Eagle Station

Eighteen

Twenty thousand feet above the Arctic Ocean, the XCV-70 Rustler stealth transport flew northeast in close formation with a much larger aircraft — a Sky Masters — owned 767 aerial tanker. The two planes were connected by the tanker’s refueling boom. They were fifteen hundred nautical miles and a little more than three hours outward bound from Yellowknife. While the Rustler still had plenty of jet fuel remaining when it arrived at this midair refueling rendezvous, the immense distances they would have to fly to complete this mission ruled out turning toward Russia with anything but full tanks.

“Scion Seven-Zero, this is Masters Two-Four, pressure disconnect,” the boom operator aboard the 767 radioed. Brad knew that boom operator was several thousand miles away at a remote console, as were the pilots of that unmanned tanker. “You’re topped off and good to go.”

“Copy that, Two-Four,” Brad McLanahan replied from the Rustler’s left-hand pilot’s seat. He felt a quick CL–CLUNK as the boom nozzle slid back out of the slipway and retracted. “Thanks for the gas. Clearing away now.”

Immediately, he tweaked his engine throttles back and pushed his stick forward a tad, lowering the aircraft’s nose a couple of degrees. The roar from their big GE Affinity turbofans decreased as they descended a few hundred feet. At the same time, the bigger air tanker accelerated and climbed away from them, already banking as it made a gentle right turn back toward the distant Greenland coast.

Far below the two rapidly separating aircraft, Arctic ice floes stretched away in all directions. Lit by the midnight sun, they were rippling sheets of dazzling pure white broken only by narrow cracks of dark blue open water.

“Our promised Trojan horse is right where it is supposed to be,” Nadia announced from the right-hand seat. She was flying as Brad’s copilot and systems operator. Currently, one of her big multifunction displays was set to show all air contacts within several hundred miles. Most were civilian flights with active transponders and in communication with air traffic control centers in Canada, Greenland, Alaska, and northern Russia.

Thanks to a highly advanced data-link system comparable to those equipping F-35 Lightning II fifth-generation fighters, her computers could fuse information gathered from a wide range of friendly ground- and space-based sensors into a single coherent picture. As a result, freed from any immediate need to activate its own powerful radar, the Rustler could fly safely through even crowded airspace without giving its position away, cloaked in electromagnetic silence.

She tagged one of those air contacts on her display. Within milliseconds, the data-link system transferred its position, heading, and observed airspeed to the XCV-70’s flight computer. A green line appeared, connecting them to the aircraft she’d selected. “Intercept course generated,” she reported.

Instantly, a new steering cue blinked onto Brad’s HUD. It was high up and sliding fast to the left across his field of vision.

“Turning to intercept,” he said. He pushed his throttles forward to full military power and pulled back and to the left on the stick. G-forces pushed them back against their seats as the Rustler rolled into a steep, climbing turn — chasing after the tagged air contact as it arrowed toward the north high above them.

Steadily, the steering cue moved back toward the center of Brad’s HUD. Glowing green brackets appeared, highlighting a distant silvery dot against the pale blue sky. He rolled back out of his turn, but kept the XCV-70’s nose up — soaring through thirty thousand feet and on past forty thousand feet before leveling off just above the altitude of the other aircraft. Their airspeed increased to 520 knots.

As they closed in, the tiny dot visible through the cockpit canopy grew bigger and took on more definition. Abruptly, it shifted to become the clearly recognizable shape of a very large, multi-engine aircraft painted in bright white and yellow stripes. “The contact is a Traveler Air Freight 747-8 cargo plane,” he said.

“Copy that,” Nadia confirmed.

Traveler Air Freight was another of Kevin Martindale’s shell companies. Ordinarily he used its aircraft to discreetly ferry supplies, equipment, and personnel to various Scion teams operating covertly around the globe. But today’s flight had a very different purpose.

