by Jack Mars
Maria appeared in the aisle again. “We’re less than thirty minutes out from Chatham Airfield,” she told them. “Bixby’s got a bead on the truck via satellite; at its current speed, we should get there about twenty-five miles ahead of it. We’ll have a helicopter waiting, and state police will set up a roadblock as soon as we land. Any sooner and our friends might realize that something is up.”
She took the seat beside him and stared at her tablet screen, on which was a GPS map with a tiny yellow blip that represented Bixby’s approximation of the truck’s location. Zero leaned over to look at it—and his frown deepened.
“Maria,” he noted, “that highway won’t take them to Chicago. It leads north to the capital of Illinois… to Springfield.”
“So?”
“So?” he parroted. “So they’re headed to another Springfield, just like the Kansas attack? You don’t find that strange?”
“Kent, Springfield is one of the most common names in the United States. There’s at least forty of them. It’s a coincidence.”
He shook his head. “You know better than that.”
She finally looked up from the screen. “It won’t matter,” she said firmly. “Because we’re going to get to them first.”
“Sure,” he murmured in agreement. Maybe they were right and he was wrong. These people could have just been lunatics with a sonic weapon and no plan.
But it didn’t feel that way to him.
*
As the Gulfstream descended quickly toward a small private airfield, Maria pulled a long black duffel bag from a rear storage compartment and unzipped it.
“We have to assume these people are armed with more than just the ultrasonic weapon.” She pulled out an AR-15 with a scope in place of a carry-handle mount and a shortened stock, and passed it off to Zero.
“That’s a little intense, don’t you think?” he asked as he took the gun.
“It’s modded to semi-auto. We’re not shooting to kill, but we don’t want any civilian casualties. If they open fire or, god forbid, use the sonic weapon, we need to be ready for that.”
The jet’s tires found purchase on the tarmac and Maria lurched forward. Zero instinctively stuck out an arm and caught her before she sprawled into the aisle.
“Thanks,” she muttered, her cheeks turning pink.
“Is your head clear?” he asked her quietly but sternly.
“Yes. Of course it is. It’s just…” She stood and smoothed her hands over her hair. “They attacked kids, Kent. Families. A parade. There was no reason for it.”
“I know. But we’ve seen just as bad and worse. We’ll get them… but I’ve got to know that someone’s going to be there to save my ass when it needs saving.” He grinned.
“Hey, I’m here too,” Strickland offered.
Maria smiled thinly. “You’ve got two daughters waiting at home for you. And you still owe me dinner. Would be nice to have this done before it’s too late for all that, wouldn’t it?”
He nodded—except he didn’t have two daughters waiting at home for him. But he wasn’t about to say that. “Then let’s go get it done.”
Strickland pushed open the Gulfstream’s door as it skidded to a stop and the three of them hurried out to board the waiting helicopter.
But there was no waiting helicopter.
“Goddammit,” Maria hissed as she put her phone to her ear. “Where’s the helo?” She winced, and then told them, “It’s two minutes out. Coming from an Air Force depot north of here.” Into the phone again she said, “Have the troopers set up the roadblock, slow traffic in the northbound lanes.”
Zero secured the strap of his gear bag and slung the AR-15 over his shoulder. This is where it counts, he told his brain. Let’s not have any short circuits.
There was a steady whup-whup of rotors as a black Bell UH-1 approached rapidly, setting down on the tarmac some yards from the nose of the Gulfstream. They scrambled aboard and the skids lifted off again before Maria could even fit a headset over her ears. She dropped into the copilot seat and gave the pilot the coordinates, and then patched them in to Bixby as Zero pulled on a headset and grabbed a canvas loop in the ceiling to steady himself.
“Bixby, we’re about twenty-three miles from target,” Maria said as the helicopter roared parallel with the highway. “Is the roadblock set up?”
