Phantom Strike

Seven

Ibrahim Ramad stood beside the podium at the head of the briefing room. The ventilation system was struggling with the haze of cigarette smoke that drifted near the ceiling. He could never figure out why pilots, who should strive to be in the best possible condition, smoked so much.

His bomber and interceptor wing commanders, along with their squadron commanders, were sprawled in desk-armed chairs around the room. To Ramad’s right, slightly out of the mainstream of air force officers, sat Ahmed al-Qati and army Major Khalil Shummari, the commander of the helicopter company which supported al-Qati’s airlift operations. The aviation company was composed of Mil Mi-8 troop transports carrying thirty-two soldiers, Mi-24 assault helicopters able to transport eight troops as well as deliver devastating firepower, and a squadron of Mi-28 attack helicopters utilized as escort ships.

Ramad waved a thick sheaf of paper at them, and the buzz of conversation dwindled away.

“The work that Lieutenant Colonel al-Qati and I have accomplished in the past ten days has come to fruition, brothers. These orders from the Leader, countersigned by Colonels Ghazi and Salmi, allow us to now test the theoretical.

“Colonel al-Qati, you are to move your special forces company to Marada for these trials, and Major Shummari will provide the tactical airlift.”

“How soon are we to begin?” al-Qati asked. He did not appear as excited about the prospects as Ramad thought he might have been.

“We will start as soon as possible. I would like to have your units in place by tomorrow night. Or is that too much to expect?”

Play on the man’s vanity.

“We will be here,” al-Qati said.

Khalil Shummari said, “Colonel, these exercises will utilize simulated ordnance?”

Ramad tapped the orders with his forefinger. “The first five in the series will be conducted with simulators, Major. Then there will be a grand finale utilizing live chemical agents.”

Al-Qati frowned. “It seems to me, Colonel Ramad, that a live exercise could lead to a large number of casualties among my infantry as well as Major Shummari’s helicopter crews.”

“Nonsense,” Ramad said. “Are you saying that your soldiers are unprepared for chemical warfare?”

“We regularly train in CW techniques,” al-Qati said, “and we are well-trained. However, in any large operation, it is prudent to expect mistakes to be made. We do not necessarily need to assume the risk — the certainty, in fact — of losing lives merely to impress higher authorities.”

“Ah, but it is not higher authorities we intend to impress,” Ramad said.

The briefing room fell silent as its occupants mulled over Ramad’s statement. He always enjoyed having that edge of surprise, of knowledge that others did not possess.

Captain Gamal Harisah, first squadron commander of the bomber wing, rose from his chair. He was a study in intensity: small, dark, sharply focused. He was also a fierce and fearless pilot.

“Colonel Ramad, are we to conduct these flights, these exercises, without regard to overhead surveillance?”

“That is correct, Captain. The satellites may watch what they will.”

“And that is the reason for the live exercise, is it not?”

“That is quite right, Captain Harisah. The Leader is now prepared for the world to know for certain that we control an arsenal of chemical weapons.”

It was, Ramad knew, a complete change in policy, and one for which he had pressed. Until now, the Leader had insisted to the world that the chemical plant constructed with German assistance was purely in support of agricultural aims. Ramad — and others, like Farouk Salmi — had argued that a chemical capability did little to deter aggression against them unless its existence was confirmed and the resolution to utilize it was proclaimed and demonstrated.

“The objective of this program,” he continued, “is not only to hone our skills, but to also make clear to the warhawks in America and Israel that forays against our homeland will have devastating results for the Israeli populace. No longer will we allow raids within our borders to take place without retaliation.”

One of those acts of aggression still stung him every time he thought about it. Ramad had been commander of the MiG-23 squadron that lost two aircraft to Sixth Fleet F-14 Tomcats over the Gulf of Sidra. The Leader had attempted to persuade the world that Libyan territorial rights extended in a straight line across the Gulf, rather than following the indented curvature of the coast. The Americans had successfully tested the proclamation, and the imaginary line, and the Leader’s resolve, along with Ramad’s pilots, were found wanting.

“No,” he continued, “it shall not happen again. Our tolerance levels finally have been achieved.”

Ahmed al-Qati smiled a ghostly smile at that statement. Ramad knew well that the man had lost his family to the Tripoli attack.

“The political objective of this exercise is to give the Israelis second thoughts about our will, our skill, and our resources. It is also intended to suggest to Washington that an American attack could well result in retaliation against Israeli targets.”

“We are certain,” al-Qati asked, “that a single live demonstration of CW weapons will achieve that end?”

“Absolutely,” Ramad assured him.

He could be confident of his assertion because Ramad, and in this room, only Ramad, knew how impressive the final demonstration would be. The lesson would be taught, and it was, after all, the will of Allah.

Bucky Barr was stripped to the waist, the sweat running through the thick hair on his chest and accumulating in the waistband of his khaki shorts, which were just about as wet as he was.

He was seated on the concrete floor of the hangar, next to the left main landing gear of three-six, hauling back on a three-quarter-inch-drive digital torque wrench. Lucas Littlefield was on his knees next to him, holding a combination wrench in place, to keep the bolt from turning as Barr tightened the nut down.

He tugged the torque wrench, and the nut reluctantly turned a quarter-turn.

“Goddamn,” Barr said, “you think we’re about there, Lucas?”

“Keep going.”

Barr reset the socket on the nut, then put his weight into the handle once again.

CLICK!

The torque wrench let him know he had reached 170 foot-pounds.

Barr sagged forward, slipped the socket from the nut, and dropped the wrench on the floor.

“Goddamn it!” Lucas yelped. “Don’t treat my tools that way, Bucky.”

Aeroconsultants had bought the tools, but Barr didn’t debate the point.

“Sorry, chief.”

He rolled onto his knees, then his feet, and crept out from under the wing.

All six F-4s were now in Hangar Four, three each staggered along each of the sidewalls, their twin canopies raised. The nose cones were also raised, revealing the mounts where the original radar scanners had been fixed. Each aircraft had its fully overhauled turbojet reinstalled, and Barr was proud of the new and sleek appearance. The lower fuselage and the underside of the wings and tail planes were finished in low-visibility grey. Topsides, the colour was that selected as the corporate colour of Noble Enterprises, a low-gloss cream. From the nose cone to the air intakes, dividing the cream and grey, a single, expanding red stripe had been taped in place. From the air intakes back along the fuselage, then swooping up the vertical stabilizer were twin red stripes. The N-numbers — all imaginary — and the Noble Enterprises logo were also red and were placed above the stripes on the fuselage sides.

The trailing edge of the wings, incorporating the ailerons and flaps, were also taped in two-foot-wide stripes, red on top and yellow on the bottom. The scheme was meant to identify for air show spectators whether or not a plane was inverted when it was flying several thousand feet above the crowd. The small plane pilots who hung around the fixed-base operator’s office had seemed reassured when they saw the planes in their new livery. Stripped of weapons pylons and military insignia, the jets presented the appearance of an aerial demonstration team.

Which was exactly what they were supposed to represent.

Both of the Hercules aircraft followed the same theme, though they had not received the cream paint. The tanker had been sandblasted down to its original aluminium finish, matching the Aeroconsultants craft, then both had received the red fuselage striping, N-numbers, and logos.

Noble Enterprises looked like a going concern, but it was misleading. None of the F-4s were currently capable of flight. Almost all of the avionics had been stripped from each aircraft. Pilots and technicians swarmed over the six aircraft, working side by side, congenially complaining while they focused on their particular tasks.

Tom Kriswell and Sam Vrdla had finally been turned loose on the contents of the Jeep trailers. They had black boxes, cables, and diagnostic equipment spread all over the workbenches. Vrdla had one old radio connected to a battery and antenna, and a Lincoln radio station pumped out Garth Brooks, Vince Gill, Tanya Tucker, and an occasional Willie Nelson.

Barr walked over to seven-seven and climbed the ladder. The ejection seats had been removed, and Wyatt was on his back on the cockpit floor, his head stuck between the rudder pedals, working a ratchet on the back of the instrument panel.

“Hey, Andy.”

Wyatt lowered his head against a pedal and peered up at him. “Yeah?”

“How long we been here?”

“We’re one day short of two weeks.”

“It seems like one week short of two years.”

“You get that main gear reinstalled?”

“Damn betcha! We are now complete on the body work and mechanical shit.”

“So you climbed up here to tell me it’s worth celebrating,” Wyatt said.

“Hell, yes! It’s a milestone.”

“Okay. Send somebody to town for beer.”

Barr slid back down the ladder and crossed to where Littlefield was cleaning tools and putting them away in his stack of castered cabinets.

“You want to check out the hydraulics while we still got her on the jackstands, Bucky?”

“We’ll do it in the morning, Lucas.” Barr pulled his wallet from his hip pocket. The leather was streaked dark with moisture. He fumbled in the bill compartment and extracted five fifty dollar bills. “You want to take a break?”

“Hell, yes, but we ain’t going to find any females in this burg.”

Barr stuffed the bills into Littlefield’s breast pocket. “Take one of the Wagoneers and go buy us a propane grill, about ten pounds of chopped sirloin, buns, pickles, chips, the works. Potato salad. Don’t forget the potato salad. And baked beans.”

“You forgot the beer.”

“The beer goes without saying.”

Littlefield dipped his hands into a plastic vat of waterless hand cleaner and started to smear it around.

Barr walked over to the workbenches at the back of the hangar.

The seeming confusion of wires, cables, instruments, and electronics boxes was actually organized. Kriswell and Vrdia had nearly identical groups of components arranged into six areas. As they probed each piece with digital and analogue instruments, verifying the correct functions of integrated circuits and silicon chips and other mysteries Barr didn’t care to know about, they tagged the components that passed with yellow tape. “How’s it going, Tom?” he asked.

“Magnifico! This is top-grade stuff, Bucky. All we’ve run into are some calibration problems.”

“I wonder how much it cost Uncle?”

“Don’t ask. We’ve got maybe ten million bucks on the bench.”

Barr reached out for a six-inch-square box.

“And don’t touch!”

“Hey.”

“This is my office. Go sit in your own.”

“Is it going to work?” Barr asked.

“Hell, I don’t know.”

“That’s comforting as hell.”

“Of course it’ll work,” Kriswell said, putting down a probe and digging his Marlboros out of his pocket. “I flat-out guarantee it.”

“For how long?”

“Hundred hours good enough?” He stuck the unlit cigarette in his mouth. He didn’t smoke anymore.

“Should be,” Barr agreed.

He moved down the bench and bent over to peer into a Head Up Display screen resting there. It was blank, but he pictured targets showing all over the place.

The F-4 Phantom was designed as a two-seat fighter, with the radar operator placed in the rear seat. The philosophy had been not to overload the pilot with too many chores to accomplish, especially when the going got hectic in a combat situation. The philosophy was still in vogue for F-14 Tomcats and F-lll swing-wing bombers.

Noble Enterprises was converting the F-4 to single seat operation, utilizing avionics and controls designed primarily for the F-15 Eagle. It was an ambitious venture, but one that Demion, Kriswell, and Wyatt thought feasible. And if they did, so did Barr.

All he had to do was fly it, and he was looking forward to that.

At four-forty-five in the morning, the air was unmoving on the perimeter of the small airfield. Ahmed al-Qati expected it to start moving at any time.

