”
She nodded and smiled. “Sure.”
She unstrapped herself and walked into the main cabin. As she went, she pulled her phone from her pocket and made a quick call to an old friend.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Hawke stared out of the cockpit window across the American continent as the jet raced toward the nation’s capital. Of all things that could have crossed his mind, it was that this was the first time he’d been involved with anything like this without Lea Donovan, and it felt wrong.
He wondered again if he’d made a mistake back in Egypt when Sir Richard Eden and the others told him about the ECHO team and had invited him to join. He wanted to say yes – he had no job, for one thing, and these people had become his closest friends. But his pride had been wounded by their deceit, and he’d said he wanted nothing to do with them. He’d felt like a fool. The argument with Lea had ended in what he supposed anyone else would call a break-up, but maybe that wasn’t the right word.
