Silver Tower

CHAPTER 35

It was the first time in months that any member of the Stavka VGK, the Armed Forces Supreme High Command, had been in the Soviet military's alternate command post located one hundred sixty kilometers south of Moscow. This particular post was never involved in any preparedness exercises or drills, was manned by only a small staff of hand-picked technicians and soldiers and did not have a major military airfield associated with it — Stavka members from Moscow were flown in to Novomoskovsk by helicopter. The other well-known "high-value" alternate command posts under the Kremlin and in Pushkino received all the attention and publicity and, it was assumed, were the ones targeted by the West in the event of a thermonuclear exchange. Novomoskovsk, well away from military targets, factories, rail depots and most important — publicity, was designed to escape all but a direct hit. Unless an attack had already been launched against the Soviet Union and time was running out, the eleven men of the Stavka and their aides and assistants knew that the Novomoskovsk command post was far safer and more secure than any in Moscow.

In fact, the Novomoskovsk command post was probably the most secure place in eastern Europe. When the Soviet Union perfected the technique of welding ultra-thick pieces of metal they had immediately applied that technology to the walls of the three-thousand-square-foot underground facility. The main construction of the bunker consisted of four-foot-thick walls of steel welded by small nuclear detonations in industrial reactors. The steel chamber rode on huge shock absorbers that would cushion the chamber from the terrific overpressures of a nearby nuclear explosion. Two dozen men and women could live and work there in reasonable comfort for at least a month. No question, Novomoskovsk was the place to be if there were ever a nuclear war.

But at the moment the command post was not the place to be if one wanted to be safe from the stinging disapproval of the general secretary of the Soviet Union. The Soviet leader sat at the apex of a large triangular table, listening with growing irritation to First Deputy Minister Khromeyev as he stood before an electronic briefing board, reviewing the progress of Operation Feather. The Stavka members were arranged on either side of the general secretary, each with a communications terminal and a telephone at his side.

Yesterday, when the first of the massive air attacks on the Nimitz carrier group had begun, the general secretary had postponed all his appearances and appointments to take personal command of the Arabian Sea conflict. The breaking of the American blockade around the mouth of the Persian Gulf was now the major focus of his attention, and he was growing progressively angrier as he realized nothing was working as planned. And who could blame him? He also had a rather complex domestic economy to run. His military people were supposed to handle their end once the goals and strategies had been spelled out.

"The Arkhangel task force will soon open the high-speed air-attack lane around the Nimitz carrier force," Khromeyev went on. "This lane will provide a relatively clear path for our Sukhoi-24 carrier-based fighter bombers to transit the American fleet and reinforce the Brezhnev carrier group in the Persian Gulf. We are expecting—"

"Stop," the general secretary broke in. "What is all this about a 'relatively clear' air attack lane? I want to know about the damned Nimitz. It's still blocking the Strait of Hormuz, isn't it? Why aren't we launching another attack on the Nimitz? Why don't we have control of the Arabian Sea? Why can't we bring the Arkhangel carrier group through to the Gulf of Oman? Why?"

"We have not sufficiently reduced the American forces to allow our vessels to pass," Admiral Chercherovin said. "Sir, it will take time—"

"How much have we reduced the American forces? How many ships have we sunk?"

Chercherovin's silence said it all. "None? We've sunk none?"

"The conflict has not progressed far enough where the surface combatants are in direct conflict," Minister of Defense Czilikov put in. "That is a phase of battle still a few days away. The battle is being fought in the air, with our aircraft winning the ships' right to move forward…"

"And we have inflicted heavy damage on some American vessels," Chercherovin added. "Our AS-12 missiles are very effective against the older American search-and-tracking radars. Once their guided-missile cruisers are made ineffective our bombers can clear a path for the Arkhangel group to pass—"

"You seem fixed on this idea that we are conducting this latest offensive merely to let the Arkhangel pass into the Persian Gulf, Admiral," the general secretary said. "That is not our goal.. Our goal is to remove the Nimitz carrier group as a presence in the Persian Gulf area. If necessary I want the Nimitz and all her escorts blown out of the water… I believe that's the phrase you people use. Well, is that clear, Admiral?"

"Yes, sir," Chercherovin said, literally feeling the heat. The Soviet commander in chief turned to the other Stavka members. "All right," he said, "let's get the rest of the bad news out in the open. What about our losses?"

"Principal surface combatant losses are still zero," Khromeyev quickly put in. "Damage has been reported aboard five vessels, all due to antiradiation missile attacks. The Krivak-class frigate Karamarov was seriously damaged but is still under way. Aircraft losses reported from Arkhangel are eighteen Sukhoi-27 fighters, three Kamov-27 anti-submarine warfare—"

"Eighteen fighters," the general secretary said. "In two days we have lost eighteen fighters from the Arkhangel? How many were on it to begin with?"

"Seventy-four."

"We have lost one-fourth of our carrier-based fighters? How?" He turned to Chercherovin. "The Arkhangel was supposed to be the ultimate weapon, Chercherovin. So far it has been damn near worthless "

"That is not true, sit," the admiral said quickly. "Our losses have been higher than anticipated because the Americans apparently aren't concerned about the dangers of escalating this conflict into a major confrontation. The Nimitz group should have pulled back from the Persian Gulf area — instead, it has not only blocked the sea lane but has used force to repel any overflight of the area—"

"Admiral, what is the problem here?… We should be the ones willing to engage the enemy whatever the cost. We should be taking the battle to them. Instead we're being pushed around the Arabian Sea by a much inferior force." He glanced at Czilikov, anticipating a response. When none came he added, "I think it's time a younger, more aggressive admiral take charge of the Arabian Sea flotilla."

Admiral Chercherovin quickly scanned the room, searching for supporters. No one said a word. Not even Czilikov. Then the admiral looked to Alesander Govorov. "I think we should first ask Marshal Govorov the status of the American military space station. That station he supposedly crippled has obviously increased the Americans' ability to repel our attacks these past two days."

The general secretary understood Chercherovin was trying to shift the blame, though the admiral did have a point. He gave Chercherovin a look that told him he wouldn't get off this easily, then turned to Govorov. "Military intelligence has reported that the Armstrong space-based radar is operational again. Satellite relay signals suggest that the station is warning American vessels of attack and directing attacks against our forces. Is it possible?"

