Nighthawk

by Clive Cussler

“Now you’ll have to test the detonator,” Kane told her.

  “How?”

  “It appears to be a touch screen; tap the front.”

  She tapped the detonator and the screen lit up. The scrolling numbers disappeared and a password screen appeared.

  Kane suggested a few ways to get around the password screen, but each was blocked. On the third attempt, the screen went dark. Two numbers appeared. A green number read 50000; the second number it flashed was a steady 26000.

  Suddenly, the first number began to decrease, rolling down like a clock.

  “What’s happening?”

  “A second precaution on their part,” Kane said. “A fail deadly.”

  Emma stared, tapping the screen, trying to stop whatever she’d done to trigger the countdown.

  “Get rid of it,” Kane said.

  Emma tried to stop the countdown.

  “You’ve got to secure it now.”

  “It’s still attached to the case.”

  “Use the shotgun,” he said.

  Emma grabbed the shotgun, aimed at the detonator and its scrolling numbers and pulled the trigger.

  The twelve-gauge blast obliterated the fragile electronic device and scattered the remnants of the Semtex and the fuel cell across the room. There was no explosion, but the room filled with acrid smoke.

  Emma lowered the shotgun and sighed.

  “Ready to try again?” Kane said.

  Emma nodded. “Let’s get the second unit in here.”

  60

  Constantin Davidov sat in the copilot’s chair watching the pilot and flight engineer run through their tasks. Blackjack 2 was performing flawlessly. “How’s our payload doing?” he asked.

  The flight engineer looked over his board and cycled through the video cameras that were pointed at the Nighthawk. “Payload secure. No sign of any flutter.”

  All of them were concerned about a repeat of what happened to Blackjack 1.

  “Change course to three-five-zero,” Davidov said.

  Major Timonovski glanced back at him from the captain’s seat. “Three-five-zero? That will take us to Cuba. I thought we were refueling over Venezuela and heading home.”

  “That was the original flight plan, but this aircraft has been through a great deal since then. There is too much risk. We are to land at Manzanillo. An Antonov 124 transport will meet us there. It’s large enough to carry the Nighthawk internally. It will be safer that way. And it will allow us to move unseen by American eyes.”

  The pilot nodded and set in the new course.

  “Have you ever been to Cuba?” Davidov asked. “Either of you?”

  “Not I,” Timonovski said.

  The flight engineer shook his head. “Nor have I. Have you been there, comrade?”

  “Many times,” Davidov said. “The first when I was a young man. A thousand years ago, it seems.”

  They smiled at that. And Davidov was glad to see their spirits perking up. Both men had appeared so gaunt when they’d arrived at the airfield that Davidov had wondered if they were fit to fly. The Falconer had badly mistreated them. Once they got back to Moscow, Davidov would have to decide what to do about that. In the meantime, he wanted to reward the men for a job well done.

  “You’ll stay in Havana for two weeks, recuperating. Then you’ll bring Blackjack 2 home and we’ll put it in a museum. It is my hope you will find the women and weather as comforting as I once did.”

  “Will you be staying with us?” the pilot asked.

  “No,” Davidov said. “I’ll be transferring to the Antonov to accompany our prize safely home. It’s high time we put this operation to—”

  Davidov swallowed the last word. Perhaps it was the change in his posture, but he thought he’d felt a subtle thud reverberate through the metal floor. As he waited, the vibration came again and then once more.

  Now that he’d clued in to it, Davidov could feel it continuously: . . . Thud . . . Thud . . . Thud . . . A few seconds between each impact.

  He pulled off the noise-cancelling headset he wore. The whistle of air over the skin of the bomber became instantly louder, but so did the dull, repetitive impact. “Is the Nighthawk secure?”

  The flight engineer ran all his checks once more. “No strain on the lockdown bolts. No sign of flutter. It’s secure and behaving perfectly.”

  Davidov continued to detect the vibration. “Do you feel that?”

  “Feel what?”

  “Something’s broken loose,” Davidov said. He reached over and pulled the engineer’s headset off. “Listen.”

  The weary flight engineer cocked his head, straining to hear the sound. A life around jet aircraft had dulled his hearing, but he picked it up just the same. He put his hand on the control panel and then slid it downward until it touched the floor. “It’s inside.”

  Davidov felt so, too. “We can’t afford a system failure. Not now.”

  The flight engineer checked his board. “Everything’s operating perfectly. It has to be something we don’t have a sensor on. I’ll go look around.”

  The engineer slipped out of the shoulder straps, grabbed a flashlight and stepped to the cockpit door. Opening it, he stepped through and into the aft section of the airplane.

  Davidov followed, grabbing a flashlight of his own.

  The aircraft was huge, larger than the American B-1, which it was based on. It had a cavernous bomb bay and other empty crawl spaces.

  He watched as the flight engineer checked one inspection panel after another and then lingered near a small crane that was used to hoist material up through the bomb bay doors. “Anything?”

  The engineer was a long way back. He turned around and shook his head.

  The banging was closer now, Davidov could feel it through his feet. “What about the landing gear?”

  He turned, looking for an inspection port, and heard another bang, far louder than the rest. He swung back around to see the egress hatch in the floor burst open.

