Thorpe keyed the radio. "Any station this net, this is Army Helicopter Seven-Eight-Six. Any station this net, this is Army Helicopter Seven-Eight-Six."
There was no response, just a steady dribble of static when Thorpe released the send key. "The radio seems to be working," Thorpe noted. He tried one more time, then put the radio back into Maysun's vest. He looked about, getting his bearings. The forest was thick, just short of being a swamp. Undergrowth cut visibility down to less than forty feet in any direction.
"You need medical attention."
"I'm not worried about my leg," Maysun said. "Kelly's dead. And we probably caught enough rads from that explosion to kill us in twenty-four hours."
Thorpe leaned down. "Take it easy, all right. Don't scare my son any more than he already is.
Maysun shook his head. "There'll be more missiles coming down any minute. You can be sure the Russians have targeted Barksdale for more than one strike."
"How do you know it's the Russians?"
"Well, somebody dropped a nuke on Barksdale. I'll pick the Russians, you pick someone else if you like. Does it really matter?"
Thorpe looked at the wreckage of the helicopter and the mushroom cloud still clearing on the horizon, then over at Tommy. He leaned close to Maysun again and spoke in a low voice into his ear. "Listen, I know your friend is dead. I know you're hurt. But my son is here and he's scared. You've got to get your act together or you're going to scare him even more."
Maysun turned his head toward Thorpe and blinked, trying to see. The pilot took a few deep breaths and then nodded. "All right, Captain. I'll be cool. I'm sorry."
In the wood line surrounding the surface entrance to the Omega Missile LCC, Kilten, McKenzie, and the other men were waiting in the trees, looking at the small building. McKenzie held a large 50-caliber sniper rifle in his hands, the end of the barrel resting on a bipod he had set up. He looked through the high-power scope and slowly squeezed the trigger. The half-inch-diameter bullet smashed into a small satellite dish on top of the building, destroying it.
Thorpe cocked his head as the sound of a shot echoed through the woods.
"What was that?" Maysun asked.
"Someone's firing," Thorpe said. His hand had unconsciously slid down and cradled the handle of his pistol.
"It would be easier if you let me shoot out the video cameras, too," McKenzie said. "The thermal might pick us up even here."
"We've got our own satellite dish," Kilten patiently replied, "but we'll need the cameras once we get in. Plus the crew needs to feel the surface is secure. The cameras only pan the open area, not into the tree line."
Two of McKenzie's men were slowly making their way across the field, crawling in the knee-high grass. They wore ghillie suits, strips of muslin woven into a camouflage netting, that for all practical purposes made them invisible if one didn't know exactly where to look. To counteract the thermal capabilities of the cameras, the suits were laced with special cooling lines that made the surface thermal image of the men the same as the surrounding grass. It was top of the line and expensive gear but McKenzie had the money to get the best.
"You sure the crew will come up?" Bognar asked. "If they don't open that vault door, there's no way we're ever going to get in there."
McKenzie looked at the younger man. Bognar and all the others besides Kilten and Drake were former Canadian paratroopers. After allegations of severe misconduct by the paratrooper unit, including the killing of civilians under interrogation on peacekeeping missions, the Canadian government had finally reacted the previous year and disbanded the Canadian Airborne Regiment. While the act had removed a severe blight on the international reputation of Canada's armed forces, it had left several hundred extremely dissatisfied, unemployed soldiers wandering the northern country. Out of several hundred, it wasn't hard to find two dozen who were willing to break the law for a high payoff.
McKenzie had worked with the Canadian Parachute Regiment on some joint operations when he was in SEAL Team Two. He'd brought in the selected men three weeks ago and they'd been prepping for this mission ever since, hiding from both their own government and the authorities in the U.S. at a remote site in the New Mexico desert. For security reasons, none of the Canadians had been told the purpose of their training or the target until this morning.
This morning was the culmination of weeks of planning. After their meeting at the VA hospital, McKenzie and Kilten had combined their knowledge. Kilten had watched the digital disk of the beach transfer in Lebanon and given McKenzie the identity of Loki and the man he worked for: National Security Adviser Hill.
"I wrote their rules," Kilten said in answer to Bognar's question. "They'll come up. They've lost all communication with their chain of command. They've launched their primary mission, Omega Missile, according to the orders I sent them. They weren't ordered to launch the ICBMs this facility controls but they won't think that's strange since Omega Missile can still launch those in addition to every other nuclear weapon in the U.S. arsenal.
"More importantly, I've taken their main computer off line. That's because I have REACT right here with me now." Kilten tapped his laptop computer.
"REACT?" Bognar asked. Bognar was not very bright but followed orders well, which was all McKenzie expected.
Kilten was still explaining things to Bognar, which McKenzie thought was a complete waste of oxygen. "REACT is the acronym for the name I gave the control computer. I invented and programmed it."
"Why can't you get REACT to open the vault door?" Bognar asked.
McKenzie wanted to smash his artificial arm over the man's head. Didn't the idiot realize they would have thought of that in their planning and done it if it were possible?
"The vault door is on a separate, manual system," Kilten patiently explained. "The security people who designed the facility are experts. You never put everything into one system. The vault door works on a code and a retinal scan. It will also open if you have a special override code. It can't be opened through REACT."
Kilten looked at the surface building. "They'll be up soon. Their priority now is to reestablish contact with their chain of command. If they can't do it from the control facility, and I have made that impossible, they have to do it physically."
"And they'll turn off the motion-controlled guns?" McKenzie added.
"Yes, they'll turn them off," Kilten confirmed.
The second stage burned out and explosive bolts fired, causing the large metal casing to fall away. The Peacekeeper was now almost out of the atmosphere as the third stage fired cleanly.
Lewis had been trying the computer while Parker held the satellite phone in her hand. "Satellite is out," she told Lewis. She looked at her telemetry board and blinked in surprise. "I'm not reading anything! Do you have third-stage ignition?"
"I've got nothing," Lewis said. "Our link to Omega Missile is down."
"How about REACT?"
"REACT is off-line."
"Shit!" Parker exclaimed. "We're down and no one knows. We have to get in touch with higher headquarters and let them know we're off-line on Omega Missile!"
Lewis looked up at the security cameras. "Hell, what makes you think there's a higher headquarters left?"
Parker was looking at the same screens. "Everything looks all right up top. Sensors aren't picking up any radiation." She paused. "That's strange."
Parker walked to the back room and opened a wall locker. She pulled a holster and pistol out and strapped them on. Then she put on an Air Force survival vest. Lewis did the same.