Rift Zone

by Raelynn Hillhouse

  “That’s NATO. I like it.” Summer bit his lip from the pain.

  “I’ve done it and I didn’t like it. The mountain passes might still be closed by snow,” Faith said.

  Svetlana batted her eyes, flashing the heavy orange eye shadow that matched her bright lipstick. “I could get you into Iran through a sturgeon boat on the Caspian Sea.”

  “Caviar’s tempting,” Faith said. “But I can’t handle the chador. Head-to-toe black is definitely not my thing. I couldn’t bring myself to do it in Berlin where it’s at least chic. Iran would also mean a high-mountain crossing of the Turkish border to get away from the Ayatollah. I don’t like multiple borders.”

  “Agreed we go direct into a friendly.”

  “Too bad Gorbachev’s trashed the economy and they can’t afford to have the Finns do construction for them above the Arctic Circle anymore. When they were building projects like Kostamuksha and the Svetogorsk pulp plant, Mama loved to use commuting Finnish workers to smuggle us and her religious propaganda into the Soyuz. I’m sure we were the only females of the non–working girl variety who ever got through that way.”

  Faith tilted her head and threw the last sip of tea into the back of her throat as if it were vodka. “I really hate the smell of fish, but heading to Finland via Estonia on a fishing co-op’s boat might be easiest. Last I heard, the Finnish mobile-phone network bleeds over into part of Estonia, and the Soviets aren’t jamming it. We might be able to get word out to someone.”

  “And how would we ever get a Finnish mobile phone?” Summer said.

  “Mug a drunk Finnish tourist. They flock to Tallinn for cheap booze and they all seem to have those phones. Personally, I think they’re a fad that will never catch on, but we might be able to call to the West with one. I don’t suppose you could arrange a pickup with your guys?” Faith asked, pouring herself more tea.

  Summer watched Svetlana sink the needle into his forearm, then pull the thread through. “The Gulf of Finland is a Soviet lake, shallow and littered with ears. Don’t get me wrong. They could do it if they absolutely had to. The biggest problem would be getting Washington on board, and I don’t think we have the time for that.”

  Reagan sprang from his bed with a bark and ran from the room, growling.

  “He never does this,” Svetlana said.

  Summer took the needle from her.

  “I’m not finished,” Svetlana protested.

  Rather than take time to tie or cut it off, he stuck the needle through his skin like a body piercing. He drew the gun that he had taken from the guard. “Give me two seconds, then get the lights out. Pull the fuses if you have to.”

  Reagan’s bark echoed from the front room.

  Then the barking stopped.

  CHAPTER

  FORTY-SIX

  MOSCOW

  5:06 P.M.

  “Freeze! Hands in the air.” Summer pointed the gun at the intruder. Reagan growled, baring his canines.

  “I’m here to help you,” Bogdanov said in American English.

  “Faith, check her for weapons. Don’t stand too close, and whatever you do, don’t block my shot.”

  “I have a shoulder holster with a gun and there’s a knife strapped to my right leg.” Zara clasped her fingers together, rested her hands on her head and turned toward Faith. “I didn’t know they were going to kidnap you until after I returned to Moscow and discovered I’d been deceived. Only then did I find out you were walking into a show trial and execution. It was too late to warn you, but I wasn’t going to let them do it to you, so I flew back to Berlin and brought Commander Summer here to help you. I didn’t see any other way.”

  “I’m touched,” Summer said. “What’d you do with Walters and Meriwether? Keep in mind the consequences if I don’t believe your answer.”

  “I ordered them detained for border violations. They’re guests of the GDR until this is resolved. I made it clear they’re to be treated well.”

  “As we say in the South, mighty white of you.” He scratched his forearm beside the wound. “Are you alone or working with someone?”

  “Alone. I don’t know who to trust. I came to help you and get you out of here before they realize where you are. I bought you some time by removing all references to Doctor Gorkovo from Faith’s dossier, but I was working fast and could’ve missed something. I was unable to delete the computerized files.”

  “How did you know to find me here?” Faith said. “I know dozens of people in Moscow.”

