"I assure you that my predictions are accurate." Salamander said, watching as the leader of the Central European zone played right into his hands.

"Are you sure?" Denes said. "Those volcanoes have been dormant since the Sixteenth century, and were deemed safe enough for the Soviets to use them as nuclear missile silos."

"Excuse me, but what did you just say?" Salamander asked, hoping that he'd misheard the man.

"The Soviets used that mountain range to house several nuclear missiles back during the Cold War." Denes replied.

"Surely they've been cleared out since then..." Salamander mused, relaxing.

"Actually, they haven't" Denes replied. "Estimates placed the disposal of the missiles in the tens of millions each, and since we didn't have enough in the budget to throw around for little things like that and virtually nobody knows about them, we just put up a fence, posted a couple of guards, and..."

"If you'll excuse me Dines," Salamander said, cutting the other man off. "I have an urgent meeting on the far side of the moon I must attend."

"What's he so scared of?" Fedorin asked as Salamander practically ran from the porch and fled through the house. "It's not like an earthquake will..."

"Ah, you know how it is, people hear the word nuclear and..."

Whatever Denes was going to say next was cut off as a massive mushroom cloud appeared over the mountains moments after the first earthquake which signaled the eruption of a certain trio of volcanoes hit.

"You know, the last report indicated that those things did have faulty wiring." Denes got out before the shockwave from the explosion hit.