Read Brown, Dale - Patrick McLanahan 01 Online
Authors: Flight of the Old Dog (v1.1)
“Got
a report of a light airplane that dropped off radar coverage into the area a
few minutes ago, General,” Briggs said. “Ridge-hopped in from Vegas, we think.
We’ve got security patrolling the area from Dreamland on out.”
“Did
it make it into Dreamland?” Elliott asked. The odds against it were
tremendous—any kind of aircraft over a few hundred pounds in weight would be
picked up by a dozen different sensors patrolling the desert.
“We’re
anticipating the worst.”
Luger
and McLanahan were already out of their chairs.
Anderson
was leaning forward, ready to move on
Elliott’s order.
“James,”
he said, “get your people over to the Old Dog’s hangar right away. They’ll be
safer there.”
Anderson
nodded and turned to the others. “All
right, you heard the General. Let’s get moving.”
As
McLanahan hurriedly led Wendy out of the briefing shack and over to the Old
Dog’s black hangar, he heard the sound of gunfire and explosions. Looking to
his left, he noticed a billowing cloud of smoke at the entrance to the
compound.
“Holy
shit,” Luger said behind him, “we’re under attack!”
In
less than half a minute each member of the Old Dog test team was in the hangar
and McLanahan was bolting the door. He had just turned away from the door and
was heading into the bowels of the hangar when he heard a pounding outside and
Elliott’s voice. He opened the door for General Elliott and Briggs.
“It’s
more serious than we thought,” Elliott told
Anderson
, who had moved forward to join them. “You
must—”
He
never finished. The first explosion was felt rather than seen. Its impact point
was on the far corner of the black hangar, on the roof. To Elliott, it felt as
if the entire four-acre roof above their heads was vibrating like a sheet of
tin.
Elliott
and Ormack were thrown off their feet by the shock wave.
Anderson
tumbled against the Old Dog’s front wheels,
landing on his head and shoulders.
Briggs
managed to stay on his feet. Still gripping his Uzi, he helped Elliott up off
the hangar floor.
“Take
cover, General,” Briggs said as the second explosion came, three times more
powerful than the first. A fifty-foot hole was blown into the roof a hundred
feet from the Old Dog’s left wingtip, showering the wing with bits of metal and
concrete. The wall beneath the hole ripped open as if someone had pulled a
giant zipper down the side of the black hangar all the way to the ground. An
acetylene line burst and flames shot skyward. Automatic gunfire erupted outside
the open mouth of the hangar. The opening was filled with running workers and
armed security police trying to spot the attackers and dodge the stampede of
terrified workers. Bodies began to fall.
Elliott
shook debris out of his hair and struggled to clear his eyes and throat of dust
and gas. He turned and saw the first impact point on the far corner, the second
right beside the bomber, and the gunfire outside the hangar. He did not need to
be a general to realize that the next mortar round was going to be right over
their heads and that more bodies were going to pile up outside.
“John.”
He grabbed Ormack and put his mouth next to his ear. “Get aboard. Start ’em
up.”
“What?”
“The
engines. Start ’em up. Get this thing
moving.
”
“Moving?”
“Taxi
the goddamn plane out of here, they’re going to blow this place apart.
Move.
” He shoved Ormack toward the
hatch. Ormack tumbled to the polished concrete floor, and for a split second
Elliott thought he wasn’t going to get up. Then Ormack scrambled up on his
hands and knees, found the boarding hatch, and climbed inside.
“
Campos
,
Pereira
.” He found the defensive systems operator
and his assistant stumbling around the bomber’s right wing, bumping into the
Scorpion
pylon, not sure which way to
turn or run. Elliott grabbed them both by the necks, ducked them under the
bomber’s belly. “Get aboard.”
Angelina reacted instantly,
scrambling up the ladder.
Campos
, confused, watched as his assistant disappeared inside. He turned to
Elliott.
“No, I can’t—”
“Get
up there, goddammit.”
“I
won’t get into that thing.”
Campos
used his bony elbows and fists and broke free, bolted toward the open
hangar door, ignoring bursts of gunfire erupting all around him. He crashed
against the edge of the hangar opening and paused, then turned and took one
last look at the black bomber.
“Campos,”
Elliott ordered, “take cover . . .”
Too
late. Just as Elliott called out
Campos
turned and ran outside. As he turned, a
third explosion tore into the front of the black hangar, ripping out the entire
left side of the building, and Campos disappeared in a blinding flash of light
and a screech of burning, shattering metal. The left side of the hangar opening
sagged and crashed to the floor.
