Anvil (30 page)

Igor lay on
his stomach, mostly concealed behind the thick trunk of a fallen cedar
tree.  Only his rifle, head and part of an arm were visible in the
dappled, early morning light.  Next to him, Dog lay with his eyes and ears
above the cover.  Both of them intently watched a spot in the brush on the
far side of a broad meadow.

They had
tracked a large buck, picking up its trail before dawn.  Now, it was
busily scraping its antlers against the bark of a Hemlock tree.  Igor had
a shot, but it was a low percentage one because of the brush that mostly
concealed the deer.  He was waiting, hoping it would move into the open
and he didn’t have to continue tracking it.

The terrain
and foliage on the western slopes of Washington State’s Cascade Mountains
reminded him of central Russia’s Ural Mountains.  He had hunted there with
his grandfather many times, learning the skills and patience that would serve
him well in the Spetsnaz.  But he was tired of tracking this damn
beast.  They were miles from home, and had a long walk back ahead of them.

A gentle
breeze was blowing in their faces, Dog’s nose twitching as he picked up the
scent of their prey.  Both were hungry, having quickly consumed the meager
rations Igor had with him.  There had been a few cans of food left in the
pantry of the house they had claimed as their own.  Igor had scavenged in
several neighboring homes, finding nothing, and they needed the meat the deer
would provide.

Igor had
considered walking in to town to look for food supplies, but had opted to go
hunting instead.  He preferred fresh to what would be available in
cans.  As Dog healed, high protein, red meat was what his body needed as
much as anything.

The buck
finally stopped scraping its antlers, pausing to look around and test the
air.  Unable to scent the man and dog that were downwind, it slowly moved
towards the open meadow.  From the corner of his eye, Igor saw Dog tense
as the large animal came into full view.  He muttered a calming word in
Russian, then repeated it in English.  Dog went still and silent.

Finally, the
big animal was in full view and Igor marveled at its size.  There was
enough meat there to feed both of them for weeks.  The weather was cold,
snow on the ground.  He’d be able to butcher the animal and hang much of
it high in a tree where it would freeze and be preserved until they were ready
to eat it.

Carefully
sighting in with his suppressed AKMS rifle, Igor pulled the trigger.  His
shot was true, the buck’s spine severed along its powerful neck by the heavy
bullet.  The deer’s legs buckled and it dropped in its tracks.

“Let’s go,”
Igor said to Dog in English.

Dog sprang
over the fallen tree, turning and waiting for the slower human.  Smiling,
Igor stood and stepped into the meadow.  Together, they crossed the open
area, stopping and looking down at the animal.  It was still alive,
paralyzed from the neck down.  Igor quickly set about tying a long rope to
its back legs so he could hoist it into a tree and drain the blood.

“Say “thank
you”,” Igor said to Dog as he worked.  “Because of him, we eat and live.”

Igor spoke haltingly. 
During his short time with Colonel Crawford he’d begun to learn English. 
Once he and Dog had settled in to the home, he’d found a small solar charger
and used it to juice up an iPad that had been laying on the kitchen floor.

Once it was
powered, he’d looked through and found a small collection of movies.  He
watched these over and over, working hard to understand the dialogue and
improve his rudimentary command of the language.  His favorite movie was a
western starring John Wayne.  It was a story about an estranged husband
and father who returned home when his grandson was kidnapped and held for
ransom.  The kidnappers had gotten what they deserved.  Igor thought
John Wayne would have made a fine Russian.

With the
deer hanging head down from a thick tree branch, Igor slit open the major
arteries in its neck and sat down to wait for the animal’s heart to pump out
most of its blood.  Gravity would drain what was left after it expired. 
He would have to butcher the animal here as it weighed several hundred pounds
and he was on foot. 

As the hot
blood ran, steaming when it came in contact with the snow covered ground, he
set about collecting wood for a fire.  A freshly cut deer steak would go
on a spit over the fire for him.  Dog would take his raw, but would have
to wait until Igor’s meal was ready.

“Leave
that,” he said when he noticed Dog nosing towards the growing stain where the
blood was soaking into the ground.

Dog looked
at him, snorted and grudgingly walked away.  He came to sit next to Igor
as the Russian gently blew on the fire he had just lit.  As the flames
grew, he straightened up and ruffled Dog’s ears, telling him he was a good boy,
first in Russian, then in English.  Dog’s tail swished in the snow briefly
before his head snapped around and he emitted a low growl.

Igor
snatched up his rifle and aimed in the direction Dog was looking.  At
first he saw nothing, then the brush on the far side of the meadow shook and
two infected males appeared.  Both were walking with their heads tilted
back, following the scent of fresh blood.

