The Minister finished opening the safe and pulled the top off.
Kornev said angrily, “Who is this?”
The Minister turned around just in time to see Kornev run from the office and out the front door. The Minister of Defense ran out the door after him holding up a black back of diamonds and yelling, “Where are you going.”
The Minister was shocked and confused to see Kornev jump into the UAZ, start the engine, slam the vehicle into gear and then drive out the opened front gate, leaving nothing but dust and millions in diamonds behind.
Busan, South Korea ― on the Gerald R. Ford Aircraft Carrier
Lieutenant Commander Foster Nolan was crazy. At least that’s what the men in his squadron thought of him. Not just because he had volunteered to fly the suicidal mission into North Korean to take out a warehouse. He was the squadron leader after all, and could have certainly guilted one of his men into taking the sortie. But he hadn’t. When the mission had come down from the top, Nolan had already accepted it even before the men in his squadron knew the mission was available.
In force, the mission was doable. But the Lieutenant Commander’s men knew that a single fighter flying into North Korean airspace had about as much chance as a kite in a hurricane. Five miles out to sea. No problem. Five miles on the friendly side of the DMZ. Easy. Five miles into Wonsan. No Bueno. Between the radar and anti-aircraft batteries, not to mention the North Korean jets just sitting in a ready state on North Korean airfields, add to that the fact that the North Korean pilots were drooling at the prospect of getting them some American jet fighter ass, it was not a good mission at all. The probability of surviving the mission was low. The probability of dying or being captured was high. Only a crazy person would fly it.
And his men also knew that their brave leader was crazy in another way. He was crazy for some pay back. His twin brother had been killed in The Five. And ever since that happened, Lieutenant Commander Foster Nolan had become withdrawn and morose. It didn’t help matters that the American military had very little to offer in response to The Five. Two years after The Five and the best response the United States could muster was some spot bombings here and there. Nothing of any real consequence. No real enemy to go after, unless their government made all Muslims enemy combatants. If that happened, then there would be plenty of countries to bomb. More than enough to go around. More pay back than Lieutenant Commander Foster Nolan could handle in a lifetime, no matter how short that was. But that was not the case. And the limp dick response from the US of A frustrated the Lieutenant Commander to no end.
So when this mission to go in fast and low and spitting missiles at the North Koreans came about, well, all his men knew why Nolan had taken the gig. He was crazy.
So, crazy Lieutenant Commander Foster Nolan sat in his Lockheed Martin F-35C, hooked into the catapult of the Gerald R. Ford aircraft carrier. The ship had just arrived at the Fleet Activities Chinhae Navy Base in Busan, South Korea.
The Lieutenant Commander checked his watch ― 3:44AM. One minute until blast off. Surprisingly, he wasn’t scared. He wondered if his brother had been scared when his Virgin Atlantic flight 1082 was shot down leaving Orlando International. He guessed there wasn’t enough time to be scared. Low altitude. Maybe only ten seconds until impact. Even so, Nolan was sure that his brother had been pulling on the ejection handle that was not under his seat. It would have been a habit. His brother had been a jet pilot as well. The ejection handle. A magic handle that could shoot you far away from danger and then float you down to the ground. Reaching and tugging for salvation. Foster Nolan supposed he could reach his handle if the shit got too heavy in North Korea. Maybe he could blow away a few North Koreans on the ground before they rounded him up. But it really didn’t matter. He had been profoundly sad since he had lost his brother. Clinically depressed is what the shrinks would say if he’d let it all out. But he hadn’t. He had contained his ailment, his secret. And the little bugger had slowly changed over time from depression, to anger, to revenge, and now it would seem it had mutated into a death wish. That was OK as well. Hell, that’s why he was a pilot. If there wasn’t any chance of dying, then everybody would want the job.
The Lieutenant Commander went over a final checklist and waited for the yellow shirted Catapult Officer, the shooter as they called him, to give him a thumbs up. His flight would only last about a half hour. Fifteen minutes one direction. Fifteen minutes to come home. That is, if he came home. If not, then his plane had probably been reduced to ash and tinsel that rained down and decorated the jungles of North Korea. Nolan often thought of dying. He fantasized about crashing his $337-million-dollar aircraft into the warehouse, instead of just sending a few missiles into the building. That would make a bigger bang. But then all pilots thought about stuff like that. At least he thought they did.
The Lieutenant Commander checked his watch again. Time to go. He saw a flurry of activity around him as the guys on the ground did their best to make sure he was safe. SAFE. That was funny. It’s like giving a flu shot to a guy being executed in the electric chair. Fifteen minutes from now he would be a bird in a shooting gallery. Or not. Down on deck, he saw the shooter in the yellow shirt getting ready to do his thing, so Nolan spun up the Pratt & Whitney F135 turbofan engines to max power.
Foster Nolan put his stick in all four corners and cycled the rudders to demonstrate to the deck crew that his controls were free. He then turned on his lights and held still. Ten seconds later, Lieutenant Commander Foster Nolan saluted the man in yellow who was standing next to his plane. The man gave him a thumbs up, dropped down on one knee and pointed toward the bow of the ship. Now in full afterburner, the ship’s catapult cut loose and ripped the F-35 off the deck and threw it out into the darkness.
Sea of Japan ― on the cargo ship Hail Nucleus
Men at Work sat silently in the green wet field only thirty yards from the main gate of the warehouse. Knox was expecting absolutely nothing and was then very surprised the see the headlights of a large vehicle crawling up the dirt road toward the warehouse. He watched for a moment and then zoomed Men at Work’s camera in closer to get a better look at the truck. He looked away from his screen and told Hail, “Marshall, I believe the last piece of the missile is arriving right now.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me?” Hail said.
Knox pressed an icon and the video streaming from Men at Work popped up on large screen number four. Hail swiveled his chair a few degrees to center on the monitor. Sure enough, a large diesel rig with a low-boy trailer was stopped at the front gate of the warehouse. The unmistakable huge cylinder was resting in the middle of the trailer. The only difference Hail could tell between this rig and the one before was the crane was mounted on the end of the trailer instead of the back of the truck.
“What’s the status of the deployment?” Hail asked.
Renner, who was still manning Sex Pistols, responded, “Almost done. THING 9 and 10 are entering the warehouse now.”
Hail turned his attention to the video on the big screen that was being streamed by BEP. The interior of the warehouse was bright, in stark contrast to all the other videos that were being shot in low light from outside. Each time Hail switched between monitors, it took his eyes a few moments to adjust.
He saw two drones fly in through the hole in the back of the building. The contraptions looked alien, even to Hail. They looked even more out of place in the warehouse, weird shaped flying apparatuses contrasted by common crates and boxes.
Both drones stopped and seemed to look around for a moment. Then, still in a hover, they went straight up toward the ceiling. Hail tracked them on the monitor as one THING went left and the other right. A moment later, Hail watched each of the drones touch down on the top of a wide stack of tall wooden crates.