Fly by Night (39 page)

Khoury didn’t move. “It is time to finish our work, Fadi. Achmed has received the final coordinates.”

For Jibril, these were the words that brought the truth crashing down. It was a lie, pure and absolute. He had been listening to the auxiliary frequency for the last two hours. There had been no instructions from any contact in Israel. The only thing Jibril had heard was the desperate voice of an unknown woman. He suddenly realized that Rafiq Khoury was not alone behind him. One of the guards was standing at his side.

“Yes, of course, sheik.”

Khoury placed a handwritten set of coordinates on the work table in front of Jibril. N29°58′50.95″ E31°09′0.10″.

“Now!” Khoury commanded.

Jibril’s hands went slowly to the keyboard. The coordinates were not in Israel—he knew this instantly—but without a map he could only estimate. Jibril tried to mentally plot the lat-long pairing using the map on his display. Somewhere north of their present position. Near Cairo perhaps? He thought about questioning the numbers, but Khoury would only grow suspicious.

The hand of death left his shoulder.

Jibril decided that identifying the target was not important. All that mattered was the evil around him. Deftly, he brushed a finger on the caps lock key and began typing the sequence. The coordinate field on the screen became populated with an indecipherable mash of symbols.

“What are you doing?” Khoury objected.

“I don’t know what is wrong, sheik. The—”

Two arms wrapped around Jibril’s chest, restraining him like a straightjacket. Khoury leaned in and entered the final coordinates, just as Jibril had taught him. The same scramble of symbols.

“What have you done?” Khoury hissed.

Fixed to his chair, Jibril watched as the imam figured out the problem. He released the caps lock key, and his second attempt succeeded. The message
FINAL POSITION UPDATE CONFIRMED
flashed for three seconds, followed by a lone word in surreal green letters at the center of the screen.
AUTONOMOUS
. In a matter of minutes, Blackstar would turn north on its final course, guided in the terminal phase by onboard systems that would hold to an accuracy of less than ten meters. Precise enough, Jibril supposed, for whatever Khoury had in mind. Worst of all, there was no way to change the command or abort. Blackstar was now irretrievable.

Jibril began to struggle against the arms that anchored him to his chair. Struggled until something blunt crashed into his head. Dazed, Jibril went limp and felt warmth oozing down one cheek.

Khoury leaned forward to be in his field of vision. “In the end you have failed me, Fadi. Fortunately, your American conscience is too late.”

“My … my what?”

Khoury started to speak again, but was interrupted by shouts from the cockpit. The words were indistinguishable to Jibril—his headset still covered one ear, and the other was ringing from the blow he’d taken. But his eyes were sharp enough. He saw Achmed coming aft again. He began jabbering to Khoury, gesticulating wildly. Only when he got closer did the words register for Jibril.

“Again he sends me here!” Achmed complained. “There is nothing wrong, I tell you. He is a madman!”

Khoury stared at the cockpit, suspicion in his mismatched gaze. He murmured into Achmed’s ear.

From the headset, Jibril heard the woman’s voice crackle across the airwaves again. It was maddening. If he spoke only once again in
his life, it would be to warn whoever it was, hope that they could forestall the terror about to rain. But Jibril had no voice. The only way to transmit was to use the microphones in the cockpit.

Moments later, his headset buzzed as someone did exactly that.

Davis heard Schmitt growl over the radio, “Who the hell is this?”

He took the microphone from Antonelli. “Say position!”

After modest pause, Schmitt said, “We’re thirty south of Giza, near our IP.”

IP was the military abbreviation for “initial point,” the spot you used as a beginning reference for a final attack run. Davis checked his instruments and estimated that Schmitt was twenty miles ahead.

Schmitt again. “Jammer, I don’t have much time. Khoury and Achmed are getting suspicious. Can somebody tell me what the hell this is all about?”

“Yeah, I’ll tell you,” Davis said. “That drone you’re controlling is about to obliterate the Arab League conference in Giza.”

Another pause, this one much longer. Davis imagined Schmitt deciphering the ramifications of that. He wasn’t stupid—just self-centered. He’d been concentrating on a nice payday, and probably assuming that anything involving Rafiq Khoury and Fly by Night Aviation had to be minor league. Now he was thinking differently, understanding the damage about to be done.

“So what can we do?” Schmitt finally replied.