Elliott
could only watch and duck as the hangar opening crashed down and bullets
whistled around him. He turned and saw
Anderson
just getting to his feet at the front of
the plane, his head and face bleeding.
Elliott
hurried over to help
Anderson
climb aboard the bomber. He felt a sting on his right calf, reached
down and his hand came back covered with blood. He put his right leg down to
stop himself and see what was wrong. It refused to support his weight and he
sagged helplessly to the floor.
“General,”
Anderson
said, crawling over to where Elliott lay
bleeding, “we’ve got to get out...” One of
Anderson
’s eyes refused to stay steady, rolling from
side to side.
“Get
on board,” Elliott ordered. A high-pitched scream issued from the number four
engine.
Anderson
turned and saw exhaust fumes bellowing from
the nacelle.
“The
engines . . . they’re starting ...”
“Ormack’s
on board. Get going.” Elliott noticed a huge gash on
Anderson
’s head, struggled to push himself off the
floor to help
Anderson
get to the hatch. The scream of the engine changed to a roar, and soon
the number five engine sounded.
“Jim
. . . hurry . . .” Elliott managed to rise to his left leg. As he did a line of
six red holes, big as quarters, appeared on
Anderson
’s gray flight suit from his collar bone to
right thigh.
Anderson
did not seem to notice. He continued to walk toward the open hatch,
then stumbled into the bomber’s sleek black side and crashed to the floor,
leaving a red streak on the Old Dog’s polished surface.
Suddenly Hall Briggs was beside
Elliott, firing his automatic pistol one-handed at whatever moved outside.
Again he dragged the general to his feet, the Uzi smoking in his right fist.
“We’ve got to get you on the plane, General—”
“No,
I’ve got—”
“Get on that plane. ”
“Chocks ... got to disconnect the—”
“I’ve
done all that, General. Chocks, air, power, pins, streamers. Now get your ass
on board.”
Briggs
fired at a running figure in the doorway, then hauled the resisting general up
into the hatch, where a pair of hands—McLanahan’s—grabbed the general by the
lapels of his fatigues and hauled his feet clear of the hatch.
“Briggs,”
Elliott yelled. “Get up here,
now.
”
McLanahan
put Elliott’s hands on the ladder, and the general realized what he had and
pulled himself painfully up to the upper deck. McLanahan then turned back to
the open hatch and extended a hand to Briggs, who was on one knee, firing into
the distance.
“Get
on board, you jerk,” McLanahan said.
“Not
my plane, my friend,” he said as a loud ringing started in McLanahan’s ears.
“Adios.
”
Briggs
was gone, and a second later the hatch snapped shut and the outside latch
locked into position.
McLanahan
was about to open the hatch, but the
Megafortress
made an incredible lurch and he was thrown toward the back of the offensive
crew compartment.
“We’re
movin’,” Luger said in amazement.
“Either
that or they just blew half the fucking plane away,” McLanahan said, got back
to his feet and went for the ladder to the upper deck.
What
McLanahan saw on the upper deck made his guts turn.
Wendy
Tork and Angelina Periera were standing over a dazed and bleeding Bradley
Elliott. Periera had been knocked off her feet by the sudden motion of the
bomber and was just regaining her balance, her jeans and blue workshirt covered
with blood.
Elliott
looked as if he had been wading in red dye. His right leg was covered with
dark, clotted blood. Blood was everywhere—on Periera, on Tork, on Elliott, on
the deck, on the circuit breaker panels—everywhere. Wendy was trying to wrap an
arm of her flight jacket around the two large openings in Elliott’s calf.
Elliott himself was hovering just above consciousness; awake enough to feel the
intense pain, groggy enough to be unable to move or help anyone. Sweat poured
down his face.
“McLanahan.”
Ormack swung around in his seat. “Get up here.”
Ormack was in the copilot’s seat,
checking the gauges. McLanahan half-ran, half-crawled up front and knelt
between the pilot and copilot’s seats. He stared out through the sleek cockpit
windows over the drooping needle nose of the Old Dog.
“We’re
moving.”
“Damn
right,” Ormack said. “Sit down. Help me.”
McLanahan
stared at Ormack.
“Well,
sit
down.
” Ormack grabbed McLanahan
by the jacket and yanked him forward into the pilot’s seat. He grabbed
Anderson
’s headset and slapped it over his head.
“We
taking off?”
“If
we can,” Ormack said.
“We
have clearance?”