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  ‘Does it matter?’

  ‘There aren’t enough bunks,’ said Guthrie.

  ‘You won’t be staying long. This is just a place to drop your bags and freshen up. We got MREs, if you’re hungry.’

  ‘Like a fucking oven in here.’

  ‘We got plenty of bottled water.’

  ‘Anything refrigerated?’

  Trenchman gestured around him.

  ‘This entire camp is for your benefit. Remember that. None of us chose to be here. We annexed the airport, secured this section of runway so you folks could complete your mission. You ought to be flying from Nellis, but it’s out of action. Don’t know why. Biggest Air Force base in the region. But some major shit went down, place is overrun, so instead we got to hold this shitty runway so you folks have the distance to take off.’

  He checked his watch.

  ‘Sundown. We aim to get you in the air before morning. Soon as you return, we pack our shit and haul ass out of here. Let those infected fucks take the compound. Welcome to it.’

  ‘Where will you go?’

  Trenchman shrugged.

  ‘The war is over. We lost. Earth belongs to the virus. Personally, I aim to find somewhere remote and hold out as long as I can. You folks do as you please.’

  Sundown.

  They crossed a slipway to hangar seven.

  Trenchman fired up a diesel generator wired to an external junction box.

  ‘We keep the hangar doors closed,’ he explained. ‘Try to stay out of sight much as possible. Don’t want to agitate prowlers out there beyond the wire.’

  He opened a side door and let them inside.

  Cavernous dark. Pungent stink of aviation fuel.

  ‘Hold on,’ said Trenchman. His voice echoed.

  He threw a wall-mounted knife switch. Arc lights bolted to high roof girders flared to life.

  A gargantuan plane filled the hangar. A slate grey B-52. Hulking airframe, wide wingspan, almost as big as a 747.

  ‘Liberty Bell. Flown down from Alaska. Spent her twilight years flying stand-off patrols, edge of Russian airspace.’

  ‘What happened to the original crew?’

  ‘They went over the wire a couple of weeks back. Happens now and again. Couple of guys get together, figure they stand a better chance on their own. Desertion, I guess. Not that anyone gives a shit. If a bunch of them walk out the front gate, what am I going to do? Shoot them in the back?’

  Captain Pinback gestured to the plane:

  ‘What kind of condition is she in?’

  ‘We got a Crew Chief. Used to maintain AWACS. Says she’s not in great shape, but it’s not like you’re taking her on a long-haul flight. All she has to do is stay airborne long enough to deliver the package.’

  Pinback walked across the hangar. Echoing bootfalls. He approached the nose of the plane, looked up at the flight deck windows. He patted the hull.

  ‘How long to get her ready?’ asked Trenchman.

  Pinback shrugged.

  ‘Couple of hours for a walk-around. Check her out, kick the tyres. Hour to finish fuelling. Hour or two to load and secure the missile. I’d say wheels up some time around two a.m.’

  Pre-flight inspection. Frost and Pinback watched the Chief and his team conduct a nose-to-tail survey.

  The names of absent airmen stencilled beneath the cockpit windows:

  EMERSON

  BLAIR

  WALTON

  KHODCHENKOVA

  TRAINOR

  It made Frost feel sorry for the abandoned plane, as if the half-billion dollar war machine had been orphaned.

  A three-cable hitch to a power car supplied 205v AC/24v DC.

  A fuel truck parked by the wing, hose hitched to a roof valve set in the fuselage spine, just back from the flight deck. Salute and wave for grunts pumping JP8 into the tanks.

  The main gear bogies: four balloon tyres on white aluminium hubs, chocked, supporting thick hydraulic actuators.

  The Chief knelt and checked tyre pressure.

  He moved on and worked through his checklist:

  Hydraulic reservoirs.

  Accumulator pressure.

  Moisture drains.

  Pitot survey.

  Shuttle valves.

  Wing surfaces.

  Engine intake/duct plugs removed.

  All panels and doors closed and secure.

  Frost glanced up into a gear well. She reached up and ran a finger across the hatch. Fingertip black with dust and grime.

  ‘She’s dying of neglect, sir. Hasn’t been serviced in a long while.’

  ‘Airworthy?’

  ‘Barely. A junker. There are wrecks lined up in Arizona boneyards in better condition than this.’

  Pinback shrugged.

  ‘Single sortie. There and back. That’s all she has to do.’

