The Icarus Agenda

The Czech had casually gone into the comfortable preflight lounge where the elite passengers waited in luxury before takeoff. He inquired about the Grinell plane, and the attractive clerk behind the counter was far more co-operative than he had expected.

'Are you on the flight, sir?' she had asked, about to type his name into her computer.

'No, I'm only here to deliver some legal papers.'

'Oh, then I suggest you go down to Hangar Seven. Mr. Grinell rarely calls in here; he goes straight to preclearance and then to the aircraft when it's rolled out for inspection.'

'If you could direct me…?'

'We'll have one of our carts drive you down.'

'I'd prefer to walk, if you don't mind. I'd like to stretch my legs.'

'Suit yourself, but stay in the street. Security here is touchy and there are all kinds of alarms.'

'I'll run from streetlight to streetlight,' Milos said, smiling. 'Okay?'

'Not a bad idea,' the girl replied. 'Last week a Beverly Hills hotshot got juiced in here and wanted to walk, too. He took a wrong turn and ended up in the San Diego jail.'

'For simply walking?'

'Well, he had some funny pills on him—’

'I don't even have aspirin.'

'Go outside, turn right to the first street, and right again. It's the last hangar on the edge of the strip. Mr. Grinell has the best location. I wish he'd come in here more often.'

'He's a very private person.'

'He's invisible, that's what he is.'

Varak kept glancing around while nodding his head at the drivers of carts and low-slung motor scooters who approached him from both directions, some slowing down, others rushing past. He saw what he wanted to see. There were trip lights between the row of hangars on the right, connecting beams from opposing short poles in the ground designed to look like demarcations—of what? wondered the Czech. Lawns between suburban houses of the future where neighbour feared neighbour? On the left side of the street there was nothing but a vacant expanse of tall grass that bordered an auxiliary runway. It would be his way out of the private field once his business was concluded.

The clerk at the preflight lounge had been accurate, Milos mused, as he neared the immense open doors of the final hangar. Grinell's plane was in the best location. Once cleared, the aircraft could move out to the field through the opposite door, take off subject only to control by the tower—no minutes wasted during slow hours. Some of the rich had it better than he had thought.

Two uniformed guards stood inside the hangar at the edge of the drive where the tarmac met the concrete floor of the interior. Beyond them a Rockwell jet with men crawling over its silver wings stood immobile, a metal bird soon to soar up into the night sky. Milos studied the guards' uniforms; they were neither federal nor municipal; they were from a private security firm. The realization gave birth to another thought, as he noted that one of the men was quite large and very full in the waist and shoulders. Nothing was lost in trying; he had reached his post for the kill, but how much more satisfying it would be to execute a traitor at close range, making certain of the execution.

Varak walked casually down the asphalt towards the imposing entrance of the hangar. Both guards stepped forward, one crushing out a cigarette under his foot.

'What's your business here?' asked the large man on the Czech's right.

'Business, I think,' answered Varak pleasantly. 'Rather confidential business, I believe.'

'What does that mean?' said the shorter guard on the left.

'You'll have to ask Mr. Grinell, I'm afraid. I'm merely a messenger and I was told to speak to only one person who should convey the information to Mr. Grinell when he arrives.'

'More of that bullshit,' added the shorter patrol to his companion. 'If you got papers or cash, you gotta get 'em pre-cleared. They find somethin' on the plane they don't know about, it don't head out, and Mr. Grinell will explode, you get me?'

'Loud and clear, my friend. I have only words that must be repeated accurately. Do you get me?'

'So talk.'

'One person,' said Varak. 'And I choose him,' continued Milos, pointing at the large man.

'He's dumb. Take me.'

'I was told whom to choose.'

'Shit!'

'Please come with me,' said the Czech, gesturing to the right behind the trip lights. 'I'm to record our conversation but without anyone in earshot.'

'Why don't you tell the boss himself?' objected the overlooked guard on the left. 'He'll be here in a couple of minutes.'

'Because we're never to meet face to face—anywhere. Would you care to ask him about it?'

'More bullshit.'

Once around the corner of the hangar, Varak raised his cupped left hand. 'Would you please speak directly into this?' he said, again pleasantly.

'Sure, mister.'

They were the last words the guard would remember. The Czech sent the hard flat base of his right hand into the man's shoulder blade, following the blow with three chops to his throat and a final, two-knuckled assault on his upper eyelids. The guard collapsed, and Varak swiftly began to remove his clothes. A minute and twenty seconds later he was overdressed in the large man's private security uniform; he cuffed the trouser legs and shoved up his sleeves, pulling the uniform over his wrists. He was ready.

Forty seconds later a black limousine drove down the street and stopped at the base of the asphalt entrance to the hangar. The Czech moved out of the shadows and walked slowly into the chiaroscuro light. A man emerged from the huge car, and although Milos had never seen him, he knew that man was Crayton Grinell.

'Hi, boss!' yelled the guard at the left of the hangar as the overcoated grey-faced figure walked quickly, angrily across the tarmac. 'We got your message; Benny's recording something—'

'Why isn't the goddamned plane out on the strip?' roared Grinell. 'Everything's cleared, you idiots!'

'Benny talked to them, boss, I didn't! Five, ten minutes, they told him. It would have been different if I was on the phone! Shit, I don't put up with no shit, you know what I mean? You should'a told that guy to speak to me, that Benny—'

'Shut up! Get my driver and tell him to move this son of a bitch out! If they can't fly it, he can!'

'Sure, boss. Anything you say, boss!'

As the guard started shouting to the driver the Czech joined the rush of activity and began running towards the outsized car.

'Thanks!' cried the passing chauffeur, seeing Varak's uniform. 'He goes on at the last minute!'

Milos raced around the boot of the car to the street side, yanked open the back door, and leaped inside to a jump seat. He sat rigid, staring at the puffed face of the astonished Eric Sundstrom. 'Hello, Professor,' he said softly.

'It was a trap—you set a trap for me!' screamed the scientist in the dark shadows of the car. 'But you don't know what you're doing, Varak! We're on the edge of a breakthrough in space! So many wondrous things to learn! We were wrong—Inver Brass is wrong! We must go on!'

'Even if we blow up half the planet?'

'Don't be an ass!' cried Sundstrom, pleading. 'Nobody's going to blow up anything! We're civilized people on both sides, civilized and frightened. The more we build, the more fear we instil—that's the world's ultimate protection, don't you see?'

'You call that civilized?'

'I call it progress. Scientific progress! You wouldn't understand, but the more we build the more we learn.'

'Through weapons of destruction?'

'Weapons…? You're pitifully naive! “Weapons” is merely a label. Like “fish” or “vegetables”. It's the excuse we employ to fund scientific advancement on a scale that would be otherwise prohibitive! The bigger bang for the buck theory is obsolete—we have all the bang we'll ever need. It's in the delivery systems—orbital guidance and hookups, directional lasers that can be refracted in space to pinpoint a manhole cover from thousands of miles above.'