Phoenix Sub Zero

“There are a few components I’d be guessing at as far as mass is concerned, sir, but within a few percent, this war head is about three metric tons. That’s 3,000 kilos, give or take a few hundred.”

“Where did they put the operational warheads?”

“We think they took them to the Mediterranean coast at Kassab.”

Destiny’s base, Donchez thought. With two warheads sized for a sea-launched weapon system that needed to be within 1,900 miles to hit its target. And Destiny had broken out of the Med and was last detected heading west.

He stood, he’d heard enough. He didn’t need the raw data, surprising the colonel, who had intended to go through the whole briefing. Apparently, Donchez thought. Colonel Parker was not used to people believing his interpretations.

“Thank you. Colonel. You’ve been most helpful.”

He and Rummel were only twenty feet down the hallway when an Army sergeant called out to them.

“Admiral? Admiral Donchez? Flash message for you, sir, relayed from Norfolk Naval Communications Center about four minutes ago. A Captain Brandt is standing by to answer questions on it, if you’ll come with me to the phone room.”

Donchez accepted the metal clipboard with the message and read while walking to the phone center. Captain Brandt, the commander of Navcom, was on hold on a white phone offered him by a corporal.

“Donchez here. Brandt, what is this?”

“That transmission just came in on HF, Admiral. Our direction finders didn’t get an accurate bearing, but we think it came from the North Atlantic. The sender would appear to be the USS Phoenix”

“How do you know?” “We asked him to authenticate with the most recent edition of the code book. He answered correctly from code book number 547. That code book was only put aboard the Phoenix.”

“Thanks, Captain.” Donchez handed the phone back.

“Where’s the communication facility?”

Within four minutes Donchez was scratching out a message to go to the Seawolf. Two minutes after that the message was transmitted, with a copy of Phoenix’s message sent to Pacino.

“Fred, get an emergency meeting with Barczynski and his staff.”

“That won’t be easy, sir,” Rummel said, a phone in his ear.

“They’re all snowed. The streets aren’t plowed, we’ve got over eighteen inches of drifted snow in some sections of Maryland. If we leave here we might not make wherever we’re going. And forget about a chopper. No one’s flying, they’re all grounded. They’ve got zero visibility with gusting forty-five-knot winds at the Pentagon helipad. Washington National’s closed, so is Dulles, Andrews, BWI, Suburban—”

“Sounds like we’re hunkering down here. We could have picked a worse place to get snowed in. Every communication system we’d ever need is right here. What about getting them on a conference call?”

“We’ll get a few. Barczynski and Clough have secure phones. The others, I don’t know.”

“President still in Key West?”

“Yes sir.”

“Well, get going on setting up a secure phone connection to Generals Barczynski and Clough, and have the White House operator get the president ready a half-hour after we start with the general.”

Donchez wandered toward the building entrance, back through the layers of security checkpoints, until he reached the lobby with its large plate-glass windows. Outside the storm raged, the road covered, the snow falling nearly horizontally. He pulled out a Havana and flicked his Zippo, glaring at a security guard who looked like he might tell Donchez there was no smoking inside.

A dispersion glue bomb, Donchez thought. With enough radioactivity to kill a city. He looked at the raging blizzard, wondering what effect, if any, the snow would have on the plutonium-dust killer. It might be the only thing that could save Washington, if Washington was the target.

Phoenix might track the Destiny. But it was up to Michael Pacino to take this son of a bitch out.

Chapter 29 Friday, 3 January

WESTERN ATLANTIC

POINT BRAVO HOLD POSITION, 500 NAUTICAL MILES EAST OF LONG ISLAND

USS SEAWOLF

While a phone rang in General Barczynski’s Fairfax, Virginia, residence, the phone next to Pacino’s bunk buzzed, both phones attempting to convey the same information.

Five minutes after the phone buzzed, the local time just after midnight, Pacino stood in the control room with a crowd of officers, the North Atlantic chart out, the position of the Phoenix plotted with a bright

blue dot, an orange navigation tape strip showing a straight line from Gilbratar in the Med to the Labrador Sea. As the message from Donchez had indicated, the chart plotter had drawn a red circle 1,900 miles around Washington, a blue one around Boston, a green one around Halifax, Nova Scotia, a purple one around Toronto.

The blue dot was inside all the circles, the circle surrounding the southernmost city, Washington, ending halfway up the Davis Strait between Greenland and Newfoundland almost to the Baffin Bay.