Clive Cussler - Cyclops

The men seated around the table were shocked and confused, dazed and angry. But they were angry only because of a miscalculation of an event that was beyond their knowledge. The awful truth took several moments to register.

"You speak of Soviet retaliation, Mr. President," said Fawcett. "Do you have any insight on the possibility?"

"Put yourself in Soviet shoes. They were on to you a good week before their Selenos 8 lunar station was launched. If I were President Antonov, I'd have ordered the mission converted from scientific exploration to a military operation. There is little doubt in my mind that when Selenos 8 touches down on the moon twenty hours from now, a special team of Soviet commandos will encircle and attack the Jersey Colony. Now you tell me, can the base defend itself?"

General Fisher looked at Hudson, then turned to the President and shrugged his shoulders. "I can't say. We've never made contingency plans for an armed assault on the colony. As I recall, their only weapons are two handguns and a missile launcher."

"Incidentally, when were your colonists scheduled to leave the moon?"

"They should lift off in about thirty-six hours," answered Hudson.

"I'm curious," said the President. "How do they intend to return through earth's atmosphere? Certainly their lunar transport vehicle doesn't have the capability."

Hudson smiled. "They'll return to the Kennedy spaceport at Cape Canaveral on the shuttle."

The President sighed. "The Gettysburg. Stupid of me not to think of it. She's already docked at our space station."

"Her crew hasn't been advised yet," said Steve Busche of NASA, "but once they get over the shock of seeing the colonists suddenly show up on the transport vehicle, they'll be more than willing to take on extra passengers."

The President paused and stared at the members of the "inner core," his expression suddenly bleak. "The burning question we all have to face, gentlemen, is whether the Jersey colonists will survive to make the trip."

<<44>>

"Do you really expect to get away with it?" Pitt asked.

Colonel Ramon Kleist, U.S. Marine Corps, Retired, rocked on his heels and scratched an itch on his back with a swagger stick. "So long as we can withdraw as a unit with our casualties, yes, I believe the mission can be pulled off successfully."

"Nothing this complicated can go letter perfect," said Pitt. "Destroying the compound and the antenna, plus killing off Velikov and his entire staff, sound to me like you're biting off more than you can chew."

"Your eyewitness observation and our stealth aircraft photos corroborate the light defensive measures."

"How many men make up your team?" asked Pitt.

"Thirty-one including yourself"

"The Russians are bound to find out who trashed their secret base. You'll be kicking a hornet's nest."

"All part of the plan," Kleist said airily.

Kleist stood ramrod straight, his chest threatening to burst from a flowered shirt. Pitt guessed his age as late fifties. He was a medium skinned black, born in Argentina, the only child of a former SS officer who had fled Germany after the war and the daughter of a Liberian diplomat. Sent to a private school in New York, he decided to drop out and make a career in the Marines.

"I thought there was an unwritten agreement between the CIA and the KGB-- we won't waste your agents if you don't waste ours."

The colonel gave Pitt an innocent look. "Whatever gave you the idea our side will do the dirty work?"

Pitt did not reply, only stared at Kleist, waiting.

"The mission will be conducted by Cuban Special Security Forces," he explained. "Their equivalent to our SEALS. Or to be honest, expertly trained exiles dressed in genuine Cuban battle fatigues. Even their underwear and socks will be standard Cuban military issue. Weapons, wristwatches, and other equipment will be of Soviet manufacture. And, just so we keep up appearances, the landing will come from the Cuban side of the island."

"All neat and tidy."

"We try to be efficient."

"Are you leading the mission?"

Kleist smiled. "No, I'm getting too old to leap out of the surf onto beaches. The assault team will be led by Major Angelo Quintana. You'll meet him at our camp in San Salvador. I'll be standing by on the SPUT."

"Say again."

"Special-purpose undersea transport," answered Kleist, "a vessel constructed expressly for missions of this kind. Most people don't know they exist. You'll find it most interesting."

"I'm not what you'd call trained for combat."

"Your job is purely to guide the team into the compound and show them the ventilator access to the garage area. Then you're to return to the beach and stay under cover until the mission is completed."

"Do you have a timetable for the raid?"

Kleist had a pained expression. "We prefer to call it a covert operation."

"Sorry, I've never read your bureaucratic manual on semantics."

"In answer to your question, the landing is set for 0200 four days from now."

"Four days may be too late to save my friends."

Kleist looked genuinely concerned. "We're already working on short notice and cutting our practice exercises razor thin. We need time to cover every uncertainty, every freak event. The plan has to be as airtight as our computer's tactical programs can make it."

"And if there's a human flaw in your plan?"

Any expression of friendly warmth left Kleist's face and was replaced with a cold, hard look. "If there is a human flaw, Mr. Pitt, it is you. Barring divine intervention, the success or failure of this mission will rest heaviest on your shoulders,"

The CIA people were thorough. Pitt was shuffled from office to office, interview to interview, with stopwatch precision. The plans to neutralize Cayo Santa Maria progressed with prairie-fire swiftness. His briefing by Colonel Kleist took place less than three hours after he was interrogated by Martin Brogan. He came to realize there were thousands of contingency plans to invade every island in the Caribbean and every nation in Central and South America. Computerized war games created a series of options. All the covert-operation experts had to do was select the program that came closest to fitting the objective, and then refine it.

Pitt endured a thorough physical examination before he was allowed lunch. The physician pronounced him fit, pumped him full of high-potency vitamins, and prescribed an early bedtime before Pitt's drowsy mind turned to mush.

A tall, high-cheekboned woman with braided hair was assigned as his nursemaid, escorting him to the proper room at the proper time. She introduced herself as Alice, no surname, no title. She wore a soft tan suit over a lace blouse. Pitt thought her rather pretty and found himself wondering what she would look like curled up on satin sheets.

"Mr. Brogan has arranged for you to eat in the executive dining room," she said in perfect tour-guide fashion. "We'll take the elevator."

Pitt suddenly remembered something. "I'd like the use of a telephone."

"Sorry, not possible."

"Mind if I ask why?"

"Have you forgotten you're supposed to be dead?" Alice asked matter-of-factly. "One phone call to a friend or a lover and you could blow the entire operation."

"Yes, `The slip of a lip may sink a ship,' " Pitt said cynically. "Look, I need some information from a total stranger. I'll hand him a phony name.

"Sorry, not possible."

A scratched phonograph record came to Pitt's mind. "Give me a phone or I'll do something nasty"

She looked at him quizzically. "Like what?"

"Go home," he said simply.

"Mr. Brogan's orders. You're not to leave the building until your flight to our camp in San Salvador. He'd have you in a straitjacket before you reached the front door."

Pitt hung back as they walked down a hallway. Then he suddenly turned and entered an anteroom whose door was unmarked. He calmly walked past a startled secretary and entered the inner office. A short man with cropped white hair, a cigarette dangling from his lips, and making strange markings on a graph, looked up in amused surprise.