Natalia screamed . . . John Rourke opened his eyes. Natalia wasn’t screaming at all, just staring at him. “The one thing I’m sure of and I wanted you to be sure of. I love you — and I know that’s destroying you and if I could stop loving you and it would do any good, I would. Rest.” John Rourke leaned over her, his hands holding her head gently, his lips touching her almost black hair. He could hear her starting to cry again . . .
The conference hall was the same as he remembered it. But that time, Vladmir Karamatsov had been seated at the head of the table. This time, he — Antonovitch — stood before it. Yuri Vanyovitch took the seat immediately on the left. To Antonovitch’s right already sat Boris Korenikov, Principal Secretary.
Korenikov’s voice might have made the uninitiated listener think Korenikov suffered from laryngitis. But the voice was always that way, strained and tight and dry, as annoying to hear as the sound of fingernails drawn across a chalkboard. The corners of Korenikov’s mouth dowriturned as he began to speak, slowly, laboriously, the mouth only serving to further draw out his already elongated face into an image reminiscent of a very sad, tired looking dog. “Comrade Colonel —or have you already taken to yourself the title ‘Marshal’?”
An answer was called for, but he didn’t know which answer to give.
There was silence punctuated only by one of the six ministers at the table clearing his throat. Antonovitch spoke. “If I viewed the world, Comrade First Secretary, as did the Hero Marshal, then I would be laying siege to
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the Underground City, not entering it to seek counsel and offer support.”
“That is a very good answer, Colonel Antonovitch. How truthful — I have no wish to offend — we shall, however, see. And what counsel is it you seek?”
“Beneath the surface of the Pacific Ocean, there is a Soviet community of great strength and possessed of nuclear weapons. The Chinese are powerful and technologically sophisticated. There will soon be, if there is not already, an alliance formed between the existing alliance—the Germans, the Eden survivors, the Icelan-dics —and this new enemy, the Chinese. The Chinese may well have access to nuclear weapons beyond those which were lost to the Hero Marshal during a less than well-planned military adventure along the coast. The Germans have the ability to construct nuclear weapons—technologically. The Eden Project survivors may well have nuclear weapons stockpiled for their use which can be reactivated after five centuries and turned against us. The Soviet people here on the land have no nuclear weapons —yet. But they must be obtained or fabricated. The Soviet people have available to them the means to reactivate Particle Beam weaponry in a much shorter period of time than it would take for the Germans or the Chinese to develop such technology. The Soviet people, if our differences can be set aside, have available to them the largest and most fully equipped standing army on the face of the planet. I come to you seeking counsel concerning how our differences can be put aside for the good of the Soviet people whom we all serve.”
There was silence, not even the clearing of a throat, then First Secretary Korenikov broke the silence. “Be seated, Comrade Marshal Antonovitch.”
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CHAPTER FIVE
The red light clicked off and Akiro Kurinami pressed his hands tightly over his eyes for a moment as defense against the brightness of the ordinary white light, then took his hands away. Outside, it was a starless night, the heavy overcast of snow laden clouds making the last stage of the trek up the mountainside like moving while hooded with black velvet. He felt like a sneak thief, but coming here was the only way to survive. And he knew John Rourke well enough that “the only way to survive” was, to John Rourke, a powerful argument, and if entering his sanctum unbidden would be viewed as a transgression at all, it would be forgiven.
Elaine Halversen squeezed his left hand and he looked down at her hand in his— the chocolate brown of her flesh. But he wondered why men of his race were called yellow, because despite his Japanese origins his hand looked white against hers. His eyes tracked upward from their hands to her eyes, as dark as his own, but somehow different, and very beautiful.
Together, they descended the three steps from the interior vault door into the great room of The Retreat.
Kurinami had half-hoped what Elaine’s words echoed. “If he were only here!”
But The Retreat was empty, except for themselves, he realized, had realized from the moment they had opened the doors. He had once said to John Rourke, “Why haven’t you shown Commander Dodd the loca-
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tion of The Retreat— it might prove important some day?”
And Rourke, taking the cigar from his mouth, the corners of his eyes —all that was visible with his eyes shielded by the dark lensed aviator-style sunglasses he habitually wore —wrinkling slightly as though he were smiling, said, “If someone knows a secret, then it’s no longer a secret. Dodd could find The Retreat by working out the coordinates off the transmission logs of the Eden computer. But he’d have to blow the top of the mountain off to get inside unless he knew how. You and Elaine share a secret that no one outside my family knows. You’re now just as responsible for the integrity of that secret as we are. I didn’t intend to stick you with such a responsibility, but you were the first people we had seen. It just sort of happened.”
Akiro Kurinami now thanked God that it had. Exposure, lack of food, exhaustion and despair had nearly claimed them.
“If we’re going to invade his home, we may as well invade his refrigerator,” Elaine began, the cheerfulness of her tone sounding forced to him.
“Yes,” he nodded, stripping away his arctic parka, dropping it on the floor of the great room. And he suddenly felt rude. He picked up the coat, holding it dumbly, looking for some place to hang it.
He had not eaten in two days, holding back the last of the emergency rations he had stolen— stolen? —for Elaine, giving them to her hours ago to keep her going. After he had been kidnapped, tortured, nearly killed, escaping barely in time to save Elaine from that fate or worse, they had sought sanctuary among the Germans who helped to guard Eden Base, the Germans giving it gladly. But after an eternity of wrangling between Commander Dodd and German high command, it had appeared inevitable that he and Elaine would be
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surrendered. And so, stealing what he could for them, they fled.
He didn’t blame the Germans. He and Elaine were -victims of diplomacy and duplicity. The Germans had been faced with serious criminal charges, including various counts of murder, leveled against him by Commander Christopher Dodd, technically the leader of a foreign nation on whose soil the German base was located .
Elaine handed him a drink. It smelled like whiskey. It was whiskey as he tasted it.
He wondered if he had decided they should flee simply to obviate the necessity of the Germans doing what they at once thought was immoral but a moral imperative?
“Some of those irradiated steaks and frozen potatoes and vegetables that look like they were fresh —maybe ones Annie and Michael grew in the garden.”
“You’re too tired. You should rest. Just anything would — ”
The whiskey warmed his stomach more than it had burnt his throat; so, admittedly never a connoisseur of spiritous liquor, he felt he had achieved a baseline for judgment that it was good.
She kissed him, hard on the mouth and he felt warmed more than the whiskey could have made him feel. “You either rest here or take a shower and warm up. Doctor’s orders,” she laughed.
She was a “doctor” but a PhD, not MD and it had become a running joke between them. “I declare martial law —so it’s lieutenant’s orders,” he told her.
She kissed him again —this time on the cheek and moved off before his hands could react and he found himself laughing, something he had not done in the weeks since it had all started. He stood up, the whiskey hitting- him now and making his balance a little uncer-
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tain. Two days without food.
He left the rest of the whiskey and started up the three steps toward the bathroom, the door open.
The main computer aboard Eden One blanked out, robbing Eden survivors of the location of strategic stores.
Missing: twenty-four M-16 assault rifles, three thousand rounds of 5.56mm Ball, botanical samples, lighting, medical supplies, emergency rations.
The men and the electric shock torture so he would reveal the location of the backup files he had made for the main computers. These were still hidden.