“We have to confirm flight programming,” Jay reminded his associate. “The bird is likely default-targeted at some Russkie or Chinese burg. We’ve got to change that.”
“Or else start World War III,” Edward noted.
“It’s a tough job, but somebody’s got to do it,” Remi chortled. He looked around the interior of the command bunker, face beaming. “This is so far-out. I always wanted to see first-hand one of these babies go up.”
“Well, you might, and you might not,” Jay said. “I feel a tiny bit less optimistic here than I did at Guantanamero Bay.”
“Now you tell us,” Edward said.
“What else should be on the list?” Willow prompted.
“Procedure for opening the launch doors,” Pump said.
“Details of the whole launch procedure, really,” Jay corrected. “We don’t want to miss some vital step.” He put his hand on my shoulder. “We also need to figure out how best to notify the media.”
“What gear we’ll need to bring to the launch,” Pump added.
“Contacting NORAD, too, at the last minute, so they can let the Russkies know in case something goes wrong with the launch,” Jay mused.
“I thought we were going to keep the launch location secret,” Phil said.
“Isn’t that how we stay out of jail?” Willow asked.
“The call can be anonymous,” Jay said. “We wouldn’t specify where the bird lifted from. Simply tell them the Woodstock Nation is blasting one off.”
Remi snorted. “Like the Russkies will believe that. Unless they see it on their radar. Then they’ll probably freak right —”
“Let’s sort out that shit at home,” Edward interjected. “Is there anything else we need to do tonight?”
I wiped sweat from my fingers. When I moved to the Gold Coast, living in a target area for nuclear war bothered me in the dark hours of the night. I had a recurring dream of desperately attempting to drive north through an L.A.-type urban landscape amid a thicket of rising mushroom clouds erupting on every side. A memory surfaced of an L.A. Times article on military preparations for the ultimate conflict.
“I just thought of something,” I announced. “I’ve read that ICBMs can’t be fired unless two different keys are inserted simultaneously into a launch mechanism. To prevent some nut blowing up the planet.”
Pump grinned. “Sure. But what do those keys do, man? Activate electrical circuits, right? Guess who had to know how to repair those circuits?”
Willow whistled. “You guys are too much.”
“The more I think about it,” Jay said, “we need to find the operations manuals. Otherwise we’re going to space out about something important. They’re probably around somewhere.”
“What do they look like?” Phil asked.
We abandoned creating the list and spread out to search for the manuals. Pump put the gloves on and riffled through filing cabinets and desk drawers.
No luck.
Remi pointed. “What’s down there?”
A hallway of offices stretched away from the command bunker. One door was marked DUTY OFFICER. Pump eased the lock ajar with a credit card, and we all went in.
“Here they are!” whooped Jay. He grabbed a thick plastic binder resting on a shelf of similar binders.
“Gloves!” everybody yelled.
Pump passed him the gloves, and he wiped the cover of the manual before putting them on and cracking the binder open. Leaning over Jay’s shoulder with the others, I saw that the first page was devoted to a notice: “This Targeting Manual is classified SECRET. Unauthorized possession of this document is a felony offense punishable by …”
I stopped reading.
“How about that?” Remi said. “We’re committing an offence.”
“Some of those present already are an offence, an offence against humanity,” Edward said. “Let’s get on with it and get out of here.”
Most of the manual appeared to be letters and numbers that didn’t mean much to anybody except Pump and Jay, who were delighted. They pointed to bits of the Operations Summary Index that we could understand:
Targeting normally will occur only following receipt of the correct codes from WHITE HOUSE or DOD, Washington; NORAD, Colorado Springs; or CINCLANDPAC, Los Angeles.
In the event of hostilities with the U.S.S.R., primary target for this missile is TYUMEN, a manufacturing city in central Asia in the Ural Complex (SEE ATTACHED MAP). Programming instructions pp. 245 and following. CODING FOLLOWS for confirmation.
In the event of hostilities with PR of CHINA, primary target for this missile is HANGCHOW, a manufacturing city on the eastern seacoast in the Shanghai Complex (SEE ATTACHED MAP). Programming instructions pp. 172 and following. CODING FOLLOWS for confirmation.
“I’m starting to feel like a spy,” somebody said.
Jay, despite his gloves, was paging quickly through the manual. “Far fucking out, people. It’s here.” A gloved finger indicated a heading: ORBIT. He started to read part of the instructions out loud, but except for Pump his words didn’t mean anything to us.
“Cool,” people said, though.
“We’ll have to take this sucker home,” Pump said. “The data’s all here, but it’s going to take a little figuring.”
“Afraid not,” declared Edward. “There’s something about having top-secret documents lying around the house that I don’t like.”
“We’ve violated about a dozen major federal felony laws now, man. What’s an op manual or two going to matter? We’ll put them back when we’re done.”
“Eddie has a point, Pump,” Jay said. “Let’s leave it for now. You and I need to come back, anyway, and sort through a ton of details. Maybe tomorrow night? No reason for everybody to hang around while you and I get it straight.”
Edward smirked. “You two haven’t been straight since July.”
Jay slid the binder back onto the shelf. “Here’s Launch.” He indicated another manual. “That’ll show us how to assess the bird’s readiness status.”
“And checklist procedures,” Pump said.
“We can cross that off our list then?” Phil asked.
“It’s still in the typewriter,” I reminded him, and we trooped back into the bunker. Nobody had anything to add when I read our items aloud for review, so I retrieved the piece of paper from the machine and passed it to Pump. I used my handkerchief to wipe down the keys, and somebody borrowed the cloth to rub over the chairs we had shifted.
“Want to see the ready room?” Jay asked. “We should scope it out. Then we’ll come back to this side and get the dimensions of the payload compartment. That’ll do us for tonight.”
Pump cut power to the command area, and we returned to the elevator. Dropping to the silo bottom, we filed across the concrete top of the blast deflectors. The vast bulk of the missile became even more apparent as we walked around its base. At the opposite wall a short hallway led to a similar elevator.
The ready room was a small-scale version of the command bunker. A number of TV monitors hung from the ceiling. A blast door, however, gave access to a retractable platform that allowed instrumentation to be removed from or installed into the rocket. Beyond the ready room, Jay ushered us down a corridor where we could peer through windows at a white-painted enclosure resembling