To the northeast, the faint glimmer of dawn was beginning to wash the squat buildings of El Bardi. It was not light enough yet to define the sea beyond the town.

Behind him in the darkness were the eighty-five men of his First Special Forces Company. The four platoon leaders and the company commander, Captain Ibn Rahman, stood with him at the side of the runway, waiting.

Al-Qati and Khalil Shummari had flown back to El Bardi right after the briefing at Marada Base yesterday, and al-Qati had put his special forces officers to work immediately, recalling the men from the exercise underway and cajoling them into cleaning and preparing their equipment for this morning’s deployment.

The grumbling had been widespread last night, and still this morning, though he could not discern the exact words, al-Qati heard the tone of discontent in the dozens of conversations taking place behind him.

He also sensed that his officers were displeased with him, not because of the unannounced deployment — for which they had not yet been fully briefed, but because he had shirked his own duties for three hours during the night.

The magnetic attraction of the Seaside Hotel in Tobruk was almost beyond his will to resist. At least, he did not mount a defensive strategy within his mind. Al-Qati could not believe, nor fathom, the fates that had brought Sophia Gabratelli to him so late in his life. Nor did he even try to understand why, after months of what he was certain was fruitless courting, she had taken him into her arms and her bed.

He harboured no illusions about himself. He had become newly aware of the bald spot expanding on the back of his head. His bold, hooked nose dominated a face ravaged by wind and weather and sun. To be truthful to himself, there were some positives. He was hard and fit. The muscles of his arms and legs and stomach were apparent and utile. Unlike many Arab men, he tried not to treat women as inferiors. He supposed that there might have been some mystique in his reputation as a professional warrior, if she were even aware of it. When they were together, he talked very little about himself or his past exploits. He was not a braggart. She was quite aware of world politics and tensions, and their conversations embraced those topics as well as soccer, for which they were both avid fans, the cinema, and music. She was far ahead of him in the realm of art and literature, but he enjoyed her analyses of both. She was an avid listener when he talked of what he had learned of military leadership and tactics.

And despite the physical change in their relationship in their last two meetings, Sophia remained something of an unattainable ideal for him. That such a woman would hold him close, that he might nuzzle the smooth, freshly scented aroma of her flesh made him more capable than at any time in his memory. She had called him a magnificent lover…

“I hear them, Colonel,” Rahman said, startling him out of his reverie.

“Yes.” He heard the thrupp-thrupp of rotors.

Seconds later, the two Mi-8s and three Mi-24s — known by their NATO codenames as Hip and Hind — came hurtling out of the dark. Four Mi-28 assault helicopters — the Havoc — flew to the sides of the main group.

Two C-130H transport craft were due to arrive within the hour, to load the company’s armoured personnel carriers. Rahman had detailed six men to stay behind and accompany the mobile equipment.

“All right, Captain,” al-Qati said. “Let’s check them out and load them up.”

Rahman nodded to the lieutenants, who spun around and went in search of their platoons for last-minute inspections before embarking.

The rattle of weapons and creak of web gear behind him was obliterated by the noise of the helicopters as they hovered into place and then settled to the asphalt of the airstrip.

The First Platoon, known as the Strike Platoon and composed of his most elite soldiers, loaded first. Ahmed al-Qati stepped back and watched them file onto the runway. They were dressed in desert camouflage utilities, with steel helmets painted in sand and tan and grey. Each man carried a twenty-seven-kilogram backpack and had four one-litre canteens of water attached to his web gear. A large pouch, attached to the side of the packs, contained each man’s CW kit. The primary weapon for the platoon was the Kalashnikov 5.45 millimetre AK-74 assault rifle. One 12.7 millimetre DShK-38 heavy machine gun was also assigned to the platoon, as were RPG-7 antitank rockets and SA-7 Grail missiles for air defence.

Despite their earlier complaints, these men carried themselves well — heads up, shoulders back, proud. Lieutenant Hakim, their commander, trotted to the head of the column and assigned the nineteen men to seats in the Mi-24 assault helicopters.

The other three platoons loaded quickly aboard the Mi-8 transports.

Al-Qati reached down and picked up his pack, slinging it over his shoulder. He carried his web gear and holstered 7.62 millimetre Tokarev automatic in his left hand and headed for the lead Mi-8. Looking around, to be certain nothing was left behind, he saw only the eight parked BMD fire support vehicles awaiting their transport. He counted six men tending to them.

Clambering into the helicopter’s cabin, he found Major Shummari standing in the cabin, talking to someone over a headset.

The clatter of the twin Isotov turboshaft engines made conversation impossible. Shummari handed him a spare headset, and al-Qati removed his helmet and slipped it in place.

“All accounted for, Ahmed?” the major asked.

“I start with eighty-five, Khalil. How many will be left when we are done, do you suppose?”

In the expanding light of dawn and the red overhead light of the cabin, Shummari studied his face for several seconds before answering.

“Do you really want a response, Ahmed?”

“Please.”

“Ninety percent would be a good number.”

Al-Qati bent over to peer out the door as helicopters began taking off. Through the open portals of the cabins, he saw the men who trusted him to provide them with as much safety as was possible for professional soldiers.

He thought that Shummari was probably correct. Eight or nine of them would be carried home, it was an acceptable number in wartime, though not in peace.

He would argue his position against the live exercise yet again.

But he did not think that he would prevail.

By the evening of the following Wednesday, the first revitalized F-4 was complete. It was an E model, carrying the number N20677. If their luck held, nine-three would be finished by the next day.

While Wyatt agreed with Barr that the external appearance of the Phantoms was impressive, he was happier with what Demion and Kriswell had accomplished on the interior.

Behind the nose radome was a Hughes attack radar scanner. It fed the APG-63 pulsed-Doppler radar which had a search range of 120 miles. A network of sensors installed in various places on the fuselage and wings were coupled to an ALR-56 radar warning system. The ALQ-128 launch warning and Identify Friend or Foe system was installed. The internal countermeasures system from the F-15 was designated ALQ-135. To protect the tail, the pilot’s blind spot, ALQ-154 radar warning and AAR-38 infrared warning systems had been added.

The black box containing the programmable signal-processing computer had been mounted on the rear bulkhead in the aft cockpit. That computer processed information from the radar, and possibly from data links with an Airborne Warning and Control aircraft, then displayed the filtered information on the HUD, now mounted on the top of the instrument panel. Radar echoes from aircraft flying at similar or higher altitudes were simple, but the computer was sophisticated enough to pick up the faint returns of aircraft near the ground, eliminate the ground return, and display only the targets on the HUD. Instead of continuously looking down to check a cluttered radar screen, a busy pilot scanning the skies around him for hostile aircraft and missiles had all the information he needed directly in his line-of-sight. The HUD reported the true position of a target, along with its range and closing speed. The display also prompted the pilot when the distance to target was safe for missile firing.

The cockpit had been substantially revised. Circuit breakers, armament and radio panels, and switches were in new positions. There were two eight-inch cathode ray tube (CRT) displays set into the instrument panel.

All sixteen of the Noble Enterprises team were gathered near the front hangar door admiring their work before locking up for the night.

Barr pulled a handful of half-dollars from his pocket. He was probably the only person in the nation with a ready supply of half-dollars. He liked the heft, he said. Wyatt saw his move and said, “No, Bucky.”

“Ah, shit, Andy! We at least ought to let the God of odds become involved.”

“No way. I’ll do the first test hop in the morning. You can fly chase with the Citation.”

“How thrilling,” Barr said.

“If you get the first trial, Andy,” Hackley said, “that eliminates you from the next five.”

“That’s only fair,” Gettman agreed.

Barr passed out coins. “Let’s settle it now.”

Kriswell grabbed a coin.

“Forget it, Tom,” Barr told him. “You’ve got to land a Cessna with prop and gear intact first.”

They flipped coins in odd-man-out until they had a roster for the test flights of the remaining five aircraft: Jordan, Zimmerman, Barr, Hackley, and Gettman.

With the priority of risks settled, Hank Cavanaugh shut off the lights and locked the door, and they all crawled into the Jeeps for the drive into Ainsworth.

The closer they got to completion of the aircraft, the more celebratory was the mood. Everyone was in good spirits when they filed into the Rancher’s Cafe and Lounge and started to place orders. Barr engaged Julie Jorgenson in a discussion of educational priorities. He was insidiously leading her into the belief that every student should be able to write well before an English teacher pounded Shakespeare and Dickens into them. She had become very easy with Barr, perhaps somewhat awed by his command of the pressing issues in education. He knew about test results and national comparisons of ability.

Wyatt twisted the top off a bottle of Budweiser and carried it to the short hallway between the dining room and the semi-darkened lounge. There were two couples at tables and three single men at the bar. He lifted the receiver from the wall-mounted telephone and used his CIA-funded calling card to place his call.

There was no answer at Kramer’s number. He didn’t leave a message on the answering machine.

The machine answered at Aeroconsultants, but didn’t tell him anything he didn’t already know.

For the fifth time, he tried Kramer’s father in Seattle.

“Mr. Kramer, this is Andy Wyatt.”

“Good evening, Mr. Wyatt.”

George Kramer had always been very formal with Wyatt, perhaps because from the first he had resented Wyatt taking his little girl away from Seattle. Or maybe because he knew more about Wyatt’s relationship with his little girl than Wyatt thought he knew.

“Sorry to bother you again, Mr. Kramer, but I wondered if Jan had checked in with you?”

The first time he had called Seattle, Wyatt had had to use the excuse that Jan was on vacation and he needed to get in touch with her.

“Why yes, Mr. Wyatt, she sure did.”

“Great! Is she there? Or do you know where I could reach her?”

“She doesn’t want to talk to you.”

George Kramer sounded positively gleeful.

Eight

The Director of Central intelligence was not only the chief executive of the Central intelligence Agency, but also head of the other agencies in the intelligence community — Defence Intelligence, the National Security Agency, the military and cabinet-level intelligence services. He split his time between offices at Langley and in the District. It kept him busy enough that Martin Church and the other three deputy directors — Intelligence, Science and Technology, and Administration — had little day-to-day contact with him, though they all got together for monthly staff meetings.

Church reported directly to the Executive Director who reported through the Deputy Director for Central Intelligence to the DCI. That process was all right with Church because he didn’t particularly care for the director, a seemingly cold man with political in-fighting ability who could get stubborn about his own viewpoints.

The Executive Director called him in mid-afternoon. “You busy right now, Marty?”

“Nothing I can’t toss in the drawer.”

“The DCI would like to talk to you.”

“Me? Alone?”

“Go on over to his office now.”

The director’s office suite was lavish and spacious, with its own conference and dining room. His two overburdened secretaries were working feverishly at computer terminal keyboards and fielding constantly chiming telephones. He was pointed in the direction of the dining room.

He knocked on the door before opening it.

“Come on in, Martin.”

The DCI was in the kitchenette making himself a cheese sandwich. He ate half-a-dozen times a day, probably because his caloric intake couldn’t keep up with the frenetic pace he maintained.

“Do you want a sandwich?” he asked. “Or maybe a piece of apple pie?”

“No, sir. Thanks, anyway.”

He came out of the kitchenette, swigging from a can of 7UP, and plopped in one of the soft, castered chairs at the big table.

