Day of the Cheetah

High Technology Advanced Weapons Center (Dreamland), Nevada

“Good morning, ladies and gentlemen,” Brigadier General John Ormack, the deputy commander of the High Technology Advanced Weapons Center, began. “This is the operational test flight briefing for Mission Three Sierra, first full-crew operational combat test flight of the B-52 M-model Megafortress Plus bomber.

“Our landmark mission today consists of an AIM-120 air-to-air missile test engagement, AGM-132C Tacit Rainbow III anti-radiation cruise missile test launch, and AGM-98 air-to-ground laser-guided missile weapon release.”

To an outsider it hardly seemed like something to cheer about. To those assembled in the briefing room, it was something to applaud. That was especially true for those seated at the place of honor in the front row — General Bradley Elliott, Patrick McLanahan, Wendy Tork, and Angelina Pereira, surviving members of the original Old Dog’s B-52 flight crew. Ormack himself had been the copilot aboard the first flight of the original Megafortress and the project director for the newly redesigned Megafortress Plus. He seemed to have grown younger since their amazing mission eight years earlier — many members of his Megafortress Plus project half his age had difficulty keeping up with him.

“The purpose of this mission is twofold,” Ormack went on. “First, it’s the final operational check flight for this B-52 after extensive repairs, and second, it’s an operational evaluation of the Megafortress Plus weapon system, pending development authorization. The Megafortress Plus system seeks to provide long-range strategic defense suppression and attack using heavily armed B-52 bombers. These B-52s would carry air-to-air missiles, anti-radar weapons, cruise missiles, shorter-range standoff missiles, gravity bombs, and a wide array of electronic jammers and countermeasures to destroy or disrupt all kinds of enemy defenses, thereby allowing other strategic or tactical attack aircraft to transit the forward edge of the battle area and complete their missions.

“HAWC has four B-52s undergoing modification to Megafortress, including one”—Ormack motioned to a tall officer in the rear of the conference room—”commanded by Major Kelvin Carter, that will act as backup aircraft for this test.” Carter’s copilot, a young female captain named Cheshire, gave Ormack a look. “You included, Captain Cheshire,” Ormack added quickly.

“Can it, Cheshire,” Carter whispered to his copilot.

“Then don’t you be hogging all the glory,” she whispered back, trying to keep a straight face.

“Roll call for Mission Three Sierra: aircraft commander will be myself,” Ormack went on. “Colonel Jeffrey Khan will be copilot, and in the instructor pilot’s seat upstairs will be Mr. George Wendelstat from the House Armed Service Committee, acting as safety observer. Welcome, Mr. Wendelstat.” Several in the room wondered how they’d manage to shoehorn Wendelstat in through the entrance hatch.

“Rounding out Dog Zero One’s flight crew is radar navigator Major Edward Frost, navigator Major Linda Evanston, electronic warfare officer Dr. Wendy Tork, and fire control officer Dr. Angelina Pereira. Good luck to us all.”

McLanahan had to choke down his feelings. It seemed so strange for him to be left out of the crew roster for the Mega-fortress’ first combat-exercise flight. But it was no longer his project. He had safely flown the Old Dog from Nome back to Dreamland eight years ago, and had not stepped inside her since. It was like being reunited with an old friend who didn’t recognize him any more.

The huge flat-screen liquid-crystal monitor behind Ormack changed to a digital time face. “Time hack, coming up on twelve-oh-four Zulu in fifteen seconds … five, four, three, two, one hack. One-two-zero-four Zulu.”

This day had been years in the making — two years of redesigning and computer testing by the engineers after the plane had returned to Dreamland; three years of rebuilding by a battalion of workers, and three years of experimentation and testing by the engineers and test flight crews. Now, the first newly redesigned B-52 bomber called the Megafortress Plus was ready to break its cherry.

A weather map came up on the screen and Lieutenant Colonel Jacobsen, HAWC’s staff meterologist, stepped to the podium. “Good morning, General Elliott, General Ormack, ladies and gentlemen. You picked a wonderful day for this flight.” A regional surface weather map came on the screen… “Strong high pressure dominates the region. This high pressure dome has reduced visibilities in the restricted areas in the past few days, but some overnight breezes have pushed most of the gook out of the way. You can expect clear skies, perhaps some scattered thin stratus at twelve thousand feet.

“For the air-to-air portion of your flight: no significant weather in R-4808 Pahute Mesa launch area. Possibly a few puffy clouds on the east side of mountain ranges but otherwise no restrictions to visibility. Winds forecast at twenty knots from the north at fifteen thousand feet. For the air-to-ground portion of your flight, excellent weather conditions will persist. Visibility may be as low as twenty miles on the surface, with winds light and variable. Bombing range area will be ‘severe clear,’ possibly some hazy conditions, temperature seventy-eight degrees. Good luck and good hunting.”

Ormack took over as the screen changed again. “Status of the chase aircraft are as shown. Everyone’s in the green as of this hour. Please report maintenance delays to job control on present channel eight. Colonel Towland is the operations controller in the command post and he will reassign backup aircraft as necessary.”

The screen changed to a detailed high-resolution map of the restricted areas around Dreamland. The map was put into motion by computer, drawing the flight path of the Megafortress as Ormack spoke: “Route of flight is as follows: we will launch via coded message and follow the Groom Victor One departure to Angel intersection. Once at Angel, we will orbit as necessary at thirty thousand feet until one-five hundred Zulu time, then proceed downrange toward the intercept area.

“Once in the intercept area two AQM-175 tactical dome aircraft launched from China Lake Naval Weapons Center will be directed by airborne controllers to engage the B-52. The Mega-fortress will carry two AIM-120 Scorpion missiles in wing pylon canisters and will engage the drone aircraft at will. The engagement will continue for one hour or until the drones are destroyed. Flight crew personnel and airborne controllers will follow standard rules of engagement for safe separation of aircraft. All flight crew personnel will take directions from the airborne controllers. If not destroyed, the drones will be recovered by parachute, and the Megafortress will proceed to the missile drop zone.”

The screen changed again. “The Tacit Rainbow anti-radiation loiter missile drop test will be at twelve thousand feet, in roughly the same area as the intercept zone. A simulated Soviet SA-14 surface-to-air missile site will engage the B-52 … Dr. Tork?”

Wendy Tork came to the podium. She was wearing a bright orange flight suit and black leather zip-up flight boots — even the baggy flight suit looked dynamite on her.

“Good morning, ladies and gentlemen,” Wendy began, her energy contagious even at the early hour. “We will be testing the new array of strategic and tactical pulse-Doppler electronic countermeasure jammers aboard the Megafortress Plus, as well as the Tacit Rainbow mod three anti-radar loiter missile. The purpose of this flight is to evaluate the Megafortress’ capability to penetrate sophisticated Soviet coastal defenses using its own assets, and at the same time create penetration corridors for other aircraft using the Tacit Rainbow anti-radiation missile. These will lay the groundwork for fleet modernization of existing B-52 aircraft as well as develop new capabilities for follow-on aircraft such as the B-1 Excalibur and B-2 Panther Stealth bomber.”

A high-resolution photo of the anti-radar missile flashed on the screen. “First developed ten years ago, Tacit Rainbow is a small winged aircraft with a one-thousand-pound-thrust turbojet engine, a ring laser gyro inertial navigation unit and coupled autopilot, a broad-band programmable seeker head with multi-pulse and digital radiation capability, and a one-hundred-pound high-explosive warhead. The missile is released within fifty miles of a known or suspected enemy surface-to-air missile site. The missile orbits the area using its inertial autopilot until it detects emissions from the nearby enemy radar. The missile then leaves its orbit and homes in on the radar and destroys it. The missile can orbit for as long as four hours and has a small enough radar cross-section to avoid detection by hostile anti-air units. A B-52 bomber can carry as many as twenty-four of these missiles, although we see these Tacit Rainbow missiles carried with a mixed load of offensive missiles and gravity weapons aboard Navy and Air Force strike aircraft …”

Patrick realized how much he envied these men and women. And listening to these briefings and organization of the Mega-fortress Plus project tended to underscore his own apparent failure with the DreamStar project, now on hold mostly because he failed to keep tighter control on his test pilots and to recognize the need for more complete and useful test standards and security.

He was in charge of nothing right now except cleanup. Sure, he had been given the Cheetah program, but that was already a thriving project nearing operational deployment. He was just another caretaker, marking time.

His eyes automatically sought out Wendy’s, and he found her looking in his direction. They exchanged faint smiles. She had been watching him off and on the whole time. Better snap out of it, you stupid mick, he told himself. She’ll have enough on her mind without worrying about you.

The briefing ended and the flight crew moved toward the exits and the bus ready to take them to the flight line. McLanahan went to each crewmember and wished him or her a good flight.

“You should be going with us, Patrick,” Angelina Pereira said, giving him a very unmilitary hug. “This is your plane. You belong on her. You and General Elliott too.”

She was wearing the same orange flight suit as Wendy, and she too looked dynamite in it despite being fifteen years older than Wendy. Her hair was more gray then he remembered, but her eyes still sparkled. Angie would always be a handful for any man — she had married and divorced twice since the Old Dog’s first mission. He could still see her in the denim jacket she had worn when she climbed aboard the Old Dog eight years earlier, and he could remember her gratitude when the Russian caretaker at Anadyr Airbase in Siberia gave her a full-length sealskin coat in exchange for her denim jacket, even though at the time the jacket was covered with General Elliott’s blood. That coat today had to be worth at least five thousand. She would not have parted with it for five million.

He could also remember her dropping into marksman’s crouch as she fired on that same Russian airbase caretaker after he discovered who they were and ran off to warn the militia. One minute she was eternally grateful to the guy; the next she was trying to blow him away. She was one tough lady, all right.

“Not this time, Angelina,” Patrick said with a halfhearted smile. “But I’ll have the fire trucks and the champagne ready to hose you guys off when you land.”

“It’s your project as well as ours.”

“Not any more. Besides, you guys did all the work … “

“No, you did. Back over Russia.” Like him, she had been thinking back to the Old Dog’s first mission. “Even though you won’t fly with us) your name’s still on the Old Dog, on the crew nameplate. It’ll be there as it’s flying.”

“But I’m not the radar nav any more—”

“No, you’re not; you’re the seventh man, Patrick. Sorry to sound corny, but you’re the soul of the Old Dog.”

She squeezed his hand, picked up her helmet bag, and walked off. He saw Wendy then, watching him once again from the back of the conference room. He went over to her.

“How do you feel, Mrs. McLanahan?”

“Wonderful. Happy. Nervous. Excited. I’ve got butterflies the size of B-52s in my stomach … Are you going to be okay?”

“Sure.”

“Wish you were going with us. You deserve it more than anyone else.” She could tell he was unconvinced. She smiled at him. “When should we break the news?”

“At the post-flight reception tonight.”

“Can’t wait.” She gave him a kiss and hurried off to join her crew.

He called out behind her. “Good luck. See you on the ground.”

Wendy flashed him an exaggerated thumbs-up. “Piece of cake,” she called out as she rushed off to catch the crew bus.

As the crew of the new Megafortress Plus headed off to begin their mission, Staff Sergeant Rey Jacinto was nearing the end of his tour of duty on the graveyard shift, on patrol guarding Hangar Number Five at the flight line at Dreamland. It was the absolute pits.

He had done everything wrong. After four years as an Air Force security guard he knew how to prepare himself for a change in shifts — plenty of exercise, the right amount of rest, not too much food, no caffeine or alcohol twelve hours before the shift. But this time everything had gone to hell. His wife had car trouble Monday afternoon and so he was up all morning towing it to his brother-in-law’s place. It had been hot, dusty work and he couldn’t resist a couple of beers at two o’clock in the afternoon — that only violated the eight-hour rule by two hours. No big deal.

His body began asking him for sleep at three o’clock, but the car needed a new water pump and his brother-in-law insisted they could do it before he had to leave. Then, to top it all off, he sat down at six o’clock for homemade pizza. Knowing that he hadn’t had any sleep in twelve hours and he wasn’t going to get any in the next twelve, he downed nearly a whole pot of coffee after polishing off four huge, thick slices of pizza.

