by Bova, Ben
THE OVAL OFFICE
The president was livid.
“They tried to kill me!” he kept repeating, shouting almost, as he paced furiously back and forth behind his huge ornate desk. “Some motherfucking bastards tried to kill me!”
The director of homeland security had never seen the president so enraged. “It wasn’t just you, Mr. President. More than six hundred people have died—”
“I don’t give a shit! They were after me!”
The secretary of defense—an old friend and a veteran of many private tirades—just sat on the plush little sofa by the empty fireplace and bided his time. Sitting across from him in the Oval Office were the secretary of state and the president’s national security advisor.
“We’re getting information on what happened,” the national security advisor said, trying to calm down his president. “Apparently a terrorist group took control of that power satellite up in space—”
“Blow it out of the sky!” the president snarled, turning to the defense secretary. “We’ve got missiles! Blast that sonofabitch to hell!”
The defense secretary hiked his eyebrows. “It’s owned by an American corporation, Mr. President.”
“I don’t care! That damned thing is dangerous! Blow it up!”
The secretary of state, very aware that she was the only woman in the room, decided she had to say something. “Mr. President, wouldn’t it be better—”
But the president ignored her. Pointing at his chief of staff, he said, “Get the Air Force on the line. I’ll give the order myself.”
The chief of staff glanced nervously at the others, then walked slowly across the carpet that bore the Great Seal of the United States, heading for the president’s desk and his telephone console.
“There’s a team of Americans aboard the satellite,” said the director of homeland defense.
“Americans?” the president snapped.
“They went up there and grabbed the terrorists. They’ve shut down the satellite. It’s not beaming power anywhere now.”
The defense secretary asked, “How’d they get up there so quick?”
The homeland defense director smiled knowingly. “Better than that, we know where the terrorist base is. The ground control base where they directed the satellite.”
The Oval Office went silent for several moments. Then the secretary of state asked, “So soon? It’s been less than an hour.”
Almost smugly, the homeland defense director pulled a photograph from his inside jacket pocket, walked over to the desk and placed it in front of the president.
“It looks like a house,” the president said, settling slowly into his desk chair.
“It’s a villa outside Marseille.”
“That’s where the terrorists are?”
“There were two on the satellite itself. The American team from Astro Corporation got them.” Tapping a finger on the photo, the homeland defense director went on, “But this is where the radio signals that controlled the satellite came from.”
“You’re certain of this?” the president’s chief of staff asked.
“Dead certain.”
The president looked up from the photo. “Are they still in there?”
“We’ve got three different satellites watching. None of the cars parked in that photo have left yet.”
“It hasn’t even been an hour.”
“They’re probably dismantling their equipment and getting set to skeedaddle,” said the homeland defense director.
The president shifted his red-rimmed eyes to the defense secretary. “Can you put a smart bomb on that villa?”
The defense secretary smiled tightly. “Which window would you like it to go through?”
The national security advisor said, “But that’s in France! Sovereign French territory!”
“How quickly can you get it done?” the president asked the defense secretary.
“We have a carrier group in the Med. No more than an hour. Maybe a little less.”
“Do it.”
The secretary of state shot to her feet. “Mr. President! You can’t bomb a building inside a sovereign nation! France, for god’s sake!”
“We have an antiterrorism agreement with them, don’t we?”
“Yes, but—”
“You get the French ambassador on the phone and explain it to him.”
“Lord knows where he is this afternoon,” she said. “It’ll take more than an hour to track him down.”
“Good. Take your time. And when you get him, explain this to him slowly.”
Dan had expected to be angry, to be in a killing rage as he heard from Van Buren what had happened at Arlington National Cemetery. But once he learned that Jane hadn’t been harmed, all the fury leaked out of him. I’m coming down from an adrenaline high, he told himself. But a voice in his head kept repeating, Jane’s all right. You saved her. She’s all right.
He sat in the last row of the spaceplane, his shoulder throbbing painfully, as Adair went through the checklist preparing to break orbit and fly back to Matagorda. In the cushioned seat next to him sat Gilly Williamson, looking exhausted, grimy, totally spent.
Like the six others in the cabin, Dan and Williamson were still in their spacesuits, although they had removed their helmets. Makes a big difference, Dan thought, when you can rub your eyes or scratch your nose.
Williamson scratched his stubbly chin and stared straight ahead, his eyes focused on some inner demons.
“Sorry we couldn’t pick up your buddy,” Dan said, keeping his voice low. “He was too far out for us to risk chasing him with the OTV.”
Williamson turned his head toward Dan slightly. “It’s okay. He wanted to be a holy martyr, anyway.”
“And you?” Dan asked. “You wanted to be a martyr, too?”
“I already am one, mate.”
Dan pondered that for all of a second or two. “You’re not Moslem.”
“Not bloody likely.”
“Then what’s the suicide bit all about?”
“I’m already dead, pal. Cancer. It’s just a matter of time.”
“So you wanted to go out in a blaze of glory? Is that it?” Williamson smirked at him. “I’ve got a wife and kids to support. This was my pension plan.”
