Текст книги "End Game"

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“He’s low on fuel.”

“Well, tell him to get moving.”

STARSHIP SLID OVER THE VILLAGE FIVE MILES INLAND FROM

Port Somalia, following the road as it wound back toward the coastline. Six small buildings stood next to each other, shouldering together between the road and a nearby cliff.

Nothing.

Nothing on the road either.

The computer gave him a warning tone. He was at

“bingo,” his fuel tanks just full enough to get him back to the Abner Read.

“Werewolf to Tac—I’m bingo, heading homeward.”

“Negative. We need you to scan the area near the Indian warship.”

Naturally.

“I can give you five minutes,” he told Eyes, planning to cut into his reserves. “Am I looking for something specific?”

“They found a raft. See if you can spot anything similar.

We believe there may be a submarine in the area, but we haven’t heard it yet.”

Ah, an admission of mortality from the all-powerful Navy, thought Starship as he whipped the Werewolf toward the Indian patrol boat. The ship’s radar remained in scan mode; they saw him but were no longer targeting him.

“Couldn’t the patrol boat pick him up on sonar?” Starship asked.

“A boat that class isn’t always equipped with sonar. And this one is not.”

Starship took the Werewolf a mile and a half north, then turned to the west, sweeping along roughly parallel to the shore for nearly three miles before sweeping back. The flight control computer gave him another beep—he’d used half of his ten minute reserve.

“Not seeing anything, Tac.”

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DALE BROWN’S DREAMLAND

“How are you on fuel?”

“One more pass and then I absolutely have to come home,” said Starship.

“Acknowledged.”

STORM STARED THROUGH THE BINOCULARS, WATCHING THE

Werewolf as it came toward the ship. The helicopter had turned on its landing lights, and it looked like a sea anemone trailing its tentacles through the ocean.

It was a good little machine. It would be even better if it were equipped with a sonar system like the AQS-22—a suggestion Storm had sent up the chain of command weeks ago. The idea had yet to be acknowledged as received, let alone considered.

What he needed were a few short circuits up the chain of command, just like the Dreamland people had.

“We think we have something, Storm,” said Eyes. “Very light contact, has to be a battery-powered propeller, six kilometers west of Port Somalia. At this range, with the Indian patrol boat so loud, it’s hard to tell.”

“Let’s head down there. I’ll put in another call to Admiral Johnson. Maybe he’ll answer me sometime this century.”

Off the coast of Somalia

0108

THE HELMSMAN CONTROLLED THE MIDGET SUBMARINE FROM

a seat at the nose of the craft, working at a board that reminded Captain Sattari of the flight simulator for American F-4 Phantom jets he’d practiced on years before. The craft was steered with a large pistol-grip joystick; once submerged, it relied on an internal navigational system. The vessel was run by two men; the vessel’s captain sat next to the helm, acting as navigator and watching the limited set of sensors.

The four submarines in Sattari’s fleet had been designed END GAME

41

by a European company as civilian vessels, intended for use in the shallow Caribbean and Pacific coastal waters. Converting them to military use had taken several months, but was not particularly difficult; the work primarily included measures to make the craft quieter. The acrylic bulbous nose and viewing portals had been replaced and the deck area topside stripped bare, but at heart the little boats were still the same submarines that appeared in the manufacturer’s pricey four-color catalog. They could dive to three hundred meters and sail underwater for roughly twenty-eight hours. In an emergency, the subs could remain submerged for ninety-six hours. A small diesel engine propelled the boats on the surface, where the top speed was roughly ten knots, slower if the batteries were being charged. The midgets were strictly transport vessels, and it would be laughable to compare them to frontline submarines used by the American or Russian navies. But they were perfect as far as Sattari was concerned.

He called them Parvanehs: Butterflies.

The captain glanced back at the rest of the team, strapped into the boats. Among the interior items that had been retained as delivered were the deep-cushioned seats, which helped absorb and dampen interior sounds. Three of the men were making good use of them now, sleeping after their mission.

