"Oh, this is doing no good," Mr. Phillips said, jabbing the end of his missile launcher out of the helicopter and trying to take better aim. "Get away from these distractions. Fly south into the open swamp, but stay away from the Canaveral Air Force Base. I don't want any trouble from fighter planes and even more helicopters."

Wrenching the stick, Nicole guided the craft away from the rocket garden and headed out to the sprawling open swamp again. Mr. Phillips saw a clearing near rivulets of water, tufts of pampas gra.s.s, and palmettos. "There," he pointed, "set down there. I need just a few seconds." When Nicole hesitated, Mr.

Phillips jabbed his pistol into her ribs. "I don't want to argue."

Nicole pressed her lips together and nodded. After gaining some distance ahead of Iceberg, she brought the helicopter toward the ground.

Mr. Phillips leaned forward, pointing his launcher up into the sky, searching for a good target. He aimed toward the approaching chattering machine-and Iceberg was flying right into the trap.

62

MERRITT ISLAND NATIONAL.

WILDLIFE REFUGE.

THE HELICOPTER LURCHED ON its skids as it settled to the damp ground. Nicole chose the best landing spot she could find in the tangle of underbrush. She hoped the surrounding trees would block Mr.

Phillips's shot.

The helicopter canted at a slight angle, but the little man braced himself as he propped the rocket launcher against his knees. He tracked Iceberg's oncoming craft with his flinty eyes. Every few seconds he'd glance back into the c.o.c.kpit.

Nicole watched the man as he simultaneously tried to position the launcher and keep a hand on his pistol. "There's no need to do this, Mr. Phillips," Nicole said. "Let me talk to Iceberg. I'm sure I can-"

"You're taking away all my fun," he said. He slid the missile into the tube and craned his neck, twisting around to get the right angle.

Iceberg's helicopter roared overhead, its engine like stroboscopic thunder. Nicole looked up past the edge of the curved windshield, watching as the copter's shadow pa.s.sed and then circled back. Iceberg bore down on them.

In the back of the c.o.c.kpit, Senator Boorman's voice was shrill. "He's going to shoot him out of the sky!"

Turning in his seat, Mr. Phillips aimed his pistol with his other hand and jabbed it toward the senator.

"Mr. Boorman, you're making it extremely difficult for me to concentrate. I'm going to shoot you if you don't control yourself."

"You're going to shoot us anyway," the senator wailed.

"Don't encourage me," Mr. Phillips said, giving a calmer but colder glare in Nicole's direction. "I would also be very unhappy if you decided to do anything unwise, Ms. Hunter."

Iceberg roared overhead, bearing down. What the h.e.l.l does he think he's doing? Nicole thought.

Was he going to crash on top of them?

Mr. Phillips turned back to his missile launcher, squinting through the aiming circle. "Steady . . . steady .

. ." His finger tensed on the trigger.

Nicole gripped the control stick, frantically wondering what she could do. Phillips would shoot her if she did anything to defy him. But at least it would save Iceberg. Was he worth dying for?

Nicole was just about to grab the throttle and make the helicopter buck when behind her Senator Boorman suddenly lunged for the wide-open doorway opposite Mr. Phillips. He leaped out the back of the helicopter with a splash into the swamp. Nicole jerked the control stick.

The helicopter joggled from side to side, throwing off Mr. Phillips's aim-just as he depressed the firing b.u.t.ton.

The Stinger whistled out, but the shot went wild, arching high and down toward the swamp. The dart-shaped explosive struck a hummock and detonated, transforming a clump of palmettos into a fireball.

The thunderous report scared up a group of flamingos that flapped their broad pink wings as they catapulted into the air.

Mr. Phillips snarled. He twisted around to see Boorman running across the marsh, slogging in his wing-tipped loafers through the brown water and mud. The senator ran all-out, crashing in blind panic through creepers and scrub brush. Mr. Phillips brought his pistol around, intending to shoot across the c.o.c.kpit of the helicopter-but then he controlled himself and snorted with disgust toward the man's receding form. "Let us hope the alligators eat him," he said.

Focusing on the task at hand, Mr. Phillips reached back into the satchel and withdrew his last missile and fitted it into the launching tube. "Second time's the charm," he said.

Iceberg's helicopter came around again, and Nicole couldn't figure out what the big ox had in mind. She knew he was rash and impulsive, but this behavior was nothing short of suicidal. Was he doing it out ofsome sense of obligation to her? She would have preferred it if he just kept himself alive. Iceberg had already seen the first missile launched at him-but now he was coming back, as if asking for it.

"No, Iceberg," she whispered. "Go away." Was he more interested in stopping Phillips, or saving her?

Or was he just seeing red and bulldozing his way forward?

Mr. Phillips spoke out of the corner of his mouth as he propped his elbow again. "Your Iceberg seems to be under the impression that he can do something about this situation."

