that would bring it over Cydonia in less than an hour.

In the air and water surrounding Easter Island, Navy ships and planes circled, forming up, waiting for the final word. Smart bombs were being made dumb, their sophisticated electronic targeting turned off and the crews preparing flight paths that would allow them to drop their ordnance from a safe distance and explode on impact, all targeted toward Rano Kau. There was enough explosive being prepared that the admiral in charge of the fleet had no doubt that by the third wave of planes, the would have blasted down the chamber that held the guardian.363.

Chapter 40.

Turcotte looked through the stack of pages attached to the clipboard that someone had put in the pilot's seat. He found what he was looking for: three sheets in the basic instructions for the mothership's magnetic atmospheric drive.

Majestic-12 had figured out how to fly the mothership, using its magnetic drive; they just hadn't known they were missing the fuel core for the interstellar drive. The instructions had been placed there by the mothership experts at Quinn's order. Like the bouncers the mothership's control system was the essence of simplicity. Turcotte sat down in a chair that was much too large for him and read the notes.

Satisfied he knew enough for the job ahead, he pressed his palm down on a certain part of the console.

"Oh, s.h.i.t, not again," Duncan whispered as she felt her stomach flip. She turned and knelt,364.

throwing up as mothership's magnetic drive engaged. The mothership lifted off its cradle for the second time in a month. But Turcotte was taking it much farther than the four-foot hover Majestic had done.

His left hand was moving on another console, directing the ship up. A panoramic view of Groom Mountain appeared on the curved wall in front of him as he gained alt.i.tude.

Lisa Duncan stared at the ma.s.sive ship silently climbing into the sky. All around Area 51 work ceased and people looked up as the ship cleared Groom Mountain and rose farther and farther. Duncan's entire focus was on the ship, her lips moving in a silent prayer as it faded to a small dot and then disappeared into the dark sky.

The ship was accelerating, but the only way Turcotte could tell was by the way the ground below fell away quicker and quicker. Soon the long airstrip at Area 51 was nothing but a very faint line scratched in the desert floor below. Soon even that faded into haze.

Turcotte could see the curvature of the Earth now on the display. It had been night when he lifted off, the last night before the dawn that would bring the Airlia. Turcotte knew he was out of the atmosphere when he could see the glow of the sun around the curve of the eastern horizon.365.

He didn't feel any different, and Turcotte had to a.s.sume the ship had some sort of artificial gravity built in. He continued away from the planet, until he could see the entire world on the front screen.

Then he slowed the ship and reoriented it away from Earth so he could look outward. The mothership came to a halt in a very high orbit above the planet.

Turcotte could see nothing but stars and the moon off to the right. He knew the talons were out there, but he wouldn't be able to see them until they were right on top of him and by then it would be too late. The last data he'd gotten from Quinn had indicated the talons were just under an hour away.

Turcotte turned to the SATCOM radio that he had had Quinn install. He had Quinn route him through to the Easter Island chamber, where a SATCOM radio had been left by the departing UNAOC scientists. "Kelly, this is Mike Turcotte."

He tried again. When he got no answer, he had a very good idea what was happening under Easter Island. "Kelly, this is Mike. Listen to me carefully. You have to tell Aspasia that we are sorry. That we made a mistake. That we've put the ruby sphere on board the mothership and I'm flying it up to give it to them in orbit. That we just want to be left alone. And then you need to leave the island right away, Kelly."

Turcotte repeated the message three times, then turned off the radio. He had much to do. Turcotte shut down the magnetic drive, then began the long walk from control room to the cargo366.

bay holding the bouncer, the ruby sphere, and the "specials" he'd had Zandra order.

Coridan indicated for Kincaid to move and took his place at the computer link.

Coridan typed in some commands and a code word, then transmitted them.

Coridan turned his sungla.s.ses toward Kincaid. "I am done here. Good day."

With that he walked out of the control room.

Kelly Reynolds was now totally enveloped in a golden haze. Her eyes were closed and her face peaceful and relaxed for the first time in a very long time.

She'd heard Turcotte's message echo off the walls of the chamber and she knew the guardian had heard, too, taking it out of her brain and sending it to Aspasia.

She felt happy that Turcotte was still alive and that he finally understood.

There was hope after all.

The first wave approached Easter Island. Composed of F-14's and F-18's, they came in at high alt.i.tude and released their "dumb" bombs on a glide path that would have them land right on top of Rano Kau.

