Price of Duty

THIRTY-NINE

Slowly, Gryzlov put the secure phone down. He sat in uncharacteristic silence for several moments, digesting the incredible news Colonel Balakin had just relayed. Around the conference room table, the most senior members of his national security team sat frozen, plainly afraid of how he would react to this catastrophe. He had summoned them to this late-night meeting to share his triumph, the culmination of months of careful planning and intense effort. Now, instead, they were here at the very moment when the taste of victory turned to ashes in his mouth.

In the bad old days, those who served a Russian strongman like Ivan the Terrible or Stalin knew they could be exiled, imprisoned, or executed on a whim — savaged by a tyrant lashing out in the face of humiliation and failure. Not much was different under the rule of Gennadiy Gryzlov. Punishments meted out to those who fell out of favor might carry a veneer of legality, but they were no less arbitrary.

For now, Gryzlov ignored their fear. There would be time enough later to savor his power over Sokolov, Kazyanov, Titeneva, and the others — power that had, if anything, just become even more absolute. While he regretted Sergei Tarzarov’s death, there was no denying that the older man’s connections and carefully cultivated ties to Russia’s business, military, and intelligence elites had checked Gryzlov’s authority and ambitions. Tarzarov’s gray, shadowy presence inside the Kremlin had acted as a constant reminder of older days and other leaders. Wittingly or unwittingly, he had sometimes served as a rallying point for those who feared their president’s aggressive behavior.

But now the old man was gone. And most conveniently for Gryzlov, he’d been killed by Russia’s foreign enemies, rather than simply losing an internal Kremlin power struggle. For good or ill, Gennadiy Gryzlov alone held the stage.

Which left the question of what to do about this most recent foul-up by Russia’s military, he thought coldly. Losing the Iron Wolf prisoner taken at so high a cost in men, matériel, and machines was bad. Watching the survivors of this mercenary assault force escape to safety would be infinitely worse.

Moodily, Gryzlov tapped the surface of his tablet computer, transferring its detailed map of Russia and its surroundings to the conference room’s huge flat-screen monitor. Green symbols dotted the digital map, indicating the reported positions of friendly radar units, SAM regiments, fighter patrols, and AWACS aircraft. A slowly expanding red circle centered on Pechora showed the area within which the fleeing Iron Wolf stealth aircraft might be found. It was an extrapolation only, based on very limited observations of its maximum speed made by the two Su-50 pilots before they’d muffed their intercept.

He swung to face Colonel General Valentin Maksimov. The old man’s square-jawed face was almost as pale as his short-cropped shock of white hair. The commander of Russia’s Aerospace Forces looked every year of his nearly seven decades… and more. With Tarzarov gone, Maksimov probably sensed that his neck was on the chopping block. Angrily, Gryzlov stabbed a finger at the monitor. “Is that an accurate depiction of our current air-defense deployments and posture, General?”

Maksimov nodded heavily. “Yes, Mr. President.” He lifted his massive shoulders and then let them fall in resignation. “By your orders, my headquarters situation plots are being fed to your personal computer in real time.”

“That is unfortunate,” Gryzlov said with undisguised contempt. “I had hoped you and your staff had simply screwed up on a minor technical question — rather than making so many obvious tactical and operational blunders.”

Maksimov looked stunned. “I… I don’t understand what you mean, Mr. President. Our forces are correctly positioned to—”

Gryzlov cut him off with a single, angry gesture. “Spare me your pathetic excuses, Maksimov!” he snapped. “You persist in making the same mistakes over and over again. Perhaps that is why your forces have had their asses handed to them so many times by the Americans! And now by these Iron Wolf mercenaries!” He waved a dismissive hand at the situation plot. “Look at it!” he demanded, glaring coldly around the table. “Do any of you see the error Maksimov and his clowns are making?”

Carefully blank faces met his gaze. No one spoke. When their president was in this kind of mood, there were no right answers.

Gryzlov smiled inwardly. Now more than ever, he suspected that his cabinet ministers regretted Sergei Tarzarov’s death. Secure in his own position, the Kremlin chief of staff had never hesitated to intercede for his colleagues in the face of the president’s rage. Now these sheep had no protector to shield them from the darker impulses of their demanding master.

“No one?” he asked, with deceptive mildness. His eyes glittered. “Perhaps I should not be surprised. You are all disposed to inaction and idleness — even when the situation demands boldness and daring.”

