Eddie gasped in relief at having avoided the crash, only to realise he still had no idea what he was doing. ‘Okay, okay,’ he said, desperately trying to remember what Harvey had taught him. ‘Centre the stick, level out, keep the throttle at… at something, fuck knows what.’ The East River and Brooklyn beyond blurred across his view as the helicopter continued its sharp turn. ‘Stop spinning, that’d be a good start! Okay, level the rudder pedals, and— Fuuuuuuck!’
The Airlander’s swollen hulls loomed in front of him.
He jammed the chopper into a dive. Nausea rose in his stomach as it plunged, the rotors whisking just below the port lobe—
A sound like a concrete block being thrown into a wood-chipper — and he was flung hard against the door as the helicopter whirled like a top.
The LongRanger had hit one of the airship’s mooring cables.
Squeals of rending metal sounded behind Eddie as parts of the overstressed rotor assembly disintegrated. The steel-reinforced line had tangled and jammed the rotor head — and the engine’s torque was instantly transferred back to the fuselage. The dangling aircraft spun around, its forward momentum swinging it upwards behind the Airlander’s stern before gravity pulled it back down like a pendulum.
But the airship was also affected. Even with its huge lift capacity, it still had to be properly stabilised in flight, and the sudden addition to one side of almost a ton of corkscrewing metal threw it wildly off balance.
The savage lurch as the helicopter snagged the mooring line sent the airship’s occupants flying. Paxton was hurled over the instrument panel, his flailing foot kicking the throttles to full power, while Norvin crashed to the floor in the central aisle. Nina ended up on her side in the bodyguard’s seat, clutching the now-detached seat back.
Cross came off worst. The impact flung him against the thin Plexiglas window in front of the door, smashing it. He dropped the statue, which skittered under the seats. The cult leader lunged after it — only to reel as the swinging helicopter jerked the dirigible sideways.
He fell backwards through the open door, barely catching the sides of the frame with his fingertips. The Secretariat Building rolled past behind him as the craft overflew the United Nations complex. ‘Norvin!’ he screamed. ‘Help me!’
‘Prophet!’ Norvin yelled, scrambling to the door. ‘I’m coming, hold on!’ He gripped his leader’s arms and hauled him back inside.
Cross collapsed on the seats behind the door, eyes wide with shock — then his expression became one of alarm as he saw something behind his bodyguard. Norvin turned—
Nina smashed the seat back into the big man’s face. He stumbled over Cross’s sprawled legs — and fell through the open doorway, plummeting over seven hundred feet with a terrible scream.
Cross jumped up at Nina — only to crash back into the chair as her makeshift club swung again and hit with a bang. ‘Fasten your seat belt, asshole!’ she yelled, snatching up his rifle.
He froze as she pointed it at his chest. ‘Put it down, Dr Wilde.’
‘The hell I will,’ she replied, glancing over her shoulder to see Paxton pushing himself off the console. ‘Tell your man to land this thing, or I’ll shoot you.’
‘You’re not a murderer.’
‘No, but you are. And you’re a direct threat to the world’s security.’ The United Nations complex dropped out of sight beyond the open door as the airship continued into the city. ‘I’ll do whatever I have to in order to protect it.’
‘Protect it?’ he spat. ‘Corruption, decadence, blasphemy — evil and ungodliness everywhere? This is the world you want to protect?’
‘It’s the only one we have!’
‘It needs to be cleansed! Babylon must be destroyed to bring about God’s kingdom on earth! The prophecy will come true — I’ll make it come true!’
‘You’re not God’s prophet,’ Nina shouted back. ‘You’re a delusional lunatic!’
Hatred glinted in Cross’s eyes. ‘“The fearful, and unbelieving, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone…”’
‘Shutteth the hell up,’ she snapped. Paxton finally dropped into his seat; she looked back at him. ‘Hey, pilot guy! Take this thing down right now, or I’ll shoot your boss—’
Paxton gasped in fear, but not at her threat. Nina looked back — to see the black glass monolith of the Trump World Tower looming directly in the airship’s path. ‘Shit!’ she gasped, grabbing the nearest seat.
The pilot yanked back the joystick. The Airlander pitched upwards, the forward engine nacelles pivoting to speed its ascent. It swept over the corner of the seventy-two-storey tower’s roof, narrowly clearing it — but still demolishing a couple of communications masts as it climbed. Nina gripped the chair more tightly, holding her breath as the building’s edge passed barely a foot beneath the gondola… then they were clear.
Paxton reduced power and put the airship into a hard turn back towards the river. ‘Hey!’ she yelled at him. ‘I told you to set us down! If you don’t, I’m gonna—’
She was thrown to the floor as the vessel slammed to an abrupt stop.
39
The crippled LongRanger’s engine cut out: whether through some safety mechanism or simply because it had been destroyed, Eddie neither knew nor cared. But the helicopter’s insane whirl was slowing, the blur through the windows resolving itself into the skyscrapers of New York.
A tall black one whipped past, and again, and again, closer each time—
‘Shit!’ he yelped, seeing the helicopter’s reflection in the dark glass growing ever larger. He grabbed Harvey — as the aircraft smashed into a penthouse apartment like a wrecking ball.
Its tail was ripped off and fell away, but the main fuselage ploughed through the condo’s windows, scattering ultra-expensive furniture as it bowled across the living room. The mooring line snapped taut as the airship pulled away from the tower, dragging it backwards — but the remains of the rotors wedged against a freshly exposed steel girder above the demolished windows. The cable strained, but held, the makeshift anchor yanking the Airlander to a sudden halt.
Eddie opened his eyes… to find himself looking straight down at a sheer drop through the broken windscreen. Only his seat belt kept him from plunging to the sidewalk over eight hundred feet below.
And his position was far from secure. The mooring line rasped against the girder as the airship tried to pull free, rocking the cockpit. ‘Oh, arse,’ he gasped, securing one foot against the column supporting the instrument console. ‘Harvey, are you okay? Harvey!’
The pilot stirred weakly. ‘Oh man, what… what happened?’
‘My third flying lesson didn’t go too well. Harvey, we’ve got to move — this thing’s going to fall any second.’
‘Fall? Whaddya— Whoa, shit!’ Harvey cried as he opened his eyes. ‘Jesus Christ!’
‘Yeah, you’ll meet him in a minute if you don’t get out! Go!’ Eddie unbuckled his seat belt, balancing precariously on the support column as the other man frantically released his own restraints and barged the door open. Harvey piled out — and the helicopter lurched with the shift of weight.
The Englishman scrambled across the cockpit, batting aside dangling headset cords and diving after the American—