Jack Archer (Book 3): Year Zero

by Taylor, Keith

  She flipped open the flap, and she was relieved to find it had been packed properly. Karen had done a half dozen jumps back in her twenties, in the brief period before Robbie had come along when she'd tried to convince herself she was a badass adrenaline junkie, but she'd never packed her own chute. She'd have no idea how to do it herself.

  She lifted Emily back to her shoulder, turned to the back of the plane and nodded toward the cargo ramp. “Ted, you said that thing wouldn’t open when the plane was on the ground, right? How about when we’re in the air?”

  Krasinski paused before answering, and Karen could see the color draining from his face as he saw the chute dangling from her hand and worked out what she was suggesting. “Well, I mean, yeah, it’ll open in flight,” he stammered. “There should be a manual release somewhere near the door. You want to jump?”

  “No,” Karen replied. She shuffled Emily higher on her shoulder, walked back to the truck and held out the chute. “I want you to jump.”

  Krasinski’s jaw dropped. “Me?” he stammered. “Why me?”

  “Take it.” She pushed the chute against his chest. “It’s a tandem rig. You can take Emily with you.”

  Krasinski reluctantly took the chute from her hand, shaking his head. “I don’t understand. Why do you want me to jump?”

  “Because of what’s in that envelope, Ted. You need to get the evidence back to the government. You need to stop them from doing something stupid before it’s too late, and I can’t do it. I wouldn’t even know who to call. It has to be you.”

  Krasinski tried to hand the chute back to Karen, but she pushed it away. “I can’t take this. I don’t even know how it works!”

  “It’s simple, Ted,” Karen insisted. “See this cord right here?” She grabbed a thin white rope protruding from the top of the pack. “You hook that into the rail. You see it?” She turned and pointed, and Krasinski noticed the rail running along the wall at head height. “The chute deploys on its own as soon as you jump. You don’t have to do anything at all. It’s completely foolproof.”

  “No!” Krasinski protested. “Look, this is stupid. I”m not leaving you up here. What kind of a mother would just abandon her daughter like—”

  The slap was so hard it almost knocked Ted from his feet. He staggered back against the tailgate, dropping the chute to the ground, and he blinked away the pain as a bright red handprint bloomed on his cheek. “Wha—”

  “I’d doing this because I’m a mother,” Karen hissed. “I need to keep Emily safe, and not just from this but from whatever the hell comes next. It's no good getting her to the ground only to land her in the middle of a nuclear war. You need to get her back to her daddy, Ted. You need to promise me. Get her to Jack Archer, but first you have to deliver that evidence to the people who can stop this. Do you understand me?”

  Krasinski looked stunned. “Yeah,” he mumbled. “Yeah, I understand.” He reached down and reluctantly scooped the chute from the floor. “What are you going to do?”

  Karen was already reaching for the first of the ratchet straps that connected the wheels of the truck to the cargo deck. With a sharp tug the strap came loose. “I’m going to stop them from doing whatever they’re planning to do,” she said, pulling the strap free of the tire. “I’m going to get rid of this thing before they can set it off.”

  Krasinski gulped. “You think you’re going to just push the truck out the back?”

  “No,” Karen moved onto the second strap. “As soon as you’re clear of the plane I’m going to drive it out.”

  Krasinski sighed, defeated. He could see the determination in Karen's eyes, and he knew there was no way of changing her mind. “OK. OK, I’ll jump. But can you show me how this thing works again? How do I strap Emily in?”

  “It's simple.” Karen grabbed the chute from his hands, pointing to the harness at the front. “You just tighten it over your shoulders, and when you’re securely fastened in you clip her in at the chest right here. See these clips?”

  He nodded. “I see them. And the chute’s big enough to support our weight?”

  “Yeah. It’s enough to hold two Marines. Don’t worry, you’ll be fine.”

  “OK.” Krasinski looked miserable as he stared down at the clips. “Hand Emily over. I’ll get her strapped in.”

  Karen nodded. “OK, pumpkin, you’re going to go with Ted now.”

  Emily squirmed in her arms as she tried to pass her over. “Where are we going?”

