Fly by Night

CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

The clock moved with glacial speed.

Davis tried the radio every five minutes. Twelve times in the first hour. The second hour he called every three minutes. Not a word came in reply. He was in a familiar arena, indeed his area of expertise — one airplane hunting another. Only he didn’t have radar for guidance, and wasn’t talking to anyone who did. He was fighting blind, just lumbering along as fast as the big machine would go, hoping like hell they were flying in the right direction. He figured the geometry of the intercept for a classic tail chase. His only chance was speed, but in that respect Davis was on unfamiliar ground. If he were flying an F-16 in full afterburner, he’d be somewhere over Europe right now, albeit out of gas. As it was, he might be gaining ten miles an hour on the pair of aircraft in front. Assuming they were in front.

He knew he couldn’t rely on radio contact alone. Schmitt might not be in a position to reply. Truth was, he might already have a bullet in his head like the two poor Ukrainian bastards. So Davis kept a keen eye out the window, looking for a slow-moving dot. Or better yet, two. It was like playing hide-and-seek, only the playground was the size of a country, a hundred thousand square miles of empty sky.

“I need to look at that,” Antonelli said, interrupting his thoughts. She was staring at the side of his head, the place where an oak log had slammed into his skull.

Davis didn’t argue.

Her hands held his head gently, and after a brief appraisal the doctor disappeared for a time into the aft cabin. She came back with a first-aid kit.

“Is that really necessary?” he asked.

Antonelli didn’t bother to reply. She cleaned and dressed the wound, and at the end wrapped a long bandage around his head three times. Davis saw his reflection in the side window.

“I look like a pirate.”

“Good, because you often act like one.”

He grinned. “Anyway, thanks.”

“You’re welcome. Now can you tell me where we are?”

“Egypt, I think.” Davis left it at that because there were no positives in an expanded answer. He was sure they’d crossed the border, and that was a problem. He hadn’t talked to an air traffic controller all morning. Not that he was concerned about air traffic — running into another airplane over the middle of the Sahara Desert was one chance in a billion. But he was very worried about an Egyptian fighter draped in missiles swooping up on his wing. Not by choice, Davis had reverted to bygone days. He was flying this old crate like pilots had flown her when she was fresh out of the factory. Maneuvering a slow airplane in a big sky, keeping out a sharp eye.

He tried to raise Schmitt again on the radio. Still nothing. Davis checked his fuel state and saw another worry. In thirty minutes, maybe forty, things would get very quiet. Antonelli had her eyes glued to the sky now, helping him look. She was clearly anxious, and Davis decided she could use a distraction. He handed over the microphone.

“Here,” he said, “keep calling. Electrons are free.”

“What do I do?”

“Just press the button and talk. The captain’s name is Schmitt. No wait — his call sign is Schmitthead.”

With a questioning look, Antonelli put the microphone to her lips.

Fadi Jibril heard the woman’s voice. He pressed his headset to his ears and listened more closely.

“I repeat, are you there?”

Jibril wanted desperately to say something, yet he had not designed the workstation with any capability to transmit. From his seat, he could monitor the frequencies but not talk. Jibril was trying to think of a way around this when a familiar hand grasped his shoulder. The gesture that had once comforted now felt like the hand of death.

“Is the drone in position?” Khoury asked.

Jibril pointed to the screen. “Yes, here. It is established in a holding pattern at the initial point, very near our own position but at a lower altitude. If you go forward and look out the window, slightly to the right, you should see it.”

Khoury didn’t move. “It is time to finish our work, Fadi. Achmed has received the final coordinates.”

For Jibril, these were the words that brought the truth crashing down. It was a lie, pure and absolute. He had been listening to the auxiliary frequency for the last two hours. There had been no instructions from any contact in Israel. The only thing Jibril had heard was the desperate voice of an unknown woman. He suddenly realized that Rafiq Khoury was not alone behind him. One of the guards was standing at his side.

“Yes, of course, sheik.”

Khoury placed a handwritten set of coordinates on the work table in front of Jibril. N29°58′50.95″ E31°09′0.10″.

“Now!” Khoury commanded.

