Independence Day (44 page)
Katya lay unconscious on the floor. Her wrists were exposed and bleeding.
“Get the first-aid kit,” said Chalmers. “We need to land and get her to a hospital.”
Chalmers reached his arm down and moved her body, then pushed the door in. He pulled Katya out, lifted her up, and carried her to one of the leather sofas midcabin and laid her down. She was covered from her chest down in blood. He felt her neck.
“She’s still alive,” he said.
Chalmers shook her shoulders, trying to bring her out of unconsciousness. When that didn’t work, he slapped her hard across the face. Her eyes opened.
“I didn’t know,” she said. “I swear.”
“Know what?”
“Where the bomb is going. But I remember. I heard him speaking. It was through the wall.”
“Where?” asked Chalmers, pulling his cell out and dialing Calibrisi.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t know. Then I remembered.”
“Where is it going, Katya?”
“Boston.”
THE WHITE HOUSE
Calibrisi and Polk were in the small office down the hall from the Situation Room when Calibrisi’s cell vibrated. It was Chalmers.
“Hi, Derek,” said Calibrisi. “Are you in the air?”
“Yes. She gave me a target.”
Calibrisi snapped his fingers, getting Polk’s attention. He put it on speaker.
“Do you believe her?”
“Yes. She tried to commit suicide. I think she’s starting to realize that if she doesn’t help us, she’s complicit, if not legally, then morally.”
“Where’s it going?”
“Boston.”
“Does she have anything more specific?”
“No.”
Polk nodded at Calibrisi, then sprinted out of the office to the Situation Room.
“We’re going to land,” said Chalmers. “She needs medical attention.”
“You’re going to have to patch her up on the plane,” said Calibrisi. “We need to get her to Moscow.”
“She’s going to bleed to death.”
“At this point, we have the name of a city and that’s it. And who knows if it’s even the right city. Until we find that bomb, Katya is the only card we have to play. Please, Derek, get her to Moscow.”
SITUATION ROOM
THE WHITE HOUSE
Inside the Situation Room, there wasn’t a spare chair or place to stand. The mood was surprisingly calm.
In addition to President Dellenbaugh, most key White House, Pentagon, and intelligence officials were gathered. Anyone not there in person was patched in, their faces adorning plasma screens along the walls.
President Dellenbaugh was seated at the head of the large mahogany conference table. The plasma to Dellenbaugh’s right showed live video from Boston, taken from a satellite in the sky. The Boston waterfront was fully visible. All Coast Guard, FBI, police, and military assets were highlighted in red, including a pair of Navy Aegis destroyers, three Coast Guard cutters, and more than one hundred FBI, Boston Police, and other law enforcement vessels.
Superimposed atop the live satellite image was a bright green grid, which was tied into the Defense Intelligence Agency. They were running the feed against a Milstar satellite and its IONDS platform, which was sweeping over the harbor, searching for signs of tritium, uranium, or plutonium emissions.
All eyes were glued to one of the screens. Bob Schieffer of CBS News was speaking, the volume turned up. Six other screens displayed different TV channels, all of which had the volume down as they continued to show normal programming.
As Schieffer spoke, one by one the other screens cut away from normal programming and went live to special reports, cascading like dominoes down the wall.
Dellenbaugh flashed a look to an aide who controlled the TVs, and the volume from the screen behind him abruptly lowered.
“How are we going to find it?” asked Dellenbaugh.
“We have eight hundred people with Geigers spreading out across the waterfront,” said Kratovil, the director of the FBI. “General Electric is bringing in Geigers from their Pittsfield facility. Siemens emptied their warehouse to fill in the gap. We’re going boat by boat. If the bomb’s there, Mr. President, we’ll find it.”
MOSCOW
As his Ferrari ripped west on the freeway, Malnikov hit speed dial.
Stihl, Malnikov’s helicopter pilot, answered.
“Alexei, it’s three thirty in the morning.”
“I don’t have time to talk,” said Malnikov. “You need to pick someone up. He’s outside the city.”
“Where?” asked Stihl.
“Elektrostal. A building at the corner of Vostochnyy and Michurinskiy.”
“When?”
“Right now.”
“The S-92?” asked Stihl, referring to Malnikov’s most luxurious helicopter, a Sikorsky S-92 VVIP.
