Z. Apocalypse (21 page)

‘No planes?’ Zoe frowned and turned to their driver. ‘What’s going on?’

‘Wait a minute . . .’ As the car
rumbled on down the slope towards the military ants’ nest, Adam thought he could see sharp lines and graceful steel curves mingled in with the mist. ‘Am I seeing things or—’

‘You’re not
supposed
to be seeing things,’ said Zoe, wide-eyed. ‘OMG, Ad. They’ve got stealth-tech going on down there!’

Like some magic-eye puzzle scattered over real life, Adam could just discern the bulk of a passenger
aircraft through the haze; he soon found the trick was not to look at it directly, but to observe from the corner of his sight. ‘They’ve been studying Keera
for almost a fortnight,’ he murmured. ‘Makes sense they’d want to know how she turns invisible.’ He narrowed his eyes; further down the strip he could just make out two more planes, massive, heavy-duty constructions.

Air transporters
, he
realized.
One of them must be there to carry Zed
.

‘This has got to help our chances, right?’ Excitement was shining now in Zoe’s eyes. ‘I can’t believe they didn’t tell us they’d done this!’

‘It makes sense of why they’re willing to risk crossing the Russian border,’ said Adam more cautiously. ‘I heard at the Pentagon that the Z. beasts slipped past radar systems in stealth mode, so if we can
do the same . . .’ He looked up and saw a hazy shape circling high above in the lightening sky. ‘Oh, man. Heads up.’

‘Zed?’ Zoe peered up through the window. ‘Wow. We really
are
using Geneflow’s own weapons against them.’

As their armoured transport got closer, Adam could hear a fierce protesting drone, like generators being run to their limits and beyond. Finally it wound down, like a screaming
mechanical siren, and as it did so the plane and the air carriers began to shimmer into plain sight.

‘Your escorts will take you from here,’ called the driver, hitting the brakes as three soldiers ran briskly
up to the vehicle. He pointed to the big white jet adorned with stripes of pale blue. ‘And you’ll be riding in style. That’s a VC-25A, military version of a Boeing 747. Worth three-hundred-and-thirty
million dollars. The President’s own plane.’

Adam swapped a nervous glance with Zoe. ‘Wow.’

‘Those other two are C17 Globemaster IIIs,’ the driver went on conversationally. ‘Heavy lifters for operations in theatre. They can airdrop over a hundred paratroopers and equipment.’

Or one dinosaur
, thought Adam. Then the doors of the vehicle were yanked open and stony faces pressed in, arms extended
to help him and Zoe down onto the tarmac. The cold air was intense, like a physical attack on the senses.

‘My friend needs her wheelchair,’ Adam began, his voice coming in puffs of steam. ‘It’s in the back—’

‘Copy that,’ came a familiar voice as someone appeared from the rear of the transport, wheeling the chair. ‘Welcome to the weirdest damn airport I’ve ever been to.’

‘Colonel Oldman!’ Adam
was taken aback; how many commanding officers took the role of porter?

It was Zoe who supplied the likely explanation: ‘How guilty is
he
feeling dragging kids into this?’ she muttered.

Oldman was out of uniform, dressed casually in
jeans and a parka. ‘Glad you two could make it,’ he said, as the soldiers helped Zoe into her chair. ‘Get the girl on board.’ As the two soldiers saluted and got
to it, he turned to Adam. ‘Now, we’re waiting for your buddy, Zed. You’re sure that he’ll—’

‘He’s coming, sir.’ Adam looked up at the blur in the breaking blue above. It was growing bigger, a hazy streak on reality, descending fast . . . ‘He doesn’t like soldiers, please don’t panic him or . . .’

‘My crew has been briefed.’ Oldman spoke in a clipped tone. ‘You’re here because you can handle
him. I hope.’ He shook his head. ‘When the Special Activities Division brought me in to handle high-threat military operations, I never imagined . . .’

His words were lost in the thunder of Zed’s arrival. The ground shook as two huge, three-toed footprints appeared in the tarmac and the force behind them grew visible – the dark, colossal bulk of the Z. rex, blotting out the dawn light. Opening
his tooth-crammed jaws, Zed threw back his head and roared. Oldman fell back in alarm against the armoured transport, but Adam stood his ground.

‘It’s all right, Zed!’ he called up quickly. ‘No one wants to hurt you.’

‘That’s right.’ Oldman recovered himself hastily, tried to act unbothered. ‘Uh, the report said . . . he talks?’