"Yes, sir, it is. I was mistaken in my damage estimates. We carried only twenty nonexplosive missiles on our first attack, and Colonel Voloshin was lost before expending all his missiles. In my rush to search for Voloshin I depleted my fuel reserves and had to withdraw from the attack before all missiles were directed on the station. The damage estimates on each station subsystem were accurate—"

"Govorov, I respect you. At least you aren't making stupid excuses, although it seems you made some stupid, or at least unwise decisions. Concern for a comrade is admirable, but there are times when difficult decisions need to be made. You left the job half finished. And more than one man has suffered for it. Well, do you have any thoughts about what you can do to make some amends?"

At that moment Govorov was easily the most resented man in that room. And he understood the general secretary's indulgence was a double-edged sword. He was being given a second chance — partly at least because he was still the most qualified man to do what had to be done. But he also understood if he should fail again, it would be better for him if he didn't come back.

"Sir, I propose to lead another attack on the space station — to complete what I should have finished the first time." He turned to include the other Stavka members. "The way I see it, the attack will be preceded by a chemical-laser barrage from Sary Shagan Research Facility against the new American Air Force geosynchronous surveillance satellite over the Indian Ocean. The laser will keep firing at the satellite while the space station Armstrong is on the opposite side of the earth, until we can be sure that the satellite has been neutralized or knocked out of its orbit. This will insure that our launch from Tyuratam will go undetected. Ground-tracking stations will find it difficult to track us without first knowing our launch point or orbital insertion point, so the space station Armstrong can receive no advance warning of our attack…

"The attack will again be made by armed Elektron spaceplanes launched from Glowing Star Launch Facility at Tyuratam, but this time there will be three Elektron spaceplanes instead of two. My two wingmen will each carry ten Bavinash missiles aboard each spaceplane, which have been modified with forty-kilogram high-explosive warheads instead of depleted uranium and molybdenum armor-piercing nosecaps. The objective of my two wingmen will be to disable the Armstrong's space-based radar system, station propulsion and any defensive armaments.

"My Elektron will carry a far more important cargo, sir. The Scimitar missiles cannot destroy such a large station as Armstrong, and our spaceplanes cannot drag the station into the atmosphere. Therefore I will carry a two-thousand-kilogram space-reactive bomb into orbit. The bomb uses a chemical reaction to provide the heat and the power to mix a large volume of hydrogen and oxygen gas together in a compressed chamber that will produce the power of over two tons of TNT in the vacuum of space. When Armstrong's defenses have been neutralized I will fly to the station, plant the explosive on it, then detonate it once my wingmen and I are away… On my first mission I took it on myself to slow my attack to allow the station's crew to evacuate the station. I don't apologize for my intent. But I also understand that it gave the Americans time to build a defense that ended in the death of Colonel Voloshin. By returning to their station and reactivating their offensive surveillance and warning systems, the Americans have shown that they don't consider our spaceplane force a threat. So this time my attack will begin immediately. And this time I will destroy that station."

The general secretary didn't show it, but he was pleased. At least this young officer came up with options. He wished the others in the room could be as creative. "It sounds like a workable plan. Do you. agree, Czilikov?" He did. "Comments?" There, were none, "Then it is authorized."

"Thank you, sir," Govorov said. "I'll be requesting final launch approval in eight hours. The attack will begin approximately three hours later."

"Very well, Marshal. You are dismissed."

Govorov stood, saluted the general secretary and left.

After he had gone the general secretary turned once again to Chercherovin. "Any other scapegoats, Admiral?" Chercherovin kept his mouth shut. "If, as I believe, Marshal Govorov makes good on his promise to destroy the American space station," the general secretary said, "will this mean that the Arkhangel group can force the Nimitz carrier group to withdraw, or is there some other small bit of information that has not been revealed, some other excuse that you will tell me only after we have had another defeat?"

"The aircraft lost on the Arkhangel must be replaced," Chercherovin said. "We have no accurate figures as to how many the Americans have lost—"

"Which to me sounds like they have not lost any," the general secretary broke in. "I sense the worst. If I can't get the truth, the whole truth, out of you, I will assume the worst has happened… so we will assume the Americans lost no fighter aircraft, and we have lost twenty fighters from the Arkhangel. How soon can we send twenty fighters out to the Arkhangel?"

"It may be difficult," the admiral said slowly, expecting another outburst. "Sukhoi-27 aircraft modified for carrier duty aboard the Arkhangel are only stationed at Vladivostok, the Arkhangel's home port. An operation to move twenty Su-27s from there will take at least a day of planning and a half-day of flying."

"A day and a half," the general secretary said. "And that, I assume, is a very optimistic figure. And that only places us at the same force level that we were at when the first twenty aircraft were destroyed. When the space station is finally knocked out, what do we have to take advantage of that?" He stood and walked around the triangular table. "Hear me now, I will not be forced to use thermonuclear weapons to secure the Persian Gulf. I will not go down in history as the first Soviet leader to use nuclear weapons, especially on an inferior enemy force. Well, let me hear some alternatives."

"A suggestion, Comrade General Secretary," Ilanovsky, the commander in chief of the army, said. "Sir, the objective is to destroy or cripple the Nimitz and her escorts. I still believe a massive cruise missile attack is the best way to attack the American fleet, but not with air-launched missiles. The flight profiles of the AS-6 and AS-4 missiles are too vulnerable to engagement by the Nimitz's guided missile cruiser escorts, and the other air-to-ground cruise missiles currently deployed, such as the AS-15, are nuclear."

"Then what else is available?"

"We have in early deployment a ground-launched cruise missile, a variant of the SS-N-24 naval cruise missile currently deployed on some of our older attack submarines. It's called the GL-25 Distant Death. It has transsonic speed, inertial and terrain-comparison guidance with active terminal radar homing, and it can carry an eleven hundred kilogram conventional high-explosive warhead or a five hundred kiloton thermonuclear warhead over three thousand kilometers to its target with high accuracy. Only a hundred or so have been deployed, but most were sent to the Southern Military Headquarters region during the readiness exercise Rocky Sweep. From Tashkent and the mountains north of Afghanistan it would be possible to strike at the American fleet in the Arabian Sea."

"But the Nimitz's escorts have already proved that they can protect themselves from cruise-missile attack," Chercherovin put in.

"Not from the GL-25," Ilanovsky told him quickly. "This cruise missile does not stay at high altitude as it gets closer to its target like the AS-4 or AS-6, but is preprogrammed to travel at low altitude when in areas of high-threat concentration, and it can make a supersonic dash for the last hundred kilometers to the target. By the time the Nimitz or her escorts spot it, it will be too late to intercept."

