Nexus (49 page)

  Fuck.

  Someone was shooting at them. The chopper shook, banked hard to one side. Sam was thrown face first into the bulkhead. Her head collided with the hard wall. The SEAL fell atop her, got his arm around her neck in a headlock, squeezed to immobilize her.

  Shit.

  She reached back to crush his balls, hit his body armor instead, tried to kick at his knee but had no leverage on the floor. She got her fingers around his forearm. It was thicker than her calf. Fuck, he was strong. She couldn't pry him off. He squeezed harder, despite her grip. Another SEAL had a rifle aimed at her, was trying to get a clean shot. Fuck.

  Her eyes landed on Kade. He was bound and gagged, staring at her with eyes wide.

  The knife she'd knocked out of one of their hands was across the chopper. If she could just get her hands on it… Kade was there. She willed it at him, sent him her desire. His feet were on it. He kicked, pushed it towards her.

  Sam pulled a hand away from the meaty arm around her neck, got one finger barely on the bottom of the knife's hilt, walked it back towards her. The headlock closed tighter. The one with the rifle almost had a clean shot on her. There. The knife was in her hand. She couldn't think, couldn't see, wasn't sure of her aim. She gripped the knife with both hands, pointed it towards his elbow, stabbed down hard. The SEAL behind her screamed in pain as the graphene tip came in between slabs of armor, severed tendons in his joint. His grip went limp.

  Sam rolled free, only to take a vicious kick to her head, another to her gut. Two guns were coming around on her. She couldn't get them both in time.

  The armored window of the fuselage door exploded in a shower of glass. Gunshots. Groans. A black-gloved hand appeared, a pistol in it, alive with muzzle flashes. Feng's feral grin followed it in.

 

"Missile launch! Missile launch!" Bruce Williams exclaimed. "Both RTAF fighters have launched! Close range. Banshees countering."

  Becker's eyes bugged out. Nichols gripped the arms of his chair. On screen red dots streaked out from both Rudras. Indian Shiva3 missiles, active radar homing. No lock on the Banshees yet. Was the stealth as good as promised?

  Both Banshees fired radar decoys. The missiles acquired locks on them instantly, swerved as the decoys put range between themselves and the choppers. An explosion lit up the night sky, then another.

  "Two misses!" Williams called out.

  "Get the Banshees into the clouds," Nichols ordered.

  "Shots fired inside Banshee One," Jane Kim said.

  Nichols looked at the screen showing the interior of Banshee One.

  "If Blackbird gets control of that craft…" Becker said.

  Nichols nodded. "Activate remote nav on Banshee One. Have the pilot engage the lockout. Controls to us."

  Jane Kim nodded. "Roger that."

  "Missile launch!" Williams said. "Two more darts in the air!"

 

Feng pushed through the shattered window, guns roaring, muzzle flashes lighting up the interior of the Banshee. He'd lost his chauffeur's hat, but the suit and gloves and shoes were still perfect.

  His bullets punched one SEAL into the bulkhead, slammed another face down against the floor of the chopper. Sam kicked up at the stunned third man, took him in the head, saw his eyes roll into the back of his head.

  Another explosion rocked the craft. The pilot banked them hard and fast, almost ninety degrees over. Sam braced herself as her world rotated. Feng stepped lightly onto the new floor. He moved like a dancer, unruffled by the chopper's acrobatics.

  Only one SEAL stirred. The man whose elbow Sam had stabbed was crawling on the floor, trying to reach a fallen assault rifle with his left hand. He glanced over, saw Feng and Sam, and froze, his fingers inches from the rifle.

  Feng held the man's eyes, shook his head.
You don't want to do that.

  The SEAL remained absolutely still. Sam turned her head at a noise from the cockpit. The SEAL lunged for the gun. Feng was there, suddenly, his foot slamming into the Navy man's head. The SEAL went limp. Feng shook his head again, picked up the rifle, slung it over his shoulder.

  Sam slid into the copilot's seat, her knife pointed at the chopper pilot's face. They were flying in cloud. The pilot had his hands up – empty – in surrender.

