Dreamland

“I don’t know that we can make fifteen thousand,” answered Brea

“Are you okay, Bree?”

He felt his heart leaping out toward the front of the plane. He felt like he was a million miles from her, as if he were here and she were back at Dreamland.

“I’m intact,” she said. “How about you?”

“As intact as I get,” he managed. His hands were starting to shake; he gave control over to the computer, settling the Hawk into a shadow trail.

“Hey, Bree?”

“Yeah, Jeff?”

“I love you.”

“Me too, baby. Me too.”

Tripoli

24 October, 0955 local

AS THEY GOT OUT OF THE HELICOPTER, FLAMES erupted from the building behind them. Tripoli was apparently under attack; the Imam’s Allah had apparently stopped smiling at him.

One of the guards turned quickly, ducking with his weapon. The other pushed Mack down toward a set of cement steps that led to a long dock. Pleasure craft were arrayed in a marina to the left.

To the right, an ancient Piaggio flying boat strained a mooring at the end of the wooden gangplank. Mack took a step toward it, then threw himself down as a pair of F/A-18’s screamed less than a hundred feet overhead, en route to a target further inland.

The Imam pulled him to his feet. His voice remained resolute, but for the first time since Somalia he made it obvious that he had a pistol in his loose-fitting sleeve.

“Into the airplane,” said the Iranian.

“Who’s flying?” asked Mack.

“You,” the Iranian said, motioning toward the seaplane. The Piaggio’s cockpit sat in front of a high wing flanked by two overhead engines. “There has been a change of plans.”

“Why don’t we just stay with the helicopter?” Mack asked. He guessed that it didn’t have the range to go where they were going—they’d had to stop several times along the way to refuel.

“You ask too many questions, Major. Go.”

“I don’t know that I can fly it,” Knife told him.

The Imam lifted his arm, placing the gun next to Mack’s ear.

“I’ve never flown a seaplane before,” said Mack, half hoping to see a Marine—maybe even Gu

Mack was telling the truth, but as a pair of attack jets screamed overhead, he realized he couldn’t stall much longer.

The Imam’s guards were up by the road; they weren’t coming aboard the plane. Climb in, take off, then find some way to dump his captor.

“I’m telling you the truth,” said Mack, ducking as another jet screamed overhead. “I don’t know if I can fly this thing right.”

“I will pray that it all comes easily to you,” said the Iranian, gesturing with his pistol.

“Well in that case, let’s go for it,” said Knife, starting down the dock.

Libya

24 October, 1020

RAVEN WAS MANGLED, BUT FLYABLE. THE RIGHT stabilizer was missing a good stretch of skin. One of the leading-edge flaps on the right wing had locked itself into a two-degree pitch, but the Megafortress’s fly-by-wire controls were able to compensate for the problem so well that Brea

“Raven, this is Whiplash leader, understand you took some serious hits,” said Da

“Affirmative,” said Brea

“Glad to hear it,” replied Freah. “Your Flighthawk is secure. A Navy CH-46 is inbound to transport it. I left two teams of SEALS standing guard.”

“You trust ‘em?” joked Rap.

“Hey, I had to give them something important to do,” answered Da

“We’ll escort you,” Brea

“Figured as much,” said Freah.

The black bat-tail of Hawk One danced in the left part of her windshield, about a half mile off—the small size of the plane made it difficult to judge its distance without resorting to the screens.

“Hawk One, this is Raven. You copy Captain Freah’s transmission?”

“Hawk,” he said, acknowledging.

“Got your six,” she said.

Kind of fu

The rush of adrenaline that had pumped through everyone’s bloodstream was starting to give way. It was a dangerous time—they were still nearly a hundred miles deep over Libya. While there were no enemy SAM sites left operating this side of Tripoli, Brea

“Has Smith been recovered yet?” Freah asked from the Osprey.

“Mack? He’s not with you?” Brea

“Negative. The site has been searched. He was separated from the other prisoners back when they landed near Tripoli. We’ve been trying to get through to JSTARS directly on this. Can you?”

“Jeff—”

“Yeah, I heard,” her husband told her.

“Poor Mack. I have to relay this to Cascade.” One of the warning lights on the master caution panel came on. She asked the computer for specifics; it failed to respond. Unsure whether it couldn’t understand her or was malfunctioning, she tapped the keypad for the error code.

“We’re having some electrical problems,” Brea

“I’ll talk to Cascade,” Jeff volunteered. “Thanks, hon.”

JEFF WAITED FOR JENNIFER TO SET UP THE transmission, which had to be routed through a backup circuit because of the damage to Raven. It seemed to take forever.

“Go,” she told him.

“Cascade, this is Hawk Leader.”

“Hawk Leader?”

“With Raven.”

“Damn, your voice sounds familiar,” said Cascade. “So does yours.”

“Jeff?”

“Shit, Jed,” said Stockard, recognizing his cousin through the synthetic rendering. “What the hell are you doing out here?”

“Long story, cousin. What’s up?”

Jeff relayed the information about Smith.

“Well, two thirds is better than nothing,” said Jed.

“We’ll catch up at some point,” Jeff told him. “Things are getting busy here.”

“You guys okay?”

“We have damage, but we’re flying,” Zen told him. “Later.”

“Later.”

Jeff hunkered over his joystick, concentrating on the view projected by the forward video camera aboard the Flighthawk. There were a number of civilian airplanes in the air, including several rented news helicopters and airplanes from Europe, sent to investigate. Flights from the Nimitz and JFK were challenging each aircraft. At the same time, Navy helos were doing the same with boats.

Zen found the coastline, turning ahead of the Megafortress. An F-14 approached from the west; he waited for the pilot’s challenge. Instead, the two-place Navy fighter ducked off to the south.