She turned to Smith. The combat knife she’d grabbed from Polk’s belt spun in her hand.
Smith yelled something at her. With the engines roaring and the wind coming in through the cabin doors, she couldn’t hear what it was.
He realized she couldn’t hear him and his eyes went wide.
She saw the pilot glance back at her. He reached for his sidearm.
She threw the knife. It sank into Smith’s throat just below his Adam’s apple. The blade missed his carotid artery.
It severed one of his vocal cords.
Smith grabbed at his throat and glared at her. She saw blood bubbling on his lips as he tried to shout commands to the pilot. The deck of the chopper tilted again.
Beneath her featureless mask, Stealth closed her eyes and leaped from the helicopter’s open cabin door. The roar of its rotors faded as she dropped away and the Black Hawk continued north.
She grabbed the edges of her cloak, letting it billow out to catch the wind. She was too high up for it to save her, she knew. Almost nine hundred feet. The cloak would slow her descent, and while she would never reach terminal velocity she would still reach a sufficient speed in the next few seconds for the impact to kill her instantly.
Then a strong arm wrapped around her waist and pulled her close. Her descent slowed and stopped, and she wrapped her own arms around his neck.
“I’ve got you,” said St. George.
“There was never any doubt.”
Chapter 31
NOW
“You are bleeding,” said Stealth.
“I’ll be fine,” said St. George. “I’ve had much worse.”
They sank down through the air. St. George could go faster on his own, but he was trying to make it a smooth ride. They were heading back into a war, but for a minute or so Stealth was pressed up against him. She was very warm, even in the cool air of higher altitudes.
“How were you able to resist the suggestion Smith gave to you?”
“I thought of The Twilight Zone,” he told her.
“Again, I do not understand.”
“If you watch a lot of Twilight Zones, there’s a bunch of them that come down to misconceptions and loopholes,” he explained. “People can’t do something because they don’t understand what’s actually going on. I figured Smith’s powers might work something like that.”
“You sought out a loophole in the suggestion he gave you?”
St. George nodded his head. “At first I was terrified, because I knew he was right. I couldn’t beat him. I was sure of it. I knew if I tried anything a lot of people would get killed and I still wouldn’t stop him.”
“Yet you resisted,” she said. “You tried to stop him.”
“Nope. I told you, I knew I couldn’t stop him. It’s like he hardwired it into my brain. I know it was some kind of mind-control and I still can’t make myself believe I could’ve stopped him.”
She hooked one of her legs around his. It took some of the weight off his arm, although it was nothing to him. It also pulled her even tighter against him. “Then how were you able to fight back?”
“That soldier hit you with his rifle. The second he did that, I realized I didn’t want to beat the bad guy. I just wanted to save the girl.”
“You defeated Smith’s powers through a semantic argument.”
“I don’t know. Did I?”
“So it would appear. It also appears you have heroic fantasies where I am ‘the girl.’”
“Well...” He tried to figure out what the right response was.
She looked up at him. “Do not worry, George,” she said. “At the moment I find your heroic fantasies somewhat endearing.”
“Ahhh,” he said. “Good.”
“I am sure Specialist Hayes appreciates them as well.”
St. George glanced down at the soldier hanging from his other hand. “Well,” said the hero, “he probably will once he wakes up.”
*
So, how’d things go up there?
Stealth slipped free from St. George’s arm and dropped the last dozen feet to the ground, her cloak billowing around her. He kept his other arm up so Hayes didn’t crack his head on the ground and two other soldiers grabbed the man. “Could’ve gone better,” he said. “Smith got away. I’m sorry.”
“Not good,” Kennedy said. “If he reaches another base he can start all over again.”
Freedom shook his head. “It’s not important for now,” he said. “Smith’s a traitorous piece of crap, but right now our mission’s to keep this base safe.”
Three lines of soldiers formed a rough triangle. It reached almost a hundred feet on a side, with close to two dozen men on each line in pairs and trios. Jefferson doled ammunition out of a Humvee packed with crates and loose weapons. For the moment, they’d pushed back the exes.
“Where did you say he was headed for?” St. George asked the huge officer. “A lake?”
Freedom gave a single nod. “Groom Lake.”
Seriously? Zzzap dropped closer to the ground. Groom Lake? He’s heading for the Groom Lake?