"You may not realize, but this project is to be giant leap for our
space program. Many of our best engineers are here. This vehicle, a
reusable near-earth space platform, would save billions of rubles over
many years. It is air-breathing vehicle that would lift research
payloads directly into space. But my son never believe that its real
purpose. Perhaps I was idealist, because I believe. I always think he
was wrong. But more and more of things I have learned about its
electronics--things we had nothing to do with--make me now believe he is
right. And yesterday, when certain . . . _chelovek_ of the Soviet Air
Force come, the worst . . ." He paused, his voice beginning to betray
barely concealed rage. "I have work all my life for peaceful exploring
of space. And now I have been betrayed. The engineers I bring with me
here have been betrayed. I also believe, Mr. Vance, that the Soviet
people have been betrayed. And along with them, Mikhail Sergeevich
himself. This is part of a plot to . . . I don't know what secretly is
plan, but I am now convinced this plane must be destroyed, before it is
too late. And the world must be warned. That is why--"
"Then why don't you warn somebody?" Vance interrupted him. "Matter of
fact, there's a lot more to this setup than an airplane."
"But why do you think I am here, talking to you? The facility now is
completely sealed. I would warn Mikhail Sergeevich what is happening,
but no communication is possible." He hesitated again, painfully. "They
want to put my son in the airplane tomorrow with guards. He has been
made prisoner, like you. He does not want to fly the vehicle for
tomorrow's test, but the CEO is forcing him to do it." He looked up,
his eyes bleary and bloodshot. "Mr. Vance, I think he will be killed as
soon as this plane is certified hypersonic. They no longer trust him."
"What about you? They probably won't think you're very trustworthy
either if they find out you came to see me."
"That is correct. But the time has come for risks."
"So what do you want from me?" He stood back and looked the white-
haired old man over one last time. Was he telling the truth? Were the
Soviet engineers actually planning a mutiny?
"We are going to stop it. Tomorrow morning, just before the test
flight. It must be done."
"Good luck."
"Mr. Vance, you are with American intelligence. We are only engineers.
We know nothing about the kind of things necessary to--"
"Do you have any weapons?"
"Nothing. The guards here are all from the corporation." He lowered his
voice. "Frankly, most of them look like criminals."
"They are." Vance laughed in spite of himself.
"I don't understand."
"I know you don't understand. If you did . . . but that's beside the
point."
"Then will you help us?" His wrinkled face was fixed in determination.
"Do you know anything about explosives?"
"Enough. But are you really sure that's the way you want to go?" He
paused. "There's a lot that can go wrong in a big facility like this
without anybody knowing what caused it."
"All the sensitive areas are under heavy security now. They are
impossible to penetrate."
Terrific, Vance thought. "By the way, how does your son, the test
pilot, figure into all this?"
"All along he was planning to . . . I don't know. He refused to tell
me. But it doesn't matter. Now that two Mino Industries guards are
being put in the cockpit with him, whatever he was planning is
impossible. So we have to do something here, on the ground."
"Well, where is he?"
"He is in the hangar now."
"I'll need to see him."
For one thing, Vance thought, he probably knows how to use a gun. All
Soviet pilots carry an automatic and two seven-round clips for
protection in case they have to ditch in the wilderness somewhere. Our
first order of business is to jump some of these _Mino-gumi _goons
who're posing as security men and get their weapons.
"By the way, do you know where they're keeping the American woman who
was brought here with me?"
The old man's eyes grew vague. "I believe she's somewhere here in the
West Quadrant. I think she was transferred here around eighteen hundred
hours, and then a little later her suitcase arrive from hangar."
"Her bag?" His pulse quickened.
"Delivered by the facility's robot carts. The plane that brought you
was being made ready for the CEO's trip back to Tokyo."
"Where was it left?"
"I don't know. I only--"
"Okay, later. Right now maybe you'd better start by getting me out of
here."
"That is why I brought this." He indicated the brown paper package he
was carrying. It was the first time Vance had noticed it. "I have in
here an air force uniform. It belongs to my son."
The parcel was carefully secured with white string--a methodical
precision that came from years of engineering.
"You will pose as one of us," the old man continued. "You do not speak
Russian?"
"Maybe enough to fool the _Mino-gumi_, but nobody else." He was
watching as Androv began unwrapping the package.
"Then just let me do all talk," he shrugged. "If anybody wonders who
you are, I will be giving you tour of the West Quadrant. You should
pretend to be drunk; it would surprise no one. You will frown a lot and
mumble incoherent questions to me. We will go directly to my office,
where I will tell you our plan."
Now Andrei Androv was unfolding a new, form-fitting uniform intended
for Yuri Andreevich. The shoulder boards had one wide gold chevron and
two small rectangles, signifying the rank of major in the Soviet air
force. Also included was a tall lamb's-wool cap, the kind officers
wore. Vance took the hat and turned it in his hand. He'd never actually
held one before. Nice.
Seems I just got made air force major, and I've never flown anything
bigger than a Lear jet.
He slipped off the shirt he'd been wearing in London, happy to be rid
of it, and put on the first half of the uniform. Not a bad fit. The
trousers also seemed tailor-made. Then he slipped on the wool topper,
completing the ensemble.
"You would make a good officer, I think." Andrei Androv stood back and
looked him over with a smile. "But you have to act like one too.
Remember to be insulting."
After the hours in solitary, freezing confinement, he wasn't sure he
looked like anything except a bum. But he'd have no difficulty leading
Doktor Andrei Androv along in the middle of the night and bombarding
him with a steady stream of slurred Russian: _Shto eto? Ve chom sostoet
vasha rabota?_
How did the Soviets find out he was here? he wondered. Must have been
Eva. She'd got through to them somehow. Which meant she probably was
still all right. That, at least, was a relief.
After Andrei Androv clanged the steel door closed and bolted it, they
headed together toward the old man's personal office, where he had
smuggled drawings of the vehicle's cockpit. The hallways were lit with
glaring fluorescents, bustling with technicians, and full of Soviets in
uniform. Vance returned a few of the crisp salutes and strutted
drunkenly along ahead.
They wanted him to help blow up the plane! He was a little rusty with
good old C-4, but he'd be happy to brush up fast. After that, it'd be a
whole new ballgame.
Friday 1:47 A.M.
"Will he help?" Yuri Androv surveyed the eleven men in the darkened
control room. The wall along the left side consisted entirely of heavy
plate glass looking out on Number One. That wind tunnel, the video
screens, the instrument panels, everything was dormant now. Aside from
a few panel lights, the space was illuminated only by the massive
eight-foot-by-twenty-foot liquid crystal screen at the far end now
scrolling the launch countdown, green numbers blinking off the seconds.
Except for Nikolai Vasilevich Grishkov, the Soviet chief mechanic, all
those gathered were young engineers from Andrei Androv's propulsion
design team. Grishkov, however, because of his familiarity with the
layout of the hangar, was the man in charge.
"I just spoke with Doktor Androv, and he believes the American will
cooperate," Grishkov nodded. "He will bring him here as soon as he has
been briefed."
"I still wonder if I shouldn't just handle it myself."
"It would be too dangerous for you, Yuri Andreevich. He knows about
explosives. Besides, you have to be ready to fly the other plane,_
Daedalus II_, right after the explosion. Nobody else can take it up."