Andy McDermott - The Midas Legacy

No reply. Eddie pulled off his headphones and handed them to Nina. ‘You should talk to ’em.’

‘Why me?’ she asked.

‘Because you’re American, and you’re always telling me I can’t do the accent!’

She donned the headset. ‘Hello, can you hear me? This is Dr Nina Wilde, working for the United Nations. We’ve uncovered a plot by North Korea to export nuclear weapons, which is why they’re trying to kill us! Please respond.’

Still no answer. Petrov glanced back at her with an expression that suggested that desperation had just driven ingenuity. ‘Tell them we helped you steal the bombs! We knew nothing about them; the North Koreans told us they were… farm equipment! Yes, farm equipment.’

‘Uh-huh,’ she said, before trying again. ‘I repeat, this is Dr Nina Wilde from the United Nations. We have—’

‘I say again, unknown aircraft,’ the American cut in. ‘Identify yourself immediately. We will shoot you down if you do not respond.’

‘Hello, hello? I’m responding! Can you hear me?’ There was no reply. ‘Oh crap!’ said Nina. ‘We can hear them, but they can’t hear us!’

One of the crew made a hurried check of his instrument panel. ‘Transmitter is out!’ he reported. ‘Electric systems, many kaput !’

The pilot made another attempt to get through, with no success. The voice on the radio returned. ‘We have you in sight and are approaching from your eight o’clock. We will attempt visual communication. This is your last chance. If you do not respond, we will kill you.’ The threat was delivered with stony calm.

Petrov turned to look back. ‘I see two jets!’

Eddie forced himself upright. ‘What are you doing?’ Nina asked, seeing his obvious pain.

‘I’ll talk to ’em.’

‘How? The radio’s broken! And also, why you?’

‘I know how to talk to flyboys.’ He addressed the crew. ‘I need a torch, a flashlight — something I can use for Morse code.’

‘The Americans do not use Morse any more,’ Petrov protested.

‘Then let’s hope these guys are old school! Come on, get me a light, quick!’

A pair of F-16 Fighting Falcons, part of the massive US military contingent dedicated to protecting the South Korean border, closed on the lumbering Antonov. One held back, fixing the freighter in its sights, while the second drew alongside to attempt communication with its pilots. Information had been passed on from the ground that the aircraft had been under SAM fire before crossing the DMZ, but that didn’t mean it would get a free pass. North Korea was notoriously sneaky, the lead pilot mused, and faking an attack to get its forces into South Korean airspace under the pretence of a defection was exactly the kind of thing they would do…

A light flashed from the rearmost window of the Antonov’s darkened cockpit. ‘They’re signalling,’ the pilot reported. ‘Looks like Morse code.’ That made sense: the An-124 was a Russian plane. While the USAF had phased out Morse from standard usage decades ago, other countries still used it.

‘Can you tell what they’re saying?’ asked his wingman.

‘Yeah, hold on…’ The code might no longer have been part of air force training, but many pilots still knew it; he had taught himself in childhood after a diet of movies and TV shows where messages were silently flicked between ships and planes, entranced by the idea of sending secret messages to his friends. His memory was rusty, but he pieced this one together word by word. ‘American… on board… do… not… shoot… you… dickhe— Hey! ’

‘Did they just insult you?’

‘Yeah!’ He was affronted — but also oddly intrigued. North Korean insults tended to be much more florid. Maybe there really was an American aboard. He let the message continue. ‘Working for usint… huh? Usintel… oh, US intel! Have stolen NK illegal weapons… three…’ He fell silent in shock as he translated the series of flashes into words.

‘What?’ said his wingman. ‘What did they say?’

‘He says they, uh… they have three nuclear warheads aboard, and do we want them?’

Thirty minutes later, Eddie and Nina were on the ground at Osan airbase south of Seoul — though the landing had been as stressful as the rest of the flight.

Shepherded by more US and South Korean fighters, all primed to blast the Antonov out of the sky if it deviated in the slightest from its assigned course, the battle-scarred aircraft made a hard and terrifying touchdown on its damaged landing gear, the strut to which the TEL had been lassoed collapsing and tearing away. With only two engines providing reverse thrust, it almost overshot the end of the runway, the twin nose wheels stopping just yards from the mud beyond the concrete. It was immediately swarmed by military vehicles, dozens of troops training their weapons upon the plane as its occupants were ordered by loudhailer to disembark and surrender.

Nina supported Eddie, helping him limp down the rear ramp as both raised their hands. ‘I was hoping for a reception with, y’know, a lot fewer guns pointed at me,’ she said, blinking into the glaring spotlights. ‘Or preferably none.’

‘Wilde and Chase nuclear delivery service!’ Eddie called out as they reached solid ground. ‘H-bombs direct to your door. Don’t forget to tip!’

The soldiers did not respond well to the joke. ‘Get down on the ground with your hands behind your heads!’ one bellowed through the speaker. ‘Do it now!’

‘He’s hurt!’ Nina protested.

Eddie gritted his teeth as he lowered himself painfully to the runway and lay on his front. ‘They really don’t care, love.’

The Russians followed them out of the An-124, also lying face-down. A squad of soldiers in armoured hazmat gear ran to surround them. One man hurriedly passed a Geiger counter over the supine prisoners. It crackled, but not enough to cause alarm. ‘Where are the bombs?’ the leader shouted, voice muffled behind his face mask.

‘In there,’ said Nina, jerking a thumb towards the hold. ‘There’s a plutonium sphere tied to the floor; you might want to take care of that first. Long story,’ she added, sensing he was about to ask a question that would require a long and convoluted answer. He got the message and quickly led his team inside.

Boots tramped towards her. ‘Which of you is Nina Wilde?’ another man demanded.

Nina risked raising her head far enough to give the questioner, an air force colonel, a scathing look. ‘That would be me, with the breasts.’ Eddie had given the F-16’s pilot more information via Morse while the Antonov was in flight, including the nature of their mission.

‘And Eddie Chase?’

‘Me,’ said Eddie. ‘The one with the bullet in his leg. Which I’d really, really like someone to fix, because it fucking hurts!’

‘Stretcher!’ the colonel called to a medical team waiting beyond the circle of guns, before turning back to the couple. ‘The State Department confirmed your story that you were in North Korea as part of an intelligence-gathering operation. So how the hell did you end up in a Russian cargo plane with a hold full of nuclear weapons?’

‘Like I said,’ Nina told him wearily, ‘it’s a long story. Too long.’

Her husband chuckled as the medics carefully lifted him on to a stretcher. ‘It’ll make a great book, though.’

Oswald Seretse gazed out of the limousine’s window as it crossed the Queensboro Bridge into Manhattan, the afternoon sun shining on the rectilinear forest of brick and concrete and glass. ‘You have been through a great ordeal, that is for sure,’ he said, having listened to Nina and Eddie’s account of events in North Korea on the ride from the airport. ‘One for which I feel in large part responsible.’