The swimmer dropped over the railing into the water.
Yuri extracted his foot, holstered his gun, then jumped in pursuit.
It was a ten-foot plunge to the water. Yuri landed almost on top of the swimmer, knocking him to one side. When he surfaced, all he saw was a turbulent patch of dark water and a face mask floating on bubbles. He dove for it and grabbed a rubber flipper. It came off in his hand. He surfaced, gulped air, then scrambled back down into four feet of water.
He felt a knife blade slice his palm.
He surfaced, backed away and drew his gun. He gambled and squeezed off three rounds, hoping to avoid a misfire. Muzzle flashes outlined dark pier timbers. Gunfire’s thunder rolled across the beach.
Yuri squinted at the target area. The rolling draw of waves—like dark and liquid lips—sucked water from the shoreline and disgorged the swimmer’s body in a single, fluid motion. The body rolled to the surface momentarily, then disappeared below a surge.
Yuri holstered the gun, then waded toward it.
Currents pushed the body into the area below the pier. It bobbed up and down in undulating surf.
Jack’s voice called from shore: “Need any help?”
“No! I can reach it,” Yuri said, slogging through chest-deep water.
Wooden planks creaked above his head. Water swirled around greasy pier timbers. A field of wires and rope clutched at his legs and feet.
He stretched a hand toward the Russian’s body, gripped a vest strap and pulled. The dead form floated free, one arm wrapping around his neck. He pulled the body toward the edge of the pier in a macabre dance paced by a tidal metronome. Something alive bumped him from behind.
He shouted, “Jeez!” and stumbled back into the darkness under the pier, crouching next to a timber.
The Russian’s head bobbed inches from his face. In the water outside the pier, he saw a dorsal fin.
“Jack!’ he yelled. “Got a situation!”
The situation was blood in the water and a dorsal fin nearby.
He drew his gun and aimed it toward open water. His hand trembled.
The fin surfaced again, then vanished below the waterline in a continuous, rolling movement.
He shot twice. No sign of the fish.Good , he thought, laughing out loud.Yes !Got the bugger—maybe .
He towed the Russian’s body clear of the pier, then headed toward shore as quickly as he could.
Jack stood on the beach, smiling. He made a megaphone with his hands, “Behind you.”
Yuri turned. There was the fin, again.
He released the body and scrambled backwards, drawing his gun.Click ,click ,click ! it went, empty chambers firing his imagination. He crawled backwards out of the water onto the beach, like some giant, frantic crab. He fired again—click,click ,click !
Jack put a hand on his shoulder.
He fired again at the sea monster—click,click ,click !
Jack laughed. “Pretty soon you’ll run out of bullets! I thought you were a tough ex-Marine. It’s just a dolphin! What’d you think it was—a shark? Moby Dick?”
Yuri grinned weakly. “Wasn’t sure. I just felt trapped. Didn’t like it.”
He pursed his lips. Blood drained from his face. He put his head between his knees.
“It’ll pass,” Jack said, more seriously. “Just take it easy.”
“I’m okay. Okay. Help me up.”
Over the next few hours, Jack and Yuri coordinated activities as a contingent of FBI, local law enforcement officers and Naval intelligence personnel retrieved the bodies, the box and other artifacts, meticulously documenting events on the beach.
SEAL Team Two failed to locate or engage the submarine. The Naval intelligence people speculated it would return to the Cienfuegos base. They promised to get satellite coverage.
The civilian, now in custody, was a NASA aerospace engineer, Louis Weddell, whose contract was about to be terminated and whose marriage had recently collapsed. Sheriff’s deputies took him to a Dade County jail.
Yuri and Jack finally left the beach at 11:30 PM. A deputy sheriff drove them to a hotel near Miami International Airport, where they both crashed in exhaustion.
After a few hours sleep, they met in an airport cafeteria for an early breakfast.
* * *
“So what’s in the box?” Yuri asked. “What could be so hot the Russians would risk sending in swimmers to pick it up? Pretty stupid, if you ask me. It’s not like them to do this.”
