Images of Broken Light

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It was on the 14th of October when Russia announcing it was selling its nuclear weapons. An entire nuclear arsenal for under £200 billion and easy terms could be arranged. The news shocked the western world. Several middle east countries expressed an interest - among those interestedparties were Iraq, Iran and most of the dictated countries. Iraq took 49% of the weapons, Iran another 49% and the remaining 2% was shared by the remaining middle east powers. This turn of events both surprised and alarmed the Americans, who were worried about a Russian superweapon, a rumour that had been circulating for years in the American press.

An American scientistr, Dave Weston, who was perhaps the most brilliant mind in the western world alive today (since Albert Einstein had died) was volunteered to go over to the USSR and substantiate or dispel the rumours. This was quickly arranged, the flight to the USSR being in three stages at which he would change identity three times to protect “American security and interests”.

He was quickly trained in the Russian language and, because of the excellent teaching facilities he learned quickly. The public was not informed of the mission which was codenamed “Bluebird”. The first stage of the journey went relatively smoothly but there was a slight problem of identity in the country of Bulgaria, as he was supposed to have a visa for entry into the country. Fortunately the American ambassador in Bulgaria was able to step in and waive the usual procedures in time for the third and final stage of the journey. The plane had to circle the Moscow airport three times before eventually being allowed in to land.

Dave Weston was quite tall, with brown eyes and hair to match. He was not the type of person who got angry easily and had quite a lot of patience and tolerance, which meant he was not perturbed by the delay in entering Moscow. But, and this was perhaps his most brilliant trait, he had a mind that could do quadruple and even quintuple integrations in his head, as well as quadruple integrations between varying exponential limits in his head. This was the sort of thing that a computer would have been hard pushed to match with the current state of the art in processing power. Dave could do this in about two minutes. If anyone could grasp the theory behind a new weapon, it would be Dave Weston.

The Russian ambassador was there to meet him at the airport, and snorted with disgust at the american accent Dominik Vladikavkas had developed. This was easily explained, Dominik assured the ambassador, by the length of time he had spent in America. The formalities over, they walked out to the ambassador’s limousine. The ambassador, Condovich Unov opened the conversation by saying “I trust you have heard of the new weapon we have developed? It must even have reached the Americans by now, no?”. When Vladikavkas did not respond, Unov continued. “It’s based on particle acceleration techniques developed in America”.

Vladikavkas was for once unable to find the Russian to express himself. Again Unov continued, unsuspicious of his guest’s silence. “You will want to see it I’m sure, but first you must eat, and rest. You must be tired after your journey. I will take you to your appartment.” He pressed the intercom located on the door handle of the car, and issued some instructions which Vladikavkas did not quite follow, being tired and more than a little shaken by the ambassador’s openness.