"But the time required to plan a strike sortie—"

"The missiles can be reprogrammed in a few hours," Hanovsky said. "The missiles have been stored in surveyed launch positions since Operation Feather began, targeted on suspected areas of resistance in Iran and Afghanistan. They can be ready to launch well before Marshal Govorov's strike against the space station Armstrong is finished. "

The Stavka was silent. "Any other objections?" the general secretary asked. There were none. "Then I'm in favor of the operation." He turned to Ilanovsky. "How many missiles can be fielded against the American fleet?"

Hanovsky paused, then: "Sir, I believe seventy-five missiles were delivered to the southern TVD in support of Rocky Sweep. I must allow for a certain number to be out of commission due to normal maintenance difficulties, but I believe I can field at least fifty GL-25 cruise missiles for launch against the fleet."

"Fifty missiles against twenty American ships. Can a definite number be targeted for the Nimitz?"

"The GL-25s can't be targeted that accurately, sir. Once within a certain distance from their preplanned target points, their homing radar is activated and the missile flies directly to the largest radar reflector in the area. But the American carrier fleet is spread out enough in the Arabian Sea to make it very likely that each missile will seek out its own target rather than join with others to attack one vessel. I think the GL-25s will have a devastating effect on the American fleet."

The general secretary actually looked pleased. "The GL-25 attack, using conventional high-explosive warheads, will immediately be implemented. I want a briefing on the missiles' exact flight path before launch."

Ilanovsky, relieved and excited, nodded and issued orders to his aide, charging him with alerting the missile brigades in the south-central Soviet Union.

Saint-Michael switched his comm panel to the TDRS channel and adjusted his earset. "Nimitz, this is Armstrong. Horizon crossing in one minute. Over. "

"Copy, Jason," from Admiral Clancy. "Standing by for data transmission test. "

They had performed this routine several times in the past two days, and each time the difference between having the station's eyes and not having them was startling. While Armstrong was on the other side of the globe the Nimitz had to rely on RF-18 Hornet maritime reconnaissance jets, E-2C Hawkeye turboprop early-warning-and-control planes, and Himlord drones to know what the Russians were up to. The Nimitz would launch two Hawkeyes and one Hornet, and the USS Kidd would launch four Himlords all at once. Eventually they all became targets for the escorts and fighters of the Soviet battle group to practice on. So far, two Hornets, one Hawkeye and an entire squadron of Himlords had been lost to Soviet attack.

By contrast, Silver Tower's SBR provided a much wider scale and more detailed look at the region; in fact, Admiral Clancy had begun to talk about the navy acquiring its own space-based radar platforms to be deployed with all its frontline carrier battle groups. It was no wonder he warmly greeted Silver Tower's reappearance every ninety minutes.

Saint-Michael monitored the system self-tests and status reports as they scrolled across the monitors. Ken Horvath pointed to a blinking line on the status monitor. "There's that relay-circuit fault again."

In the Skybolt control module Ann shooed away sweat blobs, pulled her POS mask to her face and took several deep breaths of oxygen. She was lying on her back placing the securing camlocks back into a relay circuit. The top of the module had been caved in by the force of one missile during the first Soviet spaceplane attack, so the monitors and console that used to be overhead were now squashed almost to the deck. The module was frigid, the air so thin on account of leaks that she got dizzy if she forgot to take a few deep breaths of oxygen every few minutes.

She had an unsecured ten-thousand-volt wire hanging a few inches from her head, pieces of computer components taped and Velcroed everywhere. Relays, memory chips and power supplies designed for one circuit now had to handle three or four. But it was worth it… maybe. At least Skybolt was put back together. But would it work?

"Just finished. I'm ready for a test."

"Sorry, we're about to cross the horizon again. " A few moments later the fault indication cleared and reported itself normal. Ann, who had spent most of her time in the Skybolt control module since the station had been repaired, could only work on the relay circuitry between Skybolt and the SBR when the SBR was not being used to scan the Arabian Sea.

A few minutes later she entered the command module bringing three cups of coffee and a few pieces of hard cafirly, the only uncontaminated food still on the station. Saint-Michael and Horvath reached for the coffee. "How's it going back there?"

"Bad to maybe better. The Russians put a missile right through one of the SBR relays that controls the slaving system to the laser mirror. I'm patching the circuits through to another relay, but it's sort of like reinventing the wheel. I'm beginning to discover how much I don't know about all that electronic stuff back there. I'll need a system test when we go below the target horizon. "

"You got it." Saint-Michael rechecked the system readouts. "System self-test completed," he announced, clicking the ACKNOWLEDGE key on his computer terminal. He switched his comm link to TDRS. "Nimitz, this is Armstrong. Data transmission link-check good. How copy?"

"Ticonderoga acknowledges data self-test good," said the chief sensor technician aboard the Aegis command-and-control cruiser Ticonderoga. "Trying to get acknowledgment from Nimitz. Stand by."

A few moments passed. By matching longitudinal coordinates Saint-Michael was able to announce when they'd crossed the target horizon, and they watched with quiet satisfaction as Ticonderoga and Nimitz began hungrily feeding on SBR transmissions relayed to them from Silver Tower.

"Armstrong, this is Nimitz. Come in." Admiral Clancy's serious voice erased the smiles on the faces of Silver Tower's crews. "

Saint-Michael here, sir. Go ahead."

"Jason, Aerospace Defense Command has just relayed a message to us from defense intelligence. While you were on the back side of that last orbit the laser at Sary Shagan attacked our replacement satellite over the Indian Ocean. It's been destroyed. Kaput. No missile-launch-detection capability exists in this region."

Horvath looked to Saint-Michael. "What's it mean, Skipper?"

"It means it's their opening volley, just like last time," Saint-Michael said. "Their spaceplanes can now launch without being detected. We can expect them to show any time." Over the TDRS comm. link he said, "I copy, Admiral. Can you provide even limited launch warning over Asia?"

"Negative. We're stuck with either tactical reconnaissance or SBR. No deep-space capability. SPACETRACK or Pacific Radar Barrier in Diego Garcia may be able to pick them up, but the only reliable detection and tracking station close enough to help is either Pulmosan in South Korea or San Miguel in the Philippines." An ominous pause, then: "We can try to get you a link with San Miguel or Diego Garcia, but that won't do you any good. Face it, Jas. Time's run out. You're going to have to get your butts off that station."

Saint-Michael turned to Ann. "What do you say? Can Skybolt work? Is there a chance?"

"It's the SBR that's the sticking point, Jason. The error-trapping functions of the SBR weren't made for the Skybolt interface — I have to backtrack and find all those error points myself. I think I can do it but—"

"Don't hedge on me, Ann. Can it work or not?"