"It's typical of him," Nicole whispered. "He's never concerned with the fact that the odds are totally against him."

Mr. Phillips grunted, intent on aiming the launcher tube. "Please move away from the controls, Ms.

Hunter. I can still see you."

Nicole leaned back. She knew Iceberg was a crack pilot-but not in a helicopter. She had to pray that he could do something to evade the missile as it flew toward him-and once he had launched the second rocket, Mr. Phillips would have nothing but a few bullets in his pistol. He was at the ragged end of his precious plan.

While the little man was preoccupied, though, and as Iceberg's helicopter bore down on them, Nicole saw another chance-something the terrorist wouldn't expect at all. And though it wouldn't help her this instant, it gave her hope, a bargaining chip.

As Mr. Phillips crouched over the launcher tube, Nicole reached with her left foot, probing behind the pilot's seat until her toe snagged the handle of the briefcase full of precious gems.

She watched the dapper little man intently, holding her breath. He tracked with the launcher tube as his lips curved upward in a grin. Finally he let out a long sudden sigh and pressed the firing b.u.t.ton.

As the rocket hissed out of the launching tube, Nicole used that moment to drag her foot forward, pulling the briefcase with her, and nudging it over the edge out the pilot's side.

The heavy case tumbled out of the helicopter and fell into the swamp.

Nicole whipped her gaze to the right, staring out the c.o.c.kpit windshield to see the accelerating missile buzz into the ceramic blue sky on a tail of fire and smoke.

The dartlike Stinger spiraled upward, silently now with the distance, as Iceberg's own MH-53J aircraft moved toward it. The two were on a collision course. Mr. Phillips had aimed well.

But at the last instant Iceberg wrenched his copter to one side, sliding down in the sky. He dropped by a good thirty yards so that the missile roared overhead and detonated just above his rotor blades.

The explosion was close, too close. Like an invisible hand, the blast slammed Iceberg's helicopter-already on a downsweep-farther down.

Nicole saw him lose control, go into a spin. The aircraft seemed to flare out, struggling to remain aloft, but then it crumpled to the ground in the distance, bouncing once.

Mr. Phillips tossed the empty rocket launcher tube over the side, useless now that he had no more missiles. He straightened himself in his seat once again, brushing off his rumpled suit jacket.

"Exhilarating," he said, then carefully buckled his seatbelt. Impatiently, he gestured for Nicole to take off. "Quickly now."

The helicopter heaved itself off the marshy ground and into the sky once more. Nicole gripped the control stick so tightly her knuckles whitened. She imagined it was Mr. Phillips's throat, and squeezed harder.

"It's been fun, but this is getting tiresome. Carry on back out to the ocean. I want to be flying low over the water as soon as possible."

He drew a deep breath, smoothed his jacket, and folded his manicured hands neatly in his lap. "After all of today's ha.s.sles, I am very much looking forward to a nice vacation for the rest of my life."

63.

TYNDALL AIR FORCE BASE, FLORIDA.

A FLIGHT OF FOUR F-16C Falcons roared down the runway at Tyndall Air Force Base, near PanamaCity. Though the F-16s carried a full load of Gatling guns and two air-to-air heat-seeking missiles-more than enough to bring down the helicopter the terrorist had commandeered-they were under strict orders not to shoot because of the two hostages. It wouldn't do to have the Chairman of the Senate's Foreign Relations Committee end his tenure as an incandescent fireball, along with NASA's Launch Director.

The fighter pilots lit their afterburners, throwing fire and exhaust thirty feet behind them. Airborne, they reached their cruising alt.i.tude of twenty thousand feet within minutes, leaving the Gulf Coast of Florida and heading inland.

Switching on their Forward-Looking Infrared Radar, they flew in a loose trail formation, following each other a mile apart across the Florida peninsula. With the FUR they could track the escaping helicopter and lock onto their target from miles away-if they could narrow down the general area for the search pattern.

Using scrambled communications, they gave a five-minute estimated time of arrival.

Farther northwest on the Florida panhandle, a flight of two F-15Es took off from Eglin Air Force Base, carrying sophisticated tracking packages that had previously been developed to counter Soviet military threats during the Cold War. Now they would be put to other uses. The F-15Es gave an ETA of twenty minutes.

Before long, they all expected to converge on the terrorist's escape helicopter.

CINCCENTCOM-Commander-in-Chief of Central Command-was headquartered at McDill AFB in Tampa, across the Florida peninsula from Kennedy s.p.a.ce Center. Technically responsible for U.S.

national security interests for Africa and the Middle East, CINCCENTCOM had the closest military command structure available for the defense of Kennedy s.p.a.ce Center. The other CINCs protested when CINCCENTCOM was given the task to apprehend the fleeing terrorist, but geographic location won out over other considerations; too much time had been wasted already on this response.