Rey felt pretty good as he reported for duty at seven-thirty for the shift-briefing, inspection, weapons checkout and posh changeover, but when he parked his armored assault vehicle in front of Hangar Number Five, things began catching up with him. The combination of caffeine and lack of rest made his muscles jittery. The night air was cold, so he turned up the heat in his V-100 Commando armored car, which only increased his drowsiness. He had brought his study materials for his bachelor-degree class, but the thought of even trying to listen to an hour’s worth of audio textbooks on micro-economics was too much.

By four A.M., four hours from changeover, Sergeant Jacinto was struggling to stay awake. Everything was quiet on the radios — no exercises, alerts, weapon movements, nothing. With the B-52 down the way in Hangar Three being readied for a flight, a security exercise would be too disruptive and would not be called. The engineers who had been working on the XF-34A DreamStar in Hangar Five had long since departed, and the munitions-maintenance troops weren’t scheduled to arrive until after his shift-change. Even nature was conspiring to screw him up. Thin clouds blocked most of the bright moonlight, so the ramp and most of the area were completely dark, and there were no birds or animals making their usual noises on the dry lakebed aircraft ramp. It was a dark, quiet morning. If he didn’t go completely crazy he was going to die from the strain of trying to stay awake.

Rey had just completed his hourly walkaround inspection of Hangar Five, checking all the doors and exits. He was so bored that he even began to pick up scraps of paper and pieces of junk on the ramp. He returned to his truck and keyed the radio.

“Red Man, this is Five Foxtrot.” Red Man was HAWC’s Security Control Center.

“Go ahead, Five.”

“Requesting ten mike for relief.”

There was a pause, then: “Five, that’s your fourth potty break tonight. “

“It’s Rey’s time of the month,” someone else on the security net chimed in.

“Cut the chatter,” the security controller ordered. “Five Foxtrot, unable at this time. Stand by. Break. Rover Nine, this is Red Man. Over.”

“Rover Nine, go.” Rover Nine was one of only two M113 armored combat vehicle-equipped crews that cruised around the huge compound, doing errands and relieving the post guards as necessary; they had numbers higher than two to hide the fact that there were only two of these heavily armed roving patrols on the flight line.

“Five Foxtrot requests relief for ten mike ASAP.”

“Stand by,” came the reply in an exasperated voice. A few moments later: “Red Man, we’re at the shack getting coffee — Five Foxtrot’s been drinking the stuff like it’s going out of style.” Rey Jacinto cringed as his code name was broadcast on the net — boy, was he going to get it when this shift was over. Good thing none of the other guards could leave their posts to get on his case. “We’ll be another ten here; then we need to check in with the main gate. Ask Five Foxtrot if this is a number two or if he can use the piddle pack. Over.”

Rey was fed up with all this — they weren’t letting him off easy tonight. He was just bored and sleepy. He keyed his microphone: “Break. Red Man, this is Five Foxtrot. Cancel request for relief. Request the comedians in Rover Nine bring some water when they’re done stuffing their faces at the flight line kitchen. Over.”

“Roger, Five Foxtrot. Rover Nine, you copy?”

“Affirmative. Advise Five Foxtrot to stop massaging his little one-eyed helmeted reptile and stand by. Rover Nine out.”

There were a few more comments on the net — no one liked to give the hot-dogs on Rover Nine the last word — but soon silence once again descended over the area.

By now Rey was struggling to keep his eyelids open. The worst part of any guard’s tour, no matter how well one prepared, was the hour or two just before sunrise. It was a barrier, a psychological one — the body demanded sleep at this hour no matter how much rest it had earlier. Rey Jacinto’s head was bobbing up and down off his chest. He had already stripped off his fatigue jacket, flak jacket and webbing so as much cold air could hit his skin as possible. It wasn’t helping:

He was thankful to see the lights of a big blue Stepvan supply truck check in at the outer perimeter. The blue “bread truck” van, towing a missile trailer, headed right for him. He was feeling a little ornery by now, and this was his chance to get his blood pumping again. Quickly he pulled on his combat gear and webbing as the truck pulled up.

When the truck stopped in front of Jacinto’s armored car, he got out, carrying his M-16 rifle at port arms, and ran in front and off to the driver’s side of the van. He held up the rifle, filled his lungs with cold desert air and yelled, “Driver! Stop your engine, leave your headlights on and everyone out of the van. Now!”

The driver and one other man, both in Air Force green fatigues, jumped out of the van and stood before Jacinto in the glare of the van’s headlights. The younger man, a two-striper, was shaking. The driver, a burly technical sergeant, was surprised but kept his composure as he raised his hands. “What’s going on?”

“Step away from the truck,” Jacinto ordered. Both men did. “What’s going—?”

“Quiet! Don’t move!” Jacinto still held his rifle at port arms — his voice was enough to convince the two men. Jacinto rested the automatic rifle on his hip with one hand and pulled his walkie-talkie from his web belt.

“Red Man, this is Five Foxtrot. Two males intercepted at Five, driving a blue Stepvan with missile trailer. Executing full nighttime challenge. Over.”

“Copy, Five Foxtrot,” the security controller replied. There was a hint of humor in the controller’s voice — he knew Jacinto was going to have a little fun with his visitors. “Do you require assistance?”

“Negative. Out.”

The driver of the truck said, “Sergeant, would you mind—?”

“Silence. Turn around. Both of you.”

“I’ve got authorization—”

“I said turn.” They did. “Where’s your I.D. cards?”

“Back pocket.”

“One hand, two fingers. Remove your I.D.” They removed wallets from back pockets. “Over your head. Remove your I.D. cards.” They did. “Drop them slowly, carefully, at your feet, then take three steps forward.” When they moved away Jacinto said, “Now kneel. Hands on top of your heads.”

“Give us a break, Sarge—”

“Kneel.”

As they did, Jacinto walked over to the I.D. cards, picked them up, and examined them. They were bent, dirty, grease-encrusted and barely readable — typical maintenance troop’s I.D. cards. Jacinto stepped around the two kneeling men and shined a flashlight in their faces. The faces matched the photos.

“I need job slips now. Where are they?”

“Upper left pocket.”

“Get them out.” The two technicians pulled crumpled slips of paper from their pockets and put them on the ramp. Jacinto picked them up and checked them under the flashlight’s beam. He couldn’t check the job numbers — he’d left his clipboard with the job numbers from the squadron in his truck — but he checked the MMS squadron supervisor’s stamped signoff block on the reverse side. The stamp and signature were the most frequently omitted part of the job ticket, and both were required before any work could begin on any of the birds on the line. But these guys were on the ball — both had the required stamp with the familiar signature of the MMS NCOIC.

“Okay, Sergeant Howard, Airman Crowe,” Jacinto said, looping the M-16 back onto his right shoulder. “Everything checks okay.”

“You’re damned right it does,” Howard said, hauling himself to his feet. Jacinto.held out the job tickets and I.D. cards to them. Howard took his I.D. card and job ticket back with a snap of his wrist; Crowe took his with relief.

“Why can’t you bozos do your little games during the day?” Howard said. He motioned to Crowe, who seemed to be cemented in place. “Move it, Airman. We’re behind schedule as it is.”

“Wasn’t expecting you till nine,” Jacinto said.

“I wasn’t expecting to be here until nine,” Howard said angrily. “So naturally I get a call in the middle of the night telling me they want the plane in premaintenance right now. I know better than to answer the damned phone after nine P.M.”

Jacinto nodded. “I hear that.” He put his own wife and kids on strict instructions not to answer the phone after nine P.M.

He walked back to his V-100 just as a large green M113 Armadillo combat vehicle pulled up beside his. The back door swung open and two armed soldiers jumped out and took defensive positions behind the ACV. Jacinto could see the roof turret swing in his direction, the huge twenty-millimeter Browning cannon and its coaxial 7.62-millimeter machine gun in the turret trained on the Stepvan behind him.

“Five Foxtrot, code two, report,” a voice blared through the Armadillo’s loudspeaker.

“Five Foxtrot, code victor ten victor, all secure,” Jacinto yelled back. The security crews had been given a code sequence and number for the shift. When challenged, the guard would respond with the proper code to advise the response crew that he was not under duress. If he had responded with anything else the snipers at the back of the truck and the gunner on top of the armored vehicle with his cannon and machine gun would kill anybody in sight.

But Jacinto answered correctly. The guards behind the Armadillo raised their rifles and slung them on their shoulders. Jacinto walked over to the truck.

“Pissing off the munitions maintenance troops again, eh, Rey?”

“I gotta do something to stay awake, Sarge. These guys have no sense of humor.”

“Yeah. You gotta hit the head or what?”

“Just let me refill my canteen and I’ll be okay.”

Jacinto went to the back of the Armadillo and hacked around with the two assault troops as he filled his canteen from the large water can and hooked it back onto his web belt. He gave the shift-supervisor NCO a snappy salute as the ACV drove away.

His blood flowing once again, Jacinto did a quick walkaround inspection of the hangar as the munitions maintenance troops punched in the number of the code lock on the hangar door opening mechanism. As the senior NCO went inside, the younger man hopped back into the Stepvan and pulled it around so that the rear was facing in toward the plane. Jacinto moved toward the front of the hangar so he could watch the rear of the truck and the driver. The young driver, obviously nervous around the flight line, finally got into position after a series of jerks and starts, maneuvering the missile trailer in beside the plane as close to the hangar wall as he could. Jacinto decided to help him out, and guided the driver in until the truck was ten feet from the nose of the plane and the trailer was just under the left wing-tip.

“Thanks,” the young airman said in a high-pitched voice. He hopped out and trotted back to help his supervisor.

“Better chock the truck,” Jacinto called inside the hangar. The airman froze. Sergeant Howard looked at Jacinto, then at Crowe, and finally at the Stepvan.

“Do as the man said,” Howard yelled to Crowe. “You know all vehicles are supposed to be chocked out here.” Crowe ran to the truck, pulled out a set of yellow wooden chocks and placed them under the rear wheels.

“And stop running around in the hangar,” Howard yelled once more. “You know better. Or should.”

Jacinto suppressed a smile. He remembered back to his first solo guard duties while he watched the two technicians set to work. He was a million times more nervous than this guy …

His interest was quickly drawn to the amazing aircraft they were servicing. He had never been any closer than this to the plane, even though he had been guarding it for a year now, but he was still amazed by the sleek, catlike aircraft. It looked even more deadly now with its two huge air-to-air missiles hanging on the belly on either side of the large intake. Jacinto had read every scrap of unclassified information on DreamStar and had repeatedly asked for permission to look inside the cockpit but was always denied.

Sergeant Howard had wheeled a maintenance platform around to the left side of the cockpit and locked it into place, then scrambled up the steps and opened the canopy. Meanwhile Crowe had started up an auxiliary power cart in the back of the hangar and was hauling air and power cables over to the receptacles near the left main landing gear. A few moments later Howard had flipped the right switches in the cockpit — the battery and external power switches, Jacinto recalled from his reading — and cockpit and position lights popped in all around DreamStar.

Howard stepped off the maintenance platform and walked over to the back of the truck. Noticing Jacinto watching him from the front of the hangar, he waved him over. Jacinto, and soon Airman Crowe, moved over beside Howard.

Over the noise of the power cart. Sergeant Howard said, “Want to take look inside?”

Jacinto blinked in surprise. “Is it okay?”

“Don’t see why not. Ejection seat’s been deactivated, half the black boxes in the cockpit have been pulled out and the weapons are all pinned and safe. No better time.”

Jacinto nodded enthusiastically. He pulled the clip out of his M-16, placed the clip in a pouch on his belt, checked the safety on the rifle and leaned the weapon on the Stepvan bumper. “All right, I been waiting to do this for—”

A hand reached across his face, covering his nose and mouth and twisting his head sideways. Jacinto tried to roll away from the arms holding his head, but Howard had run up to him and grasped his chin, holding his neck fast. A split-second later Jacinto felt a sharp, deep sting on his exposed neck.