She hesitated, trying to separate reality from wishful thinking. "I don't know. I think I can trap all the errors, but it'll take time—"

He'd already pulled the microphone to his lips, and his words had the force of a missile all on their own: "Roger, Nimitz. We will begin evacuation immediately. Advise us of any problems with the SBR relay. Armstrong out." And he clicked off the comm link.

"We're evacuating?" Ann said.

"We've got no other choice."

"But all our work… We made this station operational again… "

"Ann, I can't forget those bodies back in the docking module. Those men died because I made the decision to stay after the first laser attack—"

"But you had a damned good reason—"

"Good, bad… they're dead. We've got the same situation happening all over again, only worse. This station is hanging on by putty and prayers. I'm risking lives every time we open the goddamned hatch… " He paused, touched her lightly on the shoulder. "Listen to me. Skybolt was our last hope, our big ace in the hole — and now… now you can't assure me we have that. We've got no choice… We probably have a few hours until their spaceplanes make it back up here. It'll give us some time to prepare… And we can still salvage Skybolt if you and Ken can disconnect it from the station. We can put the laser module in Enterprise's cargo bay and the control module in America's and boost them both up into a storage orbit."

Ann, miserable, nodded.

"I'll try to set up the SBR computers for automatic or remote-controlled operation," Saint-Michael said. "At least we'll be able to get a few more hours' work out of her before…before they completely destroy her."

As they turned to make final preparations none of them had any doubt that, this time, the destruction of Silver Tower was going to be final.

They did not have long.

Timing, flawless; execution, perfect. A nineteen-second, full-power, sustained chemical laser-burst from Sary Shagan had, indeed, obliterated the replacement launch-detection satellite over the Indian Ocean, first electronically blinding the satellite and then piercing a thruster fuel line, causing an explosion. The satellite's new errant death-spin had been easily detected by space-scanning radars at Tyuratam, and the message was relayed to Glowing Star that the satellite had been rendered inoperative.

Govorov and his two wingmen, Colonel Andrei Kozhedub in Elektron Two and Colonel Yuri Livyak in Elektron Three, were all aboard their spaceplanes during the laser attack, at the last planned countdown hold only ten minutes from launch. When they got word of the satellite's destruction the countdown was quickly resumed.

Once again Govorov was the first to launch, riding a column of kerosene and nitro-acid fire on top of his two-million-pound thrust SL-16 Krypkei booster. Separated by only thirty seconds, just long enough for Govorov's two-hundred thirty-foot-tall, five-hundred-fifty-ton Krypkei rocket to clear the launch tower, the other two SL-16s successfully lifted off, gaining on Govorov's rocket in a matter of seconds.

The triple rocket launches were first detected by seismic sensors at NATO intelligence sites in Pirinclik, Turkey, but without satellite launch detection the seismic reading told the U.S. Space Command nothing except that there had been a series of powerful explosions. The west-to-east flight path of the Soviet boosters, however, allowed the air force SPACETRACK long-range FPS-17 detection and FPS-79 tracking radars on the tiny island of Diego Garcia, over three thousand miles south of the launch site, to spot the boosters rising through the atmosphere. It was the SPACETRACK site that detected the booster's first-stage impact in Mongolia and the second-stage impact in the Pacific Ocean north of Japan. The booster's launch progress and orbital positions were updated from the Pacific Radar Barrier radars at San Miguel in the Philippines and then by the Air Force's south-facing sea-launched ballistic-missile tracking radars in Texas and Georgia.

Although it did not take long for the three spaceplanes to reach Armstrong station's orbit altitude, the tail chase to intercept the station would take two complete orbits, over three hours, to move within a few hundred miles of the station.

With the third-stage booster still attached to each spaceplane, Govorov ordered the thrust-power setting and carefully monitored the intercept using tracking signals from ground- and satellite-based space tracking systems. He needed to strike a balance between using up fuel in a fast tail chase and wasting precious time and oxygen on a lengthy chase.

He made up his mind to be patient this time. Everything — his life, his career, the success of Operation Feather — depended on his not making another mistake. The time to hurry would be when the intercept was made and the final attack on the Americans' space station began…

Govorov was ending his first orbit of the Earth, closing the gap between himself and Armstrong when another spectacular multiple launch took place in south-central Russia.

Once every ten seconds a tongue of flame would erupt from a rugged mountain valley south of Tashkent. Boosted by a solid rocket motor, a GL-25 Distant Death ground-launched cruise missile would leap off its railcar-mounted launcher into the dark skies. Resembling a small jet fighter, with a long cylindrical fuselage, swept wings and cruciform tail section, each GL-25 launched amid a peal of thunder that echoed off the steep granite walls of the surrounding mountains.

The rocket motors accelerated the missile to five hundred kilometers per hour, then detached from the fuselage and fell away into the desolate Zeravsanskij Mountains north of Afghanistan. Air inlets along the sides of the fuselage popped open and the missile's ramjet engine automatically started. With the ramjets at full power the GL-25 missiles quickly accelerated, and using their inertial navigation system and taking position update terrain-comparison snapshots of the terrain below, they sped southward, hugging the earth less than three hundred meters above ground. Traveling eight hundred kilometers per hour, the missiles crossed into Afghanistan and steered toward their preprogrammed target-acquisition initial points over twenty-eight hundred kilometers away. After reaching their initial points three-and-a-half hours later they would activate their terminal radar-homing sensors, then for the last two hundred kilometers of their flight seek their individual targets, the nineteen auxiliary vessels and escorts surrounding the Nimitz.

In the rugged mountains there were no radars powerful enough to spot the fast-moving, ground-hugging missiles. The shepherds and farmers and the scattering of people living in the wild middle-eastern coastal mountains were accustomed to the ear-shattering sounds of Soviet military aircraft passing overhead and ignored the almost continual rocket booms. Now, unheeded, the roar of the GL-25s' ramjet engines echoed up and down the lonely mountain walls as the deadly missiles sped toward their targets.

Two hours later Ann's breathing had become shallow and slow as her prebreathing stint was nearing completion. She was in the command module helping to monitor the progress of the SBR computer reprogramming. The few remaining computers had to be taught to steer the space station to achieve the best SBR presentation, so that in turn the comm link between Silver Tower and various military and civilian experts on the ground could provide help for the crewmen.

But her duty would be much more difficult. While prebreathing in preparation for putting on her spacesuit she had studied diagrams of the attachment points of her Skybolt module, tracing the mechanical, electrical and pyrotechnic separation mechanisms. She'd also studied the status readouts in the Skybolt control modules to be sure she had the right indications. The last thing she wanted was to damage the laser or its control module, trying to detach it. What she'd told General Stuart about the dangers of handling the nuclear particle-generating components of Skybolt was a bit overstated, but not by very much. Her job was to preserve Skybolt by parking it in orbit without damaging it so badly it had no potential at sometime in the future.

