Razer

Part One

Scott Tracy never dreamed that flying could bore him. But somehow, today, the monotonous grey of sky and land, and the sedate pace at which Tracy 2 was coasting above the southern reaches of Russia, had lulled him almost to somnolence.

He cranked the air-conditioning up a notch and inhaled the cool stream of air that funnelled into the cabin, roved his eyes across the landscape that passed below. The tundra was pockmarked with the scars of rocket strikes and mortar holes, the visible remains of how close the war had come to taking out the territories of Russia. Scott stifled a twinge of remorse. It was probable he'd made some of those scars himself, during his time patrolling the Russian borderzone – the exact same zone the Tracy 2 was now skirting uncomfortably along. He and Brains had one more stop before they could turn for home, in Kemerovo, just a bit too close to the Berezhni border for Scott's liking. And, despite the ceasefire, it hadn't escaped his notice that the Russians were just as wary as he was. They might not have mentioned the elephant in the room, but they'd requisitioned eight of Tracy Corps' armoured air-transport carriers, which indicated to Scott that they could at least smell the beast.

Scott shook his head, tried to clear the fog from a brain that was dulled through lack of caffeine. He'd have killed for a coffee right now. Would have happily sucked back a pack of NoDoze if it meant he'd be less bleary-eyed when he and Brains landed to inspect the manufacturing plant. He blinked through eyes gritted from not enough sleep, shuddered at the thought of spending another cold night in another two-star hotel that reeked of cabbage and crawled with what passed for cockroaches in this part of the world.

'Brains,' he said out loud. 'Did Tin-Tin manage to book a hotel in Kemerovo?'

Brains roused drowsily from his contemplation of the monotonous scenery below. 'She, ah, said she did.' He rifled around the cabin for the paper he'd written the name of the hotel on. 'But you know Tin-Tin doesn't speak, ah, Russian, very well.'

Scott smiled at the memory of their previous night in Kiev, and the expression on Brains' face when he'd glimpsed the only bed in what was supposed to be a twin suite.

'Here it is.' Brains smoothed the paper against his thigh and squinted down at his untidy scrawl. 'The, ah, Ogorod.'

'Even the name smells like cabbage.'

'What?'

'Nothing.' Scott nodded towards note. 'What else did she say?'

Brains brought his scribbling closer to his face. 'She said that, ah, that a driver would be waiting for us at the a-airport.'

'Let's hope that this time he knows where he's going.'

'W-what makes you think that he's, ah, that he's a he?'

Scott snorted lightly. 'Don't get my hopes up.' His lips quirked at his memories of Russian women. 'It would be – hold on.'

The comms system activated with a burst of static, followed by a woman speaking English with a heavy Russian accent.

'Speak of the devil.' Scott grinned wolfishly as a surge of adrenaline lifted the fog from his brain. Amazing what the sound of a Russian accent could still do to him. And the thicker, his toes curled inside his boots, the better.

'Omsk airfield calling aircraft ident tango zero nine two,' the voice said dispassionately. 'You have entered restricted air space. Request you alter heading zero eight four.'

'Restricted airspace?' The grin fell from Scott's face as he entered the new coordinates into the nav computer.

Brains turned to stare at the featureless terrain below. 'I thought we were still over, ah, Russia?'

'We are.' Scott sat back as the computer plotted the new course, frowning as the display refreshed. 'That can't be right. They're asking us to divert in to a restricted zone, not out of one.'

The voice burst through the comms again, dull and robotic. 'This is Omsk field calling aircraft ident tango zero – '

'Tango zero nine two to Omsk airfield,' Scott cut in. 'Request confirm new coordinates zero eight four from this position.'

A burst of static entered the cockpit, followed by the announcer's thick accent. 'Confirm. Zero eight four from current position.'

'Omsk airfield,' Scott said, 'we cannot divert into Berezhni territory. Request alternate heading.'

'Omsk airfield repeating header zero eight four. Please divert.'

Scott's eyebrows knit together as he scanned the sky ahead of them. Visibility outside the cockpit was poor, a flat band of cumulus stretching from horizon to horizon, haze bunched up sullenly beneath the unmoving cloud. Below them the ground was equally sullen, a flat patchwork dotted with stretches of brown grass and unmelted snow. Signs of habitation were rare, and more than once Brains had commented how isolated life must be for the occupants of the dwellings that occasionally passed below. But now Scott could see nothing. No houses. No signs of human occupation. An endless, monotonous, no-man's land.

Brains leaned forward to examine the nav display. 'W-what are you going to do?'

Scott's focus returned to the far horizon. 'What I'm not going to do is divert onto that heading. I'm going to – shit!' He broke off as a Sukho 43 broke out of the featureless band of cloud and shot past the Tracy 2, close enough for the fighter plane's backwash to buffet the small craft violently.

'Shit,' Scott said again as he fought to keep the plane steady. 'Brains, are you buckled in?'

'Of course.' Brains' hands grasped reflexively for a hold against the inside of the fuselage. 'What's ha-happening?'

'I have no idea.' Scott twisted in his seat, unable to maintain a visual of the fast-moving Sukho as it tracked against the glare of the cloud. He twisted back in the other direction, craning his neck to see if the fighter was returning to their position.

'Scott!' Brains pointed towards 12 o'clock.

Scott turned to see two more Sukhos descending from the cloud and barrelling directly towards them. 'What the hell is going on?' He toggled the comms channel open. 'Omsk airfield, this is tango zero nine two. We are under attack. Repeat: we are under attack.'

