Cloudburst

by Pearson, Ryne Douglas

  “Holy shit,” Buxton said, almost somberly. “This is for real.”

  “Chris is right,” Sean said, getting attention instantly. “This is it, and we better have our shit together. Buddy checks, now!”

  The men broke off into pairs, going over each other’s snug web gear and limited equipment.

  “Captain Anderson,” Antonelli yelled, his partner’s hands tugging on cinch straps of his body armor. Joe looked up. “We’re going in.”

  The Delta troopers went about their preparatory ritual. Joe watched for a second, looking over his glasses, then returned his attention to the diagram. That was a generous word, but then the CIA man he had talked to while the printout came over the aircraft’s fax machine said it was obtained from someone with no knowledge of what it might be. What might it be? Joe asked himself. It was not a nuclear bomb, that was for sure. Even in its crudeness it could be almost anything but that.

  The drone of the engines was punctuated by the chatter of the troopers. Joe heard none of it. He was in his own world, one he alone understood—most of the time. But not now. He would be dealing with this ... thing when they got aboard, and he felt at a loss for not knowing what it was. The scary thing, though, was that it might not be anything he could deal with.

  Knock that crap off, Joe.

  Thirteen

  THE EXPECTED, THE UNEXPECTED, AND THE NECESSARY

  Flight 422

  “How much did we get?” Hendrickson asked.

  Buzz checked the fuel readout again. Data on the amount of fuel in the tanks was gathered through means much different than those used in a car. Floats in each of the seven fuel tanks were operated using reverse pressure. This negated the effect of minimal sloshing while the aircraft was in motion. Readings from the floats were matched against inflow and outflow meters on each tank, and all the numbers were tracked by a computerized fuel-management system.

  “Two-twenty,” the first officer answered. There were 220,000 pounds of jet fuel in the Maiden’s tanks. “I didn’t pump into the outboard extenders.”

  “Good,” Hendrickson said. The 656-gallon tanks inside the wings, right at the tips, were dry. That would keep more of the weight forward, since the wings, swept back at thirty-seven degrees, added mass behind the aircraft’s center of gravity. “Is the rest spread around?” he inquired, leaving Buzz to manage the fuel while he preflighted the engines.

  “The center is full. The inboards and outboard mains are splitting the rest.” That still left over 130,000 pounds of free space in the tanks. “This load out and the empty seats should help.”

  Hendrickson came to the number three instruments right then. With a total weight reduction of 160,000 pounds, the Maiden was lighter than at any point since landing at Benina. But the number three turbofan was showing a marked degradation in performance, down 55 percent, even at idle. “I hope. But we’re going to be dragging this one all the way,” he said, pointing at the dying engine’s indicators.

  “What do you think’s with it?” Buzz entered the final fuel numbers in the flight computer, though that would help them little without a given flight path.

  “I don’t know. It looked like the compressor two days ago. Now...?” It was more than the compressor, he knew. It might be that, or an engine bearing. Or something else.

  “Yeah.”

  The captain finished his checks. “She’ll do it.”

  “Damn right.”

  The captain turned. Hadad was sitting, the glow of the cockpit instruments lighting his face. The eyes, like before, stared ahead. “No tower contact, correct?”

  “Correct,” the answer came, without a movement or a blink.

  Hendrickson had won a small victory in securing the release of two hundred passengers. It still wasn’t enough to make up for the death of one. Or of another hundred and fifty, he told himself. He had to do it. “Look, we’re probably going to get off the ground all right, with the weight reduction and all. But we had to take on less fuel to get it down even more. Our number three engine is getting worse, even while we’re sitting here. I don’t know what’s going to happen once we get up there.”

  The face came out of its trancelike mask. “What are you saying? If it is to release more passengers, the answer is no.”

  Hendrickson’s head shook. “No. Let me explain. We had to take on less fuel in order to get the best possible chance at taking off. In doing that we reduced our range. With the engine not performing right, that’s going to increase our fuel consumption and reduce our range further.”