Davis had no answer. He’d come this far just to establish contact, but now what? If he were sitting in the cockpit next to Schmitt, they could put aside their miserable past and come up with a plan. Davis could swing a fist or a crash ax while Schmitt flew. From where he was, Davis was helpless.

“How much time is left?” he asked. “Do you have any idea when this strike is going to happen?”

Schmitt said, “I can see the drone now. It’s in a holding pattern a thousand feet below me.”

“Okay, so it hasn’t launched yet. If there’s enough time we could—”

“Ten o’clock!” Antonelli shouted from across the cockpit.

The way she blurted it out, Davis’ first instinct was to turn his head sixty degrees to the left—the ten o’clock position to any pilot—and look for an incoming missile. Then he put it in her layman’s terms, lowered the microphone, and looked at her. “Ten o’clock?” he repeated.

“That’s when it will happen.”

“How the hell could you know that?” Davis asked.

“It has been in the news for weeks. The Arab League conference begins at ten o’clock. All the heads of state will be gathered.”

Davis wasn’t wearing a watch, so he cross-checked the clock on the old airplane. Twenty-three minutes. He fumbled over the chart he’d been working with and estimated the position of Blackstar relative to Giza. Twenty minutes was just about right—if Blackstar left right now.

He keyed the microphone. “Schmitt, I think the drone is going to depart the IP any minute. We’ve got to do something now. What if you powered down all the electrical busses on your airplane? Could that interrupt the control? Maybe screw something up?”

“I could try, but it wouldn’t work for long. I’ve got two of Khoury’s goons over my right shoulder. They have guns and aren’t going to let—hang on, Jammer. I’m watching the drone right now, and it just took a turn to the north. Maybe if I—crap!”

Schmitt’s microphone went hot again, and Davis heard shouting. Schmitt was clearly struggling. More shouts in Arabic, loud and clear. Close to the microphone. Close to Bob Schmitt. He was under attack. The transmission cut off.

Davis tried to imagine what he would do in that situation. Outnumbered, outgunned. Only one idea came to mind.

“Defensive maneuvering! Push over, negative Gs! You’re strapped in but they’re not! Do it now!” Davis hoped Schmitt could still hear the radio. He repeated it all, then kept repeating it because that was all he could do. Davis saw a tiny dot ahead and thought it might be Schmitt’s DC-3, but soon he realized it was the other aircraft—the ominous arrowhead that was Blackstar. It was heading north, just like
Schmitt had said, so the DC-3 had to be to its left. Davis scanned, and did see a second dot, perhaps ten miles ahead. He watched closely, and for the first few seconds the airplane was cruising straight and true.

Then it looked like a roller coaster in a typhoon.

Rafiq Khoury had been keeping an eye on the stunned engineer while his men—Achmed and the two guards—dealt with Schmitt. Khoury was a satisfied man. His work was done, and all that remained was to rendezvous at the abandoned airstrip with General Ali’s helicopter—or rather, President Ali’s helicopter. There, they would kill Jibril and the Americans, and as a final touch make this aircraft their funeral pyre. He wondered briefly if the general had captured the last American, Davis. Khoury decided it didn’t matter. They had succeeded in every way. Khoury was staring at Jibril’s computer screen, idly imagining the possibilities his new life would present, when he suddenly began to fly.

He rose effortlessly into the air, as if the world around him was tumbling. There was no up or down, only spinning references and objects soaring past like gravity had taken leave. He hit the ceiling hard, and his eyes shut reflexively. When he opened them again, Khoury saw madness. Bodies and crates and equipment, hanging suspended like so many flakes in a snow globe.

Then, all at once, gravity returned with a vengeance.

From the ceiling, Khoury crashed down like a brick to the metal floor. He heard snapping noises that could only be his bones shattering. He felt indescribable pain in his lower leg. Screams filled the air, cries of both desperation and agony. Khoury tried to move. He got one elbow to the deck and raised his head from the cold metal.

Then it all happened again.

Schmitt’s DC-3 was careening through the sky, oscillating and tumbling.

“What is happening?” asked a horrified Antonelli.

“Negative Gs, then positive. Schmitt is pushing and pulling from stop to stop on his control column. It’s a last ditch maneuver. He’s
buckled into his seat, so he’ll stay put, but anybody who isn’t strapped down in that airplane is getting thrown around like beads in a maraca. I just hope that seventy-year-old airframe stays in one piece.”

