Dragonflies: Shadow Of Drones Read online

  DRAGONFLIES

  “Shadow Of Drones”

  Andy Straka

  e-book ISBNs:

  978-1-4756-0204-3 1-4756-0204-9 ePub

  978-1-4756-0203-6 1-4756-0203-0 Mobi

  Genre: Sci-Fi, Crime, Military, Thriller

  Published by: LLW Media

  Representation/Distribution by: Trident Media Group, NY

  Print length: 240 pages/e-book price: $2.99

  Publication Date: May 2013

  eBooks created by www.ebookconversion.com

  DRAGONFLIES: SHADOW OF DRONES

  All Rights Reserved © 2013 by Andy Straka

  No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping, or by any information storage or retrieval system, without the written permission of the publisher.

  Published by LLW Media

  Representation and original e-book distribution by Trident Media Group, New York

  Cover photo by Ganesh H. Shankar

  NOTE: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Many thanks to Durrell Nelson, Jeanne Siler, David Moody, Major Robert Schuett, USA (ret.), and loyal family and readers Chris, Julia, Kelci, Lily, Mason, John, Deborah Prum, Jennifer Elvgren, Michele Veillon, Lucy Russell, Judy Bushkin, and Denny King. Many more thanks to my wife, Bonnie, who does it all. I also owe a debt of gratitude to the dozens upon dozens of non-fiction authors, journalists, and others who have written, published, and/or produced books and stories about unmanned aerial vehicles–more popularly known as drones–and robotics over the past couple of years. Their work continues to ignite incendiary currents in this fiction writer’s imagination.

  In Memoriam:

  Corporal Bradley T. Arms, USMC

  KIA November 19, 2004

  Falluja, Iraq

  Praise for the novels of Andy Straka:

  “A breath of fresh air in the field of private eye fiction.” – Jeffery Deaver

  “A talented author.” – Publishers Weekly

  “Highly recommended. I dare you to tell me I’m wrong.” – Michael Connelly

  “Characters you feel in your bones.” – Julia Spencer-Fleming

  “A first rate-thriller.” – Mystery Scene

  “A book this good, and this original, helps remind me why I started reading mysteries in the first place.” – Steve Hamilton

  “If he keeps producing books like Record Of Wrongs he will be on top sooner rather than later. He is that good.” – I Love A Mystery Reviews

  1

  Chief Warrant Officer Raina Sanchez dropped the nose of her Kiowa Warrior as the chopper prepared to jump the ridge. Leaning back in her seat the midnight darkness seemed to embrace her. The high peaks of the Hindu Kush were barely silhouettes against the star-filled, moonless sky.

  Raina loved this kind of action. The adrenalin rush from flying AirCav was like nothing else, the fight close to the earth, as close as a pilot could get. For a moment, she felt as though she were one with the helicopter, the controls responding to her gloved hands and booted feet like deftly falling angels, the flight of the machine a synthesis of her years of training with decades worth of technological add-ons to her Vietnam-era Kiowa. Cresting the rise, she fired a burst from the .50 caliber guns, her eyes coming to focus on the target. Captain Skyles ran the mission in the seat next to her, pinpointing their Hellfire missiles with the laser rangefinder, JTAC squawking him guidance, both of them gritting their teeth to keep from chipping them due to the shudder of the guns.

  “I make about a half dozen,” he said.

  “Copy.”

  In her thermal viewfinder the insurgents looked like miniature green phantoms skittering among a clump of buildings atop a small plateau at four hundred yards. She held steady for a three count while Skyles sent their missiles roaring downrange, knowing most of those phantoms were about to meet their virgins in paradise. The Op was already beginning to feel like a success. She swooped the chopper over her own advancing infantry, the cockpit swaying as they moved into fire support.

  Thunk

  “What the…?”

  They felt the near-miss blast as much as heard it.

  Skyles turned his head. One of the advantages of the Kiowa over the larger Apache was that it allowed the pilots to see out the doors.

  “RPG. Tangos to our right.”

  Rocket propelled grenade. Where’d the shooter come from? She banked hard, swinging the copter back and forth in an evasive maneuver.

  Raina knew what she was doing. She hadn’t been flying a racetrack or any other identifiable pattern, but the flash of another RPG launch to their left knifed into her being like a sharp blow to the stomach.

  Skyles swore out loud. “They’ve got us bracketed.”

  Vra-boom

  This time they felt the full impact of the shock wave, jolting them violently to the side, the booming detonation so close it nearly ripped the cyclic control from Raina’s hands.

  Only her helmet and restraints saved her. She recovered to find their cockpit humming with warning lights and alarms.

  “Status report.”

  Skyles twisted around to have a look. “LTE,” he said, his voice tense but composed.

  Loss of Tail Rudder Effectiveness. Nightmare time for any chopper pilot.

  Already the ship was feeling balky. She pushed on the pedal controls. The Kiowa yawed left instead of right, against her will.

  “We’ve got a problem.” She knew Skyles was already beginning emergency procedures, engaging his own controls, helping her as best as he could to bring the chopper back under their command. But they had only one way left to go, and that was down, still traveling at close to a hundred knots, with precious little air between them and the ground.