Three seconds later he was dead.

“Shto slochelosch? What the hell is the matter with you, Crowe?” the man named “Howard” cursed at his young partner. “Crowe” was staring at the body, watching Jacinto’s death twitch as the poison slowly destroyed the central nervous system. “You almost let him get loose.”

Crowe did not reply. Howard slapped the young man hard on the shoulder. “We must hurry, idiot. Time is running out.”

Pushed toward the still-quivering corpse, Crowe began unbuckling Jacinto’s combat harness and webbing, jerking his hands away as the last of the dead guard’s tremors left his body. Meanwhile Howard swung open the back of the Stepvan, removed several pins from the sides of the equipment racks along the inside walls of the van, then hauled the racks away from the wall.

Out from his hiding place inside the racks, wearing the ANTARES flight suit, was Captain Kenneth Francis James.

“Nechyega syerchyanznaga, tovarisch. It is all clear, Comrade Captain. We are — ready.”

James raised the muzzle of the machine pistol and put the safety on. “Speak English, you idiot. And help me out of here.”

Slowly, carefully, Maraklov was helped to his feet. Moving as if his joints were locked in place, he slowly walked to the edge of the Stepvan. Howard then lowered him to the hangar floor, where he made his way to the maintenance platform still set up beside DreamStar.

By this time Airman Crowe — real name, long unused and almost forgotten, was Andrei Lovyyev — had put on all of Jacinto’s combat gear and was just replacing the ammo clip in the M-16 rifle. “Blouse your pants in your boots, Crowe,” James told him as he crawled up the ladder. “And keep out of sight. You’re at least thirty pounds smaller than Jacinto, someone is bound to notice.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Remember, your call sign is Five Foxtrot. The duress code number is twelve and the duress prefix and suffix is victor.”

“I remember, sir.”

He turned to Howard. “You both have been briefed on the pickup location?”

“Yes, Captain. Good luck to you, sir.”

James balanced himself on the cockpit sill of DreamStar and swung his legs inside the cockpit. Then with Howard’s help, he connected the maze of wire bundles from his flight suit to DreamStar’s computers, set the heavy ANTARES superconductor helmet on his head and fastened it into place. By this time he was breathing hard, he could feel drops of sweat crawling down his arms and neck. Howard’s hands trembled slightly with excitement as he fastened the thick shoulder straps around the metal-encased pilot and pulled them tight. “Tighter,” James said in a voice muffled by the helmet. Howard braced himself and hauled on the straps as hard as he could.

“Thank you, Sergeant Howard,” James said. “You pulled this off very well.”

“Nyeh zah shto.” Maraklov had been James too long. He could barely understand a word, but the KGB agent’s soft tone of voice gave him the idea. The man was obviously pleased by the compliment. He rechecked James’ connections and climbed off the maintenance platform.

Meanwhile Crowe had climbed inside the armored vehicle outside the hangar, scanning the flight line — Howard could see his head jerk at every crackle of the radio. It had, he now realized, been foolish to bring such a youngster on a mission like this — it was Lovyyev’s first full-scale job since sneaking across the border from Mexico via El Paso and setting up residence under cover in Las Vegas three years earlier. To put him in the lion’s den like this was taking a big risk.

But it was too late for second guessing. Howard disconnected the missile trailer from the Stepvan truck and moved it out of the way inside the hangar, closed the van’s rear doors and moved it out of the hangar and clear of DreamStar’s taxi path. Next he took several large orange-colored traffic cones marked “DANGER HIGH EXPLOSIVE” out of the van and arranged them in a wide arc around the hangar doors. This was a normal procedure — the cones were a warning to anyone else on the flight line that work on live weapons was going on inside. But these cones were different. Each was a miniature mortar-launcher, operated by remote control. When activated, each would fire a high-explosive magnesium flash bomb a hundred yards away. The concussions and blinding white light produced by the mortar rounds would slow and presumably stop any quick-reaction forces from moving in until DreamStar was clear of the hangar.

After carefully aiming the disguised mortars at response roads and likely targets around the hangar — being careful not to crater DreamStar’s taxi route or exit — Howard stepped inside the hangar once again and rechecked that all safing pins and streamers were removed from the aircraft and weapons. He then walked to the truck, retrieved a M-16 rifle with a M-203 forty-millimeter grenade-launcher under the barrel, a metal box full of grenades and a bag of five thirty-round clips, and went back into the hangar to wait.

His legs were aching, sweat was pouring into the metallic flight suit. Conditioned air from the external power cart was trickling into the suit but was hardly enough to change the temperature.

Through the canopy he could see Crowe nervously fidgeting inside the armored car, looking as if he was going to shoot himself in the face with his M-16 any second. He could also watch Howard’s careful preparations for the massive assault they knew had to come. Despite their plans, the moment they tried to start engines the full force of Dreamland’s security forces would be on top of them. Nearly fifty armed soldiers and two heavily armed tracked combat vehicles surrounding the flight line would be let loose to blow DreamStar to hell.

Amid it all James had to convince himself to relax, to empty his mind of all thoughts, to clear a path for the sleeping ANTARES computer to worm its way into his subconscious. Self-hypnosis, consciously forcing each muscle group to relax, was the simplest and usually the most effective way of achieving theta-wave state, but that seemed impossible. Muscles ached from the long climb up the platform, and the lactic acid that collected in his muscle tissue from heavy exertion would act like halon gas on a fire, blocking any conscious efforts to relax those muscles.

His mind kept straying to the thoughts of Major Briggs’ security forces — he had inspected those forces many times, acting only partially interested in them at the time when in fact he was taking careful notes on the exact numbers, equipment and deployment. He had examined the weaknesses of the force and planned possible escape routes out of Dreamland for himself should that ever have been necessary. He had devised several escape plans, depending on what, if anything, he was taking with him — one route was to be used if he was alone and on foot, another if he was driving a car, another if driving a truck, another if he was carrying a “black box” or another unit. But never had he expected to take DreamStar with him. Components, drawings, computers, electronic media, yes — never the whole plane.

Only one mind-set seemed to make sense — that morning in the cockpit he told himself he wasn’t going to make it but it was worth it to die trying. If he did beat the odds and lift off, he had to buck even greater odds to fly the eight hundred miles from Dreamland to the deserted airstrip in central Mexico for the refueling planned by his KGB contacts in Los Angeles and Mexico City. Then he’d have both the American and Mexican air forces to beat on his way to Nicaragua, plus American forces based on El Salvador and Honduras — none of them very large or effective forces, but a deadly threat to a battered and weaponless DreamStar.

But he had no choice. If he couldn’t have DreamStar, better to die in her cockpit trying to deliver her to the Soviet Union than let the Americans mothball her while they continued to perfect their research into the ANTARES interface. Were there other areas he could infiltrate, other research programs whose information could be vital to the security of the Soviet Union? Was there any other program that, if he lived, he could collect information on as valuable or as rare as his DreamStar? His? Yes, damn it, his …

The answer to all was no. Strangely, coming to that grim conclusion put him at ease, allowing him slowly to relax his knotted muscles and control his adrenaline-fired pulse and breathing.

“Do you want to live forever, Andrei Ivanschichin Maraklov?” James said into his face mask. And with that he felt his body go totally relaxed, almost limp, held upright only by the tight body harness that secured him to DreamStar’s ejection seat. It was the first time in some ten years that he had spoken his given name. The words surprised him — it was such a totally Russian name. And right now he liked it, was proud of it. “Kenneth Francis James” sounded weak. He would not use it again.

He did not realize, though, that it had taken two hours for him to speak his Russian name to himself. Without warning the ANTARES interface had taken hold. He was once again one with DreamStar…

Patrick McLanahan could only stare. General Brad Elliott and Hal Briggs couldn’t speak. Applause broke out from somewhere behind them as they stared at a reincarnation.

The doors to Hangar Three of the HAWC research flight line were opened, and a yellow “mule” tow-tractor slowly chugged out of the massive structure. The mule pulled a hulking dark beast from its lair, an aircraft so large that it seemed to blot out the faint glow of the rising sun on the horizon. It seemed to take forever to move the giant machine from the hangar, but soon there it was, sitting on the concrete ramp like a winged black dragon.

“ ‘Whenever science makes a discovery, the devil grabs it,’ ” Angelina Pereira quoted. McLanahan and Briggs turned toward her. “Alan Valentine,” she added.

“Whoever … but that’s one mean-lookin’ mother,” Briggs said.

Ormack began his walkaround inspection of the Megafortress Plus, General Elliott and other members of the crew following. Actually Ormack and the engineers had already completed an extensive walkaround hours earlier before the crew briefing, and all items of the before-engine-start checklist had already been performed by ground crewmen and technicians. But no matter who performed the inspection, or when, Ormack could not resist the urge to do one last visual inspection before climbing aboard — as much a ritual as a race car driver’s kicking the tires of his car or a marksman’s rubbing the front sight of his rifle.

Elliott pointed at the Old Dog. “I still can’t believe what I’m seeing,” he said to Ormack, once its copilot. What he was pointing at was the most radical change in the Old Dog’s appearance — her huge wings. Instead of drooping in a huge downward curve from the fuselage to the wingtips, the wings stood straight out, tall and proud instead of arched and aged-looking.

“The newest in composite materials went into her,” Ormack said. “We replaced the main wing spar, the spine, the tailplane spars and other skeletal components with fibersteel beams, the largest and thickest composite structures ever cast. I remember being called out to the hangar in Alaska when they put the wings back on — it looked like a damn optical illusion, those twenty-ton wings sticking straight out like that. They sagged when we filled them up with fifty tons of fuel, though — sagged a grand total of two inches. We used to be able to look into the outboard engines just by standing on tiptoes — now, they’re all so high off the ground we need a ladder to look into them. The takeoff distance has decreased by thirty percent. It used to take forever for the Buff to lift off because those huge drooping wings would ‘take off’ first, leaving the fuselage still rolling on the ground. No more, Brad. When this beast hits takeoff speed, it’s airborne. Period.”

Ormack continued the walkaround inspection, pointing out various new changes in the huge bomber. “Only two AIM-120 Scorpion missiles on this flight, but Carter’s Dog Zero Two can take up to ten on each wing now, instead of only the six we had on our first mission — that’s twenty air-to-air missiles total, the same as on five F-15 fighters. And computer-controlled fuel management helps us avoid the fuel problems we had on our last flight when damage forced us out of the automatic mode. No more wing spoilers that dragged in the slipstream for aircraft control and wasted so much energy. Now we use engine-bleed air-thrusters on the wings for roll control. It allows us much faster turn control, eliminates adverse yaw.”

He pointed at the Old Dog’s wingtip, which had a long, pointed oblong device trailing aft from the wingtip. “No more twin tip-tanks on this baby. With fibersteel construction we were able to build large single jettisonable fuel tanks with greater capacity that are lighter, stronger and more aerodynamic than the twin tanks. We’ve also taken off the wingtip wheels — even fully fueled there’s no danger of these wingtips ever striking ground. Another weight saving.”

Hal Briggs turned to Ormack. “General, someone might think you’re a lieutenant on his cherry ride.” As he spoke Briggs glanced over Ormack’s shoulder down the flight line and, by force of habit, checked the guard posts.

“I have to admit, I get clutched every time I see this beast,” Ormack said. “I’ve seen her blown up, crashed, broken, shot up, cut up, disassembled, and now I’ve seen her better than before. A regular phoenix, this bird.”

They walked around to the bomb bay and peered inside at the mix of glide-missiles and laser-guided smart bombs. “If this flight is a success,” General Elliott said, “this could be the beginning of a new day for the B-52 bomber. Even with all one hundred B-1 Excalibur bombers operational and the first B-2 Panther Stealth bomber squadron finally operational, the anti-air, standoff and border penetration capabilities of the Megafortress Plus may mean the refitting and reactivation of all the G-model B-52s that were retired last year. A few squadrons of B-52 Megafortress Plus bombers could fly along with the strike bombers, clear a path for them and then return to be used in reserve or for other long-range strike missions. It’s a new concept — armed flying battleship escorts for strategic bombers.”

