by Paul Byers
Standing up, he peered around the corner. The guard was facing the other way, out toward the ocean, smoking a cigarette and the dog was sitting patiently next to him. Pike took a cleansing breath to clear his mind then stepped out into the open. Immediately the dog saw him and Pike held up the ball for him to see. The dog now stood to its feet, his ears up and head cocked to one side. With a quick prayer, Pike wound up and threw the ball.
The ball flew straight and true, up over the head of the guard. The dog watched the ball sail over head as it bounced in the VIP courtyard. As the ball landed, the dog barked and took off after his new toy. The guard was spun around and was nearly yanked to the ground as the leash was ripped from his hand by the bounding dog. He started chasing the German Shepherd, yelling at him to stop.
Pike half ran, have shuffled across the ice in a mad dash toward the Clipper. He felt like a penguin waddling across the ice but it was the best he could do without falling flat on his face. Close to the launch platform he slipped and fell and started sliding. He reached out to grab the corner but missed and kept on sliding. He looked between his feet and was horrified to see the railing coming up fast with the waiting ocean thirty feet below.
As he was sliding across the ice to his doom, Pike was thinking how ironic it would be, to be done in by a simple fall and not by Cain’s master plan. Sliding on his back like a hockey puck, Pike raised his feet and managed to catch the bottom cable of the railing. The force of the impact bent his knees up to his chest. He heard his knees pop but at least he had stopped.
Wasting no time, he flipped over onto his stomach and wiggled his way back to the cover of the launcher. He lay still, listening for shouts of his discovery and hoped his pounding heart didn’t send shockwaves that would crack the ice. He peered around the corner and saw the roof was still empty and the guard was still in the VIP courtyard, yanking on the German Shepherd’s collar, who was barking adamantly at the railing where the ball had gone over the side. With the coast clear, he knew it was now or never.
Pike scramble to his feet and had just put his left foot onto the launch platform to climb into the cockpit when he caught a flash of movement out of the corner of his eye. He had seen the reflection of the sliding glass door open as three men, who he knew weren’t pool attendants, come out.
He quickly dropped to the ice like a dead man, which he knew he would be, if they came his way. He watched as they paused and turned their backs on him and for a brief moment he thought his luck would hold, but that thought was shattered as he realized they were just adjusting their coats against the cold and they turned back around and started walking toward him. Panic shot through him like a bolt of electricity; what was he going to do? He couldn’t take on all three men, plus the forth guard and Rin Tin Tin.
Frantically he looked around for a place to hide but his options were severely limited to say the least. When he glanced at the hole he had burned through the ice, he had the oddest thought; he remembered watching Bugs Bunny cartoons as a kid and whenever Bugs was trapped by Elmer Fudd, he would simply disappeared down his hole. If it worked for Bugs?
Remaining on his hands and knees, he scampered to the hole then lay down on his stomach and spun around, lowering himself down, feet first. He was halfway down with just his head sticking out of the hole when he lost his grip and fell. Staring into the abyss, he expected to fall forever but in reality he only dropped about a foot. He knew that when they were draining the pool to fill the hole, they had run out of water, leaving a two foot gap between the ice and the ceiling of the anchor room.
He dropped to his knees and was plunged into near total darkness as he started crawling toward the back. He moved cautiously with his hands in front of him, not wanting to smack into the wall, face first. When he reached the wall, he flipped over and leaned against it, trying to get comfortable. His plan was simple; wait until things blew over then come out and radio for help, but as he sat there, a heavy weariness pressed down on him and drove him into a fitful sleep.
Pike awoke to his teeth chattering like castanets at a samba contest. Even though he had his work parka on, it wasn’t designed to keep a person warm when he was wedged between two giant slabs of ice.
Shaking away the cobwebs, he noticed a bright shaft of light shining down through the hole. He stopped for a moment; something was wrong. He rolled over and held his watch up to the light. It read 12:30. He had been asleep for nearly eight hours! He only had three, four hours tops before Cain carried out his deadly plan.
