Retribution

II. Lost and Not Found

It happened so gradually that Zen didn’t notice the line he crossed. One unending moment he was drifting in a kaleidoscope of shapes, thoughts, and emotions; the next, he was fully conscious, floating neck high in the Indian Ocean. And very, very cold.

He glanced around, looking for his wife Breanna. They’d gone out of the plane together, hugging each other as they jumped through the hole left by one of the ejection seats in the Flighthawk bay of the stricken Megafortress. Eight people had been aboard the plane; there were only six ejection seats. As the senior members of the crew, they had the others bail first, then followed the old-fashioned way.

Ejection seats had been invented to get crew members away from the jet as quickly and safely as possible, before they could be smacked by the fuselage or sucked into a jet engine. While certain aircraft were designed to be good jumping platforms, with the parachutists shielded from deadly wind sheers and vortices, the Megafortress was not among them. Though Zen and Breanna had been holding each other as they jumped, the wind had quickly torn them apart.

Zen had smacked his head and back against the fuselage, then rebounded down past Breanna. He’d tried to arc his upper body as a skydiver would. But instead of flying smoothly through the air, he began twisting around, spinning on both axes as if he were a jack tossed up at the start of a child’s game. He’d forced his arms apart to slow his spin, then pulled the ripcord for his parachute and felt an incredibly hard tug against his crotch. But the chute had opened and then he fell at a much slower speed.

Sometime later — it could have been seconds or hours — he’d seen Breanna’s parachute unfold about two miles away. His mind, tossed by the wind and jarred by the collision with the plane, suddenly cleared. He began shifting his weight and steering the chute toward his wife, flying the parachute in her direction.

A skilled parachutist would have had little trouble getting to her. But he had not done a lot of practice jumps before the aircraft accident that left him paralyzed, and in the time since, done only four, all qualifying jumps under much easier conditions.

Still, he had managed to get within a few hundred yards of Breanna before they hit the water.

The water felt like concrete. Zen hit at an angle, not quite sideways but not erect either. There wasn’t much of a wind, and he had no trouble getting out of the harness. As a paraplegic, his everyday existence had come to depend on a great deal of upper body strength, and he was an excellent swimmer, so he had no trouble squaring himself away. The small raft that was part of his survival gear bobbed up nearby, but rather than getting in, he’d let it trail as he swam in the direction of Breanna.

She wasn’t where he’d thought she would be. Her chute had been released but he couldn’t see her. He felt as if he’d been hit in the stomach with an iron bar.

As calmly as he could manage, he had turned around and around, looking, then began swimming against the slight current and wind, figuring the chute would have been pulled toward him quicker than Breanna had.

Finally, he’d seen something bobbing up and down about twenty yards to his right. It was Breanna’s raft. But she wasn’t in it.

She was floating nearby, held upright by her horseshoe lifesaver, upright, breathing, but out of it. He’d gotten her into her raft, but then was so exhausted that he pulled himself up on the narrow rubber gunwale and rested. He heard a thunderous roar that gave way to music — an old song by Spinal Tap, he thought — and then he slipped into a place where time had no meaning. The next thing he knew, he found himself here, alone in the water.

How long ago had that been?

His watch had been crushed during the fall from the plane. He stared at the digits, stuck on the time he’d hit the airplane: 7:15 a.m.

The sun was now almost directly overhead, which meant it was either a little before or a little after noon — he wasn’t sure which, since he didn’t know which way was east or west.

Five hours in the water. Pretty long, even in the relatively warm Indian Ocean.

He reached to his vest for his emergency radio. It wasn’t there. Had he taken it out earlier? He had the vaguest memory of doing so — but was it a genuine memory or a dream?

A nightmare.

Was this real?

Breanna would have one. Bree—

Where was she? He didn’t see her.

Where was she?

“Bree!”

His voice sounded shallow and hoarse in his ears.

“Yo, Bree! Where are ya, hon?”

He waited, expecting to hear her snap back with something like, Right behind you, wise guy.

But she didn’t.

He thought he heard her behind him and spun around.

Nothing.

Not only was his radio gone — so was his life raft. He didn’t remember detaching it. His head was pounding. He felt dizzy.

Zen turned slowly in the water, positive he’d seen something out of the corner of his eye. He finally spotted something in the distance: land or a ship, or even a bank of clouds; he was too far off to tell. He began paddling toward it.