The admiral watched the bombs float through the air, heading directly for the volcano, when suddenly they began exploding in the air, two miles from the island. The admiral had seen the same thing a week ago when he'd attacked the367.

island with Tomahawk cruise missiles at General Gullick's orders. He picked up the mike and called Area 51. "Your 'dumb' plan might have worked with foo fighters, but this thing is different. We aren't going to be able to crack this nut."

In the chamber Kelly Reynolds's eyes were still closed, but her head turned up as if she could see what was happening miles above her. A smile played across her lips.

The six talons changed course. They were headed for the mothership now and they were going even faster than they had been.

Turcotte hummed to himself as he walked through the ma.s.sive cargo bay, checking everything. All was set. The ruby sphere was chained to one of the bays that had once held a bouncer. The specials-four nuclear warheads-were lined up on the floor near the bouncer that Quinn had loaded for him.

The bouncer looked like a kid had gone wild and mixed together his flying saucer model kit with that of a rocket ship. Four rocket boosters had been attached to the outside of the bouncer, pointing out from the bottom in perpendicular directions.

Turcotte planned on giving Aspasia back the ruby sphere and much more. He knelt down next to each warhead and entered the PAL code that armed each. Then he checked his watch.368.

He climbed on board the bouncer and got in- side. He shut the hatch behind him and powered the craft up. He could see the outside clearly. Flipping open the lid on the remote, Turcotte read down the b.u.t.tons. He pressed the one that read: DOORS.

The ma.s.sive doors to the cargo bay swung open with a hiss of the air escaping into s.p.a.ce. They swung wide until Turcotte could see the stars again. Turcotte was glad everything had been tied down as he felt the artificial gravity in the cargo bay disappear.

The engine cut out and Surveyor began the long fall down toward Cydonia.

Inside the capsule the scientific devices rested in their containers. Also inside was a small three-foot-long-by-two-wide cylinder. It had been loaded into the capsule prior to launch the previous year by someone with an ST-8 clearance.

NASA had fussed and fumed about it, but in the end had accepted the authority of the clearance and reduced the payload elsewhere to make room and to make weight.

Inside the cylinder the codes Coridan had punched in armed the nuclear warhead. It was set to go off on impact.

A talon flashed by the cargo-bay opening. Reconnaissance, Turcotte knew. The bouncer was oriented in the cradle so that the front end, which simply meant the end that Turcotte faced when sitting in the pilot's seat, was facing out. He looked down at the rough controls that had been369.

installed to the right of the depression he was in. He hit the lever that released the arms holding the bouncer in the cradle. Then he pressed the b.u.t.ton that fired the booster pointing to the rear for just a second.

The bouncer floated free, slowly edging out of the cargo bay into s.p.a.ce.

Turcotte swallowed, seeing all six talons lined up, tips pointing in his direction. "It's all yours, a.s.sholes," he muttered. He pressed the b.u.t.ton again and held it for a few more seconds, picking up speed, accelerating away from the mothership. One of the talons turned in his direction. The other five headed toward the cargo bay, edging in.

A glow appeared on the nose of the talon that was following Turcotte. A golden beam of light flashed out. It singed across the bottom of the bouncer, burning into the metal.

Turcotte slammed his fist down on a b.u.t.ton and the right booster fired, just as another golden beam of light again sliced through s.p.a.ce where he had been. He rocketed away and as he did so he hit the firing b.u.t.ton on the remote.

Inside the cargo hold, suited Airlia figures had been coming out of the lead talon, heading toward the ruby sphere, when the four nuclear weapons went off in a blinding flash of light and heat.

The thermonuclear explosion took in the ruby sphere and added its power.370.

Turcotte cringed in his seat as a second sun came into being behind him, flooding s.p.a.ce with its light. The shock wave hit, knocking him about as the bouncer tumbled.

In Central Park it was thirty minutes before dawn and the scheduled Airlia landing. The dignitaries and millions crowded around the park looked up in awe as a false daylight came in the form of a bright orb of light that suddenly appeared overhead, shining even brighter than the noonday sun.371.

Chapter 41.

Then there was the darkness of s.p.a.ce again, Turcotte desperately firing boosters, trying to regain control. After a minute he had the bouncer stopped.

Turcotte turned in his seat. The mother-ship was still visible, a tribute to the engineering capabilities of the Airlia, but there was a tremendous gash over half a mile long in the side where the cargo bay had been. There was no sign of the five talons that had been in the entrance to the bay.