Hurriedly, he started to crawl out of his cocoon when he noticed a dark form lying in the far corner. Odd, he thought, he didn’t remember leaving any tools or anything else down here after they filled room. He slithered his way over to investigate and when he got within arm’s length, he reached up and grabbed the object and pulled it toward him. To his utter shock and horror, he found himself staring into the dead eyes of Marilyn Talbot. For a moment, he was frozen as solid as the block of ice he was lying on.
He looked up and over her and saw another body and guessed it could only be Tony. Poor kid, Pike though as he shook his head. Why would Cain have had them killed? Then it came to him, first rule of assassination: always kill the assassins. No wonder no one had found him. Cain knew the bodies were here and told everyone to stay clear.
As he lay there staring at Marilyn, he knew he should feel something for her, but what? Should he hate her for what she did? Should he feel sorry for her because she had fallen victim to Cain’s plot and now she was dead too? He rolled her back over and turned around and started back toward the entrance. He felt nothing at all for her, and that’s what scared him the most.
Pike squinted as his eyes adjusted to the brightness, then he stuck his head into the shaft of light and looked up and saw a circle of beautiful blue sky. He listened intently for any sign that trouble was near. All he could hear was the muffled sounds of a busy harbor, people going to and fro, oblivious to the fact that their world was about to change forever.
Reaching up, he found that he was about a foot short of grasping the edge of the hole to pull himself up. He ducked back down to take off his coat. As he did, he noticed something glimmer near his feet. He bent down and found that it was a small puddle of water reflecting the light. Thinking nothing of it, he continued to take off his coat, then stopped dead in his tracks.
Looking around, he saw several more puddles formed by water dripping from the ceiling. There shouldn’t be any pools or dripping water, everything should be frozen, unless...Cain had already turned the juice off and was well into his plan. It was already hitting the fan!
Pike stood in the center of the shaft, bathing in sunlight as he looked up to the edge. As a kid in high school, he was able to jump high enough to stuff a baseball in a basketball hoop; now, he only hoped his old legs still had a little spring left in them.
On his first jump he didn’t feel like the man of steel but more like the man of lead. His legs were sore and stiff from the cold and he only made it half way to the top. He rubbed his legs and jogged in place to get the blood flowing. His second attempt was much better. His fingertips just touched the rim. When he landed he thought he heard a small crack but considered it just his cold joints protesting.
Third time’s the charm Pike hoped as he leaped. His hand cleared the edge and for a moment he managed to hold on until his hands slipped and he fell back down, landing hard on the ice. When he hit, he heard the crack again, only this time he knew it wasn’t from his tired body.
It was a loud snap at first, and then silence. He stood quietly listening and was about to jump again when he heard faint snaps and pops, almost like aftershocks to an earthquake. At first, just one or two snaps echoed through the room but soon the room was filled with a chorus of sounds, none of them good.
Pike jumped for all he was worth and watched the floor fall away beneath him, not from the height of his jump; it just fell away. Pike hung there watching in horror as the entire chunk of ice that had been the ancho
r room, including the anchor, popped out the side of the iceberg and plunged into the harbor below.
Looking down between his dangling legs, Pike saw the anchor chain being dragged along by its 60 ton master. It looked and sounded like a rushing freight train, the sound of the clanging steel, trapped and amplified in the tiny room funneled through the hole like a geyser. Watching the chain rumbling below him in a blur, he knew that if he fell, the only thing left of him would be a memory.
Then, just as suddenly as it had started, the chain fell silent as the anchor came to rest on the harbor floor. The sudden silence was almost as unnerving as the roaring. Still dangling ten feet up and hanging on by a thread, Pike knew he wasn’t out of danger yet. The chain was directly below him and there would be no way to avoid it if he fell. The fall might not kill him but his legs would certainly be shattered to pieces landing on the steel links.
