Lewinsky pursed his lips. “No way this will work, Captain. Odds are, we lose the mines and the divers. I wouldn’t want to be at the board of inquiry for that mission failure.”
“I worry about it working even if the SEALs are healthy,” Quinnivan said. “Fishman’s description? Jaysus, I’d rather just fire a fookin’ torpedo at the bloke and be done with it. This whole mine scheme was thought up by an academic in a Pentagon basement cubicle. It’s nuts.”
“He said they’d practiced it on submerged submarines,” Lewinsky said.
“He didn’t tell us how many times they failed in practice,” Quinnivan noted. “I’m going to call the Panther lads to my stateroom and break the news to them, that they’re a backup contingency.”
“Dankleff will be happy to hear that,” Seagraves said. “Mr. Pacino and Mr. Varney? Not so much.”
“Hey, Skipper,” Quinnivan said, grinning, “what does your American Coast Guard say? You have to go out. You don’t have to come back.”
Seagraves laughed. “I’m sure that expression will be a great comfort to Pacino and Varney.”
Vice President Michael Pacino climbed down the stairs from the forward hatch of the massive 747, Air Force Two. The bright sunshine of Moscow in September at noon was blinding. One of the Secret Service agents asked if Pacino wanted sunglasses, but he shook his head. There was a minimal greeting party at the airstrip. The American ambassador, Alphonse Captiva, was there to shake Pacino’s hand. Captiva was a holdover from the previous administration whom Carlucci kept on because the Russians liked him. He was a former senator from New York who always had been surrounded by whispered rumors of his connection to the New York City mob families, but there had never been any solid evidence of any wrongdoing. The Russian prime minister turned out, a dull functionary named Platon Melnik, who had been briefly president of Russia when Vostov’s first two terms ended, the constitution at the time mandating that he step down. During Melnik’s four years as president, Vostov had had the constitution amended to allow for longer presidential terms. When Vostov had won the next election, he’d put his crony Melnik into the prime minister seat and used him as a mouthpiece for Vostov’s policies.
Pacino shook Melnik’s hand, and Melnik told him in accented English that Vostov was waiting for him at the Kremlin. The motorcade consisted of the armored and bulletproof limousines the U.S. president used, flown in alongside Air Force Two in the cargo hold of a C17 Globemaster II Air Force freighter. Pacino climbed into the presidential limo and looked out the window at the scenery of Moscow from the airport Vostov had recently commissioned. The ride was short. Pacino yawned, the ride from D.C. to Moscow exhausting despite the luxury of the jet, his jetlag not helping.
The journey from the entrance to the Kremlin gates to Vostov’s temporary office was a blur. To Pacino, it felt like he was falling down a tunnel of dark paneled high-ceilinged hallways, some walls painted hunter green, massive paintings of former Russian officials on the walls, dozens of curious suit-clad aides greeting him. He nodded and smiled as he passed. Be a diplomat, he reminded himself. Finally, the procession of Pacino, his Secret Service guards and the Kremlin’s SBP guards, arrived at Vostov’s office suite. Pacino had read that Vostov had commandeered it from Melnik, the offices belonging to the prime minister, but Vostov’s office would be under construction for the next year to repair the damage from the assassin’s bomb, and to upgrade its security and make it invulnerable to electronic eavesdropping.
Finally, the last heavy mahogany door opened and Pacino found himself in Vostov’s office, face-to-face with the Russian president. Vostov was nondescript, neither handsome nor ugly, Pacino thought. He could have been cast by Hollywood as an aging accountant. He was slightly shorter than Pacino, but outweighed him by at least fifty pounds, much of it gathered around his middle. He was jowly, mostly balding, but had an expressive face that had curled into an appearance of bright happiness. Of course his face was expressive, Pacino thought — he was, after all, a politician at the top rung of a superpower.
“Mr. President,” Pacino said, smiling and stretching out his hand, “thank you for meeting me. It’s a pleasure to meet you in person.”