Brad kept his left hand on the Rustler’s throttles as they flew in behind the enormous wide-body cargo jet. Numbers appeared on his HUD, showing the distance between their two aircraft. Those numbers decreased rapidly at first and then slower as he reduced power, reducing the XCV-70’s rate of closure. He was careful to stay slightly above the 747 to avoid running into any wake turbulence curling off its wings.

“Two hundred yards. Vertical separation one hundred feet,” Nadia said quietly, counting down the remaining distance from her own station. “Our airspeed is now five hundred knots. Ten knots closure.”

The Rustler shuddered slightly, buffeted by turbulence.

“One hundred yards. Vertical separation sixty feet.”

Brad eased back even more on the throttles.

“Five knots closure.” Nadia reported. She glanced across the cockpit. “Just how close are you planning to come?”

“Right… about… here,” Brad said, scissoring a little from side to side to slow down and match the big 747’s airspeed. Satisfied, he leveled out.

They were now hanging back only fifty to sixty feet behind and just slightly above the larger aircraft’s tail assembly. That might not qualify as tight formation flying by the standards of a military aerobatics team like the Air Force’s Thunderbirds or the Navy’s Blue Angels, but it felt awfully close considering the size of both aircraft… and the fact that the 747’s crew didn’t have any real way to keep track of his position. Intellectually, he knew this wasn’t much different from carrying out an air-to-air refueling, but tanking up from a Sky Masters KC-767 or KC-10 Extender was an operation that usually required only five to ten minutes… and there was always a boom operator ready to warn the tanker pilot if anything went wrong. To successfully pull off the stunt he had in mind, he’d need to stick like glue to the big Boeing-built jet for the next three and a half hours.

“You said you wanted to get close enough to count their rivets,” Nadia said accusingly. She made a pretense of peering through the canopy. “Well, I cannot yet make out any rivets on that 747.”

“That was mere poetic license, Mrs. Major Rozek-McLanahan,” Brad said, with a smile concealed by his oxygen mask. “Trust me, this is more than close enough.”

The truth was that the mammoth Traveler Air Freight 747-8 looming up ahead wasn’t carrying any Scion weapons, explosives, or other gear in its cargo holds. Not on this trip anyway. Instead, its sole mission was to smuggle them into Russian airspace.

Like most military and espionage stratagems, Brad’s plan was simple enough on paper — but very difficult to successfully pull off in practice. They were tucked up close enough to blend the Rustler’s minimal radar signature with that of the much larger cargo jet. If everything worked right, Russia’s probing air defense radars should see them only as a single, innocent commercial aircraft transiting the internationally recognized Polar Route 1 on its way to Mumbai in India.

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the world’s passenger and freight airlines were quick to recognize the enormous potential savings in time and fuel offered by routing aircraft over the Arctic and through previously off-limits Russian airspace. Within several years, a series of international agreements had opened specific, narrowly defined air corridors to declared civilian traffic.

Polar Route 1 was one of the busiest, with dozens of air transits every day. It opened north of Greenland and then ran almost due south across Russia — conveniently crossing high over Krasnoyarsk — before entering Chinese airspace on its way to India.

Mentally, Brad crossed his fingers. Either this gambit worked… or this would turn out to be one of the shortest and most futile rescue efforts in Scion’s covert operations history. He glanced toward Nadia. “Time to the edge of the Murmansk flight information region?”

She checked her nav display. “At this speed, five minutes.”

Brad buckled down to the job of keeping their aircraft slotted right behind the 747. Pockets of local turbulence affected the smaller, lighter XCV-70 more than they did the huge Boeing cargo jet. So it took constant adjustments to his flight controls to stay in formation.

Beside him, Nadia tuned to the radio frequency being used by the Traveler Air jet.

Not long afterward, they heard, “Traveler Five-Five Three, Edmonton Center,” through their headsets. “Monitor VHF one-two-six point nine. At DEVID, contact Murmansk Oceanic Center, eight-nine-five-zero primary, one-one-three-nine-zero secondary. Have a good day.”

The Canadians were handing off the 747-8 cargo flight to their Russian air traffic control counterparts. DEVID was a fixed navigation point where all aircraft crossing the Arctic region were required to contact Murmansk.

