clatter of rotor blades growing louder.
Their ride home was on the way.
Epilogue
Navigation lights blinking steadily, the 747-200B that served as Air Force One, the president’s official aircraft, flew steadily east through the night sky over Europe. The cloud cover below the aircraft was unbroken, but at this altitude the night sky was ablaze with stars. Relays of U.S. F-15 and F-16 fighters flew close by, providing continuous protection. More lights blinked in the sky some distance behind Air Force One. Two mammoth KC-10 tankers were on station there, making sure the escorting fighters were always fueled up and readv for immediate action.
“Our ETA is one hour, Mr. President,” the steward said, standing at the open door to the fully equipped cabin that served as his airborne office.
President Sam Castilla looked up from his desk. “Thank you, James.”
When the door closed behind the steward, he turned to Fred Klein, who was sitting patiently on a small couch. “Ready for the big show?”
The head of Covert-One nodded. “Yes, sir.” He smiled. “Let’s hope your performance is appreciated.”
Castilla grinned. “Oh, I think it will be ?though probably not in a friendly-way.” He picked up the intercom phone on his desk. “General Wallace? This is the president. You may initiate that hot-line call to Moscow we talked about earlier.”
Both Klein and the president waited for several minutes while the communications staff aboard Air Force One made contact with the Kremlin. At length, an American voice spoke up, coming over the speakers hooked up inside Castilla’s office. “President Dudarev is standing by, sir.”
“Good morning, Mr. President,” Castilla said cheerfully. “I apologize for disturbing you so early, but the matter I’d like to discuss is fairly urgent.”
Dudarev’s smooth, calm voice came clearly over the secure circuit. “The hour is not a problem for me, Mr. President,” the Russian leader said politely.
“I often work very late these days … an unfortunate fate which I am sure we both share.”
Castilla snorted quietly. Slick, very slick, he thought. But now it was time to drop the hammer. “Yes, I’m sure you’re extremely busy just now, Viktor,” he said coolly, deliberately deciding to use Dudarev’s first name. Bluntness could be just as much a weapon of statecraft as could subtlety and indirection.
“Plotting unprovoked wars of aggression against your smaller and weaker neighbors is just so darned time- consuming, isn’t it?”
There was a moment’s frozen silence before the Russian replied. “I really don’t understand what you are driving at, Mr. President.”
“Let’s cut the crap, shall we?” Castilla said forcefully. He winked at Klein.
“Hell, I’ve seen your mobilization schedules, operational plans, and target lists. I’ve even heard audiotapes with your voice on it discussing those same plans. And Ukrainian police units and bomb disposal squads have already found the explosives your agents rigged in Poltava, for your little piece of phony ‘anti-Russian terrorism.’”
“I do not know who could have provided you with these monstrous fabrications,” Dudarev said stiffly.
Castilla leaned forward in his chair. “Your good friend, Mr. Konstantin Malkovic, Viktor. That’s who.”
“Malkovic is a capitalist and a speculator who does business in my country,” Dudarev snarled. “Beyond that, I know nothing about him.”
Castilla shrugged. “That’s not a lie that’s going to stick, Viktor. I’d advise you to come up with some other story, real quick.” He glanced out the window, catching a brief glimpse of the blinking red and green navigation lights of his fighter escort. “Let’s talk instead about the fact that you’re going to turn around those three hundred thousand or so troops you’ve massed near Ukraine, Georgia, Kazahkstan, Armenia, and Azerbaijan and send them marching back to their peacetime barracks … and pronto.”
“Can I speak candidly, Mr. President?” Dudarev asked grimly.
“By all means,” Castilla told him, grinning across the small cabin at Klein.
“I always enjoy candor. Especially since I hear it so rarely from you.”
“If I really did have so many tanks, soldiers, and aircraft ready for war, why would I abandon my plans so easily? Do you think your voice is so frightening?”
“Not in the least, Viktor,” the president said easily. “I just don’t think you’re ready for an all-out conflict with the United States?and with NATO. You’ve been thinking in terms of a lightning campaign against weak and disorganized local forces, not a slugging match with the most powerful alliance in history.”
“But you have no defense agreements with Ukraine or Georgia or the rest,”
Dudarev pointed out sharply. “Nor any forces stationed on their territory. And somehow I do not believe that your country ?or your allies ?will oppose us so seriously. No one in London or Berlin or Paris or New York will support a war against Russia for the sake of a few bare-assed Azerbaijanis and the like!”
“Maybe not,” Castilla agreed. He straightened up. “But they will if your attacks put Americans at risk, especially political leaders who are pretty well known and respected.” He paused modestly. “Like me, for example.”
“What?” the Russian leader demanded. “What are you talking about?”
Castilla checked his watch. Outside, the noise of the 747’s four big engines was changing as the jet began its gradual descent. “I think you should know-that I’ll be on the ground in Kiev in a little less than forty-five minutes. And that I don’t expect to be leaving Ukraine for a few days. Their new leaders and I have a lot of business to transact, especially negotiating a mutual defense treaty.”
“Impossible.”
“Not in the least,” Castilla said carefully. His voice hardened. “Ukraine is an independent country now. I guess you forgot that one little fact, Viktor.”
Dudarev said nothing.
“And so are the other former Soviet republics,” Castilla continued.
“Which is why a host of U.S., NATO, and Japanese senior officials, including my secretaries of State and Defense, are going to be visiting those countries over the next several days. And if a single Russian bomber, tank, or foot soldier crosses those borders, I can guarantee that you’re going to wind up dragging your country into a war it cannot afford?a war that it will most certainly lose.”
“You are insulting,” the Russian leader snapped.
“On the contrary,” Castilla said coldly. “I’m being remarkably patient. But let me assure you that neither my country nor I will ever forget or forgive your decision to unleash the HYDRA weapon on us.”
“HYDRA?” Dudarev asked, but for the first time there was a discernible note of uncertainty, perhaps even of fear. “I do not know what you are talking about.”
The president ignored him. “There’s an old, old saying that when you lie down with a dog, you get up with fleas, Viktor. Well, Professor Wulf Renkc was one damned, dirty dog, and now you have one hell of a case of fleas. When we caught up with Renke, we found something very interesting in a little case he was carrying?a whole set of glass vials filled with some kind of liquid.”
Dudarev said nothing.
“Now, the interesting thing about these vials is that many had Russian names on them?and one of them was yours, Viktor.”
Even across the thousand miles separating them, Castilla could hear the other man suddenly swallow hard.
“But I’m a civilized man, unlike you,” the president went on, not bothering to hide his utter contempt for the Russian leader. “So I’ve decided not to see how you like the taste of your own weapon when it’s thrown back at you. Instead, well, we’ll just hang on to these so-called HYDRA variants for the time being. As a form of insurance