Unable to sit still any longer, Gryzlov rocketed up out of his chair and stormed closer to the large display. Dismissively, he swiped his hand across the radar, fighter, and SAM regiment icons shown clustered along Russia’s borders. “Passive, wasteful, and, ultimately, futile barrier defenses!” he said scathingly. He sneered in Maksimov’s direction. “You deploy your forces with all the skill of a child, General… and with a child’s dependence on luck and wishful thinking. ‘Perhaps our enemies will stumble into the kill radius of a SAM battery?’ you imagine. Or, ‘maybe one of my fighter patrols will somehow spot them before they sneak past?’ you hope.”

For a moment, watching Maksimov’s face stiffen, he thought the old man would either fall dead of a stroke or finally fight back. But instead, the Aerospace Forces commander regained control over himself and simply asked, “Then what are your orders, Mr. President?”

So his old academy instructor was only another coward like all the rest, Gryzlov thought with some disappointment. There seemed to be no limit to how far he could push these gutless place-seekers. Mentally, he shrugged. If so, putting the next phase of his long-dreamed-of-plans into action would be that much easier.

Confidently, he began rattling off new movement and engagement orders for Russia’s air and missile forces. This time, there would be no easy escape for that fleeing Iron Wolf stealth aircraft.

Practically hugging the treetops, the XCV-62 banked right, turning to head northwest over a barren, almost completely uninhabited countryside of forests and frozen swamps — one virtually untouched by recorded human history. Occasional lights in the distance signaled the presence of small villages or logging camps, but otherwise everything was dark. Pechora and its burning, wreck-strewn airport lay far to the east.

“How are things in back?” Brad McLanahan asked Nadia, forcing the words out through clenched teeth. Every muscle ached. His flight suit was drenched in sweat. His vision seemed to have collapsed inward until all he could focus on was the green, softly glowing landscape visible through his HUD. The strain of flying this low and this fast for so long was draining his mental and physical reserves.

“Major Macomber is definitely concussed and has several minor wounds, but he is not in any immediate danger,” Nadia answered quietly. “However, Captain Schofield says that it is urgent that Sergeant Davis receive advanced medical care and trauma surgery as soon as possible. He and the others have done all they can for now — but it will not be enough.”

Brad nodded tightly. While the kit aboard the Ranger included medical equipment to stabilize most casualties, treating the serious wounds sustained by the Iron Wolf sergeant was beyond their ability. The best they could hope for was to keep him alive long enough to reach a skilled surgical team. “With some luck, we’ll be on the ground in Kemijärvi in roughly sixty minutes.”

“Warning, warning, multiple airborne X-band search radars detected from ten o’clock to two o’clock,” their SPEAR system reported abruptly. “Evaluated as Su-27s and Su-30s. Range one hundred miles and closing. Probability of detection very low but rising.”

A row of red boxes flashed onto Brad’s HUD, matching the computer’s estimated bearings to those Russian fighters. They stretched across the horizon ahead of the Ranger — coming southeast at nearly four hundred knots like a moving wall.

“I count at least six Su-27s and another six Su-30s flying in line abreast,” Nadia said. She peered down at her defensive displays. “I see no way to evade them on our present course.”

Brad nodded grimly. Stealth or no stealth, those Russian fighter radars would pick them up if they got close enough. Turning north to try to go around them was a nonstarter. They’d run head-on into the network of radars and SAM defenses guarding Russia’s Arctic naval and submarine bases. The big enemy air base at Petrozavodsk was almost due west. Heading southwest would take them into the middle of the layered defenses surrounding St. Petersburg. That left only one real option. And it sucked.

He banked into a left turn, coming back around to the south. “Plot a course that takes us far enough east of Moscow to stay out of its air-defense zone. And then another leg southwest, staying north of those Russian air bases at Lipetsk and Voronezh,” he told Nadia. “We’ll cross into Belarus and go direct to Warsaw.”

She pulled up their navigation system and began keying in commands. A new steering cue appeared on Brad’s HUD, a little more to the southeast. He turned to follow it.

“We have enough fuel remaining to reach Warsaw on this new course, though only by a very narrow margin,” Nadia said. Her voice was troubled. “But it adds two hours to our flight time, and—”

“Davis may not last those extra two hours,” Brad finished for her. His jaw was set. “Look, it’s my call, Nadia. My job is to get this crate home in one piece. And right now I don’t see any other way to do that.”

