Delta Green - [39]

Anatoly Shelepin was the first to greet him.

“Aleksander Illiyich!”

“Comrade General.”

“You were successful?”

“Very much so,” Maslov said.

“I am so proud of you. I knew that I would be.”

Maslov was proud of himself also.

He could still be a general.

In the Air Force of the New World Order.

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By ten o’clock in the morning, Pearson had toured the station — as security officer, she kept an eye on the military personnel as well as the visiting civilian scientists working in the laboratories — and met with Overton and Avery to accept their congratulations and to discuss her new duties. She congratulated Avery on his transfer and promotion.

“But let’s not sweat the routine stuff for now, Amy,” Overton told her. “The first priority on our list is Delta Green.”

“Yes, sir. I should have the information I requested from the CIA by now.”

“We’re putting a lot of credence in your theory of an ex-Soviet pilot,” Overton said.

“I know,” she admitted, “but the incident with the HoneyBee yesterday supports the theory. That pilot simply had to have had more training in Mako systems than someone with a background in, say, fighter aircraft.”

“Astronaut?” Avery asked.

“Well, maybe, Milt. Still, I want to run down my current leads first.”

“Go for it,” Overton said.

She left the Command Center for her office cubicle, strapped herself in, and powered up the console.

Entering her access code, Pearson checked her electronic mail file and found a great deal of information queued up. The first document was a long message taken by Don Curtis from Commonwealth Colonel Pyotr Volontov. He verified the whereabouts of twenty-eight of the pilots on the original list of thirty-four who had gone through his Mako training program. She didn’t know Volontov, but he seemed to have a mild sense of humor. He had added his own name to the list: “Volontov, Pyotr Mikhailovich, Colonel, Russian Air Force, 5th Interceptor Wing, Present and accounted for.”

That left the six defectors.

The electronic copies of dossiers compiled on the pilots by the Central Intelligence Agency and the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) were as disappointing as she had thought they might be. Until a man achieved high rank, or was placed in a command or policy-making position, the intelligence agencies did little more than track his assignments when they learned them, or paste odd tidbits in the file.

She culled out the twenty-eight that were accounted for, storing the information for possible later use in one of the mainframe computer laser disk files. Cutting and pasting, she merged the CIA and DIA files with those she had received from General Sheremetevo, leaving her with six files.

And six names: Averyanov, Bryntsev, Maslov, Nikitin, Pronnikov, and Yevstigneyev.

Tapping the intercom pad to the communications room, she said, “Anyone there?”

Donna Amber responded, “Amber, Colonel. And congratulations.”

“Thank you, Donna. Would you toss a hot coffee pouch my way?”

“Coming up.”

Two minutes later, Pearson leaned out of her cubicle and arrested the flight of coffee soaring toward her from the radio shack.

By noon, after reading carefully through each of the six files several times, she had compiled a long series of notes on her right console screen. She had Amber complete a communications hook-up with General David Thorpe, Brackman’s deputy for intelligence.

“It’s nice to drop the ‘lieutenant’ part of it, isn’t it, Amy?”

“Would it be a major breach of protocol to write a thank-you letter to General Brackman?” she asked.

“Not necessary. He’s thanking you.”

“But…”

“Be better to do it in person sometime, Amy. What have you got?”

“My possibilities for the pilot are still six, but the other twenty-eight possibles are firmly rejected now. In examining the files, I’ve come up with some repetitive names that we should explore, and I’d like to have the CIA track down some rumors. That request should probably come from you, General.”

“I’ve got my pencil handy,” Thorpe said.

Pearson read off all six names. “Averyanov and Pronnikov, according to the Commonwealth files, are rumored to be somewhere in Germany. Nikitin might be in Italy. Bryntsev and Maslov were last reported to have been seen in Syria. Yevstigneyev was supposedly in Iraq at one time. I wonder if our friends at Langley could check those out?”

“We’ll find out. What about the other names?”

“I’ve been looking for patterns involving the names of higher-ranking men,” she said. “I don’t think a pilot dreamed up this escapade by himself.”

“You don’t have a very high opinion of pilots, Amy?”

“You know what I mean, General.”

“Sure. Who have you got?”

“Chestnoy, Guriev, Shelepin, and Dneprovsky. They are all generals at this time, and their names appear more than three times in various pilot dossiers. They were commanders or recommenders or signed letters of commendation. I’d like copies of their files as well as some indication of their current assignments.”

“Those dossiers are frequently cross-referenced by their known close associates, Amy. How would it be if I asked for those, too?”