Sattari turned to the submarine commander.

“Another hour, Captain Sattari,” the man said without prompting. “You can rest if you wish. I’ll wake you when we’re close.”

“Thank you. But I don’t believe I could sleep. Are you sure we’re not being followed?”

“We would hear the propellers of a nearby ship with the hydrophone. As I said, the Indian ship has very limited capabilities. We are in the clear.”

Sattari sat back against his seat. His father the general would be proud. More important, his men would respect him.

“Not bad for a broken-down fighter pilot, blacklisted and 42

DALE BROWN’S DREAMLAND

passed up for promotion,” he whispered to himself. “Not bad, Captain Sattari. Thirty-nine is not old at all.”

Aboard the Abner Read , off the coast of Somalia

0128

“WHAT KIND OF SUBMARINE? A PAKISTANI SUBMARINE?”

“I’m not close enough to tell yet, Admiral,” Storm told Johnson over the secure video-communications network.

“We’re still at least twenty miles north of it. There are two surface ships between us and the submarine, and another oil tanker beyond it. They may be masking the boat’s sound somewhat. I’ll know more about it in an hour.”

“You have evidence that it picked up the saboteurs?”

“No, I don’t,” admitted Storm.

Johnson’s face puckered. “Pakistan, at least in theory, is our ally. India is not.”

Storm didn’t answer.

“And there are no known submarines in this area?” said Johnson.

“We’ve checked with fleet twice,” said Storm, referring to the command charged with keeping track of submarine movements through the oceans.

“I find it hard to believe that a submarine could have slipped by them,” said Johnson.

“Which is why I found this submarine so interesting,”

said Storm. While it was a rare boat that slipped by the forces—and sensors—assigned to watch them, it was not impossible. And Storm’s intel officer had a candidate—a Pak sub reported about seven hundred miles due east in the Indian Ocean twenty-eight hours ago. It was an Augusta-class boat.

“All right, Storm. You have a point. See what you can determine. Do not—repeat, do not—fire on him.”

END GAME

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“Unless he fires on me.”

“See that he doesn’t.”

Off the coast of Somalia

0158

SATTARI LEANED OVER AND TOOK THE HEADSET FROM THE

submarine captain, cupping his hands over his ears as he pushed them over his head. He heard a loud rushing sound, more like the steady static of a mistuned radio than the noise he would associate with a ship.

“This is the Mitra?” he asked.

“Yes, Captain. We’re right on course, within two kilometers. You’ll be able to see the lights at the bottom of the tanker in a few minutes. I believe we’re the first in line.”

Sattari handed the headphones back, shifting to look over the helmsman’s shoulder. A small video camera in the nose of the midget submarine showed the murky ocean ahead.

From the waterline up, the Mitra appeared to be a standard oil tanker. Old, slow, but freshly painted and with a willing crew, she was one of the vast army of blue-collar tankers the world relied on for its energy needs. Registered to a company based in Morocco, she regularly sailed these waters, delivering oil from Iranian wells to a number of African customers.

Or so her logbook declared.

Below the waterline, she was anything but standard. A large section of the hull almost exactly midship had been taken out and replaced with an underwater docking area for the four midget submarines. The vessels would sail under the tanker, then slowly rise, in effect driving into a garage. The submarines measured 8.4 meters, and the opening in the hull was just over twenty, leaving a decent amount of space for maneuvering.

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The murky image on the forward-view screen suddenly glowed yellow. The camera aperture adjusted, sharpening the image. A set of large spotlights were arranged at the bottom of the hull; as the Parvaneh came closer, another group of colored lights would help guide the sub into the hold.

“Is the tanker moving?” Sattari asked.

“Three knots.”

The submarines could dock whether the mother ship was moving or not, and as long as it wasn’t going more than four knots, most of the helmsmen felt it was easier to get aboard when the ship was under way. But in this case, the fact that the tanker was moving was a signal that there were other ships in the area. Sattari sat back in his seat, aware that not only was his mission not yet complete, but the success or failure of this final stage was out of his hands.

