Once Dead

by Richard Phillips

  Feeling himself roughly shoved into the back seat beside Rachel, pinned between two of Roskov’s goons, Rolf glanced into Rachel’s wide, tear-filled eyes. Apparently the shock of the sudden assault had managed to overcome the effects of the drugs. He hoped the reporters they had been dragged past had gotten a good look at that face.

  The ride to Building 92A-50 was a short one. Upon arrival, Rolf felt himself dragged from the car, noting that Roskov had gone a bit too far in telling his men to make his treatment look realistic. The man with his bag greeted two men who stood guard outside the door that gave access to the stairway leading up to the main Control Room.

  When they stepped out of the stairwell, Rolf was confronted with the sight of all of the Control Room night shift personnel and guards bound and gagged, seated with their backs to the walls as two more masked men stood watch. Rachel’s guard pushed her to the floor beside one of the bound nightshift crew.

  Then Rolf was shoved through the door into the six-by-thirteen-meter Control Room, its monitors and consoles now completely unmanned. The man with Rolf’s case set it at a workstation as his guard released his firm hold on Rolf’s left arm.

  Seeing Rolf, Vladimir Roskov grinned and stepped forward to cut the plastic cuffs that bound his wrists together. With a sudden tug that ripped the duct tape from his mouth, Roskov spoke the words that erased Rolf’s rising anger.

  “Herr Koenig . . . the Cosmodrome is yours.”

  CHAPTER 96

  Levi Elias’s afternoon had just taken a turn for the worse. How much worse, he didn’t yet know, but it didn’t look good.

  Janet Price’s encrypted message was marked “EXTREMELY URGENT” and, having looked at it, he couldn’t argue with the categorization. Seated here in Jonathan Riles’s small conference room, surrounded by specialists with paper copies of schematics spread across the table in front of them, his concern was steadily rising.

  The look on the Old Man’s face didn’t reassure him. For the first time he could remember, Admiral Jonathan Riles looked grim.

  Their top engineering specialists had verified that these enlarged engineering drawings were for the nuclear generator that would power Rolf Koenig’s experimental lunar mining robot. But these differed from the official documents that had been submitted to the Baikonur International Launch Services, better known as ILS. While the power supply looked like a perfect match to the original from the outside, there had clearly been significant internal modifications.

  The problem was that the specifications were incomplete. All the parts within the drawings were symbolically labeled, but the table that showed what each of those symbols meant was missing. Also, since Janet had only been able to uplink cell-phone pictures of the drawings, the quality wasn’t what he would have liked. Although it was far from unanimous, a quorum thought this might be the plans for a dirty bomb or a nuclear explosive.

  To be fair to those that disagreed with that assessment, the drawings were unlike any bomb design they had ever seen. And without knowing what materials made up the components, there was no way to be sure. It could be a bomb. It could be a refined version of Rolf Koenig’s nuclear reactor.

  The fact that these documents had been recovered from a facility owned and operated by the Russian mafia disturbed Levi deeply. But what tied his gut in a knot was the answer to Janet’s question.

  She’d asked if there had been any problem with Rolf’s XLRMV-1 payload that had required replacement within the last week. Two days before the payload had been mated with the Breeze M fourth stage, a major problem with the robot’s nuclear power supply had forced replacement of that critical piece and the timing coincided with satellite imagery that showed a sudden reduction in manning at Roskov’s Kyzylorda warehouse complex, the same facility Janet and Jack had just found abandoned.

  Clearly, it hadn’t been completely empty. One of Janet’s photos had been taken from an angle that showed a dead man’s sprawled body lying near the desk, and Levi suspected he wasn’t the operation’s only casualty.

  Admiral Riles’s cell phone rang. After a quick glance at its display, he answered it.

  “Yes?”

  There was a brief pause as the NSA director listened. Levi noted a tightening at the corners of his mouth.

  “I understand.”

