“The laser is aimed using mirrors,” the general explained. “There are no moving turrets, no shells to load, no delays in triggering the next burst. It can be trained on one target, fired, and then refocused on another target in a fraction of a second. It can discharge ninety pulses per minute without overheating or overdrawing its onboard power source. And unlike physical weapons, which are limited by the number of rounds carried in their magazines, the laser on board the EAGLneverruns out of ammunition. Once powered up, it can destroy an almost unlimited number of targets during a single mission.”
The general turned back to the chief of staff. “A mad scramble to intercept the aircraft might have cost us our entire fighter capacity in northern Europe, while almost certainly proving futile and quite possibly provoking a war. I ask you to imagine the Russian response when we scramble all our frontline aircraft and send them toward Russian airspace at maximum speed with no explanation.”
The news was sobering. No one liked what they were hearing,but it was hard to argue with the logic. Silence descended over the room.
Finally, the President spoke. The EAGL had been his pet project for three solid years. For it to end like this was almost too much to take. “Is there anything to suggest the EAGL isn’t in Russia at this point?”
The question was addressed to the general and more broadly to the room. The general deferred and the rest of the room became a sea of murmurs, filled with eyes and faces looking anywhere but at the President.
The head of the National Security Council sighed and shook his head, the director of the Central Intelligence Agency looked down at the computer in front of him as if he’d find the truth somewhere on the screen. But no one met the President’s gaze to offer an answer.
Kurt found that surprising. He thought the answer was obvious. And he felt the President deserved a reply.
He stepped forward. “Based on what’s been presented here,” he began, “I’d say there’s less than a five percent chance the aircraft is in Russia. And then only if the pilot got lost and wound up there by mistake.”
A smattering of laughter and surprise emerged in the wake of Kurt’s statement. A few derisive comments came from dark corners of the room, but the President silenced everyone by raising his hand.
The President was a tall man who loomed over others, even sitting down. As he looked up over the crowd trying to find the voice crying in the wilderness, the defeated aura around him seemed to vanish.
“And you are?” the President asked.
“Kurt Austin. NUMA special projects.”
Hearing this, the chief of staff turned to Sandecker. There was an undeclared war between them regarding who was the President’smost important advisor. It usually presented itself in a cordial manner but occasionally flared into snide comments from the chief and gruff bluster from Sandecker. “One of your people,” the chief said. “Care to tell us what he’s doing here and what he’s talking about?”
Sandecker offered an unflinching poker face; he looked composed, even though he’d never expected Kurt to jump into the fray, certainly not with a comment like the one he’d just offered.
“Considering the possibility that the EAGL or the wrecked F-35s would need to be recovered from frigid Arctic waters, I thought it would behoove us to have a salvage expert here. One who has actually pulled things off the bottom of the ocean. As for what he’s talking about”—Sandecker paused and looked Kurt’s way—“I’ve always believed in letting my people elaborate on their own thoughts. Kurt,” he said, using a tone that suggestedThis better be good, “Why don’t you enlighten us?”
“It’s simple,” Kurt said. “These men hijacked the EAGL only after they were fully convinced it was operational. They killed the crew, shot down the F-35s, and took out the E-6 radar plane to clear their path. They did all that as a warning to the Air Force:Come up and challenge us and we’ll turn your squadrons into heaps of molten metal. A warning the general took to heart. They then turned toward Murmansk, while switching off every system in the plane that would allow you to track them, including the APX-9 radar, which as you said stood out like a man in a dark field wielding a bright flashlight. It’s the last act that gives them away.”
“How so?” the President asked.
“As long as the targeting radar is operational, they’re invulnerable,” Kurt said. “Turning it off gives us the chance to mount up and scramble a few squadrons or at the very least attack them with surface-to-air missiles. It also leaves them in the dark as to our actions, creating a guessing game they don’t need. If they truly wantedto reach Russia, they’d leave the radar on until they entered Russian airspace, at which point going after them would bring about World War Three. Which means the only reason to turn the APX-9 off is so they could run and hide somewhere else.”
“So, the turn toward Murmansk is designed to throw us off the trail,” the President said, following Kurt’s line of reasoning. “Tap into our greatest fear and get us looking in the wrong place. Is that what you’re saying?”
“Exactly,” Kurt said. “They wanted you to think they were headed to Russia. Otherwise, they’d have switched the radar off before they made the turn.”
Kurt left it at that. He expected there would be those in the crowd who scoffed at his analysis, but he knew the logic was sound and he wasn’t there to score points with anyone.
Low-level discussions broke out around the room. The chief of staff leaned toward the President and whispered something in his ear. They seemed to argue. Eventually the President shook him off and turned his attention back to Kurt. “Austin…is it?”
“That’s right,” Kurt said.
“The same Austin who stopped some mad airship tycoon from dusting Guantánamo Bay with toxic gas a few years ago, and who was instrumental in destroying a rogue artificial intelligence entity that had come to life in the Indian Ocean this time last year?”
Kurt nodded. It seemed that the President knew of his adventures. Briefings from Sandecker probably helped in that regard, although both incidents involved the type of world-altering events that any sitting President would have been aware of.
“I had something to do with preventing the attack on Guantánamo,” Kurt admitted. “As for the artificial intelligence incident…I’ve always been hard on computers. Can’t keep a laptop working for more than six months at a time.”
The President allowed himself a modest grin, which was significant considering the circumstances. “All right, Austin,” he said, growing stern once again. “I’m listening. Tell me more. If the EAGL isn’t in Russia, then where do you suggest it went?”
Kurt glanced at the map. The Arctic Ocean and Barents Sea didn’t offer much in the way of safe landing spots. Bear Island was an uninhabited spot of land right in the middle of the search zone, but it was a rugged, rocky place that jutted from the ocean like a mountain poking up through the clouds. It would be all but impossible to put down there without a disaster. The Svalbard archipelago was farther north. Its various islands offered plenty of snow-covered terrain to choose from, but a couple thousand Norwegians lived there, along with scientists from a dozen countries whose stations dotted the far reaches of the place.
Greenland was out of range. Iceland was closer. But the tiny island was a hub of activity and not the type of place one could sneak a missing military transport into without being spotted. Not with NATO forces on the lookout for it.
Kurt shrugged. “It’s a lot easier to say where a missing thingisn’t, than guessing where itactually is.But I expect you’ll find it on some flat piece of land in the middle of nowhere, covered in nets and foliage in an attempt to hide it from view.”
