Fade Out (2 page)

‘By our scale of measurement, they're all huge but some are absolutely gigantic – exploding with the force of a billion H-bombs and flinging great arching plumes of molten lava tens, sometimes hundreds, of thousands of miles into space. These eruptions – which are even brighter than the sun itself – are accompanied by an equally massive blast of radiation which travels outwards like a shock wave. Twenty-six hours later, it hits the
Earth – BAM!' Wedderkind thudded his fist into an open palm.

‘I'll spare you the details of what happens in the ionosphere. Let's just say it starts quivering like a bowl of Jello. And instead of going where they should, our radar and radio waves start bouncing around all over the place. After a while it settles down – just like the Jello – and we're back in business.'

‘That's all very neat, Arnold,' said Fraser. ‘But don't we have people watching out for these things?' As Secretary of Defense, Fraser had been over at the Pentagon harrying his own experts for most of the night.

Bob Connors, a friend and ally of Wedderkind, saw him blink rapidly and adjust his glasses. A purely defensive reflex.

‘Yes. I have to admit that is one of the things that is puzzling me.'

The President waited for a few seconds then asked, ‘Do we have to guess what it is or are you going to let us in on the secret?'

‘Yeah, go ahead,' said Fraser. ‘This should be interesting.'

Wedderkind adjusted his glasses again. ‘What Mel is referring to is the fact that Mount Wilson – which constantly monitors sun-spot activity – recorded unusually large solar flares over a six-hour period last Thursday morning. As I was explaining, the resulting short-wave radiation could be expected to cause a partial fade-out in the high-frequency radar and radio wave-bands – rising to a maximum intensity some forty-five hours after the initial eruption.'

‘And did it?' Another Presidential question.

Wedderkind threw a sideways glance at Mel Fraser before answering. ‘As expected, the magnetic storm peaked around seven this morning. The problem is,
the interference, although severe, didn't even begin to compare with the level of disruption we experienced on Friday.'

‘Let me play that back to you to make sure I've understood,' said the President. ‘If whatever hit us on Friday came from the sun then it would have been picked up by the people at Mount Wilson earlier in the week. In fact, from what you're saying, the explosion, or eruption, or whatever it is, would have to have been so big it would be impossible to miss.'

‘Right…'

‘But there wasn't one…'

‘No.'

The President threw up his hands. ‘Then why are we wasting time talking about this!?'

Wedderkind leaped to his own defence. ‘Because the disruption had all the hallmarks of what happens when the Earth is hit by a heavy burst of cosmic radiation.'

‘Hold on, Arnold,' said Connors. ‘You just moved the goal posts. Don't you mean “solar” radiation?'

‘Solar, cosmic… it's the same thing.'

‘Except it wasn't a solar flare that screwed things up for us yesterday,' said Fraser, appearing to relish the fact that Wedderkind had painted himself into a corner. ‘My science is a little hazy but, as I understand it, solar radiation comes from the sun while cosmic radiation comes from some other point in the cosmos.'

‘If you want to split hairs, yes.' Wedderkind fingered the bridge of his glasses. The people at Mount Wilson and some other colleagues of mine are looking into it. Until I hear from them we can't dismiss the possibility that some, as yet undetected, solar activity is the cause of the problem. What I can state, quite categorically, is that the source of the interference lies somewhere in outer space.'

‘A meteorite, perhaps…?'

Wedderkind aimed a beady eye at Fraser. His staff over at the Pentagon had certainly been doing their homework. He turned back to the President. ‘Several stations around the world have been tracking a large incoming meteorite. It was expected to enter the Earth's atmosphere and burn up harmlessly at about 11:15 on Friday morning.'

‘About the same time we got hit by the fade-out,' said Connors. ‘Could this –?'

Wedderkind shook his head. ‘It's possible that it might have had some temporary effect on the ionosphere – and thus the propagation of radio waves – but what we're discussing is of a different order of magnitude altogether.'

All this may have been clear to Wedderkind, but it was hard going for General Wills. He pulled out a large stogy, lit up and chewed on it aggressively to combat a sudden feeling of inadequacy.