Hal Briggs listened but his attention was continually drawn to the guard posts down the flight line. Everything appeared normal, but something somewhere was out of place …

At first Briggs dismissed the feelings. All six high-security hangars had the proper guards stationed around them — six V-100 Commando assault cars positioned properly. Straining, he could make out all six guards at their posts, a few standing to watch the crowd around the B-52, a few sitting in their V-100s. A roving patrol in an M113 Armadillo assault vehicle was moving up and down the center of the ramp, cruising slowly, a couple of SPs hanging out of the gun turret on the roof to watch the Megafortress roll out. They had taken the twenty-millimeter machine gun off its mount so two guys could squeeze up through the roof to get a better look — he’d have to get on their case for that. But overall, it appeared normal. So what was it …?”

“Hal?” McLanahan had stepped beside the security police commander and was scanning the flight line with him. “Problem?”

Hal noticed that Ormack, Elliott, Khan and Wendelstat had moved off toward the tail; he and McLanahan were alone beside the Old Dog’s bomb bay. “No … nothing. I’m gonna chew some butt — those guys rubber-neckin’ in the Armadillo over there.” He looked at the colonel. “Where you going?”

“Take a ride out to the range, I think. Get a good seat near the ground target before the fireworks start. I was going to ask if

But Briggs wasn’t listening; he was staring down the flight line toward Hangar Five, Sergeant Rey Jacinto’s post. He was still sitting in his V-100, doors closed. He wasn’t asleep — Jacinto was too good for that, and besides, Briggs could see him moving around inside …

“Hal? What about it? Can I get a ride out to the range?”

… but Jacinto was a high-tech aircraft freak. He knew all there was to know, all he was allowed to know, about the B-52 Megafortress Plus and the XF-34A DreamStar. He would, though, gladly give his right nut to get a look at either bird up close. Jacinto had guarded Hangar Three before, but he had never been inside …

“He’s never seen the Old Dog before,” Briggs mumbled. “What?”

“One of my troops. Jacinto …”

“Rey? Yeah, nice guy. You keep on bouncing back his requests to take a peek at DreamStar. You ought to let him before they mothball her. Is he on duty this morning?”

“Hangar Five.”

McLanahan squinted through the semi-darkness toward DreamStar’s hangar. “I don’t see him.”

“He’s in the Commando.”

McLanahan grunted his surprise. “Looking out those tiny gunport windows? Get those guys in the Rover to relieve him on his post and have him come take a look at the Megafortress. I know he’s been itching to get a look at her too.”

“Yeah, right.” Briggs walked off toward his sedan. Patrick was about to repeat his request for a ride out to the bombing range but changed his mind — Briggs, he decided, must have a million things on his mind.

As he walked to his car Hal Briggs decided McLanahan was right. Jacinto had wanted to get a look at the Megafortress Plus and DreamStar for years. Now, with the huge bomber not three hundred yards away, Jacinto was sitting locked up in his V-100, watching through tiny gunports when he could be outside watching it. Why? Besides, Jacinto was a well-known roamer. He couldn’t stand being cooped up in a Commando for more than a few minutes.

It was then that Briggs noticed the blue Stepvan half-hidden from view beside Hangar Five. He also noticed that the doors to Hangar Five were open and that a missile-carrying trailer was parked inside. And he saw the orange safety cones arranged outside the hangar — MMS, or Munitions Maintenance Squadron, was already downloading weapons from DreamStar. They were four hours early …

Briggs pulled his walkie-talkie from his belt and set the channel for security control. “Red Man, this is Hotel.”

“Go ahead, Hotel.”

Ormack had finished his walkaround, and he, Carter and Elliott were shaking hands. Visitors began filing into buses to take them off the flight line. The crew of the Megafortress was climbing up the belly hatch into the massive bomber.

Briggs keyed the mike button: “Status check of Foxtrot posts.”

“Last status check one-five minutes ago reports all secure. Last Rover check zero-one minutes ago reports all secure.”

“Copy. Break. Rover Nine, this is Hotel. Report to Five Foxtrot for relief. He wants to get a look at the monster up close. Five Foxtrot, you copy?”

Lovyyev, alias Airman Crowe, nearly pulled the trigger of his M-16 in panic when he heard his call sign over the security net. He was about to pick up the microphone and say something when he heard, “Break. Hotel, this is Rover Nine. Job Control has requested us to assist in clearing the flight line. We are moving into position. Please advise. Over.”

Lovyyev’s throat was stone dry. He didn’t dare try to speak. Nothing would come out. Should he walk out of the car? Wave? Should he do anything …?

Briggs stared at the armored car in front of Hangar Five. Jacinto sure was acting strange. Normally he would have jumped at the opportunity to check out any aircraft, from an old Piper Cub to the hypersonic spaceplane. He was being oddly reticent this morning. Well, tough. He was too late.

“Rover Nine, continue to clear the flight line. Five Foxtrot, sorry, maybe some other time.”

Lovyyev still kept away from the mike button. He turned and saw KGB veteran Gekky Orlov, alias Sergeant Howard, standing inside the hangar, his M-16 out of sight, watching him. He knew Orlov had a tiny earpiece radio set to that security-net frequency. He was looking hard at him, trying to get him to calm down. Orlov could tell without seeing him that Lovyyev was ready to collapse. Don’t key that microphone; be silent …

No reply. Strange.

A crew chief was hauling a huge Halon fire bottle over to the left inboard engine pylon and several of his assistants were positioning themselves around the B-52 to act as safety observers for this engine start. Briggs suddenly found himself in the middle. He got inside his sedan, closed the windows against the sound of external power carts being started, switched on the engine, and headed for the security checkpoint to watch the taxi and takeoff.

But as the first dull roar of the number four engine began to invade the early morning air, Briggs stopped the car just short of the checkpoint. He was perhaps four hundred yards from Hangar Five. Still no sign of Jacinto. Hal picked up his car microphone. “Five Foxtrot, this is Hotel. How copy?” No reply. “Five Foxtrot, this is Hotel. Come in. Over.”

There may have been a reply but Briggs couldn’t hear it over the steady scream of the eight turbofan engines on the massive B-52 bomber. The crew was running through their pre-takeoff equipment checks. The three-thousand-watt taxi lights on the front landing gear trucks flashed insistently at him, indicating that the B-52’s attack radar was on. Briggs was parked right in front of the bomber. He started his car and moved away from the B-52’s front quarter.

The pre-takeoff checks were running quietly. As Hal Briggs continued to try to raise Five Foxtrot, the crew chief ran in front of the Megafortress Plus with two lighted wands, and using hand signals ordered his assistants to pull the B-52’s wheel chocks.

Hal considered cruising over to the guard post but it was too late. The crew chief swirled his wands in the air, a signal to Ormack and Khan in the cockpit that they were clear to run up their engines for taxi. The engines, began a deafening roar and the huge bomber lumbered forward. It stopped briefly to test its brakes, then taxied out quickly onto the ramp and moved toward the open exit-gate. Rover Nine and Rover Seven, the two M113 combat vehicles, fell in on either side of the B-52, their gun turrets now manned and armed with automatic cannons.

Briggs let out a loud sigh of relief when the B-52 taxied clear of Hangar Five — if there had been a commando or terrorist there he would have struck then, as the Megafortress taxied right in front. He almost expected to see a bazooka or TOW anti-tank missile round hit the Old Dog’s jet-black surface, but there was no movement. Hal keyed his car’s mike:

“All units, be advised aircraft exiting main parking ramp heading for taxiway delta. Begin pre-launch sweep check and report to Red Man when complete. Red Man, report status to Hotel when complete.”

“Red Man, wilco.”

Hal put his car in gear and fell in well behind the B-52 as it headed down the taxiway toward the sand-colored four-mile-long runway. The security units surrounding Dreamland were reporting in to Red Man Security Control as briefed. Individual tactical units would report to their sector commands, who would report to their team leaders, who would report to Red Man. Everything was going smoothly.

The last to report in were the units not involved with the B-52’s operations — base security, individual building security and standing flight-line checkpoints. It took several minutes, by which time all units had reported in as ordered … all except Five Foxtrot.

That did it. Definitely something wasn’t right here. Hal Briggs stopped his car dead in its tracks and picked up the mike: “Five Foxtrot, this is Hotel. Check in immediately. Over.”

He couldn’t wait any longer — Lovyyev could hear the irritation in the voice of whoever this Hotel character was. Orlov had disappeared into the hangar. For an instant he thought that Orlov was running, escaping before the security patrols closed in, but he knew better. Orlov was one of the best KGB operatives in North America. He would never run out on a mission unless it was completely hopeless, and he certainly wouldn’t run out on another operative.

He had to answer, but he needed to sound convincing. What was the nationality of the security guard they killed? Spanish? Mexican? Why didn’t the United States use one damned race in the military like most of the rest of the world? In the Soviet Union they used Russian soldiers. Other nationalities swept floors or collected garbage.

Taking a deep breath, he composed his reply in his mind, as taught to him in an all-day cram course by Orlov, and keyed the mike: “Five Foxtrot, all secure. Over.”

A chill ran down his spine. Hal had a tough time hearing the faint response, but even if it had been a whisper it wouldn’t have made any difference.

That was not Rey Jacinto on the mike.

The Old Dog had now reached the end of the runway. It paused for a few moments as it aligned with the runway centerline. For an instant Hal thought that now would be the perfect time to strike — here, away from the ramp, isolated and vulnerable — but as he began to issue orders to cover the bomber from attack, the engines slowly accelerated to full thrust and the huge plane rolled down the runway.

Hal Briggs stared transfixed at the huge dark creature blasting down the runway. He could see huge puffs of dust and sand erupting from the edge of the semi-camouflaged runway, those could be mortar rounds impacting near the plane — which conjured up the memory of the last time he had seen the Old Dog take off eight years ago, not five hundred yards from this very spot, when there were mortar rounds exploding all around them. The same sense of fear gripped him …

But this time it turned out to be huge dust clouds kicked up by the wingtip vortices generated by the Old Dog. A few moments later the bomber was airborne, the gear was up, the SST nose retracted into flight position and the Old Dog was racing skyward once again. It climbed nose-up, more like a light fighter plane than a half-million-pound strategic bomber.

In minutes the B-52 was out of sight. No alerts, no warnings. Members of the M113 Rover crews had gotten out of their ACVs to watch the takeoff. Hal checked Five Foxtrot once again. He could see clearly inside the hangar, but there was no sign of any munitions maintenance men in there, and the missiles were still on DreamStar’s handpoints beside the air intake. A power cart was hooked up to DreamStar, with hoses and cables snaking around to the fighter’s service panel, and now that the Old Dog had departed, Hal could hear the roar of the external power cart’s jet engine. It was as if the MMS crew had simply left the plane alone and on power to watch the Old Dog’s takeoff. That was a major breach of security, not to mention good sense. You never left a plane unattended with power and air on. Jacinto knew that — where was he during all this? And whose was that voice on the mike? Or was he imagining …?

The upper hatch on the armored car was open, and Briggs noticed that a fifty-caliber machine gun was now mounted on the armor-shielded gun bracket on the car’s roof. Still no sign of Jacinto. Maybe he had watched the takeoff, after all. But why mount his machine gun now? Or had he done it during taxi?

Briggs picked up his microphone. “Five Foxtrot, report status and location of the work crew at your location. Over.”

No reply.

“Red Man, this is Hotel, radio check.”

“Hotel, this is Red Man. Five by.”

It wasn’t his radio. Was there a radio “blind spot” out here? Was Jacinto’s radio malfunctioning? If it was, he should have gotten a replacement long ago—if it was Rey Jacinto in there.

“Roger. Break. Rover Nine, meet me at Five Foxtrot on the double. Over.”

“Rover Nine on the move.” Briggs could see the two alert crewmen run back inside the ACV. The low-slung, eleven-ton mini-tank made a tight turn and headed back toward the parking ramp on its twin-steel tracks.

