Fallout (6 page)

“How the hell did you end up in the Navy? We get zero space on a ship.”

“I’ve told you a thousand times. They gave me a scholarship. We didn’t have much money.”

“Why the Navy?”

“I wanted to fly.”

“Why not the Air Force?”

“I don’t know, I figured flying off carriers would be the hardest thing there was to do in aviation. I love a challenge.”

Just then an F/A-18 tore by overhead, heading south toward the restricted area for a night hop. “Sound of freedom,” Thud said as they both watched it fly by.

“Nothing like it,” Luke said with regret. He stood and held the screen door for Katherine, who was carrying a tray of mugs and a thermos of coffee.

Thud studied the horse trailer parked next to Luke’s garage. It was large, white, and dented. “What’s with the horse trailer?”

“I got a deal on it.”

Thud frowned and looked around. “Hey, Stick, I hate to break it to you, but you don’t have any horses.”

“One day.” Luke sat down again. “I wanted to let you know I’m going to submit my letter of resignation.”

“No,” Thud protested. “There’s got to be a better way, Stick. Ask the Admiral to review it. Everybody knows what a great pilot you are. Gun just had it in for you, for some reason.”

“Thud, you
know
that wouldn’t make any difference at all. And if I stayed in, I’d be the coffee mess officer in Adak, Alaska, by next year. You
know
that.”

“I don’t know that.” Thud poured milk in his coffee and stirred it. “There’s got to be a way.”

“There’s no way.”

Thud shook his head as he thought about life at TOPGUN without Luke. It would take all the fun out of it. “So now what? Airlines?”

“You’ve got to be kidding me. I’d rather throw up on a bus.”

“Nice,” Michelle said disapprovingly.

“Sorry. Inside joke. That’s a reference to a test they give you in Pensacola—”

“Whatever,” Michelle said, still frowning.

“So? What is it? What are you thinking about?” Thud demanded.

Luke looked at Katherine, who nodded. “Check this out,” Luke said, handing Thud a folded newspaper.

He looked at the section on top. “What’s this?”

“Read it.”

Thud read it, then looked up. “Interesting, but so what?”

“The United States bought twenty-one MiG-29s from Moldova. Did you know that?”

“Sure. Couple of months ago. They’re at Wright-Patterson, as I recall.”

“Check out the article. Extra engines, parts, and five hundred Russian air-to-air missiles. Believe that?”

“So what?”

“What if we could get our hands on a few of them?”

“A few what?”

“MiG-29s.”

“And do what?” Thud frowned.

“Remember when Gun told us there were nine thousand adversary sorties that went unfilled by TOPGUN last year?”

“Yeah.”

“What if we had eight MiG-29s and could start our own, private TOPGUN?”

Thud stared at him, then looked at Michelle, then back at Luke. “Are you serious?”

“Dead serious. And I want you to help me.”

“How?”

“Start the school with me. Our own TOPGUN School. Our MiGs. What do you say?”

“I’ve got another eighteen months at TOPGUN.”

“Your obligation is up. You could get out now if you wanted to.”

“Damn,” Thud remarked. “That’s the craziest idea I’ve ever heard. You really think you could pull it off ?”

“I just started thinking about it. Took my breath away. No more going to sea. No more commanders telling us what to do. No more getting out and flying for the airlines and hating life.”

“Who would you get to fly with you?”

“Former TOPGUN instructors who’ve gotten out.”

“That just might work, Stick. What about maintenance and parts?”

“There’s a new company, just formed. Joint venture between DaimlerChrysler and Mikoyan in Russia, called MAPS—the MiG Aircraft Product Support Company. They formed it to convert MiG-29s and MiG-21s to NATO specs and modify and maintain them. They’re doing it for Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic. I called them. They said they could do the entire thing for us. All the maintenance, you name it. You interested?”

Thud was impressed. “Maybe. Maybe I am,” he said. “Where would you fly these MiG-29s?”

“Tonopah.”

“Seriously?” Thud asked, surprised.

“Where’s Tonopah?” Michelle asked.

“About a hundred twenty miles south. It’s in the middle of total damned nowhere. It’s where the F-117 Stealth fighters were based until they were disclosed to the public. Now it’s just sitting there idle.”

“Probably a wreck.”