The four-star general had at his disposal an awesome array of war-planes, naval ships, and ground troops. One of his predecessors had commanded the five hundred thousand troops used during the Gulf War. Now he had to handle one escaping criminal.

CINCCENTCOM moved forward in his chair in the command's ready room. The carpeted, air-conditioned chamber was outfitted with computer monitors recessed into the long wooden table and covered with gla.s.s plates. As a half dozen grim-faced men and women stood behind the general in attendance, the computers synthesized and color-coded radar and FLIR data before splashing it on the huge wall screen, which displayed only a small part of Florida in incredible detail. With all the sophisticated weaponry converging on Cape Canaveral, a small, slow-moving blip on the screen drew all their attention.

CINCCENTCOM did not look happy. "How are we tracking the helicopter?"

A young Air Force major stood behind the general, at his left, her black hair in a tight bun pinned neatly out of the way. She would be the only Air Force liaison until her boss, a two-star general, arrived.

"We're getting the feed from NORAD in Colorado Springs, General," she said. "The radar is from two sources, a ground unit at Patrick AFB south of Kennedy, and some Over-the-Horizon-Backscatter information coming in from Virginia.

"Unfortunately, until our fighters arrive in the area, we won't have any airborne data. Special Operations Command is preparing to divert its C-130 that carries FLIR, but it will take a while until they can get there. Some NASA security helicopters are already up, but they won't be able to do any tracking since they can't outfly our bad guy. He's got too much of a head start." She pointed at the large screen.

"Right now we're masking out all other air traffic so you can see where we've determined the helicopter must be heading."

The slow-moving blip headed steadily out to sea. CINCCENTCOM drummed his fingers on the wooden table. "What about AWACS? Do we have any planes available to track this thing other than fighters?"

The young Air Force major checked a crib sheet she had scribbled just minutes prior to entering the command center, studying the data for the Airborne Warning and Command System. "We're using one AWACS for monitoring drug traffic in the Caribbean, but that would take an hour to get up here. Do you want me to do that for you?"

CINCCENTCOM flicked his eyes back to the broad status screen. The FLIR and radar data from the approaching fighters started to converge on the slow-moving blip as it headed across the water. Within minutes he'd have overlapping coverage of the escaping helicopter from the air. Suddenly, the blip vanished from the screen. The general spun his chair around. "What just happened?" The young major stepped forward and studied a monitor. "The helicopter dropped out of sight from our ground-based radar. Could be he's gone down in the Atlantic." "Put the rest of the air traffic back up. Display it all."

The screen flickered as it filled with radar tracks of commercial airliners, small private planes, and the helicopters around Kennedy s.p.a.ce Center. CINCCENTCOM growled, "So where's our target?"

"It dropped too low for the ground-based radar, sir," the Air Force major said. "The over-the-horizon ground clutter can't handle it."

"So he's rendezvousing with a boat or a sub," said the general simply.

The young Air Force major hesitated. "Either that, sir, or he's landed in the ocean."

CINCCENTCOM settled back in his chair. "Get those fighters out there and send me a visual. We're not going to have him slip through our fingers. That b.a.s.t.a.r.d blew up our s.p.a.ce shuttle!"

"Yes, sir." She sent out the order even as the general finished speaking.

64.

ESCAPE HELICOPTER.

UNDER MR. PHILLIPS'S GUIDANCE, Nicole held the helicopter steady, flying at full throttle straight out over the Atlantic. The aircraft screamed so low over the waves she could smell spray through the open sides of the helicopter. The backwash from the rotor blades flattened the greenish-blue swells of the Atlantic, and a fine mist dusted the curved windshield.

"How far am I supposed to go?" she said.

"Just proceed for a few more minutes. You're doing fine."

Nicole kept her gaze intent on the unbroken waves. She spotted no vessel, no rendezvous submarine, not even a fishing boat or pleasure craft. "So where's this submarine? Maybe your friends decided not to show up."

Mr. Phillips reached into his jacket and took out his pocket watch, flipping open the lid. "So anxious to get rid of me, Ms. Hunter?"

"Yes," she said. "Yes I am."

He snapped his watch shut and casually stuffed it back into his breast pocket before turning to her. A smile curved his lips. "As a matter of fact, there is no submarine . . . but we should have disappeared on all the screens by now." He made a circular motion with his fingers. "Go on, double back. Turn us around and head toward land again. But keep it so low our runners get wet."

"This is crazy!" Nicole pulled the helicopter in a sweeping turn, finally letting loose some of her temper.

"You've just stolen millions and millions of dollars, and everyone is looking for you. What are you going to do now?"

He grinned as if she had set him up perfectly. "Why, I'm going to Disneyland! Disney World, actually."