  They walked beneath the port wing. Huge engine nacelles, each containing two Pratt & Whitney turbofans. Wide intakes. Fanned turbine blades.

  Frost traced a rivet seam with her finger.

  ‘Corrosion.’

  ‘Not as much as I anticipated.’

  ‘Yeah, but what can’t we see?’

  They walked the length of the plane.

  The bomb bay doors.

  The vast vulpine tail.

  ‘What do you reckon, old girl?’ said Pinback, addressing the aircraft. ‘Want to put on your war paint one last time?’

  Briefing.

  The hangar office. Frost set metal chairs in a semicircle, encounter group-style. Hancock dragged them to face front, reasserting traditional hierarchy.

  Geodetic data, National Recon topographical maps and satellite images pinned to a noticeboard.

  Trenchman polished thick-framed Air Force reg glasses.

  ‘Simple enough mission. Proceed to the drop point. Launch the package. Fly home. Approximately four-hour flight time.

  ‘Why us?’ asked Pinback. ‘Plenty of delivery systems. Pop a Tomahawk from offshore.’

  ‘Tactical strike,’ said Hancock. He sat apart from the aircrew, arms folded, aviator shades. ‘Plenty of ships equipped to throw an H bomb big enough to leave a mile-deep crater. But we don’t want to fry southern California. Just want to take out the target, clean and precise.’

  ‘But why Liberty Bell? She was a beautiful bird, back in the day. But right now she’s fit for a wrecker’s yard.’

  ‘Little choice. Original plan was to use a Minuteman RV to deliver the mail. 44th Missile Wing out in Dakota. They tried to fire up a mothballed silo, but the place got overrun before they could launch. You know the score. The world is falling apart. We have to adapt. Use what we can find.’

  ‘B-2s?’

  ‘Otherwise engaged.’

  ‘Subs?’

  ‘Lost communication. They must be out there, somewhere, under autonomous control.’

  Pinback leaned forwards and peered at sat photos. A desert mountain range. Sedimentary rock. Rippling contours. Peaks, mesas, ravines.

  ‘What’s the target?’

  ‘Classified. The missile will make the final leg of the journey on its own. You won’t even see the aim point. All you have to do is confirm detonation, then return to base.’

  ‘What kind of bang are we talking about?’

  ‘Ten kilotons. Like I say: weapon release fifteen minutes from target. Just take position and watch the show.’

  Trenchman turned to Frost.

  ‘You’re the radar nav, right?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  He handed Frost a plastic disk on a lanyard.

  ‘Old school authorisation protocol. Dual key, all the way.’

  Frost turned the disk in her hand.

  ‘The arm code?’

  Trenchman nodded.

  ‘Captain Hancock holds the other one. Two minutes from the drop point, you will contact me for final authorisation to proceed. Once you’ve got the Go, your EWO will arm the weapon. Load both codes. Then you’re hot to trot.’

  Hancock looked around at
sombre faces.

  ‘Hey. First folks to drop an atomic weapon on US soil in anger. We’re about to make history.’

  4

  Trenchman activated the hangar door controls. Motor whine. Clatter of drum-chain. The doors parted, splitting a huge Delta Airlines logo in half. They slowly slid back, revealing the floodlit aircraft.

  Light spilled across the slipway. Low moan from darkness beyond the perimeter fence. Infected wrenched and tore at the chain-link, agitated by the sight of light and movement. Some of them started to climb the fence. Gunshots from the watchtowers. Snipers momentarily lit by muzzle flash, eyes to the scope. Rotted bodies fell from the wire, decapitated by .50 cal rounds. They hit the ground, and were immediately trampled underfoot.

  Osborne:

  ‘Hey, Colonel.’

  Trenchman unhooked his radio.

  ‘Go ahead.’

  ‘Neighbours are getting mighty restless, sir. Need that plane in the air, soon as practicable.’

  ‘Roger that.’

  Hancock rolled the weapon platform into the hangar on silent wheels. Two sentries paced behind the electric truck.

  Pinback watched as he parked the truck behind the wing, flush with the plane’s fuselage.

  ‘Give me a hand.’

  Pinback helped Hancock unrope the tarp and pull it clear.

  First sight of the weapon. AGM-129 ACM. Twenty feet long. One and a half tons. Porcelain white. Forward-sweeping fins.

  Hancock released canvas retaining straps.

