Trinity's Child (47 page)

Moreau kept her gaze trained on him.

“How the hell do I know, Moreau?” he asked, finally answering the question about Halupalai's needs. “I just know we can't run forever from something we haven't seen.”

She stretched her arm out toward him again. “I'll go back and talk to him before we make the approach,” he said. Then he went silent again, staring out the left-hand window at a sun ballooning upward into a perfect sky.

I am not proud of the part I've played in it
.... 1
think we will probably destroy ourselves, so what difference does it make?

—Admiral Hyman Rickover, father of the nuclear submarine

The fog of war blurs all human conflicts. It hangs in a heavy mist, clouding men's minds and warping their judgments. It is a strange phenomenon, causing some men to vacillate disastrously, others to move with an equally disastrous certitude. It instantly transforms enemies into beasts and sadly human errors into methodically inhuman calculations. In a moment of desolate passion an infantryman, unable to cope with the horror surrounding him, mindlessly performs the machine-gun stitching of women and children. The infantryman's distant leaders view the mysteriously ruthless response of husbands and fathers and, through the fog of war, see the new act as that of a barbaric enemy requiring swift retribution. So goes it. And goes it.

At 1600 Zulu on this winter day, as the pilots of
Polar Bear One
watched the sun pop out of the deceptively undisturbed expanse of the Pacific, the fog of war hung heavy indeed over the rest of the battlefield. Just five hours remained before the American submarines would rise, attempt to penetrate the fog, and almost certainly deliver the penultimate retribution for lost wives and children. A few moments later the Soviet ICBM reserves would respond in kind. Remaining throughout the world, of course, would be thousands of additional weapons, the arsenals were so large and well dispersed. These weapons would be expended without any semblance of even semicivilized restraint over the next days, weeks, months. Their use would be somewhat redundant.

Among the elite few who had even a lottery player's chance of altering the events, the miscalculation, and confusion were almost total. They were making assumptions that were logical but wrong. They were treating truths as falsehoods and falsehoods as truths, and acting on both. In fact, in all the beleaguered world, not a single person had the access or the wisdom to understand the swirl of events engulfing them.

Nor did the events of the last several hours, since the bombers had turned, help lift the fog. In the Soviet Union two more cities had been destroyed. Pushkin, a medium-sized town just outside Leningrad, had been leveled by an American submarine cornered in the North Sea. Nadhodka, a Siberian port city, had been hit by a trapped outrider cruising beneath the Sea of Japan. In the United States the Raleigh-Durham area of North Carolina had been sprayed randomly, like Baton Rouge, by a Soviet submarine off the Outer Banks. All three attackers had been losing deadly chases by enemy hunter subs. They had unloaded on available targets, as their orders dictated. So goes it.

Limited communications gradually were returning. But as often as not, the sketchy information caused as many problems as it solved, creating as much fog as it dispelled. Nor did it help that in Cherepovets the Soviet Premier now had gone more than thirty-six hours without sleep. Nor did it help that in Olney two frightened but dedicated young nurses, steeped in the sisterhood's time-honored tradition of giving solace and relieving pain, were adding their own brand of fog to the intravenous solution they had begun feeding through the forearm of a hurting and semiconscious American President. Nor did it help that the American government appeared to have two Presidents and that only one man—a bureaucratic second-level civil-defense director— held that information.

In the massive underground labyrinth south of Cherepovets, the Soviet Premier popped another amphetamine. He had been taking the uppers most of the day to keep himself alert. He was taking an occasional vodka as well, to settle his racking anxiety. He glanced quickly about the sterile room to see if anyone had observed him taking the pill. Already today he had quelled the inevitable coup attempt, employing methods far more sweeping than those used in the cockpit of the
E-4.
Still, his political control was tenuous, at best. The loyalist advisers and military officers with him in the multilevel bunker were edgy and doubtful, even about him. Little wonder, he grumped. His grand plan—he had been completely honest with the American President—had lurched nightmarishly out of control. Had he been a fool to think it would not? But why? Why, after the Americans had reacted so rationally to an attack on their own territory, had they acted so irrationally to such a minor event in China? Were the Americans that protective of the fuck-their-mother Chinese? The little yellow devils had obliterated fifteen of his Red Army divisions! So the rebellious commanding general of the Rocket Forces had struck back at Peking and Wuhan. Against his orders. And starting the coup. Also starting, he presumed, and he shook his head in despair at the thought of it, the spasm launches of ICBM's bursting out of the American prairies. Then the rebellious general's response out of the steppes. Then the prairies again. Then the steppes again. He groaned, swallowing hard to get the amphetamine all the way down. Could he control anything now? Anyone? He glanced about the room. There were only three other persons here—a radio operator, a decrypter, and the new commanding general of the Rocket Forces, whom the Premier had appointed only hours ago after dealing directly—and finally—with the man's predecessor. All seemed preoccupied except the general.

The Premier moved his eyes to a clock—1600 hours, Greenwich mean time, ten hours after he had begun this lunacy. How much longer could he hold it together? He had one newly rebellious ICBM wing commander in control of the isolated Zhangiztobe field in the south-central deserts. The man's wife and children had been in Pushkin. The Premier shook his head wearily, fought to stifle a yawn, and felt a powerful hand land lightly on his shoulder.

“Comrade,” the general said, “why don't you get some sleep? We will awaken you.”

“Sleep,” the Premier replied. “Sleep is for the innocent, comrade general.”

The general's broad brow knitted in concern.

“Figure of speech.” The Premier smiled without conviction. “And the Rocket Forces? No change?”

The general shrugged. “They will go, if necessary.” He paused.

“They will be somewhat more difficult to stop.” The general probed the Premier's face for hidden messages. “If necessary,” the general added.