  Karen smiled, stroking her hair. “Ted’s taking you to meet daddy.”

  “Really?” Emily’s eyes lit up. “Are we all going home?”

  Karen felt tears well in her eyes. “Yeah, pumpkin, very soon. I just have to do something first, OK?” She squeezed Emily tight. “But listen, I need you to promise me something. I need you to be good for your daddy, OK?”

  “I promise, mommy.”

  “I’m serious. No more fighting at school, OK?”

  Emily nodded. “OK, mommy, no more fighting.”

  “Good girl,” she whispered. “Now come here. I want an extra big hug.”

  Karen held her little girl close, sniffing away a tear. She held the hug as long as she could, trying to commit to memory every detail. The tickle of Emily’s hair on her nose. The unfamiliar smell of the shampoo she’d used back at Beale. The soft warmth of her skin against her cheek. The little heartbeat fluttering out of sync with her own.

  She wanted this to be her last memory. Nothing that came after mattered. When the time came she wanted to remember this. This hug. This feeling. She wanted to know in her final moments that she’d done everything she could to keep her little girl safe. To get her back to her daddy.

  “OK, pumpkin,” she whispered, her voice trembling as she fought back the tears,

  “it’s time to go.”

  Karen reluctantly passed her over, holding on until the final moment, and as Krasinski pulled the chute over his shoulder she wiped a tear from her cheek. She couldn’t bear to watch. She didn’t want to see when he finally took her away.

  “I need to get the other straps,” she muttered, turning away and rushing to the far side of the truck, and she only just made it out of sight before the tears came in a flood. Great, silent sobs racked her chest. She refused to let Emily see her cry, but the effort of holding back a mournful wail was almost too much to bear. She had to lean against the truck for support as her legs threatened to give way beneath her.

  “Hey, Karen?” Behind her she heard Krasinski’s voice, but she couldn’t face him, either.

  “Just give me a minute, Ted,” she pleaded. “I need a second alone.”

  She leaned both hands flat against the truck, trying to force herself to stop crying, but it was no good. The tears just kept flowing.

  “Karen, I’m—”

  “Just a minute, Ted,” she insisted.

  “I’m really sorry about this.”

  She looked up just in time to see the iron pry bar swing.

  She didn’t feel it hit.

  Everything went black.

  ΅

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  T MINUS 87 SECONDS

  “SIR, I HAVE Nellis for you on VHF. Major Strachan is awaiting your order.”

  MacAuliffe stared at the radar screen on the cockpit’s central console. The Hercules was just a few miles ahead of them, almost within sight. He adjusted the mic on his headset and began to speak.

  “Major, have you located the C-130?”

  Jack heard a crackle in his own headset as the reply came. They were only just within radio range of the base, and the voice in his ears sounded ghostly and distant.

  “That’s affirmative, sir. We have it on a bearing of one three two degrees at one niner four knots. At current airspeed it’ll reach Las Vegas in seventeen minutes. Fifteen until it's over populated areas.”

  MacAuliffe nodded to himself. “Major, can you confirm missile lock on target?”

  Jack held his breath.

  “Confirmed, si
r. We have a Patriot locked and loaded, ready to fire on your order.”

  Jack reached out and grabbed MacAuliffe’s arm. “Don’t do it,” he pleaded. “Please, just give them a couple more minutes.”

  The colonel shrugged his arm away. “I’m sorry, Jack. If they’d managed to pull something off the plane would have changed course by now, but they’re still headed straight as an arrow for the city. I’ve given them all the time I can afford.”

  “We have seventeen minutes!” Jack insisted. “You can afford to wait a couple more!”

  “Do I have the go order, sir?”

  Standby, major,” MacAuliffe growled, turning back to Jack. “No, son, I don’t have seventeen minutes. Right now they’re sixty miles from the edge of the city, and every minute we wait they move four miles closer. If we don’t launch now… this is our last chance.” He shook his head sadly. “I’m sorry.”

  Jack felt his heart race in his chest. He felt the sudden insane urge to leap forward and grab the controls from the pilot, to send the Chinook into a dive and keep the colonel from giving his order, but he knew it was hopeless. He knew it was always a million to one shot that Karen could somehow take control of the plane and steer it out of danger. He knew he’d been clutching at straws.