The President picked absently at the corners of his scratch-pad. ‘What d'you think, Mel?'

Fraser weighed up Connors and Wedderkind then exchanged a covert glance with the Chiefs of Staff before replying. ‘Well, we all know Arnold has stars in his eyes but – based on what my people have told me, I think we'll find the cause of the fade-out is a little nearer to home.'

‘You mean the Russians…'

‘Who else?'

Wedderkind snorted dismissively. ‘You can't be serious! Have you any idea just how – '

Fraser cut him off. ‘Why not, Arnold? They've got themselves a nice new shiny space-station up there now. I'd say that was in “outer space” – wouldn't you?'

Fraser was referring to the growing collection of space modules that had been locked on to the orbiting Russian
spacelab
Mir,
launched in 1986 to reinforce the ageing
Salyut
7. Skylab – America's answer to the Salyut program and long since abandoned – had plunged earthwards in the early eighties, burning up on re-entry. It had not been replaced and, following the disastrous loss of Challenger in February '86, NASA's space-shuttle program had slowly foundered as interest switched to the development of an orbital vehicle that could take off and land like a conventional Jumbo jet. Since the first flight was years away, the net result had been to leave the Soviet cosmonauts in sole possession of outer space.
Mir
was the Russian word for “peace” but everyone around the table knew that ever since Marx had dreamed up dialectical materialism on a wet afternoon in the British Museum, communists the world over have tended to say one thing and mean another.

President Lorenzo turned to the Navy Chief of Staff. ‘Any thoughts on this, Ed?'

Admiral Garrison tapped the file of intelligence reports into line with his notepad. ‘We don't have any data that would indicate they have developed or deployed this type of capability.'

It's in moments like this, thought the President, when I long for people who can say ‘yes' or ‘no'.

‘However – ' Garrison paused.

‘They must have a few things we don't know about.'

‘True, but – '

The President bypassed Garrison and glanced at the others around the table. ‘Is it possible for them to knock out our radar like this?'

‘You mean theoretically possible?'

‘I mean in any way possible, Arnold.' Then as Wedderkind opened his mouth, the President added, ‘Within the known limits of science.'

‘Possible, yes, but in this instance not probable.' It was
Air Force General Clayson, halfway down the table. ‘The reports from our border surveillance units all indicate total disruption of Russian radar frequencies during the same period.'

‘I know that, Chuck. They also know we're listening in. Supposing they put this whole show on for our benefit?'

‘You mean –?' Admiral Garrison was still trying to get it together.

‘This could be a dry run – just to test our response. If it
is
them, then the next time they black us out, we could be in real trouble. Right, Bob?'

Bob Connors was the President's closest aide. Some people thought he was too close. Like Mel Fraser, who faced him across the table. Connors advised the President on a wide variety of subjects that ranged from defence and foreign affairs down to what tie to wear. The State Department hated him, and so did certain people in the Defense Department. Like Mel Fraser.

Connors remained relaxed, with one arm over the back of his chair. ‘We could be, but there's no reason why we should. We have a whole raft of trade agreements, our people at Geneva say they're only a whisker away from a deal on nuclear weapons, you went to Moscow this April and only last week the Russian Ambassador confirmed that Leonovich would come to Washington next year.'

‘That's right,' said the President.

‘Hell, don't you remember – when we were over there – he said he wanted to bring his grandson and his daughter-in-law over with him so that they could visit Disneyland. I'm not saying they don't need watching but since you came into office they've responded to our approaches in a reasonably positive manner. I really don't see why they would want to pull a stunt like this.'

‘Well, it sure as hell shook me up. I know what these
bastards can do.' General Wills had helped put the original backbone into NATO. He'd been trying to keep ahead of the Russians ever since he'd faced up to them as a twenty-year-old lieutenant during the Berlin blockade back in 1948.

Clayson came back in. ‘No one could dummy up an operation this big. They couldn't risk it blowing back in their faces.'