  Riles terminated the call, returned the phone to his pocket, and dismissed everyone except Levi. When Levi closed the door behind the last man out, he looked around to find Admiral Riles’s gray eyes staring expectantly at him.

  The admiral lowered his voice, almost as if he was speaking to himself instead of to Levi.

  “The Russian Mission Control Center outside Moscow has lost communications with the Baikonur Cosmodrome. They think it’s a technical problem and will be cleared up shortly. It shouldn’t interfere with tomorrow’s launch schedule.”

  Levi didn’t curse in front of his boss, but he wanted to.

  “I hope they’re right.”

  Admiral Riles leaned back in his chair, rubbing his chin with his left hand.

  “So, Levi. Is a nuclear weapon sitting on the top of a Proton Rocket at the Baikonur Cosmodrome or not?”

  Levi worked up just enough spit to swallow. “I think so.”

  Admiral Riles rose from his chair, and then leaned over to take one last look at the schematics.

  “Damn it. Tell Janet I want her and Gregory to hustle their asses up to Baikonur and confirm.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Okay then, get going. I’ll call the president.”

  CHAPTER 97

  Control Room 4102 wasn’t a big room like NASA Mission Control in Houston or the Russian Mission Control Center in Korolyov. On one wall, a heavily armored and reinforced window provided a view onto the room where the space capsule payload was fueled prior to being mated to the Proton Rocket in the assembly area. In addition to that view, this room provided control of the launch and subsequent maneuvers to place the spacecraft into orbit.

  Rolf couldn’t remember the last time he was so excited that his palms were sweating, but, here in this room, they were so damp they felt as if they would leave puddles on the keyboard. It didn’t take long to bring up his laptop and hook it into his satellite communications network. The most difficult remaining task would be replacing the preprogrammed firing sequences and steering commands for the Breeze M main engine, thrusters, and attitude control engines. But Rolf had prepared for this moment and he knew those components as well as he understood his special payload.

  The initial arc would take the rocket eastward over southern Russia. During the initial ten minutes of flight, the Proton rocket’s first three stages would fall away, leaving the Breeze M to carry the spacecraft the rest of the way. Normally that meant the first burn would end in the vicinity of northern Japan, sending the spacecraft on a forty-minute ride across the Pacific and over the southern tip of South America. Then the second and third burns would put it in a transfer orbit as it again passed over Baikonur.

  Rolf had no intention of allowing the Breeze M to make those standard burns. His fingers moved across the keyboard in a blur that brought up a new control panel display. Moving his cursor to a button labeled BEGIN UPLINK, Rolf initiated the transfer of a program that would change the frequencies for sending commands and receiving telemetry and replace the Breeze M’s firing sequence with his own.

  Instead of waiting forty minutes after completion of the first Breeze M burn over Japan, during the following thirty-one minutes the Breeze M would execute a series of corrective burns that would alter the spacecraft’s flight path, sending it veering onto a trajectory that would take it over the east coast of the United States, where it would release its game-changing payload.

  It was a crazy flight path, one that had no chance of placing a spacecraft into orbit. Rolf didn’t care. With Nolan Trent’s help, he had arranged for a special subroutine to be inserted into the American Ground-Based Midcourse Defense system, a software change that gave those radars a blind spot alon
g this one sub-orbital path. It ensured that, approximately one hour after launching from the Baikonur Cosmodrome, Rolf’s special payload would light up the night sky.

  Those east coast Americans had better enjoy the show. It was likely to be their last.

  CHAPTER 98

  Seated on the cold concrete floor, plastic cuffs cutting into her wrists, Rachel couldn’t stop shaking. Standing over her, the stocking-masked man stared down her nightgown at an angle that left little to the imagination, the tip of his submachine gun almost touching her left breast as she cringed back against the wall.

  Confusion filled her mind and the remnants of the sleeping drug weren’t helping her sort out her thoughts. One name echoed in her head. Vladimir Roskov. The Russian crime lord must be behind this. But these men had captured Rolf, too. If anything, they had handled him more roughly than Rachel. It made no sense.

