The roar of the Tupolev’s dual continuous-bleed, after-burning turbojets filled the background with constant sound and Grigori stifled a yawn. He had slept little since leaving Afghanistan, seemingly a lifetime before. Fortunately, his two coworkers, Konstantin Lomakin and Dmitri Andreyev, had closed their eyes soon after they had taken off from Petropavlovsk.
It was most important for them to be completely rested for the mission that faced them. As for himself, he’d get by with a minimum of sleep as he always did.
He looked over his shoulder and watched his companions snoring contentedly on the compartment’s narrow floor. With barely enough room for the three of them and their equipment, the Red Fox was an efficient, yet uncomfortable means of transporting them into battle.
Returning his weary gaze back to the porthole, Grigori watched the sun settle towards the western horizon. Below them, a day was just about to end in America, while a new dawn was about to break over the eastern border of the Motherland. Well aware of the fickleness of time, he pondered the hectic series of events that had begun soon after they had arrived back in Kabul.
The sweet taste of revenge was still fresh on their lips as they had returned to their central base after the raid on Bamian. There, the officer in charge had seemed to have little interest in the loss of General Valerian and the entire armored column, and the team’s subsequent exploits. Instead, he had accepted this news with a sigh, then handed Grigori a single set of orders. Coming directly from the Commanderin-Chief of the Strategic Rocket Forces, General Vadim Sobolev, these directives had ordered the team to be immediately flown to Petropavlovsk via an awaiting Backfire bomber.
Vadim Sobolev was an esteemed, legendary figure.
A personal friend of Grigori’s late father, the general was one of the highest-ranking officers in the Motherland’s military. When he was a lad, his father would often take him to visit Sobolev, whom Grigori remembered as being a tall, heavy-set figure with a flowing mane of snow-white hair. Since his graduation from Leningrad’s Frunze Naval War College, Grigori had seen little of the man who commanded over 1,000,000 soldiers.
Rather surprised to suddenly hear from him now, Grigori had followed his directive without question.
Hardly having time to shower and change uniforms, they had loaded into the Backfire and begun the five hour flight eastward to the Kamchatka Peninsula’s southern tip.
It was cold and windy when they arrived in Petropavlovsk.
Meeting them at the aircraft’s hatch had been a stern-faced Spetsnaz colonel whom Grigori remembered from basic training. With a bare word of welcome, he had loaded them into a camouflaged Zil truck, and driven them to an isolated outpost.
There the team had been ordered to completely strip. Once this was accomplished, they had been each given a full set of United States Army Special Forces fatigues. From their underwear to the equipment they had been soon handed, each item was of American origin. Of special interest was the shoulder fired surface-to-air Stinger missile kit that he had been personally issued. Packed in a special, watertight, foam-padded carrying case, which altogether weighed less than thirty-five pounds, this weapon was a most effective one. With a range of over eight miles, and a speed several times that of sound, the Stinger’s fragmentary warhead was guided to its target by an infrared seeker that homed in on the objective’s exhaust plume. He had shot one during basic training, and would never forget how deadly accurate it had been.
At this point, Grigori had been separated from his teammates. Alone in a cramped windowless room, he had waited for the arrival of the colonel, who had then begun a quick, cursory briefing. He had handed Grigori a pair of maps. One was of the island of San Miguel. This insignificant piece of desolate, volcanic rock was the northernmost outcropping in California’s Channel Island chain.
The second chart was much more interesting. It provided an intricate cross-section view of the southern portion of California’s Vandenberg Air Force Base. Grigori had looked up expectantly as the colonel had informed him that the first part of their mission would entail the transfer of the team to San Miguel Island. Descending by parachute, they would gather on the island’s isolated western tip. There they’d place a specially designed homing device in the Pacific. This beacon would call in the Victor-class attack sub Volga, which was awaiting their arrival in the surrounding waters. It would be on the Volga that the rest of the mission would be revealed to him.
Somewhat disappointed at the extent of the briefing, Grigori hadn’t even bothered questioning the colonel further. If Command had wanted him to know more, they would have told him. It was as simple as that.
Leaving Grigori with instructions to inform his men of their mission only when they had left Petropavlovsk, the colonel had wished him good fortune and abruptly exited. All too soon, they had been driven back to the airfield, where they had been loaded into their present means of transportation.
The monotonous roar of the Tupolev’s engines accompanied his thoughts as Grigori remembered his first sight of the aircraft known as the Red Fox.
Parked in a section of the field, far removed from the flight-line itself, the rather flat, needle-nosed plane had been covered by a protective hangar and surrounded by armed guards. Completely painted with a dull, crimson-red finish, the vehicle sported a large, delta-shaped wingspan set in the lower half of the thirty-seven-meter-long fuselage. It was in the center of each of these wings that a single, massive engine was placed. Set on top of these engines were a pair of rudder-like tails.
Developed primarily as a recon platform, this particular model had an extra humped, clamshell canopy set behind the cockpit. This special compartment was apparently designed especially for Spetsnaz squadrons such as their own.
Konstantin and Dmitri had been brimming with questions, yet Grigori had remained silent until they were well airborne. He found it somewhat peculiar that they never even saw the pilot. They did have access to an intercom system that lay on the sealed, forward bulkhead door.
The plane was buffeted by a stream of moderate turbulence, and Grigori had to reach out to steady himself. The flight had been quite smooth so far. If they remained lucky, the good weather would prevail when it came time to jump.
Though he had made hundreds of HALO high altitude low-opening) free-falls before, this would be his first on American soil. Never had he dreamed that the Motherland would trust him with such a mission.
Earlier, Dmitri and Konstantin had attempted to figure out just what this task would be. Both had agreed that because of the Stinger missile array that Grigori carried, it would involve the shooting down of some type of prototype Imperialist bomber. This made sense to Grigori, who was quite content to wait for their arrival on the Volga to find out the precise nature of their goal. Patience was a virtue he had learned quite early in his military career.
Grigori’s thoughts were broken by the sudden activation of the intercom system. A penetrating electronic buzz sounded over the guttural whine of the turbojets. It was easily loud enough to awaken his two slumbering coworkers. While their heads popped up to see what the disturbance was all about, Grigori stood, and with his back hunched over so that he wouldn’t hit the low roof, maneuvered himself over to the forward bulkhead. He picked up the red plastic receiver and spoke into its transmitter loudly.
“Yes, comrade, this is Lieutenant Yagoda speaking.”