Aboard the Abner Read , off the coast of Somalia

0208

“TAC, I’M CLEAR OF THAT FREIGHTER,” SAID STARSHIP, FLYING

the Werewolf south. “Tanker is two miles off my nose, dead on. I’ll be over it in heartbeat.”

“Roger that.”

Starship whipped the little aircraft to the right of the poky tanker. He could see two silhouettes at the side of the superstructure near the bridge—crewmen looking at him.

His throat tightened a notch, and he waited for the launch warning—he had a premonition that one of the people aboard the ship was going to try shoving an SA-7 or even a Stinger up his backside. But his premonition was wrong; he cleared in front of the tanker and circled back, ramping down his speed to get a good look at the deck.

“Take another run,” said Tac as he passed the back end.

END GAME

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“Roger that. Ship’s name is the Mitra,” added Starship.

The name was written at the stern.

“Keep feeding us images.”

STORM HAD HANDPICKED THE CREW FOR THE SHIP, AND THE

men who manned the sonar department were, if not the very best experts in the surface fleet, certainly among the top ten. So the fact that they now had four unknown underwater contacts eight miles away perplexed him considerably. As did their utter failure to match the sound profiles they had picked up with the extensive library in the ship’s computer.

And now they seemed to be losing contact.

“Has to be some sort of bizarre glitch in the computer because of the shallow depth and the geometry of the sea bottom nearby,” insisted Eyes. “Maybe it’s an echo.”

“That’s impossible,” said Storm.

“I know.”

Eyes recognized the tone. It meant—not everything works in the real world the way it’s drawn up on the engineering charts, Captain.

Still, he was convinced his people were right.

So what did that mean?

That either he was looking at four submarines—four very quiet submarines—that no one else in the world had heard before, or that he was being suckered by some sort of camouflaging device.

Like an underwater robot trailing behind the submarine, throwing up a smoke screen.

The problem with that was that decoys normally made a lot more noise. These contacts were almost silent.

“We have mechanical noises in the water,” said Eyes.

“We’re having some trouble picking up the sounds, though, because of that tanker.”

“Explosion?”

“Negative.”

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“Torpedoes?”

“Negative. He may have some sort of problem. He may be using the tanker to turn around and check behind him, just as we theorized, Storm. He’s done everything we thought he would, just slower.”

“We didn’t think he’d split himself into four equal parts.”

“You really think we’re chasing four submarines?”

Storm folded his arms in front of his chest. The truth was, they’d had all sorts of glitches with their equipment from the moment they’d left port. It was to be expected—the gear was brand new and the bugs had to be worked out.

“Airforce find anything on that tanker?” asked Storm.

“Negative. Tanker checks out. They do a run down to South Africa from Iran. Goes back and forth every couple of weeks.”

“Let’s give the submariner a few more minutes to make a mistake,” said Storm. “Then we’ll turn on the active sonar.

At least we’ll find out how many of him we’re chasing.”

“Aye aye, Captain.”

Off the coast of Somalia

0208

CAPTAIN SATTARI WAS THE NEXT TO LAST MAN OUT OF THE

small submarine. The small interior smelled so horribly he nearly retched as he grabbed hold of the rope guideline and jumped onto the narrow metal gangway at the side of the hull.

“Captain Sattari! Ship’s commander needs to see you right away,” said the sailor leaning toward him at the end of the decking. “He’s on the bridge, sir. He asks you to hurry.”

Sattari glanced back as he entered the doorway at the side. Two other submarines had arrived; one was starting to unload and the other was just being secured.

The sailor ran ahead. Sattari did his best to keep up. Not familiar with the ship, he knocked his shin as he went END GAME

47

through one of the compartments to the ladder that led to the bridge.

“We have an American warship behind us,” said the ship’s captain when he reached the deck. “He’s sent a helicopter to circle us. He may be tracking the submarines with passive sonar.”

