Dragon (58 page)

He frowned and then ran the data through a computer. While his eyes remained locked on the computer monitor, he dialed Roger Stevenson, the director of the center, who had called in sick that day.

“Hello.”

“Roger?”

“Yes, speaking.”

“God, you sound terrible. I didn’t recognize your voice.”

“The flu has really knocked me out.”

“Sorry to bug you, but we just received a strike.”

“California?”

“No, the epicenter is somewhere around the Wyoming-Montana border.”

There was a brief silence. “Odd, that area is hardly classed as an active quake zone.”

“This one is artificial.”

“Explosion?”

“A big one. From what I can tell on the intensity scale, this one reads like it’s nuclear.”

“God,” Stevenson muttered weakly, “are you sure?”

“Who can be sure about these things,” said Morse.

“The Pentagon never held tests in that part of the country.”

“They haven’t alerted us to any underground testing either.”

“Not like them to conduct testing without alerting us.”

“What do you think? Should we check it out with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission?”

Stevenson may have been laid low with the flu, but his mind was perfectly healthy. “Leapfrog the system and go to the top. Call Hank Sauer, our mutual friend at the National Security Agency, and find out what in hell is going on.”

“And if Sauer won’t tell?” asked Morse.

“Who cares? The main thing is we’ve dumped the mystery in his lap, and now we can go on watching for the next big one due in California.”

Sauer didn’t tell what he didn’t know. But he recognized a national emergency when he heard one. He asked Morse for additional data and immediately passed on the information to the Director of Central Intelligence.

The President was aboard Air Force One flying to a political fund-raising dinner in San Francisco when he received the call from Jordan.

“What’s the situation?”

“We have reports of a nuclear explosion in Wyoming,” answered Jordan.

“Damn!” the President cursed under his breath. “Ours or theirs?”

“Certainly not ours. It has to be one of the bomb cars.”

“Any word of casualties?”

“Negligible. The blast took place in a lightly populated part of the state, mostly ranch land.”

The President was fearful of posing the next question. “Are there indications of additional explosions?”

“No, sir. At the moment, the Wyoming blast is the only one.”

“I thought the Kaiten Project was on hold for forty-eight hours.”

“It is,” Jordan said firmly. “There hasn’t been enough time for them to reprogram the codes.”

“How do you see it, Ray?”

“I’ve talked to Percy Nash. He thinks the bomb was detonated on site with a high-powered rifle.”

“By a robot?”

“No, a human.”

“So the kamikaze phenomenon is not dead.”

“It would seem so.”

“Why this suicidal tactic now?” asked the President.

“Probably a warning. They’re reasonably certain that we have Suma, and they’re hedging their bets by trying to fake us out of a nuclear strike while they desperately struggle to reprogram the detonation codes for the entire system.”

“They’re doing a darn good job of it.”

“We’re sitting in the driver’s seat, Mr. President. We now have every excuse in the world to retaliate with a nuclear strike.”

“All too true, but what solid proof do you have that the Kaiten Project isn’t operational? The Japs might have pulled off a minor miracle and replaced the codes. Suppose they’re not bluffing?”

“We have no hard evidence,” Jordan admitted.

“If we launch a warhead missile on Soseki Island and the Dragon Center controllers detect its approach, their final act will be to signal the bomb cars to be detonated before the robots can drive them to isolated destinations around the country.”

“A horrible thought, Mr. President. Made even more so by the known locations of the bomb cars. Most of them are hidden in and around metropolitan cities.”

“Those cars must be found and their bombs neutralized as quickly and quietly as possible. We can’t afford to have this horror leak to the public, not now.”

“The FBI has sent an army of agents out in the field to make a sweep.”

“Do they know how to dismantle the bombs?”

“Each team has a nuclear physicist to handle that job.”

Jordan could not see the worry lines on the President’s face.

“This will be our last chance, Ray. Your new plan is the last roll of the dice.”

“I’m fully aware of that, Mr. President. By this time tomorrow morning we’ll know if we’re an enslaved nation.”

At almost the same moment, Special Agent Bill Frick of the FBI and his team were converging on the vault that held the bomb cars in the underground parking area of the Pacific Paradise hotel in Las Vegas.

