Nick of Time - Smooth Criminal (read after .TXT) 📗

nodded thoughtfully. Cunningham patted lightly on his back. “That went well,” she said. He looked up at her and offered a tired smile. “It’s far from over, Danielle,” he said. She did not reply. She moved away from the console, taking up her place in Wright’s side again. They resumed their quiet talk. Matthews stayed a moment longer. He watched Harris communicate with the pilots in a language of runaway jargons, his subordinates assisting him with weather and conditions. Then he moved away towards the glass again, this time to peer at the distant outline of the giant compass rose beside Dryden Flight Research Center of NASA. Indeed, it was far from over as he had told Cunningham. Yet, Matthews thought he had done more than acquit himself well. The main threats had been to shield the operation from external influence and media, maintain the secrecy and put the fighters and the bomber in the air with the package intact. He had done that. Pegasus would take care of the rest. Nobody would know of it except for the fellows packed up here, not any other intermittent air bases, not any commercial airliners, nobody. And when the Trident came within ten miles of Andrews Air Force Base, it would be someone else’s problem. The only glitch to the plan, if any were there at all, sat in the C-3’s cockpit. Unless Caldwell did something really foolish, everything would go smooth. Matthews allowed himself a tiny smile. That was when something he had heard while he prided himself but did not strike him as particularly peculiar came again.

 

“Pegasus, I repeat, do you copy?” Harris was calling out into the mouthpiece he held closer to his mouth. A frown was creasing his forehead. Not good. Matthews hurried to the console.

 

“Pegasus, do you copy? Please respond.”

 

No response at all.

 

“Respond, dammit!” Matthews muttered to himself. The unknown frightened him. He looked around to see Cunningham and Wright, their heads cocked inquisitively in his direction.

 

“Escort Two, have you got a visual on Pegasus?” Harris tried.

 

“Control, this is Escort Two. I got Pegasus nice and clear at my twelve o clock.” came Lynch’s electronic voice.

 

“Pegasus, this is Control. Please respond. Do you copy?” Harris repeated in mechanical succession.

 

“What is it, Eddie? Something wrong with the communication?” Matthews asked.

 

“No, sir. The system is fine. Pegasus could hear our dispatch. They are not responding back.”

 

“Oh, shit.” It was the controller whose screen Venkatesh and Barocas were looking at. His pallid face looked up at them. “He’s arming the AMRAAM.”

 

Nobody moved a muscle for one shocked moment. Matthews did not have to ask whom the controller meant. The only glitch in his plan was proving to be more than just a ripple. It was primed to jeopardize the whole plan now. All the three planes were loaded with air-to-air and air-to-ground missiles for defending Pegasus which carried Barocas’s weapon. Caldwell was arming one of those missiles now, making no noise, giving no indication, throwing the protocol to the winds. “Damn,” someone said. Matthews could hear the click of Cunningham’s shoes as she approached. This time though, the click was accompanied by the squeal of another pair of shoes. The show got Wright’s attention at last.

 

“Override Pegasus’s system,” said Matthews to Harris. “Keep trying. Make him respond.”

 

Harris typed something into his console, waited for a while. His eyes did not leave the screen as he said, “Negative, General. Pegasus’s system has already been overridden by its pilot and has been locked. We cannot access it. Our feeds are all locked up.”

 

Matthews could feel his superiors’ gaze weighing down upon him. The reins had slipped away from his hand now, and he felt naked. Caldwell was on his own, with only Darren Mitchell to stop him.

 

“Jesus, Control. Escort One here. I am locked on!” It was Julian Reed’s desperate voice.

 

Matthews cringed. He did not expect this in the least. He expected Caldwell to make a mess, yes. He expected him to make a fool of himself, yes. He even feared he would blow himself up with the plane(fear for the plane, not the pilot). Trying to bring down one of Air Force’s fighter was the last thing he expected Ralph Caldwell to do. It made no sense at all. He wished the earth would open up and swallow him right there.

 

“Pegasus, what the fuck are you doing?” He stooped over the console, his forearm heavily pressing down on Harris’s shoulder. He was not a man to give in to profanity easily, not particularly in his superiors’ presence, but he was on edge now. Not that anybody in the room cared much about conduct at present. “Respond now, and stop th—”

 

Matthews did not finish it. The glowing IR signature of a launched AMRAAM missile cut him off. His mind went blank. A female voice gasped; he thought it was Cunningham. He kept watching, his posture hunched, his eyes unblinking, his attention fixed at the glittering orange dot that broke away from Pegasus’s red icon and was cutting across the grids of the screen in a rush towards Escort One, which was slowly banking away. Too slowly. It was only a second, or two at most. Pegasus was in perfect position and AMRAAM moved four times the speed of sound. All of them watched transfixed as the missile caught Escort One astern, and shattered it to a ball of flames. The fighter went off the screen instantly. Reed’s voice came in an unintelligible garble a second before impact, and then was gone forever.

 

“Escort Two,” It was Wright’s voice. The command in it broke everyone’s trance. “This is General Stephen Wright. Arm yourself and take out Pegasus. I repeat, take out Pegasus.”

 

There was no response for five full seconds. “Roger, General,” Lynch said at last. His voice was hoarse. He had just witnessed firsthand the bomber that had been termed as a promising future take out their own fighter in seconds’ time.