  “Please, I’m your case officer and I’ve studied you.”

  “Where’d you pick up English along with the American accent?”

  “Silicon Valley. I once earned a Stanford degree as part of my legend there.”

  Faith opened Zara’s black leather jacket. The KGB-issue service pistol made it all so clear. How could she have ever been so naïve as to think she could have any kind of friendship with a KGB controller? She grasped the weapon with her fingertips and held it as if she were removing a rotten vegetable from her refrigerator. Summer took it from her, Sveta’s needle still stuck into his forearm. She returned to Zara and continued frisking her, pausing occasionally when she remembered how it had felt to flirt with her only a few nights ago. Faith’s anger surprised her. She didn’t like it.

  “I didn’t have any way of waving you off. And I still have no idea who was behind the Pan Am bomb. My best guess is that someone found out something about the delivery and didn’t know who to trust. They tried to stop it in their own crude fashion.”

  Faith patted her way down the right leg until she discovered the bulge of a knife. “So why did you do it to me?”

  “I didn’t. That’s what I’m trying to tell you. There’s a lot more going on here than some MfS renegades smuggling explosives to Moscow.”

  “Yeah, we figured out that much.” She stepped back from Zara and held on to the knife. “The East Germans are planning some kind of terrorist attack or something to spur a crackdown and a return to more predictable days.”

  Zara motioned with her head toward Svetlana. “Can we trust her?”

  “More than we can trust you,” Faith said.

  “Honecker does believe Gorbachev is endangering the system. The Germans were plotting to take him out and pin it on the Americans. Until I was recalled to Moscow, I thought this was limited to a Stasi operation. It’s not. The GDR leadership initiated it—not that it will matter to anyone but a historian. They approached me to recruit dissatisfied KGB factions to back them to make sure the right side stepped into the power vacuum.”

  “Why’d they believe you’d help?” Faith said.

  “My father and I haven’t fared well under Mr. Gorbachev. And I haven’t hidden my conviction that he’s bringing poverty and chaos to my country.”

  “If that’s the case, why didn’t you join in?” Summer said.

  “Commander, I make the assumption you’re a Republican, since you’re in the military. If your president were a Democrat and you believed his policies hurt your country, would you then conspire to overthrow him?”

  “Of course not.”

  “The KGB and Soviet Army have never stepped into our government. We’re not a Third World dictatorship.”

  “I thought Andropov was KGB chief,” Summer said.

  “And Bush was CIA chief. What’s your point?” Zara said.

  Summer shrugged his shoulders.

  Zara continued, “When my boss received my reports about the MfS plans, I’m speculating that he decided to either join forces with the Germans or use them in a plot he was already involved in. Either way, I was ordered to play along with them and make them think we were cooperating so we could catch them in the act after you delivered the C-4. I believed I was feeding them disinformation, but it was the truth.”

  “When’s it going down?” Summer said.

  “Tomorrow morning.”

  “We’ve got to get out of here fast,” Faith said. “A hard-line putsch will shut this place down tighter than
North Korea.”

  “That’s not your biggest worry. This afternoon they’ve issued warnings to KGB operatives to be on the lookout for two American agents supporting Armenian terrorists. When Gorbachev’s killed tomorrow, a full nationwide manhunt for you begins.”

  “We’re screwed,” Faith said. “No one’s going to help us then. This isn’t like the West, where we could go to some remote corner of the country, rent a flat and lie low for a couple of months.”

  Summer continued to point the gun at Zara. “The KGB won’t stop hunting us at the border, will it? I remember something about Trotsky, Mexico City and an ice pick.”

  “Don’t expect protection from your own government—it won’t want anything to do with you. May I assume, Commander Summer, that you’ll be declared a deserter and court-martialed? May I put my hands down? I’m not a threat. Remember, I was the one who helped you escape.”

  “Yeah, what was the think tank with all those brains all about? I know the KGB has to have better holding cells than that,” Summer said.

  “I’ve been trying to tell you; it’s not an official KGB operation. So far as I know, only a handful of people are involved, but they’re powerful.” Zara explained her choice of a low-security KGB research lab. “And, Faith, you’ll appreciate this. That’s where they housed Lenin’s corpse during the war to protect him from German bombing.”