Saint-Michael had been expecting a briefing from her before she began her EVA, so she waited now until he turned from the computer terminal. "Ready to detach?" he asked. She nodded glumly. "Okay, one thing. We save Skybolt only if there's time. If Govorov's spaceplanes launched within minutes of that laser firing we may not have time to load the module into Enterprise. You'll have to move fast…"

She got the message — no time for any last nostalgic tours of the module. She detached herself from the strip of Velcro she'd anchored herself to, moved up to the control board mounted on the ceiling and—

Suddenly she found herself propelled to the far end of the command module as a terrific explosion rocked the station. "What the hell was that?" She pushed herself away from the bulkhead, reattached her sneakers to the Velcro deck, wiped a trickle of blood from her nose.

Saint-Michael had no time to answer as another explosion tore through Silver Tower, and a warning light illuminated over the hatch leading to the connecting tunnel. "Low pressure in the connecting tunnel," Saint-Michael read out. The station now seemed to be sliding sideways, skidding like a truck out of control on an icy highway. Fighting acute vertigo, he made his way to his communications console, attached his microphone to the clip inside his POS mask, pulled the facemask over his head and keyed the intercom button: "All personnel. Evacuate the station. Now." He unplugged his POS walk-around pack from the station's oxygen supply. "Ann, let's go…"

Another explosion — it felt as though it was right over their heads — sent both of them to the deck.

She maneuvered her way back toward the main hatch, passed the ceiling-mounted module jettison control, reached up and closed and locked its safety cover, then hurried through the hatch and into the connecting tunnel.

Saint-Michael saw her go through the hatch and keyed his microphone. "America. Jon. Ann's coming through. Help her…"

A fourth sharp explosion sounded through the station, followed by the screech of tearing and twisting metal. Now both pressurization and fire-warning lights were blinking in the connecting tunnel. Saint-Michael was thrown head-over-heels half the length of the command module, finally entangled on some jury-rigged consoles and bundles of wiring that had broken free of their temporary mountings. He managed to pull himself upright and start for the hatch when he glanced out through the observation port — midway along the outward-facing side of the command module.

What he saw made his heart sink. America was drifting aimlessly hundreds of yards from the station, its fuselage ripped open as if a huge scaling knife had sliced into it. Waves of fire gushed out of the gaping wound as the spaceplane's hydrogen and oxygen fuels ignited and hungrily fed on each other. "Oh, God…" Saint-Michael was less awed by the fire and demise of the spaceplane than the thought that there were people inside, including Ann, if she'd made it to the plane before it separated from the docking adapter…

Then he heard it, the sound of her voice coming over the microphone: "Jason… you okay?"

"Where are you?" he managed to get out.

"In Skybolt. You seen Marty?"

"No." Over interphone: "Marty, come in…" No reply. "He was in Enterprise. Saint-Michael switched to the air-to-air UHF frequency. "Marty, this is Jason. Report. Report, damn it…" But when he looked out the observation port again he saw where Marty had disappeared to. The shuttle Enterprise was speeding away from Silver Tower, and Saint-Michael just caught a glimpse of it before it disappeared. "Marty, on board Enterprise… come in."

Marty Schultz was sitting in the left-hand commander's seat on Enterprise's flight deck, nudging her thrusters forward in an attempt to fly the shuttle away from the space station and the attackers bearing down on it. He'd already made up his mind. He wasn't going to be the hunted; he was going to be the hunter. Not to be vainglorious, but, well, better to go doing some good in the space shuttle that had been his inspiration than wait around for the Russians to shred the patchwork shuttle with their missiles. He keyed the microphone button on the control stick. "Sorry to be late reporting, General. As I guess you've noticed, I've been sort of busy here on Enterprise—"

"What the hell do you think you're doing? Where do you think you're going?"

"One at a time, General. What I was doing was getting ready to load Skybolt… saw the Russian plane's missiles hit America… Hampton and Horvath bought it… Where I'm going is away from Silver Tower. Figure those planes will be on my tail pretty quick now. Well, I've always wanted to see what this baby can do. Now I'm going to find out…"

Saint-Michael wanted to kill him… He was so upset the irony of that thought went right by him… First it had been Jerrod Will. Now it was Marty Schultz. What was it with these shuttle jocks? Did they all have to be heroes…?

"Marty, listen…"

But Marty wasn't listening. Leaving Enterprise's thrusters on full power he unstrapped himself from the commander's seat and moved across the flight deck to the payload specialist's station. The cargo bay doors were open and he could see out through the twin aft-facing observation windows into the cargo bay and behind Enterprise.

He activated the reaction-control-system thruster controls at the payload station, checked them, then unstowed the manipulator arm. Swinging the arm out of the cargo bay he pointed the TV camera aft, set it to wide-angle view and swept it behind the shuttle.

Almost instantly he had a picture — perfect view of two Soviet Elektron spaceplanes giving chase. "I got two Elektrons, on my tail," he radioed back to the station. "These gumballs are in for a surprise…"

"Damn it," Govorov said over the command radio, "don't let that shuttle get away."

Kozhedub and Litvyak had fired two Bavinash missiles each at Armstrong, when Govorov saw the shuttle suddenly bolt from the vicinity of the lower pressurized modules. He had no way of knowing if it was a bluff or not, but the shuttle did seem to be piloted by a space-suited astronaut, so he ordered both his wingmen to give chase.

For a moment he hoped Litvyak would leave the job to Kozhedub because, from his vantage point about a kilometer behind and above his wingmen, Govorov had seen Litvyak's second Scimitar missile, a single missile, obliterate the spaceplane America docked at the station, creating an instant ball of flames. Flames in outer space were a rare sight. The blast must have had the force of at least a kiloton of TNT.

Deciding it was not necessary to wait for his wingmen to return, Govorov pressed a switch on a newly installed panel near his right knee. Behind him, a hydraulically powered pallet lifted the space-reactive bomb out of Elektron One's cargo bay. The side of the weapon opposite the pallet was uncovered, revealing a series of mechanical grapples all along the outer surface of the bomb.