“They’re working on it now,” Bixby told them through the radio. “Roadblock is about eight miles from the truck’s current location. By my best estimation, they should get snagged in traffic just a minute or two before you arrive.”
Their plan was to catch the truck in a traffic jam from the state troopers’ blockade, and then fast-rope down from directly overhead, surrounding the box truck and apprehending anyone inside as quickly as possible. But as Zero hung onto the canvas loop in a white-knuckled grip, he glanced up at the sliding door of the helo and let out a small groan of disappointment.
“Maria,” he said into the radio. “This helo doesn’t have rappelling lines.”
“What?” she twisted in her seat and her face fell. “You’ve got be kidding… Bixby! Change of plan. We’re going to need a place to set the chopper down, as close to the truck as possible.”
“Um… that could be a problem,” the engineer said nervously. “This stretch of highway is largely residential, with a lot of trees and power lines.”
“Just find us something!” she barked into the radio. “Twenty miles out.”
With the Bell’s cruising speed of about a hundred and ten knots and the truck, coming straight toward them at a presumed sixty-five to seventy miles an hour, they’d be on them in mere minutes, even if the roadblock slowed them. But Zero was all too aware that a helicopter landing alongside a highway was not exactly the most inconspicuous entrance. They’d have to disembark and move in immediately, with no hiccups and no surprises…
“Johansson!” Bixby shouted through the radio. “They left the interstate! The truck just turned off I-55, onto… State Route 108, heading westbound.”
Maria shook the tablet as if it was an Etch-a-Sketch. “I lost the blip! Can you lock onto them again?”
“Trying…”
Alongside Zero, Strickland shook his head. He didn’t need to say it aloud; their plan was all going to hell.
“You know this area?” Maria asked the pilot.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Get us to State Route 108 on the fastest route possible,” she instructed. Zero swayed as the helo course-corrected to the southwest. “Bixby, tell me good news!”
“Okay, okay.” The engineer sounded frazzled. “The state route runs perpendicular to I-55, so on your current route you’ll be on a triangular path and end up about… three miles ahead of them.”
“Roger that,” Maria breathed. None of them said it, but Zero assumed they were all thinking it—they had no way to stop the truck now that they lost their roadblock. They couldn’t very well shoot at it from the chopper; they wouldn’t be able to hit the tires from their angle, and even if they could, they might risk hitting civilian vehicles. And they definitely couldn’t land the chopper on a populated highway.
But there might be another way. The familiar sensation of tense excitement, that anticipation of adrenalin, bubbled up in his chest.
“There’s 108, just ahead,” the pilot announced.
“Reduce air speed and get us lower so we can get a visual,” Maria ordered. The UH-1 dipped as they soared parallel to the highway, no more than a hundred and fifty feet from the ground, no doubt bewildering holiday commuters. Maria scanned the road through the windshield, looking for any sign of the box truck.
“Bixby,” she said, “you have a location?”
“Looks like they’re coming up on you,” he replied. “Three-quarters of a mile and closing.”
Zero’s throat flexed. There would be no roadblock, no swooping down on fast-ropes—no element of surprise at all. In seconds the perpetrators in the truck would spot the chopper, and from there they woul
d have no choice but to improvise.
“I’ve got visual!” Maria shouted suddenly. “Turn us around, keep on them!”
The helicopter’s air speed dropped drastically and the tail spun, turning the Bell in a tight one-eighty so abruptly that Zero’s feet left the cabin floor for a moment.
“I can keep pace with them for as long as we’ve got fuel,” the pilot said into the radio, “but I hope you’ve got some plan on how to stop them.”
“We should call the troopers back,” Strickland suggested. “They can get ahead of them, create another roadblock…”
“No.” Zero shook his head. The people in that truck were well aware there was a helicopter on their tail; they couldn’t risk waiting longer. “Get us lower. Low as you can.”
Maria spun sharply in her seat. “Kent, you can’t be serious.”