  Hadad spoke no words in response, his eyes issuing the challenge.

  “If you want to get to Chicago, then we’ve got a problem. With this amount of fuel, our load, and our bum engine, we’ll have to stop and refuel, probably in New York.”

  The words did not trigger anger in Hadad. Instead, they elicited frustration, and exasperation. There was little reason for the American to lie. What would it get him? After all, his prime concern was staying alive, and keeping the passengers alive. It was another thing gone awry in the plan. “There will be no additional stop in America.”

  “We can’t make it,” the captain repeated. “We have to go a shorter route. Stop somewhere and refuel.”

  Why? Hadad’s thumb rubbed circles on the trigger switch. He was tiring. Sleep did not help. The fatigue was deeper than mere physical exhaustion.

  If they could not make it, then all was for naught. They had to have enough fuel for three hours of flying once the American coast was reached, for three hours of deception until he could leave his mark upon the Great Satan. If not, the mission would fail. The purpose would be unfulfilled. And... And...

  The little face filled his mind. There had to be a way.

  “Havana,” Hadad said. “Can you make it there?”

  Hendrickson visually checked with Buzz. They weren’t sure how receptive the Cubans would be to their appearance, but then they wouldn’t have much of a say. Just like the Russians had no say with Korean Airlines 007. “It’ll be close, but the skies should be clear. We can do that.”

  “Then do it. Get off the ground, now.” Hadad slid back into his seat. In a minute he could remove the increasingly painful vest, and try to rest.

  With a concrete destination and flight path—direct—the crew could let the flight computer and auto flight system do most of the flying. Buzz programmed in the destination—Jose Marti Airport.

  Hendrickson checked the entered data, as was standard. A simple mistouch of a key could have serious repercussions. Each crewman backed the other...

  The captain made his move almost automatically, reaching just above and to the left of the flight control computer and touching the activation button. There was no obvious sign of what he had just done, but Buzz could tell instantly from the crackle of static in his headset.

  Hadad was too busy being tired, and lacked enough detailed knowledge to realize that the captain had just activated the hot mike function of the VHF radio.

  Springer Seven-Three

  “Break away! Break away!” The AWACS commander yelled into his boom mike. Two seconds later the converted Boeing 707 banked hard right as the pilot responded to the order and broke away from the KC-10 tanker replenishing the AWACS’s half-empty tanks.

  “Read it back, Com,” the commander ordered.

  “It’s just chatter, sir. I’ve got it on tape, but the stuff sounds like preflight for their roll.”

  “Radar, looks like the bird’s taking off.” The commander checked his own display. “Anything in the way.”

  “Negative.”

  “Outstanding. Tag anything that gets within twenty miles of that bird on my scope, as well as yours, and give me a holler. Com, what’s going on now?” He could hear it on his headset, but he also had to process other relative information. The com officer was dedicated to listening.

  “Sir, he’s got a hot mike. He’s transmitting everything. Jesus H. Christ, that’s one slick-thinking pilot.”

  “Cut the
commentary. Just give me the important stuff. You’re my filter, remember.”

  “She’s up, sir,” Radar reported. “Gaining altitude. Slow climb.”

  Okay, baby, where are you goi— “What was that?” the commander asked, interrupting his thought. He heard it, but...

  “He said Jose Marti, sir,” Com reported. “Jose Marti is their destination. Just slipped it into the old conversation.”

  That smart son of a bitch. “Keep off that frequency, Com. No chances. That guy in the cockpit with them might be able to hear.”

  “Yes, sir,” Com responded, a smile evident in his voice.

  “We’ll just wait. Get that off to the Pentagon.” It was good news, the commander felt. They had an idea where the aircraft was going, even if it contradicted their earlier announcement.

  He also knew that at least one body of men would not be happy to hear the development. Their aircraft was just coming into the inner zone on his scope.

