The Revelation Code (Wilde/Chase 11) (41 page)

‘The Secret Service did say Paxton could fly practically anything,’ she recalled. ‘Would that include airships?’

‘It’s a big balloon with propellers on it. Can’t be too hard. We should check it out.’

‘Or we could tell the Secret Service to check it.’

‘You think Talsillybugger’d pay any attention to us? It’s just a theory, and a pretty fucking daft one at that. But . . .’

‘But it’s just insane enough to be true?’ she finished for him. They exchanged looks. ‘Just when I thought it was all over . . .’

‘We need to hire a fat lady to sing for us,’ Eddie said with a grin. ‘Okay, so how the hell are we going to get off this bridge?’ He checked the road. They were on the upper deck, two narrow Manhattan-bound lanes with concrete barriers hemming them in on both sides, and no sidewalks. Nor was there any easy way to climb down to the walkway on the lower deck. ‘Huh. Might have to rethink this.’

Nina looked ahead. The traffic was still stationary. ‘God knows how long it’ll take us to get across the river. And then we’ve still got to come back the other way.’ She reached for the door handle. ‘We’ll have to do it on foot.’

The driver turned in alarm. ‘Hey, hey! You can’t get out on the bridge.’

‘No, you can’t,’ Eddie added. ‘Seriously! It’s at least a quarter of a mile back to ground level.’

‘It’ll be a lot faster than driving across and then turning around. And you were the one who wanted to check out the airship. If Cross really is planning to use it—’

‘That was just a theory! And like I said, a daft one at that. How often am I right about this stuff?’

‘Way too often. Come on.’ She opened the door and hopped out.

‘No, lady, wait!’ the driver yelled. ‘Get back inside!’

‘Nina— Oh, for Christ’s sake,’ Eddie said in exasperation. He thrust some banknotes through the cab’s pay slot, then slid across the rear seat to follow her.

She had emerged on the roadway’s right, beside one of the barriers. A railing behind it meant that she was in no danger of falling over the edge, but there was very little space between the concrete wall and the oncoming vehicles. ‘Nina, wait!’ he shouted as she hurried towards Brooklyn. She didn’t stop; with a dismayed shake of his head, he ran after her. People in the stationary cars regarded them boggle-eyed as they passed.

He quickly caught up with his limping wife. ‘Are you fucking insane?’

‘I’m pregnant,’ she shot back. ‘If anyone asks, I’ll tell them it’s hormones!’

‘At least let me go in front of you.’ He squeezed past. ‘I’m not having you use the baby as a bumper!’

They crossed the shoreline, descending the bridge’s long ramp until they were finally able to climb over the barrier to a footpath below. ‘You okay?’ asked the Yorkshireman as he helped Nina down.

‘Yeah, just winded,’ she replied.

‘And the baby?’

She gave him a strained grin. ‘She’s survived gunfights, explosions and jumping over cliffs in boats in the past few days. Jogging for a quarter-mile’s the least of what she’s been through.’

‘You’re bloody mad. You know that, don’t you?’

‘Must be why we work so well together.’ Another smile, this time filled with genuine warmth, then she looked eastwards. ‘We’re only a few blocks from the Navy Yard here, aren’t we?’

‘Yeah, but it’s a big place, and the airship’s on the far side,’ Eddie reminded her. ‘We need another cab.’ They followed the path to a road passing beneath the Manhattan Bridge’s lower end, soon spotting a yellow taxi and hailing it. They climbed in and set off for the north gate of the Brooklyn Navy Yard.

From the bridge, the airship had appeared huge; from the ground, it was like a mothership from another world. The conjoined helium envelopes of the Airlander dwarfed even the largest passenger airliners. The mere sight of the gargantuan craft caused Nina a moment of cognitive dissonance, her brain’s gears grinding as they tried to process the existence of something that seemed impossible. ‘Damn, that’s . . .
big
,’ was all she could say as their cab pulled up at the gate. There were buildings between her and the airship, but its sheer scale made them appear no more than shoeboxes.