After about fifteen minutes he realized it was land. He also realized the current would help him get to it.

“Bree!” he shouted, looking around. “Bree!”

He paddled harder. After an hour or so his arms began to seize. He no longer had the strength to swim, and simply floated with the tide. His voice had become too weak to do more than whisper. He barely had enough strength, in fact, to resist the creeping sense of despair lapping at his shoulders.

Dog watched the tanker set down on Diego Garcia’s long runway, turning slowly in the air above the island as he waited for his turn to land. It had taken his damaged plane just under eight hours to reach Diego Garcia, more than twice what it had taken to fly north.

His body felt as if it were a statue or maybe a rusted robot that he haunted rather than lived in. His mind could control all of his body’s movements, but didn’t feel quite comfortable doing so. He was a foreigner in his own skin.

Eyes burned dry, throat filled with sand, Dog acknowledged the tower’s clearance and eased the Wisconsin into her final leg toward the runway.

Owned by the British, Diego Garcia was a desert island in the middle of nowhere, a sliver of paradise turned into a long runway, fueling station, and listening post. It was an odd mix of three distinct time periods — modern, British colonial, and primordial — all existing uneasily together.

The rush of air around him seemed to subside as he dropped toward the concrete. The wheels screeched loudly when he touched down, and the sound of the wind and the engines seemed to double. Dog had practiced manual-controlled landings many times in the simulator, and had had a few real ones besides. Even so, his hands shook as the Megafortress continued across the runway, seemingly moving much faster on the ground than she had been in the air. He had his brakes set, power down, and reverse thrusters deployed — he knew he should be stopping, but he wasn’t. He deployed the drag chute at the rear of the aircraft and held on.

The world roared around him, a loud train running in his head. And then finally the aircraft stopped — not gradually, it seemed, but all of a sudden.

The Wisconsin halted dead a good hundred yards from the turnoff from the taxiway. Dog let go of the stick and slumped back, too exhausted to move up properly. An SUV with a flashing blue light approached; there were other emergency vehicles, fire trucks, an ambulance, coming behind it.

After he caught his breath, he undid his restraints and pulled himself upright. Embarrassed, he flipped on the mike for his radio.

“Dreamland Wisconsin to Tower. Tower, you hearing me?”

“Affirmative, Wisconsin. Are you all right?”

“Get these guys out of my way and I’ll tootle over to the hangar,” he said, trying to make his voice sound light.

“Negative, Wisconsin. You’re fine where you are. We have a tractor on the way.”

“Welcome back, Colonel,” said a familiar gravelly voice over the circuit.

“Chief Parsons?”

“I hope you didn’t break my plane too bad, Colonel,” said Chief Master Sergeant Clyde Alan “Greasy Hands” Parsons. Parsons was the head enlisted man in the Dreamland detachment, and the de facto air plane czar. He knew more about the Megafortress than its designer did. “I have only a skeleton crew to work with here.”

“I’ll take your skeleton over Angelina Jolie’s body any day,” Dog told him.

“Jeez, I don’t know, Colonel,” answered Parsons. “If that’s the lady I’m thinking of, I’m afraid I’d have to go with her.”

Lieutenant Michael Englehardt hopped from the GMC Jimmy and trotted toward the big black aircraft sitting on the runway in front of him. The right wing and a good part of the fuselage were scarred; bits and pieces of carbon fiber and metal protruded from the jagged holes and scrapes. The engine cowling on the far right engine looked as if someone had written over it with white graffiti.

The ramp ladder was lowered from the forward section. Colonel Bastian’s legs appeared, followed by the colonel himself. His face was drawn back; he looked a hundred years old.

“Colonel!” yelled Englehardt.

“Mikey. How are our people?”

“Mack and the others were picked up by the Abner Read several hours ago. They’re going to rendezvous with the Lincoln and get home from there.”

“Good. What about everybody else?” asked Dog.

Englehardt lowered his gaze, avoiding his commander’s stare.

“Dreamland Fisher was lost with all crew members,” he said. “Wreckage has been sighted. The Levitow is also missing,” he added. “It went down near the Indian coast. We’re not exactly sure of the location. A U-2 is overflying the route. The aircraft carrier Lincoln will launch some long-range reconnaissance aircraft to help as well, once they’re close enough. They should be within range inside of twelve hours.”

