Tammie, you heard them. Shut this thing down and get Marine One in here. Thomas thought through the procedures that had been trained into him like instinct. His first thoughts were that there was a simple and harmless technical glitch going on at Disney World, but he couldn't take any chances with the people's lives that he had been charged with. Nothing is typical, he thought.
Tammie, you better tell Abigail to pass the information along to the president. We'll get off the ride and out quickly and smoothly.
I have already, relayed the info to the president's AIC, Thomas, Tammie replied.
Good. Now get this ride stopped. Thomas opened the channel to Kudaf and Jackson. "Boys, we have a glitch. Let's roll 'em up and get 'em out of here. Kootie, do you have Marine One yet?"
"It's inbound from MCO Airport, and Air Force One is waiting hot," Kootie answered. "Snipers show nothing on sensors or eyeball."
"Clay, I hate to end all the fun you were having on the ride," Washington commented with a hint of dry humor, but continuously scanned across the dome of the amusement park ride for danger. "We may have trouble coming."
"What seems to be the problem, Thomas?" the president asked subvocally over the net. His AIC was clever and had a tendency to be able to hack into most networks, so they had quit trying to keep her out. Not that the president couldn't order them to give him access, but he never did, as if he were continually testing his AIC. It was rumored that his AIC was one of the smartest ever born. "Abigail is detecting some sort of wireless noise level increase that is delaying our long- range coms. Could be that there is a rogue command signal in here somewhere."
"Yes, Mr. President. That's why we're rolling you out of here."
"If we are rolling out, then why hasn't this ride stopped?" Moore asked nonchalantly. The man was cool, collected, and methodical—a true U.S. marine. Thomas knew the president's history. He had read all about how Moore had seen serious action during the Martian Desert Campaigns as well as being a prisoner of war for years. Moore's years of tribulation had made him a force to be reckoned with and a man with a resolve of the hardest metals known to man.
Tammie, what gives? Thomas inquired.
I don't know, Thomas. I've relayed the stop-ride command to the system several times, but nothing seems to be happening, Tammie said.
What does Abigail say?
She doesn't know either, but we are working it. So is HQ.
"We have a situation! The President is at risk, and we need a convergence at this location and immediate extraction!" Thomas announced over the tac-net to the team.
The hovercar path led downward to the bottom of the mountain and continued to pick up speed. The three cars aligned themselves one behind the other and all of them pointed forward. The virtual spacescape didn't seem to change from the standard amusement ride scene, and the cars continued to the drop-off point for passengers but were traveling far too fast to stop.
At first, Thomas thought it would be the end of the line for them, literally, if he couldn't either veer the cars upward from the floor or somehow get the safety restraints off of them and get them out of the cars before they hit. The problem with the latter was that they were moving at least seventy kilometers per hour. The president and First Lady might be able handle the fall at that speed, but for certain, their daughter couldn't.
Open channel, he told Tammie.
"All right, everybody hang on and try to keep your heads down. These cars are out of control, and we have to slow them down." Thomas pulled his M-blaster from inside his black, armored dress coat and placed the barrel on the safety bar interlock for his car. He squeezed the trigger, frying away the five-centimeter steel restraint with a brilliant white and blue flash. Some of the chromium-molybdenum steel splattered molten hot against the side of his face, searing deep into the flesh of his jaw muscles. He braced for the pain and then repeated the process on the other side of his car. The bar pulled loose as he turned and tossed it over the side of the car.
Tammie, where is the power system for these cars?
Here and here. A three-dimensional map of the hovercoaster cars filled his mind's eye, and two points on the underbelly flashed on and off in red highlight.
Make sure Clay is getting this.
I am relaying this to Susan now. Tammie sent the information to Clay's AIC. Unfortunately, the First Lady was sitting with Clay, and he was hesitant to blow the restraint bar free as Thomas had.
"Clay, can you get a shot on the power system for your car?"
"Not without getting free. But I've got a clear bead on Hovercar One's."
"Take the shot," Thomas ordered. Jackson took aim and began firing white and blue bolts of directed energy into the back of the president's car.
"Done!" Jackson responded as the two front cars dipped forward from the abrupt power loss but then corrected themselves to normal flight. The three-car amusement ride was being propelled through the air by the propulsion system of the front and aft cars. The Disney imagineers had overengineered the ride with triple redundancy. "Thomas, we have to take the propulsion out!"
"I know, Clay! I'm working on it!" he shouted.
Thomas stood in the front car trying to maintain his balance as it sped faster and faster toward the deck of Space Mountain. He aimed his blaster at the first highlighted spot in his mind's eye and pulled the trigger twice, searing holes through the plastic in the bottom of the amusement park ride. The power system vaporized with a shower of pungent burning plastic and sparking vapors. Then the car lurched, tossing him upward more than a meter over the middle car.
As he passed over the president and his daughter, Thomas could see the panic in the twelve-year-old girl's eyes. She covered her face with her arms and screamed. Thomas continued to fly upside down through the air as the rear car approached. Clay instinctively rotated the axis of the rear car and stretched his hand upward as far as he could. Thomas reached down with his left hand just in time to be grabbed by Clay's right. He could see the First Lady's face contorted with fear as he passed over them.
His trajectory arched over the car, slamming him into the back side of the only car still powered. The force of his body colliding with the car stretched Clay's arm to its limit. The impact of Thomas's torso and head against the vividly colored plastic knocked the wind from him and bruised his already burned face. Clay clutched at his right arm with his left hand but didn't let go until he saw that Thomas had a handhold on the hovercar.
As Thomas came to his senses, he searched frantically for a handhold with his right hand, which still held the blaster, until he managed to get the grip of his weapon wedged over a faux instrument panel that could support his weight. He let go of Clay's hand and quickly found a better handhold for his left hand, freeing his blaster hand. Thomas held on tight and scrambled for a foothold on the plastic rocket nozzles jutting out from the back of the hovercoaster car. Finally gaining his balance, he trained his blaster on the power system and fired once. Sparks flew in his face, forcing him to lose his grip and balance, and he was flung free from the hovercar. As Thomas watched the car pull away from him, he maintained his focus and aimed his weapon at the remaining power unit of the ride. He held his aim tight and pulled the trigger.
The directed energy bolt danced across the darkened virtual space room toward its target, passing through a holographic asteroid and hitting home on the remaining power plant. The explosion of the supply threw the same cloud of vapors when it hit. "Yes!" Thomas thought. Then something pounded into his back and his head cracked against it too—the floor.