David's Sling (33 page)
But he could
not
deal with this now! He bit throtigh his lip, and the pain and the taste of blood shifted his mental gears again.
He carefully clenched his
left
fist. He
had
to stop these madmen, with their nuclear terrors. His eyes widened, a feverish anger filling them. "No!" he told them. "If you believe nuclear firepower can defeat the Americans, then you believe a lie. " He pointed at the general who had spoken. "Where will you drop your bombs? Quickly, for the Hoppers are moving!"
The general sat stunned for a moment, then smiled. "I will drop them in Germany." Still no one laughed.
Ivan drove onward. 'Then give me the coordinates, General, to within a meter. That is what we need to launch a weapon. And then you must tell me who will issue the launch orders, with our commanders dead. The orders must go out quickly, before the targets can move. Otherwise, comrades, our nuclear weapons will be no more effective than our artillery." He described the way the artillery shells fell around the battling tanks, which remained oblivious to the massive shelling because they never landed
on
them, only
near
them. "You could drop thousands of bombs on Germany, you could kill millions of farmers and children, you could destroy life all over the planet, without stopping a single Hopper. Artillery only works well when combined with tightly integrated reconnaissance, decision-making, and action. Even the ultimate artillery shell, the nuclear bomb, is worthless without a well-defined target."
The hysterical voice spoke again. "How can they be doing this to us?" he cried. "We destroyed
their
command and control in the first three days of war. How can they go on fighting?"
Ivan relaxed, and smiled at the second-rate Politburo bureaucrat who had given him his opening. "Thank you, sir, for that question. They can fight on without orders because they are
defenders.
It takes far less command and control sophistication to defend your position—just shoot at anything that shoots at you. The attacker, however, must orchestrate every move. Without good direction, an attacker's forces can even wind up attacking each other, rather than the enemy." A number of faces looked up in surprised anger, as if he had spoken of something obscene that had already happened. Had he hit home again? Were the Warsaw Pact allies deserting them? It made no difference. "This leads me to suggest the one way left that we can still achieve victory."
That
certainly got their interest! He doubted they would like his suggestion, however. "To defeat the American weapons that destroy attackers, we must become defenders." He paused to let them puzzle over that for a moment. "We must advance our troops back to their permanent fortifications in East Germany and Czechoslovakia. We must make this move while we still have such superior numbers and strength that we can defend ourselves."
Retreat.
He hadn't used that word, but he could see it twisting the faces around him in anger.
"Thank you for your analysis and your opinions, Major," the powerful man by the Premier said. "Now your doctors want you to rest. You are dismissed." He nodded, and someone turned his wheelchair to the door.
A sense of
deja vu
flickered through Ivan's mind. He had no regrets about his actions in this meeting. As in his study a year earlier on nuclear war, he had done his best. Perhaps this time it would make a difference.
Yurii rubbed his temples as the door closed behind Major Ivan Vorontsov.
General Ramius cleared his throat. "That man should be shot," he muttered. "It's treasonous to speak of surrender."
"He did not speak of surrender," Yevschenko responded mildly. "He spoke of retreat. He spoke as a man who has been there and knows whereof he speaks."
Pultiy, who seemed calmer now that the lowly but insightful major was gone, chimed in, "He speaks plainly, like a man who has accepted death, but who has not lost hope."
They paused. Yurii started directing the meeting toward the conclusion he had drawn, based on Vorontsov's analysis. "Major Vorontsov's greatest failing is that he speaks the truth. Unless we come up with a better alternative than any so far proposed, gentlemen, we must follow his advice. We already have a bloody future ahead of us in resubjugating the Poles." The Polish Army had started an unauthorized retreat. The trouble had begun when the Third Shock Army disappeared in a God-like barrage of fire and brimstone, just as they were about to destroy the last units of the British Army. Even Yurii felt haunted by the mystical horror of it. He sympathized with the Poles, even as he planned a hideous punishment.
General Ramius spoke again. "We could make a strategic nuclear strike. That would show the Americans that were serious, and it would tell them to hold their positions. We would form a new national boundary based on current troop locations."