“Do we have all the subs?”

“The fourth still has not come inside. I believe he is within a half kilometer at this point, or perhaps closer. I thought it best not to use the sonar.”

“You’re sure these are Americans?”

“Quite sure. The ship identified itself as the Abner Read.

Devil’s Tail.”

The American littoral destroyer had made quite a name for itself in the Gulf of Aden in the few months it had been there.

But it rarely ventured to the eastern end of the gulf, and Sattari had not seen it during his earlier scouting missions.

Beside the point now. It was here.

Discovery by the Americans would be catastrophic. Even if the Americans left them alone for the moment—and really, why would they help the Indians?—they would be on the lookout for his midget submarines in the future. It was one thing to evade the Indians and even the Chinese; quite another to have to deal with an American dragnet.

Not that he did not relish the day he would face them in combat. He welcomed the chance to avenge the defeat they had dealt his father.

“Can you launch the decoy once Boat Four is aboard?”

Sattari asked.

“With them this close, I would think it highly likely they would realize where it came from.”

“Turn on the sonar as the submarine comes into the ship,” said Sattari.

“The sonar?”

“For a brief moment. Then drop the decoy. Continue on as if nothing has happened.”

“As you wish, Captain.”

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DALE BROWN’S DREAMLAND

Aboard the Abner Read , off the coast of Somalia

0215

“SHARK GILL SONAR! DEAD AHEAD—HE MUST BE RIGHT UNder that oil tanker!” Eyes’s voice was so loud Storm thought he would’ve heard him without the com set.

“Excellent,” said Storm, though in truth he felt disappointed. Shark Gill was the NATO code word for the sonar used in Russian Kilo-class submarines. Most likely he had been trailing a Russian boat that had managed to evade the fleet– not the commandos, since Russia and India were allies.

“See if the captain of the tanker would honor a request to move off to the west,” said Storm. “Tell him that our helicopter has been tracking some mines in the area—get him scared and get him out of there.”

“The sub may follow.”

“I doubt he’ll make it that easy for us, now that he knows we’re here,” said Storm. “Turn on our active sonar as well—let’s make sure he knows precisely how close to him we are.”

Off the coast of Somalia

0216

SERGEANT IBN CAME UP TO THE BRIDGE TO REPORT TO SAT-tari while the tanker captain was talking to the Americans.

“All our men are back. No losses. Mission accomplished,” said the sergeant, his face as grim as ever.

“The success of the mission is entirely yours,” Sattari told him. “You trained everyone superbly—I for one benefited greatly from your drills.”

The sergeant turned beet red, then bent his head.

Had Sattari mistaken shyness for skepticism? No, he thought; Ibn—and most likely the others—were wary of an unproven commander whose experience was entirely in the END GAME

49

cockpit. They must have felt, and with some justification, that he had only gotten his position because of his father, who still had some influence with the government. Or else they thought the entire scheme of equipping a special operations group with gear and machines any civilian—any rich civilian—could buy was preposterous.

They would not think so now.

Ibn remained at attention.

“Relax, Sergeant,” Sattari told him. “See to the men.”

“Thank you, Captain.”

Was there more respect in his voice? Less doubt?

Perhaps. But more important, Sattari felt sure of himself.

He had done it; he had succeeded. Tonight was only the start.

“The Americans want us to go west,” the tanker captain told him. “They say they have spotted some mines.”

Had he not been so tired, Sattari would have burst out laughing.

“Comply. Make as much noise as you can.”

“The decoy will begin chattering any moment now.”

“That’s fine,” said Sattari. “They will think the submarine launched it. Combined with the sonar they heard—they won’t be able to piece the different parts together.”

The ship’s commander was a short, sinewy man who had somehow managed to keep his face clear of wrinkles despite having spent his life at sea. He looked at Sattari as if he didn’t understand, and the commando leader felt com-pelled to explain further.