Comprehension dawned on Dan. “Pension? Really? Tell me more.”
“Why the fuck should I?”
Dan beamed his brightest grin. “Because I’m a greedy Yank capitalist, and whatever they promised you, I’ll double.”
USS HARRY S. TRUMAN
As the massive aircraft carrier plowed across the Mediterranean Sea, her skipper and his flight operations officer huddled over a display table with the commander of the carrier’s attack squadron, their faces underlit by the light coming from the table’s electronic screen. It showed a satellite picture of the hilltop villa outside Marseille. The squadron commander was in his olive green flight suit; the other two officers in tropical tan uniforms.
“This comes from the SecDef himself,” the skipper was saying. “Ultra Top Secret. Only the three of us are in on it.”
“What about my GIB?” the squadron commander asked.
“Your weapons man sits in that back seat and does his job,” the flight operations officer said sternly. “He doesn’t have to know where the missile’s going.”
“As far as your guy in back is concerned, this is just a weapons test. Nothing more,” said the skipper. “You are not to fly within twenty miles of French airspace.”
“Yes, sir. I’ll keep her on the wavetops, under their radar.”
“You’ve got half an hour to get to the release point,” said the flight operations officer. “Maintain radio silence, but keep your receiver open in case there’s a recall order.”
“Satellite navigation all the way?” asked the squadron commander.
“That’s right. No contact with the ship once you’ve been launched,” the flight operations officer said.
“And the missile will follow
satellite guidance once it’s launched?”
“It better.”
The three men straightened up. The squadron commander grinned tightly. “Holy Mother of God, the frogs are going to go apeshit over this.”
The skipper was not amused. “If we carry this off properly, the French will believe a group of terrorists were attacked by a rival group. At least, that’s the cover story our people will put out.”
“I hope it works,” the squadron commander said.
“You just do your job,” said the flight operations officer. “Let the politicians in Washington worry about the rest.”
“Yes, sir.” The squadron commander saluted smartly, then turned and started for his plane, already warmed up and in place on the carrier’s forward catapult.
As al-Bashir poured champagne into the two fluted glasses, April heard a timid knock on the bedroom door.
Looking annoyed, al-Bashir slammed the champagne bottle back into its bucket and strode to the door. He opened it only a crack. April glimpsed a round-faced, bald man out in the corridor. He looked upset. The two men spoke rapidly—in Arabic, April guessed.
Al-Bashir’s face was dark as he closed the door and turned back to April.
“It appears that your president escaped with his life,” he said, scowling. “But more than a thousand Americans have been killed. And the power satellite has been shut down completely.”
“You did this?” April asked, still sitting on the bed. She felt breathless, weak.
“Yes,” said al-Bashir. Then he smiled again. “With a little help from my friends, as your Beatles sang.”
“And Dan?”
“Randolph? He’ll be blamed for the disaster, of course. His power satellite will be cursed by everyone. No one will know that we engineered it.”
“You engineered all this?”
His smile widened. “Yes, I did. And you’re not returning to the United States. You’re going to Tunis, with me.”
“But I don’t want—”
“What you want is of no consequence. I promised myself a little reward when this operation with the satellite was finished, and you are my reward.”
He held out one of the glasses of champagne to her.
April stared at him for a long, wordless moment. He’s smiling, she thought. He’s just killed a thousand or so people and he’s smiling about it. He’s ruined Dan, destroyed the very idea of the powersat, and it makes him smile.
She got to her feet, surprised that she had the strength to stand without trembling. Without a word, she stepped toward al-Bashir and accepted the champagne.
“You’ll enjoy my home in Tunis. You’ll have every luxury, so long as you behave yourself properly.”
“Every luxury except freedom,” April murmured.
He made a disappointed cluck of his tongue. “You Americans always talk about freedom.”
“Yes, we do.”
“Enjoy life, lovely one. With me you will live far better than you ever could in miserable Texas.”
April sipped at the champagne, her mind whirling. I’m his prize for destroying Dan. I’m his reward. He’s captured me and I’ll have to do whatever he wants.
Al-Bashir put his glass down on the damask-covered cart and began uncovering the dishes. “Ah, you see? A steak dinner, just as you would have in Texas. All the comforts of home.”
The spaceplane was starting to rattle as Adair jinked it through the first of several high-altitude turns aimed at killing speed before it. could come in for a landing. At least the worst part of reentry is over, Dan thought. Everybody sat tight in their seats as the craft blazed back into the atmosphere, leaving a brilliant flaming meteor trail behind it.
Dan had to put his bubble helmet on again to use the radio link to Matagorda. Williamson still sat beside him, looking less surly than he had before Dan began promising him the best medical care in America and a whopping insurance policy for his family—in exchange for his telling the FBI what he knew.
Van Buren’s voice sounded close to tears. “Hundreds have been killed, Dan. Roasted alive. The TV’s full of it.”
“What about Senator Thornton?” he asked.
“I don’t know. They haven’t mentioned her name. The president’s okay, though.”
“Can you contact her by phone?”
