Moscow Machination (15 page)

Bodo Airbase, Arctic Circle,
Norway

In the 3AM
Arctic glare, six F-35 jets leapt off the tarmac in unison. After hovering for
a few seconds, the cool looking jets shot out into the Nordic sea. The sortie, unlike
their regular missions had nothing to do with the Russians. Today, the Norwegians
F-35s were headed to the Paris Air Show – to justify their existence to the
American Congress.

Being a
field trip, they had dispensed their ammo with extra fuel and several pounds of
coffee. All they had to do was, take off and head to Paris while tapping away to
Ke dollar sign ha’s stimulating message to young pilots.

Murmansk – Arctic Circle,
Russia

“Boss, the
F-35 Lightnings are in the air,” Korlov announced.

A few
hours earlier Primakov and Korlov had caught a redeye to Murmansk. There, their
point of interest was the Severomorsk air base, home to a squadron of the supersonic
Tu-160s, aka the Bear Bombers. On arrival at Severomorsk they had handed over
their cargo to a couple of Tu-160s.

When the Norwegian
F-35s took off, Primakov gave the go ahead, “Alright, send out the bombers.”

“Sending
out the Bears….”

“And tell
them to make as much noise as possible. I want every Finnish, Swedish and
Norwegian kid to miss school tomorrow.”

“Haha, that’s
so cool. Wish someone had done that for me in school,” reminisced Korlov.

“Ya, ya
sure.”

“I mean
think about the odds…” added Korlov.

“Odds of
the mission?”

“No. What
if some Lapland boys actually scheduled a fake threat for tomorrow… to skip
exams… midterms… and all their planning would be wasted… I mean you can’t
repeat a fake threat for like a semester and… and even if you did…” ploughed on
Korlov.

Primakov
couldn’t take it anymore, “What the fuck do you care about the academic challenges
of a bunch of reindeer blowers? Just, keep your eyes on the mission ok? Make
sure everything is in place.”

The Atlantic Ocean

The
Norwegian F-35s leisurely hit their allotted altitude of 45,000 ft. To avoid
civilian traffic they had to loop around Iceland, before turning south.

Three
hundred nautical miles into the Atlantic, the F-35 pilots were thoroughly hypnotized
by Ke dollar sign ha’s thumping message. If not for the caramel macchiato piped
through their hi-tech helmets, the entire squadron would have abandoned the fjords
for sunny Hollywood.

Just as Ke
dollar sign ha repeated her feelings for Mick Jagger, the Norwegian pilots
heard massive boom. Moments later their incredibly expensive helmets went dark.
Frantic jiggling of the touch controls did nothing to revive the unit, forcing
the pilots to remove their helmets. At 45,000 feet and 0.6Mach they were
allowed to do that.

BOOM!

A second
boom.

“Bodo base
this is Spread Eagle. Our helmets just blacked out.”

After some
static, Bodo base responded, “Spread Eagle. This is Bodo Base. Repeat your
message.”

“Bodo base,
this is Spread Eagle. Our helmets just blacked out.”

“WTF? Did
you spill macchiato into the helmet again? Jesus man grow up.”

“Bodo Base
this is Squadron Leader Aas. All our helmets have blacked out.”

“All six at
the same time?”

“Affirmative,
Bodo base.”

“So you
are saying… that all six of you spilt your macchiatos? Hows that even possible.
Just the probability…”

“No! No
one spilt anything.”

“Aha… so
you guys puked… It’s that air sickness thing again isn’t it? Jesus, I thought
we fixed it with the Ram’s piss. This is beyond ridiculous… way beyond
ridiculous. No wonder we don’t get invited to the annual bombing campaigns…”

Squadron
Leader Aas swore. He slowed his breathing and channeled his inner Ke dollar
sign ha before resuming the tug of war with Bodo base. “Bodo base. I repeat no
one puked or jerked off into the precious helmets. There was a loud boom from
the outside and then we all just blanked out.”

“Oh… ok
Spread Eagle… so what do you think it was… is someone shooting at you?”

“Nope.
Radar is clean. Probably a bug in the onboard computer.”

“No, no…
remember, no talking shit about the F-35s.”

“Perhaps
an EMP.”

“Whaaat…”
began the dude in Bodo base before switching tones, “Spread Eagle. Fuck me.”

“Spread
Eagle, we just picked up 6 Bear bombers, Tu-160s. They are headed for you...
already very close… Deploy evasive measures.”