“Sit down, Martin. I’ve got about ten minutes before I leave for the District.”

Church sat across from him.

“I read the intelligence estimate you sent up this morning. The Libyan thing.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Any reservations about it? About the eight thousand figure for the warheads?”

“No,” Church said. “Embry’s playing it right down the middle of the road. They could well have a few more than we’re projecting.”

“Okay. I’m going to bring it up at the NSC meeting. Then, I’m going to spring the Icarus Project on them. What’s Wyatt’s state of preparation?”

Church managed to keep his face immobile, but his mind reeled as if he had been slugged. For the past two months, he had been proceeding with Wyatt’s mission — codenamed Icarus — under the impression that the National Security Council had already signed off on it. The DCI was capable of that deception, though. He was fond of building up his pet projects in secrecy for weeks at a time while concurrently spiking conversations with hints about the future, then springing the projects on people. It made him appear as if he was always prepared for any eventuality. His reputation as a Boy Scout hadn’t been tarnished since he took office.

“Uh, sir, it looks like about ten or twelve days,” Church said.

The director flipped open his Daytimer. “August four at the earliest?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Good. The President’s going to be at this meeting, and I want the image of eight thousand warheads to have some impact. I’m going to show that video that Science and Technology put together, the one about toxic effects on humans. I think I can get closure on the project immediately. If I can swing an Executive Order, we can bypass the Congressional oversight committees until the mission’s complete.”

“Is there a chance they won’t approve it?” Church asked.

“Very damned little, I think.”

“What do I tell Wyatt?”

“You don’t tell Wyatt a damned thing.”

Lieutenant Colonel Ahmed al-Qati leaned between the two helicopter pilots and squinted at the horizon. They were flying low, though high enough to avoid raising a dust cloud behind them, and the horizons were close. When he saw the miniature sandstorm erupt and the two Sukhoi-24 bombers begin their climbout, he tapped the pilot on the shoulder.

“Go now, Lieutenant,” he said over the intercom.

The nose of the helicopter dipped as it picked up forward speed.

Through the right side window of the Mi-8, al-Qati saw the sister helicopter, some fifty meters away, also increase its speed.

He turned to the rear and studied the thirty infantrymen poised in their seats. They were already dressed in their shapeless chemical warfare clothing, their packs strapped to the outside of the protective parkas.

Al-Qati signalled the lieutenant watching him, and the officer passed the signal to his men. The steel helmets came off as gas masks were donned. They pulled their balaclava headwear, constructed of flexible vinyl and extremely hot and uncomfortable, on next, then replaced their helmets. The unwieldy vinyl gloves were next, then they re-gripped their weapons.

They looked like bug-eyed monsters from some poorly produced Japanese movie, al-Qati thought.

“Two kilometres, Colonel,” the pilot said. “We’ll be entering into the cloud in a few seconds.”

“Prepare yourselves,” al-Qati said, pulling the headset from his ears and unsnapping the gas mask case at his waist.

The pilots took turns adjusting their own masks while al-Qati snugged his into place, blew through his nose to exhaust the air and seal the soft rubber against his skin. As soon as he tugged the hood over his head, his skin erupted in perspiration.

He always felt as if the mask short-changed him on air supply.

Leaning forward, he again peered through the windshield. The dust cloud from the exploding 300-kiloton bombs was settling, blowing off toward the east in a light wind. Still, the air was hazy and rippled as a result of the tear gas that saturated it. The exercise called for the use of tear gas in order to simulate near-reality. Ramad had feared that al-Qati’s soldiers would pull off their masks as soon as they were out of sight of an officer. Ramad did not really understand discipline, or how to instil it, al-Qati thought.

Through the haze, he could see the small sign posts that had been erected. They read, “Radio Transmitter,” or “Ordnance Depot,” or “Fuel Storage.” They were the objectives of his ground advance.

“Resistance is expected to be nil,” Ramad had laughed at the morning briefing.

“Well-equipped and trained Israeli soldiers, as an example,” al-Qati had retorted, “will be in their protective CW gear within seconds of the first blast. Resistance can be expected to be fierce. Additionally, civilians have been issued CW masks.”

The Libyan government did not so equip its civilian populace.

“That is possible,” Ramad had conceded.

“It is probable. Your bombs target civilians. Is that what we are rehearsing?”

Ramad had not answered the question.

The lieutenant gave another hand signal, and the soldiers slipped out of their seats, kneeling on one knee, facing the rear. Al-Qati could almost hear the clicks above the roar of the turbine engines as the safeties were released on the AK-74 assault rifles. The muzzles of the rifles were fitted with devices to force a build-up of gas pressure in the rifle barrels, which ejected the dummy rounds of ammunition and loaded the next dummy round. There was to be no live ammunition for these first exercises.

He grabbed a handhold as the Mi-8 flared, than thudded to a landing. The rear doors spread wide, and his soldiers leapt into action, tumbling out the rear, fanning out to either side of the helicopter.

He followed the lieutenant, dropped to the sandy earth, then jogged to the left and dropped on his stomach.

The helicopter lifted off, spraying sand in all directions, blanking out the sun.

The second helicopter, a hundred meters to his right, also took off.

As the rotor noises died away, al-Qati surveyed his position.

Typically in Libya, there was very little natural cover. On each end of his skirmish line, squads were digging shallow foxholes to site the heavy machine guns.

Officers and non-coms shouted orders.

The hot sand burned into him, and the perspiration gushed beneath the protective clothing. He had estimated in a report the year before that a soldier’s fighting ability was reduced by almost forty percent when he was encased in chemical warfare clothing and mask.

When the machine guns were emplaced and test-fired, the recon squads moved out of the line, slithering up the dime on elbows and knees.

The air was pasty with tear gas mist.

His radio operator splashed into the sand next to him, shouting through his mask, “Second squad is closing on the radio transmitter, Colonel!”

Al-Qati nodded his approval and checked his watch. One minute and forty-five seconds from touchdown.

And alarmingly, he thought about how ridiculous this all was. Grown men playing in the sand.

He would much rather be in the Seaside Hotel, ensconced in clean sheets, holding Sophia’s head to his shoulder, becoming intoxicated by her perfume, talking quietly in the night as the ceiling fan turned lazily.

He couldn’t even remember what it was that they talked about, but it was unimportant compared to the peace and euphoria she brought him.

Ahmed al-Qati got his feet under him, and cursing into the privacy of his mask, scrambled up the hill, zigzagging.

The first squad of the Second Platoon leapt to their feet and came charging up the hill behind him.

“Think of her as a beautifully and expensively restored ’57 T-Bird, Andy,” Jim Demion said. “We don’t want to scratch the paint, the first time out of the garage.”

“You’re taking an awfully damned proprietary interest,” Wyatt said.

“Can’t be helped. She’s reborn under my hands.”

In the early light of dawn — they had advanced their starting time by an hour to beat the locals to the airfield — the Phantom appeared sleek and fast and — with her weapons pylons removed — less deadly. She did have her outboard fuel tanks slung in place. In her new cream livery, she was sitting on the tarmac outside Hangar 4, her forward canopy raised as Sam Vrdla sat in the cockpit and made some last-minute adjustments.

Wyatt finished strapping on his G suit, then stood upright. “You ready, Bucky?”

“The heart’s ready, Andy. The mind will wake up around nine.”

Barr was flying the Citation as a chase plane, and he and Win Potter trundled off toward it.

“Who’s going to handle the comm system on this end?” Wyatt asked.

“That’s me,” Kriswell said, “Old Jockey Joe. You want rock or country?”

“Something symphonic might be a better omen, Tom.”

One of the other F-4s had been pushed partway out of the hangar, to clear her antennas of the steel roof. Kriswell would use the airplane’s radios to maintain contact with Wyatt and pass on messages, if necessary, to Barr.

They were testing the radios as well as the aircraft.

In addition to the standard NavCom sets, each of the F-4s, and eventually both of the Hercules transports, was to be equipped with a pair of scrambled UHF radio sets. The super-secret black boxes digitally encoded voice transmissions and decoded voice reception as a defence against hostile eavesdropping. A third black box accepted and decoded scrambled datalink signals. In the cockpit, the radios were identified as Tactical One, Tactical Two, and Data One.

Wyatt and Kriswell agreed on frequency settings for both voice channels, then Wyatt walked out to the aircraft.

“Hey, Sam! When do I get my airplane?”

Vrdla peered over the cockpit coaming. “Just want to be sure, Andy.”

“I’ll let you know what needs to be fixed.”

“It better not be anything,” Vrdla said, climbing up onto the seat and swinging his legs out onto the ladder.

Wyatt snapped his small clipboard onto his right thigh, then let Dennis Maal help him into his parachute harness.

“This has a label on it, Andy. Says ‘Don’t open before Christmas.’”

“I’ll try not to peek, Denny.”

Maal was a medium-sized, nondescript man with blondish-grey hair and a matching moustache. He wasn’t much of a worrier, and there weren’t many lines in his face. Nearly fifty, he had put twenty-five years into the Air Force, most of them flying KC-135 Stratotankers. That took steady nerves, and as far as Wyatt could tell, he hadn’t lost much composure since his retirement. His steady hands would be at the controls of the C-130F tanker, and the assignment hadn’t bothered him a bit.

Wyatt climbed the ladder, and Maal followed him and helped strap him into the seat. By the time he got his helmet on and his communications and oxygen lines connected, the sun was half a red ball on the eastern horizon.

With the APU providing amperage, Wyatt powered up the panels and tested his Tac One radio. “Yucca Base, Yucca One.”

Since they were exchanging one desert for another, they had elected to use a desert plant for their call sign.

“Five by five, One,” Kriswell said. “I couldn’t have done it any better if I’d really tried.”

“Try the Tac Two channel, and let’s see if your luck holds up.”

The second scrambled radio also performed well.

“I just told Bucky he could leave,” Kriswell reported.

The Citation passed in front of him, with Barr waving, as Wyatt went through the engine start procedures. Both turbojets fired easily, and he left them in the idle range for a few minutes.

Maal gave him a thumbs-up, slid down the ladder, and removed it.

Wyatt released the brakes and let the F-4 creep forward. Adding throttle, he picked up speed, turned onto the taxiway, and headed for the end of the runway.

The Citation lifted off before he reached the end of the taxiway.

He locked the brakes, lowered the canopy, and ran up the engines to max power, watching the instruments closely. The aircraft rocked and strained against the brakes. Tail pipe temperatures and pressures appeared perfect. He backed off the throttles, checked for airplanes in both directions, then rolled out onto the runway.

Without stopping, Wyatt turned onto what should have been a centre stripe, and slapped the throttles forward.

Almost instantly, the acceleration pressed him back into the seat. At 160 knots indicated, he eased the throttles past the detents and into afterburner.

The Phantom leapt to the chase, hoisted her slim nose, and climbed for the stars, folding in her gear and flaps.

“Ah, Yucca One, you disappeared on us.”

Wyatt read the pertinent information off the HUD. “Base, I’m climbing through angels two-five, making six-zero-zero.”

“That’s exactly what I thought you were doing,” Kriswell said. “Tell me about it.”

“The cockpit’s a little disorienting,” Wyatt admitted.