Losing any aircraft and her crew was difficult, Englehardt knew, but losing the Levitow would be especially painful for Dog — his daughter Breanna was the Levitow’s pilot. Her husband Zen had been aboard, leading the Flighthawk mission.

“What about Danny Freah and Boston?” Dog asked.

“They were picked up by a Sharkboat after they disabled the Iranian minisub. The Sharkboat is due to rendezvous with the Abner Read and another Sharkboat in ninety minutes.”

“What’s the status of the Bennett?” Dog asked.

“Our engine has been replaced and we should be ready to launch within the hour,” said Englehardt. Mechanical problems had scratched the airplane from consideration for the original mission, and while they weren’t his fault, the pilot couldn’t help but feel a pang of guilt. “I’ve prepped a Search and Rescue mission and would like to help join the search for our guys.”

“Are there still cots in the upper Flighthawk compartment?”

“Yes, sir, but we don’t have a backup crew.”

“I’m your backup crew,” said Dog. “Let’s get in the air.”

Air Force Major General Terrill “Earthmover” Samson checked his watch. Admiral George Balboa, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was nearly ten minutes late.

Admirals always thought they could be late for everything, Samson thought. But he forced a smile to his face and kept his grousing to himself.

As a younger man, the African-American general would have assumed it was because he was black. But now Samson realized the problem was more generic: no one had any manners these days.

Then again, that was one of the benefits of command: you didn’t need manners when you outranked someone.

“General, would you like some more coffee?” asked one of Balboa’s aides.

“Thank you, Major, but no, I’m fine.”

“There you are, Samson,” barked Balboa as he entered the office. “Come in.”

Balboa’s tone suggested that Samson was the one who was late. Samson hadn’t risen in the ranks by insulting his superiors. Especially when, as he hoped, they were about to deliver good news. So he stifled his annoyance and rose, thanked the admiral’s staff for their attention, and followed Balboa into his office.

“You’ve heard the news about India and Pakistan, I assume,” said Balboa, sliding behind his desk. An antique, it was said to have belonged to one of the USS Constitution’s skippers — a fact Samson wouldn’t have known except for the brass plate screwed into the front, obviously to impress visitors.

“I read the summary on my way over,” said Samson.

“What do you think of the developments?”

Samson considered what sort of response to give. Though classified, the report hadn’t given many details, merely hinting that the U.S. had used some sort of new weapons to down the missiles fired by both sides. It wasn’t clear what was truly going on, however, and the way Balboa posed the question made Samson suspect a trap.

“I guess I don’t have enough details to form an opinion,” he said finally.

“We’ve shot down twenty-eight warheads,” said Balboa. “The Navy sank an Indian aircraft carrier and several Chinese ships that tried to interfere. The President is continuing the operation. He wants the warheads recovered.”

“I see,” said Samson.

“The Dreamland people were in the middle of things. They fired the radiation weapons. Power is out throughout the subcontinent.”

“Uh-huh.” Samson tried to hide his impatience. A few months before, he had been mentioned as a possible commander for a new base that would have supplanted Dreamland, but the plans had never come to fruition — thankfully so, because he had much bigger and better things in mind.

Like the job he’d hoped Balboa had called him here to discuss, heading Southern Command.

“Some of the people in the administration didn’t understand the potential of the Whiplash concept,” said Balboa.

He was interrupted by a knock on the door.

“Come.”

One of his aides, a Marine Corps major, entered with a cup of coffee. The major set it down, then whispered something in Balboa’s ear.

“I’ll call him back.”

“Yes, sir.”

“The President,” Balboa explained to Samson as the aide left. “Always looking for more information.”

“What exactly is Whiplash?” asked Samson.

“Oh, Whiplash.” Balboa made a face that was halfway between a smirk and a frown. “Whiplash is the name the Dreamland people use for their ground action team. They’re air commandos. But the term is also the code word the President uses to deploy Dreamland assets — air as well as ground — around the world. The concept is to combine cutting-edge technology with special operations people. A few of us thought it would be a good idea years ago, but it’s taken quite a while to get the kinks out. The line of communication and command — the National Security Advisor and the White House had their fingers in the pie, which twisted things around, as I’m sure you’d imagine.”

“Of course.”