Nadia changed frequencies. Moments later, they heard the Traveler Air Freight pilot radio. “Murmansk Oceanic, Traveler Five-Five-Three, level four-zero-zero.”

The Russian-accented voice of a new controller replied immediately. “Traveler Five-Five-Three, this is Murmansk, roger. Maintain flight level four-zero-zero.”

For now, the Rustler’s threat-warning computer stayed silent. They were still well beyond the range of the air route surveillance radars posted to monitor Russia’s northern regions.

They flew on, crossing high above the polar region. Below them, the ice cap was now a continuous sheet of white glare.

Forty-five minutes and 370 nautical miles after crossing through the DEVID intersection, the threat computer issued its first alert. “Caution, S-band phased-array radar detected at twelve o’clock. Range approximately two hundred miles,” a calm female voice reported. “Evaluated as Russian Sopka-2 Arctic Air Surveillance Radar. Detection probability high.”

“Here we go,” Brad murmured. That radar was sited on a small island at Sredny Ostrov, originally an ice airfield built as a staging base for Soviet Tu-95 Bear bombers tasked with attacking the United States if the Cold War had ever turned hot. It was located just off the much larger Severnaya Zemlya archipelago. Along with the new radar and at least one surface-to-air-missile battery, current intelligence indicated the Russians had upgraded Sredny’s runway, enabling it to handle all-weather fighters like the MiG-31.

“Standing by on SPEAR,” Nadia said. The instant it appeared that their ruse had failed, she planned to bring the system online and either seize control over that enemy radar… or blind it. With luck, she might be able to buy them enough time to reverse course, drop to low altitude, and scoot for friendly airspace at high speed.

Then they heard the same Russian controller’s bored-sounding voice crackle through their headsets. “Traveler Five-Five-Three, this is Murmansk. Radar contact. Proceed DIRIP to KUTET. Monitor VHF one-three-three point four. At NOTIS, contact Krasnoyarsk Control, six-six-seven-two primary, eight-eight-two-two secondary.”

“I’ll be damned,” Brad said in wonder. “This crazy-ass stunt is actually working. Those guys really don’t know we’re up here.”

One of the icons on Nadia’s navigation display turned red. “We are approaching the breakaway point. Thirty seconds out.”

“Copy that,” Brad said, nodding. Rapidly, he blinked away a stinging droplet of sweat. Although not quite as mentally taxing and physically exhausting as prolonged nap-of-the-earth flight, the effort required to keep their aircraft so close to the mammoth 747 for so long had been a serious strain. “Any status change on that Nebo-M radar?”

Nadia checked another of her displays, this one set to monitor hostile radars and other potential threats. Several minutes before, they’d picked up the emissions of a mobile VHF-band Russian air surveillance and tracking radar operating a couple of hundred miles to the west. She suspected it was assigned to an S-300 SAM regiment guarding the vital West Siberian oilfields. “No change,” she reported. “The Nebo-M radar is still active.”

“Too bad,” Brad said. He shrugged. “Guess we’ll just have to roll the dice.”

This far out, that enemy radar shouldn’t have any real chance to detect them — even when they broke away from the sheltering embrace of the Traveler Air Freight cargo jet. But there was always the possibility of some eagle-eyed Russian spotting something odd on his screen and raising an alarm. The Rustler’s stealth design and radar-absorbent coating significantly reduced its radar cross section in some wavelengths and from certain aspects, especially from the front. But they couldn’t render the Scion aircraft completely invisible.

“Ten seconds,” Nadia said.

Brad breathed out. His hands settled firmly on the controls.

The nav icon on Nadia’s MFD flashed green. “Execute breakaway!” she snapped.

Instantly, Brad throttled back to minimum power and rolled right, going almost inverted as he dove away from the bigger jet. As a last precaution, he’d turned west to keep his nose pointed toward that distant Russian air surveillance radar. He hoped that would keep XCV-70’s radar cross section as small as possible during the critical few seconds before they fell below the Nebo-M’s horizon.

