In the second game, he’d asked himself how much he enjoyed leading this life because it made every inch of him feel vital and challenged. A lot, he had to admit. Much more than when he played soccer, because the stakes for himself and for his nation were so high. But there was no sensation like pitting his confidence, skills, and ability to self-start against circumstances that would cause most people to freeze or retreat or at the very least think twice about going ahead.
Today while he wondered where the hell the call from Mike Rodgers or Bob Hernert was, he was thinking about something Op-Center’s psychologist, Liz Gordon, had asked himwhen see first interviewd him for the command post.
“What are your thoughts on shared fear?” she had asked.
He’d answered that fear and strength were qualities the crested and troughed in any individual, and that a good team-and especially a good commander-had to be able to bring each member’s levels to their peak.
“That’s fear, ” Liz had said. “I asked about shared fear. Think about it. Take your time.”
He had, and then he’d said, “I guess we share fear because it’s caused by something that threatens us all, as opposed to courage, which comes from the individual.”
He’d been naive and Liz had let it go. Now, after three missions, Squires had come to understand that shared fear wasn’t something to overcome. It was a mutual support system that turned people of disparate backgrounds and intellects and interests into a single, bonded organism. It was what made the crew of a World War Il bomber or a police squad car or an elite commando force closer than a husband and wife could ever be. It was what made a whole greater than the sum of its parts.
As much as patriotism and valor, shared fear was the glue that held Striker together.
Squires was about to tackle Seeing the World as a motivation when Mike Rodgers called on the secure TAC-Sat. Squires was instantly out of his reverie and, as his old soccer coach used to put it, “There with the goods.
“Charlie,” Rodgers said, “sorry it’s taken so long to get to you. We’ve been going over your game plan and we’re really going to need World Cup performance on this one. In just over eleven hours, having stayed out of Russian airspace until the last possible moment, your team will parachute to a point in Russia just west of Khabarovsk. Bob is giving your pilot the flight plan and coordinates-and we hope that the II-76T buys him enough time to get in and out before Russian air defenses realize it’s not one of their own aircraft. Your target is a four-car-plus-engine train of the TransSiberian express. If the cargo is narcotics, currency, gold, or weapons, you’re to eliminate them. If the weapons are nuclear, get us proof and disable them if you can. Sergeant Grey has the training for that. Any questions so far?”
“Yes, sir,” Squires said. “If the Hermitage is involved, they could be shipping art. Do you want us blowing up Renoirs and Van Goghs?”
The line was silent for a moment. “No. Photograph and disengage.”
“Yes, sir.”
Rodgers continued, “Your target area is a one hundred-eleven-foot-tall cliff overlooking the track. The appropriate topographic maps will be sent to your computer. You’ll rappel down and wait for the train. We chose that area because there are trees or rocks from the cliff face that you can use to block the track. We’d prefer that to using explosives that may cause casualties. If the train is running on time, you’ll only have about an hour before it arrives. If it’s running late, you’ll have to wait. This one can’t get away, though you’re to make every effort not to hurt any Russian soldiers.”
Squires wasn’t surprised by the warning: ambassadors hated having to explain illegal incursions, let alone what the CIA called “maximal demotions.” Though Squires was well trained to kill with everything from a shoelace to an Uzi, he had never had to do it-and he hoped he never did.
“The II-76T will have gone to Hokkaido for refueling and then return,” Rodgers said, “though it will not be your extraction vehicle. When you’ve completed your mission, you’ll signal the II-76T and go to the rendez vous point, the southern side of a bridge one-point-three miles west of the target.”
Now, that was intriguing, Squires thought. The only reason Rodgers wouldn’t tell him about the extraction craft was in case they were captured. He didn’t want the Russians to know. As if the mission itself weren’t stimulating enough, the mystery sent another part of Squires’s motivation into overdrive. The part that, like almost every male he had ever known, loved flashy, secretive, state-of-the-art hardware.
“Charlie, this one isn’t like North Korea,” Rodgers said. There was more friend than general in his voice. Now that he’d had Squires’s undivided attention while he laid out the specifics, he was ready to give him the overview. “We’ve reason to believe that elements in Russia are looking to rebuild the Soviet empire in a hurry. Though St. Petersburg is probably involved, you’re the key to stopping them.”
“I understand, sir,” Squires said.
“The plan’s as complete as we can make it given the little we know,” Rodgers said, “though I expect we’ll have updates as H-Hour nears. I’m sorry we can’t do more for you.”
“That’s okay, sit,” Squires said. “It isn’t Tacitus or any of those guys you quote, but I told Private George when we left him in Helsinki that the cartoon character Super Chicken had a perfect observation for tough situations like these: ‘You knew the job was dangerous when you took it.’ We knew it, General, and we’re still glad to be here.”
Rodgers laughed. “I’m trusting the fate of the world to a man who quotes Saturday morning cartoons. But I’ll make a deal with you. Come back in one piece, and I’ll bring the popcorn to your house next Saturday morning.”
“You’re on,” Squires said, signing off and collecting his thoughts before briefing the team.
THIRTY-NINE
Tuesday, 3:08 A.M., St. Petersburg
For just over an hour, Sergei Orlov had been asleep in the chair at his desk-elbows on the armrests, hands folded on his abdomen, head slightly to the left. Though his wife didn’t believe he’d actually disciplined himself to be able to fall asleep anywhere, at any time, Orlov insisted that it wasn’t a talent he’d been born with. He said that when he first became an astronaut, he trained himself to snatch sleep in half-hour segments amid the long hours of training. More remarkable than that, he said he found what he called his “rest bits” nearly as refreshing over the course of a day as his normal six hours of sleep a night. And there was the added benefit that, instead of his energy and attention span flagging as the day went on, they remained high.
He could never work like Rossky, who needed to stay with his problems until he had wrestled them to the ground. Even now, with his night counterpart on duty, the Colonel was still at his post in the heart of the Center.
Orlov also found that daunting problems always seemed to make more sense after a short nap. During his last space flight, a joint mission with Bulgaria-and the first threecosmonaut flight since the crew of Soyuz II suffocated in their spacecraft-Orlov and his two comrades had tried to dock their Soyuz ship with the Salyut 6 space station. When engine failure left the ship and the station on a collision course, mission control ordered Orlov to fire his backup rocket to return to earth immediately. Instead, he fired a short burst to back a safe distance away, shut off his headset, and rested for fifteen minutes-to the dismay of his crew. Then he used the backup engine to effect the docking. Though there was no longer enough fuel in the backup rocket to return to earth, once inside the space station Orlov was able to troubleshoot the main engine, repair the faulty circuit, and salvage the mission … and the self-respect of the mission team at the Baikonur Cosmodrome. Later, back on earth, Orlov was told the on-board echocardiograph had showed that his cardiovascular activity slowed and remained down after his rest. Thereafter, cosmonaut training included “power naps,” though they didn’t seem to work as well for other cosmonauts as they did for Orlov.
He never slept to escape what was happening in his life, though when Orlov was finally able to shut his eyes at 1:45 A.M., it felt good to file away the concerns of the moment. He was awakened at 2:51 when his assistant, Nina, buzzed to tell him he had a call from the Ministry of Defense. When Orlov got on, Marshal of Communications General David Ergashev informed him about the troops moving into Ukraine and asked the new Operations Center for help monitoring European communiques about their activities. Stunned by the news and wondering if this was just a high-level test of the Center’s capabilities-why else wouldn’t he have been told? Orlov passed the order to Radio Officer Yuri Marev.