Twilight's Last Gleaming

by John Michael Greer

  Bridgeport gave him a quizzical look. “You get asked about that often?”

  “Last couple of days, all the time.” Sitting back down in his chair: “Need anything else, you give me a call.”

  17 September 2029: The August First Building, Beijing

  The August First Building echoed around him as Liu got off the elevator, paced down the hall to his office. Essential staff had already gone to underground shelters scattered over much of China, and most nonessential personnel had been reassigned to civil defense duties or sent home to their families; the few who remained would be heading to shelters in Beijing before time ran out on the American ultimatum. What had been the busy heart of the People's Liberation Army a few days before was now silent, a place of closed doors and empty cubicles. He thought of the other members of the Central Military Commission, secure in deep shelters far below a dozen widely dispersed mountains; that Meiyin was safe in yet another shelter in Inner Mongolia, with the wives and families of other top Party officials, was some consolation.

  In the reception area outside his office, his secretary stood and saluted. “Sir, a message for you—a professor at the Academy.”

  That would be Fang, Liu realized at once. “I'll take it in my office.”

  Outside the windows, morning light streamed over central Beijing. The air was no clearer than usual, but the familiar traffic was all but absent; evacuation orders had already been issued, every scrap of rolling stock the railways could hold was carrying children and the elderly to the relative safety of the countryside, while the vast network of shelters beneath the city built in Mao's day and indifferently maintained since then was being frantically refitted for the essential workers who would remain behind.

  Liu walked to his desk, picked up the telephone, punched in a phone number and a code, and listened. It was Fang's voice, as he'd guessed. “General, I know you will have far too many duties just now, but would it be possible for you to meet me this morning at the Central Xiangqi Club? It is of some small importance.”

  The message clicked off, and Liu stared at the handset for a long moment, baffled. A game of xiangqi, now of all times? He wondered briefly if the crisis had somehow unhinged Fang's mind, then caught himself. Of all the possibilities, that was the least likely. What under heaven did the man have in mind, then?

  There was only one way to find out. He punched another number on the telephone, waited. The phone rang once, then: “General? I hope my message was not impertinent.”

  “Not at all,” Liu said, and drew in a breath. “I would be happy to come. Ten this morning?”

  “That would be perfect, General.” Was that a flicker of relief in the man's voice? Liu couldn't tell.

  He finished the phone call as quickly as he could, glanced at the time on his computer, then sat down and started calling up situation reports. The fighting in Kenya was over—the Americans had stopped sending planes down from their Persian Gulf bases now that their ground forces had surrendered—and Diego Garcia was quiet, with another round of PLA reinforcements on the way by air from Trincomalee. The Persian Gulf was another matter; the Iranians had kept their promise to stir up trouble there, and eight Saudi cities were ablaze with riots that looked more like urban risings with every hour that passed. Still, that was Iran's concern, not China's.

  The conflict that mattered lay elsewhere. China's strategic forces were ready to launch, submarines and ground-based missiles alike. The Russians were saying nothing about their preparations, but photos from China's reconnaissance satellites showed the traces of ICBMs readied for launch and big Tupolev bombers circling over the northern coast of Siberia, waiting for the orders that would send them surging over the pole. The same satellites brought back word of similar preparations on the far side of the oceans—B-52s over Canada, missiles ready to launch, the few Trident submarines not already at sea leaving their bases and heading toward their assigned stations—as the American strategic arsenal got ready to strike.

  The bleak mathematics of nuclear war played out in his head as he studied the most recent photos from above the United States. Every one of the three great nuclear powers had its own antimissile system, which could be counted on to take out some of the attacking missiles, though no one could be sure how many. Every one of the powers could assume that some of its missiles would fail to launch or go astray and tumble uselessly to earth somewhere far from its target. Even so, given the size of the arsenals in question, there would be enough nuclear fireballs over enough targets to erase all three powers as viable nations, and quite possibly to bring a sudden end to the entire project of human civilization.

  Liu bowed his head, tasting his own responsibility. Were the consequences he hoped Plan Qilin might bring worth risking the survival of China, of civilization, possibly of humanity? He raised his head again, stared at the report on strategic forces until the clock on the computer warned him that it was time to leave for the Central Xiangqi Club and the meeting with Fang.

  The streets of Beijing, normally so crowded, were nearly empty, and it took his driver barely half the usual time to get Liu to his destination. He'd expected the club to be as empty as the streets, but there were more people there than usual, sitting at xiangqi boards or clustered around some unusually lively match. That brought an unwilling smile; it encouraged him that not even the threat of nuclear annihilation could keep xiangqi players from their favorite game.

  “General!” Fang was already in the main room of the club, and came over toward him at once. “I'm delighted that you could make time in your schedule for this.”

  Liu nodded, let himself be led over to a table and a xiangqi board. Fang had something in mind, he knew, and the only way to find out what was to—

  Play the game. He sat, got the pieces in their places on the board, tried to copy the concentration of the players around him. That took effort at first, but as the familiar rhythm of play began, he was able to push aside everything else and let his world contract to his pieces, Fang's, and the shifting matrix of relationships among them.