  "Take us back to the monastery," Sam said.

  "I can't," he replied.

  "The hell you can't." She gestured with the knife in her hand.

  "C&C has the controls," the pilot protested.

  "So override 'em. Take control back."

  The pilot shook his head. "I punched in the lockout. No way to get the stick back."

  Sam frowned. "Why the hell did you do that?"

  The pilot shrugged, glanced back at the bodies behind him, at the Chinese man in the dapper suit and black gloves, at the knife in Sam's hands.

  "Orders."

  Sam shook her head. "That wasn't the smartest thing you've ever done."

  She reversed the knife, slammed the hilt of it into his face. The man went limp.

  Now… was there really no way to take back control of this thing? It had been a long time since basic flight.

  First, swipe the pilot's thumb on the biometrics…

  She was studying the controls when they started to move of their own accord. The chopper was turning.

 

"We have the stick," Jane Kim said. "Bringing them back home."

  "RTAF fighters have lost the Banshees," Williams said. "Looks like they can't find us in the clouds. Good cloud cover most of the way home."

  Nichols relaxed just a tiny bit. They were a long way from done, but it looked like they might just pull this off.

• • • •

Ahhhhh, Shu thought. There is the hole.

  They'd opened it up for her themselves, just on the one helicopter, the one that Feng and Cataranes and Lane were on.

  Shu studied the encrypted stream of commands and status data flowing back and forth, compared it to the data she'd gleaned from the Ministry of Defense database. Yes. Now that they'd opened this door for her, she could control this craft.

  The directional antenna atop the Opal came alive at her mental command. There.

  She reached out, and Banshee One began to turn.

 

Jane Kim frowned.

  "Sir, Banshee One has stopped responding. I'm frozen out. It's starting to turn."

  "Did the cockpit take control back?" Had the pilot not entered the lockout code? Had it not worked?

  Kim tapped away at her console.

  "No, sir. I think it's another signal. Banshee Two is flying a sweep, trying to triangulate… Looks like it's originating from near the target."

  
What the hell?

  "Banshee One is turning back towards the monastery, sir. It's losing altitude. It'll be out of the clouds soon."

  "Get Banshee Two there ahead of them. Track down that signal. I want to know where it's coming from, exactly. Get us out of the clouds and give us eyeballs if you need to."

  What did we miss? Nichols wondered. What's going on out there?

  "Roger that," Bruce Williams said. "Popping below clouds… now."

  "Improving triangulation," Jane Kim reported.

  Telemetry data superimposed itself on the enhanced camera feed.

  "There!" Williams called out.

  The screen zoomed. A black sedan. An Opal. Chinese plates. Su-Yong Shu.

  Becker's mouth turned into a hard line. "Can you take her alive?" he asked.

  Nichols shook his head. "Not with those fighters out there."

 

Becker cut the connection the Boca Raton, dialed National Security Advisor Carolyn Pryce with his personal phone.

  
Get proof
, she'd told him,
and you'll have your clearance to go after her.

  The phone picked up.

  "Dr Pryce, we have a shot on…"

  "I'm sorry, sir. Dr Pryce is with the President. Can I have her call you back?"

  Fuck.

  "This is Deputy Director Becker at ERD Enforcement. I need to speak with her urgently."

  "That won't be possible, sir. She's with the President."

  "Then get her, please."

  "Sorry, sir. It's an important meeting."

  "This is absolutely urgent."

  "I can see about sending her a note in a few minutes."

  Fuck.

  Becker ended the connection, slammed the phone down onto his desk.

  It was all going to be on him. Election year, he remembered.

  He reconnected to the
Boca Raton.

  "Mr Nichols," he said.

  "Yes, sir," Nichols answered. The man looked flustered.

  "Mr Nichols, do you concur that video shows a Chinese Confucian Fist commando attacking a US military helicopter?"

  "Yes, sir."

  "Mr Nichols, does evidence show that this Confucian Fist has just killed multiple US soldiers?"

  "Yes, sir," Nichols repeated.