“Well, that’s finally been worked out. From this point forward, I think things will run much more smoothly. The concept — I fully support it, of course. But since I’ve been pushing it for so long, that’s understandable.”

Samson didn’t know how much of what Balboa was saying to believe. Not only was the Chairman’s disdain for the Air Force well known, but Balboa didn’t have a reputation for backing either cutting-edge research or special operations, even in the Navy. Balboa loved ships — big ships, as in aircraft carriers and even battleships, which he had suggested several times could be brought back into active service as cruise missile launchers.

Or cruise missile targets, as some of Samson’s friends at the War College commented in after-hour lectures. These sessions were always off campus, off the record, and far from any ears that might report back to the admiral. And, naturally, they were accompanied by studious elbow bending.

“As it happens,” said Balboa, “Dreamland has been under the, uh, direction of a lieutenant colonel. Dog — what’s his first name, uh…”

“Lieutenant Colonel Tecumseh Bastian,” said Samson.

A decade younger than himself, Bastian had earned his wings as a fighter jock, a community unto itself in the Air Force, and so far as Samson knew, he had never met the colonel. But everyone in the Air Force had heard of Bastian and his incredible exploits at the helm of the EB-52 Megafortress.

“Presumptuous name,” said Balboa. “Goes with the personality.”

“A lieutenant colonel is in charge of Dreamland?” said Samson. He’d assumed Bastian was in charge of a wing at Dreamland, not the entire place. “I thought General Magnus took over after Brad Elliott.”

“Yes, well, General Magnus did take over — on paper. For a while. The reality is, Bastian has been in charge. And while he has, I’m sure, points to recommend him…”

Balboa paused, making it clear he was struggling for something nice to say about the lieutenant colonel. Then he also made it clear he had given up.

“In the end, Bastian is a lieutenant colonel,” said Balboa. “What Dreamland needs to reach its potential is a commander. A command general. You.”

Samson sucked air.

“Of course, it’s not just the base,” added Balboa, obviously sensing a problem. “The Whiplash people, the Megafortresses—”

Samson cleared his throat. “I had been given to understand that I was to…that I was in line for Southern Command.”

Balboa made a face. “That’s not in the cards at the moment.”

“When is it in the cards?”

“This is an important assignment, General. Weapons development is just one aspect of Dreamland. Important, but just part. We want to expand the capability — the Whiplash idea — we want to expand it exponentially. That’s the whole point.”

Samson felt his face growing hot. No matter how much sugar Balboa tried to put on the assignment, it was a major comedown. He was deputy freaking commander of the Eighth Air Force, for cryin’ out loud. Not to mention former chief of plans for the air staff at the Pentagon. Base commander — with all due respect to other base commanders, fine men all, or almost all — was a sidetrack to his career.

Years before maybe, when he was still commanding a B-1B bomber wing, this might have been a step up. But not now. They had a lieutenant colonel in charge over there, for cryin’ out loud.

And what a lieutenant colonel. No one was going to outshine him. The brass would be far better off finding a single star general a year or so from retirement to take things in hand quietly.

“Questions?” Balboa asked.

“Sir—”

“You’ll have a free hand,” said Balboa, rising and extending his hand. “We want this to be a real command — an integral part of the system. It hasn’t been until now. We’re going to expand. You’re going to expand. You have carte blanche. Use it.”

“Yes, sir.”

Samson managed to shake Balboa’s hand, then left the office as quickly as he could.

Jennifer Gleason rose and put her hands on her hips, then began pacing at the back of the Command Center. She was due at Test Range 2B to check on the computer guidance system for the AIM-154 Anaconda interceptor missiles in a half hour. There had been troubles with the discriminator software, which used artificial intelligence routines to distinguish between civilian and military targets in fail-safe mode when the Identification Friend or Foe (IFF) circuitry failed. She had helped one of the engineers with the coding and agreed to sit in on today’s tests of the missile to see if the changes had been successful.

But she’d agreed to do that weeks ago, before the trouble in India. Before her lover, Colonel Bastian, had deployed, before her friends had been shot down trying to save the world, or at least a big part of it.

Jennifer, though modestly altruistic, didn’t really care about the world. She cared about Colonel Bastian. And Zen. And Breanna, though Breanna didn’t particularly like her. And even Mack Smith, class A jackass that he could be.