He was going to maneuver Elektron One underneath the station's central keel, as close as possible to the pressurized modules without running the risk of hitting an antenna or a piece of the debris that seemed to cluster everywhere around the crippled station. When he was positioned properly he would gently nudge the bomb up onto the central open-lattice keel until the grapples caught, then release the bomb and pallet from his cargo bay. Once away from the station — five to ten kilometers was safe in this case — he would detonate the bomb. It would be fast and sure. No more mistakes…

He began his slow, careful approach to the station, maneuvering well above the central pressurized modules to begin a visual scan of the station. Not the time to charge ahead blindly. Logic said the station's crew should have abandoned the station in the shuttle or spaceplane, but it was such an incorrect assumption that got Voloshin killed on the first mission. There was time. He would wait and watch the explosion, watch as the huge American space station folded and tore apart. As for the men who might still crew the station, well, he would try not to feel for them. At least they would die quickly… He nudged his control stick forward and watched as his laser range finder counted down the distance to the station: three thousand meters, twenty-eight hundred, twenty-six…

They were close enough now…

From the magnification setting on the aft camera Marty Schultz estimated that the two Elektron spaceplanes chasing him were no more than four or five miles behind. Enterprise, powered by its two monomethyl-hydrazine engines, had accelerated another thousand miles an hour since the chase had begun, but the Russians were slowly but surely catching up.

Just as he wanted. He shut down the engines and using only the aft thrusters spun Enterprise head-over-tail until she had turned a full hundred eighty degrees back toward her pursuers. He then grasped the arm controls and, studying the TV monitor that gave the best view of the cargo bay and the manipulator's claw, reached into the cargo bay with the arm and extracted a large cylindrical drum device from an attach-point in the center of the bay.

He had conceived his plan shortly after making Enterprise flyable. Realizing that a Soviet spaceplane attack might come with very little warning, making it impossible for them to abandon the station, he'd suggested loading up Enterprise's cargo bay with Thor interceptor missiles and launching them by shuttle-directed remote-control.

In spite of the disaster after the first time they'd tried to launch Thor missiles for station defense, Saint-Michael had agreed to the plan, at least the idea, and told Marty and Hampton to load the missiles. But by the time the Soviets had announced their assault by firing their chemical laser, he'd changed his mind. Enterprise would only be used to carry the Skybolt laser module to a high-storage orbit.

That had been it — until Marty had gotten back aboard Enterprise to get ready to accept the Skybolt laser module Ann would be detaching. From his docking point beneath the central keel near the Skybolt module, the eight remaining Thor missiles he'd taken off the shuttle only hours before had been well within reach of his remote manipulator arm. When the Soviet spaceplane attack had begun it had not been difficult to detach two missiles, activate the mechanical ejector-arming mechanism, stow the missiles in Enterprise's cargo bay, and jet away from the station. He had deliberately circled Armstrong once to get the Russians' attention, then flown away with as much speed as possible…

It took thirty seconds for Marty to extract the two missiles from the cargo bay, then clicked on the air-to-air comm channel. "Armstrong, this is Enterprise. Come in."

"Marty." Saint-Michael's voice again. "Where are you?"

"Where I should be, General. Listen, you have to launch-commit the Thor missiles now."

"You got some of the Thors, on board?" Saint-Michael didn't wait for a reply, instead immediately threw himself toward the far side of the master SBR control console hunting for the Thor missile controls. Almost every control panel had been moved or replaced, and during the first spaceplane attack the impact explosions had thrown any unsecured panels all across the module. But after a few frenetic moments of searching he found the Thor arming controls and ordered an automatic launch-commit on all Thor missiles.

The six missiles under the central keel were not affected by the command; only the two missiles that Marty had manually armed responded. The Elektron spaceplanes were less than three miles away when the Thor missile's rocket engines ignited. Marty stayed long enough to watch both Thors shoot into space toward the Russian spaceplanes, then made his way back to the cockpit and strapped into the commander's seat.

Time to take off, babe. He reactivated the digital autopilot and RCS thruster controls. If those missiles didn't hit their targets, he knew there were two Russians who were going to come at him with everything they had.

They had indeed agreed between themselves who would take the first shot on the American shuttle Enterprise: Colonel Kozhedub in Elektron Two had the honors. Colonel Litvyak, who had put the Scimitar missile into America's fuel tanks, kept his laser seeker-range finder activated but caged it to scan directly ahead of Elektron Three. If he had illuminated Enterprise with his laser, Kozhedub's missile might try to slide across to the second beam and miss the target, or the two lasers could interphase and cancel each other out.

"It's moving away," Kozhedub called out as the shuttle slowly rotated on its longitudinal axis and sped away at right angles to the Elektron's line of flight.

"Can you follow him?" Litvyak said.

"I can—"

Kozhedub told him no thanks, he could get this one just fine.

Litvyak started to say something but a glance at his front instrument panel stopped the words in his throat. Directly centered in his laser spotting-scope screen was a Thor missile unfurling its steel mesh snare! "Watch out. The shuttle has just launched missiles. Litvyak yanked on his control column, trying to translate directly to the right and dodge the missile. It tracked toward him. He switched thrusters again and moved downward at full power, changing directions so hard that his helmet cracked against the cockpit canopy. No change. The Thor missile was still following him, looming larger and larger…

The missile was less than a mile away when Litvyak, in the last-ditch effort, fired three Scimitar missiles at the large cylindrical interceptor. The first two missiles exploded harmlessly on the mesh, but the third impacted directly on the sensor nose of the missile and detonated the Thor's high-explosive warhead.

No sound, but the wall of heat and energy that washed over Elektron Three pounded on the small spacecraft. It went out of control, and Litvyak had no choice but to release his thruster controls and ride out the turbulence, hoping it didn't tear his ship apart. It took a few minutes, but soon the awful vibration and pounding on his spacecraft's hull began to subside.

Kozhedub was not so fortunate. With his laser designator locked onto the Enterprise and watching as intently as he was for the perfect firing aspect, he never saw the second Thor missile. Just as Litvyak shouted out his warning the missile hit Elektron Two's right wingtip and detonated right on top of the canopy. Kozhedub died instantly, and a moment later his Elektron exploded, spinning off into earth's atmosphere.

Litvyak, hearing his comrade's dying noises echo in his helmet, knew he could plunge into earth's atmosphere as well if he failed to bring his spaceplane under control. Using short thruster bursts and concentrating on the gyroscopic inertial horizon, he finally managed to reduce the violent multi-axis spin down to one recognizable spin axis, then gradually applied more powerful bursts until his plane was under control.

He scanned the dark gray skies around him until he spotted the shuttle beginning to accelerate back in the direction of the space station. Stabbing the thruster controls, he applied full power and took up the chase, this time drawn by a need for revenge…

"Jason, this is Clancy. Come in. We've lost the SBR signals."

No reply. "Get them back, Sparks," Clancy said to the communications officer. "Whatever it takes."