  “Just one more minute, colonel, please,” he begged, staring at the radar screen, willing the little green blinking dot to take a sudden turn.

  “Fire.”

  Jack’s blood turned to ice in his veins, and a moment later the ice became acid as the voice returned over the radio.

  “Missile is away. Intercept in T minus eighty seven seconds.”

  Out the front windshield of the Chinook the Hercules was finally coming into view. It had slowed on its approach to the city, its speed dipping so low they’d been able to claw back the space between them. Now it was a black dot in the clear blue sky a few miles to the east.

  Jack couldn’t tear his eyes away from it. He blinked away tears, wishing with all his heart that he could trade places with Karen and Emily. Right now he’d tear it from his chest and throw it at the missiles if it might help throw them off course, but all he could do was sit and watch, waiting for the moment the little black dot exploded, and with it his wife and child.

  “T minus sixty seconds to intercept. Course holding.”

  “You don't want to watch this, Jack,” MacAuliffe suggested, patting his shoulder. Jack shrugged him away, his eyes fixed on the plane ahead. They were close enough now that he could make out the wings.

  “T minus forty five seconds.”

  “Seriously, Jack, you don’t want this memory.” MacAuliffe tried to gently push him away from the cockpit, but Jack pushed back.

  “Neither do you, colonel.” He could barely see through the tears in his eyes. He clenched his jaw and held firm, watching the plane as the sunlight caught the tail.

  “T minus… standby.” Over the radio there was a sudden clamor of voices before the major returned. “Colonel, what happened? A second target just appeared on our radar.”

  MacAuliffe and Jack both leaned forward in their seats, staring intently at the plane in the distance. They were still too far away to make out any details, but there were now two shapes in the sky ahead. The plane continued onward on the same course, but beneath it something large was falling away, fast.

  “Oh my God,” MacAuliffe breathlessly gasped.

  Jack gripped the back of the pilot's seat. “What is it?”

  MacAuliffe stared open mouthed at the falling dot, the sun catching its side, dazzling them as it tumbled. He turned to Jack with a grim expression, his face drained of color.

  “I think Bailey dropped the bomb.”

  ΅

  CHAPTER TWENTY ONE

  TED KRASINSKI DAY

  KRASINSKI SWORE UNDER his breath, clenching his hand into a fist to stop it from trembling.

  “Get it together, Ted,” he whispered to himself, resting the crumpled manila envelope against the tailgate of the truck as he grabbed the pen once again. The words still came out almost illegible. They crept across the paper like the shaky, uncertain chicken scratch of a lifelong drunk, but it would have to do. There was no time for him to worry about his penmanship.

  He knew the clock was against him. He hadn’t realized how difficult it would be to get Karen’s dead weight strapped in, and he definitely hadn’t figured on Emily screaming and fighting back. That particular complication hadn't even occurred to him when he'd come up with his hare-brained plan.

  He hated that he had to do it, but when Emily saw him hit her mom over the head she’d screamed bloody murder. He couldn’t risk her screams reaching the people in the cockpit so he’d had to spend another couple of minutes gagging the girl with the torn off sleeve of his corduroy jacket, and even more time binding her hands with one of the ratchet straps. It was the only way to shut her up short of knocking her out, and he just couldn’t bring himself to do that to a child. Not after he'd felt the sickening thud reverberate down the tire iron as it struck Karen's skull. He could never do that again.

  Karen had been out cold for five minutes now, but Krasinski knew that she wouldn’t stay that way much longer, not with Emily squirming on top of her, trying desperately to free herself. Her muffled yells were still loud enough to wake the dead, though thankfully they were drowned out by the drone of the engines.

  “Please be quiet, Emily,” he pleaded, but he knew it was a fool’s errand. Nothing he could say right now would calm her down. After what she’d seen him do to her mom he was a Bad Guy, end of story, and she’d keep screaming until Karen woke up and dealt with him.