“I know,” she said softly. “Making decisions that may cost lives is the price of command.”

Brad said nothing. He only nodded. Now that it was too late, he was beginning to understand some of the stresses that had made his father seem so distant at times. If only they’d had more time to talk about important things, instead of school or sports or girls or even flying. Breathing hard, he fought back the tide of sorrow threatening to wash over him. Hold it together, he told himself. Keep flying and don’t look back. Not yet.

They flew on in silence for several more minutes. More lights appeared on the horizon ahead of them. This part of Russia was still thinly populated, but they were heading toward its more settled regions.

“Caution, unidentified L-band search radar detected. Radar is phased array, probable Beriev-100 AWACS aircraft,” the computer told them abruptly.

“Son of a bitch,” Brad said under his breath. He changed course slightly, veering a little more to the west to try to get some kind of rough bearing on the enemy radar aircraft.

Nadia’s fingers danced across her displays. Her eyes narrowed in total concentration. “I estimate the Beriev is approximately one hundred miles due south of us,” she said after several seconds. “At the moment, its apparent course is easterly.”

“Yeah, that makes sense,” Brad said. He frowned. “The Russians probably have that AWACS plane flying a racetrack oval. It’s perfectly positioned to detect anyone trying to break south past Moscow. And I bet there are more fighters — probably a mix of MiG-29s and Su-27s — hanging with it with their radars off… ready to charge in for the kill.”

He risked a quick glance at Nadia. “Somebody out there is reading my mind.”

She nodded, looking worried.

“Lima-band search radar, Beriev-100, eleven o’clock, ninety-five miles. Signal strength increasing,” the SPEAR system told them.

“Shit,” Brad muttered. He altered course again, turning southwest.

Just then their computer issued a new alert. “Warning, warning, new airborne X-band search radars detected. Multiple sources from eight o’clock to four o’clock. Range one hundred and twenty miles.”

“I identify those as Su-30 and Su-35 fighters,” Nadia said. “They are coming west at more than four hundred knots.”

The Russians had another line of combat aircraft booming in on them from the east, Brad realized. His mouth tightened as the fuzzy tactical picture suddenly clarified. “Crap,” he said. “We can’t go north or south… and we can’t reduce our speed, not with those fighters coming up behind us. These guys are driving us, just like beaters in a big-game hunt. We’re being herded straight into the St. Petersburg SAM belt.”

“I concur,” Nadia said tightly.

Several minutes later, multiple radars began lighting up across the horizon about two hundred nautical miles ahead of them, confirming his instincts. Their signature characteristics indicated they were the search and target acquisition radars for at least two regiments of S-300 SAMs and one of S-400 SAM launchers.

“Time until we hit the outer edge of their effective missile-engagement envelope?” Brad asked.

“Approximately ten minutes,” Nadia told him.

Grim-faced, he nodded. “That’s it, then, I guess. We’d better call home and report before it’s too late.” He glanced at Nadia and saw her biting her lip. He forced a grin for her sake. “Look, I’m not giving up just yet. I’ll cut south or north before we hit that SAM barrier and try to blitz through whatever fighters the Russians have in our way. But we need to let Martindale and President Wilk know the score… just in case we don’t get lucky.”

“I understand, Brad,” she said softly. She bent her head over her display again, opening a com window to enter a short situation report. Once she was finished, their computer took over. Quickly it encrypted and compressed her message to a single millisecond-long burst via satellite uplink. The system beeped. “Message sent,” she said, sitting back with a resolute expression on her face.

Polish president Piotr Wilk finished reading the signal shown on his monitor. His eyes were dark with shame and anger when he looked up at Kevin Martindale. “I sent them into a trap.”

Martindale shook his head. “We sent them into a trap,” he corrected. “I was right there with you every step of the way. Gryzlov set us up perfectly. And we all fell for it. He rigged this game from the get-go. Either we did nothing and let his cyberweapons continue hammering us. Or he figured we’d react and send a strike force to hit what appeared to be his base of operations — which turned out to be one damned big kill zone. Destroying that Russian supercomputer and the programs they were creating on it will slow his hackers down some, maybe even a lot. But Gryzlov can buy another computer and programs can be re-created.”