The CPO tried hard but there was no change. "It's dead silent, sir. No carrier, no data, nothing. It's as if they—"

Clancy looked at the CPO. "Don't say it, Sparks. Don't even think it."

But the unthinkable was unavoidable, for the admiral as well as the chief petty officer: another disaster had just happened on Silver Tower.

"Ann? How's it?"

"It's ready, Jason. Ready to switch SBR to Skybolt control…"

Saint-Michael took a deep breath, put a finger on the SBR switchover controls. He pressed the button. The SBR immediately issued a solid TRACK indication on Ann's console.

"SBR is tracking targets," Ann announced. "Now showing two hostiles. Friendly identification complete… Target discrimination in progress… Neutral particle-beam laser projector showing faulted." The neutral particle beam used to discriminate between decoys and real targets had been shot off long ago.

"Override."

He searched the SBR command menu, found the command and entered it. "Done."

"Override accepted."

Now what?

Marty Schultz could feel the presence of an enemy behind him even before he visually confirmed it. "One got away," he said out loud, to himself, to his shuttle. "We're in deep shit now, babe." Think multidimensional, he told himself, then selected ROTATE and PULSE on the digital autopilot and jammed the control stick forward. Without the forward RCS pod the motion was a tail-over-heels flip, done by the aft RCS thruster so that the cargo bay was now facing in the direction of flight. He ignited the engines once again, which put Enterprise in a dive straight for earth…

At that instant a flash of glaring light washed out his vision. The control stick felt warm, then hot, then rubbery in his hand, even through the thick nylon gloves. Warning tones, like confused cries for help from Enterprise, beeped over his headset.

Colonel Litvyak aboard Elektron Three felt the blast of heat as well, but for him it was not just a slight glare — it was a throbbing, blinding sheet of light that seemed to illuminate each crevice of his spaceplane's cockpit. His eyelids, then his solar visor when he could finally command his muscles to lower it, had no effect.

When his eyes cleared a few moments later he stopped all thrusters and did a quick systems check. A few minor ones had faulted but they all reset. His lips were dry as sand, as though he hadn't taken a drink in days. The skin on his face seemed dry and cracked as if from a bad windburn. No use flying around half-blind… He used a few short bursts of power to stop his forward momentum and keyed his microphone. "Elektron One, this is Three. Do you copy?"

Govorov was only a few hundred meters away from the Skybolt module when his skin seemed to crawl and feel dusty. He did not feel any of the searing heat felt by the other two spacecraft near the path of the free-electron laser beam, but the side lobes of energy that coiled out of the muzzle of the nuclear-powered laser stream did seem to turn his Elektron One into a huge transistor. The pulse of energy coursing through his body made stars appear before his eyes, and his fingertips tingled and burned as if about to catch fire.

As the unearthly sensation subsided and he began to think more clearly, he realized what had happened. Someone aboard the station had just fired a powerful laser. Armstrong hadn't been abandoned after all…

"Elektron One. Come in."

Govorov keyed his microphone. "Litvyak? Where are you?"

"In pursuit of the American shuttle… There was some sort of energy burst. I'm checking for damage."

"Disregard the shuttle. The space station is still manned and they've got some sort of laser. I want you maneuvering as backup while I plant the space-reactive bomb."

"But Andrei was killed by a missile from that shuttle—"

"Do as I say. There'll be plenty of time to chase down the shuttle later."

Govorov stopped suddenly and stared at the command module, the center-pressurized module facing him. He was now less than fifty meters from the station, close enough to see the patches over the holes his missiles had made, close enough to see the data-transmission cables…

And, as he moved closer he could see a figure peering out through the observation port in the command module. He applied gentle reverse thrust and maneuvered a few meters away.

Yes, it was the General Saint-Michael he'd heard and read so much about, whose picture he'd seen. A shock to see him now, like this. He had always wondered what it would be like to face his enemy. He had thought he would prefer it… fight man to man without the influence of a technology that made killing impersonal. Now he was not so sure—

"Moving out to a five kilometer orbit, Elektron One."

Litvyak's words brought him back. "Cruise further out, Three. I'm going in to plant the bomb now."

Govorov selected negative-Y translation and moved away from the station. "Good-bye, General," he said, nodding toward the command module's observation port. Strangely he felt no elation. Indeed, more a sadness…

The laser burst had not dimmed the lights in the command module, as it had the other times it had fired. Even so, Saint-Michael could not see if it had hit anything.

"Ann, what happened?"

"Ill can't tell anything. I'm resetting the SBR relay circuit — it overloaded. The laser fired but I can't tell if it—"

"Armstrong, this is Enterprise. Come in."

Saint-Michael almost jumped at the communications controls. "Marty, we thought—"

"General, there's a plane right by the command module. Look out."

And then Saint-Michael saw it. The Elektron spaceplane, an engineering thing of beauty with its flowing lines, compact and trim, was also a deadly creature. The general took it in, but his eyes were drawn to the sleek cockpit windows. He couldn't clearly see the face behind the space helmet, but he had a very strong feeling — a premonition almost — that he was looking at Alesander Govorov.

The sight momentarily rooted Saint-Michael to the spot, but then just as quickly as the spaceplane appeared, it dropped out of sight. He couldn't help but be impressed by the audacity of the pilot, maneuvering so close to the module. it had to be Govorov…

"He's moving away," Marty reported excitedly. "He didn't shoot anything; he's moving down to the keel — hey, his cargo bay is open…"

"Ann… any other planes nearby?"

"Yes. There's a fast-moving one three miles out and pulling away… Yes, he's definitely moving away. I'm picking up Enterprise… too. He's less than a mile. Two spaceplanes — must mean Skybolt missed…"

"General." Marty's voice boomed over the air-to-air channel. "That Russian spaceplane by the keel … he's attaching something to it, right beside Skybolt… Oh, God… looks like a bomb, a big one… He's attached a bomb to the space station…"

Saint-Michael watched, frozen, as the spaceplane accelerated back and away from the station. That was why the second spaceplane was retreating so fast… "Marty, stay clear. Get away from the station—"

"I can reach it, General; I can reach it. Stand by.

"Negative. There may not be time. Get away from here."

Marty, ignoring him, selected autopilot controls and jetted toward the station. He unstrapped from the commander's seat and moved back to the payload specialist's console, Schultz, he told himself, you'd better pray this doesn't take too long. Pray anyway…

Saint-Michael watched as Govorov's spaceplane became small, then smaller, then a tiny speck — and then he unfroze… "Ann, target the closer plane, the one that just moved away from the station." Govorov's…

"But Skybolt's not locking on—"

"Fire anyway. Widest possible pattern. Maybe we can get him before he sets off the bomb by remote control."

