“Mr. President, you didn’t tell me you were departing the capital,” General Anatoliy Gryzlov said.
Sen’kov’s blood turned cold when he heard Gryzlov, especially using that ominous tone of voice. “What is it, General? Bukayev was going to notify you at dawn. I’m trying to get some rest.”
“Try that OMON captain from the Thirty-first Rifles. She told me she was looking for a promotion and a transfer to Kaliningrad,” Gryzlov said. “She’ll give you anything you wish in exchange—anything. Believe me, I know. It was my recommendation that got her promoted to captain and a billet in the presidential security detail.”
So Gryzlov did have extensive connections in OMON, Sen’kov thought — and he most certainly did in the MVD Interior Ministry as well. Oh, shit… “You called to tell me about one of your OMON sluts?”
“I called to tell you, Sen’kov, that you broke faith with me and with Russia by not signing that execution order, then blabbing about me to the Americans,” Gryzlov said. “I don’t appreciate being lied to and having my name smeared to a bunch of Americans.”
“Your name is dead, Gryzlov!” Sen’kov thundered. He immediately buzzed the outer working area for his aides, then started typing a message on his computer, informing the MVD and OMON security officials to arrest Gryzlov. “I won’t tolerate your insubordination any longer! You’ve threatened me for the last time. I hereby relieve you of duty, General. Have your deputy report to the Defense Ministry for instructions. You will be confined to quarters. If you submit your resignation and retirement request immediately, I won’t press for a court-martial.”
“How generous of you, Sen’kov,” Gryzlov said. “But that won’t be necessary. I will depart the general staff this morning — and I will confine myself to the Kremlin White House.”
“What are you talking about?” There was no reply to his buzzer, and the e-mail wasn’t being transmitted. He reached under his desk and hit the “panic button,” which was supposed to send every security officer on board rushing into the cabin — but no one showed. He picked up the phone to the cockpit. It rang, but no one answered.
“It is simple, Sen’kov: You’re out, and I’m in,” Gryzlov said. “Oh, and I would recommend that you do not open the door to your VIP cabin.”
“What did you do, Gryzlov?”
“Nothing too dramatic — just a simple slow failure of your plane’s pressurization system,” Gryzlov said. “Plus, I disabled the cabin altitude-warning lights and the oxygen-generating system. When the cockpit reached four to five thousand meters altitude, your flight crew should have experienced the first symptoms of hypoxia — oxygen starvation — declared an emergency, and donned their oxygen masks. The masks won’t work, but they won’t have realized that until too late. Everyone in the main cabin should have been unconscious from hypoxia by then, and a few minutes later the flight crew would have succumbed to oxygen starvation. Right about now your plane should be on autopilot, cruising over western Finland with everyone on board unconscious — except you. Remember, don’t open your cabin door — your cabin is sealed pretty well against pressurization loss.”
Sen’kov leaped to his feet and pounded on the cabin door, but no one answered. He checked the peephole — sure enough, the security guards were sound asleep. This can’t be happening! he screamed to himself. This was a nightmare!
He looked out one of the portholes on the starboard side of the Tu-204 and was surprised to see a Russian air force MiG-29 in close formation with him. He waved, and the pilot waved back. Relieved, Sen’kov went back to his desk, punched another satellite channel, and waited to be connected.
“I have requested that all communications to your flight go through the president’s office, Sen’kov,” he heard Gryzlov say. “I’m here in your office with the members of the general staff, the deputy speaker of the Duma, and the cabinet. We are all very concerned about your safety, but I’m afraid there’s not much anyone can do right now.”
“You bastard, Gryzlov!” Sen’kov screamed. “You’ll burn in hell for all eternity for this!”
“Not exactly, Sen’kov,” Gryzlov said. “What will happen is that you will die when your plane either runs out of fuel or turbulence trips off the autopilot and you crash somewhere between Sweden and the Arctic Ocean. Unfortunately, the air will eventually leak out of your cabin as well, and you’ll be unconscious, too, so you probably will not experience the thrill of hitting the tundra or the ocean at terminal velocity or feeling the wings rip off your plane—”
“You’re a sick, twisted bastard, Gryzlov. How dare you just snuff out the lives of all these innocent men and women on board?”
“You have one chance to save them, and I’ll tell you how you can do it, Mr. President,” Gryzlov went on. “You must hold your breath, run to the cockpit, take control of the plane, and then descend below three thousand meters so you can breathe. You would have to descend at, let’s see… seven thousand meters per minute to make it down in time. The way to do it: pull the power back to idle, lower the landing gear and flaps, lower the nose, and fly in a very steep banked turn. Then you can descend quickly without ripping the wings off. Remember, you’ll have about twenty seconds after you let your breath go to do it — that’s the average time of useful consciousness with your cabin altitude above eight thousand meters. For the sake of those fighter pilots who are trailing you, you must try it. If you crash, it will be a horrible and terribly tragic accident that will be witnessed by those brave fighter pilots that are feverishly trying to figure out some way to get you down safely. God, I hope they won’t be scarred for life. Good luck, Mr. President.”
“I suppose all of you were in on this from the beginning?” Sen’kov asked.
“Not right away, but by the time you told the Americans what my plan was, we all agreed that you could no longer lead this country forward,” Gryzlov said. “You have been tainted by corruption and have been forced to accede to threats from the United States to survive. We cannot sit by and watch you flush our future down the toilet. Everyone in this room is in agreement. Everyone else — the vice president, the prime minister, the speaker of the Duma, and a few members of the cabinet — well, they cast their vote with their last living breath. Just as you are about to do.
“Now, you had better get going, Mr. President,” Gryzlov said. “You’ll probably have to equalize pressure between the cabins to open your door. Just flip the red-guarded switch inside the panel on the port side of the door. According to our calculations, if you manage to get control of the plane, you will still have plenty of fuel to make it back to St. Petersburg, or the fighter pilots will lead you to an alternate base in Sweden or Finland with a very long runway. You can still be the hero here, Sen’kov. Oh, and you’d better dress warmly — it’s liable to be cold up front. Take several deep breaths before you open the cabin door. To disconnect the autopilot, simply turn the control wheel hard left or right — you’ll have to overpower the computer, but you can do it. Pull the throttles back all the way, start a steep turn — forty-five degrees of bank should do — find the gear handle and lower it. You can do it, Mr. President.”
“I’ll see you in hell, Gryzlov,” Sen’kov said. “To the rest of you — I hope you lie awake thinking about what you’ve done here tonight. The lives of every innocent man and woman on board this plane will be on your heads.” He slammed the phone down.
Sen’kov was shaking so hard he could hardly don his overcoat, hat, and gloves. As he dressed, he took several deep breaths to flush the carbon dioxide out of his lungs — after doing so he found he could hold his breath for about sixty seconds. He rehearsed the route he had to take several times in his head. After nearly passing out from hyperventilating, he found himself remarkably calm. This was possible, he thought. The smug bastard Gryzlov had given him everything he needed to know to do it.