“The colonel just called with the following message: Execute Cloudburst.” The major’s face stayed a mask of stone, and he noticed that Graber’s, unlike the rest of the team’s, was also. The others let out a collective yell of relief. They were finally getting their chance to do the job the unit had been formed to do. “Settle down, troops. We’re going to be on the ground in less than ninety minutes. We have to be ready to go when we land, so get your gear checked, and rechecked. Captain, you see that the buddy checks get done.” Graber acknowledged the order. “Get to it. Captain, I’m going to talk to the pilot. Be back.”
“Holy shit,” Buxton said, almost somberly. “This is for real.”
“Chris is right,” Sean said, getting attention instantly. “This is it, and we better have our shit together. Buddy checks, now!”
The men broke off into pairs, going over each other’s snug web gear and limited equipment.
“Captain Anderson,” Antonelli yelled, his partner’s hands tugging on cinch straps of his body armor. Joe looked up. “We’re going in.”
The Delta troopers went about their preparatory ritual. Joe watched for a second, looking over his glasses, then returned his attention to the diagram. That was a generous word, but then the CIA man he had talked to while the printout came over the aircraft’s fax machine said it was obtained from someone with no knowledge of what it might be. What might it be? Joe asked himself. It was not a nuclear bomb, that was for sure. Even in its crudeness it could be almost anything but that.
The drone of the engines was punctuated by the chatter of the troopers. Joe heard none of it. He was in his own world, one he alone understood — most of the time. But not now. He would be dealing with this… thing when they got aboard, and he felt at a loss for not knowing what it was. The scary thing, though, was that it might not be anything he could deal with.
Knock that crap off, Joe.
Thirteen
THE EXPECTED, THE UNEXPECTED, AND THE NECESSARY
“How much did we get?” Hendrickson asked.
Buzz checked the fuel readout again. Data on the amount of fuel in the tanks was gathered through means much different than those used in a car. Floats in each of the seven fuel tanks were operated using reverse pressure. This negated the effect of minimal sloshing while the aircraft was in motion. Readings from the floats were matched against inflow and outflow meters on each tank, and all the numbers were tracked by a computerized fuel-management system.
“Two-twenty,” the first officer answered. There were 220,000 pounds of jet fuel in the Maiden’s tanks. “I didn’t pump into the outboard extenders.”
“Good,” Hendrickson said. The 656-gallon tanks inside the wings, right at the tips, were dry. That would keep more of the weight forward, since the wings, swept back at thirty-seven degrees, added mass behind the aircraft’s center of gravity. “Is the rest spread around?” he inquired, leaving Buzz to manage the fuel while he preflighted the engines.
“The center is full. The inboards and outboard mains are splitting the rest.” That still left over 130,000 pounds of free space in the tanks. “This load out and the empty seats should help.”
Hendrickson came to the number three instruments right then. With a total weight reduction of 160,000 pounds, the Maiden was lighter than at any point since landing at Benina. But the number three turbofan was showing a marked degradation in performance, down 55 percent, even at idle. “I hope. But we’re going to be dragging this one all the way,” he said, pointing at the dying engine’s indicators.
“What do you think’s with it?” Buzz entered the final fuel numbers in the flight computer, though that would help them little without a given flight path.
“I don’t know. It looked like the compressor two days ago. Now…?” It was more than the compressor, he knew. It might be that, or an engine bearing. Or something else.
“Yeah.”
The captain finished his checks. “She’ll do it.”
“Damn right.”
The captain turned. Hadad was sitting, the glow of the cockpit instruments lighting his face. The eyes, like before, stared ahead. “No tower contact, correct?”
“Correct,” the answer came, without a movement or a blink.
Hendrickson had won a small victory in securing the release of two hundred passengers. It still wasn’t enough to make up for the death of one. Or of another hundred and fifty, he told himself. He had to do it. “Look, we’re probably going to get off the ground all right, with the weight reduction and all. But we had to take on less fuel to get it down even more. Our number three engine is getting worse, even while we’re sitting here. I don’t know what’s going to happen once we get up there.”
The face came out of its trancelike mask. “What are you saying? If it is to release more passengers, the answer is no.”
Hendrickson’s head shook. “No. Let me explain. We had to take on less fuel in order to get the best possible chance at taking off. In doing that we reduced our range. With the engine not performing right, that’s going to increase our fuel consumption and reduce our range further.”
Hadad spoke no words in response, his eyes issuing the challenge.
“If you want to get to Chicago, then we’ve got a problem. With this amount of fuel, our load, and our bum engine, we’ll have to stop and refuel, probably in New York.”
The words did not trigger anger in Hadad. Instead, they elicited frustration, and exasperation. There was little reason for the American to lie. What would it get him? After all, his prime concern was staying alive, and keeping the passengers alive. It was another thing gone awry in the plan. “There will be no additional stop in America.”
“We can’t make it,” the captain repeated. “We have to go a shorter route. Stop somewhere and refuel.”
Why? Hadad’s thumb rubbed circles on the trigger switch. He was tiring. Sleep did not help. The fatigue was deeper than mere physical exhaustion.
If they could not make it, then all was for naught. They had to have enough fuel for three hours of flying once the American coast was reached, for three hours of deception until he could leave his mark upon the Great Satan. If not, the mission would fail. The purpose would be unfulfilled. And… And…
The little face filled his mind. There had to be a way.
“Havana,” Hadad said. “Can you make it there?”
Hendrickson visually checked with Buzz. They weren’t sure how receptive the Cubans would be to their appearance, but then they wouldn’t have much of a say. Just like the Russians had no say with Korean Airlines 007. “It’ll be close, but the skies should be clear. We can do that.”
“Then do it. Get off the ground, now.” Hadad slid back into his seat. In a minute he could remove the increasingly painful vest, and try to rest.
With a concrete destination and flight path — direct — the crew could let the flight computer and auto flight system do most of the flying. Buzz programmed in the destination — Jose Marti Airport.
Hendrickson checked the entered data, as was standard. A simple mistouch of a key could have serious repercussions. Each crewman backed the other…
The captain made his move almost automatically, reaching just above and to the left of the flight control computer and touching the activation button. There was no obvious sign of what he had just done, but Buzz could tell instantly from the crackle of static in his headset.
Hadad was too busy being tired, and lacked enough detailed knowledge to realize that the captain had just activated the hot mike function of the VHF radio.