A security guard leaned out of a booth. ‘Where ya goin’?’

‘There,’ Nina said, pointing at the behemoth. ‘We’ve got an appointment.’

The guard didn’t seem interested in her cover story. ‘Yeah, yeah. Take the second right on to Gee Avenue, you can’t miss it.’ The gate rose.

‘Has anyone else been to see it today?’ Eddie asked him.

‘Loadsa people wanna see it,’ he replied with a shrug. ‘Some guys went to the company offices maybe a half-hour ago.’

‘How many guys?’

Another shrug. ‘Four, five? I dunno, I wasn’t really payin’ attention.’

‘Keep up the good work,’ the Englishman told him sarcastically as the cab pulled away and made a right turn.

‘You think it could be Cross?’ said Nina, peering anxiously ahead.

‘Maybe. Or maybe not. A lot of people come here; like he said, it’s kind of a tourist attraction.’

The taxi drove past docks on the river’s edge. Ahead was a low building, and rising behind it, moored on an expanse of open ground, was the vast beetle-like airship, its broad stern towards them. Their driver stopped in the parking lot. ‘You want me to wait?’ he asked.

‘No, that’s okay,’ Nina answered. The couple paid him and got out, then regarded the building. A sign reading
SKY SCREEN INC
. was affixed to the wall, an arrow directing visitors around to the structure’s other side. They followed it. The airship came into full uninterrupted view, an almost comically small gondola mounted under its centreline seeming as if it were about to be squashed flat beneath the elephantine mass. The whole vessel was so large that one of the roads to the piers beyond had been blocked off to give it room to land. Its flanks were covered with a grid of LEDs that in flight turned it into a colossal
Blade Runner
-style animated billboard, but today they were dark.

Eddie looked up at the craft. ‘This thing’s not supposed to be flying,’ he said. ‘So why’re the engines going?’

Nina saw that the propellers were slowly turning, diesel engines rumbling. ‘Maintenance?’ she offered, not convinced.

‘Let’s ask.’ They headed cautiously for a door. Eddie opened it, flinching as an electronic bell made a loud
beep-boop
noise. ‘So much for the element of surprise,’ he muttered before raising his voice. ‘Hello?’

No response for a few seconds, then: ‘Yo! Come on in.’

‘Wait here,’ Eddie told Nina, wary. He entered a reception area. It was empty, but a large photograph behind the desk of the airship at night told him he was in the right place. Another doorway went through to an office area overlooking the airship’s landing pad.

‘Anyone here?’ he said. The office was apparently shared by the airship’s flight and ground crews and those who sold advertising space on the giant craft’s sides, a nest of cubicles surrounded by whiteboards and flip-charts showing sales figures and targets. But there was still no sign of any staff.

He rounded a battered couch, noticing an overturned coffee cup on it. A faint rush of cold air told him that an exterior door had been opened. In the far corner, a fire exit swung shut—

He froze. Poking out from behind one of the cubicle dividers was a foot, a man lying on the floor. There was a dark, glistening stain on the cheap carpet tiles nearby. Eddie instantly knew it wasn’t spilled coffee.

Another door opened, this one behind him—

He dived behind the couch as Washburn burst out of a back room, gun in hand. Bullets punched through the sofa’s back, spewing shredded foam stuffing over him as he scrambled towards a small desk bearing thick ring binders of paperwork.

The scar-faced man skirted the couch after him, seeing the Englishman go underneath the table. He bent lower to take a shot—

Eddie jumped up – bringing the desk with him. He hurled it at the gunman. Washburn fired, but the round hit only wood and paper. An instant later, wood and paper hit
him
, the table knocking him to the floor and landing on top of him.

The gun was still in his hand. Eddie rushed over and stamped a heel down hard on his wrist. A pained gasp, and the pistol thumped to the carpet. The Yorkshireman snatched it up. Washburn shoved the table away – only to take a bullet to the head from his own weapon.

