‘Not good?’ said Tony, seeing Adam’s expression.
‘Not good. They’re going to fire if we don’t turn back.’
The Global 6000’s pilot had already made his decision, the other jet peeling away. One of the Flankers followed it. ‘I guess that settles it,’ Tony said mournfully. ‘See you in the gulag…’
‘You now have ten seconds,’ said the Russian. The Beriev was dead centre in his HUD, a trilling warble in his headphones assuring him that he had a solid missile lock on his target. ‘Nine. Eight…’
A new sound, an insistent, piercing shrill. Threat warning indicators flashed red. Someone had locked weapons on to him! But who—
‘Russian fighters, Russian fighters,’ said a new voice. American. ‘We have missile lock on both your aircraft.’
The display revealed that the radar beam pinning him was coming from astern. The pilot twisted in his seat to spot its source. He glimpsed an ominous grey shadow against the sky, closing in from behind.
An F-22 Raptor, the most advanced fighter aircraft in the world.
‘You will disengage immediately and allow the two civilian aircraft to proceed on their way,’ the Raptor pilot continued. ‘If you do not, we will use all necessary force to protect them.’
‘What do we do?’ asked the Russian’s wingman, frantic.
The pilot choked back his rage. He had always wanted to know how a dogfight between a Flanker and a Raptor would play out, not believing for one minute the American claims of the latter’s superiority and certain that he was more than a match for any US pilot… but from such a weakened position, any challenge would be suicide.
‘Withdraw,’ he snarled. ‘Break off and withdraw.’
Tony was pressed against the window again, watching the Flanker curve away. An F-22 followed it, a hound corralling its prey. ‘They’re bugging out!’
‘Attention two-zero-one and companion aircraft,’ said one of the American pilots through Adam’s headphones. ‘This is Raptor One. You are now free and clear to reach US airspace. Once we’re sure these guys have gone, we’ll escort you to Elmendorf.’ A pause, then, pointedly: ‘Whatever you were doing, I hope it was worth it. There’s gonna be diplomatic hell to pay once you’re on the ground.’
‘Thanks for your assistance, Raptor One,’ Adam replied. He looked back into the cabin, seeing the RTG still secured to the deck, Bianca near it with the PERSONA cases — and Qasid, bound and under guard. ‘We got what we came for.’
Chapter 35
Double Jeopardy
The atmosphere in the meeting room was caustic, to say the least.
Gordon Harper sat at one end of the table, glaring at the STS personnel around it with utter contempt. ‘So. I bust my ass and call in a lot of political favours to give you the chance to follow up on what you found out in Macau. And in return, I get’ — he jumped to his feet, banging both hands down on the table as his voice rose to a roar — ‘a colossal cluster-fuck!’ Holly Jo flinched.
‘With respect, Admiral,’ said Morgan hesitantly, ‘the operation wasn’t a complete failure.’
‘You want to call it a success?’
‘We stopped al-Qaeda from getting the RTG,’ said Tony, more firmly. ‘And we have a recording of al-Rais’s persona. The information we get from that—’
‘Will be utterly useless!’ Harper bellowed. ‘Because you let him get away! The Russians haven’t caught him, so he’s still out there somewhere — and now he knows we’re on to him, so whatever plans al-Qaeda had in the works, they’ll change.’
‘It’ll still be valuable,’ Tony insisted. ‘Al-Rais knows names, contacts. With that information we can attack al-Qaeda from the top down, go after the captains rather than the foot-soldiers.’
Harper couldn’t deny that he had a point, so switched to another angle of attack. ‘And speaking of the Russians, do you have any idea of the size of the swirling shitstorm you’ve started at State?’
‘Awesome alliteration,’ said Bianca quietly.
Not quietly enough. Harper’s searing gaze turned upon her. ‘I don’t think you appreciate how serious this is, Dr Childs.’ He was somehow more threatening now that his voice had returned to a normal volume. ‘Not only are three members of the Persona Project dead and two more injured,’ he nodded towards Tony, who had a dressing over his head wound, ‘as a result of the failure of this operation, but it’s caused a major diplomatic incident. The Russians have raised their military alert status in response to what they call an aggressive invasion of their sovereign territory, so we’ve been forced to do the same. The United States is now at DEFCON 3 — and the last time it was that high was on September eleventh, 2001. Now do you see how serious this is?’
She nodded, abashed. ‘Yes.’
‘Good. Now, the State Department has brought out its chopping block, and it wants to see heads on it. Specifically, all of yours. Convince me not to hand them over.’
Adam spoke up. ‘We still have the other prisoner, sir — Qasid. I learned from al-Rais’s persona that he knows the identity of a mole who gave away the Secretary of State’s route in the Islamabad bombing.’
That produced surprise around the table. Harper flicked through some papers. ‘Qasid? According to everything we have on him, he’s just some low-level thug.’
‘Al-Rais didn’t think so. He considered him one of his most reliable people.’
The Admiral didn’t appear convinced, but before he could say anything the telephone in front of Morgan rang. He picked it up. ‘Morgan… Okay, thank you.’ He ended the call and turned to Harper. ‘Mr Sternberg is ready at the White House.’
Harper looked less impressed than ever. ‘Put him through.’
Morgan used a remote to activate the big screen. The National Security Adviser appeared on it. The camera shooting him was positioned below his eyeline, increasing the impression that he was looming over everyone seated around the conference table. ‘Good afternoon, Gordon, Martin,’ he said, apparently not considering anyone else worthy of a greeting. ‘I won’t mince words — the President is furious about this situation.’
Harper went straight on the attack. ‘A situation that you recommended to him.’
‘At your insistence,’ Sternberg countered smoothly. ‘But at this stage, I’m not here to apportion blame. I just want to know what you’re doing about it. Have we got any actionable intelligence?’
‘Not immediately actionable,’ Morgan replied. ‘Agent Gray was imprinted with Muqaddim al-Rais’s persona, but circumstances forced the team to erase it before he could be debriefed. However, we still have a recorded copy of that persona. Our plan is to re-imprint it and get as much information as we can.’
‘I thought using the same persona twice was unsafe?’
‘Given the circumstances, it’s the only logical option,’ said Kiddrick. ‘We think the risk is minimal.’
‘You think the risk is minimal,’ Bianca said pointedly.
‘All right, Dr Childs, that’s enough,’ said Morgan. ‘We need that information.’
‘See to it,’ said Sternberg. ‘Hopefully we can salvage something out of this mess.’
‘We did get the RTG, sir,’ Tony reminded him.
‘There is that, I suppose. NEST has secured it at Elmendorf. The question now is what we actually do with the thing. I doubt the Russians will ask for it back, considering how much it’ll cost them to make it safe. Anyway, do you have anything else to say at this stage?’