They both watched Schmitt’s DC-3 swirl up and down through two more violent cycles, actually flipping inverted on the second. Then it seemed to settle, like a floating leaf that had cleared a section of rapids to end in a calm pool.

The two airplanes were only three miles apart now, nose to nose. Davis had to look out the right-hand window, past Antonelli, to still see Blackstar. The drone was getting smaller, a dot nearly lost in the dusty haze. Davis banked the airplane to change the relative geometry, and the closure to Schmitt’s airplane slowed. He picked up the microphone, and said, “Schmitt, are you there?”

There was no reply.

CHAPTER FORTY

Jibril opened his eyes, or rather tried to. Oddly, the world that spread before him put the word “entropy” in his mind. It was a term he had learned long ago in some undergraduate chemistry class. The measure of a state of disorder. That was what he was looking at—bodies strewn about the cabin amid wiring and paper and equipment. One of Khoury’s guards was nearby, his neck folded impossibly against a shoulder, blank eyes staring into space. Fadi Jibril had never seen death before, but he was seeing it now. Near the flight deck he saw three more bodies, two piled in a heap—the second guard on top of Rafiq Khoury, and Achmed crushed under a pile of equipment that had broken free. He could also see Schmitt at the controls, or at least his shoulder. His shirt was covered in blood, as was the hand Jibril could see on the control column. But the hand was steady.

Jibril performed a self-assessment. His head throbbed where he’d been struck with the butt of a gun, and his right shoulder felt like it was on fire. He saw blood on the console in front of him and, in a strangely detached thought, wondered if it was his. When Jibril tried to move, his right leg shot with pain. He called out to Schmitt, but the pilot didn’t seem to hear.

He reached down and unbuckled his lap belt, the thing that had saved him. Jibril tried to stand, but his right leg buckled immediately, and he tumbled to the steel deck. Grimacing, he pushed onto his side. Jibril looked up, and when he did, his eyes registered something different. It took a moment to realize what it was. Rafiq Khoury had moved. He was closer to Schmitt now.

Jibril tried to yell, tried to raise an alarm, but only managed a
hoarse grunt. He began to crawl, watching in horror as Khoury, his body bloodied and distorted, lunged forward and attacked Schmitt. The two men grappled, falling sideways onto the instruments and levers between the cockpit seats. There was a tangle of bloody arms and whipping fists, howls of pain and rage. He watched the two men fall back into the cabin, leaving the craft to fly itself. The imam was utterly insane, Jibril thought, attacking the only person who could fly the airplane. Soon Khoury was on top with something big and heavy in his hand. He was hammering at Schmitt, striking again and again. The burly American tried to fend off the blows but was clearly weakening under the onslaught.

Jibril tried to crawl closer, but his shattered leg was useless. He spotted one of the guard’s weapons nearby, a machine pistol. Jibril had never used such a thing in his life, but he would learn right now. He stretched out and touched the barrel with his fingertips, dragged it closer until he had a good grip. He pointed the steel barrel at Rafiq Khoury and tried to pull the trigger. Nothing happened. The trigger seemed jammed.

More screams from the front, Khoury still pounding away.

Jibril brought the gun closer. Weapons had safety levers, and the engineer tried to deduce where it would be. He found it near the trigger, a tiny black lever. Jibril flicked it forward, pointed the barrel as best he could and fired. The weapon kicked in his hands, and a deafening noise reverberated through the cabin.

Khoury seemed to freeze, his arm poised overhead for a final strike. Schmitt managed to roll clear, and Jibril fired again, this time holding the trigger down. The gun kicked three more times, and he saw the imam shudder, saw his white robe blossom with splotches of red. Then, finally, he collapsed.

Schmitt pushed clear of Khoury’s body and rose unsteadily. There was agony in his battered face, but he caught Jibril’s eyes and the two exchanged a look. Schmitt gave a subtle nod before stumbling back to the flight deck.

Jibril tried to move again, but the pain in his leg was excruciating. He eased back and tried to take pressure off the limb. Resting on the
cold steel deck, he closed his eyes. Jibril cursed inwardly. How could he have been so blind to the imam? He had only seen what he’d wanted to see. Heard what he’d wanted to hear.
You will be to Sudan what A.Q. Khan was to Pakistan. The father of a nation’s technical might.