  Rachel had been convinced that Rolf was the one pulling Roskov’s strings. Maybe he’d tugged a little too hard. Or maybe he had never been in charge after all.

  She was in a narrow hallway, at the end of a line of similarly bound and terrified people, probably the night shift that had been on duty in this building. Rachel took some comfort in the fact that her captors wore masks to protect their identities. Why bother if they were going to kill all their prisoners? Of course, they might still be planning to abuse and kill some of them. An ex-supermodel might be high on that list.

  “So, now you can relax.”

  That was what Jack Gregory had said to her on Heidelberg’s Alte Brücke. Damn him. Rachel had felt the man’s strange energy when she’d leaned up against him. He’d looked straight into her eyes and made her believe.

  Right now, huddled in a cold hallway with a bunch of other poor bastards as an armed prick stared down at her tits, Rachel found that belief worn thin.

  CHAPTER 99

  The house reminded Nolan of 10 Downing Street. While Sir Ralston Kent wasn’t prime minister, he was of noble lineage and old money, the likes of which Britain’s current prime minister could only envy. After finishing dinner and thanking Mrs. Kent for her hospitality, Nolan had accompanied Sir Ralston to the drawing room. There, seated in twin high-backed chairs that were angled toward the fireplace, the two men regarded each other over glasses of single-malt Scotch.

  The combination of the low fire, the old English atmosphere, and the clink of the ice cubes against his glass helped spread the whiskey’s warm glow from Nolan’s stomach through the rest of his body. The conversation was light and pleasant, never straying to work topics. Altogether, as perfect an evening as Nolan could recall.

  Then his cell phone rang.

  Seeing Frank Rheiner’s name on the caller ID, Nolan apologized for the interruption and answered it.

  “Hi, Frank. I’m having a cocktail with Sir Ralston. How can I help?”

  “Find a private spot. I’m about to conference you in on a call from the Situation Room.”

  “Give me a second.”

  Nolan turned to Sir Ralston. “Excuse me. Do you have a spot where I can take this call in private?”

  “Happens to me all the time. Right through that door.”

  Nolan nodded and walked out of the drawing room and into Sir Ralston’s private office. Seating himself at the teak desk, he put the phone back to his ear.

  “I’m ready.”

  He heard a click and then the babble of conversation from the conferenced group. Then the CIA director spoke again.

  “Mr. President, I have my deputy, Nolan Trent, on the line now.”

  President Harris replied. “Mr. Trent. Let me briefly summarize. I have assembled my national security staff to help me make sense of some troubling intelligence information I just received. Admiral Riles reports that the NSA has gathered information that causes him to believe that part of Rolf Koenig’s XLRMV-1 mission payload may have been replaced with either a dirty bomb or possibly even a nuclear weapon.

  “Having looked at his evidence, Director Rheiner strongly disagrees. But since external communications from the Cosmodrome are currently down, we have no way to check it. I understand you have a man on the ground in Baikonur?”

  “Yes, Mr. President. I heard from him less than two hours ago. He reported the countdown to tomorrow’s launch was proceeding normally and he’s in an excellent position to have noticed if anything was out of place.”

  Admiral Riles’s voice was calm, but challenging in tone. “Did your man notice that the nuclear generator on the XLRMV-1 was replaced a couple of days ago?”

  Nolan kept the tension out of his voice. “Of course. The new one passed all the tests required by the International Launch Service team. Their scientists gave it a clean bill of health. If it hadn’t passed those tests, the ILS would have cancelled the launch.”

  “Admiral Riles?”

  “Mr. President, the NSA intercepted the schematics in question from people with confirmed links to high-ranking figures in the Russian Mafia. Combined with the nuclear power supply having just been replaced and the loss of communications with the Cosmodrome on the night before the planned launch, I believe this poses a serious threat to national security.”