Briggs put his car in gear and headed toward Dream Star’s hangar. Somebody was screwing up by the numbers here, it was past time to find out who and what.

Lovyyev was silently screaming at himself. Only a few hours in place, he speaks three words on the radio and is discovered.

Be calm, he told himself. Things were happening out there on the flight line — perhaps there was still time to bluff his way out of this. This Hotel person may get too busy to check on him.

But one glance out the bulletproof windscreen told him that his luck was running out. A staff car was heading his way. It was still three hundred yards off, perhaps more, but it was coming fast.

Lovyyev jumped out of his seat and crawled up into the armored open turret on the roof. He yelled back into the hangar, “Orlov. Skaryehyeh! Etah srochnah! Hurry. They’re coming!”

“Shut up, Crowe!” Orlov was hiding against the inner front wall of the hangar, his M-16/M-203 in his arms and the remote-control detonator around his neck. “Get down!”

But it was too late. In a panic, Lovyyev swiveled the machine gun turret around, released the safety, aimed it at the approaching staff car, pulled and held the trigger.

Hal Briggs was thinking about what he was going to say to Rey Jacinto about his strange behavior when he saw what looked like exhaust smoke rising from the Commando armored car. Just as he was wondering why Jacinto was starting up, he saw a line of explosions and shattering concrete race across the tarmac directly at his car. He slammed on the brakes and dived for the floorboards under the front seat just as his windshield exploded in a shower of glass. Instantly he felt a wall of fire envelop him, and realized that the engine compartment was on fire.

His synthetic fatigue shirt began to melt on his back. He clawed for the door handle, found it, shoved the door open and crawled out of the burning car. He landed only a foot from the flaming remains of the car’s hood, which had been blasted apart by the explosion, and half-crawled, half-stumbled away from the car. Thick black smoke was everywhere. He inhaled a lungful of the gas, gagged, fell to the concrete. Pieces of red-hot metal were all around him. But at least the smoke hid him from the gunner in the V-100. He stayed on his hands and knees and began to crawl to where he thought the security checkpoint was … He guessed right. A few moments later two guards rushed out and hauled him to his feet. He let the guards carry him to the guard shack but resisted when they tried to lay him down on the floor. He picked up the radio, switched the channel selector to one, the base-wide emergency channel, and clicked it on:

“Attention all HAWC security units, this is Hotel on channel one. Execute code echo-seven. Repeat, code echo-seven. Intruder alert, Hangar Five. Repeat, intruder alert, Hangar Five. This is not an exercise. Shots fired in front of Hangar Five by intruders from a V-100 armored vehicle. Number of intruders unknown.”

Briggs paused, rubbing a pain in his right temple. Massaging it, he found a gash in his head- and his hair burned off. “All Foxtrot guard units, secure your posts and stand by to repel. Break. Rover Seven, converge on Hangar Five, secure the V-100 parked there, block the front on the hangar by any means possible. Break. Red Man, notify Colonel Towland and General Elliott in Mission Control of situation, use channel nine, and have them order the flight crew on the airborne B-52 to remain clear of the area and notify the crew of the standby B-52 to prepare to evacuate. Deploy all available personnel in full combat gear to security checkpoint alpha and launch helicopter air security units one and two. Break. Rover Nine, pick me up in front of security checkpoint alpha. I will take control from Rover Nine. All units, execute …”

Orlov knew it was no use berating Lovyyev — he might have even saved them by keeping that sedan away from the hangar until Maraklov, or James, or whatever his name was now, could get ready. They had been out there for hours. Was Maraklov ever going to be ready?

The security forces were moving faster than Orlov ever thought possible. Seconds after Lovyyev opened fire, he was receiving return fire from Hangar Four, although Lovyyev was in no danger except from a lucky shot. M-16 rounds were pinging off the armor surrounding the turret, forcing Lovyyev to shoot from a more protected position inside the cab. But it was working. He was holding down any deadly return fire, keeping the first wave of defenders back. It wouldn’t last long, but he was buying Maraklov time …

As was always the case, the first device to be activated under the Advanced Neural Transfer and Response System was on the radios. Usually they were quiet. This time, there was so much chatter on the area air-traffic control frequency that at first James thought he had dialed in two overlapping Las Vegas AM talk stations. The words were almost unintelligible, which at first confused him. Then he realized that the voices were talking about them — half the military security forces in Nevada were being called on to attack Hangar Five … they had already been discovered by Dreamland’s security forces. If he’d spent two more minutes completing the ANTARES interface they’d all be dead.

A millisecond’s mental inquiry told hire all he needed to know: Sergeant Howard, if he was still alive, had done his job well. External air and power were on and available. DreamStar’s body tanks were full — he had much more fuel than he had hoped for. Apparently they had drained the wing fuel tanks but left the body tanks and their thirty thousand gallons of jet fuel intact.

Both AIM-120 Scorpion missiles were loaded and even responded to a fast connectivity and continuity check — which meant they could be launched or jettisoned at any time. Whether they were armed or capable of defending him was a question that would have to wait. The twenty-millimeter Vulcan cannon was empty — a fully loaded cannon would have been too much to hope for.

Howard had removed the inlet covers, safety pins and landing gear downlocks, and had closed all the maintenance covers except for the external power cover. The man was really efficient. He’d have to thank him someday, if they made it … ANTARES’ automatic flight-data recorder recorded the thought for later retrieval.

DreamStar had the ability to go from complete power off to full military takeoff thrust in moments. Fighters in the twenty-first century would routinely have it — now only DreamStar did. James again placed his life in the hands of a computer — only a machine could control the enormous amount of power that he was about to unleash. It was the ultimate in combat speed and efficiency — but it could just as easily turn the one hundredthousand-pound fighter into a huge bomb.

Power, fuel, air — all engine start systems activated with a single thought. Lights and transmitters off — no use in making it easier for Briggs and the Air Force to find him. A compressed air tank, filled from the external power cart, collected twenty thousand cubic feet of air at five thousand pounds PSI pressure, then emptied it onto the sixteenth-stage compressor in DreamStar’s turbofan engine in less than a second. At the same time fuel was injected into the combustion chamber and the high-voltage ignitors activated. The blast of compressed air spun the engine turbines at three thousand RPMs, mixing air and fuel in the proportions to create a huge explosive ignition equal to the force of a ton of TNT.

In ten seconds DreamStar was ready for flight. With full power available, his only concern now was to get off the ground as fast as possible.

Orlov, as Sergeant Howard, had been briefed on DreamStar’s fast-reaction-start capability, but he never quite believed it. One moment the fighter was silent, cold, without power — the next, the engine was at full power with a hugh shaft of fire burning out the engine exhaust, expelling dangerous unburned gases. It reminded him of watching a tiger being fed at the Moscow Zoo — one moment the tigers were sleeping soundly, but at the first scent of blood they were unstoppable dynamos of motion and energy.

The external power cables and air hoses dropped off the service port by remote control, and before he could rush to the side of the cockpit to see if Maraklov needed anything, DreamStar was moving forward — ready to fly.

Orlov didn’t hesitate. He reached up to the remote-control trigger device, pressed the button, then threw the device away in the hangar and sprinted for the V-100 armored car.

He reached the car just as columns of fire lit up the gloomy early morning sky. Orlov hadn’t counted on how bright those magnesium mortar shells were — he had, though, tightly closed his eyes just as he heard the loud puffs when the mortar rounds were launched. Lovyyev, inside the V-100, had neglected to shield his eyes, and Orlov found him rubbing and blinking furiously.

“Move; get out of the way!” Orlov ordered. Lovyyev followed Orlov’s grasp and tumbled into the clear area under the gun turret as Orlov scrambled into the stiff driver’s seat, put the V-100 into gear and hit the gas pedal.

“Can you operate the machine gun?” Orlov called to Lovyyev and checked his assistant as he hauled himself into the gun-turret brace. Lovyyev was still trying to blink away the flashblindness, his face red and puffed, but Lovyyev, longer on courage than brains, was the kind who would say he was okay if both arms were blown away. All Orlov could do was drive. Either Lovyyev was up to the task of holding off the response forces, or they would die.

“Just don’t shoot behind you,” Orlov told him. “Maraklov and his fighter are right behind us. Shoot at anything else that moves. Don’t waste a single shot. Our only hope is—”

Orlov’s voice was drowned out by a rhythmic hammering sound on the hull of the armored car. He thought it was from Lovyyev’s gun until he realized that the sound came from outside. He was about to warn Lovyyev to take cover when the young KGB agent’s body, minus his handsome blond head, slumped into the bottom of the gun turret. Orlov stomped hard on the gas pedal. Never leave a pretty corpse for the enemy.

Dreamland’s security forces had reacted much faster than Orlov had anticipated. Now the last obstacle lay ahead — the long movable steel gate that enclosed the fence surrounding the research hangars. Orlov had to work fast. Once fully closed, huge steel pilings would be lowered into place and the gate would be unmovable.

Driving with one hand on the wheel, gas pedal to the floor, Orlov reached up and swung the fifty-caliber machine gun back facing forward, then fumbled with the remote trigger mechanism, finally clipping it into place on the rifle’s trigger. He was less than a hundred yards from the gate. Firing in short bursts, he swung the wheel back and forth, pointing the gun’s fire at anything that moved near the gate.

To his surprise, the gate was already fully closed. Time had almost run out. Two soldiers were low-crawling along the gate, trying to reach the locking mechanism.

Orlov swung the V-100 toward them, trying to rake the fence with fire to pin them down, but the Americans refused to stop. Orlov caged the fifty-caliber forward and headed for the lock mechanism, spraying the area with bullets. But that lasted for only a few seconds — the shell-feeder on the machine gun jammed.

It was too late. One guard was dead but the other threw the handle on the locking mechanism and dropped the steel post into place.

One chance left. Keeping the throttle full open Orlov aimed the Commando right at the gate opening. If the lock could be broken and the gate dislodged from the piling he could use the V-100 to push the gate far enough open for tle XF-34A to get through.

Under a hailstorm of bullets from all sides, Orlov’s V-100 plowed into the gate’s locking mechanism at well over sixty miles an hour — the four-ton armored car had built up enough force to demolish a house. But it was still not enough to snap the five-inch steel post securing the gate. Instead, the force of the impact snapped the motor mounts off the armored car, and the heavy armored plating in the car’s nose acted like a giant piston, driving the engine and transmission into Gekky Orlov’s body. The bones in his body were pulverized like dry twigs under a steam roller. The V-100 exploded, starting a fire in the electric and hydraulic lock systems and killing the second security guard. But the gate held fast.

And DreamStar was trapped.

A quick mental command, and DreamStar’s attack-radar flashed on, then off, at precisely two hundred and twenty yards from where Kenneth Francis James, Andrei Ivanschichin Maraklov, had stopped his fighter short of the burning gate ahead. Six hundred and sixty feet, then over a twelve-foot-high obstacle. Another mental command: DreamStar’s computers sampled the external air temperature, inertial winds, pressure altitude, relative humidity, aircraft gross weight, engine-trim-and-performance variables, then computed takeoff data at max performance best angle of climb over the obstacle.

Not good enough. DreamStar reported that it needed at least one thousand feet to clear the obstacle.

James’ reaction was instantaneous. He brought DreamStar’s turbofan engine to full power, moved the vectored thrust-nozzles to full reverse and released the brakes. DreamStar began to move backward toward the taxiway throat leading to the ramp in front of the hangars — back toward the melee he had just escaped from. At the same time he activated DreamStar’s radar system, which scanned in every direction around the fighter.

DreamStar had moved only a hundred feet farther from the gate when he “saw” the first M113 armored vehicle approach. It was moving fast, nearly forty miles an hour, past the burning piles of debris scattered around in front of the now-abandoned Hangar Five less than a hundred yards away. He hit the brakes just as the superconducting radar detected the M113’s twenty-millimeter cannon open fire.

“Hal, what’s your situation?” General Elliott called over the security net.

Hal Briggs grabbed a handhold on the M113’s door for support as he keyed his microphone: “We’re approaching the plane from the left. It’s now about three hundred feet in front of us, facing down the throat toward the gate. I’d swear the thing backed up or somethin’ … Over.”