“I talked with her when this all started, but then all the phone links went down,” Van Buren answered.
Double damn it to hell and back, Dan grumbled to himself. Jane must be okay. If they didn’t get the president they didn’t get the VIPs around him. She’s all right. They didn’t kill her. She’s okay.
He wished he were certain of that.
MARSEILLE
“The French call it entrecôte,” al-Bashir was saying as he pulled up a chair for April. “Much better than the grilled steak you get in Texas.”
April sat at the wheeled cart and stared at the dinner laid out before her. Steak with some sort of sauce on it. Vegetables. A salad in a separate little plate. The silverware looked like solid silver. She picked up a fork. Yes, it was heavy.
“You must be famished,” al-Bashir said as he sat on the opposite side of the table. “Dig in, as you Americans say.”
April nibbled at the salad, sliced a piece of steak and tried to eat it. She had no appetite whatever.
Al-Bashir put down his knife and fork and looked across the table at her. “I understand,” he said softly. “This is all very strange to you, even a little frightening.”
April said nothing. She couldn’t look at him. She stared down at the table setting in front of her.
Getting to his feet, al-Bashir came around the cart and grasped her by the arm. “You’ve got to face the facts, April. There’s no life for you in America anymore. Your life is here, with me.”
“I want to go home.”
“Forget about America. Forget about Dan Randolph. His corporation will be destroyed and him along with it.”
She turned her face away from him.
His grip on her arm tightened and he pulled her to her feet. “Come to bed with me, April. You’ll enjoy it, I promise you.”
With one swift move she grabbed the steak knife from beside her plate and rammed it into al-Bashir’s soft belly. He grunted, his eyes went wide.
“How did you enjoy that, wiseass?” April snarled at him.
Al-Bashir tried to speak, but his knees gave way and he sank to the carpet, the silver knife sunk into his gut all the way up to the hilt. Blood was seeping. He tried to say something but all that came out of his mouth was a strangled little squeak.
They’ll kill me, April told herself. They’ll beat the hell out of me and gang-rape me and kill me. But at least I got him. She looked down at al-Bashir. His hands were twitching, trying to grasp the hilt of the knife.
“You’ve destroyed Dan? Well, I’ve destroyed you. How’s it feel?”
Bending over the prostrate, staring al-Bashir, April yanked the knife out of him. He screamed and blood spurted from the wound.
Holding the bloody knife, April waited for the Asian woman to return. I’ll slit the bitch’s throat, she told herself. I’ll kill as many of them as I can.
But nothing happened. No one rapped at the door. No one tried to enter. Al-Bashir was groaning, still breathing shallowly, but his eyes were closed. A growing pool of blood stained the carpet around his body.
She heard a car door slam. Going to the open French windows, she saw several men loading electronic equipment into a van. One of them looked up and pointed. For an instant April thought he was pointing at her but then she heard a roar like a rocket engine and the world exploded in a flash of fire.
Back on the Truman, the skipper stared at the satellite imagery. The hilltop villa was obliterated: nothing left standing except a few blackened stones. Even the cars and vans were only twisted wreckage now.
The steel hatch opened and the flight operations officer stepped in and saluted. The skipper dumped the satellite image and returned his salute.
“Scotty’s back. Picture-perfect trap.”
The skipper nodded. “Tell him ‘well done’ for me. And then neither of you is to say a word about this again. Ever. To anyone.”
“Aye-aye, sir.”
MATAGORDA ISLAND, TEXAS
It was a week later: a balmy, sunny Sunday afternoon. The Astro complex was quiet. Most of the staff were home enjoying the weekend. A skeleton crew stood by the launchpad, where the spaceplane had been mated with a fresh booster, ready for another flight to the powersat if necessary.
Nacho Chavez sat glumly in front of Dan’s desk. Beside him, Kelly Eamons looked on the verge of tears.
“It was my fault,” she said to Dan. “I encouraged her to play up to al-Bashir.”
“You warned her it was dangerous,” Chavez said. “You planted the tracker on her.”
“A lot of good it did.”
Dan could barely believe what they’d told him. “April’s dead? She was killed in the bombing of that villa?”
“With al-Bashir and almost a dozen others,” Chavez said.
“And al-Bashir was behind it all?”
“All of it. The crash of your spaceplane, the murders of Dr. Tenny and that technician, Larsen.”
“And they used my powersat to try to assassinate the president.”
Chavez nodded. Then he said, “None of this leaves this room, Mr. Randolph. We’re depending on your discretion.”
“We thought you’d want to know about April,” said Eamons.
Dan felt stunned. April got herself mixed up in this cloak-and-dagger stuff? he kept repeating in his mind. And she’s dead? Killed. He couldn’t get himself to believe it. He expected her to pop through his office doorway any minute. But she’s dead. They killed her.
“Why in the ever-loving, blue-eyed world would she get herself involved so deep—?”
“For you,” Eamons replied. “She did it for you. I think she was in love with you.”
Dan grunted as if he’d been punched in the gut. He opened his mouth to say something, but no words came out. His breath caught in his throat.