“Then we have to protect that helicopter at all costs.” He fired up the weapons panel. The helicopter dashed to one side, and when the second airship tried to maneuver close behind, it proved too unwieldy, banging into the cliff face. It wheeled on the helicopter, preparing to fire.
The helicopter veered sharply away from the cliff, but the airship followed and fired once more. The chopper dodged to the side, and the airship’s shot went wide, taking out a chunk of the cliff. Huge rocks rained down beneath them.
Willoughby sent a powerful blast at the second airship. It struck dead on, sending it off course. Flames erupted in the stern. The ship listed farther left. He fired again, blasting a hole in its center. This time it exploded, shuddering down to crash into the jagged rocks of the mountain. Another explosion wracked the air, and debris billowed up, filling the sky with ash and smoke.
Willoughby looked at the infrared display. “What the hell?” A line of bright red shapes was moving in, closing in on their location. “More airships!” Willoughby’s mouth fell open. “There must be at least fifteen. Damn it!”
He turned to H124. “I thought if there were only two, I could shoot down the other one. But this?” He looked helplessly at the display.
“Are they after me or Rowan?”
He turned to her. “You. After your pirate broadcast in Delta City, the power didn’t go back up. More and more people pulled away from their displays to send each other messages. They weren’t seeing to their task windows. The whole northern part of the city went dark, including all power to the PPC Tower. Getting it back up was a monumental task. The media had to debunk your story, going so far as to make up a silly meme about it to discredit you. Eventually power started returning to the city. People lost interest in your story. But the PPC structure was damaged. You undermined them. And they want to be sure it doesn’t happen again. I heard they were going after you, and I requested to be on the mission. They almost didn’t let me go, being from New Atlantic, as they blamed me for your escape. Said I was incompetent, that I had one shot to make up for it. Thankfully they didn’t suspect the real truth. Ideally they’d like to capture you and repurpose you so you can go on one of the chatter shows and say it was all a prank.”
The thought made her shiver.
“Can you order the ships back?” Gordon asked from the floor.
“I have no authority here. I’m just along for the ride.”
The line of airships closed in.
H124 watched the helicopter speeding away in the opposite direction. Just as she thought maybe they hadn’t seen it, the airships picked up speed, fanning out and flanking Rowan’s position. They caught up to them in seconds, surrounding the helicopter. She heard their voices come over the comm. “Land now and you will not be harmed.” She knew that was complete lie. “Don’t land, and we will shoot you down where you are.”
“They don’t know you’re aboard this airship,” Willoughby said. “That’s good. They think you’re on the helicopter.”
“That’s not good for the helicopter.”
Willoughby moved into position near the other airships. There was no way they could take on fifteen of them. Rowan and Marlowe were about to be shot out of the sky, along with all the information that the Rovers would need in order to have any chance of saving the planet.
H124’s mind struggled to comprehend what was happening. One second their airship was feet away from Rowan’s helicopter, and the next, it veered off wildly, picked up speed and shot away. She went off her feet, then stood up to see that they hovered several miles off, along with the other fifteen ships. She stood on the bridge, blinking quickly.
“What the . . . ?” she heard Willoughby murmur.
A flutter of confused messages came over the comm link, none of them making any sense. “Form up!” came a harsh voice.
The airships approached again en masse, closing in on Rowan. Willoughby followed them. Then once again the engines raced out of control, spinning the ships madly in the air and speeding them away so quickly that H124 had to grip Willoughby’s chair to keep from flying backward. When their ship slowed, she looked at the HUD. They were all even farther away, now five miles from the helicopter Willoughby checked and rechecked the controls.
“What’s going on?” H124 asked Willoughby.
“I have no idea!” He backed away from the controls. “But I’m no longer controlling the ship.”
“What’s happening here?” boomed a voice over the comm. “This is Commander Recht aboard Airship 503. Who is doing this?”
“No one, sir,” replied another voice. “It’s nothing we’re doing.”
“Close in on the target!” barked Recht.
Moving as one, the airships sped toward Rowan. They caught up with him in no time as he tried to flee south. Willoughby tried to blend in with the other ships, waiting for his chance to do something. “Get ready to fire!” ordered Recht.
“No!” shouted H124 as she saw a blast of fire emerge from the ships. Then their airship dipped, careening toward the ground. Then it veered upward, spinning out of control. She clenched her teeth and squeezed her eyes shut, gripping Willoughby’s chair. But she couldn’t hold on. She toppled over, sliding violently across the floor and colliding with a wall. All of a sudden the ship stopped moving.
She stood up on shaky legs, and struggled back to the control console. Her airship had been moved so far away, she couldn’t see any of the others.
“What the hell?” asked Willoughby.
H124 grabbed her PRD and sent a quick coded message to Rowan. “Are you okay?”
“H?” he replied. “How are you writing me? Are you free?”
“Yes. Did that blast hit you? What’s happening?”
“It did . . . we’re grounded. I have no idea what’s happening with the PPC airships. It looked