I'm right, thought Clayson. I have to be. The Civil Aeronautics Board had reported twenty minutes of almost total confusion as civilian air traffic control centres lost radar contact with the midmorning domestic airline flights. All the European air traffic control centres had had their radarscopes wiped out too. But by some freak-weather miracle, there was almost perfect visibility right where the densest traffic happened to be. By switching to emergency procedural control on the unaffected lower-frequency radio wavelengths, the Air Traffic Control Centers had managed to keep the ball in the air. All the same, there had been some hair-raising near-misses, and although there had still been plenty of daylight over Eastern Europe, the weather had been bad.

The President sucked in his breath as Clayson described how a Moscow-bound Tupolev had sheared through an ageing Polish Airlines jet stacked up in ten-tenths cloud over Warsaw. ‘Nasty…'

‘Fortunately, they were only half full,' added Clayson.

Yeah, but they don't have to make a profit, thought Connors irreverently.

Clayson continued. ‘And Malev – the Hungarian line – lost one of their Ilyushins on a mountain top in Moldavia. Total – one hundred and ninety-five dead.'

Admiral Garrison voiced what the President was thinking. ‘Is this what
they
say? Or have we had this checked
out?' Iron Curtain countries rarely, if ever, publicized airline crashes within their borders.

‘We had an air attaché on board the Tupolev,' said Clayson.

‘Anyone I know?' asked the President. Not that it really mattered. He was thinking about the people in those three airliners. Could the Russians have knowingly sent them to their deaths? Would they? Would any government? Still, look what the Russians had lost fighting the Germans in World War Two. What was it, ten, twelve – plus the civilians – twenty million?

Set against this scale of sacrifice, what was another one hundred and ninety-five people? It would depend, he supposed, on what was at stake. The Russians had proved they were prepared to bite the bullet with the shoot-down of KAL 007. Faced with the violation of a highly sensitive segment of Russian air space they had not baulked at blowing the off-course South Korean Jumbo jet out of the sky, killing all 269 passengers and crew. With luck, he would never find himself in a similar situation. If he did, he hoped like hell that somewhere down the line was a hatchet man who would make that kind of decision for him.

Bob Connors' voice cut through further speculation. ‘I think we can reasonably take the Soviet Premier's message at face value. From what he said over the hot line, it seems pretty clear they thought we had pulled out the plug on
them.
'

‘Did you all read the transcript?'

Everyone nodded at the President.

‘As I remember it,' said Connors. ‘You ended up reassuring
him.
'

‘True.'

‘Then it backs up General Clayson's theory.'

‘Which is?'

Clayson leaned back on to the table again. ‘A temporary, total disruption of radar and ultra high-frequency radio waves on a worldwide basis caused by some as yet unknown solar-generated phenomenon.'

‘Arnold?'

‘Yes, I'll go along with that.'

‘Mel?'

‘Chuck could have the right answer,' said Fraser. ‘But I don't think we should preclude the possibility of some technological breakthrough by the Russians.' He eyed Connors briefly. ‘Even though they are making the right diplomatic noises.'

Connors stared back at him. ‘How come they had the same kind of foul-up?'

Fraser shrugged. ‘It could have been a test transmission from a secret research unit – that even the armed forces don't know about.'

That's all we need, thought Admiral Garrison. Ordinary Russian secrets are bad enough.

The President beat him to the punch line. ‘How do you propose to check this out?' asked the President.

‘The whole of Eastern Europe and Asia is covered photographically by Air Force satellites,' said Fraser. ‘We'll just have to go over every inch of the ground and re-evaluate each installation.'

‘That's a big chunk of the map. How long is that going to take?'

‘I'm gonna have to come back to you on that.'

‘Okay, but let's keep it on a short line.' The President turned to Wedderkind. ‘Do you have any ideas how we can follow up this geophysical angle?'

Wedderkind replaced his thick-framed spectacles. ‘General Clayson and I have already got a study group together on this. The top Air Force physicists are talking
it over with people from Cal Tech, MIT and NASA right now.'