There were no guards and the steel doors were unlocked. A bad omen, thought Frick. His apprehension increased when his electronics men found the security systems turned off.

Cautiously he led his team through doors into what looked to be an outer supply room. On the far side was a large metal door that was rolled into the ceiling. It yawned wide and high enough to pass a highway semitrailer.

They entered a huge vaultlike space and found it completely empty, not even a scrap of trash or a cobweb was evident. It had been scrubbed clean.

“Maybe we’re in the wrong area,” said one of Frick’s agents hopefully.

Frick stared around the concrete walls, focused on the ventilator Weatherhill had wormed through, then looked down at the barely discernible tire marks on the epoxy-coated floor. Finally he shook his head. “This is the place, all right. It matches the description from Central Intelligence.”

A short nuclear physicist with a full beard pushed his way past Frick and stared at the emptiness. “How am I supposed to disarm the bombs if they’re not here?” he said angrily, as if the disappearance of the cars was Frick’s fault.

Without answering, Frick walked swiftly through the underground parking area to a command truck. He entered, poured himself a cup of coffee, and then opened a frequency on the radio.

“Black Horse, this is Red Horse,” he said in a tired voice.

“Go ahead, Red Horse,” answered the Director of the FBI’s field operations.

“We’ve struck out. The rustlers got here first.”

“Join the club, Red Horse. Most of the herd has come up dry too. Only Blue Horse in New Jersey and Gray Horse in Minnesota found steers in the corral.”

“Shall we continue the operation?”

“Affirmative. You’ve got twelve hours. Repeat, twelve hours to track your herd to a new location. Additional data is being faxed to you, and all police, sheriff, and highway patrol units have been alerted to stop any trucks and semitrailers matching descriptions provided by Central Intelligence.”

“I’ll need a helicopter.”

“You can sign for an entire fleet if that’s what it takes to find those bomb cars.”

Frick switched off his radio and stared at his coffee. “Too bad they don’t fax instructions on how to find a needle in a million square kilometers of desert in twelve hours,” he mumbled to himself.

As Yoshishu emerged from the Maglev train at the end of the tunnel from Edo City, Tsuboi was waiting on the platform to greet him.

“Thank you for coming, old friend,” said Tsuboi.

“I want to be here at your side when we are ready to play our hand,” said the old man, his step more sprightly than Tsuboi had seen in months.

“The blast went off in a midwest state as planned.

“Good, good, that should send a shiver of fear through the American government. Any signal of reaction at the White House?”

Tsuboi’s face had a concerned expression. “Nothing. It’s as if they’re trying to cover it up.”

Yoshishu listened impassively. Then his eyes brightened. “If the President hasn’t ordered a nuclear warhead against us, then he has a great fear of what he sees in his future.”

“Then we have won the gamble.”

“Perhaps, yet we cannot celebrate the enormity of our triumph until the Kaiten Project is ready.

“Takeda Kurojima promises to have the program on-line sometime tomorrow evening.”

Yoshishu placed his hand on Tsuboi’s shoulder. “I think it’s time we opened a direct line of communication to the President and informed him of our terms for the new Japan.”

“And a new America,” Tsuboi said pompously.

“Yes, indeed.” Yoshishu looked proudly at the man who had become his chief disciple. “A new Japanese America.”

65

T
HE
L
OCKHEED
C
-5
G
ALAXY
, the largest cargo plane in the world, settled with all the awkward grace of a pregnant albatross onto the Wake Island airstrip and rolled to a stop. A car approached and braked under the shadow of one enormous wing. Pitt and Giordino left the car and entered the aircraft through a small hatch just aft of the aircraft wheel wells.

Admiral Sandecker was waiting inside. He shook hands and led them through the cavernous cargo bay that could fit six highway buses and seat a hundred passengers. They walked past a NUMA Deep Sea Mining Vehicle that was tied down on a pair of wide stainless steel tracks. Pitt paused in his stride and ran his hand over one of the great tractor treads and stared for a moment at the huge machine, recalling his narrow escape in Big John. This DSMV was a later model and was given the nickname of Big Ben.

