Firefox Down

The clouds slid around the Nimrod, darkening the flight deck.

'No, it's almost due south of us now — I've got the line… first fix, skipper. Just keep on course — don't alter a bloody thing.'

'South?' Eastoe remarked, genuinely surprised. 'Not at the crash site. Christ, then he didn't go down…?'

'Wait till you find the distance — it could have been thrown upwards of a mile,' the co-pilot offered.

'Jeremiah. Come on, John…'

'Give me time, skipper — fifty, fifty-one, two, three

'Do it now — I'll come back for another run if you need it — ' Eastoe ordered impatiently.

'Right. Got it.' Eastoe hummed tunelessly in the silence. His ears buzzed with anticipation. The tactical navigator would now be drawing his lines on the map, out towards the point where they would intersect and establish the precise position of the homing device. Then they'd know how far away it was — exactly where it was.

'It's almost forty kilometres south of us. On what looks like a lake.'

'His PSB-anything?'

'Nothing.'

'If he's in the plane, he'd have it working. So, where the hell is he?'

* * *

Gant awoke. Some part of his mind became immediately and completely alert, but he sensed the rest of himself, his thought-processes, his whole personality; struggling to throw off the deep sleep into which he had fallen the moment he climbed into the sleeping bag. Something had woken him — something…

He groaned, then clamped his hand over his mouth. Something, something that could already be as close as the Arctic hare had been when he had shot it -

His hand scrabbled within the sleeping bag, emerging with the Makarov pistol. It was almost completely dark. He could see little more than the glimmer of the snow, the boles of the nearest small trees like fence-posts. He listened, the remainder of his mind and senses becoming alert, shaking off sleep.

He pressed the cold barrel of the Makarov against his face, leaning against the gun as if for support.

Distantly he could hear the noise of helicopter rotors, the whisper that had penetrated his sleep. He had no doubt that the sound was approaching from the east and moving in his direction. Russians… Lights, troops, even dogs…

He kicked the sleeping bag from his legs and began to fold it untidily then thrust it into the survival pack. He hoisted the harness, slipping it over his shoulders even as he began running.

THREE: In Flight

'There!' Aubrey announced immediately he located the coded map reference Eastoe had supplied, his finger tapping at the large-scale map of Finland, which lapped down over the edges of the foldaway table. 'There — in a lake, gentlemen. In a lake.' There was a note of triumph in his voice.

'The lake would have been frozen — that's why he might have thought he could land safely,' Buckholz speculated quietly, tugging at his lower lip and glancing towards Curtin for confirmation. The USN Officer nodded.

'He must have gone straight through — or otherwise the Russians would have spotted the Firefox,' Curtin murmured, his brow furrowed. It was evident he was considering Gant's chances of survival.

'Agreed. But it's there.'

'The homing device is there,' Giles Pyott offered. He was still wearing his uniform greatcoat, his brown gloves were held in his right hand. They tapped at the map in a soft rhythm. 'But what else, mm? My guess would be wreckage. Gant must have ejected.'

'Then why is there no trace of Gant's PSB?' Curtin asked gloomily. 'Where is he Colonel Pyott, if he's alive?'

'Mm. Tricky.'

'Maybe he switched it off-or destroyed it,' Buckholz suggested. 'He wouldn't want to get himself picked up by the other side… they're a lot closer than we are, and there are a hell of a lot more of them.' Despite the offer of such qualified optimism, Buckholz shook his head. 'But, maybe he isn't alive. We have to face that possibility.'

'But the Firefox — !' Aubrey protested impatiently.

'It could be in two pieces, two hundred, or two million,' Curtin answered him. Aubrey's face wrinkled in irritation. 'This location is twenty miles from the point where the Foxbat impacted,' Curtin continued. 'That was up here…' He, in turn, tapped the map. It was as if the contoured sheet had become a talisman for them as they gathered around it. Pyott's military cap rested over northern Norway, his gloves now beside it, fingers reaching into the Barents Sea.

'So, it was damaged,' Buckholz said. 'Maybe on fire — twenty miles is nothing. There's no hope down that road, my friends.'

'We really must know.' Aubrey snapped in utter exasperation. 'We must have a look' As he uttered the words, he was staring up into Pyott's face, like a child expecting assured parental activity.

Giles Pyott smiled thinly. 'Kenneth, my dear chap — let's take this one step at a time. In the ten minutes since I got here from MoD, I've taken over his flying station from poor Bradnum, all in the name of this project of yours…what else would you have me do?'

'Eastoe must overfly — '

'The lake? What about diplomatic noises from the Finns?' Giles Pyott drew a folding chair to him, flicked it open with a movement of his wrist, and sat down. He placed his hands on his thighs, and waited. Three more chairs were lifted from a dozen or more stacked against one wall of the Scampton Ops. Room, and arranged in a semi- circle in front of Pyott. Aubrey seemed content, for the moment, to become the soldier's subordinate. Buckholz was surprised, until he realised that Aubrey was simply playing a waiting game. He expected good things from Pyott, if the colonel from MoD's StratAn Intelligence Committee was given the impression of command, of superior authority.

As if he read the American's thoughts, Pyott smiled and said, 'You're flattering me with your undivided attention, Kenneth… nevertheless, there are things to be done.' Pyott's eyes roamed the Ops. Room. His curled forefinger now rubbed at his small auburn-grey moustache. Scampton was, to all intents and purposes, at their disposal. But, what to do with its resources? Where to begin? 'I agree that Eastoe might make a single overflight. I wonder, however, whether photographs will give us enough information? It's getting pretty dark up there by now.' Aubrey's face, Pyott noticed, wore an intense, abstracted air, like that of a child furiously engaged in building a sandcastle in utter ignorance of the behaviour of tides. Aubrey was preparing himself to bully, to plead — to ignore the diplomatic in favour of the covert. And yet, his priorities might be the only really important ones in this case…

'We need someone to take a really close look,' Aubrey remarked quietly.

'Mm. Director Buckholz — Charles — what is your honest feeling? What do we have up there, at this moment?'

'I side with your Squadron Leader Eastoe, Colonel. Gant was picked up visually, pursued, and shot down. We've got wreckage up there, is my best guess.' Pyott turned to Curtin who merely nodded in support.

'I'm not disinclined to agree with you…' Aubrey made an impatient noise, but remained silent. Pyott continued: 'You all know the delicate political situation. Finland agreed — largely because of personal links between Kenneth and the DG of Finnish Intelligence — to this covert overflight by the MiG-31, if its capture was successful. Perhaps they know, or suspect, what has happened. I would expect them to take a very negative line… unless you, Charles, can convince your government, as I must convince mine, that pressure should be brought to bear?' Pyott shrugged. 'I am suggesting that we hold our fire until we are ordered to proceed by our respective governments. In other words, you and I, Charles, must be very convincing. Now, are we prepared to say, hands on hearts, that the Firefox might still be intact and the pilot alive?' He paused, looked at each of them