  “Hold on to it.”

  “I’m trying.”

  “Mayday, mayday,” Skyles spoke into his mike. “Dragonfly 16 is going down. Repeat. Dragonfly 16 going in hard.”

  She searched in vain for signs of hope in the darkness below, but saw none. Willing herself to stay focused, she could still see the outlines of the plateau ahead. For a moment she thought she might have felt a response on the rudder, but it was all happening too fast. The Kiowa was beginning to spin beyond their reach with the blackness of the mountain looming.

  “Fight it, Raina,” Skyles egged her on and perhaps himself as well, straining against the centrifugal force as he dumped fuel and discharged the last of their ordinance.

  If there was to be any saving grace, she would think later, if there was to be any occasion for her to fly again, she would gladly give it all away for the chance to take this one flight back.

  The implosion of glass and steel snatched the useless stick from her hands as their spinning blades bent like flower petals into the rocky earth. The chopper broke into pieces, lethal projectiles of rotors flying off in all directions, the cockpit collapsing, smashing to one side and threatening to crush her before flipping over, driving at an angle into the ridge, blacking her out.

  She awoke seconds later to the smell of aviation fuel and fear, gagging for breath as the howling pain at the bottom of her leg began to drag her into shock. She saw nothing until the tall American infantryman was there, leaning over her in the blur of his headlamp, ignoring the tracers punching the rock and sand all around them, the white of his eyes embedded within his camouflaged face, focused on cutting her from her seat and dragging her to s
afety, and all the while her trying to scream for Skyles, all the while her trying to cry out with words that wouldn’t come….

  Raina shook her head, jarred back to reality as she stared into her darkened video screen.

  She turned her head to look around. Her butt wasn’t parked in her Kiowa anymore, but behind a computer console in the safe confines of the back of a windowless van parked along a Northern Virginia side street.

  “You all right, Rain?” she heard a voice in her headphones.

  “Yeah.” She stretched her shoulders to break the tension.

  “Lost you there for a minute.”

  “I’m fine.”

  She reached for her joystick and made the needed corrections to put her reccee–as in reconnaissance–unit back on course. Outside the van, a beautiful autumn afternoon was blooming into full display, the crisp air punctuated by sunlight and the reflection of brightly colored leaves. Not that she noticed.

  Half a mile away, her hover angel whispered through the pitch-black interior of the ventilation duct, guided by its mini CCTV night vision camera, moving deeper into the building, undetected. Barely bigger than a mosquito, the tiny drone–more correctly known in military parlance as a MAV or micro air vehicle–had been guided into the structure through an outdoor grate and carefully maneuvered through a maze of conduits and vents to the main elevator shaft, where it had risen under her control to the target floor.

  This fancy office tower may have offered class A plus commercial space and the best security measures money could buy, including a pair of armed guards keeping watch on multiple surveillance cameras, but they were no match for Raina’s angel. The miniscule flyer was nearly translucent and almost silent, virtually impossible to spot except up close. Its miniaturized systems, from power and propulsion, to imaging and detection–had they been available to the general public–would have put even the finest Silicon Valley chip developers and Swiss watchmakers to shame.

  Inside the duct, the natural light began to grow as the angel approached the ceiling vent above its objective. She switched from night imaging to the angel’s regular CCD computational camera system. Directly below the imagers, a white-haired man sat behind a large desk talking on a mobile phone.

  Gingerly, she landed the angel on the edge of the vent for a moment, before allowing it to drop, unseen, into the room.

  2

  Tye Palmer tried not to betray any emotion as Nathan Kurn’s two security men patted him down. They waved an electronic wand over his clothing, looking for weapons or surveillance equipment, and one of them spent a good deal of time looking through Tye’s wallet before handing it back to him.

  Not that he was too worried about them finding anything. The microscopic listening device in his ear canal would pass any such superficial inspection–or so he’d been told. Same with the tiny microphone tucked inside his gum, although he shouldn’t have need of it, as long as things went as planned.

  One of the guards nodded an okay to Kurn when they were finished.

  “Thank you, gentlemen,” the white-haired man said, the legendary figure himself, waving them from the room.

  Tye waited. The man also waited until his security people left, closing the door behind them.

  “Welcome, Mr. Palmer,” he said, turning to shake Tye’s hand. “It’s nice to meet you in person.”

  “Nice to meet you, too, sir.”

  “In your email you sent me background on both you and your partner, but I don’t see her with you today.”

  “Good thing,” Raina spoke into Tye’s ear where only he could hear. “I’d have to work too hard to keep from puking on the guy’s desk.”

  Tye addressed himself to Kurn.

  “I’m sorry. Raina doesn’t get out in the field all that much. It’s not always that easy...with her prosthetic and all.”

  “Great.” Raina sounded annoyed. “Go ahead and saddle me with the gimp excuse.”

  “Mmmm.” Kurn grunted his assent. “I’m sorry for the frisking. But I’m sure you can appreciate a man in my position can’t take too many chances.”