“You see,” Sattari said, “these Americans are clever people. They love puzzles, and they love to piece them together. In this case, the fact that the pieces don’t fit will confuse them. Their instincts will be to press ahead and attack. They will realize it’s a decoy soon enough, then they will look for the submarine in earnest.”

“You speak of the Americans as if you know them very well,” said the ship’s captain.

“I speak from unfortunate experience.”

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DALE BROWN’S DREAMLAND

Aboard the Abner Read , off the coast of Somalia

0218

“SHIP IS TURNING TO PORT. I WOULDN’T SAY THEY’RE BURNing up the ocean,” reported Starship.

“Take a run over them. Make sure they see you.”

“Have to be blind not to,” said Starship. But he did as he was told, moving the Werewolf down toward the tanker.

Again he passed so close that he could see a man on the ladder of the superstructure. Again he felt a chill and a moment of premonition, sure he was going to be shot down.

I’m not even on the stinkin’ helicopter, he reminded himself as he circled away, unfired on. Relax.

“WE HAVE A DECOY IN THE WATER,” EYES TOLD STORM.

“Loud. Imposter.”

Imposter was a nickname for a Russian MG-74 decoy, a versatile torpedo-tube-launched noisemaker that could employ a variety of techniques to confuse a tracking ship, including jamming sonar and simulating the sound of a large submarine.

“You have a contact with the sub that launched it?”

“Negative. We didn’t hear the tube flood or launch, either. Tubes could have been open for a while. Not adding up, Captain. Now we don’t have any contacts at all.”

“Nothing!”

“I know, I know,” said Eyes quickly. “We’re looking, Storm. I don’t know why we can’t find it.”

This was the point in the chase where a hunter had to be patient; sooner or later the prey would make a mistake and give himself away. No matter how clever—and the captain of the submarine had proven himself quite clever—he would eventually slip.

The problem was, Storm was not a patient man. He stared END GAME

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at the holographic display, trying to puzzle out where his adversary had gone.

“You’re sure he’s not trailing that tanker?”

“Negative.”

Oh my God, thought Storm, what if he managed to get underneath us?

Impossible.

But a logical explanation.

“Change course—hard to starboard,” he shouted to the helmsman behind him on the bridge. “Eyes—make sure the SOB isn’t hiding right beneath us or in our wake somehow.”

STARSHIP SKIPPED OVER THE WAVES, STARING AT THE INFRARED

feed and trying not to let it burn through his eyes. There was nothing on the surface of the water—no periscope, no radio mast, no nothing.

Navy guys stared at the sea all the time, and claimed to love it. How sick was that?

THE SUBMARINE WASN’T UNDER THEM. BUT NEITHER WAS IT

anywhere in the five mile grid they marked out in the ocean as its most likely location, nor in the wider circle that Storm had the ship patrol after the grid proved empty.

They’d been beaten. And the worst thing was, Storm didn’t even know who had done it.

A hard-ass Russian submarine captain in a Kilo, who’d wandered close to Port Somalia by accident and then thought it best to get away before he got blamed?

Or the captain of a submarine who had in fact picked up the saboteurs and scooted clean away?

“All right,” he growled into his microphone. “Eyes—we’re going to have to call off the search. We can’t stay here forever.”

“Aye aye, Captain.”

Storm’s anger flashed as the command was passed and the crew began to move, tacitly accepting defeat. His right 52

DALE BROWN’S DREAMLAND

hand formed into a fist but he restrained himself from pounding the bulkhead.

He thought of that later, in his cabin, when he stared at the ceiling instead of sleeping. It was a measure of how much he had changed in the months since the fight with the Somalian pirates.

Whether it was a change for the better, he couldn’t tell.

Las Vegas University of Medicine,

Las Vegas, Nevada

5 January 1998

1723

THE DAY’S WORTH OF TESTS WERE MOSTLY VARIATIONS ON

ones Zen had already gone through before Christmas. He was injected with a series of dyes and then X-rayed and scanned, prodded and listened to. The technical staff took a stack of X-rays, MRIs, and ultrasounds. Then they hooked him up to a machine that measured nerve impulses. This involved inserting needles into various parts of his body. The doctors had done this several days before.