  He pointed his flashlight toward it and saw a man with silver hair pop up through the open hatchway. He had a large pistol in his hand. An American HK45.

  “In the name of Saint Peter!” Davidov exclaimed.

  “Actually, my name is Austin,” the man said, climbing out onto the deck. Another man popped up after him. “And this is Zavala.”

  Davidov was familiar with the names. “NUMA.”

  Austin nodded and stood while Zavala tossed out a metal bar he’d used to bash open the sealed hatch and then climbed free.

  “You guys really should have a handle on the inside,” Austin said in a droll American attempt at humor. “Or at least a doorbell.”

  “What are you doing on my plane?” Davidov blurted.

  “We’re here to prevent you from making a very big mistake,” Austin said.

  Davidov felt a wave of anger growing in him, but he realized the opportunity at hand. The Americans had been focused on him this entire time. They hadn’t seen the flight engineer sneaking up on them from the other direction.

  “The mistake is yours,” Davidov shouted.

  The flight engineer lunged at them, swinging the flashlight. Zavala saw him at the last moment and dodged the blow. He threw a quick counterpunch and knocked the weary engineer to the ground.

  The distraction lasted just long enough. Davidov sprinted forward, rushed into the cockpit and then turned and slammed the door shut. It pressure-sealed tightly.

  “What happened?” Timonovski shouted.

  Davidov pressed against the door, looking through the small round peephole in the center. “We have boarders,” he said.

  61

  Kurt ran forward and banged against the bomber’s cockpit door while Joe prevented the flight engineer from interfering. “Listen to me,” he shouted. “We’re not here to fight you. We’re all
in danger.”

  From its thickness and the small size of its circular peephole in the middle, Kurt could tell he was leaning against a pressure door. He hoped the men on the other side could hear him through it and over the sound of the engines.

  “You are most certainly in danger,” a voice shouted back.

  “I know what you think. You’ve won,” Kurt said. “You’ve got the Nighthawk and the mixed-state matter, but trust me, you’re getting more than you bargained for. It’s a sucker’s prize. A Trojan horse. The Falconer lied to you. He lied to all of us.”

  The next words came over an intercom. “What do you know about the Falconer?”

  Kurt turned, located the intercom and pressed the white button next to it. “That he’s a liar and a master manipulator. That he played you, us and the Chinese against one another.”

  “Of course he is,” the voice replied nonchalantly. “That’s the business. In the end, he gave us what we wanted.”

  “No, he gave you what he wanted,” Kurt replied. “Enough rope to hang yourself and a billion others. The Nighthawk is nothing more than a giant bomb now. A mixed-state matter bomb powerful enough to obliterate half of Europe and set the rest of it back to the Stone Age. It’s rigged to blow once you exceed a certain altitude and then descend back below it.”

  “How would you know this?”

  “He told me as he was dying.”

  “A deathbed confession? Do you really expect me to believe that?”

  “Not a confession,” Kurt said. “A boast. He said we couldn’t stop it. That what went up would never come down.”

  Silence followed. Kurt glanced back at Joe and the flight engineer.

  Joe shook his head softly. “We’re still not winning.”

  Kurt turned back to the intercom. “Who am I speaking with?”

  “My name is Constantin Davidov,” the voice replied. “I’m head of the Directorate for Technical Resources Acquisition.”

  A spy, Kurt thought. A thief. “Listen to me, Comrade Davidov,” Kurt said. “If the Falconer wanted you to have the Nighthawk, why not just call you when he found out where it went down. He knew the location from day one.”

  “Because he needed you to raise it for him,” Davidov replied.

  “Why would he need that? Is raising a small aircraft from the bottom of a shallow lake beyond the capabilities of the Russian salvage fleet?”

  “The difficulty came with the location,” Davidov replied. “Our ships are not equipped to scale mountains.”

  “We did it with four people and one helicopter.”

  “Congratulations,” Davidov replied. “That proves nothing.”

  “He imprisoned your pilot and flight engineer. What possible reason could he have had for that?”

  Silence.

  Kurt turned to look at Joe. He had the flight engineer subdued and the man wasn’t fighting. If anything, he looked like he might be on their side.

  “Tell him,” Kurt urged.

  “It’s true,” the engineer shouted. “The Falconer lied about everything. Every step of the way.”

  “I will not take advice from a hostage,” Davidov said.

  “At least stop climbing while we talk,” Kurt urged.

  “I’m sorry,” Davidov said, “but your reputation for perseverance and deception precedes you. Save your breath. There is nothing you can possibly say that will cause me to release the Nighthawk into your custody.”

  “Looks like the reasoning portion of the evening has ended,” Joe said.

  Kurt agreed. He reached into a pocket and brought out the brick of Semtex he’d taken from Urco’s cave. He held it up in front of the peephole for Davidov to see.

  “You know what this is,” Kurt said. “Either you open that door or I’ll blow it off its hinges.”

  “You’ll blow the plane apart.”

  “That’s going to happen anyway.”

  Inside the cockpit, Davidov stared at the explosives in the American’s hand. The fish-eye effect made it seem larger than it was, but the amount would be more than enough. There was only one alternative.

