Black Wolf

“Protect me,” he told MY-PID as soon as he managed to get on his feet.

“Command accepted. Perimeter established,” said the computer, directing the two robot helicopters to orbit above him.

“Co

His arms felt as if they had been pulled from their sockets. His neck bulged, all the muscles spasming. It was as if everything between his skin and his bones had been turned into sharp rocks.

“Nuri, what’s going on?” asked Boston, coming on the line.

“I shot the captain. He was trying to kill me. I need backup.”

“I have Sugar on her way with help. I see your location. Can you stay there?”

“I’ll try. I have the helicopters above me.”

“I’m tapping into the feed… It looks like you’re clear. I don’t see any of the Moldovans heading in your direction.”

Not yet, thought Nuri. He wiped his face with his sleeve, trying to clear some of the grit that was caked around his eyes, then dropped down to look at the box. It was locked, but keyed with a pattern so simple he could have opened it with a paper clip.

Unfortunately he didn’t have a paper clip, and he’d lost the small lock picking tools he kept in his belt. He scrambled around looking for something to use, but the field was used for growing wheat, not thin shards of metal. Grabbing the box, he started walking in the direction of the road. As he reached it he saw a house about a half mile down the road.

He was about to head toward it to see if he could borrow something to open the box when he saw an oversized SUV truck heading in his direction. He almost ordered the Rattlesnakes to fire before realizing it must be Sugar.

He ran to the driver’s side as the car stopped. Sugar and two other Whiplash troopers jumped out, guns drawn, forming a defensive perimeter.

“I need a paper clip,” said Nuri.

Sugar looked at him as if he was insane.

“I gotta open this box,” said Nuri. “I just need a little piece of metal.”

“Will a bobby pin do?” she asked.

“Yeah, if you got one.”

Undoing the lock took only a few seconds. Starting to raise the lid, he realized belatedly that it might be booby-trapped, and ducked back.

Nothing happened.

“What’s it say?” asked Sugar, peering over his shoulder.

The box contained five small notebooks. Nuri took the first one out, examining it. The pages were filled with Russian script.

“I can’t really read Russian,” he told her, taking out his MY-PID controller. “I’ll have to get the computer to read it for us.”

“We better do it in the truck,” she said, holding her head to the ear set. “A couple of the people you pissed off up at the farm are headed in our direction.”

79

Czech Republic

The Black Wolf needed more of the drug. It was a thirst, a ravenous hunger, a power he couldn’t resist. But he had none, and there was nothing he could do to fill the desire, to stop it, to calm his pounding heart.

He looked across the interior of the helicopter, staring at the man they’d brought as a hostage. Zen. He was lying prostrate on the deck of the chopper, a pathetic cipher.

Someone from his past.

It was a trick. He had no past.

But he did. And it involved a helicopter. There had been a flight. Something like this.

No. Not like this. Nothing was like this.

80

Czech Republic

Cleared of the traffic around the airport, Turk found he had open skies for miles and miles in front of him.

Not a good thing. He wanted to see a helicopter.

He tried reaching a Czech controller but couldn’t get anything on the frequency that he could understand. He tried switching the Tigershark’s communications section into its satellite com module so he could talk to Brea

What would the original Dreamland team have done in this situation fifteen years ago? They didn’t have instant com co

They’d find the damn helicopter, first off.

Turk figured the helo had somewhere in the area of a twenty to thirty-minute lead over him. Traveling at 200 knots, tops, it could have gone one hundred miles from the Old State Castle.

“I need a standard search pattern, 150-mile radius of Kbely Airfield,” he told the flight computer. “I’m searching for a helicopter.”

The flight computer flashed a pattern on the screen, a series of crisscrossing arcs that would have him fly in a circle around the airport. It was a logical pattern, and to fly it he would have to turn immediately south and cut his speed.

But Turk resisted. It was too logical.

If he was the helo pilot, what would he do?

Fly like a bat out of hell.

Until he knew he was being followed. Then he’d stop somewhere, wait for the aircraft to go away, and start up again.

Which would help him, since once it set down, he could disable it safely and wait for the ground forces to surround it.

But the helicopter pilot didn’t know he was being followed. The Tigershark would be invisible to his radar until well after Turk saw the helo.

Turk could fix that. He tilted his wings, edging toward the outer radius of the search area the computer had outlined on the screen. Then he hit his flares.

81

Czech Republic

Zen dragged himself to the bench seat at the side of the helicopter, then pulled himself upright.

It was definitely Stoner; he had no doubt. But in some sense it wasn’t Stoner—there was a curtain up behind his eyes, beyond the blank expression.

The others called him “Black” and “Black Wolf.” That was his identity now.

“You have a prosthetic leg,” said Zen, studying the way Stoner held himself against the bulkhead. “Both of them?”

Stoner stared at him.

“Did you lose them in the crash?” asked Zen. “We looked for you. We figured out later that you must have ordered the helicopter pilot to make your aircraft the target so the others could escape. It was you, wasn’t it?”

“It… made sense,” said Stoner.

Everything came back.

Mark Stoner, CIA officer.