Lowering his
rifle, Igor cursed in Russian and climbed to his feet.  Telling Dog to
stay, he strode to meet them with a large knife gripped tightly in his right
hand.  It only took him a moment to dispatch both males.  Returning
to where Dog waited, he rinsed the blade with water from his canteen before
thrusting it into the fire to sterilize it.

Not leaving
it in long enough for the steel to be damaged by the heat, he stood and carved
two large pieces of meat off the deer’s flank.  Skewering one with a thin,
green branch, he placed it over the flames.  The second one went onto the
snow in front of Dog. 

Igor didn’t
have to tell him to leave it alone, but Dog’s attention never wavered from the
cut of fresh steak.  As he sat watching it, a long rope of drool appeared
from each corner of his mouth, stretching to the ground between his paws. 
Soon Igor’s steak was sizzling, the flames popping as fat dripped into
them.  Turning it several times, Igor finally lifted the spit and sat back
to enjoy his meal.  Before he took his first bite, he looked at Dog.

“Eat,” he
said.

Dog lunged,
grabbing the food in his mouth and stretching out to hold it with his paws as
he tore off chunks of raw flesh.  Igor smiled and began devouring his.

Several
hours later they were ready to start the long trek home.  The deer had
been butchered, close to a hundred pounds of meat neatly secured in plastic
bags in Igor’s pack.  The rest of the animal had been lifted high into the
tree with the rope, hopefully out of reach of any scavengers.  The carcass
had cooled and he knew it would be frozen solid by the next morning.

They stopped
once to share some more meat that Igor had cooked before extinguishing the
fire.  Dog sat close, gently taking bite sized chunks from Igor’s
hand.  They didn’t encounter any more infected and arrived at the
perimeter of their home’s property just as the sun was brushing the western
horizon.

Igor paused
inside the heavy trees, slowly performing a visual inspection of the trip wires
he had rigged to guard the area.  None of them appeared to have been
disturbed, and Dog remained quiet.  After satisfying himself that there
were no infected, or worse, laying in wait, Igor emerged into the open with Dog
at his side.

He carefully
entered their adopted house, rifle at the ready and paying close attention to
Dog.  Even though he didn’t growl or act like there was any danger inside,
Igor still took the time to carefully clear every square foot.  Dog
followed, giving him a look when he didn’t find anything.  A look that
said Igor was stupid for not trusting him.

Relaxing,
Igor shed his pack in the large kitchen.  He glanced at a large window set
in the wall over the kitchen sink.  On its sill was a satellite phone
Colonel Crawford had convinced the SEALs to leave with him when they parted
ways.  He didn’t understand why, as there was no one for him to call and
no one who would want to call him.  But, he’d accepted it and kept it
powered with the same solar charger he used for the iPad.

For some
reason he’d left it turned on, even finding a place for it in the house where
it could pick up a signal from an orbiting satellite.  He hadn’t touched
it, other than to charge it, since he’d placed it in the south facing
window.  Now, he slowly stepped over and tentatively picked up the
handset.  A small red light on the top edge was flashing.

When he
turned on the screen, it told him he had a new text message.  He had to
read the words several times to understand the English, then struggled to find
out how to view the text.  Figuring it out, he frowned when it was nothing
more than a phone number.  Looking at the screen until it shut off from
inactivity, he grunted and placed the phone back in the window.

As Igor
worked to secure the butchered meat high in a tree in the expansive backyard,
he thought about the text.  Was it really for him?  Who knew he had
this phone?  Maybe it was Colonel Crawford?  There wasn’t anyone
other than the Colonel or the two SEALs that knew he had the device, and no one
other than the Colonel would want to speak with him.

Still trying
to decide if he wanted to call the number, Igor finished his work. 
Satisfied the food would be safe, he spent several minutes throwing a ball for
Dog before it was too dark.  Going inside, he cleaned up, washing the
deer’s blood from his body.  Clean and wearing fresh clothing, he picked
up the phone and took a seat in the luxurious living room.

Dog lay down
next to the overstuffed leather chair Igor settled in, sighing his contentment
with a full belly and time spent playing.  Igor activated the phone,
stared at it a moment longer then pressed a button to dial the displayed
number.  It only rang twice before it was answered.

“Hello?” 
A male voice spoke in oddly accented English.

Igor didn’t
respond.  He didn’t know any men who spoke English with an accent he was
unfamiliar with.  He was about to disconnect when the voice spoke again.

“Is this
Igor?  I’m sorry, I don’t know your last name.  Don’t hang up. 
My name is Lucas Martin.  I’m a friend of Major Chase.”

“Da.  I
am Igor,” he grumbled into the phone after hearing the Major’s name.

