He sobbed. "Yes, Momma."
She stroked his hair. "In all things, do you trust your mother, Julian?"
"Oh, yes, Momma, I trust you."
She continued stroking his fine blond hair. "I have something to tell you, Julian. A secret. Something so secret I could not tell you before now. A secret you must never tell anyone. Since your father died last year, there are only you and I now. Do you understand, my son? Only you and I. If you ever tell anyone this secret, the Americans will come and take us away, and we would be separated forever. Do you want that to happen, Julian?"
Frightened, Julian hugged her tightly. "Oh, no, Momma, no."
"Can I tell you the secret, my son? The very special secret? The secret you must not share with anyone? Ever?"
Slowly, Julian nodded.
"Good," his mother whispered, then repeated, "Good. Now tell me, Julian, do you hate the American boys that hurt you?"
He hugged her. "Oh, yes, Momma. I hate them. They called me a Polack."
She took his face in her hands. "You must hate them, Julian. You must hate them and all of their kind, for all of your life. They are Americans, Julian. They are evil people. All of them. They are poison on this world. And all of your life you must hate them and never become one of them. Do you understand me?"
Julian nodded. "I hate them, Mother. I will always hate them. They hurt me. I will never be one of them. I am Polish."
She stared into his eyes with an incredible intensity now. "No, Julian. No, my son. You are not Polish."
Puzzled, the boy stared back. "If… if I am not Polish… then what… what am I, Momma?"
Her eyes were like burnt embers as they held his gaze. "This is the secret, Julian. You are about to learn your true identity. Your true destiny. You were born in this country, my son, but you are not an American. And you are not Polish. You are something special. Something so very, very special."
Totally bewildered now, the boy stared back and asked, "What am I, Mother?"
She kissed him on the forehead, and ever so softly she whispered, "You are a Russian."
Iceberg came awake with a start to see beads of perspiration floating around his face in a weightless dance. It took him a few seconds to realize that he was in the cockpit of the Intrepid, for the dream had been so incredibly real. He closed his eyes and sighed before murmuring, "Yes, Mother… I am a Russian."
Little Julian's indoctrination began the very same day he learned of his true heritage. And every day following, for an hour, sometimes two, sometimes three, Victoria Kapuscinski would drum into her son, over and over, the evils of America. How the rich exploited the poor. How the Americans let the Nazis overrun Mother Russia before lifting a finger to help. How the ruling American elite kept the masses hypnotized with a gagging river of patriotic propaganda. How the capitalist system fostered violent criminals. How the American "democracy" was an illusion the wealthy used to stay in power. And, finally, Victoria told Julian the story of her own life, and how her mission from the Generalissimo was now his mission.
With the father dead, the bond between mother and son fused until it was rock-hard — they were each other's lifeboat in a hostile land. She tightly controlled his access to the "outside world." There was no television or radio in the house. With her hidden source of money, Victoria placed Julian in a small, all-male private school that emphasized academics. She dropped him off when classes began every morning and picked him up immediately afterward. Girls were to be avoided.
It was these three elements — his isolation, the sense of purpose that was drummed into him, and his life-raft relationship with his mother — that crystallized Julian Kapuscinski's acceptance that he was truly a Russian.
And turned him into a borderline psychotic.
The technician checked the readout on his oscilloscope for the fifth and final time. It was correct, and he turned to his superior. "All warhead systems are verified, Comrade Major."
"Disconnect it," came the reply.
The technician unscrewed the coaxial cables from the bottom of the cone-shaped object and clambered down the platform ladder with his equipment. T\vo airmen unblocked the wheels of the carriage platform and began rolling the antisatellite warhead toward the SS-N-9 liquid-fuel booster vehicle. Major So-molya, looking like a munchkin in his winter uniform, closely supervised the transport. Using an electric-powered motor carriage — which was about the size of a Mack truck — the two technicians guided the base of the warhead inch by inch onto the "headless" booster. Finally it was in place.
"In position, Major!" yelled one of the technicians.
The major motioned to another airman at the booster's midsection, where an open panel exposed some switches and dials. "Seal it!" commanded Somolya. The airman threw a switch which triggered a pneumatic ring seal around the base of the warhead. A chunnnggg! sound was heard as the ring seal popped into place. Now the ASAT warhead was permanently attached to its maneuvering rocket, which was also the final stage of the SS-N-9 booster.
"Close it up, Valery."
"At once, Major." The airman shut and secured the panel door.
"Commence transport," ordered Somolya.
American launch centers typically use large "crawler" track vehicles to transport missiles to their launch pads, but Russians utilize a system of rails and locomotives to carry their rockets from assembly hangars to pad. A diesel engine fired up and began pushing the SS-N-9 rocket through the hangar doors and into the bitteriy cold night.
Plesetsk was situated in the far northern latitudes — not too far from the Arctic Circle. At this time of year the sun rose late and disappeared early. The cold was a nuisance for the missile crews, but they were used to it. The Soviet Union was far and away the technological leader in winter launches. The Challenger disaster had occurred when it was launched in the middle of an unusual Florida cold snap. The frigid weather prevented the O-ring of its solid rocket booster from sealing properly, and the Challenger went down. It was a painful lesson in cold-weather launches.
Although smaller than Baikonur, Plesetsk possessed dozens of launch pads and was the world's busiest spaceport. If the Kennedy Space Center was the Neiman-Marcus of space travel, then Plesetsk was K mart, designed for high-volume traffic. It handled the bulk of Soviet military payloads, such as optical reconnaissance and electronic listening satellites, and fired off a rocket approximately every six days. Therefore the SS-N-9 booster rolling out of the hangar did not arouse undue suspicion.
Upon reaching the pad, it took about six minutes for the missile to be raised into place by a telescoping hydraulic jack. Once it was in position against the tall gantry tower, a starfish network of smaller gantries closed around the base of the booster to hold it in place until launch. The major watched the scene under the glaring klieg lights while technicians in the gantry attached the dimethylhydrazine, nitrous oxide, and nitric acid fuel lines. An electronic umbilical was also plugged into the side of the rocket. It was through this umbilical that the missile's vital signs would be monitored by the launch bunker.
The President frowned. "Are you sure there isn't a better way, Admiral?"