"And no mention of a biological broken arrow in the Arctic involving two tons of anthrax?" Smith prompted.
She shook her head, then brushed back a lock of raven hair from above her brow. "Not a whisper, until the Russians brought the subject up with our President.
"Now, information on a bioweapons warload being carried by a specific aircraft might very well have been compartmentalized for security purposes. But this particular Bull and its entire aircrew have been completely erased from all standard Red Air Force documentation. They urgently wanted to make it go completely away. And I think the only reason the Russian Federation is admitting to its existence now is because it's sitting there in front of God and everybody."
Smith looked past Valentina for a moment and out the glare-bright window, digesting the information. "That is interesting," he replied slowly. "Here's one I've been wondering about. It seems damn peculiar to me that anyone would risk uploading a live biowar agent as part of a training exercise. Common sense would dictate you'd use some kind of harmless inert testing compound."
Valentina shrugged. "You'd think so, and so would I. But then, we aren't Russian. They tend to do things differently.
"Consider the Chernobyl disaster," she went on. "We wouldn't build a big electric power reactor with a combustible graphite core, but the Russians did. We wouldn't build a big nuclear reactor of any kind without a proper radiation containment dome, but the Russians did. And we wouldn't run a series of radical systems-failure tests on a big, unsealed graphite-core power reactor while it was up and critical, but the Russians most certainly did. I don't think we can make any assumptions on that point."
Smith nodded. "Then we won't. Now, let's move on to something else. I know the status of the Russian Federation's current biowar program, but you're our expert on past Soviet systems. What's the possibility that bomber might be carrying something other than plain old anthrax?"
She sighed. "It's difficult to say. The Misha 124 was the kind of aircraft that would have been used on a one-way transpolar strike mission against strategic targets in the United States. With that as a given, and given the plane was armed, it would have been carrying some kind of ABC warload: atomic, biological, or chemical. The Soviets wouldn't expend a long-range bomber and an elite aircrew to deliver anything less potent."
She took another sip of her coffee and squirmed around to face him directly, tucking her feet under her in the seat. "As for the specific agent, those were the days before the exotics like Ebola and before advanced genetic engineering. You had to make do with what Mother Nature provided. The big three everyone was fooling with were anthrax, smallpox, and the bubonic plague. Anthrax was favored because it was simple and cheap to manufacture in bulk, and militarily controllable because it isn't a contagion."
Smith frowned and considered. "If it were the plague or smallpox, we'd likely have nothing to worry about. The pathogens would probably be long inert by now. Besides, why lie about it? All three of the alternatives would have been equally nasty, and once we reach the crash site we'd know anyway."
"Exactly." Valentina gave an acknowledging tilt of her head. "That's why it can't just be the presence of the bioagent alone. They've already confessed to it. There must be some X factor involved that we don't understand. Beyond that, the present deponent knoweth not. But I can be reasonably certain about one other thing."
"What would that be?"
She took another sip of her coffee. "Something damn peculiar is going to happen when we get inside that airplane."
Chapter Twelve
Anchorage, Alaska
Three hours out of Seattle the 737 popped its flaps and airbrakes and began its descent into the Anchorage bowl. Snowcapped ridgelines and the steel blue waters of Cook's Inlet panned past the liner's windows as it spiraled down into the contradiction of a twenty-first-century American city set in the heart of an essential wilderness.
Settling on its landing gear, the little Boeing taxied to the south terminal of Ted Stevens International Airport. A uniformed Alaska State Policeman from the airport security detail stood waiting for Smith and his people at the head of the Jetway.
"Welcome to Alaska, Colonel Smith," the state trooper said gravely. "We've got a vehicle waiting for you out in the police lot." He passed Smith a set of car keys. "It's a white unmarked Crown Vic. Just leave it at Merrill Field. We'll send