“Hell, I’ve got over a thousand hours in Eagles, and the HUD seems to read correctly…”

“What do you mean, ‘seems’?” Demion broke in.

“Give me a while, Jim. What’s bothersome, it still feels like an F-4, and I automatically look down at the instrument panel, but the instruments aren’t in the right places anymore. Christ, they’re not even instruments.”

The familiar round and octagonal gauges had been replaced by digital readouts and a pair of cathode ray tubes. Wyatt figured each of the pilots would need about ten hours of flight time to become accustomed to the new layout and to learn to rely on the HUD for important data.

He levelled out at thirty thousand feet on a northerly heading.

It felt good.

He eased the stick over and did two rolls.

“Yucca One, Bucky says cut that out.”

Leaning to the right, he looked back and down and finally found the Citation flying several thousand feet below.

“She’s flying just fine,” Wyatt said.

“Follow the script,” Kriswell ordered. “Damn it, you wrote the script.”

For the next hour, Wyatt followed the script. With Barr monitoring him, he put the F-4 through a series of manoeuvres that gradually increased the stress on key components. He finished up with two intentionally staged stalls, and pulled out of each one easily.

“Bucky says you pass, Yucca One.”

“That’s nice to know. I’ve got two pages of notes on my knee here.”

“How bad?”

“Minor things. Adjustments on the stick. Rudder trim is a little jerky. The starboard throttle has a sticking point at seventy percent.”

“Hell,” Kriswell said, “any kid can live with those. Don’t be so damned picky.”

“I apologize profusely.”

“That’s better. Let’s try the navigation.”

They tried the TACAN first, using radio stations in Rapid City and Omaha to set up the directions. Then Wyatt cut in the NavSat system which used three of the eighteen satellites in the Global Positioning System (GPS) to triangulate his position above the earth. Combined with the radar altimeter, the electronics could pinpoint him to within a few yards of longitude, latitude, and altitude. With the right CRT in the instrument panel switched to the navigation mode, his symbol was displayed in the centre of the screen and superimposed grid lines gave him a graphic interpretation of his geographical position. At the top of the screen, his position was displayed numerically: 43-05-19N 98-45-57W.

The HUD readouts provided him with the crucial digital data. At the top, his heading was provided: 265. In a box at the right side, the altitude of 32,465 was shown. Along the bottom were his fuel state and his speed indication, currently 461 knots.

Through Kriswell, Wyatt learned that Barr, flying right alongside him, confirmed the navigational information.

“Let’s go to video, Yucca One.”

“Roger the video, Base.”

The sophisticated camera mounted in the lower nose cone behind a small Plexiglas window could capture true video, enhanced night vision, and infrared imagery. He brought up the true mode on the left CRT, using the small control box added to the side of the throttle console.

There had not been space enough to give the camera lens rotational or vertical movement, and it was mounted solidly. The screen showed him blue sky, and Wyatt dipped the nose until he picked up a patch of earth surrounding a tiny blue lake. With the thumbwheel, he magnified the image. The lake zoomed up at him.

“Got myself a lake, Base.”

“Integrate.”

With one flip of a toggle switch, the computer copied the true video image and added a simulation of it to the HUD. On a clear day like he had, the simulated image matched what he was seeing through the HUD, anyway, but at night, or in heavy weather, the computer would provide him with an enhanced picture he would not normally have.

He used two adjustment knobs at the bottom of the HUD and shifted the computer image on the HUD until it matched his real view. If he shifted his head too far to the right or left, the superimposed image slid off the actual one.

“Looks good to me, Base.”

“All right, Yucca, that’s enough of that for today. Let’s do the first pass on the search radar.”

Barr peeled off and ran away toward the south to act as the quarry.

Wyatt raised his nose to regain some altitude, then coasted along, giving Barr time to hide. Jotted a note on his fuel consumption. Viewed the faraway surface of the earth, which had a beige tinge to it. Noted the cloud formations, stratocumulus and cirrus, building in the west. Thought about buzzing a couple cars on Highway Two, which cut catty-comer across the state, but decided against inducing any heart attacks.

After ten minutes, he switched his radar to active which, in a combat situation, provided the enemy with radar emissions which could help pinpoint himself as a target. Selecting the 120-mile search scan, he eased into a mile-wide orbit and made two circuits.

One target presented itself immediately, and judging by its course and altitude, he wrote it off as a commercial flight headed for Sioux City. He couldn’t find the Citation.

Barr wouldn’t make things easy, of course, and Wyatt didn’t believe for a minute that he had maintained a southerly course after they had parted company.

The Citation had radar, primarily utilized for weather detection and anti-collision, but it would be sufficient for spotting the F-4 if it got close enough.

In ten minutes, at their combined speeds, if he had continued south, Barr could be close to 150 miles away. And out of radar range.

Wyatt didn’t think so.

He switched the radar to passive.

Below on his left was the town of O’Neill, with the Elkhorn River passing to the south of it. Wyatt dropped his right wing, brought the nose over, and spiralled downward, picking up speed to 640 knots and straightening out on a heading of two-hundred degrees.

After five minutes, he began a wide turn to the right and drained off speed. The radar altimeter reported the Phantom at twenty-six-hundred feet AGL. The town of Atkinson was several miles ahead on his right oblique.

The Elkhom River was clearly delineated by the meandering greenage that passed from west to east. Wyatt reduced his throttle settings some more and began a right turn that would align him with the river.

Atkinson flashed past his left wingtip. A few cars had pulled to the side of the highway — Route 20 — so their occupants could crane their necks up at him.

He dialled in a thirty-mile scan on the radar, then went active.

The back-and-forth sweep appeared on his right CRT, imposed on the navigation screen. There were no aerial targets there, nor any on the HUD.

He increased the scan to sixty miles.

Blip.

Target at ground level, forty-two miles ahead of him, moving east at 320 knots, following the river.

Wyatt could imagine that Barr had the Citation about twenty feet off the river surface and below the tops of the trees.

He switched in the attack radar mode, used the small joystick to centre the target reticule over the symbol on the HUD, and locked it in. The radar would now keep track of that target while, in its search mode, it continued to seek additional targets.

Wyatt advanced the throttles, moving the speed up to four hundred knots while he continued to lose altitude. He stayed two hundred feet above the river since his speed didn’t allow him to make the same course changes as the river.

The gap closed to thirty miles.

If he had had missiles aboard, he would soon have been able to lock a heat-seeker or a radar-homer on the target, then go on to find himself another target.

“Lock-on, Yucca Base.”

“Roger, One.” After a couple seconds, Kriswell came back with, “Bucky says ‘bullshit.’”

“He’s lucky I gave him a chance to say it.”

Wyatt checked his fuel state. He had about fifteen minutes left.

He shoved the throttles into afterburner.

The HUD symbol zipped toward him.

A few moments later, the Citation appeared sharply in the video screen, dancing above the thin trickle of the river, dodging the trees leaning toward it from both sides.

Wyatt pulled the stick back and went vertical as soon as he passed over the business jet.

“One, Base. Bucky says you’re a show-off.”

“He’s probably right,” Wyatt said.

The pressure of the gravitational force pressing him into the seat was sobering and exhilarating, yet he didn’t feel the same sense of clarity and elation he knew he would feel when his target was the real thing.

It wouldn’t be as easy then, and the targets were capable of shooting back.

That’s what got the adrenaline pumping.

Janice Kramer’s United flight landed at Albuquerque at one in the morning, and she took a cab north to her condo.

After unlocking the door, she dropped her two pieces of luggage on the carpet inside, then went around turning on table lamps and checking the soil of her plants for moisture. They were all in good shape, so she suspected that Liz Jordan had stopped by.

Someone cared, anyway.

She didn’t think Wyatt had been in.

While she stripped off the jacket of her travelling suit, then her blouse and skirt, she punched the replay for the answering machine. There were eleven messages, six of them from Wyatt. His missives were curt and to the point, as usual. “It’s me again. Call, will you?” She picked up the phone and called the Sandy Inn in Ainsworth. It rang eight times while some poor soul got out of bed to answer the switchboard. Whoever it was tried to be cheerful, though not quite successfully, when she asked for Cowan’s room.

The room phone rang twice.

“Hello?”

“Mr. Cowan. This is Miss Manners.”

“Jan? Where are you? I’ve been trying…”

“I’m back on the old stomping grounds,” she said.

“Great. Look…”

Are you going to ask me where I’ve been?

“Look at what?” she asked.

“Where have you been?”

“Out.”

“I see,” he said. The sleep was going out of his voice, and the steady baritone sounded good to her.

“I called to tell you I’ll be here until the present project is completed.”

“What? What are you talking about, Jan?”

“Somebody has to man the shop until you’re back, and that’s me. So I came back.”

“Thank you.”

Just say you need me.

After a long silence, she said, “I talked to some law firms in L.A. I think I’ll be getting some offers.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” he said.

Just ask me to stay.

“If you need anything — letters of recommendation, a phone call or two… “

She slammed the phone down.

Nine

“You woke me up, Bucky.”

“Some mornings aren’t so grand,” Barr said. He hadn’t felt good himself since the middle of breakfast, when Wyatt told him about Kramer. In fact, he had left his stack of pancakes in favour of the phone in the hallway next to the unlit and vacant bar area.

“What is it? What’s wrong?” Kramer asked him, and Barr could hear the concern in her tone. “Did someone get hurt? Who?”

“Me,” he said. “I’m hurt that you dropped this bullshit about leaving on us.”

“It’s not bullshit at all, Bucky. It’s time for me to move on.”

“That’s always an excuse for some other reason.”

He waited for her to say something about needing new challenges.

She said, “I need some new directions, Bucky. New challenges.”

“As an associate in some stuffy law firm? Where’s the thrill in that, Jan?”

“They’re talking partnership.”

“You’re already a partner. Hey, you have enough crises in a week to keep you going for a year…”

“The money’s good,” she said.

“You want more money? We’ll give it to you.”

“That takes a vote of the board.”

“You’re on the board,” he countered. “Hell, you can have my salary.”

“I don’t want your salary. I want to move on.”

“Goddamn it! Do me one favour.”

“What’s that?”

“Don’t make a commitment to anyone until I get back and talk to you.”

“We’ve just talked,” she said.

“Face-to-face.”

She sighed. “All right, Bucky.”

The Noble Enterprises bunch were up from their tables and filing out the door to the Jeeps when Barr hung up.

Wyatt was standing a few feet away, looking at him. “What’d she say?”

“You need a kick in the ass.”

“She said that?”

“She might as well have.”

Barr was going to add more to that statement, then decided to hold off. He brushed past Wyatt, crossed the cafe, and pulled open the glass door.

It was hot out, but that wasn’t unusual.

Neil Formsby arrived in Quallene, Algeria, at three in the afternoon of the twenty-fifth of July. It was 119 degrees in the shade of the date palms, but there weren’t enough palm trees to go around.

By his estimation, they were almost nine hundred miles south of Algiers and eleven hundred miles from the western coast of the continent. From his point of view, that was just about right.

The overland route from Rabat, with detours around population centres, had added eighteen hundred miles to the tens of thousands already on the odometers of his rented and badly abused vehicles. There had been a dozen breakdowns en route, but he had planned for the possibility with a cache of extra parts, and each repair to carburettors, fuel pumps, alternators, and broken springs had been accomplished at the side of the road.

