Nerve Center

A piece-of-shit F-7 wouldn’t have jumped from 250 knots to Mach 1.2 in less time than it took for the lead Eagle pilot to curse.

Stinking Madrone. He flew straight out of Zen’s book, no damn creativity at all. Though burdened by something that was increasing its radar signal for the F-15’s, the U/MF blew past the Eagles, made a feint for the F-5’s, which threw them in a tizzy, then ducked into the ground fuzz where no one could see him.

Mack waited for the U/MF to rise up behind the F-15’s. When it didn’t, he took a guess why—the larger return was being generated by a missile or bomb.

He had his passive sensors goosed to the max, but couldn’t find the little bastard. He tucked Sharkishki lower, nudging back in the direction of Dreamland.

Guy comes this far, in this direction, has to be thinking of nailing Dreamland.

That or Vegas. Maybe they’d cleaned Monkey Boy out at the blackjack tables and he wanted revenge.

Mack might take a piece of that himself. He zipped over Interstate 15 at five hundred miles an hour. Trucks and cars veered every which way, the drivers obviously freaking.

Wimps. He had plenty of clearance, at least a good eighteen inches. Maybe even twenty.

Aboard Galatica

8 March, 0853

BREANNA PUSHED AT THE STICK, THE PLANE SWIMMING sideways in the air.

Why weren’t they dead? Had Minerva been bluffing? What could be so magical about ten thousand feet if there wasn’t a bomb in the plane.

Maybe hitting that altitude simply armed it.

Shit.

There was no time to curse herself. She’d lost an engine, maybe part of a control surface. She didn’t trust the flight computer and had no copilot. Brea

Assuming she didn’t blow up. And assuming Minerva didn’t take out her knife and slit her throat.

Aboard Gal

8 March, 0855

JEFF LAY ON HIS BACK, HIS HEAD FLOATING SOMEWHERE in a black ball of fur that filled the Megafortress’s lower deck. He heard Madrone grunting above him, working the Flight-hawk toward its target. He tried to push up, but pain shot through him. His chest and upper spine felt as if they had caught fire. He flopped back, overcome by the fear that not just his legs but every inch of him was paralyzed.

No, he told himself, I’m not giving up. Fight! Fight!

But no part of him moved.

THE TARGETING SCREEN TOOK OVER MADRONE’S MIND. Numbers drained off the right side, slipping into the hole where the rest of his life had already washed away.

He had to hit the second air shaft on the target, and he had to hit it just right. But that was the beauty of the Brazilian missile. It could be steered very precisely.

The bomb would only destroy the top portion of the lab. A second reinforced layer protected the computer itself. But they’d never get around the radiation. They’d wait a hundred years, maybe more.

The numbers drained away. The Flighthawk’s pipper began to pulse, and the targeting bar went to yellow, ready.

He was now thirty seconds from his target. Time to unsafe the bomb, allowing the trigger to be activated as soon as the missile’s engine ignited.

As he started to give the command, something told him to watch his back.

ZEN’S RIGHT BOOT LAY AGAINST THE CORD THAT co

His leg stayed motionless.

Of course. Useless damn legs. Useless damn body. He’d taken his best shot and now he was truly impotent.

“No!” he screamed, smashing his arm against the base of the control seat so violently his whole body jerked away.

The cord caught on the tip of the lower flap hook on his pants. But it had been tied to the panel—putting pressure on it had no effect on the plug. Jeff cursed and tried to sit up, pushing away the pain, telling his body he’d ignored much worse. He had gotten his elbow below him and begun to lever around when Gal lurched hard to the right and downward. Jeff’s efforts were vastly multiplied by the plane’s sudden momentum; his body flew backward, tugging the wire and sending the ANTARES helmet flying across the cabin.

Aboard Sharkishki

8 March, 0855

MACK PUNCHED HIS THROTTLE AND JERKED THE STICK back, riding the massive thrust of the MiG’s tweaked turbofans upward as he saw the Flighthawk cross above him.

Little bastard was fast and still off his screen. Mack had the Scorpion thumbed up, locked.

Go, baby, go.

The missile clunked off its rail. He lost a second in locking and firing the other missile.

They were going to miss.

Son of a bitch. Chaff. Zigging and breaking down.

That damn Madrone. Zen had taught him well.

Sidewinders up.

Too far.

Mack jammed the throttles all the way to max afterburner. As the MiG shot ahead on its fiery ride, the Sidewinder growled. He launched right away.

Aboard Gal

8 March, 0658

MADRONE’S MIND FLEW INTO A THOUSAND PIECES.

He tried to give the command anyway, tell the Flighthawk to launch.

Minerva. The dark woman of death.

Kevin opened his mouth, but the only word that came to his lips was “Christina.”

As he said it a second time, he realized the co

Aboard M-6

8 March, 0900

“FLIGHTHAWK IS DOWN! FLIGHTHAWK IS DOWN!” SAID McAden. “Who got him? Shit! MiG bearing—it’s got to be Smith!”

“The bomb,” said Dog. “Was it on the U/MF or not?”

His eyes were pasted on the windscreen. Las Vegas sat peacefully in the distance.

“I’m tracking fragments,” said the copilot. “Big hunk of something.”

Dog waited. If the Flighthawk had had the weapon aboard, it might still detonate when it hit the ground.

If it didn’t have it aboard, he had to take out Galatica.

He might still have to.

The city’s neons seemed to flicker.

Crazy imagination.

No, a reflection from Galatica, passing ahead.

“Lost it. Bomb would have gone off by now,” said McAden. “Galatica, two miles dead ahead. Low, erratic.”

“See if they’ll answer a hail.”

Aboard Gal

8 March, 0906

LANZAS SEEMED DAZED NEXT TO HER. BREANNA decided it was time to get her weapon. She slipped the restraints, then jerked the stick forward, sending the plane nose down.

Pushing away her com headset, Rap dove for Minerva, wrestling for the big knife Minerva had tucked in the other side of her belt. But the Brazilian she-wolf didn’t try to fight her off. Brea

“It’s no use,” said the Brazilian. “You can kill me if you want. The bomb will get us when we land.”

“Kevin’s bomb?”

“That’s on the Flighthawk.”

“We’re booby-trapped,” said Brea

Lanzas said nothing more.

“Jeff, are you down there? Jeff, are you all right?”

He didn’t answer. She tried the interphone circuit again, but got nothing.

“Kevin?” she said tentatively.

Madrone didn’t answer.

The Megafortress accepted her commands without interference. Something had happened below—it might well be that both Jeff and Kevin were dead.

Brea