  Fang's opening moves were uncharacteristically aggressive. Liu chose a wary, defensive strategy, trying to draw the other man out, get him to commit his resources and reveal his plans. He shifted an advisor and an elephant to the center line in front of his general, brought a chariot forward and moved the horse on the same side over to the edge of the board: standard moves, those, freeing up pieces without showing his intentions to Fang.

  The opening gave way to the middle game, and Liu stayed on the defensive, leaving no openings Fang could exploit. The other man would be preparing some grand combination, Liu was sure; that was Fang's way, but so was concealing his intentions until the last minute. Liu studied the board. Others were watching the game, he noted, then tried to drive the awareness out of his mind and maintain his focus.

  When Fang's combination finally appeared, it nearly took Liu's breath away—both horses, a chariot and a cannon, threatening a lethal quadruple check. The watchers murmured, and Liu leaned forward. Something was not quite right…

  All at once he saw it, and allowed a slow smile. The move was a bluff. Fang could not execute the quadruple check without exposing his own general to attack. Liu took one of his chariots and moved it forward, close to the river, biding his time.

  Within a few more moves the momentum of the game was going the other way. Move by move, Liu closed off every remaining option Fang had, until finally the professor had no moves left and bowed his head, conceding.

  There must have been fifty people watching, Liu realized abruptly. The murmurs had turned to animated conversation, and bills rustled as money changed hands. He looked up from the board to Fang's face, caught the slight raise of an eyebrow, the almost pleading look. That was when he realized what Fang was trying to tell him.

  Half an hour later he was back at the August First Building. “I need a list of six or seven large civil defense installations and military factories here in Beijing,” he told his secretary. “Plac
es where there will still be plenty of people. I'll be visiting them, very publicly. You'll inform Xinhua—I want each visit broadcast, in China and internationally.”

  The secretary gave him a startled look, but said “Yes, sir,” and started tapping on his keyboard as Liu went into his office. He woke his computer, saw the report on strategic forces, and closed it at once. There was no need to waste his time with that. Fang was right: the Americans were bluffing.

  77 September 2029: Facility 6335, West of Sverdlovsk

  Kuznetsov glanced around the office, nodded. Though he was nearly a mile below ground, the room was comfortable enough, with curtains covering blank walls here and there to create the illusion of windows. A smart bit of psychology on the part of the designers, or the personal quirk of some Politburo official? In all probability, no one alive still knew.

  The flaws of the old Soviet government were undeniable, but it had certainly succeeded in being thorough. Eight huge emergency shelters had been excavated deep underneath the Ural Mountains, each one of them large enough to house the essential personnel of the entire national government, and built deep and strong enough that not even nuclear warheads posed any threat to those inside. These days, only two of them were still usable, and only one was kept staffed and ready for emergencies—Russia was prosperous again, with oil and natural gas revenues at record highs, but the extravagances that crippled the Soviet system were on many minds, and one such shelter was ample for Russia's current needs.

  Kuznetsov went to the desk, tapped the mouse. The screen lit up immediately. He sat down, opened a text window and sent the agreed code message back to the Kremlin, letting the remaining staff in Moscow know that he had arrived at Facility 6335 and was in charge, and that they should head for their assigned shelters at once.

  A few more clicks of the mouse brought up the screens he needed to watch: updates from the Russian strategic forces command center inside Kosvinksky Mountain, satellite and over-the-horizon radar data from the early warning system headquarters in Solnechnogorsk, hourly intelligence updates from SVR headquarters in the Yasenovo district back in Moscow, reports from EMERCOM on the nation's civil defense preparations. All of it argued that he'd gauged the situation correctly.

  If he had not…

  He brushed the thought aside, clicked on the screen with the latest SVR update. Satellite photos showed flurries of activity around American and Chinese strategic bases and both nation's fleets putting to sea. He scrolled down quickly to the reports on the world's other nuclear powers, cupped his chin in one hand as he read the report.

  Britain, France and India had all gotten diplomatic notes informing them that they would not be targeted by Russia's strategic forces so long as they reciprocated. New Delhi replied within the hour, insisting that India had no hostile intentions toward anyone and offering to mediate, but there had been no word from London or Paris. Kuznetsov frowned, knowing how few minutes it would take British or French missiles to hit Moscow or St. Petersburg. Still, the report offered some comfort: spies in both countries reported that the governments and strategic forces were acting as though they wanted to survive a nuclear exchange, not to join in one.

  At the bottom of the report, though, something caught his eye. One of the vice chairmen of China's Central Military Commission, a General Liu, was all over the news in China: he'd been seen playing some Chinese board game or other at a club in Beijing, then visited a civil defense facility in the city to cheer up the people sheltering there. SVR staff reported a rumor that he'd been in charge of China's end of the East African campaign, and noted that he was either the second or the third most powerful figure in the Chinese government—not the kind of man you would expect even the Chinese to leave aboveground in the country's most important nuclear target.

  He sat back, considered the screen. Could the Chinese really be that confident?