Turcotte froze. The sixth talon, the one that had fired at him, was between him and the mother-ship, several kilometers away. Turcotte relaxed when he saw that the ship was slowly tumbling end over end, out of control.

"Now comes the fun part," he muttered to himself as he looked down at the Earth under his feet. He hit the transmit b.u.t.ton on the SATCOM radio.372.Deep inside Easter Island Kelly Reynolds had cried out in pain as the guardian picked up the destruction of the talon fleet. But the guardian still functioned; it still kept the shield guarding the island up, and it still kept her in its field, a prisoner in the war Earth thought it had just won.

"I've got hold of someone from JPL who should be able to figure out how to get you a trajectory into the atmosphere without burning up," Quinn said. He hit the patch linking Larry Kincaid to Turcotte.

Turcotte fired the various boosters as directed by Kincaid, who was tracking him from the JPL control room. Slowly the bouncer got closer and closer to Earth's atmosphere, until finally it was caught in the gravitational well and pulled down.

Turcotte put his hands on the control bar for the bouncer as the craft hit the edge of the atmosphere, skipped, and then began to descend. Now came the tricky part, hoping the magnetic engine kicked in before he hit the Earth's surface at terminal velocity.

The skin of the bouncer reflected heat as the ship screamed through the sky, the air getting thicker around it. Turcotte pulled back on the controls: nothing.

"G.o.dd.a.m.n," he whispered.

"Do you have any control?" Kincaid called out over the radio.

"Negative."

"One hundred and sixty thousand feet and de-373.

scending," Kincaid informed him. "You've got plenty of alt.i.tude to gain control."

Turcotte looked about. He was over North America. As near as he could tell somewhere over the southeast, heading west.

A minute later Kincaid wasn't so rea.s.suring. "Fifty thousand feet and terminal velocity. Have you got anything?"

Turcotte moved the control stick. "Nothing. I think the ship took some damage from a hit."

A new voice came over the radio. "Get out of there!" Lisa Duncan yelled. "Use the emergency gear."

Turcotte reached over and grabbed the parachute that was strapped to the floor next to his seat. He threw it over his shoulder, fighting the buffets the uncontrolled craft was sustaining as it fell.

He quickly buckled the chute on, then grabbed the snap link and hooked it into the cable that was just behind his seat, running up the top hatch.

He grabbed the controls, once more trying to save the craft. Nothing. "I'm getting out of here," he yelled into the radio.

Turcotte pulled a red lever up. Explosive bolts fired, blowing the hatch off.

Air swirled in. Turcotte pushed himself out of the pilot's seat. He slid along the cable and banged into the top near the hatch. He pulled himself through into the hatch.

Then he let go and fell out of the bouncer. The static line for the parachute quickly paid out and the chute blossomed above him as the bouncer disappeared below.

Turcotte gained control of his toggles and374.looked down. He was above desert, somewhere in the southwest U.S. He descended, feeling the air on his skin and listening to the gentle sound of the wind. He played with the toggles, controlling his descent until he landed on a dune. The chute dragged him across the sand. He popped the shoulder releases and the chute floated away. Turcotte simply lay there, his back feeling the soft ground underneath.

Slowly Turcotte stood. Looking to the east he could see the sun rising, the edge just coming up over the horizon, sending rays of sunlight high over his head.

Reaching down, Turcotte picked up a handful of sand. "It's good to be home,"

he whispered.

EPILOGUE.

A golden tendril was stretched out from the guardian computer under the surface of Mars and wrapped around the head of the Airlia who had awakened the first echelon and sent them off in their talon ships toward Earth.

The guardian informed her of the destruction of the fleet and the death of her comrades. The pupils in her red eyes narrowed as she processed this information.

She twitched as the guardian picked up a small anomaly near Mars. She had the surface sensors focus on it. Something was coming toward her location, less than thirty seconds out. There was no electromagnetic reading and she almost ignored it, but she paused. She was the only one left awake. She could afford to take no chances. She mentally gave the commands.376.

In the center of the solar field array a bolt of pure energy shot upward. It hit the incoming Surveyor probe dead on.

The Airlia saw the nuclear explosion take place three miles above her location. It had been close but not close enough.

The Airlia began giving commands. She would wake the others. Then there was much to do.

The first battle had been lost, but the war was far from over.