“Nope,” Luke said, leaning forward. “It’s beautiful. I drove down there yesterday. Absolutely perfect shape. Nobody would be telling us we’re coming into the break too fast there. There’s not a house within twenty miles of the place. Hold on,” he said as he stepped inside the house for a moment. “Here’s a picture I took yesterday.” He handed it to Thud, who looked at it carefully. “It’s harder than hell to find in a car. Just off Highway 6 east of the town of Tonopah, there’s this random missile on a pedestal pointing up at the sky and an ominous sign that says tonopah test range, operated by sandia national laboratory for the department of energy.”

Thud handed the photo to Michelle. “The Department of Energy? Why do they have an air base?”

“I have no idea. It probably has something to do with you-know-what . . .”

“Nuclear.”

“That’s the only interesting thing the DOE does that would put them in the desert that I know about. Anyway, whatever it’s for, they’re not doing it now.”

“How much would it cost to do this?”

Luke nodded. “I’m not sure, exactly. But the U.S. bought all twenty-one MiGs and all the missiles
and
spare parts for forty million. The base is empty. I figure we lease eight MiGs—maybe nine, one two-seat trainer—and the air base. It’s got to cost a lot less than buying all of them did.”

“So how much money total you talking about raising?”

“I don’t know,” Luke said, glancing at Katherine. “Maybe a hundred mil.”

Thud almost choked. “Dollars?” He laughed out loud. “Are you out of your mind? Where you going to get that kind of money?”

This was the part Luke hadn’t wanted to bring up. He knew what it would do to Thud to hear it. It could ruin everything, and would put Luke’s credibility and Thud’s friendship at risk. “Your father.”

Thud stared at his friend as if he had just been betrayed for the first time in his life. “Oh, I get it,” Thud said bitterly. “You need me to pimp my father for dough.”

“No, I don’t. It’s got nothing to do with it. I’m happy to go
anywhere
for money. If you know a couple of other billionaires that might be able to fund us, let me know. And if some of them are former fighter pilots from Vietnam, like your father, that would be even better.”

“Ain’t happening, Stick. We’re not even on speaking terms.”

Luke looked at Katherine, who wasn’t about to say anything. “Yeah, help me with that. Your father flew Thuds in Vietnam. One of the few black fighter pilots in the war. And he holds it against you that you’re a TOPGUN instructor?”

“He didn’t want me to fly. He wanted me to go into business with him. His multizillion-dollar business. That’s why I was a business major. Then, when I told him I wanted to go into the Navy and fly, he did a total meltdown. I don’t think his Vietnam experience was all that positive. He always said, ‘Don’t trust the government! Ever!’ Like a mantra. ‘Don’t trust the government! Don’t trust the government!’ ”

“So
I
can’t ask him?”

“I didn’t say that. But
I’m
not asking him for anything.”

Good enough for Luke. “So what do you think? You willing to get out to do this if we can pull it off ?”

“I’ll have to think about it.” Thud looked at Michelle, who was giving him one of those spousal frowns that says, “You’d better talk to me before answering that question.” “I’ll have to think about it a lot. But it sure sounds like a kick.”

“Your father isn’t our only idea,” Katherine said. “If he isn’t interested, I know some other investors in Silicon Valley. We can go to venture capitalists if we need to. This isn’t the usual sort of thing they like to invest in, but who knows? Maybe they’ll branch out a little.”

Thud nodded. “I’ll think about it.”

“I’ve got a cross-country scheduled to go to Ohio to check out the MiGs. Want to come?”

“Ops O approved?”

“He doesn’t know
why
I want to go to Wright-Patterson. It all looks normal to him.”

“I thought you were grounded.”

“That was until after the board. Now I can fly until I’m gone.”

Thud thought about it. “Why the hell not?” he asked enthusiastically.

Petkov lay in his bed in his uniform and lined boots and stared at the dark ceiling. He had been on base security for two weeks. The Colonel hadn’t changed his mind, and everyone on the base knew it. All the pilots knew he’d been assigned to security for the duration of his natural life, which, they also knew, without flying, wouldn’t be long.

He looked at the clock on the table next to his bed. One more hour. He had the night duty again, midnight to eight in the morning. The worst watch of the worst assignment on the base. The only things that happened to an officer in charge of security were bad.