  “And I disagree,” Frank Rheiner interrupted. “Mr. President, Admiral Riles has already told us that almost half of the NSA experts that examined those schematics didn’t see anything threatening about them.”

  “The DCI is twisting my words. What I said was that most of my experts agree with my assessment.”

  “Bob,” President Harris said, “you’ve heard the arguments and seen the evidence. What do you recommend?”

  Nolan listened intently, fearing what Bob Adams, the president’s national security advisor might recommend. The pause that followed seemed longer than it probably was.

  “Mr. President, I have to agree with the CIA on this one. They have a man on the ground at the Cosmodrome and, as good as the NSA is at electronic surveillance, I’ll take good human intelligence any day.”

  “George?”

  Vice President George Gordon’s deep voice carried its usual, confident tone. “Sorry, Jonny, I have to agree. The NSA evidence just isn’t compelling enough to interfere with the launch and provoke an international incident.”

  “Admiral Riles,” President Harris responded, “thank you for bringing this to my attention. But since the CIA has an operative on site, I’m confident he would have reported anything that rose to the level of a national security threat. This matter is settled.”

  As the call disconnected, Nolan realized he’d been holding his breath and released it. Returning his phone to his pocket, he reentered the drawing room.

  “My apologies, Sir Ralston, but you know how bosses can sometimes be.”

  The MI6 chief chuckled. “I’m sure my people think I’m a pain in the ass. May I refresh your drink?”

  “Excellent.”

  As Nolan accepted the glass and resumed his seat, a smile settled on his face. One more crisis handled.

  CHAPTER 100

  Although the open Kazakh desert that surrounded the Baikonur Cosmodrome was relatively flat, it was far from smooth. As Janet drove the SUV cross country, the bone jarring ruts, gullies, and rises made it difficult to keep the night-vision goggles on her head. After allowing her to sleep the first two hours of the trip from Kyzylorda to Baikonur, Jack was now taking his turn. To her utter amazement, he seemed to be succeeding.

  After passing through the city of Baikonur, Janet had taken the off-road route they had agreed upon, one that looped well to the west of the road that led to the facilities that would be used for the upcoming launch of Rolf Koenig’s spacecraft. The route would take them to a concealed position west of Area 92. Unfortunately it had added two hours to their trip.

  She and Jack had both agreed that if something bad was happening at the Cosmodrome, it would be directed from the Control Center in Building 92A-50. That was the center of gravity around which all the action would revolve. The near certainty she felt that bad st
uff was happening at the Cosmodrome should have surprised her, but it didn’t. Maybe she was picking up some of Jack’s black magic, just from being around him.

  With one eye on the GPS display, Janet maneuvered to keep the vehicle in the low ground. Even though she was driving without lights, she didn’t want anyone with infrared equipment spotting the hot vehicle engine as they approached the pre-planned drop-off point. One last lurch rattled the suspension as she brought the SUV to a halt and killed the engine.

  “We’re here.”

  Beside her, Jack sat up in his seat, stretched, and opened his door.

  Janet stepped out onto the rocky ground and looked to the east. Although she couldn’t see any of the buildings from where she stood in the shallow wash, lights from the launch platform brightened the sky in that direction. Moving behind the SUV, she opened the hatch. Once again, she and Jack would pack up the heavy gear, same drill as in Kyzylorda, but with one big difference. This time Jack was going in light. That meant that, except for his H&K P30S pistol, all he would carry on the final assault was a healthy supply of nine-millimeter ammunition magazines, two throwing knives, and his SAS survival knife.

  It was up to Janet to keep the bad guys off his ass until he reached the building.

  She shrugged into the pack with the attached scanning laser and tripod, feeling the straps dig deep into her shoulders. Watching Jack lean into the weight of the laser’s power supply, she hitched her pack a bit higher on her back, picked up the AS50 sniper rifle, and moved out. This time they had a significantly longer hike to get to the designated over-watch position, so she didn’t even make the effort that some final light banter would require.