He watched one of the two, a corporal, move toward the door, then through it. The remaining soldier had lit a cigarette, taken a flask from the pocket of his parka. He swigged violently, wiped his chin, licked the back of his hand. Gant stepped down from the oil drum, crept cautiously along the side of the hangar. Returning moonlight searched him out. The wind slapped his parka's skirts against the building's wall, and he grabbed the garment closer around him. Paused at the corner.
Listened.
… say neither of them's capable of flying… bits missing, sir. I don't know what bits, sir. Sorry, sir….." The man's words were interrupted or accompanied by a tinny squeak from the UAZ's radio. The corporal was standing by the vehicle, leaning against the door, microphone in his hand, the other hand scratching his cheek. "That's what he said, sir, the collective's engineer. Neither of them can fly. What, sir? OK, until further orders, yes, sir. Over and out." He threw the microphone into the cab of the UAZ. Gant darted back into the shadows of the hangar. His whole chest and stomach seemed empty as he heard the corporal call out: "Ivan. Officer says we're to stay here until further orders. Have a break, he says, but stay sharp. Suits me."
Until further orders.
Gant was trapped, separated from the Antonov, unless he killed both of them. And if he did that, he'd raise the alarm for certain. As soon as they failed to call in — every hour, half hour, every fifteen minutes? — the gunships would come looking for him, certain of his whereabouts. He couldn't kill them. He couldn't do anything.
"We are at T minus three hours, final countdown continues."
Wild cheering, as if the words had released tensions in a great wave that rushed through mission control. Priabin felt battered by its strength. On screen after screen, in front of him and to each side, the shuttle stood atop its massive booster stages. The last of the liquid oxygen fumed away from the flanks of the vast machine, the skeletal gantry threw its shadows down the checkerboard pattern on the missile's side. The cheering went on, deafening and exaggerated. Even the guard at his side had a wide grin on his face, as he puffed at his cigarette. Priabin ignored the cigarette the guard had given him. On the huge fiber-optic map twenty feet away, the undulating course of the American shuttle Atlantis across the planet looked like the measurement of a regular sine wave.
Rodin's voice was amplified and mechanical over the PA, but still betrayed the man's excitement as it reached every part of the room.
"Gentlemen, we are on schedule," he announced. A renewed ripple of applause as he stated the self-evident, luxuriating in it. Priabin could see the general, behind glass like a zoo exhibit, looking out at his kingdom. "We shall be commencing the transfer of the liquid hydrogen to the booster stages in approximately two minutes' time. The Raketoplans crew will be boarding the craft within the next five minutes. Thank you, gentlemen. Keep up the good work." More applause, sounding now like a frantic desire to maintain an already overheated emotional atmosphere. Dying away reluctantly.
On one screen, the vehicle carrying the three members of the shuttle's crew drew up at the base of the launch gantry. Priabin watched as the men, already suited and helmeted, and carrying their life-support packs like white suitcases, lumbered toward the elevator to take them the hundred or more meters to the shuttle. From the television monitor, there was faint cheering from the ground personnel. Priabin looked at his guard, then drew heavily on his cigarette. His face and body's aches had subsided into a general discomfort. Rodin had even had a nurse to dab his cuts and bruises, inspect the darkened flesh over ribs and buttocks, and pronounce upon the degree of injury Serov had inflicted. One damaged rib, otherwise no more than heavy bruising and abrasions. There was sticking plaster on his forehead, but the stinging of the antiseptics and the adrenaline solution to stem the blood flowing from his cleaned cuts had faded.
Rodin had talked to him; wary of him, massively resentful at some moments, indifferent at others. But though he had Priabin guarded, he did not have him removed to a cell. Nor handed back to Serov. As if he wanted Priabin to see him succeed, witness every foment of Lightning. And yet it seemed that Rodin himself was Ptagued by something other than the launch. His son, Priabin suspected. He did not wish to hear about him, he was able for long foments to ignore his son's death, but the thought seemed to keep burning to him.
Priabin turned to look across the room toward Serov's windows.
The security monitoring unit of mission control was raised above the main floor. A row of tinted windows. He could see nothing more than occasional shadows passing back and forth behind the glass. He had not prevented Serov from continuing the search for Gant. Rodin had ignored — or suppressed — what he had said concerning the GRU colonel's murder of his son. Perhaps the idea cast doubt on too many of Rodin's unthinking beliefs?
He turned back. Rodin had left his glass booth and was walking toward him and his guard, who snapped to attention. Priabin was immediately attentive. Rodin's walk was stiff, paradelike, as if he were too aware that others were watching him. Yet he barely acknowledged the smiles and salutes that hemmed him like a corridor. He marched directly toward Priabin, halting in front of him.
He paused only to wave the guard aside. "Come," he ordered. There appeared little strength in his voice. Priabin walked at his side.
They mounted the steps between the amphitheatrical ranks of consoles and their operators. Instructions, repeated acknowledgments, orders, measurements hummed around them. It was difficult to catch what Rodin was saying in a quiet, unfamiliar voice. Priabin strained to hear.
"… a priority message — came two hours ago… didn't regard it as important, only just read it — wife….." The telemetry, the countdown, the shuttle's status, the voice of the mission commander as he boarded the craft, rising and falling like waves. Priabin could not believe what he heard; more, could not believe the voice in which the information was relayed to him. The launch became unimportant."… hospital, suffering from an overdose — my wife?" The tone of querulous inquiry was hard to accept as real."… took sleeping pills — rushed her to hospital… critical, they say…
Priabin halted beside Rodin at the top of the steps. Cigarette smoke hung heavily there, despite the air-conditioning. The noises of the room were murmurous, oppressive, as was its temperature. Incredible. Rodin seemed out of his depth. Stunned and incapable. Priabin glanced quickly toward the tinted windows of the security room. Now, now he could finish Serov, with Rodin in his present state of numbed shock. Now.
Something started him into wakefulness. Drugged as he seemed, he knew immediately he must make no noise. He rubbed his face roughly, cleared his eyes into focus. Pale light from the low moon illuminated the doors of the hangar and the UAZ still parked in front of them. And the opening of the small door and the form of one of the GRU men coming through it; eating and stretching luxuriously.
The bleep of the radio's signal had summoned the man and awakened Gant. A tinny voice succeeded the signal, which had itself sounded impatient. The voice was sharp and near on the icy air. The wind appeared to have dropped, as clouds galleoned slowly across the stars.
He listened. The tractor's rusty red body and huge rear wheels masked him even more effectively than the shadows of the pines beneath which he sat, wrapped in the folds of the parka, hood over his head and face. He had eaten the chocolate and crackers from the emergency rations, kept the stale taste of inactivity and impending defeat from his mouth with the water bottle. Ordinary, ludicrous things. He had done them because there was nothing else; he could not kill them and give the alarm, he could not reach the Antonov, he could not fit the battery, he could not fill the chemical tank with fuel, he could not tow it to the fuel dump by using the tractor— which others had used, its towbar indicated. The pieces of the puzzle lay about him and he knew its solution; but was powerless to act.