Pacino had grabbed a rifle. It occurred to him that with all the people on the ice, a polar bear might find the gathering too interesting to pass up. He checked the magazine, loaded it into the rifle and shouldered the weapon. As he did, he could hear the powerful roar of jet engines. He looked over at U-Boat Dankleff and smiled.
“I hope whoever that is has food onboard,” Pacino said.
“Whoever that is? They’re probably Russians,” Dankleff said dully. “The weather cleared from the south, the Russian side. The Canadian side is probably still socked in.”
“No matter,” Pacino said. “I’d sooner grab a ride with the Russians than stay here, freezing when the diesel heater runs out of fuel, with no food.”
“Except for polar bears.”
“Polar bears who have been avoiding us,” Pacino said. “Look, it’s visible.” He pointed to the huge four-engine jet that flew overhead, making a low altitude pass, perhaps to determine if it could land.
“I can see a flag on its tail,” Dankleff said. “White over blue over red. It’s Russian.”
“You think it can land on ice?” Pacino asked.
“I think we’re about to find out.”
The jet transport flew over again, turned, flew away, then from the far distance to the east, came lower in altitude and sailed in, its large wingspan sprouting flaps, the jet engine noises escalating, quieting, then rising again.
“It’s got skis,” Pacino said. “Definitely landing.”
The jet transport came closer to the ice and then set down, the ice splintering behind it into a huge fog of ice and snow. The jet’s engines roared with reverse thrust as it slowed, until it came to a stop some fifty feet from the shelter.
“Now that’s some precision flying,” Dankleff said.
Pacino nodded. “Well, the Russians live up here in the arctic, so landing on ice is probably what they call a Tuesday.”
The rear ramp door of the jet transport slowly opened. Pacino noticed that the Russian survivors had moved off to the right side, all of them gathered together. He sidestepped to Captain Seagraves and XO Quinnivan.
“Captain, why am I getting a bad feeling about this?” Pacino asked.
“What do we know?” Vice President Michael Pacino said curtly, taking his seat at the end of the table. The Situation Room was crowded to full capacity with admirals, generals, cabinet secretaries and their aides. On the wall opposite the end seat, an aerial view was projected.
“Sir,” Secretary of War Bret Hogshead said crisply, “we were able to get an Apex drone launched out of Alaska and overhead over the north pole. The distance to the loitering position was great, so we may only have twenty or thirty minutes on-station before we run out of fuel. When the fuel goes, the Apex will self-destruct. The image you’re seeing is the ice near the nuclear explosions detected by our seismologists. You can see four sites of open water where we think the explosions were located. At the far east site, we’ve detected an arctic survival shelter. It correlates to the gear that was loaded onto the USS
Pacino smiled in relief as he saw the video play out on the screen. He could see the black expanse of open water and the large arctic shelter erected north of it. On the ice, there were what looked like a hundred people standing, looking at a huge four-engine jet transport that had landed and taxied to a halt near the shelter.
“So, the rescue forces arrived,” Pacino said.
“Sir, the news isn’t good,” CIA Director Margo Allende said. Pacino looked at her. She was being completely professional. Their relationship had been suspended by his rising to be the acting president. He hoped she understood. When all this was over, he thought, maybe he could make it up to her.
“What do you mean?” Pacino asked.
“Sir, NSA Director Nickerson should explain this,” she said.
National Security Agency commander General Nick Nickerson cleared his throat and looked over at Pacino. “Mr. Vice President, we’ve been hearing a lot of chatter from the Russians as they launched this particular aircraft. It’s a Russian Ilyushin IL-76, a four-engine cargo jet, capable of arctic operations. And search-and-rescue operations. But this particular plane is run by the GRU, the Russian military intelligence organization.”
“What was the ‘chatter’ you intercepted?”
Nickerson cleared his throat again. “Sir, the Russians have been talking about taking the crew of the
The room broke out in muffled conversation.
“Quiet, everyone,” Pacino said. “Secretary Hogshead, is the Apex drone armed?”
“Yes, Mr. Vice President,” Hogshead said. “It has two Brimstone missiles.”
“Are we in range?” Pacino asked.
“Yes, sir.”
“Mr. Vice President, if you attack that jet,” CIA Director Margo Allende said, her hand out, “you’ll be giving away that our intel agencies were able to determine the Russians’ intentions.”
