“Complete, Colonel. Ready for engine start.”
“Ten seconds,” Chiu said. He trained the muzzle of his SIG Sauer automatic on her. “You have ten seconds to tell us where the Black Star is.”
His words echoed in the emptiness of the empty shelter. For several seconds no one spoke. All eyes were on Mai-ling.
“It was here. They have moved it.”
“I have lost four soldiers to reach this shelter.” He shoved the muzzle of the semi-automatic pistol beneath the rim of her helmet and pressed it against her ear. “Enough lies. Where is it?”
“If they moved it…” she moved her lips in thought for a moment “… it would have to be in one of the other shelters — number two, probably. The one with the lift bays and the overhead fork arm.”
Chiu seemed to be weighing the decision whether to continue the search or kill her on the spot.
His finger tightened on the trigger.“Listen to her,” said Maxwell, trying to sound calm. “It makes sense to search the next shelter. We’ve come too far to turn back.”
Chiu whirled on him. “I give the orders, not you. You want to save the defector because you think you will have more sex with her. Don’t you know her job was to seduce you?”
“It’s not true,” blurted Mai-ling.
Bass stared at Maxwell, then at Mai-ling.
Chiu still held the SIG Sauer to her head. “We are in this position because of your false information, and now the entire PLA knows we are here. If the Black Star is not in the next shelter, we return to the helicopters and withdraw. And I will put a bullet in your brain. Is that understood, Madame Defector?”
Mai-ling responded with a barely perceptible shake of the head.
“Move!” He gave her a hard shove toward the door.
Maxwell watched with a mounting sense of alarm. Chiu was a ticking bomb. He meant it. He would kill Mai-ling. He’d probably kill her even if she did take them to the Black Star.
Shit. His job description didn’t include interfering with the mission commander. That much Chiu was right about. He did give the orders. He had his own reasons for distrusting Mai-ling, and maybe they were valid. Maybe she was a double agent, working both sides of the strait. Maybe she was leading them into a trap.
Bullshit.
Or was he blind to the truth? Not more than nine hours had passed since they had been together back on the darkened ramp at Chingchuankang. He no longer qualified as an objective judge.
What would he do if Chiu decided to terminate her? He didn’t know.
He pushed the matter out of his brain — for the moment. If she was leading them into a trap, it wouldn’t matter who killed whom. It would all be over.As Chiu and the team re-entered the semi-darkness outside the shelter, Bass pulled on Maxwell’s sleeve. “Is he making that stuff up? About you and Mai-ling? Have you two—”
“Come on,” said Maxwell, heading for the exit. “We’ve got other stuff to worry about.”
Bass stood motionless for another moment. Then he headed for the door.
The Number Two shelter was a hundred meters nearer the still-raging petroleum blaze. Maxwell could see vehicles, hoses, dark figures moving around the flaming tanks.
In the dancing light of the fuel fire, he could make out the rounded top and the slab sides of the shelter. The entry door was in the same position as in the first shelter.
In front of them lay another fifty yards of open tarmac. Again they were exposed, vulnerable to snipers and guards and roving PLA security troops. Maxwell wondered whether the sentries were equipped with night vision goggles. Probably, he decided. NVG was nothing new. A prize as technically sophisticated as the Black Star would be protected with the most sophisticated devices they had.
Ahead, the orange glow of the blaze flickered over the dark outline of the shelter. The Black Star had to be there. It had to be.
On signal from Chung, standing in view beneath the cockpit, Zhang initiated the start cycle for engine number one. When the whine of the turbine had settled at idle power, he started number two. Chung scurried beneath the belly of the jet, disconnecting the umbilicals for electrical and pneumatic power. When he reappeared in front of the cockpit, he gave the signals for control surface checks and flap extension. Zhang cycled the controls, then extended the flaps to take off setting.
This hangar, like the other two specially-constructed Dong-jin shelters, permitted the crew to start the engines inside the closed building, with the jet exhaust muffled and ducted to the outside. Not until the Dong-jin was fully ready for flight would he order the massive electro-hydraulic bi-fold door raised. By this means the Dong-jin received minimum exposure to prying eyes before leaping into the air.
The Dong-jin was ready.
“Activate cloaking.”
“Airframe cloaking coming on,” answered Yan.
Yan was a competent WSO, more reliable than the blundering Lo Shouyi, whom Zhang had ordered terminated. Lo’s removal had served as an excellent example to the rest of the Dong-jin unit. Fear was the most powerful of motivators.
Over the whine of the engines Zhang could no longer hear the outside chatter of machine guns. It didn’t matter. He would make an abrupt departure and put his trust in the Dong-jin’s cloaking technology. The second Dong-jin would trail him by a few minutes. By the time they returned from the mission, the raiders would be dead or captured.
He took a deep breath to steady his nerves. Then he gave the signal to open the door.
CHAPTER 18 — KILLING MACHINE
Muzzle flashes.
Chiu sensed bullets thudding into something close by. Then he heard the staccato rattle of another Chinese assault rifle. Ten meters away, a commando dropped to his knees and pitched forward.
“Down!” he barked over his shoulder, knowing it was too late. Rolling onto his side, he slipped the MP-5N off his shoulder.
Chiu cursed himself. More sentries. He should have anticipated that there would be more, probably equipped with their own NVG. Each shelter would have sentries posted in the same location. The PLA was predictable.
He peered into the shadows beneath the high slab side of the shelter, searching for the shooters. There were two, maybe more. He couldn’t spot them in his own NVG, but he sensed movement where he had seen the muzzle flashes.
He glanced over his shoulder again. The two Americans were on their bellies, eyes fixed on him. Watching, waiting to see what he would do. The woman seemed to have attached herself to Maxwell. Why? Was she using him to betray the operation? Or was she—
Another burst of fire. This time Chiu got a fix on the shooter. He was crouched behind a low wall. From this angle, neither Chiu nor his troops could get a clear shot at him.
Chiu lay in the darkness, trying to assess the matter. They were pinned down, out in the open. He’d lost another commando and his ground time was running out.
He scuttled over to Kee, six meters away. “Over there,” he ordered, pointing to the left. “Take two men with you, thirty meters away, draw their fire and give me cover.”
Kee gave him a quick nod and crawled into the darkness.
Chiu waited until they were in position. More muzzle flashes appeared from the low wall. When Kee’s SMGs opened up, returning the sentry’s fire, Chiu was on his feet. Sprinting toward the concealed sentry position, he kept an oblique angle to the low wall.