“Bodo
Base,” replied the frustrated Squadron Leader Aas, “Dude, nothing other than
the fucking million dollar macchiato maker is working… Plus how can the bombers
attack us? Do they plan to ram into us? What the freak are they thinking?”

“Well I
don’t know. Fly fast or something. For fuck’s sake man… you are flying the most
advanced jet of the generation.”

“Bodo
base, we are still quite heavy on fuel. We should have got the F-22s… just
saying.”

“Enough
with the F-22s… the Bears will be there within thirty seconds.”

“Rodger
that.”

“Try and
hang on for twenty minutes. Brits have scrambled their Typhoons.”

“Spread
Eagle out.”

The F-35s
after a brief contemplation, engaged their after burners and turned south. One
minute after hitting Mach 2, the onboard radar informed the Squadron Leader Aas
about an incoming intruder. Unfortunately, the radar couldn’t really say what
the hell the intruder was? It was sort of free falling but coming towards the
Norwegian jets… like a JDAM… abandoning its database, the onboard computer checked
Wikipedia and confirmed that it wasn’t a bomb.

It was
a carbon based biped
.

“Fuck me,”
whispered Aas.

“Fuck
fuckity fuck. How do we dodge this bum?” shouted one of the other pilots, a
Larsson.

The radar
suddenly beeped again, indicating that two more objects – again human beings – were
floating towards the F-35s.

“Try
dodging.”

“I tried.
They have some JDAM shit attached to their asses. How is this even possible?”

The F-35’s
super advanced electronic array radar beeped again. There were in total nine kamikazes.
The presumably Spetsnaz dudes were within 500ft.

“Too late
to turn around. Let’s do a rapid dive to 10,000ft.”

As the
pilots began their dive, all sorts of alarms started to blare up inside the
F-35 cockpits. The words CPU OVERLAOD began flashing in a very friendly font – Comic
Sans MS –rendering every knob and control useless.

As the
Norwegian pilots thrashed around their cockpits, the onboard computer was
ballsy enough to flash a ‘
Would you like to send bug reports to Lockheed,
Nevada?
’ Incredibly the popup’s NO button was grayed out. Hoping to
unfreeze the darned jet, the pilots hit YES.

As the
upload began, the six jets levelled out at Mach 0.5 and settled on a straight
line.

Moments
later, a smiling Spetsnaz dude landed right on top of Aas’ cockpit with a loud
thwack.
The Spetsnaz agent wore a suit
…. Not some pressure suit… but a sweet
Reservoir Dogs style suit… bizarre, but definitely not uncool. The Russian was
smiling.

Within
seconds, other Spetsnaz agents landed on the F-35s. Some got two.

To the
Norwegians’ horror, the Spetsnaz dudes pulled out hammers and sickles and got
to work on the F-35’s multimillion dollar cockpit.

CLANG.
THANG. WOMP.

CLANG.
THANG. WOMP.

CLANG.
THANG. WOMP.

“Sweet fuck.
What the hell is wrong with these guys…? Bodo base, this is Squadron Leader Aas.
We have nine or more Russians trying to break into our cockpits. Bodo base can
you hear us…”

CLANG.
THANG. WOMP.

CLANG.
THANG. WOMP.

Hearing
silence from Bodo base, Squadron Leader Aas frantically began searching the
F-35’s service manuals for something do in case of frozen CPUs and a dangling
Russian. The tablet manual returned zilch. Aas gave up after the third loop
through the index.

THUNK. CRASH.

One of the
Russkies had cracked the plexiglass dome. Long streaks spread across the dome
as Aas felt the Russian might.

Just when all
seemed lost, the onboard CPU returned. The ‘CPU OVERLOAD’ sign was replaced by
a smug smiley face waving a checkered flag. Aas tried the controls again. This
time the F-35 responded. Wasting no time, he twerked the controls causing the
aircraft to rollover. The bloody Russian was blown away.

The rest
of the squadron, made similar moves to rid themselves of the Russians.

By the
time the F-35s landed back in Norway, they were the No.3 breaking news all the
way from Oslo to Atlanta. No.1 went to some late night guy announcing his
retirement, while Crimea took No.2.

‘Heroic
N’wegians outflank Russian aggression’ ran the
Washington Redgister
, ‘Foolish
Spetsnaz caught beating off to F-35s’ opened
Calamity News Network
, ‘F-35s
ward off Bear Blitz’ crooned
The Nephew
. The whole thing about the CPU freezing
up was swept under the rug citing
national securitah
.

