Joe seemed no better than Timonovski. Davidov looked to be awake but too weak to move, and the flight engineer was hanging in the straps, a huge gash to his forehead.
Kurt had no idea how high they were, no idea what would happen if they ejected, but he’d seen the wreckage of the other bomber on the bottom of the sea. That impact he knew they would not survive.
He looked around for an ejection handle. Everything was labeled in Russian. Finally, he spied a red bar with two orange stripes.
He reached for it.
Grasped it.
And with one hard pull, yanked it up and back.
An explosion shook the plane, fire surrounded the cockpit and everything went black.
68
Emma arrived in Washington five days after what they were calling the event. It took that long because so much of the world was in chaos. Half the world’s satellites were down, most of the communication systems were down, aircraft were being routed by hand and most of those were being used to fly relief supplies to the Pacific.
When she finally arrived in D.C., she discovered that land lines were temporarily back in fashion as a line of two hundred people was waiting to use three working pay phones.
She skipped the line. Found a cab and rode into the city. After a long debriefing with the NSA, she walked across town to NUMA. There she found Rudi, Hiram and Priya.
They had old-fashioned paper maps in front of them. Various areas were outlined in green, yellow and red.
“How bad is it?” she asked.
“Nowhere near as bad as it could have been,” Rudi said. “Hawaii and the Aleutians fared the worst, but physical damage was minimal. A sixteen-foot tsunami hit Waikiki, but the larger wave went to the west. Ironically, Japan shielded the Chinese coast, but since they’ve been preparing for this since the Tohoku tsunami a few years back, they were ready.”
She’d been hearing the reports for days. She was thankful.
“Surprised the NSA let you come up for air,” Hiram said. “Figured they’d have you working round the clock on the mixed-state matter you brought home.”
“It’s a huge controversy,” she said. “I think they plan to send it all back into space.”
“The irony,” Rudi said.
“Anyway, they have no more claim over my time,” she said. “I’ve resigned. As of an hour ago, I’m officially unemployed.”
“Really?” Rudi said. “Want to help us?”
He pointed to an open spot at the desk.
“What are you doing?”
“Searching for Kurt, Joe and the Russians,” Priya said.
She looked at the map: it was the eastern Caribbean.
“The Navy and the Coast Guard are a little busy running emergency supplies to the Pacific Rim, so we figured we’d jump-start the effort on our own,” Rudi explained. “We’ve got NUMA assets, private aircraft and chartered boats on the search. These are areas we’ve checked. And these are other possible search zones.”
“But nothing yet,” she said.
Rudi shook his head.
Emma sat down. “I’ll help any way I can,” she said. “I hate to think of them out there—suffering, fighting off sharks and dying of thirst.”
“They’re tough and well trained,” Rudi said. “I’m sure none of that will be a problem.”
69