Marcus couldn’t remember thinking about such things in the Marines or the Secret Service. He’d done his job and done it to the best of his ability. He’d never second-guessed the morality of the mission. The Taliban were sheer evil. Al Qaeda was worse. Each person he took out had been a clean kill, casualties of a military conflict. Marcus was more than willing to give up his own life to protect his country and her leaders. But the deaths of his wife and son had changed everything. Studying with Pastor Emerson and the vets on Wednesdays back in Lincoln Park had changed him too. These days he thought a great deal about eternity. Why, then, had he not thought of Oleg’s fate? He felt uncertain and ashamed.
Petrovsky got more bad news the moment he arrived at the Defense Ministry.
The air force had been scrambled, but the plane carrying Oleg Stefanovich still had not been found. There were just too many planes in the sky at the moment, too much clutter and confusion over Moscow and the western skies. It was like finding a needle in a haystack, he was told.
He went ballistic. “Get every plane on the ground—now,” he ordered.
He turned on every TV in his office. Fortunately, news of the assassinations had not yet broken. A quick check of multiple channels confirmed that, but Petrovsky knew the story would not hold for long. He had already called Luganov’s chief of staff and persuaded him to summon the entire cabinet for an emergency meeting at the Kremlin without giving any hint as to the reason. At the same time, he knew Kropatkin—now operating as acting director of the FSB—had made it crystal clear to his men that anyone who leaked this news would be guilty of treason and would be executed without a trial.
The one person he worried about most was Katya Slatsky, who had been taken to the Kremlin after the debacle at the airport. She had to be isolated indefinitely. If there was one person who could leak the whole thing prematurely and not care in the slightest about the implications, it was she. Petrovsky thus ordered Kropatkin to send someone to Luganov’s private chambers at the Kremlin, drug her, and keep her drugged until they could figure out exactly what to do with her. Kropatkin didn’t flinch but vowed to carry out the orders at once.
Meanwhile, Petrovsky issued written orders for all Russian military forces to cease their exercises and begin withdrawing from the borders of the Baltics and Ukraine. To the outside world, such actions would look entirely consistent with what Luganov had been saying publicly. The inner circle of high government officials, he knew, might believe Petrovsky had orchestrated a coup d’état to stop a war they knew he did not support. He did it anyway. The hours ahead would be chaotic enough. There was no guarantee he would wind up at the top of the Kremlin’s greasy pole, but if there was anything he could do while still alive and in power to defuse the prospect of nuclear war with NATO, he was bound and determined to do it.
97
RUSSIAN AIRSPACE—29 SEPTEMBER
“It’s time,” Marcus said.
He explained to Morris and Oleg exactly what was happening and how little time they had to decide their fate. As he did, the Gulfstream hit a bit of turbulence. The plane shook for a few moments—worrying an already-rattled Oleg—then stabilized again.
Just then, Marcus’s satphone rang. He answered it, gave a nine-digit code proving his identity, listened carefully, acknowledged the message, and hung up. He raced back to the cockpit. Seconds later, a series of alarms started sounding and lights began flashing. These had nothing to do with the standard avionics package. The plane’s sophisticated radar system had been installed by technicians at Langley. It was not unlike the ones used by American fighter jets and even Air Force One.
From the back, Oleg shouted a message from Jenny. “Turn off the autopilot.”
Marcus did, then flicked a series of other switches and a new radar display flickered to life. Gone were the weather data and the images of the massive snowstorm hitting the northwestern provinces of Russia. Now he was staring at a display showing two blips forty miles back and gaining fast.
“What’s that?” Oleg demanded, suddenly standing behind Marcus.
“Go finish getting her ready,” Marcus replied. He didn’t have time for explanations.
Reluctantly Oleg agreed. The moment he left, Marcus closed the cockpit door. The blips were MiGs. The Global Operations Center at Langley had just called to alert him that they’d intercepted a series of Russian civilian and military communications. On the civilian side, the Kremlin had issued a full ground stop on all flights preparing to take off throughout the Russian Federation. They were requiring all air traffic over the country to land immediately at the nearest airport. On the military side, Russian fighter squadrons throughout the Western Military District were being scrambled and directed to hunt and shoot down any Gulfstream business jets of any description. The Magic Palace had not indicated that the fighter pilots or their weapons systems officers had been given a specific tail number. They had, however, been authorized to use any means necessary to prevent any business jets from leaving Russian airspace.
Marcus was surprised the Russians had taken this long to issue such an order. He chalked it up to the fog of war and the interruption in the chain of command Oleg had created by taking out the president and the FSB chief. But none of that mattered. Whatever delay there had been, it was over now. The MiGs were up and in hot pursuit.
He turned the yoke, banking the plane to the north, off the flight plan and away from St. Petersburg and beyond it Helsinki. There was no way he was going to let the Russians force them to land. He and Morris had discussed this in depth when they’d been planning Oleg’s extraction. If they were shot down, so be it. But under no circumstances could they let themselves or this plane and its contents be taken intact.
The fighter jets were now only thirty-two miles behind. No sooner had Marcus turned off and reset the alarms than they sounded again. He looked again to the enhanced radar screen and saw two more MiGs coming up from a base just south of St. Petersburg. These were only twenty miles out. When the alarms blared yet again, he spotted two more MiGs converging on them from the north, less than fifteen miles out. So that was that. They had no fewer than six fighter jets streaking toward them with orders to keep them from reaching international airspace at all costs. And then the radio began to squawk.
The first message came from St. Petersburg air traffic control. It was directed to all civilian flights, informing them that Russian airspace was now closed and ordering them to land immediately. Marcus was struck by the fact that Langley had gotten that message to them faster than the Russians themselves. Moments later came the second message, from the lead pilot of one of the Russian fighter jets. He spoke firmly in clear if heavily accented English: obey his orders and follow him to the nearest air force base, or be fired upon. Marcus didn’t hesitate. He took the controls, picked up the intercom, and ordered Oleg and Jenny to cinch their seat belts as tight as they could.