Origin (13 page)

Captain Delongis, cowering in the scrub, looked up, and with a deeply regrettable mixture of rage and humiliation saw the Lynx rise steadily from the desert and power away towards the border.

Eldridge tried hard to conceal his rage, but it was difficult.

The Lear jet was on its way to the border now, with an estimated arrival time of no more than twenty minutes. He should have been arriving at the border checkpoint to take possession of his prisoners, but now? His prey had hijacked a helicopter and was all set to just fly straight over the border and he had no way of stopping them.

Well, that wasn’t quite true, Eldridge had to admit to himself; he had no
non-lethal
way of stopping them. And it had really come to that decision. Was trying to capture them alive for fear of what they knew worth the mounting costs and attention the whole debacle was creating? Eldridge was starting to think it was doubtful.

Was it likely that the pair had told anyone else, or had the ability to deliver any evidence to anyone who would even care? Surely the organization could deal with the media even if things did find their way into the public spotlight. Eldridge knew that the special programme was operating right on schedule, and soon nothing else would matter anyway.

Mind made up, he picked up the satellite telephone and dialled the number for Stephen Jacobs. He would present his case and ask for permission to blow the helicopter out of the sky, killing the fugitives and wiping them off the face of the earth once and for all.

Ten minutes later, Eldridge was being patched through to Colonel Carlos Santé, the commander of Chile’s First Armoured Brigade. Jacobs had finally capitulated, and agreed to the killing of the fugitives. Although reluctant to authorize their deaths without first interrogating them, Jacobs had seen the unfortunate reality of the situation and had surrendered to it. Rather they die now, he had said, than they escape again.

The brigade provided Chile’s anti-aircraft border defence and was based in Arica, just next to the border itself. Colonel Santé was in command of a battery of Gepard 1A anti-aircraft artillery vehicles, bought only a few years before from the German contractor and recently updated to launch the deadly Mistral anti-aircraft missiles.

The conversation was brief, as Eldridge stressed the timeframe; the helicopter would be approaching the border now, if it hadn’t already entered Peruvian airspace. Santé promised he would shoot the chopper down immediately.

The next call Eldridge made was to the Peruvian side, seeking permission for the helicopter to be shot down by the 1st Armoured Brigade, even if it had already crossed into Peru. The mere mention of terrorism and anthrax meant that permission was instantly granted.

As Eldridge continued his own flight towards the border, he smiled.

There was no way the fugitives would escape 20kg of high explosive hurtling towards them at 1,200 miles per hour.

No way at all.

T
HE STOLEN
L
YNX
helicopter overflew the border just ten minutes after being hijacked, and Adams and Lynn could see the masses of vehicles congregated around the checkpoints below.

‘At least we’re safe up here,’ Lynn said as she looked down at the desert below. As they passed into Peruvian airspace, she clutched him, holding him tight. ‘We made it!’ she exclaimed.

Adams just nodded, his attention occupied by – what? What was it that he’d noticed? He scanned the desert again, the masses of cars, trucks and vans around the Interstate 5 border checkpoint; but that wasn’t it.

His vision drifted further, and then he saw it – about two miles out towards the west, some sort of military installation. His eyes narrowed as he tried to look at it in more detail. It was movement that had caught his eye.

‘Lynn,’ he said, ‘check out that military base over in the west. Can you make anything out?’

Lynn looked out of the side glass, straining to see. There was movement. But what? She looked harder. Could it be . . . Surely not.

‘Matt,’ she said finally, ‘it looks like guns. Big ones, mobile artillery pieces. And they’re moving, lining up.’ She looked even closer, and realization hit her. ‘They’re lining up on us!’ she cried out. ‘They’re going to shoot us down!’

Colonel Santé watched as the first of his battery of artillery pieces loosed off a Mistral missile, flame shooting from the rear as it blasted into the sky, rocketing towards the escaping helicopter at over a thousand miles per hour.

The stolen chopper was now ten miles into Peru; impact would be in approximately thirty seconds.

Colonel Santé used the time to light a cigar.