  “How thoughtful of you,” Faith said.

  “I didn’t take the C-4 when I saw it in your shoes and I returned everything you needed to break out and even started a fire as a diversion.”

  “I’m sure we set some mad scientist’s research back decades.” Faith turned to Summer. “What do you think?”

  He lowered the weapon.

  Svetlana grasped Summer’s elbow. “Now that this is settled, I haven’t finished with your arm.” She and Reagan led him back into the kitchen, but Faith and Zara stayed behind.

  “I’m so glad you’re okay.” Zara stepped toward Faith, but she moved away.

  “So am I.”

  “I couldn’t confirm it, but I believe your father is alive.”

  “I know.” Faith turned and walked into the kitchen.

  “Sveta, our captor here has hardly fed us. Do you have anything we could eat?” Faith said as she opened the refrigerator.

  “I did what I could.” Zara leaned against the sink, watching Svetlana push the needle through Summer’s skin.

  “All done.” Svetlana knotted it and clipped the thread. “There’s some cheese and sausage in the icebox for sandwiches, or I could make you some pork cutlets.”

  “Let’s go with the sandwiches,” Summer said. “I agree with the major here that we need to get a move on.”

  “It’s Lieutenant Colonel.”

  “Kinda young for that, aren’t you, comrade?”

  “I was promoted to the rank years ago for my work in California.” Zara walked to the table. She picked up one of the antique cups, looked at it, then set it down.

  “Hit a ceiling, huh?”

  “You could say that,” Zara said as she pulled out a chair.

  “I know exactly how you feel. So what’s your plan?”

  “The future of my country is at stake. The problem is, I’ve been abroad and out of the loop, so I don’t know who to trust. Help me stop the coup.”

  Faith rummaged through the refrigerator. “You’re kidding, right?”

  “That’s another reason why I brought Commander Summer to Moscow. As a US Navy officer, I knew he wouldn’t want to see the world return to the days of the old Cold War, and I mean a very cold, Cold War.”

  “Obviously you don’t know the military, but you have my attention,” Summer said.

  “If they come to power, I can guarantee an invasion of Poland to stop Solidarity. The Party has gone too far in Hungary with their border liberalization and their market reforms, so I suspect we’ll invade them, too. They were fierce fighters in fifty-six.” She shook her head. “And fanatical totalitarians in command of our nuclear weapons won’t make any of us sleep better at night. Remember Korea? Vietnam? Angola? And how many times have we nearly gone to war over Berlin? These men don’t like West Berlin in the middle of the Warsaw Pact, as you call it. All they need to do is wait for a weak American president and they can take the city—finish the business Stalin left undone. Do I need to go on? I’m sure Doctor Whitney could assist me further.”

  “It probably wouldn’t have hurt to mention the purges, gulags—”

  “I was focusing on foreign policy, since our domestic policy rarely concerns your military. I know the people who’ll take over and revenge is on their minds. Stalin has already shown the way. They’ll hit hard before a resistance movement can develop, reestablish the gulag system. All of the journalists and entrepreneurs who thrived under glasnost will have knocks at the door in the middle of the night.”

  “I get your point.” Summer spoke, shielding his full mouth with his right hand until he swallowed. “What are you thinking of doing?”

  “We are not getting involved.” Faith slammed the plate of food down onto the table.

  “We are involved. If what she’s saying is true, the next twenty-four hours are going to alter the course of world events, and I don’t think it’ll be for the better. If you don’t see a way to escape after a coup, and you can’t get us out fast enough before they start the all-out manhunt, then our best bet is to keep them from calling out the dogs on us.”

  “How can the three of us ever hope to stop part of the Red Army and KGB? I vote we run.” Faith opened her sandwich and extracted a peppercorn from a slice of salami. “We can borrow Sveta’s Lada, steal some plates. It’s eight, ten hours to Tallinn. I have connections that could probably get us out on a fishing trawler.”