The discussion that followed paralleled discussions that had been held in the White House just weeks before. The Soviet discussion was not the same. The values important enough to affect decisions in a free society are not the values of importance in a police state.
But the conclusion was the same: nuclear missiles were too crude to operate as instruments of politics. The risks were too great.
Yurii summed up. "We could have risked it had Mayfield been alive, but Nell Carson is in charge now. She is too clever to be predictable. And being unpredictable, she is dangerous." His eyes swept the room. "Are there any other suggestions?" He paused, but not long enough to allow others to open any new discussions. "Then the major was correct. We must return to the original borders." He glanced at Sipyagin, whose labored breathing filled the silence. "And we will need to negotiate with the Americans, to make sure they don't press their advantage into our territory. In order to be credible in this endeavor, comrades, we must reshuffle the highest echelons of the government. "
The General Secretary's heavy breathing stopped. "What?"
Yurii smiled without compassion. For a moment he felt an icy pleasure at the justice he would now serve on the General Secretary.
Yurii thought about the decrepit men sitting here in this decrepit room with venomous hostility. They hadn't been able to wait. For decades, the Soviet Union had waited while America's strength slowly but surely deteriorated. In just another decade, the Americans would have withdrawn from Europe completely, without any further moves on Russia's part at all. The waiting had almost been over.
But the little old men wanted to see that day of victory in their own lifetimes. They couldn't wait. They had to hurry the process just a little bit too much.
During the first heady weeks of the war, it had seemed that they had been right to finish the job quickly, and Yurii had been wrong. But the perverse American capacity for losing all the battles and still winning the war had shown through at last. Now the whole Soviet empire would pay the price for the impatience of these fools. He spoke to Sipyagin. "Sir, the American propaganda blames you for starting this war. If you remain in power, the Americans will continue to fight. They will fight to destroy
you,
believing that as long as you have power, we might try this again.
"But if we install a new leader, they can then deceive themselves into believing that our government has toppled. Our new secretary will be a peacemaker. The American news media will herald him as a savior."
An anonymous voice spoke quickly, with heavy irony. "No doubt the new General Secretary should be someone who helped the Americans sign away their defenses with numerous treaties."
Another anonymous voice snorted.
Yurii swept the room with his eyes but could not tell who had taken those shots. Whoever they were, they already realized how dangerous their outburst had been.
Yurii could identify them later. For the moment he returned his attention to Sipyagin, who was searching the room for supporters. No one volunteered. "We must ponder this carefully," Sipyagin said, stalling for time.
"Of course," Yurii conceded. "But we must ponder it quickly. We must decide before the Americans reach our Pact borders—before they work themselves into such a frenzy of victory that they fear nothing. We must hurry!" A number of logical flaws gaped in Yurii's analysis, but no one would object. Emotions now drove the decision-making process, emotions of fear and embarassment at this terrible calamity. This pathetic roomful of almost-conquerors needed a scapegoat and a viable successor.
Sipyagin understood this as well as Yurii. Yurii continued to watch as he searched the room for alternate choices for the new leader. Yurii knew, with smug confidence, what his senile mentor would find: only one man in this room still had the youthful vitality to make a good General Secretary for the Soviet Union.
In the end, Yurii won by default. He issued orders for the Army, described the necessary propaganda for the newspapers, and adjourned the meeting.
When the last of the old guard had left, Yurii returned to his old office to contemplate the mixed tastes of his own personal victory and his country's overwhelming defeat.
If Mayfield hadn't died, the whole Soviet plan would have succeeded. Of that, Yurii was certain. If Mayfield had had a vice president as malleable as Mayfield himself, that too would have allowed Sipyagin's premature conquest of Europe to work. How had Mayfield wound up with a she-fiend for a successor?
Carson's second in command was Avery Faulke, the American Speaker of the House, a pudding of a man.
He
would have been a proper Mayfield running mate. Yuri could have used Faulke very nicely.
For a moment, Yurii dreamed of Nell Carson's death, and the succession of another pathetic creature to America s helm. He could still wrest victory from this terrible position! A simple assassination would give him triumph.
