Power Curve (43 page)

“General, I’m freezing to death.” This from the copilot, Rod Davis. It was one more item in his long list of complaints.

“We’re all cold,” Bender replied, telling him the obvious. He walked to the heavy steel door in the far end of the long arm of the room. “Everyone stay with Jenkins and keep out of sight,” he said. “Let them focus on me.” He beat on the door with his fist. “Guard! We got a problem in here.” There was no answer, and he kept pounding on the door.

“You’re going to make them mad,” Davis moaned.

Stop whining
, Bender thought.

“I can hear someone coming,” Courtland called from around the corner.

Bender stopped beating on the door and massaged his hand. Now he could hear footsteps in the corridor. The lock rattled and the door clanged open. The woman was standing there with a large group of guards at her back.
The dragon lady returns
, Bender thought. He stood back and she entered. Again, he was struck by the beauty and grace of the woman that contrasted so violently with their
surroundings. “Sergeant Jenkins is seriously injured and needs medical attention,” he said.

The woman waved a hand, dismissing his plea for help. “You are here under false pretenses,” she said in perfect English.

She and Wang are reading from the same script
, Bender thought. “Madam, we’re here as special representatives from our president and traveling under diplomatic status. I demand our immediate release.”

“You have no diplomatic status and can demand nothing,” she snapped. “You were sent here by the Turner woman as a delaying tactic, and she never intended to negotiate in good faith.”

“If I understood Mr. Wang correctly,” Bender said, “you were expecting the president to give you Okinawa in exchange for peace.”

“That was our understanding,” she said. “Otherwise, you would have never been allowed to come to China.”

“Then I am glad that misunderstanding is cleared up,” he said. “That is certainly a worthwhile result in itself. Now, I must demand our immediate release.”

“The People’s Republic of China does not release spies,” she told him.

“We’re not spies and you know it.”

“Do I?” she replied. “We have evidence to the contrary.” She spoke to a guard in Chinese, and he held up the copilot’s video camera. “We found this among Captain Davis’s possessions. Perhaps you’ve seen it?” The guard jammed the video camera in Bender’s face and pressed the play button. Bender could not hear the audio but he saw the action through the eyepiece. Davis had managed to pan the long line of MiG-19 fighters at the end of the runway before Bender had told him to stop recording. “Your voice can be heard discussing the number of fighters,” she said. “This is the work of spies.”

“We’re not spies,” Bender repeated. A coppery, bitter taste flooded his mouth, and he felt helpless. What did he have to negotiate with? “Holding us hostage is counterproductive.”

“Is it?” she answered. She spoke to the guards in Chinese. Six guards rushed into the cell, and one pinned
Bender against the wall, holding him there with a long wooden truncheon against his throat. The other five disappeared around the corner, and he heard dull thuds that sounded like flour sacks being dropped on a floor.

“Nooo!” Davis screamed. The guard holding Bender pressed harder, cutting off his breath. Two guards dragged the limp copilot from around the corner. “General,” Davis pleaded. “Help!” The guard pressed harder against Bender’s neck, and his vision started to blur. Bender relaxed, and the guard eased the pressure. The two guards holding Davis forced him to a kneeling position and straightened his arms out behind his back. They forced the American’s head down, and the sickly smell of fresh human excrement assaulted Bender.

The woman uttered a harsh guttural command, and a sergeant stepped in from the hall. He drew an automatic from his holster and chambered a round. It played out with an unbelievable swiftness. The sergeant took four quick steps up to Davis, jammed the muzzle of the pistol against the base of his skull, and fired. The single shot rang out in the cell as the guards released their grip on Davis’s arms.

“Must I repeat myself?” the woman asked. “You are spies and will be treated as such.” She bowed her head gracefully at Bender and left him in silence. The door banged shut, and only the sound of boots marching down the corridor marred the perfect silence. Bender sank to his knees, not able to take his eyes off the copilot’s lifeless body. A violent shudder wracked his body. But it was not from the cold.