Elliott, now in a staff car with McLanahan at the wheel, was racing down taxiway delta toward the hangar area, careening over ditches and weaving through gates to get back to the ramp. McLanahan looked at Elliott. “Did he say DreamStar was backing up?” Elliott had no answer. “Hal,” Patrick said, “what’s DreamStar’s range to the gate?”

“Hard to tell until we get closer, but I’d say less than three hundred yards.”

Elliott looked at Patrick. “Is it enough …?”

McLanahan didn’t dare take his eyes off the road, floored the gas pedal and gripped the wheel tighter. “Cool morning, half a fuel load, a little headwind … it’s enough.”

“God damn. Who the hell’s flying it?” Even then, Elliott could not believe that James, one of only three men alive who could possibly fly DreamStar, was in the cockpit. “How the hell did he get in there?” Elliott pressed the mike switch hard enough to turn his finger white. “Shoot out the tires, Hal. If the plane moves, shoot to kill. If DreamStar moves ahead, destroy it.”

Eight hundred twelve point seven feet. Now.

Keeping the brakes on hard, James commanded the throttles to full power, let them stabilize for a few seconds, then pushed them to max afterburner. He allowed another half-second for the computer to perform a single full-power engine-trim adjustment, then opened the dorsal engine louvers. DreamStar’s aft end pitched dowry, and the nose shot up at a steep angle. He set the flex wings and canards for high lift and max performance climb-out. … then released the brakes.

DreamStar had not rolled more than a hundred feet forward when he realized he was not going to make it. He knew it even before the performance computer, receiving data from radar on range to the obstacle, reported a collision warning and recommended an immediate takeoff abort. Maraklov overrode the recommendation with the thought: this is how I’ll die? Not after a dogfight trying to steal and save DreamStar. Dying in a fireball crashing into the security gate, trying something that I knew had no chance from the beginning …

Five hundred feet to go. All wheels still firmly on the ground, airspeed hardly registering. Maraklov could feel the absence of lift on his wings, the absence of the familiar twist that the composite flex wings underwent during the takeoff acceleration. Countering the wingtip twist was a simple computer-controlled correction, as simple as swallowing, as simple as—

He cut short his gloomy predictions. The wingtip twist … DreamStar automatically neutralized the twist in the wingtips because the twisted wing created. vortices under the wing and fuselage, which created turbulence, which increased drag and lengthened takeoff roll distances. But the turbulence under the fuselage created something else — ground effect. And the power of ground effect would be to cushion the plane a few feet off the ground, just below flying speed but still airborne. If that was true …

Four hundred feet left …

Maraklov overrode the order to counteract the wingtip twist. In response, the tips of DreamStar’s wings curved even more, creating two hundred percent more lift as well as two virtual tornados of wind that swirled counterclockwise from the wing-tips down and under the wings and across the fuselage. He felt the vortices slam into the fuselage and fought for control. DreamStar felt sluggish, unresponsive, out of pilot control.

Ninety knots. Three hundred feet remaining …

A loud creak from the left wingtip, and a “CONFIGURATION” warning flashed in Maraklov’s conscious mind. He ignored it. The wingtips were now being buffeted by winds nearing hurricane force, while the rest of the wing was wallowing in relatively calm winds nowhere close to takeoff speed. Maraklov stiffened the wings by twisting the inner surfaces, allowing the power being generated in the wingtips to flow to the lazy parts of the wing. The aircraft rumbled in protest. He was receiving “CONFIGURATION” and “COLLISION” warnings, and had to struggle not only to ignore the warnings but to prevent ANTARES from taking command and aborting the takeoff. DreamStar’s artificial brain was programmed for self-preservation at all costs, not self-destruction.

One hundred knots, two hundred feet remaining … DreamStar’s nose gear popped off the runway, held aloft by the large canards and by the force of the upwardly directed thrust from the dorsal louvers. DreamStar was in takeoff attitude but she was still far, far from lift-off speed.

One hundred fifty feet … one chance left — he commanded the landing gear up.

One hundred feet, one hundred ten knots. An ANTARES-generated warning from the flight-configuration computer flashed in Maraklov’s mind, warning him that the landing gear safety switch still showed pressure on the gear struts — DreamStar was still on the ground. Instantly he overrode the warning, commanded gear up, then closed his eyes and waited for DreamStar’s tail to hit the runway.

Seventy-five feet, one hundred fifteen knots — liftoff speed for this takeoff configuration. The tail did not hit the runway.

Zero feet left … With the tall, bulky landing gear retracted, DreamStar accelerated to one hundred thirty knots, and was able to use the extra airspeed to lift its nose even higher, clawing for every last bit of altitude. A shower of sparks erupted from the top of the steel gate as DreamStar scraped past the reinforced barbed wire, tearing apart the two ventral rudders that had automatically deployed in DreamStar’s slow-flight mode — Maraklov did not think to retract those low-speed rudders in time. DreamStar shuddered as the rudders ripped off her belly, but she did not stall or hit the ground.

DreamStar was airborne.

McLanahan and Elliott had just reached the hangar area as DreamStar lifted over the gate, the aircraft flying so slowly and at such a steep climb that it seemed almost suspended in midair, an apparition at the end of a shaft of fire. It also appeared to be falling slightly, but this was mostly an illusion; DreamStar’s nose dipped slightly to build up valuable airspeed, and it began to accelerate at it crossed the deserted runways and climbed slowly into the dawn.

McLanahan slammed on the brakes in time to avoid an M113 combat vehicle that continued to fire heavy caliber rounds into the sky until DreamStar was completely out of sight. A few moments later Hal Briggs climbed out of the ACV, head tightly bandaged and carrying an M-16A2 rifle, and moved over to McLanahan’s sedan. After Elliott opened a door for him, he nearly collapsed in the backseat.

“Sorry,” Briggs gasped, painfully hauling himself upright. “Couldn’t … couldn’t stop him.” Before Elliott could speak, Briggs had pulled out a walkie-talkie. “Red Man, this is Hotel. Notify the four-seventy-fourth tactical fighter wing at Nellis. XF-34A fighter aircraft stolen from this location. Aircraft is armed with air-to-air missiles and must be considered hostile. Orders from Alpha are to search and destroy,”

“Copy, Hotel.”

“Break. All Dreamland security units, this is Hotel. XF-34A aircraft is airborne, last seen heading southwest out of Dreamland at slow speed. The aircraft has been hijacked by unknown persons. It is equipped with air-to-air missiles only. Air defense units have authorization to engage and destroy at will; report detection or engagement to Red Man, Nellis and Las Vegas Air Traffic Control Center ASAP. Repeat: all units, engage and destroy at will. Hotel out.” He dropped the walkie-talkie into his lap as if it weighed a hundred pounds.

“Take us over to Hangar Five, Patrick,” Elliott said. He turned to Briggs, gently lifting up the bandages to check his wound. “Cancel that. Take us to the infirmary.”

“I’m all right,” Briggs said, gingerly touching the top of his hairless head and checking his hastily applied bandages. “The guys on the ACV fixed me up.”

At least for the moment, Elliott didn’t want Briggs in the hospital any more than Briggs wanted to be there. As McLanahan headed for the hangars he asked, “What the hell happened, Hal?”

Briggs wiped stinging sweat from his wounds and burns. “It all happened so fast, General. The Foxtrot guard posts didn’t look right. I had them report in. Whoever was in Five Foxtrot’s Commando, it wasn’t Jacinto. I headed over to check it out when I got hit by the fifty cal. I barely made it to Rover Nine when flash grenades start popping. Before I knew it DreamStar was out in the throat. I’ve never seen anything like that takeoff, whoever did it. It was like he levitated right over the gate. I didn’t think he’d make it …”

They drove up the entrance of Hangar Five. Rover Seven, the second M113 armored combat vehicle, was positioned in front, with guards covering both the front and back. Rover Seven was also aiming a huge spotlight inside the hangar.

“Seven, this is Hotel. Is the hangar secure?”

“Affirmative.”

“Roger. Sergeant Macynski, follow me in. The rest cover us.”

Briggs got out of the sedan, flipped off the safety lever on his M-16 and ran over to the M113. He met up with Macynski, outlined a brief tactical plan to the NCO, then approached the hangar door at a dead run. They scanned the interior of the hangar, quickly sweeping their rifle muzzles around the hangar while sighting through them, ready to fire at any sound or movement. Nothing. Briggs ordered the M113 in closer to secure the hangar, then headed back to the sedan.

In the backseat he said into the walkie-talkie, “Red Man, this is Hotel. I want an investigation unit in Hangar Five and one on the Commando ACV on the ramp gate on the double. Break. Rover Nine, secure the V-100 that crashed into the gate. Recover any bodies from the wreckage for the investigation unit. I want an I.D. on the occupants ASAP.”

“Roger, Hotel,” the security controller replied. “Hotel, be advised, Lance One and Lance Two F-16Fs airborne from Nellis at five past the hour. Two F-14 units from China Lake also report airborne. CATTLECAR is their controller. You can meet them on channel one-one.”

“Roger, Red Man. Get all Dreamland air defense units on channel eleven and help coordinate an intercept with CATTLECAR. The last thing we need is for our guys to take shots at those F-14s or -16s.”

“Switching all units to eleven, sir,” the security controller said. “Simultaneous voice and data.” Briggs switched his walkie-talkie over as well.

“CATTLECAR, this is Hotel on channel one-one. Over.”

“Hotel, this is CATTLECAR,” the radar controller replied. “HAWC anti-air units are reporting in now, sir. All assets should be on-line in sixty seconds.”

“Any airborne radar platforms up?”

“Not yet, sir. Nellis’ 767 AWACS is not an alert bird. I’ve requested the tac fighter unit to recall the crew, but that may take some time.”

“We’ll lose him without an AWACS up there to dig him out of the terrain,” McLanahan said. “Ground radar won’t pick him up if he stays low.”

“Hotel, this is CATTLECAR. Radar contact on your hostile. I’m directing all HAWC anti-air artillery units to engage. Any further instructions?”

Briggs stopped and looked at Elliott. The general inwardly flinched but did not hesitate. “If they’ve got him, destroy him.”

Briggs nodded and raised his walkie-talkie. “CATTLECAR, message confirmed through Alpha. Engage at will and shoot to kill. Out.”

Maraklov was no more than two hundred feet above ground when ANTARES began to report the emitters all around him. As Maraklov scanned outside the cockpit, visual images were supplanted by ANTARES-generated images of catalogued terrain features around which multicolored arcs or bands undulated, disappeared and reappeared in kaleidoscopic waves. The colored bands were beams of radar energy — search radars, tracking radars, and data-links — all searching for him.

Most of the waves of color were above him, like curtains of fire stretching across a ceiling, but a few seemed to slice right through DreamStar. Maraklov had to avoid those bands. The green bands were search radars, not deadly in themselves, but they would give away his position to the searchers. The other bands of energy were yellow — tracking radars that would pinpoint his location and would begin to feed targeting information to surface-to-air or air-to-air missiles. If the yellow bands turned red, it meant that a missile had been launched. If he was inside the red band, he was within the missile’s lethal envelope and would probably die within seconds unless the missile could be outmaneuvered — DreamStar carried no jammers, no decoys. Maraklov had to outrun, outmaneuver, or kill his attackers, or it was over for him.

He was finally free of the dry bed of the Groom Lake area, heading south and almost into Papoose Canyon northwest of Emigrant Valley, when a single finger of green light snapped out between a narrow gap between two rocky buttes and hit DreamStar broadside. One of the search radars had found him. The band immediately turned to yellow, but one of the buttes blocked the energy and the band turned green once again as the beam continued its three hundred and sixty degree sweep. But they now knew where he was — and were closing in on him. Maraklov dodged further away from the butte, hoping to stay in the butte’s radar shadow as long as possible.

