Murray McDonald - Critical Error

“Where’s he off to that El Al couldn’t take him?”

“Oh it wasn’t for him, it was two seats from Paris to New York.”

Russell couldn’t believe his luck, instantly making the link. One of those seats would be Sam Baker’s. They had him trapped. He called Johnson. Surely even he would manage to capture an unarmed man on an aircraft.

Ben rushed into the meeting. Of all the meetings he had in his diary, that was the one that he never failed to attend and the one he prayed would deliver more than any other. The Heads of pretty much every security, police and Defense service awaited his arrival.

“Well?” he asked, repeating the same question he asked every morning and evening as these meetings took place.

“No news,” was the subdued response.

There were now only five days until Yom Kippur. Five days until four nuclear weapons would devastate the land of Israel. “Any news on the American one?” he asked again, as he had for every previous meeting.

“Nothing,” offered David Hirsch, the Defense Minister, without hope.

“We have every satellite the Americans have and every one of their military vessels are checking every ship they can see but nothing. Maybe it’s already there.”

“What about Marseille?”

“What about it?” asked Hirsch.

“Any boats leaving there bound for America?”

“We’ve checked them all. They were either going to Africa, staying in Europe, heading to the Far East or South America and we even checked them to make sure they were on course and they are. No boat that is on its way to America has the weapon. It must be a hoax.”

“Well, if it is, the joke is on us. They’ll be five explosions not four!” exclaimed Ben. “Sorry, what was that?” asked Ben not quite catching what one of the analysts had whispered to a colleague under his breath.

“Apologies, Mr Meir, I spoke out of turn,” said by way of apology.

“No, please if you have information, you must share it. Please stand up and enlighten us with whatever you deem so relevant.” Ben was in a particularly foul mood.

The young analyst stood up and when Hirsch spotted who Ben was picking on, he immediately tried to stop him.

“Ben, if you don’t mind, I’ll deal with this less publicly.”

“No David, the young man has something to say!” He was not in the mood to be stopped.

“Sorry, please also give us your credentials,” ordered Ben, keen to see why the young man felt it appropriate to make secret remarks.

David Hirsch sunk further in his seat. Adding the young man’s credentials was just going to exacerbate the disaster.

The young man could hardly be heard as he stammered. “I work for the Defense Department in the nuclear capability team.”

“Ben,” interrupted David Hirsch, the young man’s ultimate boss. “I really must insist you let me deal with this.”

“No, carry on,” ordered Ben firmly.

“My specialty is the likely scenarios and long term impact of nuclear weapons.”

“Oh, OK. So I can certainly understand why you’re here. Now what was so important you had to share it with your colleague but not the rest of us?” pushed Ben.

“I simply said that whether it’s four or five was irrelevant. Israel’s fucked either way.”

Ben looked at the young analyst somewhat surprised at his tone and language.

“Sorry that was what I said, verbatim, Mr Meir, I mean no disrespect,” added the analyst noting Ben’s disapproval.

Ben looked at David. Nothing of this magnitude had ever been relayed to him. Israel being fucked seemed to be a fairly explicit and certainly far worse than the destruction of part of four cities that had previously been cited.

“What exactly do you mean by ‘fucked’ young man?” asked Ben, having calmed down and keen to hear a less edited version of the potential impact.

“With the input of Professor Ilya Kielson, the Soviet scientist, we should assume two things. The nukes are around the 100 kiloton range and will be extremely efficient. He would, I assume, also have advised the Palestinians of placement to ensure maximum damage and impact.”

“Go on,” prompted Ben.

“With this scenario, the projections would obliterate four major cities, wiping out pretty much all their inhabitants.”

“Yes.” Ben was aware of this. “But Israel is much larger than four cities, young man.”

“Sorry, I’m not finished. The radiation and thermal effects would be devastating to a significantly greater area and ultimately I would anticipate that Israel, the West Bank and Gaza would pretty much be unlivable for the next fifty years. I would include a large area of our neighbors’ territories in that category also.”

“Jerusalem?”

“Wasteland, a radioactive nightmare!” The young analyst was on a roll.

Ben Meir, not for the first time, was hoping his heart would keep going. The stress was going to kill him. They had to find those weapons. Ararat depended on Jerusalem.

Sam thought he could get used to this as he pressed the button and for the first time in his life, actually felt comfortable aboard a plane. Two minutes after the stewardess had put out the fasten seat belt signs, he was sleeping soundly. Seven hours and almost 3,000 miles later, he woke up feeling refreshed and energized for the full day that lay ahead. The electronic map told him there was just about an hour to JFK.

He turned to Rebecca and all the pleasant thoughts that had been swirling in his mind stopped. Her face was one of sheer panic and coming from a woman who had faced what she had, he knew something was very wrong.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, looking deeply into her eyes.

“I think Ben’s screwed us and most certainly you,” she whispered, and quickly hissed. “Don’t turn around.”

“You’ve just had a bad dream. We’re in a plane, nobody can touch us up here. Nobody even knows who we are.”

She shook her head firmly. “No, I haven’t slept a wink. Two hours ago the man one seat behind and over to your right was called to the cockpit door and handed the phone by the stewardess. He hasn’t stopped checking on us since then. So just make it look like we’re talking normally, ok?”

“OK,” said Sam, looking calmly into her eyes.

“I can only assume he’s the Sky Marshall. He’s probably been told to assist when we land.”

“OK, I’m going to take a casual look, don’t worry,” instructed Sam as he yawned and nodded to the passenger across the aisle from him. A quick look behind confirmed Rebecca’s worst thoughts. The bulge in his otherwise perfect suit trouser gave him away. The right leg snagged at the sock line, giving away the pistol that would resolve any potential hijackings.

“Yep and he’s good,” confirmed Sam. “Caught me looking!”

“Shit, we’re screwed,” said Rebecca, feeling caught in a guided missile heading straight to Sam’s assassins.

Sam considered all the options which amounted to pretty much none. The cockpit door was locked and would never be opened. He could HALO and HAHO, basically parachute from inner space, either quickly or slowly but that tended to require a parachute which commercial airliners did not carry. Sam didn’t want to get into the whole argument about why somebody had decided to put lifejackets on board a plane instead of parachutes. He’d argue that point when he had more time.

After thinking through the options, he was coming down on the side of Rebecca. However, Sam was not a person to get screwed. He preferred to be the screwer.

“I’m just going to nip to the restroom,” he said as he kissed her on the cheek and walked the few feet to the restroom. Closing and locking the door, he waited three seconds before very carefully removing the lock. He then opened the door and charged. As expected, the Marshall had relaxed slightly, assuming Sam would be at least a couple of minutes. With the Marshall’s guard down, Sam launched himself at him and stopped the Marshall’s hand reaching for the gun. Sam had ended up almost sitting on the man’s lap as screams echoed down the plane, Rebecca’s voice piercing through them all, telling everyone to “get the fuck down!”