“I truly wish you would stop pacing up and down,” said Ray Rubeo. “Don’t you have a test or something to supervise?”

Jennifer glared at him. Rubeo could be a difficult taskmaster — nearly all the scientists at Dreamland preferred dealing with the military people rather than him — but she had never felt intimidated by the tall, skinny scientist. Rubeo made a face, then touched his silver earring stud — an unconscious tic that in this case was a sign of surrender. He scowled and went back to his computer screen.

“All right, we have the missile trajectories,” said one of the analysts nearby. “Do you want to see them, Dr. Rubeo? Or should I just zip the file and send it to the White House?”

“Hardly,” said Rubeo, his witheringly sarcastic voice back in full swing. “Put it on the main screen and let me have a look at it.”

“You think you know everything, Ray?” said Jennifer peevishly.

Immediately, she wanted to apologize. Sniping wasn’t her style and she admired Rubeo. And he was brilliant.

Even if he was full of himself.

Rubeo ignored her, rising and walking toward the large screen at the front of the room. Adapting one of the test programs used at Dreamland, the analysts had directed the computer to show the likely path of the missiles that had been disabled by the T-Rays. Bright red ellipses showed the areas they were most likely to have fallen in; the color got duller the lower the probability.

A review of the launch data showed that the Indians had fired twenty nuclear missiles, the Pakistanis eight. All were liquid-fueled. Besides the guidance and trigger circuitry in the warheads, a number of engine parts were particularly vulnerable to T-Rays, including the solenoid valves and electronic level sensors necessary for the engines to function properly. Failure of these items in most cases would choke off the engines, causing them to fall back to earth.

The question was: Where? According to the computer, all but two had fallen in the Great Thar Desert, a vast wasteland between the two countries on the Indian side of the border.

Rubeo walked toward the large screen at the front of the room. Folding his arms, he stood staring up at the map, as if being that close to the pixels somehow allowed his brain to absorb additional information.

“Problem, Ray?” asked Major Catsman, who’d been absorbed in something on the other side of the room.

“Two warheads are not showing up,” he told her.

“How can that be?”

“Hmmmph.”

“Are you sure the launch count is correct?” asked Jennifer.

Rubeo continued to stare. The analyst manning the computer that controlled the display began reassessing the data.

“We can give them what we have and tell them there may be a problem in the data,” said Catsman. “Better something than nothing.”

“The difficulty, Major,” said Rubeo, “is that the program doesn’t seem to realize the missiles aren’t there.”

His sarcasm was barely masked, but Catsman either missed it because she was tired or ignored it because she was used to Rubeo.

“Well, we better figure something out.”

“Hmmmph.”

“I’ll tell Colonel Bastian about it,” Catsman added. “He’s in the Bennett.”

“He’s in the Bennett?” said Jennifer. “I thought he went back to Diego Garcia.”

“The search operations for the rest of our downed crewmen have been slow. He wanted to kick-start them.”

Jennifer sat at one of the back consoles as Catsman made the connection. She looked away from the big screen when she heard his voice, afraid of what she might see in his face.

She wanted him home, safe; not tired, not battered, not pushed to his limit, as he always was on a mission.

She knew he would have scoffed at her, told her he wasn’t doing anything any other member of the team hadn’t done — anything that she hadn’t done herself a hundred times.

“How could the computer lose the missiles?” she heard him ask Rubeo.

“If I knew the answer, Colonel, I wouldn’t have mentioned the question,” Rubeo replied. He explained that the most likely answer had to do with a glitch in the hastily amended software they used to project the landings. But it was also possible that the satellites analyzing the launch data had erred, or that the flight paths of different missiles had merged.

“There are a number of other possibilities as well,” added Rubeo. “It will take some time to work things out.”

“We’re not the only ones doing this,” said Catsman. “NORAD, the Navy, Satellite Command — they’ll all have information. We can coordinate it and refine the projections. Once the U-2 is able to complete its survey of the area, things should be much clearer.”

“The question for you, Colonel,” said Rubeo, “is whether we should tell the White House what we have. They have tended to ignore our caveats in the past. Not always with the best results.”

“Tell them,” said Dog. “And keep working on it.”

“As you wish,” said Rubeo.

“What other information can you give us on the possible location of the Fisher’s crew?” Dog asked.