  ‘Better stand back.’

  He adjusted the handset. The carriage wheels swivelled ninety degrees. The weapon truck slowly slid beneath the plane, easing to a halt beneath the open bomb bay doors.

  Hancock ducked beneath the doors and looked up into the payload compartment. Frost stood on a narrow walkway looking down on him.

  ‘Ten kilotons.’

  ‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘Hiroshima, give or take.’

  ‘You’ve done your sums, right? We won’t get blasted out the sky?’

  ‘We’ll be fifteen minutes clear. Close enough for a grandstand view. Thermonuclear detonation, up close and personal. Not many folk get the privilege.’

  He activated brakes. Steel feet extended and anchored the weapon platform to the hangar floor.

  He pressed RAISE. Hydraulic rams began to lift the massive weapon into the belly of the plane.

  The flight deck.

  Pinback ducked beneath overhead control panels and lowered himself into the pilot seat. He secured the five-point harness.

  Interior inspection. He checked avionic presets.

  ‘Battery start.’

  The external AC cart was disconnected and rolled clear. Thumbs up from the crew chief.

  ‘All yours.’

  Aircraft on internal power.

  Trim check. Another thumbs up from the chief. He disconnected his external headset and stepped clear.

  Pinback:

  ‘All right. Engine start.’

  Ground crew wearing heavy ear defenders fired up the start-cart. Air injected at 30 psi kicked engine pod two into life. Engines three and four boosted the other turbofans to motion.

  ‘Starting one, starting two …’

  Throttles to Idle. Check rpms.

  A shudder ran through the plane. Escalating jet roar.

  Start-cart rolled clear.

  Chocks removed.

  Clearance to taxi.

  The lower cabin.

  Frost secured the floor hatch and replaced the deck cover.

  She strapped herself into the radar nav chair. She secured her helmet, jacked her oxygen feed and radio. She loaded cryptographic presets, slotted a data transfer cartridge and uploaded flight data.

  It would be a quiet journey. Noble, the Electronic Warfare Officer, would have little to do. There would be no air contacts, no acquisition lock from enemy radar. They would fly through empty skies. Drum his fingers until the final moments when he would confirm authorisation to deploy, call the countdown, then hit WPN REL. The missile would drop from the payload bay. Boosters would fire and the ALCM would begin its journey, skimming the dunes at Mach zero-point-five. Liberty Bell would circle at safe distance and wait for the blast.

  Ten kilotons. A mix of dread and exhilaration.

  Guthrie leant close, conspiratorial:

  ‘What do think?’ he asked, gesturing up the ladderwell to the flight deck.

  ‘Hancock? A true believer. A zealot and an asshole.’

  Frost took gum from her mouth and glued her lucky coin to the console. She secured her oxygen mask and adjusted her harness.

  Flaps lowered. Brakes released.

  ‘Let’s roll her out the barn.’

  Pinback eased the throttles forwards.

  The massive B-52 slowly rolled from the hangar out onto the floodlit chevrons of the slipway.

  They followed lead-on lights to the runway. Slow taxi to the head of 19R.

  The plane jinked starboard, aligned itself on the threshold, facing the nine-thousand foot strip.

  Pinback secured his oxygen hose and mask. He jacked the interphone cable.

  ‘Trench. You copy?’

  ‘Ten-four.’

  ‘Hit the lights.’

  Runway lamps, centre line and edge. Brilliant white. A wide boulevard stretching to vanishing point.

  First time Pinback had seen the perimeter fence from an elevated perspective. Hundreds of infected butting the wire.

  ‘Jesus Christ. They can’t hold them back much longer.’

  ‘Not our problem,’ said Hancock. He checked output dials. ‘EPR good.’

  ‘Ejector seat arm.’

  ‘Ejector seat arm. You have the plane.’

  ‘Time to hit the road.’

  Pinback gripped the throttle levers and eased them forwards. Airspeed indicator crept from zero.

  Increasing thrust. Pressed back in their seats by acceleration. Engine rumble rising to an earthquake jet-roar.

  Hancock:

  ‘… Twenty knots. Thirty …’

  Pinback glanced down at the central alert panel. Winking red light.

  ‘Intermittent fuel warning on three.’

  The warning light shut off.

  ‘Cleared,’ said Hancock.

  ‘I’m calling abort. We need to put her back in the hangar and check it out.’