He shrugged in a gesture that he hoped looked confident. “I’ve done it before.” He zipped up his jacket, secured the AR-15 and his gear bag, and then pulled open the sliding cabin door. Chilled November wind instantly swirled through the helicopter.
Zero leaned out precipitously, hanging onto the canvas loop. Below him, he could see the green box truck—and there was no doubt they saw the chopper. The truck jumped in speed, swerving around slower traffic, weaving between the two westbound lanes. Cars in both directions screeched to a halt or pulled over, either baffled over the appearance of the helicopter or trying to get a photo.
“Get right over top of them!” Zero instructed. “And low as possible!”
“You’re not actually going to—” But the pilot’s protest was cut off as Zero pulled the headset from his ears and tossed it over his shoulder. Clinging to the open door, he stepped carefully down onto the skid of the Bell. At least that would reduce his fall by a few feet.
The chopper dipped again. The cold wind raked at Zero like claws. The truck swerved in some vain attempt to outrun a helicopter, and they swerved with it. Zero’s right foot slipped from the skid, his body teetering forward over nothing—
A strong hand grabbed the back of his collar. He nodded quickly to Strickland over his shoulder as he regained his footing.
Don’t think about it too much.
He’d done it before; he’d once leapt from a helicopter onto the top of a moving train. Though that was of little comfort now. The train had afforded him a lot more runway for error than a sixteen-foot-long box truck.
Just do it.
The truck was closer now; they were about twenty-five feet directly over it. The helicopter wasn’t going to get any lower, and the truck could swerve out of the way at any moment.
He let out a breath, and he jumped.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
The thing about falling from any significant height, in Zero’s experience, was that it always felt like it took a lot longer than it did. The mere seconds that one would fall from twenty-five feet, or fifty feet, or a hundred feet seemed to stretch onward, as if the world had suddenly turned to slow-motion. He knew that it was a trick of the brain, full thoughts forming cogent in his head about every horrible thing that could go wrong on landing.
As he fell from the skid of the UH-1, he forced himself to focus and not think about missing his mark or becoming a bloody skid mark on an Illinois highway. He reminded himself that the momentum of the truck would try to force him backwards, so he would have to propel forward on the moment of impact.
But as his feet touched down on the roof of the truck, knees bending with the fall, the driver slammed the accelerator. The truck lurched forward suddenly, and there was nothing Zero could do to keep from hurtling backward.
He fell onto his back, heels flying over his head, sliding on his stomach, hands grasping out fruitlessly for any hold to stop himself but there were none, nothing but smooth metal. His feet slid out over the rear of the truck, then his knees, his waist. He had no way to stop himself. He was going to careen right off the back. Broken bones would be the least of his concerns; the oncoming traffic stopping before they pancaked him was far more worrisome.
As his torso slid out over the back of the truck, something white fluttered in his face and he reached for it, grabbing it in both fists. The muscles in his arms screamed in protest as they went taut. His body swung and slammed painfully into the truck’s steel rear door, rattling it in its tracks.
Zero was clinging to a white nylon strap that had been caught in the top of the door. He murmured a quick prayer to whoever was the patron saint of lifesaving strokes of luck; if not for that errant strap, he’d be a dead man.
Despite the searing pain in his arms and shoulders, he held tightly onto the nylon and planted his feet on the back of the box truck, shimmying his way around the corner as far as the strap would afford him—just far enough, thankfully, for his feet to rest of the steel wheel well of the rear passenger tire. The truck swerved into another lane and he nearly lost his footing, but clung tight.
Okay, now what?
If he dared to let go with one hand he could reach for his pistol, possibly blow out a front tire. But the angle would be difficult, and if anyone was in the passenger seat they needed only to glance in the side mirror and they’d see him there.
Not that they didn’t already know he was there, thanks to his less-than-graceful landing.
