User:Dristarg/sandbox

Dominator is a novel by James Follett, published in 1984. While the politics now seem dated, it is set in “a world of high technology and even higher risks”, and was hailed as “a thriller for the 80s – and beyond”.

In the early 21st century, the USSR and Middle Eastern countries are supporting the PLO, who is waging war against Israel. A disaster in the Negev Desert all but wipes out Israel’s secret research centre, which has been developing the ‘Massada’ missile, a nuclear ICBM. David Heinlein, an Israeli Lieutenant imprisoned for cowardice and then pardoned, joins the PLO; he plans to destroy Israel by launching missiles from an orbiting space shuttle, Dominator.

Heinlein recruits Peter Sarcha, a British mercenary. They successfully hijack four 'Massada' missiles and smuggle them on board Dominator. The shuttle is piloted by Neil O'Hara, dismissed by NASA after being blamed for the death of another astronaut. Aboard the shuttle in orbit, Heinlein kills two NASA astronauts and blackmails Neil into co-operating by threatening to have Sarcha kill Lena, Neil's girlfriend. When the missiles are armed and ready to fire, Heinlein reveals that he has really been working for Mossad all along, and intends to destroy the PLO's base and Russian cities.

Israel's Prime Minister, in conference with the US President, threatens to let the operation proceed unless the USA gives military support to Israel to fight back against the PLO. The president agrees, which will give Israel time to develop the Massada missile as a defence weapon. But when the president demands that, on the shuttle’s return, Heinlein is tried for killing the astronauts, Heinlein threatens to launch the Dominator’s missiles anyway. Neil tries to overpower Heinlein and, in the struggle, destroys the missiles’ control-box. Heinlein makes Neil crash-land Dominator in South Africa’s Kruger National Park, where Lena and Sarcha are waiting. Sarcha is killed when struck by Dominator, and Heinlein is shot by Lena.

Ikon is a 1982 thriller novel by Graham Masterton, promoted as "The secret that has already changed your life".

In Phoenix, Arizona, the local police and press investigate the beheading of a woman named Margo Schneider. James Skellet, a National Security Agent, unsuccessfully tries to persuade police chief Ruse to release her body to them. When journalist Kathy Forbes asks Skellet why, he and his gang kidnap her. Ruse is killed by a car-bomb, and Margo Schneider’s body is released.

Secretary of state Titus Alexander opposes talks with Russia in nuclear weapon reductions. He plans to blackmail the president with photos of him with a prostitute named Colleen Petley. She is given refuge with Titus' wife Nadine, and the two have a lesbian relationship.

Daniel Korvitz is a cafe proprietor whose friend at an Arizona USAF base told him about design faults in military weapons. When he hears that his friend has been killed in an accident, he sneaks into the airbase’s morgue to see the headless body, and realises that it could not have been done by accident.

Skellet tortures Kathy, who confesses that she found evidence that Margo Schneider was really Marilyn Monroe. The police rescue Kathy, but fail to catch Skellet and his gang. Daniel escapes from the airbase and contacts Kathy, and they discuss the two murders by decapitation. They wonder why American weapons are designed to be ineffective against Soviet targets, but then hear that Skellet has kidnapped Daniel's daughter.

Nadine Alexander meets with a mysterious Russian, code-named Ikon, who orders her to kill Colleen. Nadine then tells Titus that the Soviet Union has secretly been running the USA since 1962. Titus is furious with her, but an army general friend of his confirms that it is true. President Kennedy surrendered when Russian missiles were revealed to be in Cuba, and every president since then has been a puppet of the USSR.

Ikon discusses the takeover of the USA with his deputy, Kama. They only wanted Margo Schneider’s body to prevent it being identified as that of Marilyn Monroe. Nadine kills Collen, along with some of her husband's aides, who admit that they knew that both she and Colleen were working for the Russians.

Kathy and Daniel meet with a retired police lieutenant who tells them that another woman was killed in the place of Marilyn Monroe in 1962, as she might have learned about the secret of Ikon through her relationship with the Kennedys. A stuntman named Rick Terroni helps Daniel get his daughter back, and tells him and Kathy about Ikon, the Russian ruler of the USA. But Skellet and his gang captures all of them and takes them to Washington to meet with Ikon.

Fearing that they will be killed to keep the truth a secret, Daniel and the others escape into the Washington building's basement and set up the cache of explosives there to go off. They all escape just in time. Ikon, Skellet, Titus and Nadine are killed.