Eagle Station

The truth was that the mammoth Traveler Air Freight 747-8 looming up ahead wasn’t carrying any Scion weapons, explosives, or other gear in its cargo holds. Not on this trip anyway. Instead, its sole mission was to smuggle them into Russian airspace.

Like most military and espionage stratagems, Brad’s plan was simple enough on paper — but very difficult to successfully pull off in practice. They were tucked up close enough to blend the Rustler’s minimal radar signature with that of the much larger cargo jet. If everything worked right, Russia’s probing air defense radars should see them only as a single, innocent commercial aircraft transiting the internationally recognized Polar Route 1 on its way to Mumbai in India.

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the world’s passenger and freight airlines were quick to recognize the enormous potential savings in time and fuel offered by routing aircraft over the Arctic and through previously off-limits Russian airspace. Within several years, a series of international agreements had opened specific, narrowly defined air corridors to declared civilian traffic.

Polar Route 1 was one of the busiest, with dozens of air transits every day. It opened north of Greenland and then ran almost due south across Russia — conveniently crossing high over Krasnoyarsk — before entering Chinese airspace on its way to India.

Mentally, Brad crossed his fingers. Either this gambit worked… or this would turn out to be one of the shortest and most futile rescue efforts in Scion’s covert operations history. He glanced toward Nadia. “Time to the edge of the Murmansk flight information region?”

She checked her nav display. “At this speed, five minutes.”

Brad buckled down to the job of keeping their aircraft slotted right behind the 747. Pockets of local turbulence affected the smaller, lighter XCV-70 more than they did the huge Boeing cargo jet. So it took constant adjustments to his flight controls to stay in formation.

Beside him, Nadia tuned to the radio frequency being used by the Traveler Air jet.

Not long afterward, they heard, “Traveler Five-Five Three, Edmonton Center,” through their headsets. “Monitor VHF one-two-six point nine. At DEVID, contact Murmansk Oceanic Center, eight-nine-five-zero primary, one-one-three-nine-zero secondary. Have a good day.”

The Canadians were handing off the 747-8 cargo flight to their Russian air traffic control counterparts. DEVID was a fixed navigation point where all aircraft crossing the Arctic region were required to contact Murmansk.

Nadia changed frequencies. Moments later, they heard the Traveler Air Freight pilot radio. “Murmansk Oceanic, Traveler Five-Five-Three, level four-zero-zero.”

The Russian-accented voice of a new controller replied immediately. “Traveler Five-Five-Three, this is Murmansk, roger. Maintain flight level four-zero-zero.”

For now, the Rustler’s threat-warning computer stayed silent. They were still well beyond the range of the air route surveillance radars posted to monitor Russia’s northern regions.

They flew on, crossing high above the polar region. Below them, the ice cap was now a continuous sheet of white glare.

Forty-five minutes and 370 nautical miles after crossing through the DEVID intersection, the threat computer issued its first alert. “Caution, S-band phased-array radar detected at twelve o’clock. Range approximately two hundred miles,” a calm female voice reported. “Evaluated as Russian Sopka-2 Arctic Air Surveillance Radar. Detection probability high.”

“Here we go,” Brad murmured. That radar was sited on a small island at Sredny Ostrov, originally an ice airfield built as a staging base for Soviet Tu-95 Bear bombers tasked with attacking the United States if the Cold War had ever turned hot. It was located just off the much larger Severnaya Zemlya archipelago. Along with the new radar and at least one surface-to-air-missile battery, current intelligence indicated the Russians had upgraded Sredny’s runway, enabling it to handle all-weather fighters like the MiG-31.

“Standing by on SPEAR,” Nadia said. The instant it appeared that their ruse had failed, she planned to bring the system online and either seize control over that enemy radar… or blind it. With luck, she might be able to buy them enough time to reverse course, drop to low altitude, and scoot for friendly airspace at high speed.