Negative G’s tugged him forward against his seat straps. The roar from the Rustler’s engines faded away — replaced by the shrill shriek of the wind as it plummeted almost vertically toward the ground. The altitude indicator on his HUD decreased precipitously.

Junior Sergeant Anatoly Yanayev frowned. Had he really seen what he’d just seen? He swiveled in his seat. “Captain Dyomin?” he said.

Frowning, his commander poked his head back into the operations van. He’d been enjoying a smoke outside in the early afternoon sunshine. “What is it, Sergeant?”

Yanayev indicated his console. “I think I’ve detected an unidentified air contact.” He shrugged. “Well, at least for a second or two…” He let his voice trail off uncertainly.

With a sigh, Dyomin pitched his cigarette away and climbed back into the van. “Show me the recording,” he demanded.

“I was tracking a big American air cargo jet transiting south about three hundred kilometers east of here,” the young enlisted man explained. “As practice, you see.”

Patiently, Dyomin nodded, deciding not to point out that Yanayev was only following the orders he personally had issued at the beginning of this training session. Tracking the passenger jets and air freighters using Polar Route 1 to cross Russian airspace wasn’t exactly a challenging test of their equipment, even at such a long range, but at least it was a task he’d hoped might be within Yanayev’s capabilities. The junior sergeant wasn’t exactly one of the regiment’s shining stars.

“Well, suddenly I saw this… er… second blip for a couple of seconds. It sort of looked like something maybe falling off that American 747.” He pushed a couple of buttons beside his console’s seventeen-inch LCD display, replaying the short sequence it had automatically recorded.

Dyomin sighed even harder, as he watched the tiny transitory radar blip flicker into existence slightly below the larger cargo jet and then vanish. “What you just saw, Junior Sergeant Yanayev,” he said heavily, “was a perfect example of a minor systems glitch.”

“But—”

“Unless you think FedEx is now dropping bombs on the Motherland?” Dyomin growled with biting sarcasm.

“No, sir,” Yanayev admitted, chastened.

“Then wipe that useless recording,” the captain ordered. “And get back to work.” Shaking his head in disgust, he turned away, fumbling in his shirt pocket for another cigarette.

What had been a mostly featureless patchwork of green and brown earth cut by the winding blue trace of the Yenisei River grew sharper and sharper as the Rustler plunged downward at ever-increasing speed. Suddenly, an indistinct blur of green flashed into the needle-edged tops of pine trees stabbing upward.

Grinning wildly, Brad slammed his throttles forward. He leveled off only a few hundred feet above the treetops and banked hard left. Curving south, the Scion stealth aircraft streaked low across the forest canopy at nearly five hundred knots. “Engage DTF, two hundred, hard ride!” he ordered.

“DTF engaged,” the Rustler’s computer acknowledged.

He relaxed a bit. With their aircraft’s digital terrain-following system engaged, they were reasonably safe flying this low, even at high speed. Using detailed maps stored in its computers and quick bursts from its radar altimeter, the DTF system enabled feats of low-altitude, long-distance flying beyond the ability of any unaided human pilot.

Beside him, Nadia leaned forward against her straps. Quickly, she toggled a sequence of virtual “keys” on her open navigation display, cueing up the precise coordinates of their preselected landing zone — a 1,600-foot-long clearing in the middle of the woods northwest of Lesosibirsk. They were currently a little over 150 nautical miles away, less than twenty minutes flying time. She selected it and tapped another icon. “LZ coordinates laid in.”

The steering cue on Brad’s head-up display shifted slightly as his computer accepted the updated information. He tweaked his stick left. The Rustler banked a touch, altering its heading by a fraction of a degree. “We’d better give Sam and her people the good news that we’re getting close.”

“I am on it,” Nadia said. She opened a com window. Her fingers blurred across the display, entering a short message. As soon as she finished, their computer took over. It compressed and encrypted her signal into a millisecond-long burst and then transmitted it via satellite uplink. “Message sent.”