“No,” said Malnikov. “Take the Dauphin.”
“There’s no seating, Alexei. I had it retrofitted for tactical assaults.”
“That’s the idea. Now get going. His name is Dewey.”
* * *
Every time Malnikov thought he was getting closer, Cloud seemed to sense it, finding an extra burst of speed at precisely the right moment. He was running the bike recklessly, stabbing left and right, dodging the occasional car or truck, trying to get away.
Malnikov owned six motorcycles. He’d climbed aboard his first when he was only twelve. But the thought of going as fast as Cloud was now going—and in the rain—was unfathomable.
He glanced down at the speedometer: 144 mph.
He couldn’t go any faster, and yet, when he saw the straightaway, he throttled the Ferrari even harder. He watched as the distance between the Ferrari and the Ducati slowly decreased. A quarter mile became a few hundred yards, then only a hundred.
Above the blurry lights of the motorcycle, Moscow’s skyscrapers came into sharp relief, spires of glass and steel illuminated against the dark sky.
As Malnikov came within a dozen feet of the Ducati, Cloud suddenly slowed, then burst right down an exit ramp. Malnikov didn’t see it coming. He hit the brakes, put the car in reverse, then slammed the gas, ripping backward until he was even with the ramp. He jammed the car into forward then shot off the highway.
Again Cloud opened up distance, but Malnikov tasted blood. He trailed Cloud along the river, soon closing the gap. Near the center of Moscow’s business district, Cloud abruptly slashed right, charting a course that led into the crowded warren of steel and glass that constituted Moscow’s skyscrapers.
Malnikov pushed the Ferrari as fast as it would go without skidding out of control. Looking down, he saw the number: 160 mph.
As he brought the Ferrari alongside Cloud, time seemed to freeze. Despite the low primitive growl of the Ferrari, despite the high-pitched roar of the Ducati, despite the rain and the chaos, Malnikov felt nothing but stillness and calm.
* * *
Cloud felt the lights on him. He heard the low rumble of the Ferrari; even as wind torched his ears and bended with the Ducati’s roar, he still heard it. He glanced quickly left. It was Malnikov after all.
Cloud saw into the open window. He’d been wrong about the Americans. It hadn’t been their hackers who found him. It had been Malnikov. He overestimated the United States and underestimated the brute who, at that moment, was half a car length back, raising a gun toward him. He heard the loud boom from the gun in the same moment he heard the frame of the Ducati being struck. The next shot would come any second, and so …
In one startling motion, Cloud flexed his right knee out, dived forward and to the right, as if he were trying to dive off the bike, and pushed the left handlebar with every ounce of strength in his body. The bike slashed hard right, the back tire slid but held. He was now alone on a deserted street. In front of him stood Moscow’s newest skyscraper, Evolution Tower, half constructed.
He throttled the Ducati. Now was the time. He had to lose Malnikov
now.
When he heard the sound of gunfire, he ducked lower and rolled the throttle to its max.
* * *
With his left hand, Malnikov lowered the passenger window. He put his hand back on the wheel as, with his right hand, he reached for his gun from the center console.
He came alongside Cloud, raised the gun, then aimed it at Cloud’s head. For several seconds, he held the target in the muzzle. Instinctively, Cloud turned, the black glass of the helmet all Malnikov could see.
Malnikov felt the steel of the trigger. He wanted nothing more than to put a bullet in the head of the man who put his father in prison, who stole a hundred million dollars from him, who caused him nothing but embarrassment and anger. But he didn’t fire. Instead, he swept the muzzle lower, aiming for the Ducati’s back tire. Then he pulled the trigger. The slug hit metal, just above the tire, and Cloud banked abruptly right.
Malnikov slammed the brakes. He opened the door and jumped from the car, his gun out in front of him. Cloud was getting away. Malnikov fired, once, twice, and then the third bullet ripped into the motorcycle’s back tire. The bike popped right as Cloud tried to keep it vertical. He weaved sharply left, fighting to slow the Ducati before it tumbled. Then the bike’s front tire jackknifed and the motorcycle collapsed backward, with Cloud still on it, and slid down the Moscow street. Sparks and flames arose from the friction of metal and tar. Cloud’s horrific scream pierced through the noise.
