Jon Stock - Games Traitors Play

‘You are only carrying two Vympel and two LGBs, so we’ve loaded you up with four 1,500-litre drop tanks, two under each wing,’ Sergei said over the r/t to Dhar, who was in the rear cockpit of the SU-25, where the instructor normally sat. It was raised a little, giving him a good view of Marchant, who was strapped into the seat ahead, listening in on the conversation. The avionics and weapons suites were identical in both cockpits — full dual control — but Sergei had disabled them in the front.

Marchant had met Sergei only briefly. Dhar spoke warmly of him, but the Russian had shunned eye contact as he had inspected the plane’s undercarriage in the hangar. Afterwards, when he handed Marchant an ill-fitting flying suit and helmet, he had again avoided his gaze. There was a haunted look about him, Marchant had thought.

‘Distance to target is 2,875 kilometres,’ Dhar said, reading from a sheet of waypoints in the clear-panel leg pocket of his flying suit. ‘And the Grach has a ferry range of approximately 2,500 kilometres. “Do the math,” as our American idiots like to say.’

‘The extra fuel and a good tailwind should get you there,’ said Sergei.

Should? Marchant could have done without the mordant banter. He closed his eyes and tried to picture what lay ahead. Dhar had finally agreed to let him fly with him. Marchant wasn’t sure if it was a reflection of how much he trusted or distrusted him. Either way, it had bought him precious time in which to work out what to do.

‘We can be martyrs together,’ Dhar had joked, making no mention of a return journey.

Earlier, Dhar had revealed their route — north into the Barents Sea, south-west down the coast of Norway into the North Sea, and then west into UK airspace — but there had been no talk of the target. Whatever it was, timing was evidently crucial. Dhar had checked and double-checked windspeeds on the journey, going through the waypoint ETAs several times with Sergei.

Marchant had already clocked the two missiles on the wings’ hard points. Air-to-air suggested that Dhar expected airborne company, but why not a full complement? And now Sergei had mentioned two laser-guided bombs for a ground target. It was a tailor-made suite of weapons. But for what?

Marchant glanced around the cramped cockpit at the array of dials. The Jet Provost he had once flown in had been privately owned by an ex-RAF friend of his father. Taking off from Kemble airfield, near the family home in Tarlton in the Cotswolds, had felt like rising into the sky on rails: surprisingly smooth and steady. He suspected the SU-25 would be a rougher ride.

As the plane began to roll forward, Marchant peered through the mist at the godforsaken scenery. Dhar had taxied to the far end of the main runway. A light drizzle was falling. All Marchant could see was pine trees. The control tower was a long way off, barely visible in the murky distance. Halfway down the runway on the right were two MiG-29s. He guessed that they must be on permanent standby, like the Typhoons at RAF Leuchars and Coningsby that would be scrambled if Dhar showed up on the radar. Then he noticed the armed guards, dotted about on the periphery of the trees, out of sight of any US reconnaissance satellites. He had only spotted the two guards outside the hangar door before. Security had been ramped up for their departure.

Marchant thought again about Primakov, the sharp intake of breath just before he fired, as if the Russian was bracing himself. After the shooting, Dhar had not wanted to talk, preferring instead to spend time on his own behind the curtain. Marchant assumed that he was praying, not for the Russian’s soul but for a successful jihad . As far as Marchant could tell, no one else seemed to be running the show or telling Dhar what to do. He was very much his own man, ignoring the guards and talking only with Sergei before climbing into the cockpit. There was a quiet confidence about Dhar, a self-assurance that gave him an air of authority.

‘Comrade Marchant?’ It was Sergei’s voice on the r/t.

‘Yes?’ Marchant said, taken by surprise.

‘Talk to comrade Dhar about collateral. He will understand.’

Marchant was about to ask for an explanation, but Sergei had already signed off.

‘Did you get any of that?’ he asked Dhar over the intercom.

‘We can talk more later. Our flying time is more than three hours. Now we must prepare for take-off.’

Paul Myers had given up trying to make conversation with the Russians. They had sat motionless in his room throughout the night, waking him with a prod at first light. He had stumbled out of bed, forgetting that his hands were still tied, and they had accompanied him to the bathroom, where he managed his ablutions with difficulty.

It was only when they sat him down in front of the computers that he persuaded them to untie his wrists. If it had been a working day, he would have been missed by now, as he liked to work the early shifts at GCHQ in the summer, getting in at 7 a.m., sometimes earlier. It gave him longer in the park afterwards to fly his model planes. But today was a Saturday, and no one would miss him. He had made a loose arrangement to meet a couple of colleagues in the pub in the evening, but otherwise his diary was free, as it was most of the time.

The Russians wanted him to do exactly what he had done for Marchant: delay High Wycombe’s real-time Recognised Air Picture feed. He had already told them that it would be hard to repeat the trick, but the Ministry of Defence’s IT experts, many of whom he knew, had yet to trace the source or cause of the Link 1 breach.

Of more concern to Myers was what Marchant and Fielding would want him to do. Marchant was clearly party to the planned second violation of UK airspace. Would he want Myers to help him, or to stop him? His instinct told him to let the Russians run with it, whatever they were planning.

Nursing a hangover, he logged in to his GCHQ account and prepared once again to tamper with the Tactical Data Links that were meant to keep the skies above Britain safe.

‘All I need is a start time,’ he said, looking at his watch. ‘I can’t delay the RAP for long. A few minutes at most.’

‘This time we need a little longer,’ Grushko said.

The morning had dawned bright and clear in the Cotswolds, and the ground staff at RAF Fairford were already busy laying out the tables and chairs in the private enclosure towards the eastern end of the runway. It was a big day for the base, and General Glen Rogers, head of the United States Air Forces in Europe, was taking his run around the airfield early, before the VIPs began to arrive. The USAF would shortly be pulling out of Fairford, leaving it as a standby facility that could be reactivated at short notice for the use of B-2 Spirit stealth bombers and U2s.

All the usual merchandise stands were present. Jogging at a steady pace, Rogers passed the Breitling Owners’ Club, a dogtag stamping stall for wannabe GIs, and a stand that would later be selling Vulcan memorabilia. Now that was a plane he wished he had flown. This weekend, though, was all about modern military hardware, and in particular the global export market for the F-16 Fighting Falcon, one of America’s finest fourth-generation jet fighters, otherwise known as the Viper.

The delegation from Georgia had spent the night on the base, drinking too much of their own Kakhetian wine in the officers’ mess, but he couldn’t blame them. Today marked the official beginning of a new era for the Georgian air force. Six F-16Ds had already been delivered to Alekseevka Military Airbase, but the deal between Washington and Tbilisi would be formally signed off in the private enclosure. To mark the occasion, the F-22 Raptor, a plane that was strictly not for export, would make its debut at Fairford with a breathtaking display of fifth-generation manoeuvrability.