It wasn’t working. The terrain was forcing him to climb, but the beam of green energy above him wasn’t rising with him. He had no time to react. The green beam of energy, completing a full revolution every six seconds, hit him once again as DreamStar crested a rocky ridge line. This time, it turned yellow and stayed on him. DreamStar’s threat-warning receiver immediately reported the contact, and after a few seconds’ analysis concluded that a British-made Rapier surface-to-air-missile was locked on.

The computer suggested a heading, altitude and airspeed to escape the Rapier missile’s lethal radius, and Maraklov ordered the evasive maneuver just as the band of energy went from yellow to red — the Rapier had gone from search to missile-uplink in seconds. The missile was in the air. There was no time and no room to move. DreamStar was bracketed by hills and mountains.

Sensing Maraklov’s confusion, ANTARES canceled the first suggested maneuver, immediately deployed the canards into their high-lift configuration and ordered a hard, tight Immelmann — a fast inverted half-loop — directly into the short rocky butte they had just passed. ANTARES also activated the superconducting radar, which showed the butte only three-quarters of a mile directly ahead. They would impact in less than four seconds …

A flash of light erupted off the right wing, and suddenly DreamStar banked hard right, pulling nine G’s in the tight turn. The Rapier missile had missed by only a few short feet. Maraklov tried to search the sky for another missile, but the hard nine-G turn had blurred and tunneled his vision. Another explosion off to his right — there had, indeed, been a second Rapier missile launched at him, but that one had exploded on the butte not three hundred yards behind him.

As his ejection-seat back began to recline automatically, which would help blood to flow back into his brain while ANTARES completed evasive maneuvers, Maraklov watched as the colored bands surrounding him switched back to green. The older Rapier missile systems surrounding Dreamland carried only two missiles on each launch platform, and the system had switched back to search mode while the Rapier crew reloaded.

Maraklov watched, fascinated, as ANTARES automatically increased power to full thrust, and began to use short bursts of its multi-directional radar to scan the terrain around DreamStar and fly as close to earth as possible. His ejection seat slowly returned to its upright position as the G-forces subsided, and he actually could relax … he would be long gone from the range of that Rapier site by the time it was reloaded—

A warning beep sounded in the upper-center part of his cockpit, and with it a blue-triangle icon appeared, with a long green triangle protruding from the front end. Answering his mental query, ANTARES reported what it was: an F-16 Falcon fighter, sweeping the skies below with its new AEG-91 look-down radar. Although pushing age twenty-five, the F-16 had undergone so many modifications that it could hardly be considered the same aircraft as twenty-five years earlier. Not originally designed for look-down, shoot-down, low-altitude engagements, it now sported a multi-purpose “cranked arrow” effect, with huge delta wings, and was capable of attacking air or ground targets at any altitude. Its new capability was in evidence as its green triangle swept down from the sky and in moments DreamStar had once again been discovered.

Maraklov commanded an immediate hard bank and searched for terrain to hide in. He knew the F-l6s rarely worked alone; only one would activate its radar, while one or two others would take vectors from the leader and close in on their prey, activating their attack radars at the last possible moment …

Another mental command … and Maraklov’s heart sank. At its present low altitude, DreamStar was gulping fuel. He could not afford to get into a situation where he’d have to waste time and fuel dodging missiles from the F-16s, let alone any sort of protracted aerial battle with them. Reinforcements were surely on their way — very likely F-15s from the Air Force Reserve base at Davis-Monthan in Tucson. Maraklov’s options were running out. There was only one real choice left to him.

Run like hell.

At a single request, Maraklov discovered the single best altitude to use to clear all terrain within five hundred miles — six thousand five hundred feet. He ordered the computer to maintain that altitude and set best-speed power settings for the engines. As fuel was burned off and gross weight decreased, the computer would pick the best speed versus drag settings of engine power, trim, and wing configuration to achieve the fastest possible speed. He could afford no more power changes, climbs, descents, terrain avoidance or defense maneuvers. His only option was to stay at zero Q — where the sum of all aerodynamic forces on his aircraft remained zero, the highest possible cruise efficiency — and run for the border.

A fast mental inquiry and the GPS satellite-navigation system checked DreamStar’s position, computed a likely flight path around known population centers and defense areas, measured the distance between present position and the tiny dry lake, Laguna de Santiaguillo, where Kramer and Moffitt in north central Mexico were supposed to be waiting with a fuel truck. Laguna de Santiaguillo was an abandoned training facility (KGB assets utilizing locals equally receptive to rubles and dollars) in the foothills of the Sierra Madre Occidental mountains, well within range of two Mexican fighter bases at Mazatlan and Monterrey. A lousy location, Maraklov thought, but the only one possible on such short notice.

The computer had his answer after a relatively long two-second pause: three hundred miles to the Gulf of California, another seven hundred fifty miles along the west ridge of the Sierra Madre Occidental mountains, then across the Remedias River valley to Laguna de Santiaguillo. He was traveling at one point one Mach, about nine hundred miles per hour, and was consuming twenty thousand pounds of fuel an hour. He had exactly twenty-two thousand pounds of fuel remaining. Which meant, at his current setting, he would flame out right over Laguna de Santiaguillo. He would have more fuel available if he used an idle-power descent and a long glide for landing, but he’d have less if he had to dodge any more missiles or if he had to use afterburner.

Another mental command and he checked the two AIM-1200 Scorpion missiles, then tried a test arming. Both were fitted with instrumented warheads, but otherwise would launch and track like fully operational weapons. He could use them if he got himself cornered. He would, though, have to shoot very carefully — without explosive warheads there would be no proximity detonation; each shot had to be a direct hit.

But up here, the possibility of anyone touching him seemed unlikely. There were still search radars all around him, resembling huge green cones rising out of the terrain, but there were large gaps between the radar cones and he was picking his way through them, using slight heading changes to put a mountain or ridge line between himself and the radar cones. Smaller yellow blobs, giant mushrooms, appeared now and then — the lethal envelope of surface-to-air missiles stationed below — but he was avoiding them as well. Now he was almost out of the Dreamland complex, accelerating past one thousand miles per hour.

Speed and stealth meant survival more than fancy flying or superior weaponry. The first time he had decided to steal DreamStar he’d imagined himself taking on the air might of the whole southwestern United States, flying rings around the best fighters and the best pilots in the world, winning out over a billion dollars’ worth of hardware. Well, it wasn’t going to happen that way. He was going to sneak out, hiding behind every shadow, measuring every quart of fuel.

Whatever it took …

For the first time he really allowed his body to relax. He had stolen DreamStar right out from under the noses of the people who wanted to give up on his baby. And now he even dared to think that he might actually make it all the way.

He was allowed that heady thought for precisely forty seconds. From out of nowhere, a green triangle of energy appeared in front of him. There was no time to evade. The green triangle enveloped him, and instantly turned to yellow …

This thing was truly amazing, Major Edward Frost, the radar navigator aboard the B-52 Megafortress Plus, marveled. A goddamned B-52 bomber with more gadgets and modes and functions and bells and whistles than L.A. Air Traffic Control.

Frost was studying a fourteen-inch by ten-inch rectangular video display terminal set on one-hundred-mile range. A circle cursor, automatically laid on a radar return that matched the preprogrammed parameters set by Frost, was tracking a high-altitude, high-speed target dead ahead. You told the system what you wanted to find) and it did the searching. It was a hell of a lot different from only a few years ago when radar nays on B-52 bombers concentrated on terrain and cultural returns — mountains, buildings, towns. This B-52 was different.

Major Frost hit the mike button near his right foot. “Pilot, radar. Radar contact aircraft, one o’clock, eighty-five miles.” He punched a function key on his keyboard. “Altitude six thousand five hundred, airspeed … hey, he’s moving out. Airspeed one thousand one hundred knots.”

He hit another function key, and the display changed to a maze of arcs, lines, grids. The computer had presented a series of options for approaching the target.

Frost shook his head. Here I am, sitting in a B-52 bomber planning to attack a high-speed fighter!

“Turn right heading zero-five two to IR intercept in six-two nautical miles. Automatic intercept is available.” Then to Angelina Pereira: “I’m aligned for guidance-mode transfer at any time—”

“Belay that,” General John Ormack said over interphone. “Weapons stay on safe — that’s our damned plane out there, Frost.”

“Sorry; got carried away.”

“Auto-intercept coming on, crew.” Ormack connected the digital autopilot to the intercept computer and monitored the Old Dog’s turn, pushing the throttles up to ninety five percent power to keep the angle of attack low. The autopilot made several small corrections farther to the right as the distance between the two aircraft rapidly decreased.

“Exactly what are we trying to accomplish here, General?” George Wendelstat, the safety observer asked. Wendelstat was firmly strapped into the instructor-pilot’s seat, wearing a backpack-style parachute on his beefy shoulders. His face was cherry red and he was sweating in spite of the B-52’s cool interior temperature. “Do you mean to attack that aircraft?”

“What I mean to do is everything I possibly can to turn that aircraft back,” Ormack said. “If I can’t get him to turn around I mean to delay him long enough for help to arrive.”

“But this is suicide,” Wendelstat protested. “A B-52 against this DreamStar? That’s a fighter plane, isn’t it?”

“It’s also a stolen aircraft from my research center,” Ormack said. “I’m not going to let this guy go without trying to do something—”

“Including getting us all killed?”

“I know the limits of this crew and aircraft,” Ormack said. “We have the capability to engage DreamStar and hopefully detain him long enough for help to arrive. I won’t go beyond the limits of my responsibility or common sense—”

“You already have. He can launch a missile against us at any second—”

“Seventy miles and closing fast, General.”

“Wendelstat, sit back and shut up,” Colonel Jeff Khan, the copilot, broke in. “The general knows what he’s doing.”

Ormack reached up to the overhead communications console and switched his command radio to channel eleven. “CATTLECAR, this is Dog Zero Two. We have the hostile at our twelve o’clock, seventy miles. Closing on an intercept course. Requesting instructions from HAWC Alpha as soon as possible.”

“Break. Zero ‘No, this is HAWC Alpha. You can’t do anything up there, John. We’re vectoring in the F-16s now. Get out of the area as fast as you can. Over.”

“I’ve got a lock-on and I’m turning for an I.D. intercept, Alpha,” Ormack answered back. “I can turn it into a radar pass at any time. Just say the word.”

“Sixty miles.”

“He’s got two Scorpion missiles, John,” Elliott said. “Repeat — he’s armed with two live Scorpions. You won’t have a chance. Disengage and leave the area—”

“I’ve got two Scorpions too, General. Plus I’ve got jammers that can counter the Scorpion’s active radar. He doesn’t.”

“He can fly circles around your Scorpions—”

Ormack interrupted again. “I can engage him, maybe force him to turn back, maybe knock the sonofabitch down. Or I can let him fly our plane to Central America or wherever the hell he’s going. Which is it going to be?”

No immediate reply. Ormack nodded — he’d gotten his answer. “Radar, change to Scorpion-attack profile. Crew, prepare to engage hostile air target.”

Frost had his finger on the function key and hit it even before Ormack finished giving the order. Immediately the Old Dog heeled over into forty degrees of bank, then abruptly rolled out. It was now aiming for a spot several miles along DreamStar’s flight path, projecting out to intersect the fighter’s path at the AIM-120C’s optimum flight range. Ormack pushed his throttles up to full power, then reached over to his left-side panel and flipped a gang-barred four-way switch. “Guns, you have Scorpion missile launch consent.”

“Confirmed,” Angelina Pereira replied. “Left pylon on automatic launch, missile counting down … twenty seconds to launch.”

On the UHF radio Ormack said, “CATTLECAR, this is Dog Zero Two. Clear airspace for red fox engagement. Be advised, red buzzer activity on all frequencies. Dog Zero Two out.” On interphone Ormack said, “Defense, clear for electronic countermeasures. Crew, prepare for air combat engagement.”

“Fifteen seconds …”

Suddenly a metallic, computer-modified voice cut in on the frequency: “Dog Zero Two, disengage. I’m warning you.” Khan looked puzzled. “Who the hell was …?”

“ANTARES. The master computer on DreamStar.” Ormack flipped to the channel. “This is Dog Zero Two. Who’s this?”