Shouts from outside, Nina’s voice amongst them. Eddie ran back through the reception area, checking for further enemies before emerging.

His wife had gone.

But he could still hear her. He hurried to the corner of the building and looked across the landing field—

To see Cross dragging the struggling Nina with him as he and Norvin headed for the airship.

The cult leader had a gun to her head, using her as a shield. Eddie whipped up his own weapon, but knew he couldn’t shoot at Cross without risking hitting her. He aimed instead at Norvin, but before he could fire was forced to jerk back as the bodyguard sent several shots at him.

Another man sprinted towards the airship’s cabin. Eddie recognised him: Hatch. He had released the mooring lines, the cables now hanging limply from the bulbous envelope. Paxton was visible at the controls in the gondola.

Norvin fired again, forcing Eddie to retreat further as bullets smacked off the wall. When he looked back around it, Hatch had reached the cabin, Norvin following him aboard. He saw Nina shout, but couldn’t hear her over the noise as the propellers revved. Cross pulled her inside, and the door closed.

Eddie ran into the open, raising his gun. He knew it wouldn’t deflate the airship, but the envelope wasn’t his target. Instead he took aim at one of the engines. There were two pusher propellers mounted on the stern, and he opened up on the nearest. The fibreglass cowling cracked apart.

The gondola’s door slid open again, Cross leaning out – with a sniper rifle.

Eddie immediately abandoned his attack and sprinted for cover. A bullet tore the air barely a foot behind him with a supersonic crack. He threw himself behind a parked van as another shot exploded brickwork in his wake. Before Cross could fire again, he hunched into a tight ball behind the front wheels. The whole vehicle jolted as a third round struck the engine block.

The airship’s propellers grew louder. Eddie looked up to see it pulling away from him. He fired his remaining rounds at the second engine, but this time caused no visible damage, and even with its cowling broken the port engine was still running.

The airship gained altitude, slowly at first but with increasing speed as its forward engine nacelles tilted downwards to provide extra lift. It cleared the landing field, turning north over the East River towards the United Nations.

With Nina trapped aboard.

38

‘W
atch her,’ ordered Cross as he went to the front of the cabin. It was equipped for sightseeing, ranks of aluminium seats on each side of the central aisle. Norvin and Hatch shoved Nina into a window seat opposite the door, the hulking bodyguard squeezing beside her to block her in as the other man took the place directly behind.

‘So this is your plan?’ Nina said over the buzz of the engines. ‘You’re going to drop the angel on the UN and kill the “kings of the world”?’

‘Babylon will fall, Dr Wilde,’ Cross replied. He put down his rifle and took the eagle-headed statue from a bag. ‘The prophecy will come true.’

‘But it
can’t
come true,’ she insisted. ‘We stopped Simeon’s attack in Mecca, and his statue’s been secured. It’ll never be loosed, which means the sixth angel’s instructions can’t be carried out. Until that happens, it’s impossible to fulfil the prophecy.’

Cross glared at her, eyes wide in mania. ‘It doesn’t matter! The Witnesses are dead. That means the seventh angel is about to sound – and when I destroy Babylon,’ he held up the figurine, ‘the end time will come!’

‘No it won’t!’ Nina shot back. She realised how dangerous he now was, clinging to his delusion even as it crumbled in the face of the evidence, but she couldn’t help challenging him. ‘You’re picking and choosing pieces of Revelation to suit yourself! What happened to the seven angels who pour out their vials of plague over the earth? What about the Beast, and the dragon? Where are they? You’re ignoring anything that doesn’t fit your interpretation!’

‘I found the angels!’ he shouted. ‘That proves my interpretation is
right
. I saw through all the layers of hallucination and metaphor in John’s writing – I saw the
truth
. The only truth! God’s word was revealed to me, and now I’ll reveal it to the world!’