Lucas talked
for several minutes.  He relayed what had happened to the Major and the
rest of the group after Igor had parted ways with them.  Sadness descended
over Igor when he learned of the death of Colonel Crawford.  Then anger
replaced it as he was told the rest of the story.

He asked a
few questions in his broken English, not liking the answers he received. 
After several more minutes, he ended the call without bothering to say good
bye. 

He sat in
the chair, staring straight ahead for a long time.  Arriving at a
decision, he looked down.  Dog was watching him, sitting up and putting
his chin in Igor’s lap when they made eye contact.

“John is in
trouble.  We go to Mother Russia,” he said to Dog, gently rubbing his
ears.

The mood in
the Navy’s cyber warfare center was somber.  Admiral Packard had addressed
the staff after Major Chase surrendered to the Russians.  Shocked and
horrified looks quickly spread across the room as he explained the turn of
events.

Jessica,
tears rolling down her face, lunged at her terminal and brought up a satellite
image of the airfield in Idaho.  The Russian helicopter carrying the Major
had already departed, but she was able to locate it quickly.  It was still
being escorted by Apaches, the American attack helicopters peeling away when
they reached fifty miles from the exchange point.

The system
automatically tracked the Hind, maintaining visual surveillance as it flew
west.  When it landed at the airport in Bend, Oregon, she zoomed and they
watched as the Major, in shackles, was escorted to a long range Anotonov
jet.  Within minutes of the door closing behind him, the large aircraft
took off and turned north, following a flight path across the pole that would
terminate in Moscow.

The jet had
taken off three hours ago on its eleven-hour journey to the other side of the
world.  Fighting her emotions, Jessica had kept working furiously. 
The initial error that had caused the delay in bringing the Thor System online
was her fault, which meant the Major surrendering to the Russians was her
fault.

Guilt gnawed
at her, despite that fact that there was no way she could have known about the
hidden file.  It was a security measure, intentionally housed on a
different server with a name so generic as to be invisible.  Without it,
the software automatically corrupted itself during the installation
process.  It was clever, and she was still kicking herself for not having
thought to check first. 

At least
she’d had the foresight to make copies of every file, and when she realized her
mistake was able to erase the bad data and start fresh.  If only… She
stopped herself.  All that mattered now was getting the system
operational.  She was not going to allow the Major’s sacrifice to be in
vain.

The software
install was finally complete.  Jessica checked several things, nodding in
satisfaction when they appeared functional.  Now, all that was left was to
set up the communications protocols so the software could talk through the
satellite relays in Hawaii.  That took another fifteen minutes as her
fingers flew across the keys, then five minutes to double check her work.

When
everything showed green, Jessica typed a command that would initiate the system. 
With a muttered prayer, she pressed the “enter” key.  The screen remained
black, nothing other than a blinking cursor showing for several long
seconds.  Then it refreshed.

THOR SYSTEM
ONLINE

“Yes!” 

Jessica
jumped up from her seat, looking around.  She was momentarily surprised to
see half a dozen people, including Lieutenant Hunt and Admiral Packard,
standing behind her chair.  They were all smiling at her.

“Sorry,
sir,” she said, unable to stop smiling.

“No apology
necessary, Petty Officer,” Packard said.  “How soon can you be ready to
launch?”

Jessica spun
back to her station and dropped into the chair.  Her fingers were flying
again as she navigated deeper into the system.  In less than a minute she
was in the targeting system, a cursor waiting for her to enter
coordinates.  Admiral Packard handed her a piece of paper with three sets
of coordinates printed on it.

“Lock them
in, but do not engage,” he said.

“Yes, sir,”
Jessica answered, already entering the second set.

“Time to
targets?”  Packard asked when she finished with the third set.

“Twenty-seven
minutes, sir,” Jessica reported after double checking the data displayed by the
system.

“Initiate
launch,” the Admiral ordered.

Jessica took
a deep breath, typed in a command and hit enter.

Far above
the earth, a small constellation of large satellites were in orbit. 
Twenty-four in all.  They were simple devices, linked to a ground
controller through the top-secret NSA satellites.  They didn’t contain
targeting or tracking computers.  They were nothing more than launch
platforms. 

What each
did contain was thirty-six, nine ton rods made of tungsten.  Each rod was
twenty feet long and a foot in diameter, with a sharply tapered nose and
aerodynamic trailing edge.  When Jessica’s command was accepted by the
satellite, nine circular doors on the tapered end pointed at the Earth slid
open.

As soon as
the holes in the bottom of the satellite were fully exposed, hydraulic rams in
the tubes gave each rod a gentle push.  As they emerged and dropped free,
small canisters of compressed carbon dioxide mounted to the tail section
activated and small control surfaces deployed.  The small push from the
jet of escaping gas accelerated the rods into their fall towards the Earth’s
atmosphere.