“This is Colonel Andrei Ivanschichin Maraklov, General Ormack.” Maraklov thought before continuing: should he give his American name? But he was never going to return to America — the KGB or the CIA would see to that — and they would find out anyway. “You know me as Captain Kenneth Francis James, sir.”

Ormack swore through his oxygen mask. “Goddamn — Ken James stole DreamStar.” He switched his command radio to channel eleven. “Alpha, monitor GUARD channel. Urgent.” He then quickly switched his radio to the universal emergency frequency, GUARD.

“James — Ken — Mara … whatever the hell it is … land that plane immediately. I have orders to attack.” On interphone he told Angelina Pereira to get ready to cancel the auto attack.

“Yes, sir … ten seconds.”

“Turn off your attack radar immediately, General Ormack,” the computerized voice of Maraklov on the emergency channel said, “or I will have no choice but to defend myself.”

“Damn it, James, you’re about ten seconds from getting your ass blown out of the sky. Decrease speed and lower your landing gear, or I’ll engage.”

No reply.

“Five seconds … four … three … “

“Any change in his airspeed or heading?”

“Negative,” from Frost. “Still goin’ full blast …”

“Launch commit,” Angelina said.

There was a muffled screech of rocket exhaust from the left wing, as the first Scorpion missile raced out of its streamlined canister. It ran on course toward its quarry. Unlike previous air-to-air missiles, the C-version of the Scorpion did not glide or cruise to its target; even though it was still considered a medium-range missile it stayed powered throughout its flight.

“Uplink tracking … missile now tracking … dead on course …”

The bands of yellow, signifying the B-52’s tracking radar illuminating his aircraft, suddenly changed to red. Maraklov caught a chill. This was real, Ormack wasn’t bluffing. This Dog Zero Two had live missiles on board, and he was under attack. By a B-52 bomber …

He activated his attack radar. The radar image of the B-52, still over fifty miles away, seemed the size of a flying mountain. His radar wasn’t picking it up but he knew the missile was only seconds from impact. His reactions were executed at the speed of thought …

He turned right toward the B-52, exposing only the minimum radar cross-section of his aircraft possible. He then began a series of high-speed reversals using the canards in their high-maneuverability mode, not rolling into each turn but sidestepping, darting back and forth, keeping only DreamStar’s front cross-section aimed toward the B-52. The B-52 would be carrying AIM-120C, same as DreamStar. The AIM-120 was a fabulous weapon, with big fins to steer it toward its target. But its developers ten years earlier had never envisaged an aircraft that could move sideways like DreamStar.

Maraklov continued to shoot back and forth for another two seconds, completing two full horizontal S-slides, making each dodge wider than the other, using his high-maneuverability canards to keep DreamStar’s nose pointed at where he thought the missile would be. It was a gamble. With each turn, he hoped, the Scorpion missile would have to make bigger and bigger turns to maintain lock-on. As DreamStar’s side-steps got bigger, the missile’s turn rates had to increase even faster to keep up — not fast enough, he hoped, for the missile to track its target at close range.

He was at the top of a right ninety-degree bank and about to execute another hard left break when he heard and felt a sharp bang to his left. He had been very lucky this time. Forced farther and farther out of phase, the missile was opposite his canopy when its proximity warhead detected it was within lethal range. Maraklov waited for the concussion and flak to hit, but nothing happened) and all systems reported with a good status check when queried by an instantaneous mental command. Then Maraklov realized the Megafortress must have been on a test flight and so would not have live warheads in its missiles. Which diminished but hardly eliminated their threat.

He had never paid much attention to the Megafortress Plus project, thinking of it as just another one of Elliott’s eccentric boondoggles. Another underestimation …

A quick flash of his all-aspect-attack radar showed the B-52 maneuvering hard right, moving back into attack position, its huge wings pulling it easily around and behind him. The enormous plane had to be pulling at least four or five G’s, Maraklov thought. It was enough force to rip the wings off any conventional bomber and many fighters as well. Ormack obviously meant business, and he had the hardware to back him up. This was no place for a fight, even with a supposedly decrepit B-52.

ANTARES, however, always favoring the offensive, was begging for a fight and had recommended a high yo-yo maneuver — a hard vertical pull, zoom over the top, then an inverted dive to lock-on — to pull behind and above the B-52 to get into missile-firing position. Maraklov queried about fuel: now he was two thousand pounds below the fuel curve instead of two thousand pounds above it. He had no time to waste with a missile pass. Every time ANTARES activated its attack radar, even in small, frequency-agile bursts, the B-52 would jam it. ANTARES was being forced to use older and older data to process an attack. Besides, if the B-52 could jam DreamStar’s phased-array radar, it could easily jam the AIM-120’s conventional pulse-Doppler active radar. It was definitely time to bug out. Maraklov canceled the right high-G yo-yo and pulled into a sharp left turn, using radar to clear terrain until he could get established on course again.

ANTARES tried to tell him, but Maraklov wasn’t listening — tried to tell him that a left turn was precisely the wrong thing to do.

He barely had time to roll wings-level when the missile-launch warning hammered into his consciousness. This time it wasn’t a head-to-head engagement — the B-52 was in missile-launch position, behind and slightly to the left, the cutoff angle established, the missile already aiming ahead of its target’s flight path. Radar, infrared, laser — whatever he had, DreamStar was wide open. The Scorpion missile was even close enough to be picked up on radar …

But ANTARES, literally, did not comprehend the meaning of surrender — it would compute escape and attack options until it ran out of power to energize its circuitry. And Maraklov, feeling he had no hope of survival, had surrendered control of DreamStar to ANTARES.

The computer took over. Using its high-lift wings and full canard deflection, DreamStar executed a sharp ninety-degree pitch-up at max afterburner. The Scorpion missile overshot but turned precisely with DreamStar, arcing nearly up to twenty-thousand feet before following the guidance signals from the Old Dog and pitching over hard for the kill. The missile was now aimed straight down, passing Mach four, locked on, closing in again on DreamStar’s tail.

With its canards again in high-lift configuration, DreamStar continued its inverted roll, screaming below, then back up through the horizon. It was now clawing for altitude, skimming across the high desert floor by only a few feet. The Scorpion missile tracked every move, following DreamStar’s high-G loop. The missile broke Mach five as it closed in on its target …

Which suddenly stopped in mid-air, then climbed five hundred feet straight up. The missile could make a fourteen-G turn far greater than any fighter yet designed, but not even this high-tech missile could discontinue a Mach-five diving loop and then turn a ninety-degree corner. The Scorpion missile tracked perfectly, but at such close range, and moving at almost a mile per second, its turn radius was several hundred feet greater than its altitude above ground. The missile exploded into the Amargosa Desert, just a few yards from a truck stop northwest of Jackass Airport off highway 95.

The threat gone, the maneuver accomplished, ANTARES switched to offense in less time than it took for the last of the Old Dog’s missiles to disintegrate into the hard desert floor. With its attack-radar activated, it quickly searched for the enemy. At such close range even the Stealth fibersteel skin and radar energy-absorbing honeycomb arrays couldn’t diminish the huge radar cross-section of the Megafortress Plus. Lock-on, data transfer, active seeker lock-on, missile stabilization test, unlock, motor firing, launch.

The thing was done before Maraklov really knew it — missile flight time was barely four seconds …

“Missile launch,” Wendy called over interphone. “Break right.”

Ormack yanked the control stick hard right, all the way to the stops. Roll-control jets pushed the right wing down and pulled the left wing up, and nose and tail thrusters counteracted the adverse left yaw, which increased the roll rate even more. At fifty degrees of bank the B-52’s right wingtip was no more than two hundred feet above ground. Ormack pulled back on the stick, letting the Old Dog’s twin-tails pull the nose around even faster.

At the same time, Wendy released five rocket-powered decoys from the left ejector racks under the tail. The rockets spewed a huge globe of radar-reflecting tinsel a hundred yards from the B-52, followed by the blinding hot glare of phosphorous flares. Simultaneously Wendy activated her electronic jammers, present to the frequency of both DreamStar’s track-while-scan phased-array radars and the Scorpion missile’s seeker-radar, and pumped over a hundred thousand watts of energy across that frequency band.

The B-52’s decoys flew past the missile’s active radar seeker undetected — it had a solid lock on the B-52 itself. The seeker radar was blinded by the intense jamming, but in a millisecond it switched to the most accurate and reliable of its four backup modes: track on jam. The missile homed in on the center lobe of the jamming energy from the B-52, following the energy beam the way a hungry bat follows the echo of its hunting screech, straight to its prey. The missile flew under the B-52’s tail, past the ECM emitter and under the fuselage to the right wing, impacting on the number-three engine pod.

The right wing, made of composite materials far stronger than any metal, held fast, but the number five and six engines disintegrated in a cloud of flying metal and a huge fireball. The fireball lifted the right wing fifty feet into the air, then dropped it, stalling it out. The left four engines pulled the Old Dog around in a clockwise spin. None of its huge wings was generating lift now; the plane was being held aloft only by its forward momentum, like a chewed-up Frisbee tossed awkwardly into the air.

Engine-compressor blades from the number-five engine acted like huge, powerful swords, chopping through the crew compartment. Jeffrey Khan and Linda Evanston, sitting on the right side of the plane, were pierced by hundreds of shards of white-hot metal. Wendy Tork, thrown sideways in the blast, was hit by several pieces of metal.

Ormack pulled the control stick to the left and stomped hard on the left rudder pedal. Fibersteel screamed in protest. The flat spin slowed almost to a stop, but so did the Megafortress’ airspeed. Ormack knew he had pulled the plane out of its spin, but the sudden negative G’s told him that the Old Dog was never going to fly. Wendelstat was screaming, clawing at his lap belt, face distorted. Blood was coming from places all over his body, his helmeted head tattered from the impact of flying metal.

Ormack reached over to the center console, finding that the centrifugal forces were gone — it felt as if he was riding a gentle elevator down to the first floor. Lowering his head caused the cockpit to tilt violently, but he fought off the sudden vertigo and flipped the EJECT WARNING switch to EJECT.

Downward ejection for the two navigators in a B-52 bomber was a crap shoot in the best of circumstances, and Major Edward Frost knew it. Driven by years of experience, it took him only a few seconds to get his hands on the ejection ring, get his back straight, chin down, knees and legs braced, elbows tucked in. He pulled his ejection handle the instant he saw the red EJECT warning light illuminate. But even then it was too late. The zeropoint-two-second drogue-parachute ripped Frost’s ejection seat free, automatically pulling the zero-second ripcord, but his main parachute barely had time to deploy fully from its backpack before Frost hit the earth.

Angelina Pereira had pushed Wendy back upright in her seat when she saw the bright red EJECT light. Still holding Wendy in her seat with her left hand, she carefully rotated Wendy’s right ejection lever up and pulled the trigger. The fingers of her left hand broke as Wendy’s armrest smashed into them, but she didn’t notice the pain as she watched the seat blast skyward. Then she slammed herself back into her own seat, raised her arming levers, and pulled both triggers.

Her seat malfunctioned. Nothing happened. She reseated her triggers and activated the backup ballistic acutators, but by then it was too late …

Ormack heard the loud pops and surges of air as ejection seats left the plane — at least someone might make it out alive, he thought. Wendelstat had finally collapsed. There was nothing to do for him — no time to haul him downstairs for manual bailout. But Khan had a chance. He yanked up on Khan’s left ejection lever and hit the trigger, watching as his long-time copilot and friend blew clear of the crippled bomber. Ormack now rotated his own arming levers and pulled the ejection triggers …

Khan had promptly been grabbed by the Old Dog’s exhaust and blown several hundred yards back, away from the impact area, but Ormack had spent precious time rescuing Khan. He was a hundred feet above ground, his chute filling with wind and inflating rapidly, when the Old Dog slammed into the Amargosa Desert valley floor. Directly over the aircraft, face down, in position to watch the end of the B-52 Megafortress Plus, Ormack was engulfed by the two-mile wide fireball that blossomed over the desert, consumed by the flames of his beloved aircraft.

His last thought was that somebody had to get that son of a bitch James …