“Deltas, Delta Blue.”
“Red,” she said.
“Yellow.”
“Orange.”
“Alpha, you there?”
“We copy, Blue,” Overton said.
McKenna filled them in on possible takeover of Soyuz Fifty and the destruction of the Russian Mako.
“Volontov,” she asked.
“Yes,” McKenna said.
“Damn. I liked him.”
“So did I, Country Girl. So did I.”
“Blue, Alpha. Where are you now?”
Munoz answered, “We’re ninety miles south of Nassau, climbin’ through angels one-fifty. In six minutes, we’ll have an ignition window.”
“And what’s the plan, if I might be so bold?” Overton asked.
“I don’t like the plan,” McKenna said, “but for now, the priority is the defense of Themis.”
“I think that part’s okay,” Overton said.
“If we’re continually on the defensive, we’re not going to get much sleep, much less attack the problem. Mako Five is on the ground, but I’m calling in the other six Makos, and well put them all on guard duty, three at a time, with one MakoShark to carry the ordnance. That will free up two MakoSharks.”
“That’s a little risky,” Overton said.
“Priorities at stake, General. One Mako or one Themis?”
“We’ll work with your order of battle, Snake Eyes.”
That troubled Haggar. She would be responsible, not only for Delta Red, but also for the crews of three Makos.
Over the ICS, Olsen said, “I know what you’re thinking, Lynn.”
“You don’t.”
“Sure I do. Keep in mind that we’re also protecting the station.”
She thought about it. “Okay, Ben. Thanks.”
“Deltas, you’re to stay in position until relieved by the Makos. As soon as we achieve orbit, Tiger and I are going to visit Soyuz Fifty.”
Maslov descended on the New World Base in a wide spiral from ninety thousand feet of altitude. It was daylight, but he felt that they were running out of time. Waiting until nightfall was a luxury they could no longer afford.
By the time he and Nikitin had started the jet engines and reached twenty-five thousand feet, they had seen no suspicious aircraft.
He depressed the transmit stud. “Commodore, this is Captain.”
Sergeant Nikita Kasartskin replied, “Proceed, Captain.”
“We will be landing in five minutes.”
“But, Captain…”
“Immediately,” Maslov ordered.
“As you wish, Captain”
By the time Maslov was on his final approach from the north, the magnified video view of the airstrip showed him that the final hill was being winched off the runway.
The landing was quickly accomplished, and the men waiting on the ground at the end of the strip pushed the MakoShark into her revetment immediately.
Maslov and Nikitin were descending from their cockpits when General Druzhinin came rushing up to them.
“Maslov! Is there a problem?”
“None that haste will not solve, Comrade General. Boris and I will take two hours to sleep while the craft’s jet engines are refueled and the next warhead is loaded. Then we will take off again”
Druzhinin signalled the crew chief and joined Maslov and Nikitin as they left the revetment.
“The space station?”
“Is secure for the moment. Not, however, for very long, I think,” Maslov said.
“Why do you think this?” Druzhinin asked.
Maslov told him about the missed radio contact with Baikonur Cosmodrome and his attack on the Mako.
“There was not another option open to us, General. And now, the Rocket Forces will have strong suspicions. They may enlist the aid of the Americans.”
“Yes, you are correct, Aleksander. We must get the second missile into orbit as soon as possible.”
“And, Comrade General, in order to protect Soyuz Fifty, it is time for Chairman Shelepin to deliver his speech.”
“Hey, compadre, we’re flat cruisin’. Mach two-two-point-six. I’m gonna paint the sky.”
“Go,” McKenna said.
The radar came up on McKenna’s screen, showing a 360 degree scan. The HUD reported their altitude at 276 miles.
“There’s that dead Molniya satellite,” Munoz said. “Someday, we’ll have to shoot the damn thing. It’s takin’ too long to reenter the atmosphere.”
Every few minutes, McKenna rolled the MakoShark to a new position so they could maintain a visual search in all quadrants.
He rolled again as new targets began to show on the outer fringe of the 220-mile scan of the radar.
“See them, Tiger?”
“Yeah, jefe. Should we check it out?”
“Hate to.”
“Me, too.”
“But we’d better.”
“Go left one-five.”
McKenna used the OMS to alter the nose fifteen degrees to the left, then kicked in the rocket motors to boost them onto the new course.
Twelve minutes later, he had to flip the MakoShark over and use the rocket motors to retard their velocity. As soon as the fifteen-second burn was completed, he flipped back to a nose-forward attitude.
They drifted slowly into the debris field.
“Jesus Christ,” Munoz said.
“Yeah.”
The largest single piece was the upper right wing skin, still virgin white, with the large black letters “C I S” inscribed on it.
McKenna hit the forward thrusters to slow the MakoShark enough to match velocity with the remains of the Mako.
Fractured and snapped structural members were everywhere, appearing like a three-dimensional forest, with the leaves stripped from every tree.
“The debris field is a little over half-a-mile wide,” Munoz said.
“The missile caught her in the aft end and set off both fuels.”
“No doubt,” Munoz said. “I’m scannin’ the rear.”
McKenna saw the rearview video come up on the small screen as Munoz checked the area behind them. He felt an itch along his spine and thought about the thousands of pounds of fuel contained in Delta Blue’s wings and fuselage.
And about their lack of armament. They had come straight from Washington, without a stop to arm the bird.
Munoz was thinking along the same lines.
“I’m shuttin’ down the radar.”
“Good idea, Tiger”
Using the OMS, McKenna cruised slowly around the debris field. They found a few recognizable pieces: landing gear, half of a rear canopy, part of a turbojet engine, a cargo bay door, a radar antenna.
“Oh, shit!” Munoz said.
“What?”
“One o’clock high, twenty yards.”
“Use the camera.”
Munoz deployed the nose camera, focused it, and aimed at the object he had spotted.
Helmet.
All by itself.
The camera zoomed in.
The visor was shattered.
Above the visor in Cyrillic lettering that McKenna could interpret was the legend: VOLONTOV.
“That’s enough, Tiger.”
“Roger that.”
McKenna backed away from the debris.
“Give me a vector for Soyuz.”
“Goin’ active three sweeps.”
Munoz gave him the celestial coordinates for the Commonwealth station, and McKenna keyed them into the computer. When he activated the start program, the computer shifted their attitude and ordered a twenty-eight second burst of the rocket motors.
As soon as he could take back control, McKenna began rolling the MakoShark again.
“We want to stay on our toes here, Tiger.”
“What if my toes are crossed, Snake Eyes?”
“Use something else then.”
“Everythin’ is crossed, amigo. Closure rate twenty feet per second.”
When they were within thirty miles of the station, McKenna began using bursts of the nose thrusters to slow their progress.