Op Center 02 - Mirror Image Read online

  TOM CLANCY'S

  Op-Centre

  MIRROR IMAGE

  PROLOGUE

  Friday, 5:50 P.M., St. Petersburg

  "Pavel," said Piotr Volodya, "I don't understand."

  Pavel Odina squeezed the steering wheel tightly. He looked unpleasantly at the man sitting next to him in the passenger's seat of the van. "You don't understand what, Piotr?"

  "You forgive the French," Piotr replied, scratching a woolly sideburn, "so why not the Germans? Both of them have invaded Mother Russia."

  Pavel frowned. "If you can't see the difference, Piotr, you're a fool."

  "That's not an answer," said Ivan, one of four men seated in the back.

  "It happens to be true," grinned Eduard, who was seated beside him, "but Ivan is right. It isn't an answer. "

  Pavel shifted gears. This was the part of the nightly, half-hour commute to the Nepokorennykh Prospekt apartments that he hated most. Just two minutes out from the Hermitage, they had to slow as they neared the bottleneck at the Neva River. They were mired in traffic while his political nemeses were proceeding at full speed.

  Pavel pulled a neatly rolled cigarette from his shirt pocket and Piotr lit it for him.

  "Thanks, Piotr."

  "You still haven't answered me," Piotr said.

  "I will," Pavel insisted, "when we've gotten onto the bridge. I can't think and curse at the same time."

  Pavel swung the van suddenly from the center lane to the left lane, jolting the men to the other side. Having fallen asleep when they left the Hermitage, both Oleg and Konstantin awoke with a jolt.

  "You're too impatient, Pavel," Ivan said. '.'What are you in such a rush to get home to, your wife? Since when?"

  "Very funny," Pavel said. The truth was, he wasn't hurrying to get to anything. He was in a rush to get away from the pressure, away from the deadline that had consumed them for months on end. Now that it was nearly over, he couldn't wait to go back to designing computer animation software for Mosfilm.

  Shifting gears again, Pavel zigzagged between the rows of small Zaporozhets-968s, with their sputtering forty-three-horsepower engines, and the larger, five-seat Volga M-124s. There was also a smattering of foreign cars, though only government officials and black marketeers drove them; no one else could afford to. He and his comrades wouldn't even be driving this van if the TV studio hadn't provided it. The powerful Swiss-made vehicle was the only thing he would miss.

  No, that isn't true, he thought as he glanced west. He savored the sight of the Peter and Paul Fortress on the opposite banks of the Neva as the setting sun glinted off its tall, graceful spires.

  He would also miss St. Petersburg. He would miss the beauty of these blazing orange sunsets on the Gulf of Finland, the calming flow of the blue waters of the Neva, the Fontanka, and the Yekateringofki rivers, and the simple splendor of the many canals. Though the waters were still somewhat dirty from years of Communist neglect, they were no longer thick with foul-smelling industrial waste as they wound through the heart of the ancient city, Russia's Venice. He would miss the majesty of thee ruby-red Belozersky Palace, the gilt interiors of the Alexander Nevsky Chapel, where he sometimes went to pray, the towering golden onion domes of Catherine the Great's palace, and the peaceful gardens and cascading fountains of Peter the Great's palace, Petrodvorets. He would miss the sleek, white hydrofoils that skimmed along the Neva looking like something from a science fiction novel by Stanislaw Lem-and he would miss the magnificent battleships that dwarfed them, coming and going to the Nakhimov Naval School on Aptekarsky Island in the Neva.

  And, of course, he would miss the incomparable Hermitage. Though they weren't supposed to wander in the museum, he always took time to do just that when Colonel Rossky was occupied. Even if someone did see him day after day, he was supposed to be an employee there. No one would give it a thought. Besides, a religious man can't be put among the likes of Rembrandt's Descent from the Cross, or Carracci's Lamentation of Christ, or his favorite, the School of Ribalta's St. Vincent in a Dungeon, and not be expected to look. Especially when he felt such a kinship to the trapped but resolute St. Vincent.

  But he would be happy to get away from the work itself, from the stress and the seven-day workweeks and especially the watchful eyes of Colonel Rossky. He had served under the bastard in Afghanistan, and cursed the fate that had brought them back together for the past eighteen months.

  As he always did when he reached the bridge of the Kirovsky Prospekt, Pavel made his way to the outside lane, with its low concrete barricade and more intrepid motorists. He breathed easier as he settled in among the faster-moving vehicles.

  "You want an answer?" Pavel asked, drawing hard on his cigarette.

  "To which question?" Ivan joked. "The one about your wife?"

  Pavel scowled. "I'll tell you the difference between the Germans and the French. The French followed Napoleon because they were hungry. They've always put comfort before decency."

  "What about the Resistance?" Piotr asked.

  "A freak. A reflexive twitch of the corpse. If the Resistance in France had been as strong as the Russian Resistance in Stalingrad, Paris would never have fallen."

  Pavel applied pressure to the pedal to keep a Volkswagen from cutting right and getting in front of him. Black marketeer, he guessed from the surly look of the woman. Pavel glanced in the mirror as a truck pulled behind him from the center lane.