‘You’re insane,’ was the only response she could manage.

Fury clenched his face. ‘You’ll soon see,’ he growled. The airship was now passing over the Williamsburg Bridge, the United Nations complex visible on the west bank a few miles ahead. ‘The gas will kill everyone at the UN. “And the kings of the earth, who have committed fornication and lived deliciously with her, shall bewail her, and lament for her, when they shall see the smoke of her burning.”’

‘And how are they going to do that if they’re all dead?’ Nina demanded. Cross did not reply, instead regarding the view ahead with growing anticipation. ‘You can’t answer that, can you? You’ve lost it.’

He stalked back down the aisle, getting in Nina’s face to snarl: ‘After Babylon falls, so will you, Dr Wilde.’ His gaze flicked towards the cabin door. ‘Right on to its ruins from five thousand feet up!’

‘Look, just get everyone out of there!’ Eddie yelled into the phone at Seretse. ‘The airship’ll be there in a few minutes!’

‘A full evacuation in such a short time will be impossible,’ the alarmed diplomat protested. ‘There are thousands of people here; even if we get the leaders out first—’

‘Just do what you can,’ Eddie snapped before ending the call. He stared helplessly at the receding Airlander, which was still gaining height, then had an idea. He found another number in his contacts and hurriedly dialled it.

Infuriating seconds passed. He watched the airship retreat – then a shrill of engine noise told him that he was through. ‘Harvey! Harvey, it’s Eddie Chase – can you hear me?’

‘Eddie? Yeah, sure,’ Harvey Zampelli replied, sounding puzzled. ‘Where you been? I phoned you a coupla days ago, but—’

‘Harvey, we’ve got trouble,’ the Yorkshireman interrupted. ‘Where are you?’

‘Right now? Just comin’ back from a tour of Liberty Island.’

‘I need you to pick me up. I’m at Brooklyn Navy Yard, the airship landing field.’

‘Pick you up?’ the helicopter pilot exclaimed. ‘Eddie, I got passengers, I can’t—’

‘Can you see the airship?’

A moment’s pause. ‘Yeah. Hey, I thought it was supposed to be grounded ’cause of that thing at the United Nations.’

‘It was, but someone’s stolen it to
attack
the UN. Harvey, they’ve got Nina, my wife, aboard. I’ve got to get after them!’ When there was no immediate reply, he went on: ‘You said you owed me a favour. Forget flying lessons – this is it. A lot of people will
die
if I can’t stop this!’

‘You’re not kiddin’, are you?’ said Harvey, worried. ‘Okay, I’ll come find you. Not sure how I’m gonna break it to my passengers, though.’

‘Just get here,’ Eddie said. He stared upriver once more. The airship was still heading relentlessly towards its destination – but had now been noticed by the forces guarding it, helicopters changing course to intercept.

Paxton listened to a message through his headphones, then turned to Cross. ‘They’re ordering us to turn back to the Navy Yard and set down.’

‘Of course they are,’ Cross replied, surveying his target through binoculars. The United Nations was now only two miles away, and the Airlander had reached its cruising speed: two minutes’ flight time. ‘There’s a lot of activity on the ground. They know we’re coming.’

‘They’re evacuating,’ Nina told him. ‘The VIPs’ll be out of there before you can drop the angel.’

‘In two minutes? No, they won’t. There are one hundred and sixty-five world leaders attending the General Assembly, and they’ll all be fighting over who gets to escape first. I know how these things work. The Secret Service won’t let anyone else leave until President Cole’s been secured, and they haven’t even gotten a
police
helicopter on the ground, never mind Marine One.’ He raised the binoculars to check the sky ahead. ‘Paxton, NYPD choppers coming in.’ He indicated a white-and-blue Jet Ranger heading towards them.

‘I see them,’ Paxton replied. ‘What do you want me to do?’

‘Stay on course. I’ll deal with them.’