This was
obviously sweet music to the USAF, DoD and other concerned entities. If that reindeer-petting-zoo
of a country could dodge the Russians, imagine what a true-blue-Top-Gun-squadron
could do… Kaching! Kaching! Kaching!

Murmansk – Arctic Circle,
Russia

Korlov and
Primakov thanked the Severomorsk base commander Gruzinsky.

“Thank you
Sir… for the Bear bombers,” said Primakov.

“Fuck that
shit… so how’d you do it?”

“What?”

“The dead
guys... how did they ‘get alive’… how did they hammer the F-35 cockpit?”

“Bacon,”
offered Korlov.

“Bacon?”

“Americans
love to wrap everything in bacon… so we wrapped some mechanical gear and chips
with bacon… 900 pounds of bacon.”

“What a waste…
muhahaha,” laughed Gruzinsky.

Washington, District of
Columbia

 “This
will not stand. This will not stand. This aggression against Norway will not
stand...,” Doug Sanders the US rep to NATO declared via
GovChat
. Jim
Borland and Sarah McAllister sat across the 32 inch screen that streamed Sanders
all the way from Brussels.

 “Doug,
there’s no need to go all 91 over this,” said Sarah McAllister the
Undersecretary of State.

“91? 91?
You should be glad it’s not 76…”

“76?”

“1776 man.
What kind of a patriot are you?”

“But 1776
was good, it was good for America…” Jim Borland the CIA dude responsible for
clowning Russia replied.

“Whatever,
like I was saying, this… this aggression, this act of petulance against an all-weather
ally will not stand....”

“Ya we get
it Doug. That’s why we are here.”

NATO’s Sanders
shook his head before continuing, “But what the hell is wrong with those Russians?
We absolutely need to protect the F-35s.”

“Well we have
a few theories, Jim you want to take this?” asked Sarah.

“Thanks
Sarah. It’s actually quite simple. The Russkies have a raging boner for our
F-35s.”

“Raging
Russian Boner? Worst pickup line ever.”

“Guys get
back in here,” chided Sarah.

“Right, as
I was saying, the Russians envy our F-35s. Greatly. Their fifth gen fighter, the
Sukhoi PAKFA is in shambles. On the one side you have India, their FGFA
developmental buddy flirting with the French Mirages, while their other ‘partner’
China is hell bent on pirating their jet fan technologies… you throw in Ukraine
and suddenly you see how bad it is for the Russians.”

“Ok. So
what’s the recourse? I need some actionable points…” protested Doug.

“Two
parts: Defense and Offense. Defensively, we box the F-35s someplace safe till things
cool off, or at least till someone exterminates the bugs. Offensively…”

“No effin way.
The Paris Air Show is crucial. We can’t afford to pull out. It will be an
absolute disaster,” protested Doug.

“Gotta
agree with Doug here, Jim. We can’t abandon Le Bourget. We need those camel boys
to buy the F-35. Forget profitability, a Saudi-Emirati order is our only hope
for saving Lockheed and its American jobs. Abandoning Le Bourget would be an ArmsRace
101 Fail.”

“Well I
thought there is no such thing as bad publicity.”

Doug
Sanders still streaming via
GovChat
flared, “This isn’t some Hollywood
starlet caught injecting bitumen up her ass in an Arby’s restroom. We are
talking about trillions of dollars here… and American jobs.”

“Bitumen
up the ass? Fuck you guys… send the jets to Paris, Baku or Timbuktu, what do I
care… All I am saying is that, they aren’t ready to fly.”

“Maybe not
to fly… but… definitely ready to sell.”

“Well then
don’t come crying to us when the Serbs or Somalis shoot one down and you have
to go rescue Owen Wilson, ok? But seriously they inject bitumen up the ass…”

Sarah
McAllister had heard enough. “Owen Wilson or not, I gotta go with Doug. We have
to send the F-35s. Plus I don’t think the Russian intellect has degraded to the
point where they believe they can hit the Lightnings twice.”

“But we
still need to address this Russian aggression…”

Jim
Borland shook his head in resignation, “We should send the Raptors instead... now
those things can take care of themselves…”

“We aren’t
allowed to sell them, even if we were, that assembly line is history… it’s at the
Smithsonian.”