But the risks would be incredible. If the assassination failed, or if the Americans found out that he had instigated the attempt, the repercussions could destroy the whole planet. With a last lingering farewell, he put the fantasy aside. Too much reality required his immediate attention.
THE DUELISTS
May 13
May the pens of diplomats never again ruin what the people have attained with such exertion
—General Blucher after the Battle of Waterloo
She was toying with him, Nathan realized. She played with her drink as she played with him.
At considerable cost in time and effort, Nathan had brought two Fritzbe's strawberry shortcakes from the suburbs of Reston, so they could share this unusual drink here in the private, third-story dining room of the White House. The strawberry shortcake was a deceiving alcoholic liquid with a creamy consistency and a mellow hint of amaretto blended in. Like many shortcake drinkers, Nell now swirled her straw in rhythmic patterns, mixing the pink and white layers.
Nathan continued the banter. "So you've selected the new vice president. You're honest enough to tell me that you've made the decision, but you're cruel enough not to tell me who it is, is that the situation?"
She raised her eyebrows with an innocent sip at the shortcake. "Oh, I suppose you could put it that way."
Nathan harrumphed in response. The room seemed too quiet in comparison with the hubbub of Fritzbe's, where he normally drank shortcakes. Nathan didn't really miss the hubbub too much, the collage of engineers and lawyers and teenagers that seemed like a carefully orchestrated accident. But here alone with Nell, his heart pounded loudly, and he wondered if Nell could hear it in the stillness of the room.
If Nell insisted on toying with him, he would try to reciprocate. "Very well, then, I won't tell you about the person who most recently converted to Zeteticism."
"Who is it?"
"I said I wouldn't tell you."
"I see." Nell smiled at him with an expression of mischief. It occurred to Nathan that Nell seemed to grow younger every time they met. She no longer frowned with a look that reminded one of battered steel. Tonight, she had let her hair fall free; it was longer than he had realized. She took references to herself as "Madam President" in stride. Now that the Soviet armies had withdrawn to their old stations within the Warsaw Pact, she could afford to be graceful, not hardened. "Do you like to dance?" Nathan found himself asking.
Nell dropped her straw with a sudden laugh. "Sometimes," she said, "But not generally when I'm running a country." She raised another eyebrow. "Actually, even as president, the opportunity arises occasionally, as long as I'm not also running a world war."
"Good point. Though I suspect the dancing style at presidential functions is a bit sedate."
Nell nodded. "I'm afraid so." She paused. "So what will you be doing now that we no longer need the Zetetic Institute to save the world?"
"We're reorganizing." Nathan paused to take another cool sip of the rich strawberry, cream, and amaretto concoction. "Though the news media haven't given the Institute much credit for our victory in the Flameout, enough people have heard about us to quintuple the size of our seminars. " After the SeaHunters had destroyed the Soviet fleet, and after their armies had left Germany and Denmark, the news media had given the War a name that suited its events: the Flameout. It had been a brief, fierce, and ultimately irrelevant engagement. When it was over, nothing had changed that the news media could describe as significant.
"Are there any seminars I should take?"
Nathan smiled. "I would prefer to tutor you individually."
"Hah! I'll bet."
"First, I'd teach you about best-case and worst-case event preparation. On an ordinary day, an ordinary person only prepares for the most probable future, thus leaving himself open to disaster, should the future turn out differently. "
Nell sighed. In the length of her breath, Nathan could hear a hundred arguments, a thousand discussions that might have prevented the Flameout. "I know all about the importance of preparing for different possible futures," she said. "It's more depressing than I'm ready to deal with at the moment."
Nathan shook his head. "Ah, but there's what you're missing, Nell. All those possible futures
shouldn't
be depressing. Because, in addition to preparing for the worst, you must also prepare for the best. " Hardly believing what he was doing, he reached out his hand to her chin, to lift her head, to force her to look at him. "Often, the critical preparation for worst-case is to recognize the possibility. That way, if the worst occurs, you only need to deal with the problem, rather than having to deal with your shock at the same time, And that—" he felt his voice rising "—is when the sense of wonder returns."
"The sense of wonder?" Nell stared at him as though he spoke Gaelic.
