Callsign: King

23.

The two ETAF Russian-made Sukhoi Su-25 fighter jets approached from behind King and struck without warning.

Fortunately for him, the pilots had been instructed to engage with guns only. With an equivalent price tag of more than $70,000, the Vympel R-73 infrared guided air-to-air missiles they carried were deemed too costly to be used as a first-strike measure against a slow moving and evidently unarmed helicopter. Absent that consideration, he would have died without even knowing that he was in danger. Instead, the lead plane greeted him with a short burst from its Gryazev-Shipunov GSh-30-2 30 millimeter cannon.

Eighteen of the twenty-one rounds fired in that initial volley arced harmlessly past the JetRanger. Two of the rounds were phosphorous-tipped tracers that lit up the display of King’s night-vision device like streaks of lightning. But even as those rounds were flashing by, betraying the presence of hostile aircraft, the other three rounds hit their target. The helicopter shuddered as the projectiles, as thick as flashlight batteries and nearly three times as long, penetrated the aluminum and Lexan airframe. Even though they struck neither flesh nor critical systems, King felt the heat and concussive force on his skin as the rounds passed through the cockpit, far too close for comfort.

King had no idea who was shooting at him, or even what kind of aircraft was involved, but he knew luck alone had saved him. He was an easy target. He hastily reduced the collective pitch and the helicopter immediately dropped almost straight down. More tracers lit up the night, flashing harmlessly overhead. He looked up and saw, blazing like a miniature suns, the engine exhaust of the two attack planes as they flew through the space where he had been only a moment before. The jets arced across the night sky, maneuvering to come around for another pass at him.

The planes’ superior speed was both an advantage and a liability. Because they were so much faster than the helicopter, they could attack from almost anywhere, but at the same time that speed would make it very difficult to hit him with cannon-fire. King didn’t know why they hadn’t simply fired a heat-seeker up his exhaust pipe, but he had no doubt that eventually they would, and then it would all be over. There was, he realized, only one way to survive this.

He kept descending, tilting the cyclic forward and increasing speed in a power dive. The barren landscape, rendered even bleaker in the monochrome night-vision display, rushed up at him. He leveled out less than a hundred feet above the uneven terrain, and began weaving the aircraft back and forth, all the while keeping an eye on the distant moving lights in the sky.

The jets made another attack run, strafing the ground nearby as if he were a stationary target, but King came about and steered under them, well away from danger. The jets broke off and winged skyward, repositioning once again.

King’s instincts told him that the gloves were about to come off. His attackers had probably expected him to be easy pickings, but now that he had demonstrated his ability to elude them, they would look for a quick, decisive solution. His mind raced to find anything that would help him survive the next few seconds.

The JetRanger wasn’t equipped with any weapon systems. He had the M-4 he’d taken from the cavern, but that wouldn’t be much use in a dogfight, even if he had a hand free to use it. He also had one frag grenade.

Maybe… A grin spread across his King’s face. It was a crazy plan, but crazy was better than nothing.

He felt certain that the fighter pilots would use missiles on this pass, almost certainly thermal guided missiles, and there was only one way to elude those-make something else even hotter. Unfortunately, that was easier said than done. Since most air-to-air missiles could travel in excess of twice the speed of sound, it would take split second timing.

He watched. He waited. And then, when he saw a bloom of fire under one of the jets, he dropped the grenade out the sliding window, and then hastily pulled up on the collective. The helicopter rose sluggishly, and with each passing second, King knew he was getting closer to the missile now streaking toward him.

But then, he felt the concussion wave of the grenade exploding on the ground a few hundred feet below. For just an instant, the center of the detonation released a burst of intense heat-much hotter than the JetRanger’s turbine exhaust. There was a streak of light in his night-vision, the missile flashing by as it homed in on its new target, and then a second later, another concussion.

King was stunned by the success of his plan; it had been a desperate play, and he hadn’t really expected it to work, and so hadn’t really thought about what would happen next. He had dodged this attack, but what now?

The jets veered skyward again. He had fooled the missile, but not the pilots. They knew he was still alive.

And King was out of moves.

# # #

The Sukhoi fighters needed only one more pass. The pilots were relatively inexperienced, but they were learning from their mistakes. The engagement had already lasted longer than either man expected; now it was time to finish it decisively.

The helicopter was descending again, its operator evidently desperate to land before the next missile blew him out of the sky. The pilot of the lead Su-25 decided not to give him that chance. He changed the targeting selector on the missile’s guidance system to visual, put the helicopter in the crosshairs, and thumbed the launch button.

The R-73 missile, NATO designation AA-11 Archer, dropped away from the wing and shot through the sky at Mach 2.5. The pilot kept his targeting sight on the fleeing aircraft until, a few seconds later, both the missile and the helicopter exploded in a ball of smoke and flaming debris.

Sigler is dead.

›››Understood. What is your status?

I’m back in Addis. I have Sara Fogg and Felice Carter with me. Fogg believes that Carter can infect others by some unknown vector. We’ll need to keep her isolated.

›››Transportation will be arranged. Bring the women to the Brainstorm facility.

Are you sure that’s a good idea?

›››Your inquiry is irrelevant. It is the only logical course of action. The vaccine must be developed. The facility has been upgraded to ensure the highest probability of success in accomplishing that goal.