Death Wave by Stephen Coonts Page B

compromised!”
“Pakistanis! What Pakistanis?”
“He didn’t tell me, sir,” Dean replied, “but Group Captain Narayanan is a relative of India’s national security advisor. A nephew, I believe. He may have intelligence passed on from the IB that has not yet reached your desk. Sir.” The IB was the Intelligence Bureau, India’s equivalent of the CIA.
Vasilyev scowled. “You Indians see Pakistanis behind every rock!”
“Yes, sir. The problem is that Pakistanis hiding behind rocks may have nuclear weapons, and they hate India. A certain amount of paranoia is called for, wouldn’t you say?”
Dean hoped his Russian was getting through clearly enough. Was “paranoia” really paranoia in Russian, a borrowed word identical to the English? He wasn’t sure, and down here in the basement he didn’t have Desk Three’s linguists online to help him out.
He thought it was right, though. The word was so quintessentially Russian.
In any case, any minor slipups in grammar, vocabulary, or pronunciation could easily be blamed on the fact that he really was a foreigner—one reason they’d created this particular legend for him back at Fort Meade.
As he answered Vasilyev’s questions, he glanced past the man’s shoulders and across the room at Akulinin. His partner was standing next to one of the autopsy tables, his left hand cupped around an unseen device. No one else was paying him any attention. As they’d planned, while Dean played the decoy, Akulinin was surreptitiously photographing the bodies.
“The IB,” Vasilyev said with an unpleasant smile, “is run by naive and easily excited children.”
“Sir!” Dean snapped back. “The Intelligence Bureau is the oldest and best-established intelligence service in the world!”
It was a somewhat dubious claim, one based on the idea that the IB had been created by Major General Sir Charles MacGregor in 1885 to monitor a possible Russian invasion of India through Afghanistan. Still, the Indians believed it—and the IB was widely believed to be one of the five best intelligence services in the world.
“If you say so, Wing Commander.” Vasilyev’s unpleasant smile widened. “Right now, however, I need to see some identification from you.” He nodded at an aide, a captain, who stepped forward, his hand out.
Dean reached into his pocket and produced his wallet, extracting his Indian military ID card, a second card issued by the Tajikistan Military Authority, and a third card giving the phone number of Air Vice Marshal Subarao’s headquarters office. Any call going to that number would be rerouted to Desk Three, as had happened to that unfortunate watch stander at Ayni a few hours before.
“Air Vice Marshal Subarao will vouch for me, sir,” Dean said, handing the cards over. He reached into another pocket and pulled out a folded-up sheet of paper, covered by close-spaced Hindi characters. “And my orders, sir.”
“You will come with us,” Vasilyev told him. “You are not the only one around here afflicted by a certain amount of healthy paranoia .”
“Yes, sir.” He was relieved to hear the Russian use that word.
    ILYA AKULININ
MORGUE, RUSSIAN MILITARY HOSPITAL
DUSHANBE, TAJIKISTAN
WEDNESDAY, 1910 HOURS LOCAL TIME
     
Akulinin stepped back behind the shelter of the central refrigerator unit and watched the gaggle of Russian soldiers crowd out through the door leading to the alley at the back of the hospital. One of them had Charlie Dean in tow, practically at gunpoint.
Unfortunately, there wasn’t a lot he could do about that at the moment, and, in any case, the mission always came first. Always .
The last of the soldiers banged out through the swinging doors, and Akulinin stepped out from his hiding place. As Dean had predicted, they’d paid no attention to him whatsoever once they’d spotted Dean’s IAF uniform.
“ Excuse me,” a woman’s voice said at his back. “Aren’t you supposed to be going with the rest of them?”
He turned and found