The two big articulated arms with the excavation scoop and claw that were normally installed on the deep-sea vehicles had been removed and replaced with extensions fitted with a variety of remote manipulators for grasping and cutting through metal.

The other modification, Pitt noticed, was an immense nylon pack that rested on top of the upper body and control cabin. Heavy lines ran from the pack and were attached at numerous points around the vehicle.

Giordino shook his head sadly. “I’ve got that old feeling we’re about to be used again.”

“They aim to really stick it to us this time,” Pitt said, wondering how the aircraft could lift off the ground with such a massive weight in its belly.

“We’d better get forward,” said Sandecker. “They’re ready for takeoff.”

Pitt and Giordino followed the admiral into an officelike compartment with a desk and chairs bolted to the floor. They were connecting the buckles on their seat belts when the pilot pushed the throttles forward and sent the great aircraft and the twenty-eight wheels of its landing gear rolling down the runway. Affectionately called the Gentle Giant, the huge C-5 Galaxy lifted into the tropical air with a thundering roar and slowly climbed in an easy bank toward the north.

Giordino glanced at his watch. “Three minutes, that was a quick turnaround.”

“We haven’t time to throw away,” Sandecker said seriously.

Pitt relaxed and stretched out his legs. “I take it you have a plan.”

“The best brains in the business have put in a lot of last-minute homework on this one.”

“That’s obvious by this aircraft and Big Ben arriving here with less than twenty-four hours’ notice.”

“How much did Ingram and Meeker tell you?” Sandecker asked.

“They enlightened us on the secret history of the B-Twenty-nine resting on the seabed,” Pitt answered, “and gave a brief lecture on the geology and seismic fault system around Soseki. Meeker also claimed that by detonating the atomic bomb still inside the aircraft, the shock waves could cause the island to sink beneath the sea.”

Giordino pulled out a cigar he’d already stolen from Admiral Sandecker by sleight-of-hand and lit it up. “A cockamamie idea if I ever heard one.”

Pitt nodded in agreement. “Then Mel Penner ordered Al and me to enjoy a holiday on the sandy beaches of Wake Island while he and the rest of the team flew off into the blue for the States. When I demanded to know why we were being left behind, he clammed up, revealing only that you were on your way and would explain everything.”

“Penner didn’t fill in the cracks,” said Sandecker, “because he didn’t know them. Nor were Ingram and Meeker briefed on all the updated details of ‘Arizona.’ “ 

“Arizona?” Pitt asked curiously.

“The code name of our operation.”

“Our operation?” Giordino questioned guardedly.

“It wouldn’t, of course,” Pitt said sarcastically, “have anything to do with Big Ben, or the fact that Arizona is the name of a state, or more precisely the name of a battleship at Pearl Harbor.”

“It’s as good as any. Code names never make any sense anyway.”

Sandecker stared at his friends closely. A day’s rest had helped, but they looked dead tired and worn out. He felt a gnawing sense of guilt. It was his fault they had already endured so much. And now once more he had recommended their services to Jordan and the President, knowing full well that no other two men alive could match their skills and talents in a deep-ocean environment. How terribly unfair to throw them into another deadly maelstrom so quickly. But there was no one else on God’s earth he could turn to. Sandecker could taste the remorse in his mouth. And he felt guilt at knowing Pitt and Giordino would never refuse to attempt what he asked of them.

“All right, I won’t hand you a lot of crap or sing ‘America the Beautiful.’ I’ll be as straightforward as I can.” He broke off and laid a geological chart on the desk that showed the seafloor for fifty kilometers around Soseki Island. “You two are the best qualified to make a last-ditch effort to finish off the Dragon Center. No one else has as much hands-on experience with a Deep Sea Mining Vehicle.”

“It’s nice to feel needed,” Giordino said wearily.

“What did you say?”

“AI was wondering what exactly it is we’re supposed to do.” Pitt leaned over the chart and stared down at the cross marking the location of
Dennings’ Demons
. “Our assignment is to use the DMSV to blow up the bomb, I assume.’

“You assume correctly,” said Sandecker. “When we reach the target site, you and Big Ben will exit the plane and drop into the water by parachute.”