“Russian security’s highly compartmented—just like in the old days under the Soviet system. It could be that the equipment was so secret they didn’t want even the Russian Embassy folks to know about it. There are a few programs like that.”
“I thought the Russian attachés were cleared for everything. Guess I was wrong... So what is it?”
“It’s called aBiefeld-Brown effects generator . At least that’s what the Martin Norris Company calls it.”
“Never heard of it.”
“I’m just a comm engineer,” Jack said, stirring his coffee. “But as a kid growing up in the 50s, I used to get turned on reading UFO magazines—you know? It was interesting. They always had some crazy theory or Looney Tune ‘authentic picture.’ Anyway, there were lots of articles back then about this guy named Thomas Townsend Brown, the inventor of the so-called Biefeld-Brown effect. Brown claimed there was a correlation between the electric field and gravity. He also claimed there was an absolute reference frame in time and space—which, of course, is contrary to Einstein’s relativity theory.”
“Of course,” Yuri said.
“If I’m boring you, just tell me to stop.”
Yuri glanced at his watch and grinned. “Not yet. Go on.”
“Well, the potential fallout from this theory was the stuff of science fiction—gravitational lasers, atomic structure disintegrators and secret communications techniques that used background noise, because the universal random hiss of microwave radiation was now a decodable pattern. Brown also claimed the effect could be the basis for UFO propulsion systems.”
“Sounds like advertising claims for hair tonic. The be-all, end-all. The magic potion.”
“Yup... except we now have in our custody a device—stolen from NASA—which the Russians want badly enough to kill for, and which is referred to in coded intercepts and by the Martin Norris Company as a Biefeld-Brown effects generator.”
“Do you believe in UFOs?”
Jack reflected for a moment. “I’ve never seen any evidence that held up under close scrutiny. And I’ve got a lot of clearances to black programs. I’ve read about zillions of hoaxes motivated by profit. I’d have to say no—but I’m open to new evidence.”
“Maybe it’s like the Russians—the program’s so secret that not even the NSA guy knows.”
Jack shrugged. “We’re compartmented, too. Very few people know all the pieces. You have to get to the top for that. I’m not there yet.” He beamed a broad grin at Yuri. “When they read me in on those UFO programs, I’ll let you know.”
“But then you’d have to kill me,” Yuri said with a smile. “I’m just a simple guy. I do what they tell me to do and don’t ask too many questions. I suppose the only relevant piece of information about this NASA equipment is that it’s stolen property.” He looked at his watch, then drained a small puddle of coffee remaining in his cup. “NowI gotta run, or I’ll miss my plane. Thanks for your help. For an NSA guy, you’re okay.”
Jack lifted his cup in a toast of token acknowledgment.He’s okay , Jack thought, watching Yuri hustle toward his gate.A bit too intense, maybe, but okay .Gotta watch that combat stress syndrome, though.Makes him crazy.
15. PUTSCH
August 1991
Moscow
The Stalin-era government building was a sculpture in concrete dedicated to repression. It combined the stink of decay with the esthetics of a prison.
Katrina stepped carefully over a pool of leaking water, circumvented an abandoned tile-repair project a
nd trampled firmly on an old Communist Party poster. She opened a door to see Sergey Giglavyi talking rapidly on the phone in a Spartan office.
Like the decor, his conversation was devoid of non-essentials. He slammed the phone down following a short, curt exchange that omitted even ‘goodbye.’ He glowered at Katrina, but failed to intimidate her.
“Speak,” he said.
“I heard news of the coup.”
“Everyone has heard.”
“I briefed your group once—the Committee on Informatization. I heard you were a Yeltsin supporter.”
“Should I be grateful that we helped each other once? Times change. People change. How can you help menow , little girl?” He leaned forward in his chair, nervously tapping a pencil to the beat of an impatient brain.
“You remember the SDI project at ALMAZ? Maybe now it will pay off, Giglavyi. I’ve studied both U.S. and Russian telecommunications protocols. I have access to prototype encryption equipment that not even the KGB has. I have a warehouse full of western-made microwave equipment. I have contacts with certain western companies who have dedicated high speed lines out of Moscow—lines that bypass our own KGB-rigged infrastructure. I want to help.”