Malnikov sprinted toward the crash. Smoke and flames shot up from the engine, doused only partially by the rain. He ran until he was just a few feet from the smoking wreckage, then slowed, pistol extended in front of him.
On the other side of the badly damaged Ducati, he came to where he knew Cloud now was lying, unconscious, maybe even dead. He stepped past the smoking pile of steel, gun out, muzzle trained, finger on trigger, cocked to fire.
Cloud was gone.
* * *
Dewey scoured the ceiling, looking for a way to get to the roof. In the center of the room, at least fifteen feet in the air, was a small hatchway.
He pushed the tables together in a line that ended beneath the hatchway. He went to the far end and sprinted down the line of tables, leaping from the end, into the air, legs and arms kicking, then grabbing the frame of the hatchway. As he dangled from the ceiling, he held himself up with his left hand as he punched at the steel hatchway with his right. It was lodged shut. After several minutes of trying, he dropped to the floor. An involuntary yelp of pain came out as he landed, the drop exacerbating the wound in his leg.
A few minutes later, after catching his breath, he walked to the window, picked up the gun, and put it in his coat pocket. He climbed back onto the table and repeated his run, charging as fast as he could go, then leaping and catching the edge of the hatchway. He pulled the gun from his pocket and smashed it viciously into the steel. This time, after less than a minute, the seam between the hatchway and roof, sealed tight from decades’ worth of rust, cracked. He pushed the square hatchway up and pulled himself onto the roof.
Rain was pouring down in sideways sheets. Dewey sat atop the roof for several minutes, catching his breath. He closed his eyes and allowed the rain to wash over him. He pushed away the thought of Cloud and of Russia. He pushed it away and thought of nothing, knowing that any other thought would bring him back to the harsh reality facing him. He knew that if he sought mental refuge in thoughts of family, it would only remind him of the bomb—the nuclear bomb that was now somewhere close to America’s shores.
* * *
Cloud limped toward the base of the skyscraper. Looking back, he saw Malnikov running toward him.
He needed to get to a hospital. But that wasn’t going to happen until he killed Malnikov.
He looked up at Evolution Tower. Its curvilinear half arcs swerved like steel ribbons, as if they’d been interwoven and then hung a thousand feet in the sky. Even half constructed, it was stunning. He’d admired it before, from afar. Now it represented his only hope of escape.
The building was ablaze with lights from cranes and scaffolding and, from within, bright halogen lights for the crews of workers who, at this hour, were not there.
Cloud pushed open the steel chain-link fence. He dragged his right leg, using his right hand to help pull it. He limped through the base of the tower, between stacks of steel girders, past massive construction trucks, huge piles of cement to be mixed into concrete, cranes, and other materials.
He looked up. Wind made the top of the structure move. The skyscraper appeared as if it might simply fall over on him.
He heard a clang from the chain-link fence. He didn’t bother glancing back.
Cloud’s eyes moved to the ground. For the first time, he realized he had on only one shoe. His right foot was exposed and covered in blood. He couldn’t see some of his toes. He registered a raw sensation on his right side. Most of his pant leg had been scraped away in the crash. The sight of his injuries sent a wave of fear through him. Because he didn’t feel them. Because, left untreated, they would kill him.
If you want to live, you must kill him.
Beyond a pile of lumber, Cloud saw the construction elevator. He limped to it, climbed inside, and slammed the gate shut. He hit a red switch, and the elevator bounced, then started climbing into the tower.
Malnikov came running into the light, saw the elevator rising, then raised his gun and fired. The slugs struck the steel cage just to Cloud’s right. He ducked into the corner, shielding himself from the fusillade.
* * *
Even on a calm night, the all-black, heavily customized Eurocopter EC155 B1 Dauphin was difficult to spot. Its lights could be extinguished completely at the pilot’s discretion and flown via advanced thermal night-vision optics, either in-helmet or imposed on the inside of the chopper’s cockpit glass. Tonight, in the hell of a storm, what was usually difficult to see was nearly impossible.
For Stihl, the elements were nothing. Twelve years in Russian special forces, including more battles in Chechnya than he could count, battles that nobody in the outside world knew about, had forged skills no standard training could match.