  “Come, now. It’s not like you’re going to a shipping agent and booking passage on a passenger liner. She also isn’t telling you that you might have to literally jump ship in the Danish Straits.” Svetlana dropped the used needles and hemostat into boiling water. “It’s been done. But not many stevedores are willing to take the risk, and those who are usually turn out to be working for the KGB on the left. When I helped Faith get that sarcophagus out a few years ago, it took me a week in Estonia to find someone reliable to take it into international waters—and he’s not available anymore.” Svetlana’s smile disappeared and she looked away.

  Zara turned toward Faith and raised an eyebrow.

  “It didn’t have a body in it or anything,” Faith said. “It was a couple thousand years old and it was a special order from a client who wanted to be buried in an ancestral coffin.”

  Summer turned to Faith. “Faith, it’s getting riskier here by the minute. Let’s hear the lady spy out and then make our decision. If her plan’s not feasible, we’re gonna run like hell and commandeer a boat if we have to. Think about what’s at stake here. It might be time you decided to take a stand for what’s right for once in your life.”

  “The conspirators are meeting in a dacha just outside of Moscow at nine tonight to coordinate final plans,” Zara said.

  “What kind of security are we talking about?”

  “They won’t want any uninvited guests, but they won’t be prepared to fend off an attack. I would expect less than a half-dozen guards.”

  Summer popped the last bite of his sandwich into his mouth and reached for another. “I see you have exact mission specs. Why aren’t they meeting on a base—somewhere more secure?”

  “To not arouse suspicion. The GRU knows what happens at every military installation, and too many ranking KGB and Army officials in one place would make GRU worried. You don’t want them worried. Unlike your Office of Naval Intelligence, the GRU has teeth.”

  “I know I’m not supposed to interrupt, but can’t we just go to the GRU if they’re pro-Gorbachev?” Faith said.

  “They might be compromised,” Zara said.

  Summer washed the sandwich down with cold tea. “How were you thinking about taking them out?�
��

  Zara gestured toward Faith. “My friend here was expected to bring with her some plastic explosives that I had planned on using to destroy the dacha. Thanks to her ingenuity, I only have something called Play-Doh.”

  “Hold on.” Faith rose from her seat. “Sveta, can you come help me find something?”

  “What are you doing?” Summer said.

  “Taking a stand,” Faith said as she left the room.

  A few minutes later, Faith hoisted the cooler onto the table and removed a plate crudely decorated with blue and pink posies. “Compliments of Captain Ian’s delivery service.”

  “Faith, I don’t know what’s with you, but we don’t have time for any more wheeling and dealing. We’ve probably been here too long as it is.” Summer picked up the plate and his fingers sunk into it slightly. He flashed Faith a grin. “I take that back. We might just be back in business.”

  “Couldn’t fool you for a second,” Faith said. “But then, it does get a little soft at room temperature. Dry ice kept it hard as a rock, though.”

  Zara picked up a plate and scratched off some paint. “I take it this is the C-4?”

  “Yes, ma’am. Looks like we have enough to take out a dacha or two, depending on size and construction.”

  “Wooden, single-story and not very big. Maybe two hundred, two-twenty-five square meters. I can draw a rough floor plan.”

  “So where’re the caps and time fuse?”

  “We might have a small problem. I only had that one small strip of time fuse and one blasting cap. I wasn’t exactly expecting to use the stuff. I did the Play-Doh routine to allow me to bargain for safe passage until I turned over the real thing.” Faith handed Summer the Leatherman.

  “That’s going to be a problem, but I’m not sure we want to tackle it right now. I’m getting antsy we’re staying here too long,” Summer said as he shoved the multipurpose tool into his pocket.

  “You’re right.” Zara got up from the table. “By now they should be questioning Faith’s old friends and acquaintances, and Doctor Gorkovo’s name might be mentioned. We need to remove every obvious sign that we were ever here. If nothing looks unusual, they won’t stay. Don’t worry about fingerprints, because it’s not a crime scene and they’re not interested in proving you were here. All they want to know is where you’re going. Doctor Gorkovo, I suggest you leave town for a few days to avoid any unpleasantness.”