The Dnepr-1 rocket rose into the night sky, moving faster with each second, smoke and steam and flame behind it on the launch pad and in the air. A screech filled the air and a thumping vibration shook the ground for miles in all directions.
The 260-ton machine achieved a speed of 560 miles an hour in less than thirty seconds.
As it rose, all Russian forces abandoned their attack on the Baikonur Cosmodrome.
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Safronov had programmed the flight telemetry himself using data derived from the working group he’d assembled a few months back. The group had no idea they were working on a nuclear attack, their understanding was that they were to reinvestigate the plan to send rescue boats and other emergency aid via rocket launch. The LV had instructions loaded onto its onboard software that controlled pitch and yaw and burn time, all to direct it toward its destination.
It was the ultimate “Fire and forget” weapon.
The first stage of the launch vehicle separated and fell back to earth, landing in central Kazakhstan just eight minutes after launch.
Moscow was tracking the trajectory, and everyone in the know realized within a few short minutes that their former R-36 missile was on course to Moscow itself.
But there was no running away. No leaving the city. The weapon would hit in under fifteen minutes.
High above central Russia, the second-stage powered flight ended, and after the second stage separated, it crashed onto a farm road near the town of Shatsk on the Shacha River. The third stage then flipped in flight and began traveling backward, and within minutes the fairing jettisoned back to earth. Soon the third-stage rockets extinguished and a protective shield released and fell. This released the Space Head Module from the upper platform stack where the payload container was attached, and this piece, a green cylinder with a payload container holding the device, began returning to earth, a ten-foot-by-ten-foot object weighing in excess of two tons.
The payload dropped in an arc, the heavier atmosphere affected the trajectory somewhat, but Georgi and his scientists had solved for a great number of variables, and the device pushed through the friction at terminal velocity.
The men and women in Moscow who knew of the launch held their children or prayed or cried or hoped or cursed everything Dagestani. They knew there was nothing else they could do.
At 3:29 a.m., while the vast majority of the huge ice-covered city was asleep, a low boom echoed across the southeastern district of Moscow. Nearby residents were shaken from their beds a second later when a larger explosion erupted, windows blew from buildings, and a rumbling vibration rolled across the entire city like a small earthquake.
Those in the city center could see the glow to the south. It rose higher into the air like a sunrise out of the predawn, reflecting off ice crystals on the rooftops of the metropolis.
At the Kremlin’s crisis center they could see the rising fire, a savage inferno just miles away. Men screamed and cried as they braced for what was still to come.
But nothing came.
It took minutes to be certain, but eventually they had reports from the area of the impact. Something had fallen from the sky into the Gazprom Neft Moscow Refinery, a 200,000-barrel-per-day facility southeast of the city center.
It had struck the gas oil vacuum distillation tanks and created a massive explosion that killed more than a dozen people at the refinery instantly, and more died during the ensuing fire.
But it clearly was not a nuclear device.
Clark woke to the sound of a low boom in the distance.
He had a crick in his neck from sleeping sitting up. That his sore cervical joints were the most annoying sensation of the moment was telling. After several days of “rough stuff,” he would have thought that Ӏhe would be hurting more from the —
Oh, yeah. There it was. The pain in his jaw and his nose and the dull throb in his head. It took a minute for the mind to accept the assaults to the nerves, but his mind was processing everything nicely now, and the pain receptors were working overtime.
After the boom he heard nothing else from outside. He thought that maybe an electrical transformer shorted out somewhere, but he could not be sure.
He spit more blood, and a molar loosened. He’d bit the inside of his cheek somewhere along the way, as well, and his mouth was swollen on both sides.
He was growing tired of this.
The door opened again. He looked up to see which of the Frenchies were coming for a chat, but he did not recognize the two men who entered.
No, the four men, as two more came through the door now.
Moving with speed and a distressing efficiency the four young men cut Clark’s bindings and ordered him to his feet in Russian.
Clark stood on shaky legs.
Two more men appeared in the doorway. They carried Varjag pistols in their right hands; they held them low but menacing. Their clothes were civilian, but their thick dark jackets and utility pants made them look, to a trained eye like Clark’s, as if they were part of some sort of special unit of military, police, or intelligence officers.
“Come with us,” one of them said, and they walked him through a large house, right past the French detectives, and into a van.
On the surface, Clark realized, perhaps he should have been glad. But it just didn’t smell to him like a rescue operation.
No, this had an “Out of the frying pan, into the fire” feel.
They blindfolded him and drove for an hour. No one spoke to Clark, nor did the men in the van speak to one another.
When they stopped he was led out of the vehicle, still under his own power. The air was freezing cold, and he felt thick snowflakes on his beard and lips.
Into another building, this with the smell and feel of a warehouse, and he was placed on a chair. Once again, his hands and legs were tied. The blindfold came off and he squinted into a bright light for a moment, before finally opening his eyes.
Three men stood before him, just in the shadows outside the light above. Two wore blue jeans and track-suit tops, their heads shaved and their wide flat Slavic faces cold and unfeeling.
The third man wore pressed slacks and a black ski jacket that looked to Clark like it might have cost several hundred dollars.
A table nearby, just out of the direct light, contained a pile of tools, stainless-steel surgical instruments, tape, wire, and other items John could not make out.
Dread filled the American and tightness entered his stomach.
This wasn’t going to be like playing punching bag for a group of French detectives. No, this looked like it was about to get ugly.
Clark also heard noises farther away in the warehouse. Armed guards, it sounded like, from the occasional shuffling of feet and the rattling of rifles on slings.
The man in the ski jacket stepped forward, under the light. He spoke excellent English. “My father sayӀs you are looking for me.”
“Valentin.” John said it in surprise. From the little he knew about the young man, he did not take him for someone that would make a house call to what, by all indications, seemed to be a torture facility. “I said that I wanted to talk to you.” Clark looked at the table and the square-jawed men. “This is not exactly what I had in mind.”
The thirty-five-year-old Russian just shrugged. “You and I are both here under duress, Mr. Clark. If I had a choice in the matter I would be anywhere else, but you are causing problems for my government and they have selected me to meet with you to resolve the problem. The Kremlin has given me free rein to deal with you.”
“Sounds like a job for your father.”
Valentin smiled mirthlessly. “This is not his job, nor his problem. I need to know everything about your current employer. I need to know who you spoke with in Moscow. We found the telephone that you called, but it had been dumped in a landfill, so we learned nothing.”