Fall Revolution 4: The Sky Road

life,’ he
said. ‘It makes us all close, in the end. What is the
theory, the six degrees of separation?’ He laughed harshly.
‘When I was very young, I shook hands with a woman who had
been one of Lenin’s secretaries. Think of that!’
    Myra thought of that. ‘Come to think of it,’ she
chuckled darkly, ‘so did I.’
    But it still hit her, the pang like a blade in the belly: all my ships are gone and all my men are dead.
    No, no. Not yet. She still had ships, and she might still have
Jason.
    Ivan Ibrayev’s office was small. They sat with
theirknees up against his desk. The trefoil flag hung on one
wall, rocketry ads on the others. The window overlooked the East
River. The door was open. A flunkie appeared with coffee and
cups, then vanished discreetly. Ivan closed the door and turned
on the audio countermeasures. Myra swallowed, trying to make the
strange pressure in her ear-drums go away. It didn’t.
    She swallowed again, sipped her coffee. The two men leaned
forward, glanced at each other. Ibrayev gestured to her to go
ahead.
    ‘OK,’ she said. ‘You know why I’m
here, right?’
    ‘To negotiate US military aid,’ said Ibrayev.
    ‘Yeah, well. East American, anyway.’ They laughed.
‘I’ve already been given to understand that not much
will be forthcoming. What the person who told me that
didn’t know, what you probably don’t know, is what we
have to offer them.’ She paused. Their faces showed
nothing. ‘The ISTWR still has some functioning
nukes.’
    ‘Nuclear weapons?’ Khamadi asked. Ibrayev
smirked, as though he’d always suspected that the little
state he served still sheathed this hidden sting.
    ‘Weapons,’ Myra nodded. ‘City busters,
mostly, but a reasonably comprehensive suite – all the way
down to battlefield tactical nukes, which -’ she shrugged
‘- aren’t that hard to come by. But still.’
    ‘We knew nothing of this,’ said Khamadi. Ibrayev
nodded emphatic concurrence.
    ‘Chingiz Suleimanyov didn’t tell you?’
    ‘Nyet.’
    ‘Good,’ Myra said briskly. ‘Well,
that’s what I’m here to tell you. Kazakhstan is now a de facto superpower, for what that’s
worth.’
    Ivan Ibrayev steepled his fingers. ‘How do we use them,
that’s the question. They’re not much directuse
against the Sheenisov – no point in nuking steppe,
eh?’
    Khamadi’s eyes brightened, his mouth shaped a shining
snarl. ‘We could point out that they need not be aimed
Eastward…’
    ‘Huh!’ Myra snorted. ‘Citizens, comrades… I am an American, and I can
tell you one thing the Americans – East, West or Middle
– won’t stand for is nuclear blackmail. This is a
people whose nuclear strategy involved megadeath write-offs on their side. They may have come down in the world a bit,
but they’re not too demoralised to take us out before we
know what hit us if we even try that. No. What the President
wants me to do is almost the opposite: offer them – under
our control of course, but a public, unbreakable deal – to
the US, or the UN, in exchange for a military alliance that can
stop the Sheenisov in their tracks.’
    The two men pondered this proposal with poker-faced calm. Ivan
opened a pack of Marlboros and offered one to Myra. She lit up
gratefully.
    ‘It’s worth trying,’ said Khamadi. ‘I
must say, between ourselves, I think we may regret giving up the
new power which the nukes would place in our hands.’
    ‘It’s not much of a power,’ Myra said.
‘In a sense we are proposing to blackmail the Americans,
not with possible use against them but with possible use against
someone else without their permission.’
    Khamadi refilled the cups, frowning. ‘The UN still has
some nukes itself, as we’ve just seen. I suspect their
stock has been significantly depleted by their use. So they might
just be keen to replenish it.’
    Ivan gestured at his wall posters. ‘It has occurred to
me,’ he said, ‘that we could go all the way backinto the old business: selling deterrence to everyone who
wants it!’
    Myra laughed. ‘Deterrence against whom? The UN? I
don’t see that working for long.’
    Khamadi grimaced, as though the coffee were more bitter than
he’d expected. ‘Yes, I take your point. Perhaps it is
for the best. So what can we do to facilitate this?’
    Myra drew hard on her cigarette. ‘Apart from verifying
my authority?’ She smiled at them. ‘You can arrange
– I hope – somebody