  "Mr Nichols, does evidence lead you to believe with a high probability that said commando is the driver and personal bodyguard of Dr Su-Yong Shu?"

  "Yes, sir."

  "And Mr Nichols, is it your professional opinion that the Chinese vehicle in your sights is engaging in electronic warfare with a US military aircraft and attempting to hijack that aircraft?"

  "Yes, sir. Definitely."

  Becker looked down at the phone. There would be no help. This was all going to be on his head.

  He looked up at Nichols. So be it.

  "Mr Nichols, take out that vehicle."

  "Yes, sir. With pleasure."

  Nichols gave the order.

  Banshee Two turned nose down. It fired missiles as it lost altitude to come in low to the monastery again. The AGM-101s zoomed down at the black Opal at ten gees.

 

Shu felt the missiles fire. They were aimed at the car. She couldn't penetrate the security of the second helicopter, but these missiles were a different matter. They depended on an external source to inform them of their targets. She twisted their primitive minds, sent them spiraling back up at the craft that had fired them.

 

"Missiles way off course," Williams reported. "Coming back around at Banshee Two. Countermeasures."

  Banshee Two fired decoys port and starboard and the missiles went after them, bracketing the stealth chopper in explosions. It flew through the flames, a black shape emerging from a roiling cloud of red and orange, dropping altitude fast for a shot at the car.

  "Switch to guns," Nichols said. "Nothing with guidance."

  Jane Kim nodded, relayed the orders.

  "Roger that," Williams said as Banshee Two spiraled down down down. "Firing." Flames burst from the muzzle of the Banshee in a meters-long gout.

  Foot-long, spent uranium-cored shells streaked out from its one-inch chain gun in rapid-fire, rained down on the Opal sedan, ripped it to shreds. The vehicle slumped as its suspension failed. The antenna disintegrated in the first half second. The shells found the engine and the fuel tanks and punished them, tearing sparks from the metal of the car into the escaping fumes, detonating the gasoline, sending up a fifty-foot fireball that tore the car in two.

  "Target killed," Williams announced.

 

Shu almost had the helicopter back. She could see it now, just a few hundred meters away. She would get them back, then she would turn this helicopter on its mate.

  Bullets rained down on the car, tearing it to shreds. The connection to the helicopter dropped in the first instants. The car nearly disintegrated, then exploded. Shu watched from the shadow of the meditation hall, angry. They'd tried to kill her. Again.

  She reached out with her own mind for Banshee One. It was at the extreme end of her unaided range. She just barely had her mental fingertips on it. There, she had it. It responded to her thoughts. She would bring it home, extract her people, and then show these arrogant Americans who they were fighting.

  Oh yes, she would show them.

  Then Banshee One's masters started fighting her.

• • • •

"Banshee One is starting to respond," Kim said.

  Then she grunted in frustration. "It's still fighting me. Someone else is still in there working against me."

  Williams tapped to triangulate. Banshee Two collected data points as it circled above the compound.

  "Signal's weaker but still there," Williams said. "Originating from near one of the buildings. If it's Shu, she's still alive."

  "Take her out," Nichols ordered.

  "Missile launch! Missile launch!" Williams called out. "RTAF fighters are back. Four darts in the air."

  "Fuck," Nichols said. "Evasive maneuvers. And activate the spiders. Weapons free. Shoot to kill on primary targets."

  "Roger that. Weapons free."

 

Shu pulled the Banshee towards her. Signals from the Americans fought her, tried to turn it back. She ordered it to lose altitude. The Americans ordered it to climb. The chopper did a crazy dance in the air as they struggled over it.

  Shu couldn't win this, she knew. The car had been a powerful tool, now lost to her. Fighting this hard without its aid was killing her. Nexus nodes were broadcasting at emergency strength, using every watt of power they had available, exceeding their specs. Waste heat from the wattage was overheating her brain. The physical drain of the energy expenditure was draining glucose from her bloodstream, sapping her, starving this body's neurons.

  She dropped to one knee in the doorway. A monk saw her, came to support her. She had to end this now.