Jibril’s hands went slowly to the keyboard. The coordinates were not in Israel — he knew this instantly — but without a map he could only estimate. Jibril tried to mentally plot the lat-long pairing using the map on his display. Somewhere north of their present position. Near Cairo perhaps? He thought about questioning the numbers, but Khoury would only grow suspicious.

The hand of death left his shoulder.

Jibril decided that identifying the target was not important. All that mattered was the evil around him. Deftly, he brushed a finger on the caps lock key and began typing the sequence. The coordinate field on the screen became populated with an indecipherable mash of symbols.

“What are you doing?” Khoury objected.

“I don’t know what is wrong, sheik. The—”

Two arms wrapped around Jibril’s chest, restraining him like a straightjacket. Khoury leaned in and entered the final coordinates, just as Jibril had taught him. The same scramble of symbols.

“What have you done?” Khoury hissed.

Fixed to his chair, Jibril watched as the imam figured out the problem. He released the caps lock key, and his second attempt succeeded. The message FINAL POSITION UPDATE CONFIRMED flashed for three seconds, followed by a lone word in surreal green letters at the center of the screen. AUTONOMOUS. In a matter of minutes, Blackstar would turn north on its final course, guided in the terminal phase by onboard systems that would hold to an accuracy of less than ten meters. Precise enough, Jibril supposed, for whatever Khoury had in mind. Worst of all, there was no way to change the command or abort. Blackstar was now irretrievable.

Jibril began to struggle against the arms that anchored him to his chair. Struggled until something blunt crashed into his head. Dazed, Jibril went limp and felt warmth oozing down one cheek.

Khoury leaned forward to be in his field of vision. “In the end you have failed me, Fadi. Fortunately, your American conscience is too late.”

“My … my what?”

Khoury started to speak again, but was interrupted by shouts from the cockpit. The words were indistinguishable to Jibril — his headset still covered one ear, and the other was ringing from the blow he’d taken. But his eyes were sharp enough. He saw Achmed coming aft again. He began jabbering to Khoury, gesticulating wildly. Only when he got closer did the words register for Jibril.

“Again he sends me here!” Achmed complained. “There is nothing wrong, I tell you. He is a madman!”

Khoury stared at the cockpit, suspicion in his mismatched gaze. He murmured into Achmed’s ear.

From the headset, Jibril heard the woman’s voice crackle across the airwaves again. It was maddening. If he spoke only once again in his life, it would be to warn whoever it was, hope that they could forestall the terror about to rain. But Jibril had no voice. The only way to transmit was to use the microphones in the cockpit.

Moments later, his headset buzzed as someone did exactly that.

Davis heard Schmitt growl over the radio, “Who the hell is this?”

He took the microphone from Antonelli. “Say position!”

After modest pause, Schmitt said, “We’re thirty south of Giza, near our IP.”

IP was the military abbreviation for “initial point,” the spot you used as a beginning reference for a final attack run. Davis checked his instruments and estimated that Schmitt was twenty miles ahead.

Schmitt again. “Jammer, I don’t have much time. Khoury and Achmed are getting suspicious. Can somebody tell me what the hell this is all about?”

“Yeah, I’ll tell you,” Davis said. “That drone you’re controlling is about to obliterate the Arab League conference in Giza.”

Another pause, this one much longer. Davis imagined Schmitt deciphering the ramifications of that. He wasn’t stupid — just self-centered. He’d been concentrating on a nice payday, and probably assuming that anything involving Rafiq Khoury and Fly by Night Aviation had to be minor league. Now he was thinking differently, understanding the damage about to be done.

“So what can we do?” Schmitt finally replied.

Davis had no answer. He’d come this far just to establish contact, but now what? If he were sitting in the cockpit next to Schmitt, they could put aside their miserable past and come up with a plan. Davis could swing a fist or a crash ax while Schmitt flew. From where he was, Davis was helpless.

“How much time is left?” he asked. “Do you have any idea when this strike is going to happen?”

Schmitt said, “I can see the drone now. It’s in a holding pattern a thousand feet below me.”

“Okay, so it hasn’t launched yet. If there’s enough time we could—”

“Ten o’clock!” Antonelli shouted from across the cockpit.

The way she blurted it out, Davis’ first instinct was to turn his head sixty degrees to the left — the ten o’clock position to any pilot — and look for an incoming missile. Then he put it in her layman’s terms, lowered the microphone, and looked at her. “Ten o’clock?” he repeated.