"Yes, the sense of wonder that so many of us have lost." Nathan leaned forward, preparing his explanation as he had done so many times before. "Don't you see the consequences of preparing for only the most likely future? Most of the time, that most likely future will come true, and how do you react to it? 'Of course,' you say,
taking it for granted.
But if you have recognized the worst possibilities—if you have accepted them with your whole mind- then when the 'normal' future comes to pass, you can say, 'How wonderful! How special and beautiful this moment is.' "
Nell leaned back against the wooden back of her seat as Nathan leaned forward. She asked, "I guess you take your sense of wonder pretty seriously, don't you?"
Nathan retreated with a short laugh. "Yeah, I guess I do. Somehow, my sense of wonder has stayed intact throughout my life, as if it were an automatic response. Most people claim they enjoy watching sunsets. Yet, if they enjoy it so much, why do they do it so rarely? I can take pleasure in even simpler things. Every time an airplane takes off to ride on a puff of wind, every time a photograph gives us a window on a scene from the past, every time you throw a
light switch
, each one of these things is wondrous. And though we can't take time to appreciate these things every time we touch them, does that mean we should
never
take the time for appreciation?" He laughed, and held up his hands as if to cast a blessing. "Think of the universe as a supersaturated solution of wonder. Every once in a while the wonder crystallizes out in some beautiful form—in the shape of a tree, or a flower, or a skyscraper. Or in the shape of a special woman who is president." Realizing he'd said too much—indeed, he'd intentionally said too much—he brought his hands down quickly and continued. "You know, the people of America—even most of the poor—are the richest, the most comfortable, the best educated, and the most potent people ever to live on Earth. How could we acquire so many things and still not be happy? What did we fail to acquire?" He held his finger to his forehead. "We failed to acquire minds capable of appreciating our acquisitions. We failed to expand our sense of wonder."
The light struck Nell's features harshly; for a moment, she seemed pale, even meek. "I see that. You're right; I've lost many things in my life," she half-whispered.
With a shake she looked back at Nathan. "Perhaps there
are
some things to learn from the Zetetic Institute. Were you serious about wanting to tutor me? I'll make you a deal. You do the tutoring on Zeteticism, I'll tutor you on slow dancing. It would be wonderful to have someone to dance with the next time I'm forced to attend a ballroom affair. "
"I'd like that very much—almost as much as I would like to know who the new vice president is."
Her laughter released her tension as much as it expressed her pleasure. "You'll know in just a few hours. Just like everyone else."
"Fiendish. I suppose I'll survive."
"Actually, you're the most likely person in the country to guess who the next vice president will be. But that's the only hint I'll give you."
"I can guess? Well, let's toast to him, whoever he is." Nathan raised his empty glass.
Nell shot him a look of mock disappointment. "A toast to
him?
Why do you think I chose a
man?
"
Nathan looked at the president with amused delight. "The women's
coup d'etat
has begun. I was afraid that once we let women into office, we'd never get them out again." He raised his glass in a toast. "To the coup. To all that's fair in love and war. "
"Let us drink particularly to all that's fair in love," she replied, raising her eyebrow. "I prefer love to war, don't you?"
Nathan nodded his agreement; the lump in his throat made it impossible for him to speak.
Nathan had spent his life building families out of the friends he met along the road. Many, many people respected and admired him, but love had never quite worked out. He was too remote, somehow, peering into a distance where they couldn't, or wouldn't, quite follow.
Nell made him feel happy in ways he had never known before. His sense of wonder grew stronger.
SNAP.
Bill's hands shake. He casually slides them beneath the table, to prevent the audience from seeing his weakness. He is presenting the most terrifying double-feature story in the history of journalism. He wonders whether he should discuss this material on the air or not. For mankind's sake, he must try not to create misperceptions in the minds of his viewers. The safest short-term action would be to say nothing, thus creating no misperceptions at all. Yet for mankind's sake, he must spread the information he has gathered, creating correct understandings. The only long-term safety lay in communicating only correct perceptions.
Bill digs his fingers into his thighs, and still the trembling continues. He knows he will fail.