His convoy included seven tanker trucks, one flatbed semi-truck with an aged D-9 Caterpillar tractor on it, and the Land Rover that he was driving. There were seventeen men of just about as many nationalities and driver’s licenses assisting him, and he suspected that all of them were wanted in one country or another for at least a single capital crime. He had let his beard grow, and he had allowed the grime to build up in his clothing, just to fit in with the crowd.

The arrival of his drivers increased the population of Quallene significantly. It was barely a wide spot in what the Algiers government probably defined as a road. A dozen decrepit buildings housed an unknown number of people who, being intelligent and non-British, were staying inside and hidden away from the midday sun.

He stuck his arm out the window and rotated it in big circles, signalling the truck drivers behind him to keep their units rolling.

He drove on through the village and picked up speed to nearly forty kilometres per hour. The speed was positively exhilarating after the twenty-five kilometre per hour average they had managed.

Twenty kilometres beyond the town, he veered off the road, which was not actually a courageous act. The road was quite similar to the non-road. It was composed of hard-packed earth, and the dried-out weeds and shrubbery — akin to miles and miles of skeletons — suggested that vehicles did not normally travel there. The region was hilly, if three-or four-meter-high mounds could be called hills.

Keeping an eye on his rear-view mirror, so as not to lose any of his charges, Formsby wheeled the Land Rover several kilometres to the north, weaving around the mounds. When he found a place that was relatively flat and isolated from every other living thing on earth, he stopped and parked. Shutting off the engine, he got out and stretched.

The sun beat mercilessly on his head, and he reached back in the truck for his wide-brimmed safari hat. His physical movement felt restricted by the build-up of dirt that had stiffened his jacket and pants. His boots barely cracked the surface crust of the earth.

“This is it?” his companion asked, as he too exited the truck.

“I believe it may well be the place, Jacque.”

Jacque — his only name — claimed to have served in the French Foreign Legion, and it may have been true. His appearance was disreputable enough that Formsby had kept his 9 millimetre Browning automatic holstered by his side for the entire trip. His sleep had come in gasps.

Jacque went off to guide the semi-trucks into a militarily rigid parking line, and Formsby took a long walk northward, stopping to urinate on a bush that begged for any kind of moisture.

After gauging the area in all directions with his sharp eyes, Formsby decided it would do, then walked back to the trucks.

“All right, Jacque, we can unload.”

It took almost an hour for the men to unload and set up the canvas wall-tent, the single cot, the cooking table and propane grill, the propane-powered refrigerator, and the portable shower. He got his boxes of provisions and his M-16 rifle out of the Land Rover and put them inside the tent.

Formsby thought the shower a nice touch, and he was not worried about water. He had brought along ten thousand gallons of water, figuring the Central Intelligence Agency would not balk at the cost so long as they did not know about it.

When the campsite was finished, the single canvas tent appearing rather forlorn alongside the big trucks, Jacque approached him.

“I think that does it, Mr. Jones.”

Formsby was going by the name of Nevada Jones, a superlative touch of The Carpetbaggers and Indiana Jones, he thought.

“I believe it does, Jacque.”

He pulled the envelope from inside his shirt, and handed it to the former Legionnaire.

Jacque counted it. “Ten thousand American. That is correct, Mr. Jones.”

He had arranged to pay Jacque in ten thousand dollar increments, at intervals of every five hundred miles. Jacque knew he had a money belt wrapped around his waist, but Jacque also knew he had the Browning automatic, and Formsby had refused to allow any of Jacque’s colleagues to carry weapons on this journey.

“Very well,” Formsby said. “Now, you may take the tractors and the Land Rover and go back to Quallene. On the seventh of August, when you return here, you will receive the final fifty thousand.”

“Plus the water?”

“And whatever is left of the water.”

While the men were unhitching the tractors from the trailers, Formsby went inside the tent, dug around in one of his cardboard boxes, and came up with four square plastic boxes. He also found ten fragmentation grenades.

When he emerged from the tent, Jacque studied him for a few minutes before asking, “What are those?”

“These are infrared beam and motion detectors. I shall put them on my perimeter, and anyone who gets close receives the gift of explosively propelled shrapnel.”

“I see,” said Jacque.

And Formsby was certain that he did. Their agreement was that Formsby would be left without a vehicle, to insure that he would be present on the seventh of August with the balance of the payment. Formsby was adding to that agreement by insuring that neither Jacque nor any of his seventeen friends came calling in the night prior to the seventh.

He was relieved when the truck tractors and the Land Rover finally departed. He had not slept well during the long days of the journey.

As soon as the last truck disappeared, Formsby went to the refrigerator standing next to the tent, unlocked it with a key, and unwrapped the air-bubble packaging from a bottle of Molson ale.

He drank it in three long swallows, then opened another bottle.

Just in case Jacque had doubled back to check on him, Formsby spent some time playing out his role of security manager by siting the motion detectors and grenades at four corners around his campsite. The detectors did not really set off the grenades, but their transmitters would alert him if intruders entered the area.

And he knew how to set off grenades on his own.

The shower was erected next to the water tanker, and Formsby connected a hose from the tanker’s pump to the holding tank above the shower. He filled the tank with the gasoline-powered pump, then stripped off his clothes and took a shower that lasted twenty minutes and cost seventy gallons of a commodity very precious in the desert. Then he shaved and took another short shower.

Padding naked across the hot sand to the tent, he entered and dressed in fresh Levi’s and a white sport shirt. He felt immensely better, recharged, and ready for action.

The action was confined to stripping the M-16, cleaning it, and priming it with one of twenty magazines he had with him. Then he cooked himself a dinner of brussels sprouts, mashed potatoes and brown gravy, and rare roast beef. He topped it off with a bottle of 1978 cru bourgeois red Bordeaux. The CIA had paid for it, and he enjoyed it.

On the twenty-sixth of July, Formsby emerged from the mosquito netting protecting his cot, made coffee and a poached egg for breakfast, then unchained the Caterpillar tractor and got it running after several false starts. He climbed down to lower the ramps from the flatbed trailer, then backed the bulldozer off and tested his rusty knowledge of the controls for both the tractor and the bulldozer blade.

While the Cat idled, he broke ice cubes from four of the trays in his refrigerator and made up a jug of iced tea. He refilled the trays with water, put them back in the freezer, then got his safari hat.

Formsby spent eleven hours driving the Cat east and west, then had liver and sautéed onions for dinner.

On the twenty-seventh, he devoted another seven hours to levelling a two-kilometre-long, thirty-metre wide strip through the mounds of earth. To Formsby, the rough airstrip looked like a scar on a land that knew far too many scars. In a month, no one would ever know it had been there. When he was done, he parked the Cat back on its trailer and chained it down again. Formsby might not have been a superb craftsman, but he liked to put his tools back in their proper places.

He had particularly tender veal chops for dinner, accompanied with an excellent St. Emilion. After dinner, he set up his radio and connected it to an antenna he erected outside the tent. At midnight, he turned on the radio, tapped in a frequency on the digital keys, pressed the transmit button, and said, “Paper Doll, Degas. In position.”

He did not expect, nor wait for, a reply. Punching a new frequency into the radio, he shut it off and considered that the next nine days were going to be full of one-sided conversations.

Though he was up early on the twenty-eighth of July, it was to be a day composed mostly of leisure. He ate a breakfast of eggs, bacon, waffles, and muffins, then showered for the first time that day. He was managing four showers a day.

He stayed in the tent for the morning, lounging on his cot, and reading Proust. He perspired a great deal.

At ten minutes past noon, the radio barked.

“Goya.”

He rolled off the bunk and picked up the microphone. “Degas.”

“’K, fella, gimme somethin’ to home on.”

Formsby held the transmit button down, so the pilot could use his direction finder.

When he lifted his thumb, the pilot said, “’K, guy, be there in about ten.”

Formsby prepared by buckling his holster in place, then slinging the M-16 over his shoulder.

One never knew quite who was coming to lunch.

The airplane — a De Haviland DHC-5 Buffalo without any national or corporate markings — appeared low out of the east and made one pass over the primitive runway. The pilot was apparently happy enough with what he saw for he made one circle, then brought the cargo plane in.

It landed with two bounces and a short rundown, then turned toward the parked trailers.

Formsby waved merrily and pointed to a place next to the flatbed trailer. The pilot goosed the throttles, shot toward the spot, then whipped around in a tight 180- degree turn. The engines died with several burping backfires.

Walking across the hot soil toward the plane, Formsby felt his muscles tensing up.

The pilot and another man emerged from a side door. Formsby figured the raw-boned, cowboy-hatted pilot for an American.

His muscles relaxed a trifle.

“You’re Jones?” the pilot asked.

“Nevada Jones.”

“Yeah, I read the book and saw the movie. What’s with the rifle?”

“I’ve been told that there are many wild things in the desert,” Formsby said.

“I guess there are. You want us to dump all of it right here?”

“I surely do.”

Thirty minutes later, fourteen pallets had been floated down the rollers of the ramp and left in the dirt next to the flatbed. Each pallet was covered with a tarpaulin.

Formsby untied the tarps and inspected the contents of every pallet.

“That what you ordered, Jones?”

“Exactly, my good man, exactly.”

“We try to please,” the cowboy said.

“Could I offer you gentlemen luncheon?

The pilot looked up at the sky, around at the horizon, and then at his wristwatch. “Yeah, I don’t see why not.”

Formsby made a half-dozen thick ham sandwiches and got out a six-pack of ale.

They had changed the tires on all of the airplanes, substituting the widest, softest tires they could mount and still get into the retract wells. Nitrogen gas was used to inflate them.

All of the pylons for the F-4s, and a pair for the Hercules, had been refurbished, painted grey, and stored aboard the transport.

Wyatt held up his clipboard, with the checklist clamped onto it, toward Demion. “That’s the last tick-off on my sheet, Jim.”

Demion’s eyes scanned his own list. “Mine, too. There were a few times, Andy, when I didn’t think we were going to get here.”

“We’re a day ahead of schedule.”

“Except for the fuel and the training schedule,” Demion said.

They had had to refill their rental tanker truck six times, to meet the requirements of the test and training flights and to fill the fuel cells of the C-130 tanker. Winfield Potter was in Lincoln once again for another load. The Noble Enterprises charge card for fuel was getting a workout, and Wyatt hoped that someone on the other end was paying the bills.

The two of them walked slowly through Hangar 5, watching the activity as tools and equipment were loaded aboard the Hercules transport. In the morning, the transport was making a quick turnaround trip to Albuquerque to return the equipment they weren’t taking with them: engine cradles, compressors, extra tool sets.

Huge, hand-lettered signs were spread all over the place. “NO SMOKING” was the rule since the tanker had been fuelled.

Wyatt spotted Arnie Gering and Lefty Harris and waved them to the sidewall.

“What’s up, Andy?” Harris asked.

Wyatt had their envelopes prepared. He handed one to each of them. “You guys get to ride back to Albuquerque with the Herc in the morning. I want to tell you how much I appreciate your putting in the overtime.”

Gering opened his envelope and counted the twenty one-hundred-dollar bills.

“Be careful how you spend it, Amie. You don’t want to attract any unnecessary attention.”