  “Prepare for rapid decompression,” he said to Timonovski. “And then open the bomb bay doors.”

  “They’ll be sucked out of the aircraft,” Major Timonovski said. “The engineer will go with them.”

  “Yes,” Davidov replied. “That’s the idea.”

  “What if the American is right?” the pilot said. “Falconer murdered my copilot, he did nothing when the Nighthawk was breaking Blackjack 1’s spine. Nothing.”

  “Do as I order!” Davidov commanded.

  Timonovski stared back at him and then shook his head.

  “Then I’ll do it myself.” He stepped away from the pressure door and lunged for the bomb bay controls.

  62

  NUMA Headquarters, Washington, D.C.

  Rudi Gunn sat in NUMA’s communications room with Hiram Yaeger, Priya Kashmir and Collin Kane. They were now part of a globe-spanning web of satellite links.

  One screen showed the White House Situation Room where the President had convened his Security Council. A second screen displayed Paul, Gamay and Emma at the Internet café in Cajamarca. The Vandenberg control room appeared on the third, where Colonel Hansen and Steve Gowdy were standing by. The fourth connection went all the way to China, where General Zhang of the People’s Republic sat and scowled.

  As the conversation progressed, with all its requisite arguments, denials and disagreements, Rudi had the sense of a runaway train with five different engineers in the cab, none of whom had their hand on the tiller.

  Finally, the group managed to get down to business. Zhang admitted that the Chinese had two of the Nighthawk’s containment units on board one of their long-range aircraft and gave away its transponder code.

  The path was instantly picked up. Much farther along than anyone had expected.

  “Are you sure this is the right aircraft?” someone asked.

  “The HL-190 has super cruise ability,” Zhang said. “It can travel long distances at supersonic speeds.”

  The aircraft was five hundred miles northwest of Hawaii. Its altitude was listed at fifty-one thousand feet. Its speed at more than a thousand knots.

  “We know all about the HL-190,” Gowdy said. “Ever since you stole our engine designs.”

  “And improved on them,” Zhang said.

  The President’s chief of staff broke in with a calming tone. “Gentlemen, we need to work together now or there won’t be anything left to argue over. Ms. Townsend, please explain what you’ve discovered.”

  “We’ve taken both bombs apart,” Emma said. She stood calmly on the screen but looked exhausted. “The first attempted a self-destruct when we made a mistake. The second detonator was neutralized. Once it was removed from the explosives, we discovered a USB access port used to program it. Hiram and Priya took it from there.”

  Hiram cleared his throat. “The device is a combination GPS receiver and altimeter. It becomes active once the aircraft exceeds a certain threshold speed and climbs above a specific altitude. It will detonate when they descend below the threshold altitude again or arrive at their destination.”

  “What speed?” General Zhang said. “What altitude?”

  “One hundred and twenty knots,” Hiram said. “Twenty-six thousand feet.”

  “Unfortunately,” Priya added, “your aircraft has already exceeded both parameters.”

  On-screen, Zhang nodded. “I can see that. How do we stop it?”

  “Your people will have to disarm the bomb before they begin their descent.”

  “Why not just dump the fuel cell out the door and be done with it?” Zhang suggested.

  “Because of the power requirements of the cryogenic system and the magnetic bottles holding the mixed-state matter,” Emma said. “It re
quires an extremely pure flow of power. Tiny surges or fluctuations could be disastrous. You can’t just plug the unit into a cigarette lighter.”

  “Don’t patronize me,” Zhang snapped. “It wasn’t my people who brought this curse down on us.”

  “But it was your people who tried to steal it,” Emma shot back. “If they hadn’t interrupted the flight, the material would already be safely stored in underground facilities.”

  “Yes,” Zhang said. “Yours and yours alone.”

  Again the President’s chief of staff cut in. “Please!” he urged. “None of that matters at this point. We’re all damned lucky that the containment units didn’t explode in Peru. And we’re fortunate, General Zhang, that your aircraft is still out over the Pacific and not coming in for a landing. That gives us time. We can argue over who the mixed-state matter belongs to later. But first the bomb must be disarmed without damaging the fuel cell.”

  “How is that to be done?”

  “It’s a fairly simple process. We’re prepared to transmit the schematics of the fuel cell, along with everything we know about the detonator, the power demands of the cryogenic unit and the design of the Penning traps. All we ask in return is that your aircraft change course to a more northerly route.”

  “Why?”

  “Should your agent fail, it’s important that the detonation take place as far from civilization as possible.”

  “Perhaps I’ll order the pilot to turn for California or Hawaii,” Zhang replied testily.

  “I promise you,” Colonel Hansen said, jumping in. “If that aircraft deviates toward any landmass, American or otherwise, it will be shot down.”

  Zhang shook his head. “You are too easily baited, Colonel. Of course I have no intention of doing any such thing. Transmit the information. I have no wish to argue about this again.”

  “Turn the aircraft first,” the chief of staff said.

  A brief stare-down ensued.

  “Very well.”

  With that, Zhang’s screen went dark. And the four remaining links in the network lapsed into silence.