Zed suddenly pushed his massive head down
and forwards until it
was level with Oldman’s; the colonel held very still. ‘Here . . . for Adam.’ The words hissed and rattled from the monstrous throat. ‘Just Adam.’

Oldman managed a single nod. Zed reached past him with a chunky arm and pressed his hand against the side of the all-terrain vehicle. Then he scraped his claws downwards, a slow, nails-on-chalkboard effect, scoring the armoured metal and bulletproof
glass.

‘Adam,’ said Oldman quietly. ‘Can you ask Zed to step into the back of this C17? We put some, uh, food in there . . .’ He raised a hand towards the big plane, which had a massive ramp hanging down from the rear of its fuselage. A squad of soldiers were flanking the plane, but keeping a wise and healthy distance.

‘It’s OK, Zed,’ Adam told him. ‘They’re going to carry you so you can save
your strength. I’ll check the place out with you.’

He crossed to the C17, Zed padding alongside him, tossing barks and growls at the soldiers around the airfield. The cargo hold looked a reasonable size; lengthwise it was longer than a train carriage, nearly four metres high and almost six metres wide. Several hunks of meat had been piled inside. Zed looked at Adam for a few moments. Then he
ducked his head and stepped lightly up the ramp, curling
round like a dog finding a comfortable spot to lie down. He sniffed the food, but did not eat – then looked at Adam, perhaps a little resentfully. Feeling sad, Adam mouthed a thank you to him.

Oldman came up behind him. ‘We’ve fixed two-way comms so you’ll be able to talk to him from our own plane when you need to – and he can, uh, talk
to you.’ A pause, then he lowered his voice. ‘You’re certain this . . . creature will do as you tell him?’

‘As sure as I can be.’ Adam wasn’t bragging; the admission made him feel bad. He raised his voice. ‘Zed, these people here are all my friends. Will you help them like you’ve helped me, and do as they ask?’

The huge reptile shifted his head to one side and gave a soft, sulky snort.

‘Think
that’s a yes,’ Adam murmured.
At least I hope so
.

Oldman hit a red button built into the fuselage. The ramp cranked slowly upwards, sealing the bulkhead. Adam watched, heart pounding, as Zed was taken from his sight.

As Oldman strode off towards the VC-25, which was humming and hissing as its systems came alive, he looked to be in a daze. ‘No wonder the government’s gonna deny all knowledge
if we blow this thing – who the hell would ever believe them?’

Adam tagged along behind him. ‘What’s the other C17 carrying?’

‘Operatives from Delta Force, Navy SEALs, SAS Mountain Troop . . . the cream of NATO’s special operations forces.’ Oldman nodded distantly. ‘Out of uniform of course, and no ID, so can’t be traced – while their equipment was purchased from a private arms dealer.’

‘But
if this is the President’s air transport, isn’t it going to be obvious—’

‘Don’t worry about the cover story. Special Operations Group deals with this stuff all the time.’ Oldman looked up at the bare, blue-and-white expanse of the plane’s nosecone. ‘It’s already the most advanced aircraft on the planet. That’s why it was the first to be fitted with the super-stealth technology we adapted from
Keera’s cellular design. That might
just
get us past the Russian fighter jets patrolling the borders without starting a major diplomatic incident.’ He walked up the gangway to the plane’s main entrance. ‘Come on. We’re all aboard and good to go.’

We are?
thought Adam, his legs wobbling as he followed the colonel. The mist was thinning and the sky brightening over the surrounding moorland and
the distant trees. But Adam felt a dark foreboding swell inside, and as he reached the door, he hesitated.

We’ve got one chance at this. Just one
.

Will we make it back?

He looked towards the C17 and thought of Zed trapped inside . . . Thought of Keera lying so sick and still back at the camp . . . Thought of all the days he’d woken feeling sick and small and helpless. Thought of Zoe too, and
his dad and Eve, of the carefree days they’d lost, forced down into danger.

One way or another
, he thought,
that changes after today
.

Adam stepped inside, and the door swung shut on the cold blue sky behind him.

Chapter 23: The Careful Invasion

ADAM WAS SHOWN
to a high-tech conference room on the top deck of the three-level plane. With the wood panelling, huge oak table and giant TV screen it looked to be modelled on the Pentagon office he’d visited. Only the many porthole-style windows studding the walls, their shutters half-raised to let in the morning light, reminded him that he was on an aircraft.

Zoe was already there, strapped into a leather seat, big fingers drumming on her jeans where her leg should be, watching her mum and Adam’s dad at work. They were standing behind their untidy tumble of hardware and monitors, grappling as ever with multicoloured cables. Only this time, the Think-Send headset had extra bits and bobs attached, and was linked to a large metal box.