Chapter Forty Eight
He raised his right arm to pull himself up but instantly stopped as he suddenly started slipping. Pike’s ears were ringing from the heavy pounding of his heart; despite the cold, he could feel the sweat rolling off his forehead.
In one quick motion, Pike put the sole of his right shoe on the ice in front of him then jammed the sole of his left shoe behind him on the ice, holding himself up with his legs in a very awkward position. A split second later, he summoned all his strength and in one massive push/pull effort, he shot out of the hole onto the ice like a penguin shooting out of the sea.
Wasting no time, he quickly scurried under the launch platform and lay still, watching and waiting to see if he had been discovered. He knew he had been extremely lucky so far, he just hoped his luck held out for just a few more minutes. With no immediate sound of rushing feet or gun fire, he pushed himself up on his forearms and scanned the area. Despite the crashing of the anchor through the side of the iceberg, no one seemed to be paying much attention. He shrugged; maybe sleeping late was a blessing after all, allowing everyone to be long gone.
Pike thought it odd: here he was in the middle of New York harbor fighting for his life in full view of the world. He could hear the rumbling of the traffic in the distance, honking horns, and squealing tires. He looked up and saw several airliners pass overhead along with a couple of police and news helicopters.
But what concerned him most was that the harbor was swarming with boats. Boats of all shapes and sizes were milling around, surrounding the iceberg like a pack of kids swarming the neighborhood ice cream truck. If they only knew the danger they were in.
Pike scrambled from under the launch chassis, looked around one more time, then climbed up on the wing, opened the canopy and quickly slipped into the cockpit. Slouching down as low as he could, he put on his helmet, flipped the master switch, then turned on the radio. “Mayday, Mayday, this is the Yankee Clipper. Do you copy? Over.”
Static.
“Mayday, Mayday, this is the Yankee Clipper. Do you copy? Over.” He repeated. He tried several more frequencies but the only answer he got was more static. How could Cain jam his radio in the middle of New York Harbor? Someone would have noticed…unless it was extremely localized and extremely short range.
“Hello Gabriel.”
Pike nearly jumped out of the cockpit, hearing Cain’s voice over the radio.
“May I ask you what you think you are doing?”
“Hello Nigel. Thank you for your hospitality but I really must be leaving now.”
“I must say, I really do admire your cleverness and ingenuity.”
“I wish I could say the same.”
“Oh come now Gabriel, we can still come to an equitable solution don’t you think?”
“Sure.” Pike said, stalling for time as he studied the new controls for the launcher Cain had installed. “You and Beth can just turn yourselves in, then we can talk.”
Cain laughed. “Now you know I can’t do that. But we can talk. Seriously, tell me what you want and maybe we can come to some sort of terms.”
“What do I want? What do I want?” Pike shouted in anger. “What do you think I want? I want K.D. back! That’s what I want!” Pike could feel himself going blind with rage. Cain’s arrogance was unbelievable. He had had second thoughts about having to kill the guard during his escape if he had to, but he would have no such thoughts if Cain were in front of him right now.
Suddenly he caught a glimpse of motion out of the corner of his eye. He turned to see two men with guns drawn coming out of the spa area and another two scrambling their way across the roof. Pike was not a swearing man but he was cursing himself now for letting Cain distract him so his men could get the jump on him. He didn’t recognize the first gunman but the second one he did. He had a bandage on his nose and his face was badly bruised; it was the guard from his cell. Orders or no, Pike knew the guard would kill him this time.
He turned on the engine and pulled the throttle back, letting it idle and warm up. In a military emergency, the Sabre could go from a cold start to take-off status in three minutes. He had never attempted to do this before, but as with many events of the past 24 hours, he was about to learn.
Just then, a news helicopter zoomed overhead then made a low pass, then hovered slightly in front of the Clipper. Pike looked up and saw a cameraman hanging out the side, filming, and Tabatha Amies in the copilot seat broadcasting. She looked down and smiled, then gave him a thumbs up.
