“Push the yoke forward,” Joe shouted. “Hurry.”
Kurt slammed his hand into the control column, shoving it hard. Instinctively, he turned the wheel back to the center. The aircraft nosed over, preventing a stall, and then picked up speed, rapidly transitioning from a climb to a dive.
Kurt was suddenly weightless, thrown upward, along with everything else that wasn’t tied down. He slammed into the top of the cockpit and saw the horizon give way to the sea through the windshield.
He grasped the control stick with both hands and pulled firmlyback. The g-forces mounted quickly, and Kurt pulled back too hard. The aircraft dipped to within fifty feet of the waves before pitching up and climbing sharply once again.
Joe rushed in, grabbing the controls and stabilizing the roller-coaster motion caused by Kurt’s heavy hand. After a few small up-and-down oscillations he had the jet flying smoothly again.
“Okay, we’re straight and level.”
“Tell me you know how to fly this plane?” Kurt asked.
“Fly it, yes,” Joe said. “Land it…not so sure.”
Kurt figured they’d cross that bridge if they were lucky enough to get to it. He looked over the instrument panel. “We’ve gone off course. We were heading oh-four-nine. Get us back to our old heading in case anyone’s watching.”
Joe dropped into the copilot’s seat and soon had the plane pointed back in the direction it had been going. With that done, he reactivated the autopilot.
“Assuming the flight plan is still programmed into the computer, this should take us to the rendezvous point. What’s your plan once we get there?”
“First we call the Pentagon and warn them,” Kurt said, searching the radio stack for a transmitter that would be compatible with NUMA’s worldwide network, but wouldn’t blow their cover. The only system he found that wouldn’t give them away was a data link, the equivalent of an aeronautical text message. He hoped his typing skills were up to par.
“And after that?”
“We knock Ahab and Saber One out of the sky—even if we have to ram them.”
Chapter 63
Five o’clock in the morning, north of Taiwan, was four p.m. in Washington, D.C. Things were winding down in the city. Half of Congress had already left for the weekend, while staff members of every agency were getting ready to wrap things up.
At the White House it was a different story, a strange message relayed through the National Underwater and Marine Agency had created a sense of confusion. The President was now in the Situation Room along with Vice President Sandecker, the chief of staff, and a dozen members of the military.
They sat dumbfounded, listening in shock as Rudi Gunn, NUMA’s second-in-command, read the message aloud over a video link.
“Ahab in possession of the EAGL laser system,” Rudi announced. He sounded like a man reading a telegram in a previous century. “Weapon is mounted on an old KC-135 painted in USAF colors and using authentic Air Force transponder codes. His intent is to cause a war between the U.S. and China by attacking them with this aircraft and passing blame to us. First target is actual KC-135 out of Japan now stationed for refueling. We will be in position to stop him shortly, but we cannot do anything about the initial attack. Advise crew to abandon the plane immediately.”
“This is astonishing,” the chief of staff said.
“I know,” Gunn said. “Austin and Zavala—”
“Are out of control,” the chief said, cutting him off. “What kind of nonsense are they trying to pass off here?”
“This message is deadly serious,” Rudi insisted. “They’re obviously embedded in Ahab’s operation somehow, but are unable to act until after this first attack. We need to give them the benefit of the doubt.”
The President was incredulous. “You want the Air Force to have one of their crews abandon a fifty-million-dollar airplane mid-flight because of a text message? How do we even know this is authentic?”
“The message was sent using a code that only Kurt knows. It identifies him as the sender.”
“Unless someone has captured him and is forcing him to transmit this false message,” a member of the National Security Council suggested.
“There are red-word protocols in place for that,” Rudi explained. “If Kurt was under duress he would have worked those words into the message.”
The President turned to the ranking member of the Air Force, a three-star who was assigned to the general staff in D.C. only this week. “Is there a tanker flying the route this message suggests?”
“Condor One Five,” the general said. “Part of the training exercise. My information shows it on station now.”
The President ran his hands through his hair. The strands that weren’t ash gray were tuning white. He admired Austin and Zavala. Hell, he admired the entire NUMA crew, but this…
