"Comfy?"
"Er, I'm waiting for an important callback."
"I was just speaking with the President. You remember the President, don't you? The man who thinks you're God's gift to the Pentagon?"
"I never claimed that, Admiral Blackbird, sir."
"He's getting impatient. I don't think you're going to be able to buffalo him much longer."
"Sir, I-"
The phone rang.
"That must be your call. I hope for your sake it's the answer you need." The admiral shut the door.
General Leiber grabbed the telephone. "Major Cheek here, sir."
"What is it?" General Leiber demanded.
"Sir, this is incredible."
"Nothing is incredible anymore."
"This is. We now understand why the last KKV didn't burn off any mass in flight."
"Big deal."
"You don't understand, General. This is it. This is the lead we've been looking for. The KKV was protected by an American product. We can go to the manufacturer and trace all recent shipments. That should give us our aggressor nation."
"Oh, thank God," General Leiber said fervently. "What is it?"
"It's called carbon-carbon."
"Carbon-carbon?" The general's voice shrank. He wasn't sure why it shrank. His voice seemed to understand the significance of the major's report before his brain did.
"Very crudely applied, sir. But it did the job because of the short flight duration."
"Carbon-carbon," the general repeated dully.
"Yes. It goes by other brand names, but it's very expensive. Not exactly available at the corner hardware. With your connections, you should be able to trace it easily. All you have to do is find the culprit who sold this stuff to unfriendlies."
"Carbon-carbon."
"Yes, sir. That's what I said. I knew you'd be interested."
"I think I'm going to be ill."
"Sir?"
Without another word, General Leiber hung up. Frantically he scrounged among the litter of notes on his desk. Only yesterday he had received a recorded incoming call informing him that henceforth the offices of Friendship, International had been relocated to the United States and giving a new telephone number. He wanted that number.
It was in the margin of a Chinese takeout menu. General Leiber punched out the number with his middle finger. He had already worn out the others from too many phone calls.
"Friendship, International," a well-modulated voice answered.
"Friend, ol' buddy. This is General Martin S. Leiber."
"General. You received my message."
"Yes. Roger on that."
"General, I detect a high degree of tension in your voice. "
"Cold," said General Leiber. He coughed unconvincingly.
"I am sorry to hear that."
"I have a business proposition for you, Friend."
"Go ahead."
"I can't talk about it over the phone."
"My sensors indicate the line is secure. You may speak freely."
"It's not that. I need to meet with you. Face-to-face."
"I am afraid that is against corporate policy."
"Look, this could mean a hefty profit."
"How hefty?"
"Dare I say ... billions?"
"I am tempted, but I cannot break that rule. No fraternization is one of the inviolate rules of Friendship, International. "
"Look, make an exception just this once. Please."
"I am sorry. But I eagerly await your proposition."
"I told you I can't give it over the phone!"
"Then write me a letter."
"What's your address?" General Leiber asked, grabbing a pencil.
"I accept only electronic mail."
"For crying out loud, what kind of an operation are you running, where you don't have a mail drop or do meetings?"
"A profitable one," said Friend, disconnecting the line.
"Damn!" fumed General Leiber. "He hung up on me! Now what am I going to do?"
In LaPlata, Missouri, farmer Elmer Biro was awakened in the middle of the night by the crack of a sonic boom. His bed jumped and bounced him out of it. Through the bedroom curtain an eerie orange-red light glowed.
Then he heard a series of popping sounds. Not sharp like gunfire or firecrackers. But muted. It sounded familiar, but he just couldn't place the sound.
Elmer Biro ran out of his house and stumbled into his fields. Out among the grain silos something glowed and smoked. The popping continued. Having fetched his shotgun from inside the front door, he crept cautiously toward the smoke.
He discovered a scorched patch, and in the middle of it, something glowed in a crater where the corn silo had been. The air was heavy with the stench of burnt cornsilk and the black ground was sprinkled with fresh popcorn. Some grains still popped.
Elmer Biro felt the sweat dry from his face and stepped closer. The shotgun jumped out of his hands and sizzled when it struck the hot object. Elmer leapt into his pickup. On his way into town, he tried calling the sheriff on the CB.
Elmer poured out his story when the sheriff answered. The sheriff cut him off. He didn't believe Elmer's wild tale about a UFO landing in his corn silo.
All over America, there were reports of UFO's, meteors, and falling stars. But America, ignorant of the actual threat, was not alarmed. Only the President knew that an unknown enemy had unleashed all-out war.
The Joint Chiefs were screaming for a target. Veiled threats were being made that if the President didn't make an unequivocal response, then the military was not going to shirk its duty.
And still every available line to the office of Dr. Harold W. Smith was busy.
Pyotr Koldunov was dazed by it all. Two dozen gleaming steel engines had been loaded into the EM Accelerator. Two dozen engines of blind, brute destruction had been hurled across the Atlantic. He was sick at the thought of how many Americans must be dying. And as the Lobynian workers strained at pulley ropes to load the next locomotive, Colonel Intifadah exhorted him to keep working.
"Faster! Work faster, Comrade Koldunov. The sooner you are done, the sooner you can go home."
"I must compute the proper trajectory," he returned, the sheet of paper and its complex mathematical figures blurring before his tired eyes.
"Who cares? I have many, many more engines to throw at the Americans. I do not care where they land. As long as they land somewhere."
"Very well," Koldunov said, crumpling the paper in his hands. He dry-washed his face tiredly.
"Here. You need a drink."
"Yes, you are most kind," said Koldunov, taking the glass of clear liquid from Colonel Intifadah. He drank it down greedily. He had swallowed the entire contents before he realized that it was merely water, not vodka. Of course, he thought stupidly, these infernal Moslems do not drink. Still, the water had an interesting tang to it.
"What's next?" he asked Colonel Intifadah.
Colonel Intifadah bestowed upon Pyotr Koldunov a broad smile. An American would have called it a shit-eating grin. "The next engine is about to be loaded. Come, you must open the breech."
"Yes, yes, of course. I forgot," said Pyotr Koldunov, stumbling to his feet. He grabbed the steel console to steady himself. He looked out the Plexiglas. The launch area blurred before his eyes. Damn those endless calculations. Well, he would not have to do them anymore.
"Come, let me assist you, my brother," Colonel Intifadah said solicitously.
Shaking his head in a fruitless effort to clear it, Pyotr Koldunov allowed himself to be led out to the launch-preparation area and to the keypad mounted on the shield wall next to the Accelerator's massive breech.
The keypad swam before his eyes. He groped for the first key. He had to lean one hand against the wall to steady himself. Now, what was the first number of that combination? Oh, yes. Four.
Pyotr Koldunov carefully tapped out the unlocking combination, hit the hydraulics button, and waited for the familiar sound of the hatch opening.