“Successful
deployment, sir,” Jessica said when she received a confirmation that the rods
were clear of the launch platform.

Packard
looked at his watch and noted the time.  He nodded at his aide who handed
Jessica another piece of paper with two long columns of coordinates.

“These are
follow on targets,” he said.  “Get them entered into the targeting system
and ready to go.  On my order only.”

“Yes, sir.”

The rods
quickly built speed as gravity pulled them down.  Several minutes later
they began encountering the outermost layer of the atmosphere.  They were
traveling in excess of forty kilometers per second.  As the rods continued
to fall, the air grew denser and they slowed due to atmospheric friction. 

The control
surfaces, useless in space, made minute adjustments, guiding the weapons as
they continued their plunge towards the Earth’s surface.  A final course
correction was made, three groups of three rods each forming up and spreading
apart as they raced for their targets.

Admiral
Packard checked his watch and turned to his aide, telling him to get Russian
Fleet Admiral Chirkov on the phone.  Three minutes later a handset was
handed to the Admiral and he lifted it to his ear.  His eyes were glued to
the computer generated track of the inbound weapons.

“Admiral
Packard, so good to hear from you,” Chirkov crowed over the phone.  “I’m
so glad you decided to hand over Major Chase.  I have always wanted to
visit Hawaii and would have hated to have to destroy it.”

“Where are
you right now, Admiral?”  Packard asked, not rising to the bait thrown out
by the Russian.

“You know
where I am.  I’m on a plane on my way to accept your surrender and take
control of your fleet.”

“Sorry, I
must have forgotten that was today,” Packard said sarcastically.  “Do you
have access to satellite imagery?”

“What are
you doing, Admiral?”  Chirkov asked, the threatening note in his voice
unmistakable.

“I suggest
you find a screen that can give you a real time view of the Kremlin.  And
your naval base on the Kamchatka Peninsula.  Oh, and let’s not forget your
nuclear power station in Smolensk.  You’d better hurry.”

“Admiral,
what are you doing?  Do you not believe we will destroy you?” 
Chirkov screamed over the phone.  Packard held it away from his ear for a
moment.

“Chirkov. 
Time’s almost up,” Packard said, his voice perfectly flat.

“I am
watching,” the Russian growled a few moments later.  “And I am not
amused.  Whatever you are doing, it will be met with swift and devastating
retribution.”

Packard
ignored the man, shifting his gaze from the computer generated tracks to real
time views of the three targets he had listed.  The sprawling naval base
was the first to be struck.  There were three distinct flashes as each rod
impacted the surface of the Earth.

At terminal
velocity, the tungsten rods were travelling at six kilometers per second. 
As each 18,000-pound projectile struck, it released all of the kinetic energy
created by its fall from high earth orbit.  Explosions equivalent to five
tons of TNT were generated by each, effectively destroying the majority of the
base and heavily damaging most of the ships in port.

There was
strangled gasp over the phone, but Chirkov was apparently unable to speak.

The next
target reached was the huge nuclear power plant in Smolensk.  All three
reactors were in operation when the rods impacted.  Each containment
vessel was shattered in the resulting explosions, exposing the cores to the
atmosphere and creating a disaster far worse than the meltdown of Chernobyl.

 Finally,
the Kremlin.  The sprawling complex located in Moscow itself.  The
most well protected national seat of power in the world.  All three rods
came down within its thick walls.  Every living thing within the Kremlin,
as well as a half a mile radius around it, was killed instantly.  Admiral
Packard watched the monitor in satisfaction as the symbol of Russian might was
laid to waste.

“Admiral
Chirkov.  Are you there?” 

Packard had
waited for nearly a minute after the destruction of the Kremlin.  He
wanted to be sure the impact of what had just happened had time to sink in.

“What have
you done?”  Chirkov bellowed.  “I will rain nuclear fire until there
are no Americans left alive on the planet!”

“You will do
no such thing, Admiral.  I am currently targeting 147 locations within
Russia with the same weapon your defensive systems didn’t even detect.  I
only have to push a button and all of these targets will be destroyed. 
Russia as you know it will cease to exist.  You’ll have no power.  No
communications.  No military.  Not even food.  And winter is
coming, Admiral.”

There was a
long silence.  The only thing Packard could hear was the ragged breathing
of the Russian.  He remained quiet, leaving the next move up to Chirkov.

“What do you
want?” 

Packard
smiled a tight smile when he heard the question.

“All
Russians off US soil immediately.  Full withdrawal of your military to
within your borders and a cessation of all hostilities.  If I so much as
think I hear a submarine coming shallow to launch a missile, I’ll rain fire on
you until there’s not a fucking thing left.  And turn that goddamn plane around
that’s carrying Major Chase.  I want him back on US soil.  Now!”