“We’ve already passed along everything we have,” Catsman told him. “We’re pretty confident of where they were when they bailed out, and where they would be in the water.”

“Then why haven’t they been found?”

When Catsman didn’t answer, Rubeo did — uncharacteristically offering an excuse for the Navy.

“The Abner Read was distracted and too far from the area to be of much use at first,” he said. “They’re now coming south and the Werewolf should be able to help. The Lincoln is still quite far from the ejection area. Their long-range patrols can’t stay on station long enough to do a thorough job. The odds should improve the closer they get. We computed the effects of the currents and wind on the crew and gave them to the Navy, as well as the U-2 surveying the region. That should help narrow the search.”

“We’ll find them, Colonel,” added Catsman.

“I’m sure we will,” said Dog. He paused for a moment, then asked for her. “Jennifer?”

She looked up. The large screen magnified his face to the point where she could see every wrinkle, every crease and blemish. He was pale, and his eyes drooped.

“Hi, Colonel.”

The faintest hint of a smile came to his face.

“You were working on an updated search routine for the Flighthawks,” Dog said, all business.

“It still has some bugs.”

“Upload it to us anyway.”

“Yes, sir.”

For a moment it looked like he was about to say something else.

I love you, maybe. She wanted desperately to hear it. But he didn’t say it.

“I’m here if you need me. Bastian out.”

Jennifer felt a stabbing pain in her side as the screen blanked.

Jed Barclay knocked on the President’s door before entering. President Kevin Martindale sat behind his desk, facing the window that looked out on the back lawn of the White House.

“I put together the latest data on the missiles, Mr. President,” said Jed. “There’s some disagreement between the CIA projections and Dreamland’s. The Dreamland scientists say they have two missiles unaccounted for and that may indicate—”

“Can you imagine wanting to turn the earth into a nuclear wasteland, Jed?” asked the President, staring out the window.

The question took Jed by surprise. Finally he managed a soft “No.”

“Neither can I. Some of the people in both India and Pakistan want to do just that.” The President rose, but continued to stare out the window. “The reports are filled with misinformation this morning. I suppose we can’t blame them. I didn’t tell them exactly how we stopped the weapons, and there are a great many people who distrust us.”

Jed hadn’t seen any of the actual news reports, but had read the daily classified CIA summary before coming up to see the President. Martindale had said only that the U.S. used “new technology” to bring down the nuclear weapons launched by Pakistan and India; the news media, without much to go on, speculated that he was referring to antiballistic missiles launched from Alaska and satellite weapons that didn’t actually exist.

What they couldn’t quite understand was why power had gone off across the subcontinent. Some analysts had concluded that this meant at least a few of the nuclear weapons had exploded and created an electromagnetic pulse. Others simply ignored it. Given the President’s desire to seize the warheads, ambiguity was definitely in their favor, and the White House had issued orders forbidding anyone — including the official spokesmen, who actually knew very little — from addressing the matter.

Adding to the confusion was the fact that the T-Rays had wiped out communication with practically all of Pakistan and a vast swath of India. The media was starved for information, though obviously that situation wouldn’t hold for very long.

“I hate sending people into war,” continued the President. “Because basically I’m sending them to die. It’s my job. I understand it. But after a while…after a while it all begins to weigh on you…”

His voice trailed off. Jed had never seen the President this contemplative, and didn’t know what to say.

“We’re going to recover the warheads,” Martindale said finally.

He turned, walked across the office to the credenza that stood opposite his desk, and paused, gazing down at a bust of Jefferson.

“Some people call Dreamland my own private air force and army. Have you heard that, Jed?”

Having heard that said many times, Jed hesitated.

“You can be honest,” added Martindale. “That’s what I value about you, Jed. You’re not involved in the political games.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Dreamland is too important a command to be run by a lieutenant colonel. The Joint Chiefs want it folded back into the regular command structure. And I have to say, they make good arguments.”

“Yes, sir.”

“We’re going to appoint a general to take over. A two-star general for now — Major General Samson. He has an impeccable record. An enviable one.”

“Yes, sir.”

“What’s your opinion of that?”

“I think whatever you want to do, sir—”

“I haven’t used it as my private army, have I?”

“No, Mr. President, absolutely not.”

“This has nothing to do with you, Jed,” added the President. “Or with Colonel Bastian, for that matter. I still have the highest regard for him. I want him involved in the warhead recovery. Him and his people — they’ll work with the Marines.”