“Zhangiztobe?” the Premier asked bleakly.

The general shrugged again. “Even getting through to them is difficult, Comrade Premier. And threats have little effect tonight.”

The Premier sighed in acknowledgment, flicking his fingers to dismiss his military commander. He was having extraordinary difficulty communicating with the surviving Rocket Forces. He was having extraordinary difficulty communicating with anyone. Why couldn't he get through to the Americans? He looked at the arched back of his radio operator and cursed silently.

The Premier brushed the wetness from his forehead and tried to review what he knew. The American President was dead, his command plane not having made it out of Andrews. The death was most unfortunate and unintended. He felt no love for his old antagonist and still blamed him, rightly or wrongly being irrelevant now, for pushing them both into this disaster. Still, the Premier was a practical man. He had not wanted to deal—if any dealing could be done—with a leaderless country out of political control. Nor had he wanted to deal with an amateurish successor drawn out of the insignificant ranks of the American Congress or the President's Cabinet. But a successor was in charge. The sketchy information intercepted from conversations between the
E-4
and the
Looking Glass
was incomplete and incomprehensible. Still, orders of some kind were moving back and forth. And that confirmed it.

So. He was dealing with a faceless man. He had no clue as to his identity or his background. But, to his surprise, the Premier had developed a tremendous respect for the man already. It had been beyond reasonable hope to find such a sophisticated man drawn out of the lower reaches of either of their governments. But the chess moves with the bombers! Masterful! Turn one bomber, wait for a response, and then turn the others! Ingenious! The man had reinvented the carrier pigeon. It had bought them some time. The Premier slumped in his seat. Perhaps not enough, he thought bleakly. Pushkin. Nadhodka. He knew the system. He knew the orders to take his cities had not come from the
E-4,
just as the decision to hit Baton Rouge had not come from Cherepovets.

It further amazed the Premier that the presidential successor had shown such wisdom after that bit of insanity. The Premier had issued orders to have the idiot submarine commander shot if he ever made it back to the motherland, which was doubtful. The American submarine commander had shown far greater wisdom as he prepared to die in the North Sea. Had he unloaded his missiles on Leningrad instead, there would have been no controlling the people in this bunker, loyalist or not. The Premier knew people. He knew that neither side could tolerate many more Pushkins or Baton Rouges. His hands were shaking. He reached for another small vodka to settle his nerves. The American had sent him a sign of good intentions. Still, even with the best intentions, the Premier knew the system he once thought he controlled was hanging on by a most slender and fraying thread. He was certain the new President had the same problem—especially with the submarines. Those infernal American submarines. He absolutely had to talk with the man.

The Premier swirled down the vodka. He lifted himself ponderously and moved toward the radio operator. He harangued the man unmercifully—
Durak!
Fool!—and ordered him to bull his way through the mangled atmosphere to the American
E-4.
The technician frantically went through the motions again, but with no success. The only place in America from which he heard regular signals—signals that were neither directed at them nor understandable—emerged from the location in Maryland that the KGB had identified as an obscure civil-defense bunker. The Premier, unable to control himself, thumped his fist down angrily. He was not interested in chatter among low-ranking American bureaucrats. He needed to talk only with the President.

“Large hematoma on the right thigh . . . abrasions, contusions. Whole area's edematous.”

“Ummmm. Legs crushed. Do we have any ice around here?”

“Good God, his eyes are gone. Severe retinal burn.”

“Nothing we can do about that. Just make him comfortable. Get the ice, huh? Let's get his legs splinted.”

The President moaned unintelligibly.

“Just relax, Mr. President. You'll feel better in a minute. Just relax, sir.”

“Shocky.”

“Little wonder at that. What's with the I.V.?” “Normal stuff. L.R. Lactated ringers. Two milligrams of morphine.”

“Yeah. How long ago was that?”

“Let's see. Ummmm . . . twenty-five minutes.”

“Let's give the poor man two more milligrams. Damn, I wish we had a doctor here.”

“Well, we don't. Tough bugger, isn't he?”

“Tough, but he's no youngster. And he's hurting, sweetie. Two more milligrams of morphine.”

“Got it right here. They stocked this place with enough to keep every junkie in Washington going for a year.”

The President groaned again and tried to say something.

“Just relax, sir. You're doing fine. You'll feel better in a minute.”

Sedgwick already was feeling better—much, much better. He floated rapturously, not a care in the world, two angels in white hovering over him and his friend. Life was splendid and the nurses' words washed serenely over him. The room was white and bright and warm. His friend lay next to him. His friend . . .

The young naval officer sat bolt upright in his bed, the pain from his legs searing through his serenity. He ripped at the intravenous tubing attached to his arm, causing one of the nurses to rush at him.

“No morphine!” he screamed, lashing out at the nurse.

“Hey, hey, hey,” the nurse soothed. “Calm down. You'll be okay, soldier.”

“Sailor,” he corrected her, more calmly, the drug taking him again.

The nurse chuckled softly. “Okay, sailor boy, take it easy.”

“Two aspirin and call me in the morning,” the President mumbled woozily.

The nurse laughed. Sedgwick floated back into his angelic world.

Off to the side, in the small white hospital ward buried near Olney, the civil-defense director watched the scene without interrupting. He had trouble absorbing what suddenly had happened in his obscure little niche in the bunker world. He had almost refused the President entry, the scene outside had been so unlikely. A man arriving battered and bruised, dressed only in a tattered bathrobe and pajamas, wrapped in blankets, carried on the back of a street tough he could barely understand. Unconscious and with no identification. It was only the military aide's NSA card, with the little coded dot that gave him admission anywhere, that finally convinced him.