  ‘Negative. You will fly the plane.’

  ‘I’m ranking AC.’

  ‘And I have tactical command. The warning has cleared. You will get this bird in the air and complete the mission.’

  Heading for the end lights and stopway. Moment of decision. Pinback increased thrust.

  ‘… sixty, sixty five …’

  Airspeed clocked seventy.

  He eased back the control column.

  Nose up.

  Wheels left asphalt.

  They took to the sky.

  5

  Frost woke face down in sand.

  Her field of vision: a gloved hand viewed through the amber tint of her visor. A Nomex gauntlet. Seams, strap cuffs, and her, alive, looking at it.

  She rolled onto her shoulder.

  Dunes rippled heat.

  She fumbled the sweat-slicked silicone of her oxygen mask and released the latch. She pulled off her helmet and threw it aside. It rolled. The airhose snaked in the dust.

  Fierce sun. Blue sky. She shielded her eyes from the glare.

  ‘Hey.’

  Silence.

  ‘Yo. Anyone?’

  Nothing.

  She patted herself down, ran fingers through her hair and checked her scalp for blood.

  Typical injuries a person could expect to sustain during the 12g-force of ejection: bust ankles, concussion, compressed spine.

  She tried to sit forwards. Shock of pain.

  ‘Motherfuck.’

  Her right leg. A sudden wave of dizziness and nausea.

  She lay back, panting for breath. She was tempted to unlace her boot, slit her pant leg, p
robe her ankle and shin for broken bone. But if she unstrapped the injury, pain and swelling might render her immobile.

  ‘Hey. Anyone?’

  Sudden wrench. Hauled backwards six feet. She scrabbled at the parachute harness and flipped the canopy release. Nylon billowed and pulled tangled chute cord beyond the lip of a high dune.

  She shrugged off the harness.

  A morphine auto-injector pen in the sleeve pocket of her flight suit. She popped the cap, stabbed the needle into her thigh and delivered a 15mg shot.

  Warm bliss diffused through her veins.

  Her survival vest: nylon pouches slung on a mesh yoke.

  She took out a PRQ-7 CSEL radio and pulled it from a protective plastic sleeve. She extended the antenna and maxed the volume.

  ‘This is Lieutenant Frost, US-B52 Liberty Bell, anyone copy, over?’

  No response.

  ‘Mayday, Mayday, Mayday. This is Lieutenant Frost, United States Air Force, navigator tail MT66 broadcasting on SAR, anyone copy?’

  She was transmitting on the standard military Search and Rescue frequency. The mid-watch radioman back at the Vegas compound should be on air demanding comsec validation: her day-word and a digit from her authentication number.

  Nothing.

  She cupped a hand over the screen to shield it from glare.

  GPS hung at ACQUIRING SIGNAL. All base stations returned NO COMMS.

  She shut off the radio to conserve power.

  She unwrapped a stubby marine flare. She flipped the striker and tossed the pyro.

  She lay back and watched red smoke curl into a cloudless sky.

  Crawling up a steep gradient on hands and knees. Her lame leg gouged a trench.

  She crested a dune. She shielded her eyes.

  A rippling sandscape stretched to the horizon. Primal nothing, like something out of dreams. It was as if she had turned inwards and was traversing her own deep cortical terrain, a race memory bequeathed by early hominids. The hunt: tracking prey across sun-baked, sub-Saharan wilderness, spear in hand.

  She checked her sleeve pocket. Two more morphine shots.

  Somewhere among the dunes lay the slate-grey wreckage of Liberty Bell. A UHF beacon bedded in the debris transmitting a homing tocsin on 121 and 243 MHz.

  Somewhere, in the Vegas garrison, a radioman would pick up the distress signal. Trenchman would call Flight Quarters. Alert 60. He would assemble a TRAP squad and order immediate scramble. The team would strap their vests, buckle helmets, distribute live ammo. The Chinook would be marshalled out of the hangar. Strap in, spin up, head west tracking their beacon. Touch down at the crash site, rotors kicking up a storm. The squad would descend the loading ramp. They would cut the twisted fuselage with oxy-acetylene gear, slice open the belly of the aircraft, suit up and take Geiger readings before entering the payload bay to retrieve the warhead. Finally they would fry sensitive electronics with thermite grenades, and begin a radial search for survivors. Scan the dunes for the six personnel that ejected from the craft.