He dropped the pencil ceremoniously, then eyed her with suspicion. “Whydo you want to help?”
“Can’t you see? It’s falling apart.”
“You were pretty eager once to play Soviet politics to get project funding. Why should I believe you now?”
She smiled, throwing it back at him. “Times change. People change.”
“Yes,” he said. “These are desperate times, aren’t they? And desperate people. Sometimes we all have to take risks.” He placed a folding chair next to Katrina and straddled it backwards, studying her face. “Institutionalized Communist arrogance makes my gorge rise. It’s my passion to see that it dies a quick death.”
“We want similar things, Giglavyi.”
“How carefully you choose your words.” He squinted for a moment, trying to fathom motives and read body language. She was a blank—an indecipherable code. Any emotions seemed hidden behind large green eyes. If she was Soviet KGB, she was good. Finally he relaxed with a long sigh, then spoke slowly and quietly. “Yeltsin is at his dacha about twenty miles from here, in a forest near Arkhangelskoye. He and his aides are working on an appeal to the nation. We still control the TV stations, but it may be dangerous to travel. I’d like to connect his dacha with the Moscow station. Do you have enough equipment to do it?”
“I think so. A lot depends on terrain, availability of tall structures to hang the equipment on and power. Can you get me a team of trusted engineers, some trucks and winches? And some firepower—just in case?”
Giglavyi nodded, grabbed his pencil and started writing, throttling his energy level to a high peak. “We also need to connect Yeltsin with Washington, New York, London, Paris, Brussels, Bonn and Tokyo. Can you do that?”
She nodded. “I can if you don’t need dedicated circuits.”
“We’ll take what we can get. You’ll bypass Moscow switches?”
“There’s a Microsoft team that has a T-1 circuit on Intelsat—1.544 megabits. They owe me one. We’ll create a spur off the link to Arkhangelskoye.”
“Welcome aboard,” Giglavyi said, handing her a piece of paper. “Now get your ass to this address. Don’t use the phones. Don’t tell anyone else what you’re doing. This is a Top Secret effort. Understand?”
She nodded and left.
* * *
Katrina arrived at the Presidential dacha with a heavily-armed security escort, a team of engineers and a truckload of equipment. The home, nestled in a birch forest, would have been a subdued, restful oasis in other times. On this particular day, it was an armed camp, frantic with activity.
Inside was chaos.
Groups of civilian and military leaders clustered in every room, with maps, documents and, where possible, telephones. A security escort led Katrina to a tall, older, bear-like man behind a desk. Beside him, in the next desk, the silver-haired Boris Yeltsin, beet-red with anger, yelled on the phone.
“We don’t accept you gang of bandits, Gennadi! We will keep in mind everything you do. When it is over, we will try you for treason!” He slammed the phone down, breathed deeply to control his rage, then finally smiled at the older man. “I think I intimidated him,” Yeltsin said. “Gennadi Yanayev is a coward. That’s why we will win! Now, I have to talk to that bastard, Kryuchkov!”
As Yeltsin made another phone call, the man beside him turned to Katrina. “You are Fontanova?”
She extended her hand. “Yes.”
“I’m Pavel Voschchanov. You work for me. Sit down.”
The single chair near Voschchanov’s desk propped up a Kalishnikov assault rifle. Katrina picked it up.
Weapons cocked around her.
Voschchanov paused for a moment, then smiled. “Everyone’s a little nervous. Hand me the rifle, my dear—slowly.”
She did as he asked, then sat down.
“You see what you got yourself into?”
“I know what I’m doing. I just hope you know what you’re doing.”
Pavel Voschchanov laughed a deep laugh. “That’s what we need here—more spirit!” He laughed again, then wiped a mirthful tear from his eye. “You won’t make it very far in a Soviet-style bureaucracy, Miss Fontanova. We have to win here, or we all go to jail. Or worse.”
“Let’s win, then,” she said.
