Brown, Dale - Patrick McLanahan 09 (85 page)

 
          
“The
West would want us to testify as witnesses against Kazakov, and then our lives
would be worthless,” Yegorov said. “We're co-conspirators with him now, Pyotr,
can't you understand that? We’re his hired killers. Just because you’re a
scientist and not a pilot or gunman doesn't absolve you from guilt. If we
testify against Kazakov, we'd be put in prison ourselves, and then we'd be
targets for his worldwide network of assassins. If we're put into a witness
protection program, our lives would be at the mercy of some government
bureaucrat— no guarantee we’d be safe from Pavel Kazakov No. We have a job to
do, you and I. Let's do it."

 
          
“Are
you crazy, or just blind?" Fursenko asked incredulously. “Can't you see
what’s happening? Kazakov is a killer. Once he's done with us. we're dead.
He'll have his billions, and we'll be dead."

 
          
“Doctor,
to my knowledge, no one in Kazakov’s employ has ever been killed without good
reason—they were killed either for disloyalty or incompetence,” Yegorov said.
“Kazakov is generous and loyal to those who are loyal to him. I told you
before, Ion was unstable, unreliable, and taking unnecessary risks. He was a
danger to Kazakov's organization, and he had to he eliminated. Ion was my
friend and longtime colleague, but under the circumstances, I agree with
Comrade Kazakov—he had to be eliminated. And if there was any other way Ion
could have been retired without blabbing his drunken mouth off to the world
about what we'd done, I'd be angry about how he died. But he brought it on
himself.

 
          
“I
will not let that happen to us," Yegorov said, impaling Fursenko with a
stem gaze through the rearview mirror. “We are going to accomplish this mission
successfully, and then return home, and get ready to fly and fight again. If we
did any less, we'd deserve to die ourselves.”

 
          
There
was simply no arguing with Gennadi Yegorov. Fursenko was stunned. This
intelligent, soft-spoken pilot and engineer had turned into some kind of
mindless killing machine. Was it the money? The power? The thrill of the hunt
and the kill? Whatever it was, Yegorov was not going to be deterred.

 
          
There
was no more time to think about it, because the last target complex was coming
up. Yegorov had Fursenko configure the release switches and pre-arm the last
two remaining Kh-73 laser-guided bombs several minutes before the bomb- run
initial point. His trigger was hot. Once IP inbound, Fursenko extended the
imaging infrared scanner and laser designator and began searching for the last
set of targets.

 
          
It
was easy to find—because the Metyorgaz oil tanker
Ustinov
was one of the world's largest vessels.
Surrounded by Turkish military vessels and a second tanker, to which the last
five hundred thousand barrels of oil left in its holds w as being transferred,
the cluster of ships made a very inviting target.

 
          
“There’s
the
Ustinov
,”
Yegorov said, as he looked carefully into his targeting monitor. “The
navigation system is dead on. just like over
Tirane
. Remember, we release on the
Ustinov
first. We'll probably lose it in the fireball, but we have to keep
aiming as long as we can. If we miss the
Ustinov
we’ll drop the second Kh-73 on it. If we
hit the first time, we’ll shift aim to either the Turkish tanker or that big
Turkish frigate nearby.” He actually laughed. "This’ll teach the Turks to
take something that doesn’t belong to them! Get ready, Doctor.”

 
          
The
bomb run was short and quick. There were enemy air craft nearby, but they were
patrolling farther north and east, probably to protect against any attack
aircraft coming from
Russia
. The Turkish frigate was scanning the skies
with its air search radar, but with the external pylons jettisoned long ago,
the Mt-179 was too stealthy to be picked up by it. By the time it flew close
enough to be detected, the bombs would already be in the air One bomb would
certainly be enough to send the
Ustinov
to the bottom, and the explosion
would probably destroy the Turkish tanker and severely damage any nearby
vessels, too—the second bomb would ensure complete and total devastation. Half
the oil from the
Ustinov
was already offloaded, but spilling half a
million barrels of crude oil into the Black Sea would certainly qualify as the
world’s biggest oil spill, more than double the size of the enormous
Exxon
Valdez
oil spill in Prince William Sound.
Alaska
.

 
          
The
white computer targeting square was dead on the tanker. Yegorov had Fursenko
move the pipper slightly so it centered on the very center of the middle hold,
the structurally weakest point on the upper deck and also one of the empty
holds. The bomb detonating inside an empty hold would ignite the petroleum
vapors and quadruple the size of the blast, which would certainly rip the
tanker into pieces and create the enormous spill they wanted. Yegorov had
already had Fursenko set up the secondary target pipper on the Turkish frigate,
although he wouldn't switch targeting away from the
Ustinov
until they were sure it was holed.

 
          
Switches
configured, final release checks accomplished. Fursenko opened the inwardly-opening
bomb doors, and the first Kh-73 bomb dropped into space. “Bomb doors closed!
Laser on!'’ Yegorov commanded. Fursenko activated the laser designator and
received a good steering signal from the weapon. “Data good, laser off.” They
only needed to turn the laser on for a few seconds after release to give the
bomb its initial course, then for ten seconds before impact to give it its
terminal steering. The pipper stayed locked on target. Everything was going
perfectly, just like
Tirane
. Everything was—

 
          
DEEDLE
DEEDLE DEEDLE!
they heard from the threat warning receiver—an enemy radar
had just locked on to them. It was the Turkish frigate’s air search radar
Yegorov started a shallow turn away from the ship, careful not to turn too
suddenly so as to break the laser’s aim. Yegorov wondered about the warning,
but soon dismissed it. The frigate might be trying to lock on to the bomb, he
thought—the Kh-73 one-thousand- kilogram bomb probably had ten limes the radar
cross-section of the Metyor-179 stealth fighter right now. No problem. The bomb
was tracking perfectly.