Adams was coaxing everything he could out of the chopper, nearing two hundred miles per hour as they raced into the Peruvian interior.

But he was all too aware that they had no hope of outrunning an anti-aircraft missile. The radar showed that one such weapon had already been launched and was homing in on the helicopter’s infrared signature.

It had been many years since Adams had been in a Lynx but instinct told him where to find what he was looking for.

He reached for the toggle switch on the interface in front of him, flipping it down hard.

‘What was that?’ Lynn asked, trying to control her rising panic. She had told Matt that she would be OK, but the truth was that she was scared; and not just superficially scared but scared right down to her core. Just travelling in a helicopter after what had happened in Antarctica was a struggle, but with a missile now threatening once more to destroy her, she felt her heartbeat rising, her palms turning sweaty.

Not again
, the voice kept repeating in her head.
Please, not again
.

Her inner voice was interrupted by Adams’ reply. ‘Countermeasures,’ he announced. ‘Infrared, to confuse the missile’s own infrared guidance system. Should make the missile fly into
it
, rather than
us
.’

‘Does it work?’

Adams grimaced. ‘We’ll know in about ten seconds.’

Colonel Santé could no longer see either the helicopter or the missile with the naked eye, and so watched the radar with his bombardiers as he puffed away on his cigar.

The signature of the missile quickly caught up with that of the helicopter. There was a blur of light – the impact – and the men watched closely as the light dimmed.

But what was this? The image of the helicopter was still there!

Damn!
The countermeasures must have been deployed. Santé puffed angrily on his cigar as he realized that the pilot must know more about the helicopter than he’d been led to believe.

‘Another sortie!’ he announced gruffly. ‘Launch guns two through five!’

If one missile had failed to do the trick, four would surely accomplish the task. After all, the cost was immaterial – the man who had called had promised full reimbursement for any ammunition used, as well as a little sweetener for Santé himself if he succeeded in shooting the chopper down.

Countermeasures or not, four missiles were a guarantee of destruction.

Adams knew it had been a lucky escape, and that they were unlikely to be so lucky again. The artillery commander would doubtless now order a multiple strike, and if several missiles were launched, one would be bound to get through.

Another approach had to be taken, and Adams knew what it was. The only trouble would be getting Lynn to agree to it.

He waited for a moment, wanting to leave it until she really had no other choice. And soon he saw the electronic blips appear on his radar. Four of them.

He quickly calculated their speed of approach, his own current speed, and estimated the impact time at about a minute and a half. He checked the surface map once again, and reduced his airspeed. He wanted to reach the canyon at almost exactly the same time as the missiles.

‘Are we slowing down?’ Lynn asked incredulously.

Adams turned to her, nodding his head. And then he told her his plan.

At the headquarters of 1st Armoured Brigade, Santé watched with fascination as his four majestic birds streaked towards the unfortunate helicopter. He admired the pilot of the chopper as he carried out evasive manoeuvres – up, down, left, right – and at the same time pitied him for his futile efforts.

There wasn’t long to go, and although the chopper was now almost fifty miles into Peru, he wasn’t anxious about the clash of authority – he had been promised Peruvian cooperation.

He noted how the fleeing pilot deployed more countermeasures, and how one of his missiles went for the infrared bait, exploding behind the chopper.

And then he smiled widely as the remaining three missiles struck directly, seeing the big flare on the radar screen.

He blinked, and the screen was blank.

The missiles had done their work; the helicopter – and the people in it – were no more.

E
LDRIDGE RECEIVED THE
news within a minute of the destructive impact.

So, it was over. Or was it? Eldridge was aware that he had made this mistake before, signing off on their deaths too early. Well, not this time. He would check himself. The Lear jet would be over the impact site within the next ten minutes, and there were Chilean and Peruvian military and law enforcement teams also on their way there.

He would check the site from the air – check that the helicopter was
really
destroyed, and it wasn’t just another damned trick – and then he would land, and lead the crash scene investigation.

After being hit by three separate missiles, the wreckage would be an inferno, no more than a smouldering mess; but Eldridge would not be happy until he found some evidence of the bodies within.

Then he would be able to relax.