Frustrated, Wilk started to climb to his feet and then sat back down sharply, gritting his teeth against a wave of pain. His injuries were not fully healed yet. Only his own direct order as commander in chief had freed him from the hospital. “At least we have a fighting chance to get the survivors out,” he said. “Signal Captain McLanahan and Major Rozek to use the Passkey cyberweapon your Scion experts have devised. I’ll order Colonel Kasperek to send his F-16s in at the same time.”

“I didn’t brief the assault team on Passkey,” Martindale said flatly. His face was completely expressionless. “The codes are in their computer as a subroutine in the SPEAR system, but set to self-destruct in the event the XCV-62 is shot down or captured. They don’t know it exists.”

“In God’s name, why not?” Wilk asked, scarcely able to believe what he’d just been told.

“The risk that the team might be captured was too high,” the American said stubbornly. He spread his hands. “And as things stand now, Passkey is our ace in the hole against the Russians if this war escalates further.” His face darkened. “Hell, after this failed raid, it’s practically the only card we have left.”

“Meaning what, exactly?” Wilk demanded.

“Meaning, Passkey is essentially a onetime-use weapon,” Martindale said. “It doesn’t make sense to waste it saving one aircraft and its crew — no matter who they are and how much they mean to us personally.”

“I will be the judge of that, Mr. Martindale,” Wilk told him sharply. “Not you.” Icily, he stared at the other man. “Unless, of course, you have decided that Scion will unilaterally break its contract with my country.”

There was silence for several agonizing moments.

“No, Mr. President,” Martindale said at last. “We honor our contracts. All the way.”

“Good,” Wilk told him. “Then listen to me very closely. Poland has a debt of honor to the Iron Wolf soldiers and airmen aboard that aircraft. It is a debt I intend to pay. Is that clear?”

Reluctantly, Martindale nodded. “It is.”

“Very well, then,” Wilk said. “Then you will signal Major Rozek and Captain McLanahan to activate Passkey at the appropriate time.” He turned away from the American and picked up a secure phone. “Connect with me Colonel Kasperek at Ämari Air Base.”

When the Polish F-16 squadron commander came on the line, Wilk said, “Pawel, get your Vipers in the air at once! Wykonać Taran. Execute Battering Ram.”

“Time to effective engagement envelope for those S-300 and S-400 SAMs is now only sixty seconds,” Nadia reported, sounding frantic. Her fingers were a blur across her MFDs as she managed their defenses. “SPEAR is active, trying to engage and spoof the Russian radars. But there are too many of them! They are locking on too fast! And the systems I knock off-line are coming back on target very quickly — much more rapidly than they did last year when we bombed near Kaliningrad.”

“Understood,” Brad replied. Should he break left or right? he wondered. There sure as hell was no way he was going to fly straight down the throat of all those surface-to-air missile units.

“Warning, warning, enemy fighters at three o’clock through nine o’clock increasing speed and closing,” the Ranger said. “Multiple target-tracking radars detected.”

“Ah, hell.” Brad resisted the urge to just close his eyes and let the Ranger auger in. The Russians weren’t taking any chances. None at all. Between the Su-27s, Su-30s, and other fighters closing in from the flanks and rear and those SAMs out ahead, they were royally fucked.

Nadia’s left-hand MFD pinged, alerting them to the receipt of a satellite transmission. “Message reads: ‘Hold your course. Activate SPEAR Passkey subroutine,’” she said.

Puzzled, Brad asked, “Passkey? What the hell is that?”

“I do not know,” Nadia admitted. She leaned forward against her straps, rapidly paging through menus on the MFD she’d set to handle their primary defensive systems. She paused uncertainly, with her finger hovering over the screen. “Here it is. But there is no indication of what this subroutine does! Only an initiate button.”

“Warning, warning, multiple X-band Tombstone and Gravestone target tracking radars locked on,” the Ranger’s computer reported. “S-300 and S-400 missile launches imminent.”

“Just bring it up,” Brad said tightly. “Those Russian bastards are about to shoot. So whatever this Passkey thing does, it can’t make things any worse.”

Nadia tapped the button.

“New commands accepted. Transponders are set,” the computer said coolly. “Squawking Five-Zero-Five-Zero.”

