She wasn’t dead.
She gradually became conscious of the laptop computer still clutched against her ribs. She unfolded her arms and opened the computer. Her movements were jerky, as her muscles were still flushed with unneeded adrenaline. That must be why she was feeling slightly giddy.
She smiled weakly to herself, and looked at her computer. Mouse’s friendly green triangle symbol stared back at her from the screen. Her child had reached the bus stop safely. He was ready for his mother to take him home for milk and cookies.
Ann was fine. She was alive. Mouse was fine. And now they’d pick him up and bring him home for cookies.
Ann giggled at the thought. Her laughter was shrill, and oddly modulated. It dragged on long after real humor would have failed, but she couldn’t seem to make herself stop.
People were beginning to stare at her now, but her mind had become a disconnected jumble of missiles, and cookies, and exploding airplanes, and milk-drinking robots. Out there somewhere in the pre-dawn darkness, the mangled bodies of the jet pilots would be sinking through the waves … settling to the bottom of the sea.
The laughter died as suddenly as if someone had flipped a switch. Ann felt slightly dizzy. She took a deep breath to clear her head. She let it out slowly, deciding as she did so that it seemed to be working; her thoughts were becoming a little less manic.
And then she vomited all over the floor of Combat Information Center.
CHAPTER 46
Sergiei Mikhailovich Zhukov hurled the clipboard toward the lieutenant who had just handed it to him, not ten seconds earlier. The clipboard sailed past the young officer’s head, missing his left cheek by less than a centimeter. It was a tribute to the man’s training that he neither ducked nor flinched.
“They did what?” Zhukov screamed.
The officer continued to stand at attention. “Comrade President, they have shot down three of our fighter planes. MiG-31s, flying out of Yelizovo. The fourth plane was fired upon, but not damaged. It escaped and returned to base.”
“Who?” Zhukov yelled. “Who fired upon my planes?”
“We do not know, Comrade President,” the lieutenant said. “The planes were patrolling the southern edge of the ice pack, in accordance with your standing defense plan, sir. They encountered a surface vessel of some kind, operating without lights and without radar near the ice. The vessel was within the exclusion area, and it was not one of ours, so the planes attacked it with missiles, per your orders.”
Zhukov nodded curtly. “And?”
“A missile battle ensued, Comrade President. Three of our planes were shot down. The pilot of the fourth plane believes that the unidentified vessel may have been a missile boat. He reports that the radar signature was much too small for a major combatant ship. The pilot is unable to identify the country of origin.”
“I see,” Zhukov said. His voice was deathly quiet now. “And where is this pilot?”
“In his quarters at Yelizovo air station,” the lieutenant said. “Having a vodka, I imagine. His comrades were killed in front of his eyes. I understand that he is quite shaken.”
“I’m sure he is,” Zhukov said. He ran a hand through his hair and cleared his throat. “Send a message to the commander of the air station at Yelizovo. I want the pilot taken out in the snow and shot, within the hour.”
The lieutenant cocked his head “Sir?”
“We are facing the enemies who brought down the Soviet Empire,” Zhukov said. “We cannot defeat them with incompetence and cowardice. The fool should have pressed the attack, not run away like a frightened child.”
He glared into the lieutenant’s eyes. “Have the pilot shot. Do it now.”
The young lieutenant swallowed and snapped out a salute. “Right away, Comrade President.” He made an abrupt about-face, and marched from the room.
CHAPTER 47
“More coffee, ma’am?” The wardroom mess attendant held out a silver pot and tipped it slightly forward, indicating that he was ready to pour. It was the young Sailor who had escorted Ann and Sheldon from the flight deck to the wardroom on their return to the ship.
Ann looked at her watch and shook her head. It was time, maybe a couple of minutes past time. The Navy guys would already be out there on the boat deck, standing around in the cold and the dark, wondering what was keeping that crazy civilian woman.
Ann knew the answer to that question, but she didn’t want to admit it. Not even to herself. She was afraid.
The ship had been sailing north at high speed since an hour before sundown. Now they were back up near the ice pack again, not far from the area where they’d been attacked at the end of Mouse’s last run. Those fighter jets — or others like them — were still out there somewhere, and now they were alerted to the presence of U.S. warships in the area. Last time, the planes had stumbled across the ship by blind chance. This time, they would know exactly what they were looking for. They would be waiting.
Ann discovered that she was waiting too. Her ears were waiting for the distant growl of jet engines and the shuddering roar of launching missiles. Her muscles were waiting — preparing themselves to re-experience the paralysis that had been her body’s fear response to the aircraft attack. Her stomach was waiting to void itself of the breakfast and coffee that she’d foolishly allowed herself to consume. And her soul was waiting for that liminal moment — the critical threshold at which her fellow voyagers would either kill, or be killed, or both.
She looked at her watch again. She was definitely late, now. It was time to go out there and do her job. She decided to stand up and get it over with, but was surprised to find herself still sitting in the wardroom chair. Her body seemed to be on strike.
She frowned, and grabbed the arms of her chair, ready to push herself to a standing position. And found herself still seated.
She was still puzzling over this when the young Sailor spoke.
He set the coffee pot on the table. “Ma’am, can I ask you a question?”
Ann nodded.
“Are you…” the Sailor halted in mid-question. He swallowed, and spoke again. “How did you end up working on robots?”
Ann had almost no skill for reading people, but she knew instantly that this was not what the kid really wanted to ask. He had changed his mind at the last second, shied away from his real question — whatever that was.
She decided to answer him anyway.
“When I was about ten years old, I saw this movie called ‘Silent Running.’ Have you ever seen it?”
“I don’t think so,” the Sailor said. “Is that one of those old submarine flicks? Like ‘The Enemy Below,’ or something like that?”
“No,” Ann said. “It’s science fiction. It’s about the future, when the Earth is so polluted that the atmosphere can’t support trees or plants any more.”
The mess attendant waited for her to continue.
“There are these giant spaceships in orbit,” Ann said. “They carry all that’s left of the world’s forests in these enormous geodesic domes. And on one of those ships is this guy named Freeman Lowell. He’s sort of a botanist and ecologist. He takes care of the forests.”