Yes, the Frenchman is dead and Rhonda isn’t far behind. Her eyes are glassy and a pool of dark-red blood frames her pale face. Her right hand drops the gun and applies pressure to what looks like a bullet wound on her left shoulder. It’s one hell of a mess, a lot more serious than the one he cauterised earlier. She moves her head, focuses on him, smiles. It’s weak but it’s a smile. He returns it, pulls himself into the open viewport.
The rope round his waist is wrenched tight and he’s dragged out. ‘No!’ He flips the hooks down, catches the viewport’s edge.
The Loach drops back as the Galaxy accelerates and there’s nothing Corey can do about it. He tries to squeeze more power out of the little chopper but it’s not working. It’s time to cut Judd free. Corey pulls the knife from its pouch on the side of his seat and saws at the rope.
Thump-thump-thump-thump.
The familiar sound cuts across the soundscape. Corey glances in the side-view mirror. ‘Oh come on!’ In the distance the black chopper rises into view. He’s very disappointed. The lucky bucket didn’t work after all.
It hadn’t taken as long as Dirk feared. The windscreen had been knocked out of its frame by what appeared to be a bucket filled with rocks. Thankfully it didn’t hit a rotor or shatter the windscreen, the latter taking only a few minutes to jam back into place. Big Bird, who was dazed but otherwise okay, did the job with the soles of his shoes.
It was only a temporary fix but then they wouldn’t be in the air for long. They were to escort the Galaxy as far as the coast then abandon the Tiger and head for the rendezvous point in Berlin. That was the plan, anyway, but then this little yellow chopper turned up again and threw a spanner in the works.
If Dirk wasn’t looking at it he wouldn’t believe it. A rope runs from the Loach’s cabin to the front of the shuttle, where it’s tied around a man’s waist. It’s the astronaut. Judd Bell is somehow attached to the shuttle’s fuselage.
Dirk could finish him now, open up the Tiger’s cannons and blow him off there. He doesn’t. He’d risk sending live rounds into the flight deck where Henri is. His eyes move to the rope tied around the astronaut’s waist and he instantly knows what to do: take out that yellow chopper and he takes out the astronaut.
Corey furiously saws at the Dynamica rope. He won’t be able to take any evasive action until it’s severed. His eyes flick to the rear-vision mirror. The black chopper closes in, spits white fire.
Bullet rounds slam into the Loach’s fuselage. The turbine coughs, makes a God-awful sound Corey’s never heard before, then begins to wind down.
The chopper lurches to the right and the rope pulls at Judd. ‘Not good.’ Corey plays the controls but there’s no response. The Loach is dying.
How does he get out of this? The answer is in his hand. He twists his left arm around the last metre of rope, takes the knife with his right hand and saws at it. It severs and instantly unravels around his arm, zips through his fist and scorches his skin. Corey drops the knife, grabs what little remains of the rope around his right hand and wrenches his fists in opposite directions. The rope skids to a stop, 10 centimetres to spare —
The Loach tips right and Corey scrambles left, dives over the passenger seat towards the open doorway. He’s not sure what’s worse, not knowing if his life’s about to end or abandoning the chopper his father left to him in his will.
The rope around Judd’s waist goes light. He looks back, watches the Loach tumble away. Its cockpit misses the shuttle’s engine pod by centimetres then its tail boom swings around and slams into the Galaxy’s tail, shears it off at the base.
‘No!’ He is racked with grief. Corey only came along because Judd asked him to.
49
Horrified, Dirk watches the Loach and the Galaxy tail tumble towards the Tiger.
‘What did you do?’ Big Bird’s voice rattles in his headset as he tips the chopper into a steep, diving bank to avoid the wall of wreckage.
The rope around Judd’s waist twangs tight, cuts into his hip, almost wrenches his hands off the hooks. He looks over his left shoulder.
Corey!
He’s holding the end of the rope with both hands, slapping against the shuttle’s fuselage like a ribbon in a breeze. Judd’s so delighted he laughs out loud.
The Galaxy convulses. Kelvin wrestles the controls. He instinctively knows the Galaxy has lost its tail and rear stabiliser. It takes every ounce of his experience to stop the jet from nosing over and diving towards the ocean.
Nico panics. ‘What’s going on? Can we still make it to Virginia?’
Kelvin doesn’t look at him. ‘We’ll be lucky to make it back to land.’
The Galaxy’s turbofans spool up, then down, then up again, sounds like a braying animal. Judd realises the pilot is using thrust vectoring, increasing engine power on one wing, then the other, to keep the jet stable. It is the option of last resort and means Judd must get Atlantis free of the Galaxy now.
He pushes his head over the viewport as the shuttle lurches and tilts down. It’s good and bad. Good because Judd slides straight into the cabin, bad because Atlantis and the Galaxy now head towards the ocean.
Judd lands on his chest and a volt of pain shoots through his cauterised wound. He ignores it, finds his feet as the rope around his waist wrenches him back towards the viewport. He turns to Rhonda. ‘Can you get us off this thing?’
She can barely shake her head. Her white face is a stark contrast to the pool of dark blood she lies in. She’s dying. Judd knows it as clearly as he’s known anything in his life. He wants to go to her, help her, but the rope is so tight he can barely move. He turns, grabs it, braces a foot against the side of the cabin and pulls hard.
‘Whoah!’ Corey thumps along the fuselage towards the viewport. It’s 2 metres away. His hands are numb from holding the rope but he’s not letting go. He’s yanked forward again…
Corey slides through the viewport and Judd breaks his fall as he thumps to the floor. ‘You okay?’
The Australian finds his feet, nods. ‘The lucky bucket didn’t work. Tango in Berlin’s chopper’s back there.’
‘Right. Christ.’ Judd nods at the viewport. ‘Keep your eye on him.’ Corey nods, moves to it as Judd kneels beside Rhonda. He slides his arms under her back and legs, gently lifts her into the pilot’s chair, straps her in. Leaving his singlet on, he pulls off his shirt, wraps it around her wound, then places her right hand on top of it. ‘Keep pressure on it and stay awake.’ Rhonda nods faintly.
Judd slides into the commander’s chair, the rope still knotted around his waist. There’s no time to take it off. He scans the instrument panel. The flight deck has power and all systems appear to be operational. He glances at the altimeter. Four thousand, three hundred feet and dropping like a stone. Atlantis is pointed at the green-blue expanse of water below.
They’re just a minute from auguring in. His left hand grasps the rotational controller and his right hand reaches for a small toggle switch on the panel above. He knows what will happen when he triggers it but can’t see another way forward.
He flicks the switch.
The three explosive bolts on the underside of Atlantis fire and release the spacecraft.
Through the windscreen of the Galaxy, Kelvin watches the shuttle sweep away to the starboard side. The Galaxy instantly shudders and noses down at an even steeper angle. It needs a tail and a vertical stabiliser to fly. The only thing that kept it aloft this long was the shuttle’s wings and tail.