Just as he was about to let go with one hand and go for the Glock in his jacket, he saw movement in his periphery. His gaze darted to the right as something protruded from the passenger-side window—something long, like the barrel of a large gun, but green and tapered to a point at the end…
A rocket-propelled grenade.
The truck swerved right, across a lane and right onto the shoulder. Zero was so focused on the weapon that he wasn’t prepared for it and lost his footing, bouncing off the corner of the truck as the nylon strap swung him back to the rear. He smacked against it again, cursing, arms burning.
“RPG!” he shouted. “They have an RPG!”
Panic reached its icy claws into his chest and gripped his heart. He didn’t have his radio earpiece in. He’d taken it out after the Vegas op and hadn’t replaced it.
He couldn’t warn them; he could only hope they saw it too.
The hiss of the miniature missile was impossibly loud, even with the cold wind whipping in his ears. Clinging to the strap for his life, Zero could do nothing but watch, his neck craned awkwardly as the projectile rocketed up toward the helicopter.
The UH-1 veered, but not fast enough. The RPG struck a glancing blow to its tail and exploded, tearing off the rear rotor and most of the tail with it. The helicopter spun wildly, unable to stabilize, losing altitude and speed.
The last thing Zero saw before it vanished behind a roadside copse of trees was a flash of Todd Strickland, through the open cabin door, clinging to a loop in the ceiling while the rest of him was airborne, feet flailing.
He was alone now.
But he still had a job to do.
Anger and adrenaline fueled him in equal measure as he once again set his feet against the rear of the truck and pushed off, swinging around the corner and landing on the steel of the wheel well. The truck swerved left and right, trying to throw him off, but he wrapped the strap tightly around his left fist.
Without giving it a second thought, he let go with his other hand, unzipped the jacket enough to free the Glock, and leaned out as far as he dared to give himself a bigger target as he aimed for the front tire.
He fired once. The report was dulled by the wind and the roar of the truck’s engine, but the sparks that flew from the front wheel well told him that he missed.
Your aim is tracking to the left, he reminded himself. He aimed again, compensating for his injury. From the corner of his eye he saw movement again from the passenger window of the truck’s cab—a stubby machine gun, and along with it, a tiny hand and arm.
Too tiny, he thought, to have been the redheaded woman’s. But he had no time to discern its owner. He focused and aimed again; if he didn’t hit it this time, h
e’d be shredded by machine gun fire in the next few seconds.
The second thunderous clap from the Glock hit home. The front tire exploded; the truck veered right. The machine gun tumbled away from the tiny arm that held it. Zero held on as tight as he could while the truck left the road, careening down a small embankment at around eighty miles an hour.
Each bounce of the tires from the ruts in the ground sent him smacking painfully against the aluminum side. He lost his footing on the wheel well and cried out in pain as his entire body weight strained against the strap, crushing his hand.
He had to let go.
He let the Glock fall to the grass as he reached up for the strap and unwrapped it from around his fist. Then he planted a foot on the side of the truck and half-fell, half-jumped away. He hit the ground hard on his back and rolled with it, tumbling two and a half times before coming to a stop on his stomach, panting.
The truck kept going. Despite the blown-out tire and lack of road, the driver seemed intent to try to regain control. It bounced violently through a field, veering uncertainly. A rearview mirror snapped off against the side of a tree. Zero squinted; there was something white ahead of it. A vinyl fence—a home. A residential neighborhood.
The truck tore through the fence as if it was made of paper and smashed into an oak tree on the other side in a collision so violent the rear tires came off the ground.
Then, finally, there was silence.
Zero pulled himself to his feet, groaning in pain. His arms and shoulders hurt. The bruise around his left hand from the strap was already turning purple. He was certain he would have plenty more bruises to discover later from the tumble off the truck. But still, he had a job to do.
He started in the direction of the truck, through yellow weeds two feet tall—but he stopped just as suddenly. He had taken several reckless risks in just the last two minutes. What point was there in rushing into another one?