CLICK
. "Good evening, ladies and gentlemen," he tells the camera that represents over 50 million viewers. "For those of you who have not heard, an assassination attempt has been made on President Carson. Tonight we have exclusive film showing the assassin in the act. We also have an exclusive story on Soviet planning documents that suggest a possible Soviet link to the assassination attempt. "
CUT.
The recording of events earlier that day unfolds. A striking woman in royal blue steps gracefully across the front of a crowded room to the podium. Her silk scarf flutters ever so slightly with the speed of her motion. The room, noisy before, now breaks into cheers and clapping. She turns. She is Nell Carson, here to announce the selection of the new vice president.
WHIR.
Her voice rises and falls, pauses and rushes. She speaks of the difficulty of making the decision, and the marvelous qualities of the man finally chosen. Her eyes shine, her voice sings, but not even Nell Carson can make this standard speech come to life. "—That's why I'm pleased to announce the new vice president, Hilan Forstil! '
PAN.
Bill's camera, impatient with the ceremony, drifts across the audience to a stocky man—a man who might once have had glowing health, but who now has tight twists of tension across his face and a gaunt look, as if he has not slept for days. He reaches into the shadow of his pocket to retrieve a darker shadow.
ZOOM.
The darker shadow now held in the man's pale hand resolves. It has the shape of a pistol.
CLICK. FLASH. CUT.
The man fires twice. President Carson jerks across the stage. A dozen men move rapidly, identifying themselves by their speed and organization as Secret Service Agents.
FLASH.
The gaunt man turns his pistol sideways. Looking peaceful at last, he fires once more, striking himself in the temple.
CUT.
The newscast returns to Bill's somber image. Bill tells the audience what is known about Ted Muhlman, the assassin. Though Bill speaks at length, the sum of his words is, w
e know almost nothing about this man.
ZOOM.
"Why did he shoot the president? We don't know. But the most terrifying suggestions come from sources outside the United States." Bill holds up the document he had received less than a day earlier, from one of his contacts in the Soviet Union. In bold red letters, the English translation of the title slashes diagonally across the cover: A
Revised Assessment of the Global Consequences of Nuclear War.
"What does this document have to do with the attack on President Carson?" Bill riffles the pages, stopping on the final chapter, the Summary. "This document has two different Summaries. The first summary, written by the analysts who conducted the study, reflects on the logical consequences of the dangers of nuclear war." Bill takes a deep breath, a shaky pause. "However, that summary angered members of the Politburo, so it was rewritten to reflect the thinking of men in power in the Soviet Union. The man who authorized this study—and who presumably had the summary rewritten to agree with his own thinking— was Yurii Klimov, the new Soviet General Secretary."
Bill clears his throat. With the somber tone of a judge, he reads. "As this revised analysis shows, the global consequences of nuclear war remain grave, even under the most optimistic assumptions. However, this danger need not deprive the Soviet Union of opportunities to exercise its strength. Indeed, this unassailable vindication of the dangers of war can work to our advantage. We can count on the threat of global disaster to paralyze enemies—particularly enemies who already show indecisiveness. Chief among these indecisive opponents is the American President: Jim Mayfield demonstrates the archetypical set of traits we would desire to see in an American leader.
"With Mayfield in office, we can apply force with minimal restraint. Some graduation in scale is still necessary, but we see no reason not to use troops in Iran to resolve the religious tensions there. If Mayfield responds weakly to our invasion of Iran, as we we are certain that he will, we may then calm the chronic East German uprisings with an invasion of West Germany. Thus we would continue the successful strategy we initiated in Afghanistan decades ago."
ZOOM.
Bill looks up at the camera. "Either by coincidence or by intent, this summary describes the Soviet Union's activities for the last year. Now listen to what the summary says about Nell Carson."
SCAN
. He returns to his somber recitation. "Of course, we must match our steps to the mood of the American President. If Nell Carson succeeded President Mayfield, for example, we would have to move with greater caution, due to her unpredictability.
:
" Bill licks his lips. "Other potential American leaders can be categorized easily into these two types: the indecisive and the unpredictable. We have composed such a list of American leaders here to encourage farther discussion of the timing and intensity of our future geopolitical moves."