Gering stuffed the envelope in his back pocket. “Yeah, Andy, thanks. You sure you don’t need some more help wherever you’re going?”

“We’ve got it covered,” Wyatt said.

Gering looked to Demion, who nodded his agreement.

“Well, I can always use the extra bucks.”

“There might be some other special projects in the future,” Wyatt said.

“When?”

“We never know when they’re going to come up,” Demion told him. “We’ll let you know.”

Gering and Harris wandered back to the transport to help load boxes.

Both of the C-130 aircraft appeared nearly identical, except for the fuselage numbers. The tanker, numbered 61043, had a few feet of the retracted fuel line protruding from the trailing edge of her port wing. The transport, 54811, had several new antennas and a plastic bulge mounted on the top of the fuselage, connected to the interior console that had been installed three days before. The tactical coordinator’s console had been stripped from a Grumman E-2 Hawkeye and refurbished by Kriswell and Vrdla. The sonar, armament, and sonobuoy deployment functions had been discarded since they didn’t plan on hunting for subs where they were going. In place of the antisubmarine gear were enhanced radar, voice, and data communications, and electronic countermeasures controlling gear. While they didn’t have the massive radome of the E-2, with the equipment Kriswell had rigged, they were going to have a limited early warning capability in the Hercules.

Wyatt and Demion climbed through the port side door and found Kriswell tinkering at the console, which had been bolted to the bulkhead in place of the two crew bunks.

“You seen Bucky, Tom?” Wyatt asked.

“He and Lucas went to town for party-makings. He’s calling it a wrap-up party.”

“We still have a few days of training to go.”

“Yeah,” Kriswell said, “but that’s the fun part. The hard stuff’s over.”

Wyatt hoped it went that way.

Colonel Ibrahim Ramad flew his personal MiG-27 into Tripoli to meet with his superior. He landed at night, when it was relatively cool, and was picked up by a truck and taken to Farouk Salmi’s office at base headquarters.

Salmi’s aide, a captain by the name of Mufti, was the only other in attendance at the meeting.

“Ibrahim, it is good to see you,” Salmi said.

“And you, my Colonel.”

Salmi waved him to a seat in front of his desk. “How are your exercises proceeding?”

“Exceptionally well,” Ramad boasted as he sat down.

“And al-Qati’s soldiers?”

“I must admit, Colonel, that Colonel al-Qati’s troops are well-conditioned and well-disciplined. They have adapted quickly.”

“That is good to hear,” Salmi said. “I had feared that al-Qati’s reputation was as much smoke as substance.”

“No, he lives up to it.”

The air force commander lit a cigarette and relished his inhalation.

Ramad waited patiently.

Salmi asked, “Do you suppose that the good Colonel is also prepared to engage in Test Strike?”

Test Strike was the live exercise that Ramad had designed three months and eleven days before.

“Probably not, once he hears about it.”

“He must be told by tomorrow morning,” Salmi said.

Ramad let his lips broaden into a smile.

“Test Strike has been approved?”

“It has.”

“That is wonderful,” Ramad said. “However, as I said, al-Qati will drag his feet. We have discussed before what we think his true mission to be, spying on our operations at Marada Base for Ghazi. He will want to talk to Ghazi before he makes a commitment. And Ghazi will balk.”

Salmi, whose pockmarked, narrow face rarely smiled, offered a yellow-toothed grin. “The concerns of Colonel Ghazi have been taken care of, Ibrahim.”

“How can that be?”

“The Leader, advisor Amjab, and I met with Ghazi this morning, and he has been given his orders. He agreed to cooperate completely.”

Rather than lose his command of ground forces, Ramad thought.

“And therefore,” Salmi continued, “al-Qati’s objections are curtailed even before he makes them.”

Ramad hoped that he would be in a position to see al-Qati’s face when the man learned that Colonel Ghazi could no longer protect him.

“Now,” Salmi said, “it is your plan, and you must make the final decision. Your name alone will appear on the recommendation.”

The documentation would be self-protective of higher authority. Ramad understood that.

“My decision was made, Colonel Salmi, when I prepared the proposal.”

Salmi nodded, “Captain Mufti, if you would?”

Mufti pushed a cart containing a television and a videocassette recorder into position next to Salmi’s desk. He turned both on.

The screen blossomed into a view of a cell. Concrete walls and a steel door could be seen. The camera angle was from high in one corner. A man in stained clothing sat on a small stool in the centre of the cement floor.

The camera looked down on him, but he was apparently unaware of it, or he no longer cared. He sat with his head hung down, his lanky black hair falling forward, his elbows resting on his knees. He was dejected.

“The subject?” Ramad asked.

“All of the subjects are condemned persons. It does not matter how they die.”

“And this test?”

“This one utilizes the psychological agent. PD-86, I believe,” Salmi said.

Of the five types of chemical agents — incapacitating, defoliant, psychological, nerve, and toxin — they had not concerned themselves with the short-acting incapacitating agents such as tear gas, nor with defoliants.

PD-86, Ramad knew, was based on lysergic acid, the LSD of the American hippies.

On the screen, the cell began to mist. It was unobtrusive at first, just a slight blurriness to the environment. The prisoner seemed unaware of it.

Nothing else happened.

The man sat there for about five minutes.

Then began to laugh.

A little laugh at first, a smirk and giggle. Without effort, he was coming out of his depression.

Then an uproarious laugh.

He threw his shoulders back and his head snapped upright. His eyes appeared vivid.

He shook his head violently.

Laughing.

His arms flailed about.

He scratched his chest, his armpits, his crotch.

Laughing.

Insanely laughing.

The screen went blank.

“That went on for nearly forty minutes,” Salmi explained. “PD-86 completely disoriented him. On a larger scale, I think we could expect that a hostile force would act similarly, unable to mount a defence.”

“What are the aftereffects?” Ramad asked.

“We do not know. We took him out of his cell and shot him.”

That was to be expected.

Salmi nodded at Mufti.

The captain started the video machine again. It was the same cell, Ramad supposed, but the prisoner was a different man, taller, thicker. And he was just as dejected as the first man. The stool was closer to the wall. He sat on the stool with his head leaning against the wall. Tears streamed down his face.

“Toxin this time,” Salmi said.

“The botulism?”

“No, the Leader ruled that out, even though chemically based toxins do not create epidemics, as do the organically based compounds. The designation for this one is TR-11.”

Ramad knew the nomenclature. This toxin acted similarly to a psychological agent, but created abject terror in those subjected to it.

The base of the cell suddenly spurted white fog from half-a-dozen jets.

The man noticed immediately, and his face turned up toward the camera. Ramad could see the pleading in his eyes.

The fog roiled around his legs, rising.

There was no sound, but Ramad saw the man’s mouth working. Please. Oh, Allah, please.

He climbed up on the stool, attempting to stay above the fog.

The fog began to disperse, a white haze filling the room so that the prisoner’s movements were difficult to follow.

From the video, Ramad could tell the man was no longer begging God for mercy.

He was screaming.

His eyes rolled in their sockets.

His body recoiled from nothing seen.

He fell off the stool, knocking it across the cell. He immediately rose to his knees, slithered into the comer, backed into it.

His balled-up fists struck out at something, anything, the wall. In minutes his knuckles were bloodied from striking the rough concrete walls.

The screen went blank.

“We waited forty minutes before shooting him,” Salmi said. “He never came out of his acute terror.”

Ramad nodded his head affirmatively.

“A consequence we had not considered,” Salmi said, “was that, in his terror, he was difficult to control.”

“I can understand that,” Ramad said.

“It will be interesting to see how al-Qati’s troops deal with three or four thousand people acting the same way.”

Mufti started the video again.

This would be the nerve agent. The final formula had been labelled GB31, and it was a derivative of Sarin, an older agent that was almost removed from the stockpiles of other nations. The newer version was non-persistent, precluding the necessity for decontaminating an area where it had been used.

Again, the cell appeared on the screen, though it now contained a woman. She was a pretty woman, and she was naked, perhaps for the enjoyment of her jailers.

She was afraid, ignoring the stool to curl against the far wall, holding her arms and hands in front of her.

She was weeping, perhaps sadly, but quite definitely quietly.

There was no visible release of the gas.

The woman became aware that something was wrong with her, and she forgot her modesty.

She leapt to her feet, her small breasts bobbing, her head rotating from side to side as she sought to find whatever it was that alarmed her.

Ramad saw her cheeks twitching. A tic in one eye. Her arm jerked.

“This attacks the nerve centres very quickly, Ibrahim. Muscle control is lost rapidly.”

Her legs went out from under her, and she crashed to the floor.

All of her limbs became spastic.

Jerking, twisting, out of control.

Her eyes were so large, the whites dominated. They seemed to spin. Her chest heaved as she fought to breathe.

On her back now, her head slamming back and forth on the cement floor.

“The brain is the last to go,” Colonel Salmi said. “It is aware throughout that something unfathomable is happening to the rest of the body. We judge the terror quotient to be extremely high, though there is little problem of control. The terror aspect is high for spectators, also.”

Ramad did feel a little twitch or two deep in his guts, observing this ritual.

Abruptly, she died.

“Less than four minutes,” the air commander said. “It is very efficient.”

Salmi was watching him closely, Ramad knew. This was as much a test of himself as it was an observation of results.

“Very efficient,” Ramad agreed. His stomach still felt a little queasy, but that was because he was so close to the action.

He knew the woman. She was a second cousin he had not seen in several years. He wondered what her crime had been.

Perhaps simply that she knew him.

“Do you still wish to proceed?” Salmi asked.

“Absolutely.”

“With which agent?”

“All three, I think, Colonel. It would be well to let our adversaries know the range of our choices.”

Salmi smiled for the second time in years.

Ten

After the fifth and final simulated exercise, Ahmed al-Qati and his company commander, Captain Ibn Rahman, flew back to El Bardi to meet with the company commanders of his other three companies. They spent an afternoon planning continuing drills and approving requisitions for supplies. There were four disciplinary problems for the battalion commander to address, all of them involving men late for something — to work, to formation, back from leave.

Neither al-Qati nor Rahman described what they were doing at Marada Air Base, though he was certain that the three commanders he had left behind at El Bardi were nearly overcome with curiosity. They did not know how fortunate they were, not knowing. Al-Qati himself, as soon as Ramad had revealed the plan, had gone into a shock that was difficult to conceal. For hours, his body had seemed removed from his mind. The mind was divided, normal functions occurring by rote on one side, and the other side desensitized, three or four steps removed from reality.

He forced himself to attend to routine.

Then al-Qati took a long bath, shaved, and patted the last of his last bottle of Aqua Velva over his face and neck. He dressed in a fresh uniform, commandeered a Volvo from the motor pool, and drove to Tobruk.

He parked in front of the Seaside Hotel and went into the lobby to call Sophia’s room.

“Ahmed! You are here!”

“Only by a stroke of fortune, and only for tonight. I am inviting you to dinner. If you do not have other plans,” he added lamely.

“But I am not hungry,” she said, “except for your company. If you would like to come to my room now, we will find dinner later?”

He resisted the urge to skip his way across the lobby and up the stairs to her second-floor suite like some carefree youngster.

She was waiting behind the partially opened door, peering through the crack at him as he advanced down the hall. When he reached her room, she pulled the door wide. Her smile was like the radiant beam of searchlights.