  18 September 2029: Expediency Council offices, Tehran

  The guarded room in the nondescript building was crowded, with more than twice the usual number in attendance. Not only the members of the Expediency Council but every other figure of importance in Iran's government had been summoned. Every face turned toward Ayatollah Jahrami as he set down the latest briefing paper.

  “You all know what we are facing,” he said. “If the Americans follow through on their threat, it is inconceivable that they will spare us.”

  The old ayatollah Saif al-Shirazi considered him through thick glasses. “I trust you will excuse me if I ask why.”

  Zardawi, the commander of the Revolutionary Guards, cleared his throat discreetly. “In a nuclear war, your eminence, if anyone can be said to win, it is those countries that stay out of the fighting and are spared the fallout. If Russia, China and the United States destroy one another, maybe we will all die anyway, but Allah willing, some of the nations not directly involved may not perish. Which of them will dominate the world once the war is over, if anyone does? It will be those large and strong countries that take no part the war. Iran could be among those—Iran, India, Brazil, two or three others. Whether the Americans will bomb India or Brazil I do not know, but they will not miss the chance to bomb us.”

  Jahrami nodded. “It is simply a matter of whether the Americans are bluffing or not. And in the meantime, we have an unexpected crisis on our hands. General?”

  “I suspect,” the Revolutionary Guards commander said, “that you have all been watching the news from Arabia as closely as I have. I am informed by our intelligence service, though, that the situation is even more unstable than the media realizes—certainly more so than we anticipated. We hoped merely to stir up trouble for the Americans, to distract them from East Africa and foster good relations with the Chinese. None of us expected the rising against the Saudis to grow so quickly or accomplish so much.”

  “Do you think they can overthrow the Saudis themselves?” This from a general in Iran's regular army.

  Zardawi shook his head emphatically. “With Allah, all things are possible; still, barring His direct intervention, they will be crushed. Not soon, not without a great expenditure of money and blood—but they will be crushed.”

  “And if that happens,” Jahrami said, “we will suffer a double loss. First, all the preparations we have made to destabilize the Saudis will have to be made all over again, against a government grown wary by experience. Second, our allies will be slow to risk themselves in the future, thinking that we will abandon them as we abandoned the Arabian rebels. Yet if we act now, you know as well as I do how the Americans are likely to respond.”

  “Do you have a proposal to suggest?” Shirazi asked.

  “Prayer comes to mind,” Jahrami said.

  The old ayatollah glanced around the circle of faces. “That is always wise,” he said finally, “but it seems to me, along those same lines, that an important point is being neglected. Whatever the military, political, economic issues in all this—” A wave of his hand dismissed them. “There is also a religious dimension. It is possible that this is how Allah has decided to end the world He has made. If so, do you wish the last day to find you sitting at your ease here in Tehran or cowering in a shelter in the mountains?”

  “That is a consideration,” Jahrami admitted.

  “What exactly are you suggesting, your eminence?” This from Zardawi.

  “The liberation of the Holy Cities from the Sunni,” Shirazi said. “The dream of the Faithful since Husayn's time.” He shrugged. “I am not a strategist, merely a religious man, but it seems to me that this might be suitable for discussion.”

  Zardawi glanced from one ayatollah to another. “I am in favor of it,” he said finally. “If we are all going to die anyway, why not die bravely? And if we are not all going to die, control of the Holy Cities—and a few other things located between here and there—might be of some significant advantage to Iran.”

  Most of the men in the room laughed, Jahrami among them. The coy reference to the Saudi oil fields, still a sixth of the world's daily pr
oduction, was lost on none of them.

  “We have substantial Revolutionary Guards units stationed on the Iraqi border,” Zardawi went on. “It would be the simplest thing in the world to send them across the rivers, through Kuwait, and down the coastline to assist the rebels.”

  “Turkey will intervene,” Jahrami said.

  “Let them. That war has been on our doorstep for years now—who else have we been fighting in Kurdistan these last three years? When the American sun sets, either the Turks will rule the Dar al-Islam or we will, everyone knows that. And the American sun is setting. Of that, I think, there is no question.”

  Jahrami did not argue. “I can see the advantages of such a thing—and the risks. Still, we cannot linger over this. Do any of you oppose this project?”

  No one spoke. After a moment, Jahrami nodded. “May Allah favor us, then.” And if He does not, he was thinking, may He have mercy on us all.

  17 September 2029: Mount Weather, Virginia

  The elevator door opened and Weed and his wife got out. The hallway reminded him of official buildings in has-been nations and five-star hotels in resort towns that had fallen out of fashion; though a lot of money had obviously gone into the thing, it had an indefinable air of neglect and decay about it. He tried not to notice that. What mattered, he told himself, was that he and Andie were a mile underground, safe from Russian and Chinese missiles if the worst happened, and that he could manage the nation's response to the crisis from here.

  Aside from the lack of windows and famous paintings, the rooms in this part of the Mount Weather shelter were a fair imitation of the residential floor of the White House. Weed got Andie settled in the private sitting room off their bedroom. “They said that the staff and our luggage will be down in a bit,” he told her, unnecessarily. “Will you be okay for now?” She gave him a bleak frightened glance, but nodded, and he left the room, hurried back the way he came.