Now they inserted more, and left them in for nearly two hours.

He didn’t feel the ones in his legs, but he did get a prickly sensation in his neck when they were inserted along his upper back. It didn’t hurt, exactly, but lying there was more difficult than he had imagined.

“Done,” said Dr. Vasin finally. Two aides came over and helped Zen sit up.

“So I can walk now?”

“Jeff.”

“Hey, Doc, loosen up. Just a joke.” Zen pushed his arms back. His muscles had stiffened. “Tomorrow I go under the knife, right?”

“Laser, and then the injections. Bright and early, but listen—”

END GAME

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“I know. No guarantees.”

“This is a really long process, Jeff. And I have to be hon -

est, brutally honest—”

“Ten percent chance. I know.”

“Ten percent is very optimistic,” said Vasin.

“It’s OK. I understand.”

“Operation one is tomorrow. The procedure itself is relatively simple, but of course it is a procedure. No food after seven P.M., just in case we have to put you out.”

“Beer’s not food, right?”

“Not after seven. And for the duration of the test period, alcohol and coffee are forbidden.”

“Well, there goes the bender I was planning. Don’t worry, Doc,” added Zen, “I’m just joking.”

Needles and sensors removed, Zen got dressed and wheeled himself out into the hallway. He headed toward the lounge area, where he could call for a taxi before taking the elevator down. He was surprised to see Breanna waiting for him.

“Bree?”

“You called for a taxi?”

“What are you doing here?”

“Like I said—need a taxi?”

“I thought you were snowed in.”

“I shoveled the runway myself.”

She leaned over and kissed him. Zen grabbed her around the neck and hugged her, surprising himself at how much he missed her.

“Everything all right?”

“I feel like a pincushion. Other than that, I’m fine.” He thought of telling her about the dream but decided not to. It would fade, eventually.

“Operation still on for tomorrow?”

“Not much of an operation,” he told her. “They just inject me with crap. Don’t even knock me out.”

“Crap,” she said sarcastically.

“Let’s go grab something to eat, OK? I’m fasting from 54

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seven P.M. After that, no food until tomorrow night. I want to have a beer. I can’t have any during the two weeks of injections. No coffee, either.”

“No beer or coffee? You sure this is worth it?” Breanna laughed.

“Hope so.”

II

Impossible!

Navy Ministry Building,

New Delhi, India

6 January 1998

0900

DEPUTY DEFENSE MINISTER ANIL MEMON STARED AT THE

table, trying to master his rage as India’s Prime Minister continued to speak about the need for a “measured response” to the latest provocation. The minister claimed that there was no obvious link between the attack at Port Somalia and the Pakistanis—an absurd claim in Memon’s opinion. Memon knew that he should hold his tongue, but finally he could not.

“Who else would have launched the attack?” he said.

“Who else has connections to these pirates?”

“We have no proof of connections,” said the Prime Minister.

“They are Muslims. What other proof do you wish?”

Memon ignored the disapproving stare from his boss, Defense Minister Pita Skandar. “They will attack again and again. They will strike our ships. They do not wish to see us prosper. Anyone who does not realize that is a fool.”

“You haven’t proven your case,” said the Prime Minister.

“How many of my sailors must die before you consider it proven?” said Memon.

“They are my sailors too, Deputy Minister,” said the Prime Minister, his anger finally rising. “More mine than yours.”

“Then let us act. Mobilize. Send the new carrier to block-ade the Pakistani ports.”

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“My deputy speaks with passion,” said Minister Skandar softly. “Take into account that he is young.”

“I assumed he spoke for you,” said the Prime Minister.

“He goes further than I. I would not block the Pakistani ports quite yet. But the Shiva should set out immediately.

Its trials are complete. We must show that we are resolved.”