“That’s when it will happen.”

“How the hell could you know that?” Davis asked.

“It has been in the news for weeks. The Arab League conference begins at ten o’clock. All the heads of state will be gathered.”

Davis wasn’t wearing a watch, so he cross-checked the clock on the old airplane. Twenty-three minutes. He fumbled over the chart he’d been working with and estimated the position of Blackstar relative to Giza. Twenty minutes was just about right — if Blackstar left right now.

He keyed the microphone. “Schmitt, I think the drone is going to depart the IP any minute. We’ve got to do something now. What if you powered down all the electrical busses on your airplane? Could that interrupt the control? Maybe screw something up?”

“I could try, but it wouldn’t work for long. I’ve got two of Khoury’s goons over my right shoulder. They have guns and aren’t going to let — hang on, Jammer. I’m watching the drone right now, and it just took a turn to the north. Maybe if I — crap!”

Schmitt’s microphone went hot again, and Davis heard shouting. Schmitt was clearly struggling. More shouts in Arabic, loud and clear. Close to the microphone. Close to Bob Schmitt. He was under attack. The transmission cut off.

Davis tried to imagine what he would do in that situation. Outnumbered, outgunned. Only one idea came to mind.

“Defensive maneuvering! Push over, negative Gs! You’re strapped in but they’re not! Do it now!” Davis hoped Schmitt could still hear the radio. He repeated it all, then kept repeating it because that was all he could do. Davis saw a tiny dot ahead and thought it might be Schmitt’s DC-3, but soon he realized it was the other aircraft — the ominous arrowhead that was Blackstar. It was heading north, just like Schmitt had said, so the DC-3 had to be to its left. Davis scanned, and did see a second dot, perhaps ten miles ahead. He watched closely, and for the first few seconds the airplane was cruising straight and true.

Then it looked like a roller coaster in a typhoon.

Rafiq Khoury had been keeping an eye on the stunned engineer while his men — Achmed and the two guards — dealt with Schmitt. Khoury was a satisfied man. His work was done, and all that remained was to rendezvous at the abandoned airstrip with General Ali’s helicopter — or rather, President Ali’s helicopter. There, they would kill Jibril and the Americans, and as a final touch make this aircraft their funeral pyre. He wondered briefly if the general had captured the last American, Davis. Khoury decided it didn’t matter. They had succeeded in every way. Khoury was staring at Jibril’s computer screen, idly imagining the possibilities his new life would present, when he suddenly began to fly.

He rose effortlessly into the air, as if the world around him was tumbling. There was no up or down, only spinning references and objects soaring past like gravity had taken leave. He hit the ceiling hard, and his eyes shut reflexively. When he opened them again, Khoury saw madness. Bodies and crates and equipment, hanging suspended like so many flakes in a snow globe.

Then, all at once, gravity returned with a vengeance.

From the ceiling, Khoury crashed down like a brick to the metal floor. He heard snapping noises that could only be his bones shattering. He felt indescribable pain in his lower leg. Screams filled the air, cries of both desperation and agony. Khoury tried to move. He got one elbow to the deck and raised his head from the cold metal.

Then it all happened again.

Schmitt’s DC-3 was careening through the sky, oscillating and tumbling.

“What is happening?” asked a horrified Antonelli.

“Negative Gs, then positive. Schmitt is pushing and pulling from stop to stop on his control column. It’s a last ditch maneuver. He’s buckled into his seat, so he’ll stay put, but anybody who isn’t strapped down in that airplane is getting thrown around like beads in a maraca. I just hope that seventy-year-old airframe stays in one piece.”

They both watched Schmitt’s DC-3 swirl up and down through two more violent cycles, actually flipping inverted on the second. Then it seemed to settle, like a floating leaf that had cleared a section of rapids to end in a calm pool.

The two airplanes were only three miles apart now, nose to nose. Davis had to look out the right-hand window, past Antonelli, to still see Blackstar. The drone was getting smaller, a dot nearly lost in the dusty haze. Davis banked the airplane to change the relative geometry, and the closure to Schmitt’s airplane slowed. He picked up the microphone, and said, “Schmitt, are you there?”

There was no reply.