“You can try, Seline. But grounding all those aircraft… they’ll ground one if you tell them there’s a bomb on it. But they’re not going to believe they all have bombs on them. And they’re not going to believe this drone story. And we don’t have time to convince them.”
“They’re probably infiltrated by Purity,” Pearce said. “Look what happened to that DoJ guy, Doolin—and Kiskel.” He shook his head sadly. “Kiskel wasn’t some kind of heroic guy but he put his life on the line and…”
“We have to try,” Seline insisted.
Wolfe nodded. “I don’t have time to wait on them though. I’m going to check out that cargo plane that Verrick’s taken such an interest in. Let me give you the specs and basic methods for the drones, Pearce…”
It wasn’t far to O’Hare airport. Pearce had printed him out a counterfeit access to the cargo field, and Wolfe had swiped a Jaguar to get him there as fast as he dared to go—if he went too fast he’d be delayed, maybe arrested, by Chicago PD.
Now Wolfe was walking up behind the hangar—cargo hangar three, which his PearcePhone designated as the last known location of Roger Verrick.
The orange sun, blurred by the striations of clouds at the horizon, looked like it was spreading out like the broken yolk of an egg. He figured the light was still good for another half hour or so. And Wolfe had to take action within minutes if he was going to stop this thing…
There was a rear corner door, for maintenance workers, at the back of the hangar. Wolfe stalked across the tarmac to the door, opened it, looked out at the interior of the hangar. There was the cargo plane, taking up the hangar floor. The hangar was open to the runway at the front. Lights gleamed from the main airport. Wolfe could see planes taking off—planes full of unsuspecting people who might soon be screaming as the plane crashed into Chicago.
If only he could spot something here—something he could warn the airport authorities about. Something he could phone into Homeland Security— maybe upload a picture to them.
But there was nothing visibly illegal going on in the hangar—nothing that would bring the authorities stampeding here in time. The freight loading ramp at the rear of the cargo jet was down. The aircraft was a 747-400M Combi, a twelve-year-old cargo jet with room for some passengers. Men were loading large oblate canvas covered objects, on wheels, into the back of the fuselage with a roller-conveyer system. The objects just fit. Most of them must already be loaded. One was disappearing into the plane, the other was just going up the ramp. The general shape told Wolfe these were probably the drones—but UAVs could be legitimately shipped—and they were under canvas so they weren’t obvious anyway.
He saw two Graywater mercs standing near the jet, watching the loading, with Mack 10s over their shoulders. No sight of Verrick yet.
Nearer were a number of fueling pumps, washing hoses, and an unloaded freight truck. Wolfe slipped through the door and went stealthily to the left, quickly getting under cover of the fueling pumps. The smell of jet fuel was strong. He waited, looked cautiously around the pump. No one was looking his way. He moved on, and got to the freight truck. It was angled toward the front so he was able to use it for cover to get closer to the cargo plane.
The big spaces of the hangar echoed with voices, the clank of machinery, the whir of the loading machine. Someone laughed.
He had no hope of pretending he belonged here. They had to be on the lookout for him.
But he was close enough, now, to hack the plane’s controls. If he could do it—he could put the kibosh this whole project of Verrick’s, quick and easy.
Squatting in the cover of the truck, Wolfe took out the PearcePhone, and tapped it to aircraft automatic pilot hack…
And got an app error message. It read:
No Can Do. Vehicle/Aircraft is shielded. Cannot be hacked with present techno-interface. Sorry, dude.
He wanted to shout, “Fuck!” but he crouched silently near the grill of the truck, trying to think of a plan. He had to stop this plane from leaving. If it meant he had to pull out the .45 and shoot every son of a bitch here, he had to do it. Countless lives were at stake.
Could he get the truck started—maybe smash it into the plane? Should he try to call Homeland Security? Seline had probably gotten some sort of message to them but it might be too late…
Then he heard, “All clear! Shut the hatch!”
“Shit,” Wolfe muttered, peering over the top of the truck’s hood. The ramp was clear, and beginning to go up on hydraulic lifts.
The two Graywater mercs were walking toward the front of the plane—which was warming up, its engines beginning to whine. The cargo jet was getting ready to taxi for takeoff.
There was no time to do anything…
Except what he did.
He ran for the back of the fuselage, jumped, caught the edge of the rising ramp, did a pull up, and scrambled up onto the metal lip. As he went he imagined it closing—and cutting him in half. Verrick would be pleased, and amused, standing there and looking at him dangling, dying, spitting blood…
But then he was over the steel lip, sliding down into the cargo hold of the aircraft just as the hatch finished closing. The plane jolted forward, and started out of the hangar and Wolfe was thrown forward, fell on his belly with a grunt.
The noise of the engines covered for him. The three men at the other end of the hold, buckling themselves into a short row of seats forward of the six chained-down drones, were facing away from Wolfe and they didn’t turn around. None of them looked like Verrick from here. He was probably in the cockpit with the pilot and maybe Starling.
Wolfe thought about sabotaging the drones. But that would take time, it would make noise, and there might be a short cut to get them neutralized… probably in the cockpit.
The plane was taxiing onto the runway…
Wolfe thought he was probably going to have to sneak up behind these guys and shoot two of them, one after another, rapidly, in the backs of their heads. He’d need the other one alive—he’d have to put the gun to the guy’s head, force him to talk that cockpit door open. Like any large jet, post 9/11, the cockpit would be locked from the inside to prevent hijacking.
He wasn’t looking forward to shooting two strangers in the back of their heads. He couldn’t be sure these guys knew what was going down, here. But he had to do whatever he needed to.
Including, maybe, crashing this plane with himself aboard it, if that was the only way to stop it…
The first thing that came into his mind when he thought of crashing the plane, and going down with it… was a picture of Seline.
She was just sitting on the sofa with her hair up in a towel, her feet bare, looking up at him. Very grave look in her eyes…
He’d probably never see her again.
Just get this done, Wolfe.
Wolfe drew his gun, went into a crouch, and moved alongside the drones toward the men up front. Then the plane took off, steeply and rapidly. Wolfe was thrown off balance, and slid backwards. He grabbed a frame on the bulkhead and held on—then saw that one of the men up front was unbuckling his seat belt, and getting up.
Wolfe flattened, and crawled under one of the drones.
If he tried to take this guy down right here and now, the others would become aware of it—he’d be outgunned and he’d lose the element of surprise. He needed to wait his moment.
He looked at the deck, saw that the drones were locked into some kind of railing. The plane had been retrofitted to facilitate their launching.
Wolfe watched the shoes of the man walking up toward him. The man paused by a drone, and unfastened something with a clicking sound. Then he threw the canvas off the drone. He was getting them ready for launch…