“What’s going on?” Benjamin King demanded as two Royal Marines escorted him into the Operations Centre.
“Ben, thank god,” Sid threw her arms around King’s neck and kissed him. He gently pushed her aside, throwing her a reassuring smile. He’d made it back up to the surface in time to see the base in a state of chaos, marines and military police running here, there and everywhere. He’d stripped out of his hazmat gear and allowed his escort to bring him to the O.C. where the rest of the team had relocated.
All around him, the room was in a state of chaos as men and women in military uniforms punched commands into computers or barked into satellite phones. A glance through the large windows on the southern wall confirmed that the Air Day was continuing unimpeded, the chaos smoothly covered up, but the activity within the O.C. told King otherwise.
“West escaped on a Russian plane,” Nadia informed him. She and Sid had been stood in the middle of the room, feeling very much in the way. Gibbs spoke animatedly into a telephone while O’Rourke and the others were liaising with the base staff.
“On a Russian plane?” King repeated. “So the Russian government are involved?”
Nadia’s face was grim. “So it would seem.”
King grimaced. “Nadia, I’m sorry—”
“Do not apologise.”
“Well, if it helps, I accused Nate of being the traitor too.”
The Russian woman shrugged. “It helps. A little.”
Then a thought occurred to King. He frowned. “Where is Nate?”
The Red Arrow thundered through the clouds, the sonic boom of its engines rippling out through the sky, turning the heads of people far below.
The Cornish Peninsula vanished from view in the blink of an eye as the world’s most famous display plane tore east across the southern coast of Britain. Far in the distance Raine could see the tiny speck of orange flame which represented the escaping Sukhoi Su-30. He kept his attention focussed on it, desperate not to lose sight of his prey.
Despite their global renown, Raine realised to his chagrin, the Red Arrows were a far cry from his technologically advanced prey. While the Sukhoi Su-30 was fitted with all the latest fighter jet mod-cons — sat-nav, radar and on-board computer — not to mention an extensive array of weaponry, the Red Arrow was essentially a tin can fitted with a huge engine. Basic compared to modern day warplanes, the Arrows’ fame came not so much from the planes themselves, but from the amazing flying abilities of their Royal Air Force pilots. The stunning displays they put on as world-wide ambassadors for the RAF elevated those men and women to be recognised as the best in the world. They had inspired men and women to become pilots for generations and Raine was no different. He could still remember the day he’d first seen them in action. “Someday I’m gonna fly a Red Arrow,” he remembered telling his grandfather who’d brought him and his brother on holiday to England.
Just look at me now, Gramps.
“Understood,” Gibbs finished barking into the phone then slammed it back onto its cradle. King approached him but he waved him off dismissively. “Not now, Doctor.”
“What’s going on,” the archaeologist ignored him, “What are we doing about the Moon Mask—”
“I said not now,” Gibbs snapped and turned his back on him.
Captain Robertson burst out of an adjoining office, looking flushed and red faced. He marched straight up to Gibbs. “I’ve just got off the blower to Downing Street. I’ve been ordered to pass operational command of the retrieval of your ‘cargo’ to U.N. Headquarters.” He didn’t look happy about it. “Just what the hell did your people find down there?”
Gibbs’ face was impassive but King had come to know him enough over the last few days to pick up on a concealed smugness. “That information is on a need to know basis, Captain.”
“And I’d say I damn well need to know,” Robertson shot back under his breath. King remained just within ear shot. “The safety of my base has just been compromised, my men have been killed and a British aeroplane has just been stolen from off of my bloody runway by a member of your team. I’d say I’ve earned the right to know.”
Gibbs slowly turned to look out the window. “I’m sure he’ll return it in one piece.”
King couldn’t help but laugh. “I doubt it.”
G-Force crushed Nathan Raine as he pushed the Red Arrow’s engines harder. The sleek plane ripped through the skies at phenomenal speeds, a red streak appearing for the blink of an eye against the azure summer sky before it vanished into the far distance.
The shores of Great Britain were far behind him now. The blue expanse of the North Sea stretched out below. To the south the northern coastline of what he presumed was Germany streaked by. In his head he pictured the route he was taking — a straight line cutting across Northern Europe from Great Britain to the western boarder of Russia.
On the huge wall mounted map in the TOC, two blinking dots represented the progress of West and Raine as they made their dash towards the domineering mass of Russia.
“Okay, we’ve got two squadrons of F-15 Eagles just taken off from Geilenkirchen.”
Instantly, on the wall map, another blinking dot appeared, about fifty miles from Cologne in Germany. The NATO Air Base in Germany was the only one of its kind in the world, a truly international military base with personnel from thirteen NATO countries. While two separate entities, the ultimate goal of the United Nations and the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation were one and the same: the maintaining of international peace and security. As such, the NATO commanders had been apprised of what had become known as the ‘Sarisariñama Incident’ and had been kept in the loop on the escalating situation with the Moon Mask. It hadn’t taken much persuading in Langley’s call to NATO’s Supreme Allied Atlantic Commander, to get him to authorise the interception of the Russian plane. The political fallouts and repercussions of a Russian plane being shot down by a U.N. requested NATO force were not something Langley relished being immersed in, but everyone knew the stakes. If the Moon Mask got into Russia, it wouldn’t be seen again. And Russia, the all-time-favourite enemy of the west, would have the power of a tachyon bomb at their disposal.
“Thank you,” Langley said, relaxing ever so slightly at the news of the interceptors launch. “Patch me through to Raine.” A second later, he got the go ahead. “Nate,” he said into the wireless headset he had been given.
“Alex?” Raine’s voice came back, a little surprised.
“That’s right Nate. You can power down and return to Culdrose now. We’re tracking West’s plane and we’ve got two squadrons of F-15’s on intercept. Thanks for the good work up there.”
“You’re recalling me?” Raine asked.
He could still see the afterburner fire of the fleeing Russian plane. He grimaced as he pushed the Red Arrow to its maximum speed, hitting nearly eight hundred miles per hour. About 7 Gs pounded into him and it felt like his chest was going to implode and his eyeballs pop. Most people would have blacked out by now but, like all pilots trained to fly at such speeds, Raine had been taught how to tense his stomach muscles to prevent his blood from rushing into his legs, abandoning his heart and starving his brain. Pilots ordinarily wore anti-gravity suits pumped with pressurised air to prevent this, but he hadn’t exactly had the time to don one. It was an exhausting process, a mental and physical effort to keep his muscles tensed but he knew if he released for even an instant he would black out and die.