 
          
Ten
seconds to impact. “Laser on!” Yegorov shouted. He immediately received another
“data good” signal from the bomb. Nothing could stop it now....

 
          
“Contact!”
Duane Deverill shouted. “Annie, come thirty left
now!”
He keyed the
voice command button on his target tracking joystick and ordered, “Attack
target two with two Anacondas!”

 
          
“Attack
command
two
Anacondas
,
stop attack
...
bomb doors open
,
missile one away
...
launcher rotating, stop attack
...
missile
two away
.. .
doors closed
,
launcher rotating
, ” the computer
replied, and it fired two AIM-152 Anaconda long- range air-to-air missiles from
twenty-three miles aw
^;
ay. The missile’s first-stage motors
accelerated the big weapon to twice the speed of sound, and then the missile’s
scramjet engine kicked in, accelerating it well past five times the speed of
sound in seconds. Traveling at a speed of o\er a mile per second, the Anaconda
missile closed the gap in moments.

 
          
Steered
by its own onboard radar, the missile arrived at a point in space just two
hundred feet above the tanker
Ustinov
.
then detonated—at
the exact moment the Kh-73 laser-guided bomb arrived at the exact spot. There
was a massive fireball above the tanker, like a gigantic flashbulb popping in
the night, that froze every thing within a mile in the strobelike glare. The
Anaconda missile’s sixty-three pound warhead split the big Kh-73 into several
pieces before it exploded, so the size of the fireball wasn’t enough to do much
damage to the tanker except cook some paint and blow out every window not
already destroyed on its superstructure.

 
          
“Any
aircraft on this frequency, any aircraft on this frequency, this is Aces
One-Niner,” Deverill radioed on 243.0 megahertz, the international UHF emergency
frequency, as he studied his supcrcockpit display. “I have an unidentified
aircraft one-seven miles northwest of Eregli at thirty-one thousand feet,
heading south in a slow right turn.” He was aboard an HB-1C Megafortress Two
bomber, flying high over the Black Sea about thirty miles north of the Turkish
naval base at Eregli. He had been scanning the area with the Megafortress’s
laser radar all evening, but had detected nothing until seconds before the bomb
came hurtling down from the sky toward the Russian tanker “Just a friendly
advisory. Thought someone would like to know.”

 
          
“Aces
One-Niner, this is Stalker One-Zero, we read you loud and clear,” David Luger
replied. Luger was aboard the Sky Masters Inc.’s DC-10 launch and-eontrol
aircraft, orbiting not far from the EB-1C Megafortress at a different altitude.
He, too, had been scanning the skies with a laser radar mounted aboard the DC-10,
and he had detected the unidentified aircraft and the falling bomb at the same
instant. “You might want to contact Eregli approach on two-seven-five-point-three.
Thanks, guys.”

 
          
“You’re
welcome—whoever you are,” the Megafortress’s aircraft commander, Annie Dewey,
replied. She found it impossible to hold back a tear and keep her voice from
cracking. “Have a nice flight.”

           
“You too. Aces One-Niner,” David
said. Annie heard his voice soften for the first time, and it was a voice
filled with promise, and good wishes, and peace. “Have a nice life, you guys.”

 
          
Dev
reached over and touched Annie’s gloved hand resting on the throttles. She
looked over at him and smiled, and he smiled back. “We will,” Annie replied.
“Thanks. Be careful out there.”

 
          
David
Luger switched over from the emergency frequency with a touch of sadness, but
no regrets. He knew it would probably be the last time he’d ever talk to Annie.
But she had made a life with Duane Deverill, and it was hers to hold on to and
build if she wanted it. His destiny lay elsewhere.

 
          
On
the new secure interplane frequency, he radioed, “Stalkers, Stalkers, this is Stalker
One, your bandit is now two-two-one degrees bull’s-eye, range three-one miles,
level at angels three-one, turning right, possibly racctracking around for
another pass.”

 
          
“Stalker
Two-Two flight of three, roger,” the Turkish F-16 flight leader responded.
“Converging on bandit at angels three-four”

 
          
“Stalker
Three-One flight of two, acknowledged,” the Ukrainian MiG-29 flight leader
responded. “We will converge on target at angels two-niner.”

 
          
“Stalkers,
datalink on blue seven.”

 
          
“Two-Two
flight, push blue seven.”

 
          
“Two.”

 
          
“Three.”

 
          
“Three-One
flight, push blue seven.”

 
          
‘Two.”
Each fighter pilot set the same laser frequency channel into their receivers,
corresponding w ith the frequency that Luger, in the DC-10. was using to track
the unidentified aircraft with the laser radar. Since none of their air-to-air
radars could pinpoint a stealth aircraft, the laser radar on the DC-10, tuned
to the only frequency that could track the aircraft—a fact known by the
Metyor-179’s first chief designer, David Luger— was the only way to do it.

           
“Two-Two flight, tally-ho!” the
Turkish flight lead called out.

 
          
“Three-One
flight has contact,” the Ukrainians called a few moments later. “Three-One has
the lead.”

           
“What happened
?” Yegorov
shouted. “We lost contact with the weapon! What is going on?”