‘I’ll have to slow down,’ the pilot warned. ‘The wind at this speed’ll throw your aim off.’

‘I can handle it. Just hold us steady.’ Cross went to the port-side door and opened it. Wind rushed into the cabin, the rasp of the propellers rising to ear-splitting volume. He squinted into the slipstream. ‘Come right five degrees so I can get a clear shot!’

Paxton obeyed, turning the Airlander slightly to starboard. Cross leaned against the door frame as he aimed the rifle through the opening at the nearer of the approaching helicopters. ‘Steady, hold it steady,’ he called, fixing the cross hairs in the telescopic sight on his target. ‘Steady, and . . .
now
!’

He fired. Even over the roaring engines, the retort made Nina jump. For a moment, it seemed that he had missed – then the leading helicopter slewed around, dropping into a corkscrewing descent.

Cross hurried to the front of the cabin to watch as its fall picked up speed, spinning like a sycamore leaf until it smacked down on the river. The rotors sliced into the water’s surface and kicked up a great swathe of spray before the downed aircraft rolled over and began to sink. ‘You got it!’ Paxton crowed.

‘There’s still another one.’

The second helicopter started a sharp climb, taking a course that would pass directly over the airship. Paxton leaned forward to follow it, then turned in alarm to Cross. ‘He’s going to use his rotor downwash to force us down!’

‘Will that work?’

‘Against a ship this big? Probably not, but it’ll throw us around and make it almost impossible to steer.’

Cross returned to the door with his rifle, but the Jet Ranger was now out of sight above the airship’s bulbous twin prows. The cabin shook, forcing its occupants to brace themselves. Nina held on tightly to the seat in front as the Airlander rocked despite Paxton’s best efforts to stay level—

She felt something protruding from the aluminium frame. A latch. The lightweight seats were designed to be easily disassembled and removed . . .

The idea that formed was quashed as the Airlander wallowed, pitching sickeningly like a ship on stormy seas as the chopper’s downdraught pounded it. Cross grabbed a ceiling strap. ‘Up, take us up!’ he roared.

Eddie shielded his eyes from flying dust as the red, white and blue tour helicopter swept in to land. He scurried beneath the whirling rotor blades. ‘Come on, everyone out!’ he yelled to the passengers. Even after Harvey had explained the situation, they were still bewildered and frightened. ‘You’ll be a lot safer on the ground, trust me!’ He helped them down. ‘Sorry about this, but I’m sure Harvey’ll give you a refund.’

‘Refund?’ said the pilot as Eddie clambered into the front seat and donned a headset. ‘They got a longer flight than they booked – they should be payin’ me!’ He checked the passengers were clear, then applied throttle and raised the collective control. The LongRanger left the ground and turned up the East River.

‘There’s the airship!’ said Eddie.

‘It’s kinda hard to miss,’ Harvey replied sarcastically. Even from almost two miles away, the Airlander still loomed like a floating football stadium. He frowned, spotting something above it. ‘The hell’s that guy doing?’

Eddie saw an NYPD helicopter flying directly over the enormous airship. ‘Must be trying to force them down.’

The pilot grimaced. ‘Hell of a chance he’s taking. If the airship comes up underneath him, the displaced air’ll maybe cause a vortex ring!’ The Yorkshireman gave him a blank look. ‘That’s a bad thing.’

‘What about the airship? Can he make it crash?’

‘Only if he completely wipes out on it, and hopefully he ain’t that stupid. Probably the most he’ll do is slow it down.’

‘Good enough for me. The longer it takes it to get to the UN, the more chance there is of evacuating everyone.’ The LongRanger cleared the Williamsburg Bridge, rapidly closing the gap to the airship as the huge craft veered right, its nose tilting upwards – towards the buzzing fly above it. ‘Oh shit! They’re going to hit each other!’

Harvey stared at the police helicopter in horror. ‘Move, you asshole,
move
!’

‘Full power!’ screamed Cross. ‘Ram him!’