The oncoming Sukhos split formation and roared around the Tracy 2 at high speed, the dual backwash buffeting the plane violently. 'Repeat,' Scott broadcast as he struggled to keep the aircraft level. 'We are under attack. Mayday. Mayday!'

A male voice issued calmly from the comms. 'Please divert to header zero eight four.'

Scott looked up to see the Sukhos regrouping against the glare of the sky. 'This is tango zero nine two repeating mayday. Please acknowledge.'

The voice returned, methodic and dull. 'Please divert to header zero eight four.'

Brains leant forward at the unfamiliar voice and tapped the comms panel. 'Scott,' he said after a few seconds. 'Frequency shift. We-we're no longer talking to Omsk field.'

Scott glanced sideways at Brains as he banked the Tracy 2 sharply and aimed her back towards the heart of Russia. 'Then hold on. This could get rough.'

Brains tightened his grip and shrank deeper into his seat.

Scott came out of the steep bank, looked back to see the three Sukhos had entered combat formation and were now tailing him.

'Now what,' he muttered as they once again broke formation, two of them splitting up and circling around him. They passed at high speed across the Tracy 2's nose, forcing the aircraft to abruptly drop altitude. Scott spun the craft out of the dive, dimly aware of Brains struggling with the extra G's in the seat beside him. No sooner had he levelled out than the third Sukho came up on the starboard wing, forcing Scott to bank again and sending the Tracy 2 in the opposite direction, straight back towards Berezhni territory.

'Brains,' Scott said. 'Get Father on the comms. Now.'

Tracy 2 was a civilian aircraft, a means of getting from point A to point B. She was not equipped with anti-aircraft defences, and not suited to high-speed manoeuvring. The Sukho 43s might be well over a decade old, but Scott knew he had no hope of outrunning three of them, let alone evading any weaponry they might send his way.

'Father,' he said as soon as Brains signalled he had a connection. 'We're under attack.'

As if to illustrate the point, a missile hit them from behind, grazed across the wing of Tracy 2 and sent a plume of black smoke out to stain the white sky.

'Say again, Scott.' Jeff Tracy stared at the metal speaker grill, willed anything else to come out of it other than what he'd just heard. Anything. Just not…

'Repeating: we are under attack.'

…not that.

'Father? Are you reading me?'

'Yes. I'm reading you.' The pen fell from Jeff's fingers and rolled beneath the contracts that lay unsigned across his desk. 'Tell me what's happening.'

'We have been engaged by three Sukho 43s, Berezhni colours.' There was no hint of panic in Scott's disembodied voice. Only cool, calm efficiency – five years of front-line service reasserting itself in the blink of an eye. 'We've sustained damage to the port wing and are being forced into Berezhni territory.'

Jeff opened a connection to Thunderbird Five. 'Alan, get a fix on Tracy 2's transponder.' Jeff watched from the corner of his eye as Virgil rose from his seat at the piano. 'Scott, have you tried evasive?'

'They're one step ahead of us. I can't see any way out of this.'

'I have it, Father.' Alan's face appeared on the portrait feed from Thunderbird Five. 'Seven kilometres from the restricted territories. Any minute now and communications will be lost.'

'Alan, use what you've got to plot all possible trajectories.' Jeff glanced up as Gordon and John entered the lounge, looked away from the apprehension in their eyes. 'Scott… how long?'

'At the rate we're bleeding fuel…I estimate ten minutes. Less.'

Jeff stared at his desk, at the paperwork draped untidily across the polished timber, the print on the pages merging into a meaningless black and white blur.

'Father,' Scott said, his voice laden with meaning. 'We're going down.'

'Son.' The blood drained from Jeff's face. 'I'll do whatever it takes to find you.'

The console cut off, a blinking red light signalling the connection had been lost.

'Whatever it takes,' Jeff said into the dead air.

Scott brought the Tracy 2 down hard, bumped her across the uneven field and powered down his only remaining engine. He watched as the first of the Sukhos taxied across the snow-powdered grass and came to a slow stop, nose-to-nose with the Tracy 2. Close enough that Scott could see paint flaking from the scrapes on the pilot's helmet.

'What now?' Brains watched as a second Sukho descended towards the field.

'I don't know,' Scott said as the pilot that had forced them down slid from his cockpit and walked the short distance between the two aircraft, hefted a pistol in his hand and aimed it directly at them. 'But my guess is they're going to want us to get out.'

'A-and then what?'

The second Sukho taxied across the empty field to box them in. The canopy slid open and the pilot clambered out, aimed another weapon in their direction. Both pilots' faces remained concealed by their helmet visors, their bodies clad in the distinctive gunmetal grey flying suits of the Berezhni Air Force. The suits were the same colour as the Sukhos, the only difference being the blood-red flag of Berezhnia that adorned the flanks of the aircraft, and the number of kills proudly displayed beneath the cockpits.

Scott twisted in his seat to study the damage to Tracy 2s wing, knew he'd been in the hands of experts.

The third Sukho buzzed the perimeter of the field then shot off deeper into Berezhni territory. Scott spared a brief glance as it arced overhead and disappeared into the distance.

'I guess it's time to get out,' he said as the first pilot indicated with his weapon that the occupants of the Tracy 2 needed to disembark.

'No,' Brains said, fear rising in his voice. 'W-we can't!'

'We always knew this day was going to come.' Scott turned and looked Brains in the eye. 'We couldn't get away with it forever.'