The Prime Minister nodded, then turned to the Chief of the Naval Staff for his opinion. The discussion continued for a few minutes more, but Skandar’s recommendations had clearly set the course, and within a half hour the meeting concluded.

Memon, feeling defeated and frustrated, sat in his seat as the others began filing out. When he finally rose, Skandar touched his sleeve, signaling that he should stay. Cheeks flushing, Memon sat back down.

“You win no points by being too fiery in the cabinet room,” said Skandar.

“The Muslims must be behind this,” said Memon. “They are the only ones who benefit. The intelligence services simply are inept in gathering evidence.”

“We must examine everything in context.”

A large man, with a shaved head and an emotionless smile, Skandar appeared almost godlike. But of late Memon had begun to wonder if the man generally referred to as the

“Admiral” was simply old. Not quite thirty years before, he had distinguished himself as a young officer in charge of a raiding party in the 1971 war with Pakistan. Promotions quickly followed. In time, Skandar became the head of the Naval Staff, the highest uniform post in the navy.

In 1994, Skandar retired to run for congress. Winning election easily, he had been asked to join the Prime Minister’s government as the Defense minister. The old admiral at first demurred, but soon was persuaded that he could do much to help the services.

Memon had been among those who helped persuade END GAME

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him. The admiral’s “price” for agreeing was that Memon would join him as deputy minister. He’d done so, despite the fact that he had hoped for his own minister’s portfolio.

Like many other young Indians, he saw Skandar as the one man in the government with enough stature to bring India’s military into the twenty-first century.

The admiral had done better than any one of them, Memon included, might have hoped, adding aircraft to the air force, tanks to the army, and above all ships to the navy.

It thrilled Memon, who wished India to take her rightful place in the world. But of late Skandar had seemed only an old man, talking of abstractions rather than actions.

“Admiral, the context is before our eyes,” Memon told him. “We are being attacked.”

“In the next century, who will be the superpowers of Asia? Russia is a shadow of herself. We pick over her bones to build our own forces. The United States? They are preoc-cupied with Europe, Taiwan, and Japan, spread so thin that they cannot afford to send more than a token force to the Gulf of Aden.”

“China is our ultimate enemy. I realize that,” said Memon. “But you’re worrying about fifty years from now.

I’m worrying about today.”

“Our actions today will determine what happens in fifty years.” Skandar smiled. “You’re still young. Full of fire.

That is admirable.”

At thirty-eight, Memon did not consider himself particularly young. But since he was half Skandar’s age, the comment was not meant unkindly.

“What do you think of joining the Shiva?” added Skandar.

Memon had been instrumental in the conversion of the ship from the Russian, Tiazholyi Avianesushchiy Kreyser, or Heavy Aircraft-Carrying Cruiser, Kiev. To Memon, the Shiva epitomized India’s new aggressiveness, and he would love to be aboard her. Its captain, Admiral Asad Kala, was an old acquaintance.

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But why was Skandar suggesting it? To get him out of New Delhi?

“I would like nothing better than to join the Shiva, ” said Memon warily. “If you can spare me.”

“Good, then.” Skandar rose. “You should make your plans immediately.”

Dreamland

6 January 1998

1140

“THIS ISN’T A B-1, CAPTAIN. YOU’RE NOT GOING TO GET UP

over that mountain unless you start pulling the stick back now.”

Jan Stewart clenched her teeth together but did as she was told, jerking the control yoke toward her. The EB-52

Megafortress lifted her nose upward, shrugging off a wave of turbulence as she rose over Glass Mountain at the northern edge of Dreamland’s Test Range 4. As soon as she cleared the jagged peak, Stewart pressed the stick forward, aiming to stay as close to the mountain as possible. But it was no good—though a vast improvement over the B-52H

she had been converted from, the Megafortress was still considerably more comfortable cruising in the stratosphere than hugging the earth. Her four P&W power plants strained as Stewart tried to force gravity, momentum, and lift into an equation that would get the plane across the ridge without being seen by the nearby radar sentry, a blimp hovering two miles to the west.