Paxton shoved the throttle levers to maximum. The engine noise rose to a scream, the airship forcing its way through the downdraught—

A muffled
whump
reverberated through the vessel as it hit the police helicopter’s skids. The impact threw everyone around in their seats. Paxton struggled to maintain control, wrestling with the joystick.

Nina pulled herself upright, her hand again finding the latch. This time, she tugged it. It opened with a
clack
, but the noise was drowned out by the roar of the propellers. The seat back came loose, aluminium tubing sliding freely inside its frame. If she raised it, it would detach.

But she kept it in place as Norvin levered himself up beside her. She now had a weapon, however improvised: what she needed was the right time to use it.

Paxton pulled back the joystick. The Airlander pitched upwards once more – and another blow shook the cabin.

‘That guy’s crazy!’ said Harvey, unable to look away from the slow-motion collision.

‘The chopper pilot, or the airship pilot?’ Eddie asked.

‘Both!’

The police helicopter reeled drunkenly as it bounced off the Airlander’s upper hull, the tips of its main rotor coming perilously close to the envelope’s Kevlar skin. It levelled off, trying to climb out of trouble, but the airship rose after it like a killer whale. The pilot finally decided that discretion was the better part of valour, accelerating away before turning to flank the enormous craft from a safe distance.

The Jet Ranger’s rear door opened and a cop leaned out – holding a sub-machine gun. He opened fire, shots spraying the airship’s port lobe. The envelope was tough, but designed to resist impacts from birds and hailstones rather than bullets. It puckered and ripped, helium gushing out with a piercing shrill.

But the airship was not slowed. Only one of its internal compartments had been violated, and the others provided more than enough buoyancy to keep it afloat. Magazine empty, the cop withdrew.

‘Now what’s he doing?’ Harvey asked as the helicopter descended.

Eddie saw the cop return to view, holding a different weapon. ‘He can’t shoot down the airship – so he’s going to shoot the pilot!’

A red light flashed insistently upon the instrument panel. ‘We’re losing helium,’ Paxton warned.

‘How bad?’ Cross demanded.

The pilot checked the display. ‘Only looks like one cell.’

Cross looked to port, seeing the helicopter drop back into sight. He hefted the rifle and went back to the door. ‘Hatch, give me cover fire. I’ll take him out.’

The cult leader braced himself against the bulkhead. Hatch unslung his gun and crouched alongside him to take aim at the helicopter—

The police sniper saw them and fired first. The round ripped through Hatch’s thigh. He screamed and fell through the opening, tumbling into empty space.

But Cross had now locked on to a target of his own – and pulled the trigger.

The sniper lurched, then toppled out of the Jet Ranger. Nina gasped in shock, flinching as he jerked to a stop in mid-air, hanging from a safety line. The helicopter jolted violently with the abrupt shift of weight. It peeled away from the airship, the wounded cop throwing the aircraft off balance as he swung back and forth.

Cross tracked the chopper as if about to shoot the pilot, then drew back inside the cabin, returning his attention to the view ahead. Nina lifted the loose seat back slightly. He was barely six feet from her, beside the open door. If she could reach him, she was certain she could push him out . . . but Norvin was a wall of flesh obstructing her. ‘Don’t try anything,’ the bodyguard rumbled, as if reading her mind.

She looked away, seeing that the airship had been knocked from its flight path by the helicopter. Roosevelt Island bisected the river ahead, the UN complex off to one side. ‘Bring us back on course!’ Cross called to Paxton.

The pilot adjusted the rudders, the behemoth angling to the left. ‘We’ll be overhead in a minute,’ he announced.

‘Excellent.’ Cross returned to the front of the cabin, putting down the rifle and collecting the angel. He gazed down at the approaching tower of the Secretariat Building and the broad domed sweep of the General Assembly beyond, the ground around it a seething mass of people. ‘“Thus with violence shall that great city Babylon be thrown down . . .”’