 

Matthews knew there was no question of the mission being successful now. The only option now was to not make it too unsuccessful by leaving the dangerous technology at Caldwell’s mercy. The weapon had to be retrieved unscathed from under his arm and the chances of doing that were wafer-thin. Or, as Wright had ordered now, the wonderful technology should go down with him. His whole body shivered now. Not out of fear, but anger. He peered into Harris’s display. C-3 had started to bank away after shooting the missile. It would not be an easy task for Lynch to bring it down now.

 

“Control, Pegasus is at my two o’ clock now, Escort Two.”

 

“Roger, Escort Two.” Harris confirmed nervously. He was dwarfed now by Matthews and Wright, both stooped over his console on either side.

 

The two deadly aircrafts circled each other now over the skies of Mojave National Preserve. C-3 was turning quickly to get to the tail of the Eagle. F-15 was a lighter craft than C-3, hence faster, yet it was no match for C-3’s efficiency. Lynch maneuvered his fighter in a cautious circle, informing ATC of his every move. Harris was busy confirming back and keeping his eyes riveted to the action. A chilling dogfight ensued once the Pegasus came within the shooting range of F-15. Lynch blasted away a fusillade of machine gun fire. Pegasus slipped away from them in a tight turn.

 

Lynch kept shooting for the better part of a minute. No munitions came out of C-3 in reply. F-15 was racing around in a furious attempt to get behind C-3, but the bomber kept revolving in dangerously tight circles. Matthews marveled at Caldwell’s skill in flying the craft. Considering the angle in which the bomber turned, its wings must have been tilted to such an inclination that the safety of the flight was on its edge. A little more speed or a little more deviation in the angle, then the bomber’s weight would work against its lift and douse its engines to leave the craft plummeting down as dead stick. The son of the bitch was walking a tight rope and walking good.

 

After a few minutes, Lynch got a lock on. He launched a Sidewinder missile at the bomber.

 

“He’s finished.” Matthews said.

 

“I doubt that, General,” said Wright, looking at Matthews for a moment, straight in the eye. When Matthews turned back to the display, he understood why he said that.

 

The missile had come within yards of the bomber when flares rained out of C-3’s back end. Flares in themselves were not so effective. C-3 shot forward impetuously, its nose dipped lower in the screen, and for the first time in his life, Matthews witnessed a heavy bomber go upside down as the missile was lured into explosion by the flares high above. Caldwell had pushed the bomber beyond its limit, he thought, he had dug his own grave. He was going to say it out loud when, to his utter amazement, the bomber whizzed in air upside down, and righted itself in a graceful arc. It came as no bigger surprise for Matthews when Lynch’s voice raved in a frenzy that Escort Two had been locked on. In another three seconds, a second AMRAAM missile materialized in the screen and wiped the Eagle out.

 

“Goddamn it!” Wright pounded a fist on the sheaf of printouts on Harris’s desk.

 

Matthews sat down heavily beside Harris, his arms cupping his balding head. His whole plan had been shattered into a pile of detritus in less than a minute. Hundreds of questions buzzed inside his head, each threatening to reveal a fearsome number of horrifying possibilities. On top of them all, the impact of the defeat pressed down upon him like an immovable burden.

 

“General, it’s coming back.” Harris said.

 

Matthews looked up. “What?”

 

“Pegasus. It’s coming back.”

 

Matthews shot up quickly, and fixed his eyes on the screen. Indeed, the bomber was tracing back its route to Edwards Air Force Base. Matthews swirled around to look at Wright. “The Beacon,” Wright whispered.

 

“Shit,” Caldwell said.

 

“Oh, hell,” Matthews breathed.

 

“What is it?” Chitra Venkatesh spoke for the first time.

 

“He’s coming in for the Beacon.” Matthews said, his hands holding his head in a helpless gesture. The bomber was seconds away, closing in with furious speed, and none of his armaments were up and ready to bring it down. Surface-to-air missiles were sleeping away peacefully in bunkers only meters away from the control tower, but miles away relative to the predicament at hand.

 

“His missile bay is opening, General.”

 

Matthews felt an overwhelming urge to whack Harris in the head; he had announced enough bad news for one day. Instead, he just turned around and looked deadpan at the screen. Harris turned away from the screen for the first time since it all had started, and looked him in the face. “It’s the JASSM, sir.”

 

Matthews could not help but let slip a forlorn smile. Clever bastard, he thought.

 

The C-3 hovered safely away from the base, and disgorged another pinpoint of orange. This one showed up with a sign marking it as ‘AGM-158 JASSM’. The air-to-surface missile stuck its wings out in mid-flight a mile away from where they all stood motionless, waiting tacitly for the worst to be over. It blinked on and off across the screen, its trajectory leaving no doubt about its target. Matthews walked away from the scene towards the side of the room facing the Beacon. The deadly calm of the night remained unchanged for five more seconds. Then he saw a brief flash of white streaking towards the structure, and the Beacon exploded. A bright flame of orange erupted from the point of impact, mushroomed away into the whole building, hurling it off its place with a savagery only the latent power locked up in a missile could possess. The raucous explosion threatened to tear their eardrums, and the shock wave followed. The glass wall facing the explosion cracked in a number of places, but held. The control tower shook for a precarious moment. Electronics choked up and corrected themselves. Everyone in the room held their