Her hair was piled high and wrapped with a towel, as if she had just emerged from her bath. She was wearing… what was it?… a peignoir. Her full breasts thrust at the loose, almost sheer fabric, and he found the effect nearly as exciting as her total nudity.

“You are so beautiful,” he said.

“Come to me, Ahmed.”

She wrapped her arms around his waist, and drew him tightly to her. Leaning back to look up at his face, she raised up on her toes to kiss him.

“I missed you.”

“And I you,” he confessed.

“Are you really hungry?”

“My appetite seems to have vanished.”

She reached behind him, to push the door shut, then led him toward her bed.

They made love, intense and perhaps a bit ineptly, for nearly an hour, then went downstairs for a dinner that became rushed toward the end of the entree. He was aware of the flush that climbed up her throat and spread over her cheeks. He was rattled enough that he could not even remember what entree he had ordered and consumed.

Al-Qati paid the bill, over tipping the effusive waiter, and they hurried back to her room and spent a leisurely two hours satisfying themselves yet again.

In the early hours of the morning, with the French doors to the balcony flung wide and the lazy circles of the overhead fan creating a wispy breeze that cooled his flesh, Ahmed al-Qati decided he was very much in love.

He told her so.

“I am glad to hear you say it, my darling, for I wanted you to be the first to speak. I, too, love you.”

Al-Qati sighed deeply, as lazy and content as he had been in years.

“I worry about our future,” Sophia told him.

“What? What is there to worry about?”

“My husband, my almost ex-husband, can be expected to be vindictive.”

He smiled in the dark. “We will not concern ourselves with him. I will see to your protection.”

“And I worry about you, Ahmed. From the little you have told me, I know you must do dangerous things.”

“They are not so dangerous.”

“You lie to make me feel better,” she said.

“They are not so dangerous, most of the time. Usually, they are quite boring. After this operation, I will be back in El Bardi performing boring tasks, and then we will be together almost all of the time.”

“What is it about this operation that makes it so perilous, Ahmed? Could you resign your position before it occurs?”

“Resign? No, I do not think so.”

“I have some money,” she said. “Money I have not told you about. You could quit.”

There was so much concern in her trembling fingertips as they stroked the side of his neck, and his distaste for Ramad was so near the surface, that he told her.

“Before you say anything,” Martin Church told George Embry, “sit down.”

Embry sat in the chair facing Church’s desk. “I received a message from Cummings.”

“Well, forget it. The DCI couldn’t convince the security council, and Icarus is history. Pull her out of Tobruk. I’ve got to call Wyatt and tell him to stand down.”

Embry ignored him, saying, “It was a long message.”

“Long,” Church said absently. He was so incensed with the DCI and his petty and self-serving games that he couldn’t focus properly.

“Yeah, a long, long message. You want to know what she said?”

“You’re going to tell me, no matter what.”

“Yup. She’s in love with the subject.”

“She what!” Martin Church yelped.

George Embry held up his left hand, palm out. “Careful, Marty. Remember your blood pressure.”

“She can’t be in love with him! Goddamn it! That’s just not done.”

“Hey,” Embry said, “you’ve got to give her credit for telling us.”

“How can one of our agents fall in love with a goddamned Libyan terrorist? Tell me that!”

The comers of Embry’s mouth dipped. “He doesn’t really fit the definition, Marty. Our army Rangers at Benning trained him, after all.”

“And Cummings has fallen for the guy. Jesus! The whole damned world’s going to hell.”

“I don’t think it affects her job,” Embry said.

“Christ! If you believe that, you’re nuts, too!”

Church climbed out of his chair and turned toward the window. The forest along the Potomac appeared excessively green, as if someone had been playing with the tint adjustment on his private view.

Then he remembered that Embry always saved the best, or the most shocking, for last.

He whirled around to stare at the man who handled the African desk.

Embry wasn’t smiling.

“She’s still doing her job, you say. What are you holding back, George?”

“Ramad has planned himself a little demonstration, Marty. He calls it Test Strike.”

“Test Strike? What does it do?”

“It shows the Israelis, and us, I suppose, that the great Leader has balls. He’s going to reveal his arsenal of chemical weapons.”

“I don’t suppose this will come in a press release, will it, George?”

“No. It’s a practical demonstration of three different chemical agents. If she’s got it right, they’ll be psychological, toxic, and nerve agents. There won’t be any announcements, but we’re supposed to read between the lines, I think.”

“How practical is the demonstration?”

“From their point of view, Marty? Very. They’re going to attack three Ethiopian refugee camps simultaneously.”

“Shit!”

“It’s the truth, as far as we can tell.”

Church collapsed back into his desk chair. “Refugee camps.”

“I suppose the Leader feels that no one will complain unduly about the loss of a few thousand mouths to feed. I suppose also that he’ll film the attacks for the benefit of the Israelis. Deliver the tapes by accident, as it were.”

“My God!”

“He’s going to show them how he can operate over long distances, with all of the logistics that involves, as well as deploy devastating ordnance.”

Church was less stunned by the revelation than he was professing. He had seen too many examples of man’s inhumanity, and he knew that Arabic extremist groups — which was not to condemn all Arabs — were the driving forces behind many of the examples in his archives.

“Damn it, George! Why do you always wait so long to spring these disasters on me?”

“That’s not the worst part, Marty.”

“Shit, again!”

“It happens on August second.”

Wyatt thought that his people were going to be ready by their date of departure, August 4.

They had been getting almost five hours a day out of each Phantom during the training and shakeout phase. The first flights had resulted in a rash of small but important glitches in the weapons and electronic systems. Kriswell and Demion were at fever pitch, diagnosing problems, supervising corrections, and reprogramming software.

He stood in the wide-open door of Hangar 4 and watched as Barr brought three-six in for a perfect landing. The sleek jet whistled by, heading for the end of the runway.

“He’s still not getting the correct hydraulic brake pressure,” Demion said. “He’s having to fight it a little on the roll-out.”

“Is that analysis by your observation or by report, Jim?”

“Observation, but you can be damned sure he’ll complain about it.”

Barr’s F-4 wheeled around and off the runway as Hackley passed him, lined up, and took off. The scream of turbojets had become almost a continual background noise. Down at the civilian end of the tarmac, no one had complained. Quite often, there were a few carloads of kids, and sometimes of adults, parked near the office so that Noble Enterprises had a spectator section.

Barr parked the F-4E in front of the hangar, popped the canopy, and clambered out when Hank Cavanaugh brought the ladder out to the plane. He shed his helmet and carried it in the crook of his elbow as he approached them.

“Hey, Jim, the brakes are squishy on the left side.”

“What’d I tell you, Andy?” Demion went back into the hangar to find someone to work on the brake hydraulic system.

Barr stopped in front of Wyatt.

“I’m going to head for town and get a couple hours of nap time and make a phone call.”

“Okay.”

“You want to know who I’m going to call?”

“No.”

“I’m going to call Jan-baby.”

“Okay.”

“I’m going to ask her to marry me,” Barr said.

That got Wyatt’s attention. “I don’t think I caught that, Bucky.”

“Sure you did. We’ve got to keep her somehow, and I guess it’s up to me to do it.”

“Bucky…”

Barr turned and walked off to where two of the three Jeeps were parked. He tossed his helmet into the front seat, followed it, started the engine, and drove off.

Just as a pickup from the airport office came rattling up to Wyatt.

The airport manager poked his head out the window. “Hi, Mr. Cowan.”

“Afternoon.” Wyatt couldn’t remember his name.

“You’ve got a long-distance call on my line. It must be important ’cause they said they’d hold while I came down here after you.”

“Thanks. I’ll follow you back down.”

The manager took a good, close-up look at three-six and whistled his appreciation before engaging the clutch and making a U-turn.

Wyatt crawled into the last of their Jeep Wagoneers and followed him back to the office, skirting wide around a Piper Cherokee parked at the fuel pumps. Inside the office, in rather blessed air-conditioning, he picked up the telephone resting on the counter.

“Cowan.”

“This is the East Coast calling. You know me?”

The voice belonged to Embry.

“I know you.”

“We’ve got a little problem, if I lie a bit. It’s a big one, actually.”

“This is nothing new,” Wyatt said.

“You know what today is?”

“The thirtieth of July.”

“There’s going to be a disaster of mega proportions on the second of August.”

“The hell there is.”

“You’ve got to get there first. That means you take off within the next couple hours.”

“That can’t be done.”

Wyatt’s mind raced over the schedule. The pilots still needed another ten hours, minimum, of seat time. They hadn’t even attempted practicing bomb runs, even though Tom Kriswell was confident that they could get by without them.

His caller’s next statement jerked his attention from the schedule.

“If we don’t get you in place, about five thousand people, maybe more, are going to die,” Embry said.

Wyatt digested that. “You’re not just talking to hear yourself talk?”

“Not this time, buddy.”

“Do I get some details?”

“I’ll personally meet you at your stop in Maine, which I’m setting up now. You’ll get everything you need when you get there.”

“While we’re speaking of needs, have you heard from my logistics agent?”

“That is affirmative. The coded signal was picked up by satellite some fifteen hours ago. He’s in place and ready to go.”

Wyatt’s mind reeled as he considered the implications. The whole thing might actually come together. “I’ll have to leave here without picking up after myself.”

“You go right ahead and do that. I’ll send in a team by morning to clear out the motel and get rid of the vehicles and any other junk.”

“You’ll need to send someone who can fly my Citation back to Albuquerque.”

“Will do. One other thing. I’ve had the National Security Agency set up a satellite relay and monitoring system for us.” Embry gave him a UHF frequency.

“You don’t mean that we’re going to have an ongoing conversation during this operation?”

“We might. There’s some other things going on that you don’t know about.”

Wyatt started to ask him just what those other things were, but Embry hung up.

Wyatt depressed the reset button and called the motel. He gave the girl on the desk the airport number and asked her to have Barr call him when he got in.

Sixteen minutes later, the phone rang and Wyatt waved off the airport guy, then picked up. He turned his back to the manager.

“What’s up, Andy? You don’t want me to call Jan?”

“Cliff’s in his room somewhere, Bucky, catching some Zs. Get him up, hit every motel room, and toss everyone’s clothes and baggage in the Jeeps, then get back here. Wait. Stop and settle up with Jorgenson on your way. Tip him big, huh?”

“Damn. What’s going on?”

“We’ve got an early go signal. And we’re going.”

Wyatt hung up and went back out to his Wagoneer. He had the engine running when he changed his mind and shut it off. Back in the airport office, he asked to use the phone again, then put the long-distance call on his special card.

“Aeroconsultants. This is Liz.”

“Hi, Liz. Is Jan around?”

“Hold on, Andy.”

After two minutes, she came on the line.

“Hello, Andy.”

“How’s it going?”

“Fine. It’s better with Gering and Harris back. We may catch up someday. I’ve landed a restoration job and another security contract.”

“Wonderful,” he said.

He was prodding himself, but just couldn’t reach over the edge. Come on, Wyatt!

“Is that all you wanted?” Kramer asked.

“Uh, one thing. Our schedule’s been moved up. We’re taking off this afternoon.”

A few moments of silence passed before she said, “I don’t like that. Last-minute changes mean mistakes.”