  Krasinski froze, staring down at the prone body at his feet. Karen muttered something, her lips moving but the words almost silent. She squeezed her eyes tight and curled her lip, wincing as the pain of the blow reached her even through the unconscious fog. He only had a few seconds now. God help him if she woke before he was ready.

  Now he felt his heart race in his chest. Even the Xanax he’d tossed back wasn’t enough to keep him calm. He felt the panic creeping up on him, and he knew that if he let it overwhelm him all of this would be for nothing. He needed to hold on just a little longer. He took a deep, slow breath, forcing the panic into the background.

  Timing was everything. The moment the cargo door began to open he knew an alarm would sound in the cockpit. The plane would depressurize. It would be chaos, and he’d only have a few seconds before someone would back from the cockpit, armed and ready to fire. But he also knew they’d hear him in the cockpit if he fired up the engine of the truck. Either way he’d only have seconds to spare, and there was no way he could deal with Karen at the same time. There was just no way.

  This isn’t going to work.

  He swore again, louder this time, and he stalked around to the side of the truck and slipped his arms beneath Karen. She was heavier than he expected, especially with Emily’s wriggling, uncooperative weight attached to her, but the adrenaline gave him just enough strength to lift her from the ground. With a grunt he hefted her up to the passenger seat of the truck, dropping her in place like a rag doll and stuffing her legs in after her. She grunted, mumbling again, but he didn’t have time to worry about her waking. He only had seconds now.

  He grabbed hold of the cord from the parachute pack, tying it off around the steering wheel of the truck, and then he ran back to the top of the cargo ramp, searching the wall until he found the control panel. The enormous red button jumped out at him, large enough to be slapped with a gloved hand, and with a silent prayer he punched at it with his fist.

  Nothing happened.

  He slapped it again, pushing it until he felt firm resistance, but again nothing happened.

  “What the hell?”

  He couldn’t believe this was happening. All this fear, all this risk, and it was all for nothing if he couldn’t open the damned cargo door. If he couldn’t open the door he’d be back where he started, staring death in the face, but now he’d have to go throu
gh it with Karen hating him and Emily fearing him. He’d have to—

  Wait.

  Just below the red button was a switch, a rubberized black toggle with the words RAMP LOCK etched in white. He flipped the switch, and immediately a deafening klaxon began to sound through the cargo bay. A blinking yellow light began to flash on and off above the control panel, and when he slapped the button again the light turned to red.

  The door began to open.

  The sudden rush of air as the bay depressurized threatened to knock Krasinski off his feet. He grabbed hold of the edge of the control panel, steadying himself against the gale, and his heart leaped to his throat as he caught a glimpse of clear blue sky out the back of the plane. He gripped the panel tighter as the ramp completed its descent with a loud mechanical bang, holding on for dear life even after the gale died down. He knew he was perfectly safe where he was standing. He was just as safe as he'd been when the ramp was closed, but now he knew that if he took two steps to his right he'd be on the ramp, and after the steel grating ended there was nothing beyond but twenty thousand feet of clear air.

  Krasinski shivered, turning back to the truck as he forced himself to let go of the control panel and make his way on unsteady legs back to the cab. He could barely take a breath in the thin air, gasping for a lungful that felt empty of oxygen, but he didn’t let it stop him. Nothing could keep him from climbing behind the wheel now.

  “Ted?”

  He froze. Karen was awake in the passenger seat, only half conscious but present enough to notice her daughter pressed against her chest, her hands bound and a length of tan corduroy strapped across her mouth. “What are you doing?” she slurred. “What’s going on?”

  “I…” he began to answer, but he was interrupted by a sudden shower of sparks exploding against the driver’s door. For a split second he stared at the door, confused, before a second gunshot punched through the windshield, shattering it into a cobweb of glistening edges.

  “Get down!” he yelled, throwing himself into the driver’s seat and fumbling for the key. The shooter was ahead them, holding onto the rail of a gantry that led towards the cockpit, in a perfect position to hit them unless they pressed flat against the seats. As his hand found the key hanging from the ignition Krasinski reached out and grabbed Karen’s shoulder with the other, dragging the dazed woman down below the base of the windshield, out of sight of the shooter.