  “No problem.”

  “I’d have asked you to sit down, but I’m on a tight schedule. I’ve already had you vetted by my security people and, given the sensitive nature of our discussion, I thought we’d better get right down to business.”

  “Fine by me.”

  A TV remote lay on the desk blotter directly in front of Kurn. It was, in fact, the only thing on the blotter at the moment. Kurn picked it up and pushed a button, turning to point it at a flat panel television display mounted to the wall behind him.

  “Let’s get started then.” He stepped around the desk to stand next to Tye as the screen flickered to life. He pushed another button on the remote and a video began to play. No sound came from the film. The display showed merely images. It took a few moments for Tye to fully process what he was seeing on the screen. He was shocked by what he saw, but he kept it together. Kurn let the film roll on.

  “Do you know who this is in the video?”

  “No, but I’m sure you’re going to tell me.”

  “Big problem,” Raina whispered in his ear. “Where he’s standing is blocking my view of the screen. And my audio is acting up. Have to reposition. See if you can stall him.”

  The film on the wall rolled on.

  The footage had apparently come from the inside of a college fraternity house. Not exactly cinematic quality and the lighting wasn’t good. But it was good enough to tell what was happening.

  “This is my only son we’re talking about,” Kurn said. “His name is Derek.”

  Tye nodded.

  “Your son? Pretty disgusting.” From the tip Major Williamson had given them, he’d guessed all along the identity of the male on the screen. Kurn had just confirmed it.

  “I know.”

  “I can see you’ve got a problem.” Tye played along. “So what do you want us to do about it?”

  “Simple. I want you to go in, gain his confidence, and a have a confidential discussion with the boy, if you get my drift, about his behavior. We need to put a stop to it.”

  “Confidentially.”

  “Yes. Indeed.”

  On the tape, a strapping young Derek Kurn could clearly be seen rising from the bed in what appeared to be his room at the fraternity. He wore no clothes. An attractive, naked girl lay on the bed beneath him. She was tied down. But she didn’t appear to be struggling at all, and the closer Tye looked it was obvious she had either had far too much to drink or been drugged.

  It was a clear case of date rape. The picture looked as ugly as it sounded.

  “What about the girl?” Tye asked.

  “What about her?”

  “Do you know who she is?”

  “Some coed, most likely.”

  “Have you thought about trying to find out who she is, to try to make amends?”

  “Make amends? What good would that do? She clearly won’t remember what happened anyway. Trust me, it will just open up a whole can of worms.”

  Tye said nothing.

  The tanned big game hunter and self-described tennis addict stood gripping the remote while the film kept running. The links on his French cuff shirt probably cost more than what Tye had ever earned in a month.

  Tye didn’t know what else to say. He glanced around Kurn’s elegantly appointed corner office, which occupied a sizable piece of the twelfth floor in the glass office tower in Roslyn, Virginia. The walls were filled with framed photographs of Kurn and various presidents, senators, and other celebrities, a potent reminder of his status as one of the most colorful and influential broadcast figures on the planet, an A-list invitee to all the important beltway-insider gatherings. Just across the Potomac, in all its glory, stood the hive of politicians and political dealmakers in Washington, D.C. that Tye, though he was no longer a soldier, still found worth defending.

  “Okay,” Raina said. “Back online again. I’ve got a little bit better angle. Try to keep him
from moving around.”

  What was Tye supposed to do, bear hug the guy? He’d been dubious about using the little snooper drones from the beginning. He could see with his own two eyes what Derek Kurn was guilty of and how his powerful old man was trying to keep it quiet and cover up for the kid. He didn’t need a drone to tell him that.

  Kurn looked impatient. “You’re back working on your degree and even though you’re older you can still pass as a student. You think you’ll be able to get in and do what I need, or not?”

  “I think so. Yes.”

  “Good. I can’t abide this type of behavior. I don’t know where Derek ever learned such things. But something has to be done about it.” The man seemed more than a little on edge. Maybe he was having second thoughts about letting Tye, and by extension Raina, in on his dirty little family secret.

  Tye was half-tempted to walk out and just report what he’d seen to the police. But he knew if Raina continued to run into technical difficulties, it would simply be the word of a lowly former Army grunt against a media celebrity’s like Kurn. Tye would be discredited, or slandered, if need be, and the case would go nowhere. Kurn didn’t get to where he was without knowing how to play hardball. And even if Raina did manage to record some good copy of the tape, they still might be on thin ice.

  “I think that’s quite enough,” Kurn said. “You get the idea.” He punched a button on his remote and the screen went blank again.

  3

  Watching and listening blocks away, Raina flexed her arms and rolled her shoulders to keep her hands from beginning to quiver. From where she’d landed the MAV she had thought she could get the best camera angle on both the screen and Kurn. But whether consciously or unconsciously, the man kept moving back and forth, blocking her view of the video. Turning his back to the MAV also muffled the sound of Kurn’s voice, and it forced her to fly silently along the seam of the curtains to find a better location along the hanging curtain rod.