“No, no just
to send a message… that we are psychos… or superior badasses…”

“Ya, your
F-35s get attacked and to prove they are fine, you send F-22s, makes complete
sense…”

“In my
world it does. At the CIA it makes double absolute sense.”

“We need
to prove the F-35s are fine. No Raptors. End of discussion.”

Jim
Borland pouted, “Fine.”

“Like you
said, Offense. A covert Offensive push. The Russians have been pulling these
crazy stunts all year. I think it’s time we did something ourselves.”

“Black ops
style?”

“Yep.
Joint NATO mischief.”

“Eww NATO?
Fuck the Europeans.”

“I wish I
could.”

 “Will they
cooperate, I mean they have all these currencies and treaties and gay kings…?”

“Absolutely.
Norway as you know,” smirked Sarah, “is shit scared like its 1940. Sweden is shitting
bricks like its 1941…”

Jim
Borland said, “That’s not saying much. One leased out wombs to Nazis while the
other remained ‘neutral’… Swedes are like the dumber version of Swiss…”

“And Finland
too... they believe it’s going to be 1939 all over again,” continued Sarah.

Doug was
lost, “Is that supposed to be a big deal?”

“The Finns
did manage to repulse Stalin… so yeah.”

Doug was
still lost, “Wait. The Finns fought Stalin? Wasn’t Stalin bff with FDR and Churchy?”

“Yeah… the
Finns were sort of allied with Hitler… just for a bit… and kinda responsible
for the siege of Leningrad.”

Doug lost
his shit, “WTF? Leningrad? The second greatest battle of survival only-topped-by-the-meat-grinder-at-Stalingrad?
That Leningrad? And you are telling me that the Finns were responsible for
that?”

“Yeah... had
something to do with those cuckservatives, Molotov and Ribbentrop. But trust me
the Finns had their hearts in the right place… probably. And in their defense, they
were stuck between the two massive butt cheeks of Hitler and Stalin. They had
to crawl into an asshole to save themselves. Look at what happened to Poland. I
give the Finns a pass.”

“Ya, it’s
gets a little fuzzy,” said Jim.

“Well fuzz
my ass,” scowled Doug Sanders.

Sarah
tried to restore sanity, “Doug, this was during WW2. They are totally fine these
days, just like Germany and Austria and Japan.”

Doug
pondered for a while before surrendering to the vagaries of American foreign
policy, “Yeah, I suppose the Germans turned out fine.”

“There you
go buddy.”

“But still
can’t believe the Finns were part of the Solution.”

Sarah
pulled her ace, “Ok. Tell me something… if the Finns weren’t serious, why in
the hell would they offer us Rovio?”

“What in the
hell is a rovio? Is it a new designer drug?”

“Sweet
Shiva…. Rovio Studios…. makers of Angry Birds…”

“Angry
Birds? Wow, the one where the pigs breed with the birds?”

“Yep,
that’s the one. Rovio is a Finnish company and accounts for like 17% of their GDP.”

“And they
want to give it to us? The United States?”

“Technically
they want to relocate to Palo Alto, but essentially yes.”

“Holy
Krampus! Those Finns aren’t kidding I guess…”

“Yes. So
we good? We are all on the same page now?”

“Yes.”

Before
signing off the trio of Civil Servants hashed out a plan to out-clown the
Russians.

“I say we
hit something weird, like Svalbard. I know it’s under Norwegian control but historically…”
suggested Jim.

“Nope. I
am thinking
Mistrals
… the navy ships caught between the French and
Russians,” said Doug.

“
Gone Mistrals
,
sounds like the perfect Affleck vehicle. So how do we boost them?”

 “Ever saw
the
Hunt for Red October
?”

Kremlin, Moscow

Primakov
felt distinctly uncomfortable leaning over the secretary’s IKEA desk. It seemed
to have been designed with one intent… to rear end someone. Consensually or not,
was a question he wanted to pose to the Swedish Embassy. But before the Swedes
got the better of him, the trim secretary called him up.

“Comrade,
the President will see you now.”

“Spasibo.”

As
Primakov entered the office, President Petrova swiveled away from the
Calamity
News
broadcast.

“They are
into the sixth hour of Russobating,” the President said.

“Reruns or
live?”

“Reruns.”

The President
moved on to the
Mistrals
. “So how do we get them back? SVR intel
suggests that the French are playing hardball with the Americans and might
actually unload the ships to Vietnam.”

“Madam, have
you seen
Jack Sparrow
commandeer a ship?”