Tom Clancy - Locked On

“I will need to discuss this with—”

“You may discuss this with whoever you want. But remember this. I have sixteen foreign prisoners here. Six are from the United States, five are from Great Britain, and five are from Japan. I will begin executing the prisoners unless I speak with Nabiyev by nine o’clock tomorrow morning. And I will release the missiles unless Russia has quit the Caucasus in seventy-two hours. Dobry den.” Good afternoon.

In the beautiful library of Paul Laska’s Newport, Rhode Island, home, the aged billionaire cradled the handset of his telephone at his desk, and he listened to the low ticking of the Bristol mahogany grandfather clock in the hallway.

Time ticking away.

It had been five days since Fabrice Bertrand-Morel had reported that Clark had found Kovalenko and learned of Laska’s involvement in the dossier passed to the Kealty administration. In those five days Bertrand-Morel had called every twelve hours with the same story. The grizzled spy has not talked about his contacts, has not revealed whom he told or what he told them. Each time Laska added more questions for the French to ask the man, more things that, if only revealed, could create some sort of leverage for Laska in case the news of his conspiring with the Russians made it into the wrong hands.

It was no longer about defending the Emir, and no longer about destroying Jack Ryan, though Paul hoped for that even now. No, at this point the Czech immigrant was concerned for his own survival. Things had not gone according to plan, the FBI had fucked up the arrest of Clark, and FBM had fucked up the capture of Clark since he had already learned about Laska and passed that info on.

And now, Paul Laska decided, it was time to end this game. He lifted the phone from the receiver and dialed a number written on the blotter in front of him. He’d had the number since the beginning and he had doubted he would ever need to use it, but now it was unavoidable.

Four rings, and then a mobile phone in London was answered.

“Yes?”

“Good evening, Valentin. This is Paul.”

“Hello, Paul. My sources tell me there is a problem.”

“Your sources include your father, I assume.”

“Yes.”

“Then yes, there isƀ a problem. Your father spoke to Clark.”

“Clark should not have made it to Moscow. Your mistake, not mine.”

“Fair, Valentin. I’ll accept that. But let’s deal with the world as it is, not as we would like it to be.”

There was a long pause. “Why did you call?”

“We have Clark, we are holding him in Moscow, trying to find out just what our exposure is on this.”

“That sounds prudent.”

“Yes, well, the men working for us are not interrogators. They have fists, yes, but I am thinking you would have some expertise that would be very helpful.”

“You think I torture people?”

“I don’t know if you do or not, though I can imagine it is in your DNA. Many people talked after a few hours in a basement with your father.”

“I am sorry, Paul, but my organization needs to limit its exposure in this enterprise. Your side has lost. The developing situation in Kazakhstan is occupying the concerns of everyone in my nation right now. The excitement about bringing down Jack Ryan has passed.”

Laska fumed. “You cannot just walk away from this, Valentin. The operation is not complete.”

“It is for us, Paul.”

“Don’t be a fool. You are in as deep as I am. Clark gave your name to his contact.”

“My name is, unfortunately, a matter of record in the CIA. He can say what he wants.”

Now Laska could hide his fury no longer. “Perhaps, but if I make one telephone call to The Guardian, you will be the most recognizable Russian agent in Britain.”

“You are threatening to out me as SVR?”

Laska did not hesitate. “You as SVR, and your father as KGB. I’m sure there are still some angry people in the satellites that would love to know who was responsible for the death of their loved ones.”

“You are playing a dangerous game, Mr. Laska. I am willing to forget about this conversation. But do not test me. My resources are—”

“Nothing like my resources! I want you to take custody of Clark, then I want you to find out who he is working for, what his present connection to Ryan is, and then you make him disappear so he cannot speak about what he has learned in the past month.”

“Or what?”

“Or I make phone calls in the United States and in Europe, revealing what you’ve been up to.”

“That is a poor bluff. You can’t reveal your involvement. You have broken laws in your country. I have broken no laws in mine.”

“In the past forty years, I’ve broken laws that you cannot imagine, my young friend. And yet I continue. I will survive this. You will not.”

Kovalenko did not reply.

Laska said, “Make him talk. Cut off all the loose ends. Clean this up and we can all move on.”

Kovalenko started to say something, to grudgingly agree to look into the matter personally, but to make clear that he would not commit to any particular measure.

Bˀut Laska hung up the phone. The old man knew Valentin Kovalenko would follow orders.

Georgi knew from the very beginning that the FSB’s Alpha Group would attempt to retake control of the facility. His fertile mind could have guessed as much even if he had not witnessed a mock FSB raid to retake the Soyuz facility from a terrorist organization, just three years prior.

He had no reason to be involved in the Soyuz operation, but he had been in Baikonur at the time on other business, and he was invited by facility officials to witness the exercise. He’d watched it all with incredulous fascination: the helicopters and the overland movement of the camo-clad forces, the concussion grenades and the rappelling from the roof of the building.

He’d talked to some Soyuz engineers after the drill and had learned more about the Russian contingency plan in the unlikely event terrorists ever took control of the complex.

Safronov knew there was also a chance Moscow would simply decide to fight fire with fire, and nuke the entire Cosmodrome in order to save Moscow. Fortunately for his plan, the Dnepr launch site at Baikonur was the original launch site of the R-36, and was therefore built to withstand a nuclear attack. Sites 104, 103, and 109 contained hardened silos from which the missiles launched, and the launch control facility was built with thick reinforced concrete walls and blast-proof steel doors.

At six p.m. on the first day, eight hours after the facility was overtaken by Dagestani terrorists, a pair of Russian FSB Alpha Group Mi-17 helicopters landed on the far side of the Proton rocket facilities, twenty-five kilometers from the Dnepr LCC. Twenty-four operators, three teams of eight, climbed out, each man laden with sixty pounds of gear and covered in white winter camouflage.

Within minutes they were heading east.

Shortly after eight o’clock in the evening, an Antonov An-124 transport aircraft landed at Yubileinaya Airfield northwest of the Baikonur Dnepr facility. The An-124 was the largest cargo aircraft on earth, and the Russian military needed every inch of the cabin space and cargo hold for the ninety-six Spetsnaz assault troops and all their gear, including four assault vehicles.

Four more Mi-17 helicopters arrived an hour later along with a refueling aircraft.

The twenty-four men in the white camo had been traversing the Baikonur steppes throughout the evening, first in heavy four-wheelers handed over by the Kazakhs, but as they got closer they left the vehicles behind and marched through the snow-covered grassland in the dark.