“Yes, sir.”

“But it makes more sense — this whole mission has shown the real potential. We can double, maybe triple their effectiveness.” Martindale looked at Jed. “General Samson will handle informing the Dreamland people. Understood?”

“I shouldn’t tell them?”

“The news should come from the general, and the joint chiefs. That’s the way I want it. We’re following the chain of command. Dreamland is not my private army.”

The joint chiefs — and especially the head of the joint chiefs, Admiral Balboa — had been fighting to get Dreamland back under their full control since early in Martindale’s administration. With the end of Martindale’s term looming — and the very real possibility that he would lose the election — the chiefs had won the battle. It certainly did make sense that Dreamland, as a military unit, should answer directly up the chain of command, rather than directly to the President through the NSC.

In theory, Jed realized, he was losing some of his prestige. But he knew he’d never been more than a political buffer. Part of the reason the President and the National Security Advisor used him as a liaison, after all, was the fact that he was young and had no political power base of his own.

“I’ll do whatever job you want me to, sir,” he said.

“Good. You have a bright future. Let’s get through this crisis, get these warheads, and then maybe we’ll have a chance to sit down and see how best you can serve your country.”

“Uh, yes, sir.”

The President went back to his desk.

“You can go now, young Jed. Forward these reports to Admiral Balboa, with copies to Admiral Woods on the Lincoln. Make sure he has everything he needs. Dreamland is working with the Marines, under Woods. We’ll follow the chain of command.”

“Yes, sir.”

Steven L. Bennett was a captain in The U.S. Air Force, assigned to the Twentieth Tactical Air Support Squadron, Pacific Air Forces, during the Vietnam War era. After completing B-52 training in 1970, Captain Bennett went about as far from strategic bombers as you could in the Air Force at the time — he trained to become a forward air controller, calling bombs in rather than dropping them, and flying in an airplane designed to skim treetops rather than the stratosphere.

By June 1972, Bennett was piloting an OV-10 Bronco, an excellent combat observation aircraft with only one serious flaw — it was almost impossible to crash-land successfully. The forward section of the two-seater would generally implode, killing the pilot, though the backseater could get out with minor injuries. Pilots quickly learned that it didn’t make sense to try and ditch an OV-10; “hitting the silk,” as the old-timers used to call ejecting, was the only way to survive.

On June 29, 1972, Bennett flew what was known as an artillery adjustment mission over Quang Tri Province in South Vietnam. His observer was a Marine Corps captain named Mike Brown. The two men pulled a three-hour sortie and were about to head home to Da Nang when they learned that their replacement was running behind schedule. Going home would leave ground troops without anyone to call on if they got in trouble.

Captain Bennett checked his fuel and decided to stay on station until the relief plane could get up. A short time later South Vietnamese troops in the area called in for assistance; they were taking fire from a much larger North Vietnamese unit and were about to be overrun.

Bennett and Brown called for a tactical air strike, but no attack aircraft were available. They then requested that Navy guns bombard the attackers, but the proximity of the South Vietnamese to their northern enemies made that impossible.

So Bennett decided to do the job himself, rolling in on several hundred NVA soldiers with just the four 7.62mm machine guns in his Bronco’s nose. After the fourth pass, he had them on the run. He came down again to give them another snoutful, but this time his aircraft was hit — a SAM-7 shoulder-launched heat seeker took out his left engine. His plane caught fire.

Bennett headed out over the nearby ocean to jettison his fuel and the highly flammable rockets used for marking targets. As he did so, an escort aircraft caught up with him and advised him that the fire started by the missile was now so severe that his plane looked like it would explode any minute. Bennett ordered Brown to get ready to eject; they’d punch out over the water and be picked up by one of the Navy ships or a friendly helicopter.

Brown agreed. But then he saw that his parachute had been torn by shrapnel from the missile that struck the plane.

Not a problem, said Bennett, whose own parachute was in perfect condition. Get ready to ditch.

And so they did. The OV-10 cartwheeled when she hit the water, and then sank. If Bennett was still alive after the crash, his cockpit was too mangled for him to escape as the plane went under the waves. Captain Brown, fortunately, managed to push his way out and was picked up by a rescue chopper a short time later.