  Thunder One

  McAffee gave a polite ‘thank you, sir’ to Cadler on the other end of the radio and slammed the headset down on the console in front of the startled communications officer. He stopped at the top of the stairs to the hold, letting the initial anger at the news dissipate. It took a full minute before he proceeded down.

  “All right, listen up,” the major shouted. The Starlifter started into a shallow bank to the left. It was obvious to the troops that something wasn’t right—Tenerife was to the south, or right. “Effective now we are in a stand-down. The bird flew.”

  The soldiers reacted quietly. This had happened before, but not when they had been so close, in such a big operation.

  Anderson looked around, catching Graber’s gaze. It was downcast, but not fixed. “What happened?”

  Sean noticed the diagram in Joe’s hand. It had been there for over an hour. “The aircraft took off. We’re heading back.”

  “Back? Back to where?” Joe excitedly asked.

  “Pope, most likely.”

  Joe pulled himself up from the wraparound seat. He worked his way across the tilting cargo deck to McAffee’s position in the darkness of the Humvees’ side. “What the hell is this about going back? What about those things on board?”

  The major looked up, almost uninterested in the civilian’s protest. “Unless you think good old Fidel is going to give us landing rights, then we don’t have much choice.”

  “What?” Joe didn’t understand.

  “Havana, Anderson. They’re going to Havana. They announced it over the radio. Nice, safe Havana, where we can’t touch them.” Blackjack was pissed, and it showed.

  Anderson didn’t say anything else. It was just as well, since the major’s eyes said, ‘Back the fuck off’ quite clearly.

  Al-‘Adiyat

  Failure had again invaded his existence.

  Muhadesh pushed the roller-mounted chair into its space under the desk. It didn’t go in completely, requiring him to push it with more force. The jacketed arm fell into view.

  Indar. He, too, had failed. An hour he had been given to restore power, and still they were without it, leaving the camp in the dark and the Americans with only a partial response to their request. Muhadesh bent down with the flashlight and shone it on the body. It was curled into an unnatural ball in the cramped space below the desk. If the diminutive lieutenant was any bigger, he would not have fit. Muhadesh lifted the arm and laid it back against the head. Still there was little blood from the bullet hole in the forehead.

  The Beretta was less three bullets. Two used on the whore in the city, and one on the wormy lieutenant. It was still a waste of lead, Muhadesh thought. He tossed the still loaded weapon under the desk. “Take this with you into the hereafter, Indar. It will not help. Satan fears no gun.”

  He went to his wall safe. The combination was a date, one he would never forget. The date of al-Dir’s disappearance. Inside the small boxlike vault were some papers, unimportant now as always, and a holstered weapon. It was a Russian-made Makarov pistol, a gift from al-Dir. Muhadesh removed it from its leather holster. The steel was cold and clean, with a slight feel of the penetrating oil he used to regularly clean it. Just enough to keep the rust away. Also in the safe were two clips, both full. He took one, inserted it into the weapon, and chambered a round. There was no need for a second magazine.

  He put it back in the holster, clipping that to his belt. Next he checked his pocket; the messages were there, including the last, handwritten one. It was in Italian, his second language. If things went accordingly, someone would get it, and would have it translated in due time. It was best that those who were coming for him didn’t know the entire story immediately.

  He grabbed his parka, the one earned as a commando years before. The room was left behind, locked, without a second look or thought. It was now his past.

  The military jeep hesitated to start in the cool night, as was usual. It turned over after a minute’s trying. Muhadesh swung it around, heading south from the command center toward the camp’s rear exit road. He followed that to the perimeter gate—actually a hole in the combined barbed wire-chain link fence—and drove through, getting a casual salute from the enlisted man at the rear. Within two minutes the red taillights faded to almost imperceptible dots in the distance as the vehicle headed south, and then east.

  It was well past midnight. A new day, Muhadesh thought. A beginning. There was no joy to accompany that thought.