Every morning he’d come back to his room after his watch and try to sleep, while his fellow pilots headed toward their MiGs to climb into the cold morning sky to their freedom. He couldn’t explore how he felt, knowing he would never climb into a MiG again. It had been the only thing worthwhile in his life. He had ruined everything else.

Suddenly there was a knock on the door. Petkov rolled slowly off the soft, noisy bed, walked across the concrete-floored room to the door, and opened it. It was Leonid Popovich, the Lieutenant Colonel in charge of all security on the base. Petkov immediately assumed he had somehow missed his watch. He was about to begin a profuse apology when he noticed another man with Popovich.

“I want to introduce you to someone,” Popovich said in his distinctively raspy voice as he stepped through the door into Petkov’s room. The second man followed closely behind. He quickly surveyed the room with the expertise of someone who always watched his back.

Petkov noticed that the visitor was wearing a Russian hat against the cold, but not the hat of the Russian Air Force, or even the Army. He was a civilian, and his hat was made of seal fur. Beautiful, dense, black seal fur. Very expensive and hard to find. The man himself was short and ugly and had mean eyes.

“Sergei Alexei Gorgov, this is Major Vladimir Petkov, the one I told you about.”

Gorgov looked up at Petkov with his mouth open. “Ah,” he said slowly, with a deep, penetrating voice, “you’re the drunk.”

Petkov tried not to show the impact the comment had on him. He chose not to respond.

Popovich closed the door. “He works for me now,” he said to Gorgov.

“So,” Gorgov said, removing his gloves, “what do you want?”

Petkov was confused. “I don’t understand.”

“What do you want?” Gorgov repeated. “What do you want from life now that you have pissed it away?”

Petkov wanted to yell at the man, to strike him. “Just to do my job.”

Gorgov smiled, revealing his yellow, uneven teeth. “Your job,” he laughed. “Your job.” He shook his head. “From what I hear, you were one of the best pilots in the wing. Part of your job, then, was to not become a drunk, and you couldn’t do that, could you?”

Petkov said nothing.

“You want to do your job? What job?” He looked around at Petkov’s small room. “That’s all you want? To do your job? And then what? Become an old man and retire somewhere to sit alone and hold your dick?”

“What do you want?” Petkov said angrily. “Why are you here?”

“Colonel Popovich and I have been working together for some time now. He told me you were interested in a similar arrangement.”

Petkov’s eyes darted to Popovich, who was staring back at him, warning him. They had never had any such conversation, and Popovich knew it. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“An arrangement of mutual convenience. You have many skills. You can be of great value to me and my friends.”

It suddenly hit Petkov where he’d seen the black seal hat before. Riding in the back of a black Mercedes, with the tinted window down just enough for him to see the hat on a short man sitting in the backseat of the car, the sign of a member of the Russian Mafia. “In what way?”

“In your current position, by doing nothing. Or, I should say, at least doing nothing at the right time. The Air Force does not fully appreciate your skills. You, like most others, are underpaid. I can provide you the pay you deserve. You can own a car, you can own a
dacha
. I can get you all the women you want. You can live the life you’re entitled to live.” He studied Petkov’s face. “To get drunk every day, if that is what you want.”

“I will
never
get drunk again—”

“Major, please,” Gorgov said slowly. “Please.” He paused. “Have you ever said that before?”

“It is hard.”

Gorgov nodded, then paused, waiting for Petkov’s attention. “When I say so, you make sure your security watch does not interfere with my friends.” His mean eyes were locked on to Petkov’s. “Understand?”

“I’m not
interested
,” Petkov replied angrily.

Gorgov looked at Popovich, then back at Petkov. “I don’t think you understand. It has already been decided. Tonight will be the first time. At three in the morning, my friends will be coming onto the base to complete one small transaction. You will make sure they are not bothered. Do you understand?”

“I won’t—”

“He understands perfectly,” Popovich said, glaring at Petkov.

Gorgov smiled his yellow smile and put his gloves back on. “Excellent. I knew you were a man of integrity.” He opened the door and turned back to Petkov. “If you do these things well, I have much bigger plans in mind for you.” He could feel Petkov’s resistance and knew where his temptations lay. “It will be very lucrative for you. I can get you out of this shithole. Perhaps even to the West.” Popovich held the door as they headed out. “If you do your job. Your
new
job. For me.” Gorgov walked to his Mercedes without looking back.