Paris, France

T
he phone call came at exactly eight o’clock Thursday morning, February 14. Mazie Hazelton’s first reaction was to not take it because it was from a clerk at the Chinese embassy. She bridled at the diplomatic slap in the face but took the call. Forty minutes later, she was at the chateau where the talks with the Chinese were held. But this time, she was met by the military attaché who was above her in the diplomatic pecking order. The handoff from the toady to the attaché could mean only one thing: The Chinese were sending a message to the president and she was the courier.

Hazelton tried to be diplomatic, but the attaché was speaking for a new leader in Beijing and not concerned with the normal protocols. He ended his long harangue with “Your president must understand that we are very serious in this matter.”

She replied in kind. “And the quid pro quo?”

“Okinawa, of course.”

“Unacceptable,” she told him.

“Then we will execute them as spies,” the attaché said. He dropped an electronic copy of a photo on the table in front of her. Transmission had degraded the photo, but the body of Captain Rodney Davis lying on a cell floor in a pool of brains and blood was clearly visible. “Justice is swift in China.”

Washington, D.C.

Madeline Turner’s elbows were resting on her desk in the Oval Office. Her hands were pressed together in front of her face, her chin resting on her thumbs, looking over her fingertips. Her eyes were cold and unblinking as she listened to Secretary of State Barnett Francis. “We received this message from Mrs. Hazelton in Paris.” He handed out copies of Mazie’s message. “She met, in secret, with the Chinese military attaché less than an hour ago.” He waited nervously while they read. “Mrs. Hazelton confirms that a power struggle is going on in Beijing, and the military faction is winning.”

“So Lu Zoulin is about to be historically revised,” Shaw said.

“He’s probably suffered the same fate as Captain Davis,” the DCI said.

“How dare they execute Captain Davis,” Turner said. It wasn’t meant to be a question.

“The Chinese are aware of what’s going on here,” the DCI said. “In their view, you are preoccupied with your own survival, their selective release has gone unanswered, and it’s only a matter of time until we abandon the Japanese. Wang Mocun is apparently the new premier and demonstrating his mastery by pushing the United States around and rubbing your face in the dirt. It’s an object lesson for his political opponents.”

“And the Japanese,” Shaw added.

“Mrs. Hazelton,” Francis said, “also claims that Wang has a personal vendetta with General Bender.”

The president’s words were hard and clipped. “If Mr. Wang thinks he can use hostages to blackmail me into selling out Okinawa, he is sadly mistaken. General Charles, I want another selective release, the same target. This time use a submarine-launched Tomahawk missile. I want it done immediately and with as small a warhead as possible.”

“Madam President,” Francis said, “you realize that a selective release at this time will, most probably, result in
General Bender’s execution.” Turner’s face paled, but she did not answer.

“Yes, ma’am,” Charles said, “we can do that. But there are problems.” She fixed him with a hard stare over her fingertips and arched an eyebrow. Charles pressed ahead. “First, the Chinese have most of their submarines at sea. When our submarine launches a Tomahawk, it will give its position away and will be at risk of attack.” He gulped. “Second, the Tomahawk’s warhead has never been tested and only has higher yields. But we have a high degree of confidence that it will detonate.”

“How large of yields are we talking about?” she asked.

“It’s selectable for either 100 or 500 kilotons. That’s equivalent to 500,000 tons of TNT, half a megaton.”

She visibly cringed at the thought of an explosion that large. “You only have a ‘high degree of confidence that it will detonate’?” she repeated. “You mean, you don’t know?”

“Because we have discontinued underground nuclear testing, we can only test the high explosive that triggers the detonation and run computer simulations. It did perform as designed.”

Turner was relentless. “Now you’re telling me that this bomb, which was not tested, will detonate. What went wrong with the bomb we did drop?”

“The weapons designers disagree,” Charles said. “Some claim it’s a problem in the physics package or the age of the warhead itself, while others say it’s a mechanical problem or in the electronics. Without underground testing, we can never be certain.”

“A resumption of underground testing is out of the question,” Turner said.

Shaw shook his head. “It sounds like we’re caught smack-dab in a pissin’ contest and gotta choose which side has the smartest physicist. Now, how are we gonna do that?” No one had the answer to what was a very serious question.

