The Reply

CHAPTER 32

Twenty miles to the east, lying on the floor of the cargo bay of the first Black Hawk, Professor Nabinger had his eyes closed. His mind was absorbed with the images he’d received from the guardian inside Qian-Ling. There was much he didn’t understand, but one thing was clear to him: He had to stop Aspasia!

Then he remembered something else. The central tunnel in the tomb that was guarded by the holograph and the ray! He knew where it led and what was down there. And he knew how to get in there! No matter what happened, Nabinger knew he would have to come back to Qian-Ling.

He pulled out his leather-bound notebook and began writing furiously.

At Osan Air Force Base in South Korea, Zandra and Duncan were listening to the radio traffic from the AWACS when there was a beeping noise from Zandra’s laptop.

She quickly turned in her seat and entered a code. She read the message on the screen, then rapidly typed out commands.

“What’s wrong?” Duncan asked.

“Foo fighters,” was Zandra’s succinct answer. “Two of them are heading for China.”

In the Cube at Area 51 Kelly Reynolds knew nothing of the drama being played out over the skies of China, but she could follow the progress of the foo fighters. They were almost at the end of the Pacific and nearing the coast of China.

“What’s going on?” she asked Quinn, who had been hooked in to the military’s secure MILSTAR communications net.

“They’re pissed in the Pentagon. They lost a lot of men on that sub.”

“But they interfered…” Kelly began, stopping as she saw the look on Quinn’s face. She suddenly realized that perhaps not everyone was as anxious to have Aspasia land as she was. And that those who had died on the submarine were more than just numbers to a lot of people.

“They think the foo fighters are going to intercept the choppers,” Quinn added.

“Why would they do that?”

“That’s a good question, isn’t it?”

“Splash four,” the pilot of one of the F-117’s laconically reported over the radio to the AWACS, as if it were an everyday event. The F-117’s had launched four air-to-air missiles from over forty miles away. The Chinese pilots had never even known they were targeted when their planes exploded.

“Roger that.” Colonel Zycki dropped down into his padded command chair and relaxed for the first time in hours.

It only lasted a few seconds.

“Sir, we’ve got two foo fighters three minutes out from the lead Black Hawk.” “Are the F-117’s out in front?”

“Yes, sir. One minute to intercept,” the radar operator informed Zycki.

Zycki had received word over the secure scrambler about the fate of the Pasadena. “Tell them to fire as soon as the foo fighters are in range.”

“Great,” the pilot of the lead F-117 muttered as he received that order. He had the two foo fighters on his small radar screen, closing fast. He hit the fire button immediately, launching two air-to-air missiles at the incoming objects. His wingman did the same.

Nabinger’s Black Hawk was ten miles behind them, flying low to the ground. Colonel Zycki could see the four missiles racing toward the foo fighters. They had closed half the gap when the missiles simply disappeared.

“Oh, shit,” Zycki whispered.

Then as the two foo fighters closed on their position the dots representing the four F-117 Stealth fighters blipped out. That left just the foo fighters and the two Black Hawks. The foo fighters closed on the lead one.

“Twenty seconds until intercept!”

“We’ve got foo fighters inbound!” the pilot yelled, startling Nabinger out of his reverie about what was secreted in the lowest level of the imperial tomb of Qian-Ling. “Our escort is down!”

The chopper shook as the pilots began evasive maneuvers. Nabinger reached forward and grabbed one of them on the shoulder. “I need a radio link!”

The pilot threw him a headset. Nabinger put it on and keyed the mike. “Hello! Hello! Is anyone listening?”

Duncan still had the mike in her hand, listening to events forwarded from the AWACS. She recognized the voice on the radio.

“Professor, this is Dr. Duncan!”

Nabinger’s hand was wrapped tight around the small boom mike. He could now see the two foo fighters looping in, small glowing golden orbs in the sky.

He pushed the transmit button. “In the tomb — Qian-Ling — in the very bottom chamber — there’s—” He paused as a rushing noise filled the headset, rising to an ear-piercing screech, forcing him to rip the headset off, trying to stop the agonizing pain that tore through his brain.

The Black Hawk’s engines abruptly stopped functioning along with every other piece of machinery on board the craft. The helicopter nosed over and dropped like a rock.

The last thing Nabinger saw before impact were the two foo fighters hanging overhead, like two small moons illuminating his death.

“Professor!” Duncan yelled into the microphone.

“It’s down,” Colonel Zycki announced over the radio.

In the back of the trail chopper Turcotte had listened to the death of the lead helicopter and Professor Nabinger in stunned silence. He’d had a run-in with foo fighters before and knew they could easily incapacitate a helicopter. There was also no way to outrun the small glowing orbs.

“Cut all your power!” he yelled into the intercom. “Set us down!” O’Callaghan twisted his head to look at Turcotte in disbelief. “What?” “Kill the engine and autorotate,” Turcotte yelled, “or we’re all going to die!”

“Shut down!” O’Callaghan ordered Spence.

O’Callaghan reached up and hit the emergency shutdown, a move that was never supposed to be done while the helicopter was in the air. At the same time Spence disengaged the transmission, freeing the blades to rotate on their own, slowing the chopper’s descent. He then began running his hands down the rows of controls, flipping off every system that had been on.

O’Callaghan glanced down. He spotted a small clearing among the trees. He pushed hard on the cyclic, trying to get the chopper to it.

Two foo fighters appeared, racing past the helicopter and disappearing to the rear.

“Brace for crash!” O’Callaghan yelled as he realized they weren’t quite going to make the open area. The Black Hawk hit the trees and rolled to the left.

The aircraft tore through the thick tree cover and came to a halt on the ground. The combination of the original forward speed and the sudden drop in altitude produced a collision that crumpled the left front of the helicopter.

Shattered glass, twisted metal, and pieces of trees filled the front of the aircraft.

On impact all the occupants of the cargo bay had been thrown forward in a pile. Turcotte shook his head, trying to clear it. He could smell jet fuel leaking. As soon as that fuel touched part of the hot engine, Turcotte knew the helicopter would become an inferno.

Someone got the side door open. He could see Harker silhouetted against the door for a moment, then tumble out. Turcotte turned to the front to help O’Callaghan, who was trying to tear through the wreckage and free his copilot. Turcotte could see the blood seeping from under the man’s helmet. Turcotte reached forward and felt the copilot’s neck.

Turcotte let go and grabbed O’Callaghan, who was fumbling with the copilot’s shoulder harness. “He’s dead!”

O’Callaghan shook his hand off and continued to work to free the body.

“Leave him!” Turcotte yelled. “The chopper’s gonna blow!”

Turcotte simply grabbed the pilot and pulled him between the seats into the cargo bay. Then he shoved O’Callaghan toward the open cargo door.

Fuel reached the hot engine exhausts and burst into flames. Instantly, the helicopter became an inferno. Turcotte staggered away from the flames, pushing O’Callaghan ahead of him.

They were thirty meters away when the helicopter exploded. The impact threw them all to the ground.

“Second Black Hawk is down.” Colonel Zycki’s voice was flat. “All aircraft are down.”

Duncan pushed back from the control console and stared at Zandra. “There! Are you satisfied now? We have nothing!” She pointed at her watch. “Twenty-eight hours until the Airlia arrives and all we’ve managed to do is kill some damn good people.”