  "The French are not evil," Pavel continued, "but the Germans followed Hitler because they're still Vandals at heart. Give them time. Their factories will once again be turning out tanks and bombers, I guarantee it."

  Piotr shook his head. "What about Japan?"

  "Also bastards," said Pavel. "If Dogin wins the election, he'll watch them too."

  "And is paranoia a sensible reason to vote for any man for president?"

  "It's not paranoia to fear old enemies. It's caution."

  "It's provocation!" Piotr said. "You don't get behind a man because he's vowed to strike the Germans at the first sign of remilitarization."

  "That was only one reason." The road ahead cleared and Pavel sped up as he crossed the wide, dark river. The men shut the windows against the sharp wind. "Dogin promised to revitalize the space program, which will strengthen the economy. He'll build more studios like ours, and constructing new factories along the TransSiberian Railroad will provide cheap goods and new housing."

  "And where will the money come from to achieve these wonders?" Piotr asked. "Our little nest back there cost twenty-five billion rubles! Do you really believe that if Dogin wins he can cut enough fat from the government and from foreign adventures?"

  Pavel blew out smoke and nodded.

  Piotr frowned. He cocked a thumb over his shoulder. "That isn't what I overheard back there. Number Two was talking to an aide about the thieves-in-law. That's where he plans to get the money, and it's a dangerous association to-"

  Pavel reacted instinctively as the Volkswagen suddenly angled in front of him. He pushed down hard on the brake and spun the wheel to the right. As he did so, he heard a pop and thick green smoke began pouring from under the dashboard.

  "What is it-?" Piotr coughed.

  "Open a window!" one of the men yelled from the back as they all began to gag.

  But Pavel had already fallen against the wheel, barely conscious. There was no one steering as the truck struck them from behind.

  The Volkswagen was partly in the right lane as the truck drove the van into it. The left side of the van's front fender struck the car, skidding and sparking along its right side. Pointed toward the side of the bridge, the van hit the low concrete barrier and rode up and over, propelled by the truck. The right tire exploded, the
axle hooked over the top of the barricade, and the van plunged nose-first into the choppy river.

  There was a hiss as it struck the water, the van standing upright for a long moment before falling over on its back. Steam and air bubbles rose from the sides, mixing with the dissipating green smoke as the van bobbed belly-up on the surface of the river. The rest of the van was entirely submerged.

  The burly trucker and the young blonde woman who had been driving the Volkswagen were the first ones to reach the shattered railing. They were joined by other motorists who scurried from their cars.

  Neither the man nor the woman said a word to each other. They just watched as the van drifted to the southwest, twisting slowly in the current, the air bubbles dwindling and the smoke now just a faint wisp. The vehicle was already too far away for anyone to dive in and attempt to look for survivors.

  The two drivers assured those who asked that they were all right. Then they made their way back to their vehicles to await the police.

  No one had seen the truck driver drop a small, rectangular box in the river as he turned away.

  ONE

  Saturday, 10:00 A.M., MOSCOW

  Tall, powerfully built Minister of the Interior Nikolai Dogin sat behind the centuries-old oak desk in his office in the Kremlin. There was a computer in the center of the heavy, age-toned desk. To his right was a black telephone and a small, framed photograph of his parents sat on his left. The snapshot had a horizontal crease in the center. It had been folded by his father so he could carry it in his shirt pocket during the War.

  Dogin's silver-gray hair was brushed straight back. His cheeks were sunken and his dark eyes looked tired. His plain, brown GUM department store suit was wrinkled, and his light brown shoes were scuffed-a careful, studied rumpledness that had worked so well for so many years.

  But not this week, he thought bitterly.

  For the first time in thirty years of public service, his man-of-the-people image had failed him. With his characteristic intensity, he had given his people the nationalism they had said they wanted. He voiced renewed pride in the military, and fanned suspicion of old enemies. Yet the people had turned on him.

  Dogin knew why, of course. His rival, Kiril Zhanin, had cast out a tattered net one last, glorious time to try and snare the flounder of Old Peter's fairy tale, the fish of-the-sea that would make every wish come true.

  Capitalism.

  While Dogin waited for his assistant, he looked past the seven men seated before him. His dark eyes were focused on the walls, on a history of the success of totalitarianism.

  Like his desk, the Walls reeked of history. They were covered with ornately framed maps, some of them centuries old, maps of Russia under different Czars going back to the reign of Ivan. Dogin's tired eyes took them all in, from a faded vellum map painted, it was said, with the blood of captured Teutonic Knights, to a cloth map of the Kremlin which had been sewn inside the pant leg of a murdered German assassin.

  The world as it was, he thought as his eyes settled upon a map of the Soviet Union that Gherman S. Titov had carried into space in 1961. The world as it will be again.

  The seven men sitting on sofas and armchairs were also drawn with age. Most of them were fifty or older, some of them were over sixty. Most wore suits, some had on uniforms. None spoke. The silence was broken only by the hum of the fan in the back of the computerand then, finally, by a knock on the door.

  "Come in."