“I want to use a weapon,” Turner said, “with the lowest possible yield. But you’re telling me that no one can guarantee a detonation. So what do I do?”

Charles looked embarrassed. “The probability of detonation is a factor in target planning. We raise the chances of success by allocating multiple weapons to a single target.” He knew he hadn’t answered her question. “We can increase the probability of detonation by thoroughly checking the weapon out first.”

“My physicist is smarter than your physicist,” Shaw muttered sotto voce.

Charles’s face turned beet red. “We have some high-powered experts at the Sandia Labs in New Mexico and the Lawrence Livermore Labs in California,” he said. “It would take too much time for them to check out a Tomahawk, load it on a submarine, and position the sub for a launch. But we can fly the team to Okinawa, where we still have three B-61s. Once there, they can test the bombs and select the best one. The target is less than fifteen minutes flying time from Okinawa.”

Turner thought for a moment. “Do it. I want a selective release executed within twelve hours.”

“We can’t do it that fast,” Charles said. “We need at least forty-eight hours.”

“You’ve got twenty-four,” she replied. “If you can’t do it by”—she looked at her watch—“seven o’clock tomorrow morning, I will hold you and every officer, every bureaucrat, everyone involved, fully accountable. You will all be on the streets looking for a job, and the next ground zero will be the Pentagon.”

Charles believed her. “Please excuse me, ma’am. I’ve got work to do.”

Shaw watched the general bolt from the Oval Office. “The clock is wound tight and tickin’.” He turned to look at Turner. Her hands were still together in front of her face, not like a steeple but poised like an ax.

“Barnett,” the president said, “keep beating the diplomatic bushes. Also, call Mrs. Hazelton in Paris and have her deliver a message to the Chinese attaché. Tell them that I want General Bender and his crew released immediately or there will be very grave consequences. I want her back here by this evening.”

“She is not to wait for a reply?” Francis asked.

“General Bender’s release is the only acceptable reply.”
She stood and paced the floor. “Patrick, Mrs. Bender needs to know what has happened to her husband.”

“I’ll tell her,” Shaw said.

“No,” Turner replied. “I’ll do it. Set up an appointment for later this afternoon. Hopefully, we’ll have good news by then. Also, brief key members of Congress on what’s happening and continue the hourly briefings for the press.” She sat down. “Patrick, we have another problem.”

“What’s that, Mizz President?”

“We need another way to send a message to the Chinese.”

“Like a reporter with an inside to the White House?”

“As long as he has a big audience.”

“I can take care of that.”

Shahe Air Base, China

Jenkins was conscious and sitting up. “Them miserable suckas,” he moaned, holding his head.

Bender sat on the bunk beside him. “I screwed up,” he said.

“We had to try something,” Jenkins allowed. “Does anybody in the real world know what happened to us?”

Bender looked at his watch: nine o’clock Thursday night, eight Thursday morning in Washington, D.C. Twenty-seven hours had passed since their scheduled take-off. “Someone should be asking questions by now,” he said.

The steward, Larry Burke, had his ear against the wall in the far corner. “I hear footsteps,” he told them, “coming this way.” The pilot, Bill Courtland, stood and headed for the door.

“I’ll do it,” Bender said. Courtland stood back, relieved that the general was still taking the lead, butting heads with their captors. Bender walked around the corner of the room and stood by the body of the copilot. The door swung open, and two guards stepped into the room. The woman he thought of as the dragon lady stood in the doorway and looked at him. He followed her eyes as she lowered her gaze to the body. “How much longer?”
Bender asked. Her face was a mask, unreadable and unmoving in the dim glow of the one light bulb.
Come on, answer
, he thought. He was using the one bargaining chip he had left.

“How much longer before what?” she finally replied.

“Before you realize you’re making a bad mistake.”

“Are we?” she asked.

Now it was his turn to be silent. Timing was everything because her next command would set the guards on him. He watched for the telltale contraction of facial muscles. He spoke just as her lips opened. “Most assuredly,” he said. “Unfortunately, Mr. Wang does not understand President Turner. That could lead to a terrible tragedy. So unnecessary.” From the look in her eyes, he was certain she was listening.