“We’ll be okay.”

“You haven’t completed your full training schedule, have you?”

“We’ve got enough of it,” he said.

“Uh huh, that’s crap. No good. This has been bad from the start.”

“It’s all right, Jan. What do you mean, ‘bad from the start?’”

“It’s a feeling.”

How did he deal with that?

“A few more days, and it’ll be over. Hang in there,” he said.

“I’ve got an offer. Full partner, upscale firm. Tell Bucky that I’m taking it.”

“I don’t want you to take it,” he said.

Long pause on her end.

“You don’t? Are you into suppressing the advancement of women, now?” she asked with a laugh, but the laugh sounded hollow.

“You know better than that.” He felt a little defensive, but didn’t think he needed to feel that way.

“Give me a better reason,” she said.

“I need you right where you are.”

“You do? You need me? And where is that?”

“With me. beside me.”

“Oh, damn you, Andy!”

“I mean it.”

“But you can’t say it?”

“You know me, hon. I’m not good with the words, but there’s no one else.” His own laugh sounded hollow. “Bucky said he was going to propose to you this morning, but I want to get my bid in first.”

“Jesus Christ! This is fodder for the afternoon soaps.”

“I don’t watch them.”

“Good damned thing.”

“I love you, Jan.”

“Finally, you ass! Oh, my God, I love you, too. More than you’ll ever know.”

“You’ll be there when I get back?”

“Yes.”

“Are you sure?”

“I don’t know how I’m going to break this to my father. We are getting married, aren’t we? I’m not sure I heard you mention the word.”

“We’re getting married.”

Her tone changed abruptly. “Don’t go.”

“Got to, hon.”

She sighed. “I know. Be very careful, Andy.”

For some reason, he felt a great deal better on the drive back to the hangar.

The C-130 transport was parked out on the apron, being used as a radio base station for the training flights. Wyatt pulled up next to it, got out, and went to lean inside the hatchway.

Winfield Potter was on the radio.

“Hey, Win!”

He shoved his headset back from his right ear and turned to Wyatt. “Yo, boss?”

“Call all the planes in and start fuelling them up.”

“No shit?”

“We’re on the way.”

Potter started calling aircraft.

Wyatt walked over to the hangar and found Demion and Kriswell debating some point.

“Okay, guys, we’re moving out.”

They both turned to him.

“We’ve got some kind of deadline to meet. I’ll give you the details later.”

“Well, hell,” Kriswell said, “I guess I’d just as soon be surprised as wait for another five or six days.” Demion held up his clipboard. “We’ve still got a stack of bugs to work on, Andy.”

“But nothing that would ground an airplane?”

“No.”

“Make up a schedule and hit the priority items any time we get a couple hours on the ground.”

“Got it.”

“We should have all planes on the ground in about fifteen minutes. I want a briefing with all pilots. Everyone else turns out to refuel and pre-flight aircraft. We want external tanks in place.”

“I’ll see to that,” Kriswell said.

Wyatt checked his watch. “It’s one-twenty now. Wheels up by three.”

The word spread fast through Demion and Kriswell, and Wyatt’s team shifted into action. They all seemed to know what to do, and the standard bickering turned into good-natured repartee.

It was times like these when Wyatt appreciated the people who worked for him. With him.

Kriswell and the ground personnel began fuelling operations from the tanker truck as well as loading the transport with tools, equipment, and spares still in the hangar. Castered pallets of oil, hydraulic fluid, and engine parts were nudged out to the lowered ramp of the Hercules with a tow tractor, then winched aboard. They were taking along one small tow tractor, miniature crane, and several ordnance carts. One pallet contained gear for quick encampment: tents, cots, sleeping bags, jerry cans of water, and Meals Ready to Eat (MREs).

Barr and Jordan arrived in two Jeeps and parked near the rear of the C-130. They had stripped the motel rooms without regard to filling suitcases.

Wyatt went out to meet them and helped carry the personal items aboard.

“You’re not much of a packer, Bucky.”

Barr dropped his load of clothing in a pile, and Jordan dumped his load on top.

“They’re going to have plenty of time in the air to sort it out,” Barr said.

“The Navy would never allow this kind of mess,” Jordan said.

“Yeah, but the Navy takes ten days to deploy,” Barr countered.

Wyatt went back to the first Jeep, grabbed a suitcase from the back, and tossed it to Barr, who heaved it on to Jordan in the cargo bay.

By the time they finished, Zimmerman had returned with the last F-4, and Wyatt called the pilots into one corner of the hangar.

Everyone was dripping sweat.

“I’m not going to miss this humidity,” Gettman said.

“Assignments,” Wyatt said.

They all had a pretty good idea of which seats they were getting, but Wyatt had not yet finalized them. Since equipment or personnel problems, or losses, might have forced changes, they had all been training in several different roles.

“I’m Yucca One,” Wyatt said. “Barr is Two, Hackley is Three, and Gettman is Four. Zimmerman and Jordan get Five and Six.”

“Damn,” Zimmerman said.

“Sorry, Dave, but you and Cliff have the most backseat experience. Those are the skills we’ll need from you.”

“And I get the Herc,” Demion said.

“Right, Jim. Your call sign will be Wizard.”

Dennis Maal, with his background in KC-135 Stratotankers, had always known he would fly the C-130F. “Do I get to come up with my own call sign?”

“Sure,” Wyatt said.

“I’m going to be Thirsty.”

“Thirsty?”

“I always wanted to be Thirsty. The guy from the comic strip?”

“Okay, you’re Thirsty. And Borman will fly with you as boom operator. We’ll put Hank Cavanaugh in your right seat, acting as co-pilot. He’s not rated, but I think he could get it on the ground.”

“Does it count, in how many pieces?” Gettman asked.

“No scoring here,” Wyatt said. “We’ll make Vrdla your flight engineer.”

Maal nodded his approval.

Wyatt turned back to Demion. “Kriswell will be your engineer, and Win Potter your co-pilot. Littlefield will ride with you.”

“That’s fine with me, Andy, except that Lucas makes lousy coffee.”

“Both Hercs can go any time you’re ready, since you’re not going to establish any speed records,” Wyatt said. “We’re not filing any flight plans, and we’re going to Northfield, Maine.”

“Northfield? Is it on the map?” Jordan asked.

“I hope it’s not very apparent,” Wyatt said. “We’re supposed to get all of the tanks topped off there, then the Hercs go first again.”

“Are we allowed to know the next stop?” Demion asked.

“As long as we don’t tell anyone else until we’ve departed CONUS. It’s a little place in Algeria called Quallene.”

“That’s our staging base?” Gettman asked.

“No. It’s just a filling station.”

Wyatt spent the next twenty minutes going over routes, times, and frequencies. Everyone jotted notes in their little black books. He knew that they wanted to know more about the preparations and the routes in Africa, but he and Bucky had kept the full plan to themselves, relying on their military experience of providing only what information was necessary for each phase of the mission. The strategy avoided needless worrying and kept pilots focused on the immediate objective.

They ran a little late.

By three-forty-five, the C-130s took off. Wyatt and the others moved the Citation and the Jeeps into the hangar. Everyone made a call on the bathroom in the comer of the hangar, then dressed in flight suits and G suits. They took turns with the single start cart that had been left behind and started all of the turbojets. Wyatt carried the single ladder from airplane to airplane, assisting each pilot aboard his craft.

He hooked the ladder on the side of seven-seven, climbed up, checked the ejection seat safety pins, then slid inside. He disconnected the ladder and dropped it to the ground. His parachute harness was already in place, and he pulled it on, then strapped into the seat. Lifting his helmet from the floor, he settled it into place and hooked into the aircraft systems. He dialled his Tac One radio into the common frequency for Minneapolis — the local air control, just in case some air controller called him. The Tac Two radio was set for interplane communications.

“Yucca Flight.”

“Two.”

“Three.”

“Four here.”

“Five’s reading five by five.”

“And Six on the tail end.”

“Let’s go by twos,” Wyatt told them.

He released the brakes and headed for the taxiway. Barr pulled up alongside him, grinning like a horsey maniac.

“How’s your brakes, Bucky?” he asked.

“Who needs ’em? I’m not slowing down for anyone.”

At the end of the taxiway, after checking for airborne aircraft, he rolled onto the runway.

Down by the airport office, a few people were gathering. They had probably noticed the C-130s taking off, and now they would be treated to a flight of six. The Noble Enterprises outfit had become something of an accepted fixture at the old bomber base, and the people down there probably also thought they were coming back.

Wyatt lowered his canopy.

A blue Pinto came racing around the office and headed toward Hangar 4.

“That’ll be Julie,” Barr said. “I didn’t get a chance to say goodbye.”

Wyatt couldn’t see her face, but the car slowed, then stopped, when she saw the fighters sitting at the end of the runway.

He thought the whole thing was pretty forlorn.

“Damned if I’m not going to miss Nebraska,” Barr said. “Some damned good people around here.”

“Let’s go,” Wyatt said.

“Waiting on you, partner.”

He slammed the throttles forward.

Kramer and Liz Jordan went to a Wendy’s for dinner. Both of them were depressed, and their dinner conversation revolved around everything but what was on their minds.

Kramer hadn’t told Liz or anyone about Wyatt’s proposal. She thought she’d just wait.

With the way she was feeling about this operation, there might not be a wedding.

The thought depressed her further. She was torn by conflicting emotions.

They had worked late, and it was after eight when they walked out of Wendy’s.

“I am going home,” Jordan said, “and crawl into the spa and think good things about Cliff.”

“I may call Sears and have them send up a spa.”

“Not Sears, Jan. They don’t have spas.”

“So I’ve got to wait until tomorrow?”

“Unless you want to use ours.”

“Thanks, but I’ll just opt for bed.”

They reached their cars in the lot and said good night. Kramer unlocked her Riviera, then remembered a chore.

“Hey, Liz. Did you feed Ace?”

“Oh, damn. I thought you had.”

“That’s okay. I’ll run back and check on him.”

“That cat’s more trouble than he’s worth,” Jordan said.

“Have you seen any mice out there?”

“On second thought…”

Kramer drove back out to the airport, passed the passenger terminal and the end of the runway, and pulled into Clark Carr Loop. She parked in front of the building.

Walking up to the front door, she retrieved her keys out of her purse.

Unlocked the door and pushed it open.

Reached out automatically to tap the security code into the keypad on the wall beside the door.

And saw the green light.

The alarm system wasn’t armed.

She positively remembered setting it before she locked the door that evening.

Cautiously, she looked around the reception room. The light of the setting sun kept it from being dark, and it appeared normal.

The door to her office was closed, as it should be. Only she, Wyatt, Barr, and Liz Jordan had keys to it.

She looked at the base of the door.

Light peeked from under it.

And Ace the Wonder Cat was squatting next to it, rubbing up against the doorjamb.

She could hear a tap-tapping.

Kramer crossed the carpeted reception area and tested the door handle.

Ace nuzzled her ankle.

The door wasn’t locked.

She turned the handle and shoved the door open.

A man’s back was bent over her computer keyboard. There was blue lettering against a white background on the screen.

The man was suddenly alerted.

His head whipped around.

And Ace snarled, took two bounds and one leap, and landed right in the middle of the man’s face.