The Lear jet cruised over the crash site within the estimated ten minutes, and Eldridge was gratified to see the fiery wreckage of the chopper, buried at the bottom of a deep canyon, flames licking up the sides, almost reaching his own aircraft.

It was doubtful that anyone could have survived such an explosion, but if his current assignment had taught Eldridge anything, it was that all things were possible.

He entered the cockpit and told the pilot to find a place to land.

It was twelve hours later, after the darkness of night had well and truly drawn in and the temperature had dropped to near freezing, that the crash scene investigators found something.

There had been low-level squabbles early on in the day about whose jurisdiction such an investigation should come under, but Eldridge and his men took control of the scene, utilizing the investigators from both countries in order to fast-track the operation.

But there really wasn’t much to go on. The impact had superheated the fuselage, obliterating everything inside in an instant. By the time the Lynx crashed into the canyon’s deep valley bottom, there wasn’t a whole lot left to investigate.

What there was, was extracted, separated, examined and identified piece by piece. The investigators told Eldridge that the heat had been so intense that it was doubtful anything would be left of the two fugitives who had stolen the craft. The best they could hope for would be bits of charred bone, or perhaps an odd tooth or two.

Eldridge was not going to be satisfied until he knew for sure that Adams and Edwards were dead, which was why his first sense of true relief did not come until almost midnight.

‘Here, sir!’ the excited technician announced, carrying something in a small clear plastic wallet.

‘What is it?’ Eldridge demanded.

‘It’s a tooth,’ the man replied happily. ‘It’s badly burnt,’ he continued, holding it up for Eldridge to see with his own eyes, ‘but it is the tooth of the man who was in the helicopter when it went down.’

‘You’re sure?’ Eldridge asked, only letting his excitement rise a little at this point.

‘One hundred per cent, sir,’ the technician replied.

Eldridge nodded. ‘Good.’ He took the wallet with the tooth inside from the man. ‘I’ll need to get it tested immediately.’

Stephen Jacobs was excited. He had just flown to Switzerland to see the machine with his own eyes, and was delighted with the progress of the CERN team. It was really going to happen.

He was flying home now, thirty-eight thousand feet above the Atlantic in his own private jet, when the phone rang.

‘Jacobs,’ he said, answering the call.

‘Sir,’ he heard the deep rumble on the other end announce, ‘it’s Eldridge. The situation here has been contained.’

‘Are you sure?’ Jacobs asked.

‘Yes, sir. The helicopter was almost totally destroyed, but we managed to find three burnt teeth. DNA testing shows two of them belonged to Matthew Adams, and the other to Evelyn Edwards. There’s no way they could have survived. It’s over.’

Jacobs sat down deeper into his leather club chair. It was over, yes. And yet it was also all about to begin – the deaths of the two fugitives heralded the birth of the new world order.

‘Good,’ Jacobs said finally. ‘You can come home, and take your place among us. It is almost time.’

Jacobs could almost feel the excitement of the man radiating through the satellite phone. ‘Yes, sir,’ the Alpha Brigade commander said, and Jacobs put the phone down, ending the call.

Yes
, Jacobs thought to himself as he stretched out in the chair, delighted at the news from Peru,
it is almost time
.

A
DAMS SCANNED THE
desert scrub for signs of life as they settled in to their temporary shelter, but found none. Satisfied that they were safe, he pulled the cover over them and put his arm around Lynn to help keep her warm.

After their helicopter had been blown out of the sky the night before, the pair had used the hours of darkness to walk across the desert. The chopper’s navigation system had provided their exact location, and Adams had then worked out the direction of the nearest large town, which was Arequipa. Using the stars for navigation, by the time dawn came they had covered thirty miles and were both nearing exhaustion.

Adams would ordinarily have been able to keep on walking much further, but the recent lack of sleep was hitting hard, making him into a quivering, uncontrolled wreck. They decided that they would rest up for the day – moving at night was better for combating the freezing desert temperatures, as well as for keeping hidden from view – and Adams spent the next half an hour preparing a hide, a small natural crevasse well hidden among a scattering of sun-bleached rocks.