‘Ad!’ His father
saw him, discarded a set of leads and enveloped him in his arms like he hadn’t seen him in weeks. ‘I’m so glad to see you. Zed’s on board the carrier safely? You’re all set . . .?’

Adam hugged him back, but barely heard the questions, mumbling vague replies. The weighty realization filled his chest like cold water:
This could be the last day of all our lives
 . . . But there was a sense of excitement
fizzing among those fears.
Or maybe it could be the greatest
. He’d lived through so much, clawed his way through the craziest odds.

Just imagine if we actually made it
 . . .

A steady rush of turbines began to build, as though the aeroplane was gathering strength to fly. Adam felt his stomach twist with nerves – and then a dour-looking man appeared at the door. ‘Would you all get into your seats,
please? We’ll be taking off shortly.’

‘Who’s he?’ wondered Zoe as the man stalked away.

‘Secret Service,’ Eve explained through a mouthful of croissant, spitting pastry flakes as she connected the last leads to a slew of wires protruding from a hole punched into the on-board comms console. ‘There’s a couple of nice men with guns on board to keep us in line – doubling up as flight crew.’

Adam
looked at the lash-up. ‘So, what does that thing actually do?’

‘Hopefully, and at its most basic, it’s a dinosaur jamming device.’ Mr Adlar pressed a couple of buttons and looked relieved to find a number of red lights dotted around the construction glow into
life. Then he patted the Think-Send helmet. ‘We’ll transmit a loop of random code, which will hopefully be picked up by the Z. beasts’
brain implants and scramble their minds.’

Zoe nodded. ‘So they can’t be used as weapons.’

‘Exactly.’ Mr Adlar crossed to the communications console and flicked a switch. ‘We’re up and running, colonel.’

‘Pleased to hear it, Bill,’ came Oldman’s crackling reply. ‘Will your jamming device work?’

‘We hope so,’ said Eve. ‘There’s been no way to test it properly.’

‘I think you’ll get your chance,’
drawled Oldman. ‘You can bet Geneflow will send every dinosaur in the place to attack the moment they see us coming.’

The speaker went dead.

Adam slumped down on the leather couch that ran the length of the cabin. ‘This thing won’t hurt Zed, will it?’

‘Only slave animals given orders by Think-Send will be affected,’ his dad assured him. ‘We just don’t know how
much
they’ll be affected.’

‘Oldman
wants those poor creatures alive if possible.’ Eve fastened her seatbelt with a loud click. ‘They’ll be key evidence in proving to the world that Geneflow were behind all this madness, not Washington or the NATO powers or anyone else.’

‘Glad we’ve got stealth mode,’ said Adam.
‘Imagine if we were shot down before we even got close . . .’

‘Could happen,’ said Eve gloomily, helping Mr Adlar as
he fumbled with his seatbelt. ‘To simulate what Z. beasts do naturally takes an awful lot of power for a plane this size. Oldman’s not certain how long the systems will stay operational . . .’ She tailed off as she finally noticed Mr Adlar’s frantic mouthings to stop. ‘Uh, but it’ll be fine. We don’t have to worry, really.’

Zoe rolled her eyes. ‘Great pep talk, Mum.’

‘So, just in case we
do
get there,’ Adam ventured, ‘do we know what happens then?’

Adam’s dad nodded. ‘Oldman takes us in a fly-by over Geneflow’s ghost town so we can switch on the mind-jammer – and you can get Zed to sniff out the entrance. Geneflow will no doubt attack him, revealing the way into their base in the process – and that’s when Oldman deploys the special ops boys from the other C17, who’ll parachute in
with all guns blazing.’

‘Meanwhile, we’ll have landed on that airstrip you talked about,’ Eve added. ‘Once the operatives have “subdued” resistance and secured the place, we go inside as expert witnesses and let Oldman know what Geneflow have been up to.’

Suddenly the plane started to taxi forwards a little way. A chime sounded. ‘As you might’ve guessed,’
came Oldman’s voice, ‘we’re taking off.
We have a little over a thousand kilometres to cover and our flight time is estimated at seventy-five minutes. Out.’

‘Pilot’s not very friendly,’ Zoe said. ‘I’m not flying this airline again.’

Adam couldn’t muster a smile. The whining rush of engines started to build, and then the push forward began in earnest. He clutched his armrests as the craft juddered over the airstrip, picking up speed.