Vostov smiled even wider and gripped Pacino’s hand in a firm, dry handshake. “Vice President Pacino, the pleasure is all mine. Please forgive my English if I stumble or search for words.” Vostov’s English was perfect, Pacino noted. “I arranged for us to meet alone, one-on-one, man-to-man. I thought we could achieve an understanding this way. Normally my chief of staff would be in here with us, but she unfortunately died in the explosion. Not a week after my wife passed away in the terrorist incident.” Vostov’s face fell as he said the last remarks.
Pacino looked solemnly at Vostov. “I came to convey my — and President Carlucci’s — deep condolences on the loss of your wife, sir, and your chief of staff. I sympathize, Mr. President. My late wife Eileen was suddenly killed in an interstate accident. I felt like I was in a walking coma for a year afterward.”
“Please, Mr. Vice President, have a seat,” Vostov said, gesturing to a grouping of deep leather club chairs near a fireplace. “May I offer you a drink? We have the best vodka on the planet, but also the best scotch outside Scotland, and the finest bourbon outside your province of Kentucky.”
“Sir, I’ll have what you’re having,” Pacino said, smiling as he sat. Vostov poured two glasses of vodka and handed one to Pacino.
“A toast,” Vostov said, “to fallen comrades.”
Pacino and Vostov drank. Vostov refilled the glasses. “And another toast, to new friendships, yes?”
“Yes, Mr. President, absolutely,” Pacino said, taking a second sip.
“When we’re here together, alone, please call me Dimmi,” Vostov said.
“As for me, please call me Patch,” Pacino replied.
Vostov smiled. “So be it, Patch. Your wife Eileen, I’m sorry for your loss. That happened just before your East China Sea war, didn’t it? I was made to believe you were in supreme command of United States forces for that conflict, yes?”
“That’s correct, Dimmi. I was.”
“Well, one thing about losing your wife in a sudden accident, Patch. At least you didn’t find yourself in the situation of having to make decisions that would lead to her death. With Lorena? I had to decide whether to send in my counterterrorist troops and risk her dying in the crossfire, or trying to negotiate with the terrorists who took her. I lie awake at night and wonder what would have happened if I’d made the second decision. Maybe my Lorena would still be with me.”
“You know, Dimmi, my son Anthony told me a story that might give you some consolation. I wonder if I could take a moment to tell it.”
“Your boy is quite a hero, if I remember my briefing,” Vostov said. “Won the Navy Cross in that nasty Piranha sinking. I imagine you’re very proud of him.”
Interesting, Pacino thought, that Vostov left out mention of Anthony’s role in the Panther operation. Certainly, the Russian president must know about that. “Yes, sir, I am,” Pacino said. “He’s quite an officer.”
“Well, please, tell me the story he had.” Vostov refilled their glasses again. Pacino wondered if he’d get so drunk he’d be on the floor after an hour.
“This story was told to my son by this tough-guy commando, a man named Fishman. According to Fishman, our lives change dramatically with every major decision. Whether to go to college. Whether to join the military. To marry this woman or that. To take this job or that. In Fishman’s view, when a decision is made, a new universe is created with the new reality formed by the aftermath of the decision. But also, a second universe is created at the same time, where the other decision is made. And both lives continue on in those separate worlds. And over a lifetime, there might be a hundred thousand separate worlds formed by different major decisions. Fishman told my son to imagine what he called a ‘base life.’ In that base life, the person makes very safe decisions with no risk, and the person lives to a ripe old age, dies and goes on to the afterlife. And in Fishman’s version of the afterlife, that man who lived the base life wonders what would have happened to his life if he had made different decisions, and he looks over the results of all the other life realities and he sees which life turned out to be the best. And by seeing all those other lives, all those other realities, he learns everything to be learned by the experiences arising from all those other decisions, and he comes to know peace and to grow. The person’s soul is reunited with all the personalities who made different decisions. In the view of Fishman, the very universe you are living in right now is only one universe out of thousands in the story of your lifetime. So in another reality, a reality that is happening right now, there is another you that made the other decision. You can’t know how that turned out until you find yourself in the afterlife, but at that point you will know. And for all we know, that reality could have turned out much worse.”