  The White House

  “Our choices are few, gentlemen.” The president was looking for answers. “I don’t like what is happening.” He was mindful of the contingency plan Bud had set in motion.

  Bud and Meyerson were silent. Coventry jingled the ice in his glass. The water was long gone. Outside the light was still evident, though it was tempered by the scattered gray in the sky. It cast pretty, uneven shadows on the south lawn, leaving several of the smaller trees shrouded in the shade of the larger ones.

  “Can we get them to land somewhere before going on to Chicago?” Ellis asked.

  “The point is to not let them in the country,” Bud responded. “If we let them in, we lose.”

  “Then what?” Meyerson inquired of the others, not expecting a satisfactory answer.

  “Sir,” Coventry began, “who are the culprits in this?”

  “Your point?” the president responded.

  Coventry sat forward, putting his glass down. Meyerson grabbed a handful of nuts from the tray, dropping a few into his mouth.

  “Leverage and diplomacy of the most delicate order,” Coventry replied. “One of the causes of this crisis, one who made it possible, is sitting protected in a villa somewhere outside of Havana. The world might not know that, but we do, and a certain Communist dictator does.”

  Bud wasn’t following the path of Coventry’s words. “How does this fit in?”

  “Castro is well aware of Vishkov’s presence in his country. It has been a strain on his relations with some elements of his military, our sources tell us.”

  “That’s true, sir,” Meyerson confirmed without prompting.

  “Which doesn’t endear Vishkov to Castro or his inner circle. The Russian enjoys protection from Ontiveros, as you heard before, and Ontiveros is one of the political dissenters on the Defense Council. His position is even to the right of Castro.”

  “So you think we might be able to use this to...what?” the president asked.

  “Not this alone. Castro won’t be swayed by just the knowledge that Vishkov is peddling designs, or that one of them incarnate might be on the hijacked jet. But if we can make it clear to him that we consider his sheltering of Vishkov to be a major factor in this, and if we can back that up with some pressure, he might become receptive to our handling of the situation before something horrible happens requiring us to hold him responsible.”

  Bud saw another aspect of it. “And if he’s really at odds with this general...”

  “Correct,” the secretary of state said, knowing what the NSA’s gist w
as.

  The president saw some hope in the idea, but the logistics would be tricky, and the communication of the message the most difficult part. He had a thought on that. But first... “So we need some pressure? Andrew, can we arrange for some muscle to be in place. Just enough for a credible show.”

  “Absolutely. We can rustle up some air power.”

  The president put on his business face, the one that Ellis was familiar with. He wore it when a challenge presented itself. It was time for some forceful maneuvering.

  “Secretary Meyerson, get word to Delta that the go is back on. They’re going to be going to some unfriendly territory. And Secretary Coventry,” the president added, “get out to Andrews. You’re taking a message to Havana—personally.”

  Flight 422

  Hadad tried to rest. An hour after takeoff he still twisted in the oversize lounge seat, its back reclined fully to a bedlike position. The vest was next to him. It was part of the cause. His neck was now aching, the soreness having spread from the shoulders.

  But the vest was not entirely at fault. He knew that in the months leading up to the mission he had become soft. Technical details of the plan that others could have handled he had delved into. Even when the colonel offered to give him more assistance, he had refused.

  Hadad realized now that he had erred. He should have hardened his body to match the determination of his mind and soul. It was worthless observation now.

  It could have been perfect, he told himself. But it will still end in the same way. The purpose will be fulfilled.

  * * *

  To hell with the rules.

  Buzz dozed, or tried to. Captain Hendrickson had ordered his first officer to get some rest, knowing that they were both becoming physically exhausted. According to every regulation of air safety they should both be awake at the controls, but the rule writers didn’t have this in mind when drafting those words.

  The terrorist behind him was the mild one. Hendrickson wasn’t sure why he classified him as that, considering his participation in the murder, but his manner was definitely different from the others.