Matthew Reilly - Area 7

nightmarish slow motion; eyes wide, mouth open, his shout

drowned out by the roar of the waterfall--before he disappeared

into the inky darkness of the shaft.

Book II swore. "Damn it!"

And then he did the only thing he could think to do.

"Sergeant! No!" Calvin yelled, but it was too late.

Book II loosened his grip on his cable and slid like a

bullet down the shaft after Love Machine, disappearing into

the darkness.

BOOK II DROPPED INTO BLACKNESS.

He slid for a long time, whizzing down the counterweight

cable, sliding fast, the heat from the cable burning

through his white formal gloves.

Then suddenly, with a splash, he entered water--deep water--at the bottom of the shaft.

Just as he had hoped.

The elevator shaft was approximately ten feet square

and if all its exit doors were sealed, then with the monumental

quantities of water rushing out of the hole on Level 1,

he'd figured it wouldn't take long for it to accumulate at the

bottom and fill to a reasonable depth.

Sure enough, Love Machine hovered in the pool of water

next to him, gasping for air, coughing water. But alive.

Area 7

"You okay?" Book II yelled.

"Uh-huh!"

Calvin and Elvis arrived at the base of the shaft a few

moments later, sliding down the counterweight cables. The

roaring waterfall thundered into the pool all around them,

kicking up spray.

"Okay, Captain Fantastic," Elvis said to Calvin, "our

nice safe elevator shaft is now filling with water! What do

you suggest we do now?"

Calvin hesitated.

Book II didn't. He nodded at the pair of outer doors a

few feet above them. "Simple. We bust out!"

"MOTHERFUCKER ..." BRAINIAC SAID AS HE PEERED OUT FROM

the rear of the AWACS plane's main cabin.

A high-pressure geyser of water was now shooting out

of the hole in the wall over by the personnel elevator, throwing

a carpet of water all over the concrete floor of the hangar.

"What the hell is this ride?"

"Just another day of mayhem and destruction with the

Scarecrow," Mother said.

"Hey," Gant said, looking out through her door-window.

"What happened to the guys on the wings?"

Mother and Brainiac spun to look out at the plane's

wings.

The AWACS's wings were bare.

The 7th Squadron men who had been out there before

were nowhere to be seen.

It was only then that they heard the ominous sound of

thumping footsteps on the roof.

the AWACS plane continued on its rampaging circuit

of the hangar, now traveling through a layer of water one

inch deep.

It had almost come full circle—so that now it was facing

the empty section of the hangar that led to the wide-open

doorway of the aircraft elevator shaft.

Schofield pumped on the steering pedals, trying to keep

the enormous surveillance plane under control.

He saw the doorway to the aircraft elevator shaft directly

in front of him. At the moment, a shallow film of water

cascaded over it like Niagara Falls, dropping out of sight

into the shaft.

The big hydraulic elevator platform was almost certainly

the best way out of this jam", but the last he had seen, it

was stopped down on one of the lower levels ...

And then, more suddenly than Schofield could possibly

have anticipated, the roof above him exploded in a shower of

sparks.

In actual fact, it wasn't the roof—it was one of the blast

hatches set into the roof of the cockpit, one of the hatches

that blew open when the pilot's ejection seat was activated.

No sooner had the hatch blasted open than a veritable

hailstorm of gunfire flooded down through it, smashing into

the airplane's dashboard, shattering all its gauges and dials.

This torrent of bullets was quickly followed by a second

volley which ripped through the empty pilot's seat ... the lefthand

seat; the seat Mother had been sitting in before ... tearing

it to shreds.

Area 7

Schofield saw what was going to happen next and he

quickly dived out of his seat, rolling forward into the tiny

section of floor space in front of it.

Not a moment later, a pair of combat boots landed with

a thump on the pilot's seat--boots that belonged to a

fearsome-looking 7th Squadron commando.

The masked commando spun quickly, his P-90 assault

rifle pressed firmly against his shoulder, searching for enemies

at the rear of the cockpit. Then he turned to look forward,

and downward--where, to his complete surprise, he

saw Schofield lying curled up on the floor.

Gunless and defenseless, Schofield saw the masked

commando's black-gloved trigger finger begin to squeeze--

And so he lashed out with his foot.

Not at the man's legs, but at the lever that ran alongside

the flight seat underneath him--the ejection lever.

Schofield's kick connected.

The lever snapped backward.

And with a loud, blasting whoosh! the pilot's ejection

seat shot up through the hole in the cockpit's roof--taking

the 7th Squadron commando with it!

python willis watched in complete and utter astonishment

as one of his men went rocketing up at incredible

speed out of the cockpit of the AWACS and past his shocked

colleagues on the roof of the plane, on top of an ejection

seat!

The man shot into the air like a bullet, before smashing

--violently, concussively--into the concrete ceiling of

the hangar.

The crack of the man's neck echoed sickeningly

throughout the underground hangar bay--it was distinct

even above the roar of the AWACS's engines, so hard did his

body hit the ceiling. He was killed instantly, the force of the

three-hundred-pound ejection seat snapping his spine like a

twig as it squashed him against the concrete roof.

In the meantime, Schofield had gotten his own Beretta

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Matthew Reilly

pistol out and, sliding on his back onto the floor behind

the pilots' seats, was firing it up at the roof of the cockpit-- trying to deter anyone else from following their comrade

into the flight deck.

In seconds, his gun went dry and he stood up and

looked out through the forward windshield--

--and saw that the plane was heading directly for the

massive doorway leading to the elevator shaft!

"Oh, this just keeps getting better and better," he said.

In a fleeting second, he tried to find a solution to the

situation.

The plane was heading for the shaft.

The 7th Squadron were all over its roof--all over the

hangar for that matter.

And he and Gant and Mother and Brainiac were stuck

inside the plane.

What was the solution?

Simple.

Get out of the hangar.

But there is no way out. We're stuck in this plane, and if

we leave it, we're dead.

Unless, of course, we get out of the hangar while we're

still on board the plane ...

Oh, yeah ...

And with that, Schofield climbed back into the co-pilot's

seat and took control of the plane again. Despite the bullet

damage, the controls still worked.

He pushed forward on the collective, speeding up the

big Boeing 707, keeping it pointed directly at the enormous

steel doorway that led out to the elevator shaft.

"WHAT THE HELL IS HE DOING ... ?" PYTHON SAID.

The giant AWACS plane was picking up speed, rumbling

across the wide expanse of the hangar, heading straight

for the open elevator doorway.

THE COMMANDOS ON THE ROOF OF THE PLANE FELT IT SURGE

forward, gaining momentum.

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They looked forward, saw where it was heading, and