“Chairman Wang understands all that is important,” she said.

“He doesn’t know what President Turner will do next,” Bender said.

“And you do?”

“Most assuredly,” he repeated. “Perhaps you should tell him that I know.” They stared at each other a few seconds. It seemed like hours. She spoke to the guards, and they picked up Davis’s body as she turned to leave. “We need blankets and food,” he said to her back. The door banged shut, and the Americans were alone.

“What are you doing?” Courtland asked.

“Negotiating.”

“Someone’s coming,” Burke cautioned from his listening perch by the back wall. The door lock rattled, and the door burst open. A guard shoved the muzzle of his submachine gun in, and for a split second, Bender was certain they were dead. Another guard threw in a bundle of blankets while a third placed a basket on the floor. They backed out and closed the door.

Courtland passed out the blankets while Burke checked the basket. Inside were four plastic bowls, four spoons, and a covered pot. “Negotiations are in progress,” Bender muttered.
She’s lying
, he thought.
Wang isn’t the chairman, not yet
.

Lawrence Livermore Labs
Livermore, California

Tobias J. Malthus was sitting at the shot director’s console in the control room of the Nova Laser Facility. Toby Malthus was a bearded teddy bear of a man in his late fifties, six feet tall with soft brown eyes and the disposition to match. Women wanted to cuddle him and thought of him as a muffin. Secretly, Malthus often wished they would add “stud” to the “muffin,” but he couldn’t change what he was, a gentle human being who played with nuclear fusion, the stuff that powers our sun and the distant stars. On this particular early Thursday morning, he was about to create a tiny star of his own that would live for a billionth of a second.

Malthus gave the word to start the three-minute countdown to another shot, their term for an experiment. Because computers handled all the necessary tasks, little was said.

In the basement of the Nova Laser Facility, the 10,000 capacitors released a large burst of electrical energy into the ten laser beamlines in the main bay. Each of the beamlines was approximately thirty inches in diameter, about the length of a football field, and resembled a Rube Goldberg collection of sewer pipes connected with coffinlike transformer boxes. The beamlines were stacked in banks of five, and an unwary visitor might think he or she was in a plumbing warehouse suffering from an overdose of steroids. Ten trillion watts of energy went down each laser beamline and was focused into a target chamber that might have once been a deep-sea diving bell. Suspended in the target chamber was a fuel pellet the size of a grain of salt. For most humans, what happened next equated to magic. The laser beams compressed the pellet to a density twenty times greater than lead, reduced its size by a factor of thirty, and caused a nuclear reaction.

In quiet moments on long walks, Toby Malthus ran the mathematical probabilities of a shot releasing the full potential of the energy in the small pellets they bombarded with lasers. There was no danger of a mushroom cloud rising over Livermore, everyone agreed on that. But they
were trying to fuse two forms of hydrogen to generate heat. That also created radiation. What if they were too successful and the Nova Laser Facility got an unexpected dose of radiation? Then his dreams of being a studmuffin would have to go on permanent hold while the physicists returned to their computers and drawing boards. But even then, he would be that much closer to giving the world the gift of a clean, safe, and unlimited source of energy in the form of heat. It amused him that the hope of the future might be found in the same weapons laboratories that designed thermonuclear weapons. He was a very contented man.

The director of Lawrence Livermore buzzed for entrance into the control room. He was a friendly man, superintelligent, given to expensive suits, and an astute scientist who could explain nuclear physics to kindergarten children and, therefore, politicians. “Toby,” he called, “you free to talk?”

“Uh-oh,” Malthus replied. He knew how the director worked.

“Weren’t you involved with the W-40 warhead?”

“I was young then,” Malthus told him. “That was way before your time.” As a young physicist, Malthus had predicted that the type W-40 thermonuclear warhead would, under the right circumstances, not detonate or only achieve a low-order detonation. It had been an esoteric argument based on Malthus’s calculations pitted against those of another physicist. The argument had raged hot until it was settled in a tunnel deep underneath the Nevada desert. “It was one of the last underground tests before the ban,” Malthus said. “I was wrong.”