58
“Wow! Is that an Antonov Ruslan?” Jon asked for Tatyana’s sake. He still wondered why he’d agreed to this crazy endeavor.
He’d spent the entire flight over the Atlantic and then on to Samara, studying the Antonov manual someone had scared up for him.
The damn thing was a monster. And staring at it now parked on the Russian tarmac, it seemed to glower at him. Like the C-5 Galaxy, its wings drooped heavily when it was on the ground. It wasn’t the natural state for either airplane. They belonged aloft; wings lifted near to level rather than drooping like sad rabbit ears.
“It is,” Tatyana’s pleasure at his surprise reminded him of his role.
Barely.
He wanted to yell to Holly. “Abort! Abort! Abort!”
But they were so far in. So close.
Then he thought about the five thousand kilometers