  Dogin felt his heart sink as the door opened and a fresh-faced young man stepped in. There was a profound sadness in the youth's eyes, and Dogin knew what that meant.

  "Well?" Dogin demanded.

  "I'm sorry," the young man said softly, "but it's official. I reviewed the figures myself."

  Dogin nodded. "Thank you."

  "Shall I make the arrangements?"

  Dogin nodded again and the young man backed from the office. He shut the door quietly as he left.

  Now Dogin looked at the men. Like him, their expressions hadn't changed. "This was not unexpected," said the Minister of the Interior. He moved the photograph of his parents closer, running the back of his fingers down the glass. He seemed to be speaking to them. "Foreign Minister Zhanin has won the election. It's the time, you know. Everyone's giddy with liberty, but it's liberty without responsibility, freedom without sanity, experimentation without caution. Russia has elected a president who wants to create a new currency, make our economy a slave to what we can sell abroad. Eliminate the black market by making the rubles and goods it holds utterly worthless. Eliminate political rivals by making it impossible to oust him lest it upset foreign markets. Eliminate the military as an adversary by paying the Generals more money to serve his policies than to protect Mother Russia. 'Like Germany and Japan,' he tells us, 'an economically strong Russia needs fear no enemy."' Dogin's eyes narrowed as he looked at his father's image. "For seventy years we feared no enemy. Your hero Stalin did not rule Russia, he ruled the world! His name itself came from stal-steel. Our people were made of it then. And they responded to power. Today, they seek comfort and respond to audacity and empty promises."

  "Welcome to democracy, my dear Nikolai," said General Viktor Mavik, a barrel-chested man with a booming voice. "Welcome to a world in which NATO courts the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, nations of the former Warsaw Pact, to join the Western alliance without so much as consulting us."

  Deputy Finance Minister Yevgeny Grovlev leaned forward, his sharp chin resting on his thumbs, his slender fingers steepled under his hooked nose. "We must be careful not to overreact," he said. "Zhanin's reforms won't happen fast enough. The people will turn on him faster than they did on Gorbachev and Yeltsin."

  "My adversary is young but not stupid," Dogin replied. "He wouldn't have made promises without agreements being in place. And when he pulls them off, the Germans and Japanese will have what they failed to obtain in World War II. The United States will own what it failed to get during the Cold War. In one way or another, they will all possess Mother Russia."

  Dogin turned his eyes to one more map: the map of Russia and Eastern Europe on his computer screen. He pressed a key and Eastern Europe grew larger. Russia vanished.

  "A keystroke of history and we're gone," he said.

  "Only by our inactivity," said lanky GrovIev.

  "Yes," Dogin agreed. "By our inactivity." The room was growing stuffy and he dabbed the moisture on his upper lip with a tissue. "The people have thrown off their mistrust of foreigners for the promise of wealth. But we'll show them that isn't the way." He looked out at the men in the room. "The fact that you or your candidates lost the election shows how confused our people have become. But the fact that you are here this morning indicates that you want to do something about it."

  "We do," General Mavik said, running a finger inside his collar. "And we trust your abilities. You were a strong mayor in Moscow and a loyal Communist in the Politburo. But in our first meeting you told us very little of what you planned if the old guard failed to retake the Kremlin. Well, the old guard has failed. Now I would like some details."

  "So would I," said Air Force General Dhaka. His gray eyes glared from beneath a heavy brow. "Any one of us would make a formidable opposition leader. Why should we back you? You promised us a cooperative action with Ukraine. So far, we've only seen a few Russian infantry maneuvers near the border which Zhanin himself quickly approved. Even if joint maneuvers take place, what does that accomplish? Old Soviet brothers are reunited, and the West trembles a little. How will that help us to rebuild Russia? If we're to join you we must have specifics."

  Dogin looked at the General. Dhaka's full cheeks were flushed, his pendulous chin raw where it met his tightly knotted tie. The Minister knew that the specifics would send most of them rallying behind Mavik or even running to Zhanin.

  He looked at each of the men in turn. In most faces he saw conviction and strength, while in others-Mavik and Grovlev in particular-he saw interest but wariness. Their hesitation angered hi
m because he was the only one who offered Russia salvation. Yet he remained calm.

  "You want specifics?" Dogin asked. He typed a command on the computer keyboard then swung the monitor so it faced the seven men. As the hard disk hummed, the Interior Minister looked at his father's picture. The elder Dogin had been a decorated soldier during the War, and one of Stalin's most trusted bodyguards afterward. He once told his son that during the War he had learned to carry only one thing with him: the country's flag. Wherever he was, in any circumstance, in any danger, it would always find him a friend or ally.

  When the disk drive fell silent, Dogin and five men rose at once. Mavik and Grovlev exchanged suspicious looks, then slowly got to their feet. Both men saluted.

  "This is how I plan to rebuild Russia," Dogin said. He came around the desk and pointed to the image that filled the computer monitor, a yellow star, hammer, and sickle on a red field-the old Soviet flag. "By reminding people of their duty. Patriots will not hesitate to do whatever is necessary, whatever the plan and regardless of the cost."