* * *
The idea of winning—of beating a faceless, amorphous opponent who suffocated millions of minds through a vast experiment in social engineering—energized Katrina as she walked through the abandoned campus of the Russian-American University. Beasts growled in the nearby Moscow Zoo, short-tempered by August’s heat, and disturbed by the non-stop rumbling of armored personnel carriers patrolling Sadovaya-Kudrinskaya, Moscow’s Garden Ring Road. The pungent smell of jungle predators overpowered summer’s scent.
She thought of yellow eyes and padded feet searching for meat, and walked a little faster along the campus path. The sounds connected with her brain, painting vivid images of hunters and hunted. Somewhere a big cat moved in a quick, fluid stalk, exposed fangs and rasped at darkness with a loud, guttural hiss.Did something move beyond the archway ? She walked faster.
In the twilight haze, a man stepped from shadows into the light and grasped her arm. She yelled in panic, unprepared for the encounter. Then she remembered her mission. The man gripped her arm tightly, steering toward a guarded doorway, where darkness swallowed them both.
“Conceal yourself,” the man said. There are eyes everywhere.” They entered a lightless hall that seemed to amplify and echo even the quietest of sounds—the muffled scuttling of rats and the guarded whispers of their own voices. “My name is Daniel. Russian KGB. I am with the movement. These are my associates—Mikhail and Anatoly. They work with me.”
“Fontanova,” she replied, regaining control. “ALMAZ.”
“Step through here. Be careful not to trip. We have to close the door first.”
She stepped through a portal into more darkness. The door closed, cutting off the last vestige of indirect light. Darkness evaporated with the loud click of a switch.
It took her eyes a moment to adapt. What had once been a library was now an arsenal of rifles and automatic weapons. Ammunition and body armor replaced books on most of the shelves. Daniel reminded her of Vladimir. He was perhaps a few years older than her brother, but he spoke with a similar intensity. His eyes—sharp, clear, military—seemed out of place between lengthening hair and a stubble beard. His face sagged, as though saddened by events. An unwashed, threadbare uniform, with a row of medals, only hinted at a former pride.
Mikhail and Anatoly, similarly dressed, shrouded in the same sadness, positioned themselves near the door. Daniel moved among boxes and clutter to an area with desks.
“This is where we need a hotline to the Parliament building. You must work quickly. Put it in toni
ght.”
She inspected the area, testing the power point and noting the location of windows—now boarded shut.
“There’s already a microwave dish on the roof of this building,” she said. “I saw it on the way in. A second dish won’t be noticed. We’ll beam from here to a point just south of the zoo. From there, we’ll go direct to government offices on Rochdelskaya. No problem.” She smiled at Daniel, hoping for approval.
“Good,” he said, lighting a cigarette. “One other matter. Tomorrow afternoon you are to take an Aeroflot flight to Sverdlovsk.”
“Why?”
He lowered his voice. “It is Yeltsin’s home. The city has publicly defied the Committee.” He drew closer and spoke in an intimate whisper. “They make preparations for a Russian government-in-exile. They need your help, Katrina—in case we fail. Here are your instructions. We will stay in Moscow and do what we can, regardless of the outcome.”
She took the paper, then looked closely at Daniel’s face. The eyes showed no emotion—no fear—at the possibility of failure or death. They were matter-of-fact eyes, like eyes reading crop statistics, body counts or actuarial records.
She nodded to show that she understood.
Katrina made a quick survey of lights and electricity, pushing crates out of the way, moving equipment. She came across a few boxes filled with clothes and personal effects.
“Is this an armory or a boudoir?” she asked.
“Those are my things,” Daniel said. “My apartment wasn’t safe anymore.”
She lifted a cartoon picture from a box, looked at it a moment, then handed it to Daniel and laughed.
“I must say, you have the artistic gift!”
“A message from a relative—Anton. It’s supposed to be an eagle. He said he wanted to be free. And he wanted Lithuania to be free.” Daniel paused, searching for words. “He died in January when they attacked Vilnius. The Soviet postal system, with typical efficiency, delivered it yesterday. It’s a nice little cartoon. He was a good drawer, don’t you think, for someone seven years old?”
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