The Day Before Midnight Read Online Free Page A

generated by an airborne nuclear explosion, or by the effects of a blast itself, that is, anything less than a direct hit by a Soviet SS-18, carrying a throwload in the twenty-five-megaton range. And sealing the capsule off from the rest of the installation was a huge blast door like a door on a bank vault, usually kept closed tight.
    “Junie says we ought to have you guys over,” said Romano.
    “Uh, not a good idea,” said Hapgood. “I think we’re in terminal countdown. She spends a lot of time on the phone to her mother. And she’s not exactly nuts about the trailer. And look at
this.”
    He made a fishy face, and held up the object of his contempt. It was a paper lunch sack with grease spots on it.
    “Jeez, I remember when she made bacon, lettuce, and tomato sandwiches, or Reubens, or hot turkey, that you could zap up in the microwave. Now look. The sad reality of my marriage.”
    He pulled out a Baggie with a wilted sandwich in it.
    “Peanut butter,” he announced.
    There was a buzz on the installation phone.
    “Oh, hell, now what?” Romano said. Their twenty-four-hour shift had another ten hours to run. Relief wasn’t due until 1800.
    He picked up the phone.
    “Security Alpha, this is Oscar-one-niner,” he said.
    “Oscar-one-niner, just a security warning, SOP. Be advised I have some kind of disabled vehicle just beyond the gate. It looks to be a van of some sort, off the highway. Looks like some kids in it. Advise SAC or National Command?”
    Romano looked swiftly to the console for his indicators for Outer Zone Security and saw no blinking lights, then glanced at Inner Zone Security and confirmed the status freeze. These lights were keyed to the installation’s low-level Doppler Ground Radar networks, which picked up intruders beyond the perimeter. Occasionally they’d go off if a small animal rushed through the zone, and a security team would be dispatched to investigate. But now he saw nothing.
    “Security Alpha, what’s your security status? I have no OZ or IZ indicators showing.”
    “Affirmative, Oscar-one-niner, I don’t either.”
    “Have you notified Primary and Reserve Security Alert Teams?”
    “Primary is suiting up, sir, and we woke Reserve, affirmative, sir. Still, I’d like to put a message through to Command—”
    “Uh, let’s hold off, Security Alpha. It’s only a van, for crissakes. Keep it under observation, and let your PSAT do the walking. Report back in five.”
    “Yessir,” said the security NCO topside.
    “I’m surprised he didn’t shoot,” said Hapgood.
    The Air Force Combat Security Policemen who maintained the defensive perimeters of the installation were traditionallynot much loved by the missile officers. The missile guys viewed them as cops, the technologically uninitiated. Besides, the security people were known to have sent complaints to Missile Command if Capsule personnel showed up with unshined shoes or uncreased uniforms.
    “Jesus,” Hapgood, a notorious security baiter, said, “those guys must think they’re in the
military
or something. I mean, what is this, the
Air Force
, for Christ’s sake?”
    He went back to his homework, part of his program to get an MBA. It was a case study of difficulties encountered by a fictitious bicycle manufacturer in Dayton, Ohio. Now, with assets of $5 million, operating costs of $4.5 million, a decline in sales projected at 1.9 percent over the next five years, what should CEO Smith do? Buy a motorcycle, thought Hapgood.
    “I wish he’d call back,” said Romano ten minutes later.
    Dad was struggling with the spare tire. He crouched next to the vehicle just off the snowy roadway beyond the gate of the installation. The voices of impatient children lashed out from within the interior of the van.
    “Dammit, settle
down
in there,” he bellowed. “This isn’t
easy.”
    Master Sergeant O’Malley of the Air Force Combat Security Police watched him from the guardhouse. Even from where he stood he could hear the