Whether by design or just trying to get a scoop, the effect was the same. The closest two men coming from the spa slowed and tucked their guns under their coats, not wanting to be seen on national television with weapons in their hands.
The lead man stopped, then put his hand to his ear, receiving instruction through an earpiece. The first guard stopped his partner and the two of them argued stubbornly. After their brief exchange, the wounded gunman shoved his partner aside, not willing to be denied his revenge. He drew his gun and fired an unaimed shot toward the helicopter as he continued toward Pike. The news chopper banked up and away, out of the line of fire. That was very good advice, Pike thought.
He said a quick prayer then flipped the switch for the Zero Length Launch rocket and shoved his throttle to the stops. With a deafening roar, he was thrown back into his seat as he went from zero to over 250mph in only four seconds.
“WWWWHHHHOOOOAAAA!” Pike heard himself yell. A film Cain had showed him said the g-force at takeoff was about the same as a navy pilot taking off the deck of an aircraft carrier. After this, he was ready to sign up for the Navy. What a rush! Now he knew what the term ‘Bat out of hell” felt like. He was so exhilarated that he almost forgot that he still had a job to do.
He shot out over the harbor at sixty feet above the water, barely missing the mast of a passing tug. He gently pulled back on the stick, slicing between two high-rise office buildings as he slowly gained altitude, circling back over the iceberg. Pike noticed that the Clipper was handling sluggishly, so he looked back to see that the booster rocket hadn’t fallen off like it was supposed to. He knew he could still be able to land with the rocket attached so he wasn’t overly concerned. At this point it was just a minor hindrance and no real cause for alarm.
“Mayday, Mayday, Mayday! This is Yankee Clipper,” Alpha Whiskey seven-niner-niner-two-one, declaring an emergency. “Does anyone copy?” The only reply was static interrupted with an occasional faint voice that was too garbled to understand. He tried several more frequencies with the same result. He was circling at 2000 feet and decided to climb to 3000 to see if that would get him out of range of Cain’s jamming signal.
“Mayday, Mayday, Mayday! This is Yankee Clipper, Alpha Whiskey seven- niner- niner-two- one, declaring an emergency, does anyone copy?”
“Yankee Clipper.” The voice cut through the static so cleanly, it startled Pike. “This is Lt. Colonel Douglas Madison of the United States Air Force. I read you five by five. Is that you, Mr. Pike?”
“Colonel Madison? Am I ever glad to hear from you. What are you doing over here?”
&
nbsp; “We’re a four ship heading to Lakenheath, England, then on to Afghanistan. Look to your high four o’clock.”
The F-86 Sabre was circling over the iceberg counter-clockwise. Pike strained his neck as he looked over his right shoulder and saw a flight of four F-15 Eagles descending.
“What is the nature of your emergency?” Madison asked.
“You are not going to believe me.” Pike said, shaking his head and feeling his entire body trembling slightly as a sense of relief came over him; it was finally over. Before he could finish, the radio came to life.
“Blackjack Three to One, I have a man on the iceberg, he appears to have a hand held missile launcher, could be a stinger sir, I can’t tell at this range. He’s tracking the Sabre, sir. I’m getting a targeting signal.”
Tracking the Sabre? A targeting signal? WHAT! It finally registered in Pike’s mind, Cain was going to shoot him down with a missile! “No, no, no,” Pike said, shaking his head frantically in disbelief; “This can’t be happening!”
“I have a launch signal…and visual confirmation.”
“WHAT!”
“Blackjack Three, Four. Dive behind the Sabre and execute flares and chafe. Pike cut your engine.”
“Three.”
“Four.”
Both pilots acknowledged.
Pike, still in a daze, watched in fascination as the two fighters banked hard and dove in behind him. In a lighting fast pass, they dipped in behind him and then it looked like both planes exploded.
“Cut your engine now!” Madison ordered again, his voice raised but still professional.