“Jesus Christ!” Brad snarled, stunned. The Ranger’s transponders were part of its IFF, or identification, friend or foe, system. When interrogated by a radar, its transponder automatically sent back a code identifying the aircraft and reporting its current altitude. That was fine in friendly-controlled air space or when operating openly under civilian air-traffic control. But turning them on in enemy territory, in a combat situation, was just about as loco as painting the XCV-62 bright yellow and flying around in lazy, slow circles. What the hell was Martindale playing at? “Okay, scratch what I just said,” he growled. “Things just got worse.”

Major General Anatoliy Kaverin, commander of the 2nd Aerospace Defense Brigade, stood at ease in his command post. His eyes were fixed on the displays showing the developing engagement — images he knew were being simultaneously transmitted directly to President Gryzlov and his national security team. He felt confident. The radio chatter passing between his firing units and their associated radars was thoroughly calm and perfectly professional.

He smiled. This was a far cry from the clusterfuck that idiot Konrad Saratov had presided over last year in the Kaliningrad area. Whenever the fast-approaching Iron Wolf aircraft managed to blind or spoof one of his radars, the newly upgraded target identification and acquisition software provided by Dr. Obolensky’s lab at NNIIRT brought it back on line and on target within a few seconds. Besides that, the sheer number of systems he had radiating made it impossible for the mercenaries to deceive them all.

“Sir!” one of his staff officers said suddenly. “The enemy aircraft has turned on its transponders.”

Kaverin swung around toward him. “Is it using our IKS system?” he demanded. That was one possible trick he hadn’t considered. It wouldn’t matter in the end, since he could order their own fighters to back off and have his SAM units override the lockouts that would otherwise prevent them from firing on nominally friendly planes.

“Negative, General,” the younger man said, sounding puzzled. “It’s broadcasting an unassigned civilian code.”

“Maybe somebody aboard panicked,” Kaverin said with a shrug. He smiled coldly. “So now it’s that much easier to spot them, eh?”

Another staff officer interrupted. “Sir! Batteries Four through Eight report solid locks. The enemy is in range. They are ready to attack!”

“Commence firing,” Kaverin said calmly. This would be short and sweet.

What neither he nor anyone else in the 2nd Aerospace Defense Brigade knew was the “5050” code the Iron Wolf XCV-62 was squawking was the detonation trigger for a Scion-designed logic bomb buried inside their upgraded target identification and acquisition software. The difficult and dangerous covert work done by Samantha Kerr and her team in Nizhny Novgorod was about to pay off. Unseen by any of the humans who thought they were in control, lines of malicious code spooled through their battle-management systems… executing one simple identification change as each surface-to-air missile launched.

“Missile launch!” Nadia called out in a tight, strained tone. She tapped frantically at her displays, desperately trying to jam or spoof the missiles being fired at them. “I show multiple missile launches.”

Through the cockpit windows, Brad could see Russian surface-to-air missiles streaking aloft ahead of them, soaring skyward on pillars of fire and smoke. The incoming missiles curved toward them, closing fast as they accelerated toward Mach Six.

“Jesus,” he murmured. His hand froze on the stick. No combination of desperate maneuvers or chaff could dodge or decoy that many SAMs. He was basically out of altitude, airspeed, and ideas. There was time for only one thing. He turned toward Nadia. She stared back at him, with her beautiful blue-gray eyes full of unshed tears. “Kocham cię,” he said softly. “I love you.”

And then the first Russian missiles slashed right past them, still accelerating. The XCV-62 rocked wildly, buffeted by the wake of their passage.

“What the hell—” Brad blurted out. Miles behind them, explosions speckled the night sky. Those Russian SAMs were attacking their own fighters — knocking Su-27s, Su-30s, and Su-35s out of the air with contemptuous ease.

More smoke trails appeared along the western horizon, but these curved down toward the ground. Huge flashes rippled across the landscape, briefly turning night into day. Fires burned, glowing white-hot as they fed on missile propellant. In twos and threes, Russian radars and SAM launchers were destroyed — obliterated by the hundreds of bomblets packed inside each precision-guided AGM-154A Joint Standoff Weapon fired by Polish F-16s as they popped up off the deck.

Brad stared in amazement as icons filled his HUD, each indicating a Polish Viper squawking the same 5050 transponder code, a code that falsely identified them as friendly to the Scion-hacked Russian missile software. “Wolf Six-Two, this is Taran Lead,” he heard Colonel Pawel Kasperek say through his headset. “The gate is down. I repeat, the gate is down. Welcome home!”