The wait was excruciatingly long. Govorov had all but disappeared, intermingling with the stars and the bluish haze surrounding earth. By now he had to be far enough away to detonate his bomb…

Govorov, his laser range finder locked onto Armstrong, decided to wait until ten kilometers before detonating the bomb. If the laser was operating, the resulting secondary explosion of the laser module might be far more violent than a mere hydrogen-oxygen explosion.

He let the laser range finder click up to ten kilometers, then moved his finger across the special-weapon control panel near his right knee, and pressed…

The first free-electron laser pulse had missed Govorov by over a hundred feet, but even at that distance the two-megawatt burst of nuclear-fired energy was still hot enough to melt steel. In a fraction of a second Govorov's heat-resistant quartz glass windscreen, which could easily withstand reentry temperatures of three thousand degrees Fahrenheit, softened, melted, vaporized. The pressure of the atmosphere in the cockpit blew the liquid glass out into space, creating a huge glass bubble just moments before bursting and flying off in all directions. Alesander Govorov was cremated in the atomic heat of the beam.

A second laser burst from Skybolt knifed through the spaceplane itself, creating another huge bubble — this time of titanium, not glass. The heat was so intense that the plane's fuel had no time to detonate. In the blink of an eye — both pulses had lasted less than one-tenth of a second — the spaceplane Elektron One and the commander of the Soviet Space Defense Command had simply vanished in a puff of plasma.

"Elektron One. Do you read? Over."

Litvyak got no reply. Ever since the last energy surge — laser, Govorov had said? — the tactical air-to-air frequency had been silent.

Lost communications procedures for this mission were different than for other space flights with more than one manned spacecraft. The standard procedure was to proceed immediately to the nearest hundredth altitude — one hundred kilometers, two hundred, three hundred-establish a circular orbit and await reentry or station-docking instructions. For this mission the instructions were simpler:

If weapons are aboard, continue the attack on the space station Armstrong. The space-based radar, rescue spacecraft, pressurized modules and fuel cells have priority. Withdraw only if all weapons are expended.

Litvyak turned his Elektron around, guided it a few kilometers closer to the station and locked his laser range finder on Armstrong's starboard space-based radar array. He fired one of his five remaining Scimitar missiles at the station. The missile, running hot and true, slammed into the face of the upper starboard array. The explosion from its warhead blew a ten-meter-diameter hole in the antenna, which wobbled and weaved for a moment, then wrenched itself in two and toppled over, slamming into the keel.

"The bomb didn't go off," Saint-Michael called out. "Ann, you did it. Skybolt worked—" His congratulations were sharply interrupted by a loud bang and rumbling vibration that shook the command module. The one usable attitude-adjustment thruster could be heard trying to move the station upright again, but the station began to tip slowly backward. Streams of SBR fault messages raced across Saint-Michael's monitors, but he didn't need to read the screen to know that there was at least one more Russian plane out there.

"Jason, reset the SBR. Fast."

He moved back to the SBR control terminal, entered the command to reset the radar's circuitry. But the computer refused the input. "It won't take."

"You have to find out what component is out and power it down," Ann told him, "or else the SBR will keep short-circuiting. "

Saint-Michael scrolled through the error messages that had zipped across the screen. It seemed every single part of the SBR had been hit by a Russian missile. He switched his comm link to A/A. "Marty, can you see the station? What did he hit?"

"Stand by." Marty, who had stopped trying to detach the Russian bomb when the laser fired, boosted himself away from the keel, flipped upside down to get a better view and maneuvered over the station. "Try the number one SBR array."

Saint-Michael erased the error log and had just entered the code to deactivate the damaged SBR array when a thunderous explosion rocked the command module. "Fire on the keel," Marty shouted over the air-to-air frequency. "The master fuel cell's been hit."

Fire-warning lights blinked on all the surviving panels. Saint-Michael ignored them. "SBR's reset, Ann. Hurry up, we're going to run out of power any—"

As he said those words the main lights in the command module flickered out. A few battery-powered emergency lights snapped on, but they lit a corpse. Silver Tower was dead once again.

Litvyak's second Scimitar missile hit finally produced a spectacular result, even better than the collapsed radar antenna. The secondary explosions, fire and sparking on the keel from the missile hit on the fuel cell created a multicolored fireworks display for dozens of meters from the impact point, then began to creep along the keel toward the pressurized modules. The explosions fizzled out just a few meters away from the double column of modules in the center of the keel, but the end result was still satisfying to Colonel Litvyak: the few visible lights remaining on the station had all gone out. That last hit had finally killed the station.

It was dead, but not destroyed. Govorov had ordered the station destroyed. The Americans had already reactivated a "dead" hulk once; they might do it again. Litvyak swept his laser range-finder designator around the station and finally rested the red beam on the best and most obvious target of them all: Govorov's unexploded bomb.

It was all about to end, right now. Litvyak selected his three remaining Bavinash missiles, locked the laser designator on the bomb. He squeezed the trigger. The three missiles fired straight and true with a solid lock-on—

And all three were caught in the intense free-electron laser beam that shot from the station. Skybolt had needed only a millisecond of the station's waning power to energize the laser's ignition circuitry, and once delivered — Skybolt's internal battery did the rest. Skybolt's beam vaporized the Scimitar missiles, and three one-millionths of a second later the beam traveled the remaining five miles to Elektron Three and turned the two-hundred-fifty-thousand-pound spacecraft and its pilot into a few milligrams of cosmic dust.

As Saint-Michael and Ann Page struggled into space suits, the first of the Soviet GL-25 cruise missiles were just a few dozen miles from the sea. Running undetected, they had navigated through the western rim of the Selseleh Ye Safid Mountains in western Afghanistan, down into the Margow Desert valley and along the Chagal Hills down the border between Iran and Pakistan. Now they were well within the Central Makran Range in southwest Pakistan, only minutes from the Gulf of Oman. Their inertially guided course had been well chosen by Soviet army planners to conceal the missiles in the most rugged terrain available and to keep them away from known surveillance sites or large population centers.

Each of the fifty GL-25 missiles had expended three-quarters of its fuel on only two-thirds of its journey, but the easier part of the flight was ahead of them. Once over the ocean the missiles would gradually step-climb to twenty thousand feet, where their ramjet engines would be more efficient. They would cruise at high altitude until within three hundred miles of the outermost escort ship of the Nimitz, then gradually descend back to fifty feet above the water. At approximately one hundred miles from the last known position of the Nimitz, their homing radars would activate…

And the devastation of the American fleet would begin…