For his selfless devotion to duty and his determination to save another man’s life even at the cost of his own, Captain Steven L. Bennett was awarded the Medal of Honor posthumously. It was presented by then Vice President Gerald R. Ford to Bennett’s widow and daughter two years after his death.

Steven Bennett’s namesake, Dreamland Eb-52 Megafortress Bennett, had begun life as a B-52D. And, in fact, the aircraft had actually served in the same war as Captain Bennett, dropping bombs on North Vietnam during two different deployments. It remained in active service until 1982, when it was mothballed and put in storage. And there it remained until the spring of 1996, when it was taken from its desert storage area, gutted, and rebuilt as a Megafortress. The changes were many. Its wings and tail section were completely replaced, new engines and electrical controls were installed, a radar “bulge” was installed in a spine above the wing roots, and provision was made for the EB-52 to carry and launch robot aircraft. Much of the new gear was simply unimaginable when the B-52 was first built.

When the aircraft was flyable, she was taken by a special crew to Dreamland, where additional modifications were made to her frame. More equipment, including an AWACS-style radar for the bulge, was added.

The plane had completed final flight tests shortly before Thanksgiving, 1997. She’d received further modifications on Diego Garcia to make her systems impervious to T-Rays. Ironically, the work on those modifications had not been completed when the T-Ray weapons had to be used, and the Bennett remained on the ground. A subsequent glitch with her left outboard engine required her to turn back after being launched shortly afterward, much to her crew’s consternation.

The Bennett was making up for it now, her engines pushing the airplane to just under the speed of sound as she raced northward in search of the crew of the stricken Levitow.

“We should be in the area where they ejected within the hour,” Lieutenant Englehardt said as Dog looked over his shoulder at the situation map set in the middle of the dash. “So far we haven’t heard the emergency beacons.”

Dog nodded. The emergency PRC radios had a limited range. Like everyone else in the Air Force, the Dreamland fliers relied on PRC radios, which used relatively old technology. Better units were available, but hadn’t been authorized for purchase because of budget issues. Dog suspected that if some congressman had to rely on one, money would be found for upgrades pretty damn fast.

“Incoming transmission for you, Colonel. This is from the NSC — Jed Barclay.”

Dog dropped into the empty seat in front of the auxiliary airborne radar control. As soon as he authorized the transmission, Jed Barclay’s face appeared on the screen. He was speaking from the White House Situation Room.

“Bastian. Jed, what’s up?”

“Colonel, I, uh, I have Admiral Balboa on the line. He uh, wanted me to make the connection.”

“OK,” said Dog, puzzled.

“Stand by.”

Balboa’s face flashed onto the screen. Dog had spoken to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff several times since taking command of Dreamland. Balboa didn’t particularly like the Air Force, and Dog sensed that he didn’t particularly care for him either.

“Colonel, how are you this morning?”

“It’s nighttime here, Admiral.”

“Yes.” Balboa scowled. “The President has decided to recover the warheads. He wants you to work with the Marines from the Seventh MEU. Admiral Woods will have overall control of the mission.”

Dog smiled. He knew Woods from exercises they’d had together — exercises where Dreamland had blown up his carrier several times.

“Problem with that, Colonel?” asked Balboa. The nostrils in his pug nose flared.

“Not on my side.”

“Admiral Woods has no problems,” said Balboa.

“What sort of support does he want?”

“Help him locate the missiles. He’ll tell you what he wants.”

“I’m going to need to gear up for this,” said Dog. “We’re down to one working Megafortress.”

“Well, get what you need,” said Balboa. “Has General Samson spoken to you yet?”

“Terrill Samson? No.”

“Well, he will. We’re reorganizing your command structure, Colonel. You’ll be reporting to Major General Samson from now on. Got it?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Good.”

The screen blanked. Dog didn’t know Samson at all. He’d had a Pentagon general to report to when he started at Dreamland, a good one: Lieutenant General Harold Magnus. Magnus had retired some months before after being edged out of the running for chief of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Dreamland’s official “position” on the Pentagon flowchart had been in flux ever since. Dog had known this couldn’t last, and in some respects welcomed the appointment of a new superior: As a lieutenant colonel with no direct line to the Pentagon, he was constantly having trouble with even the most routine budget requests.

“Colonel, are you still there?”

“Yes, Jed, go ahead.”

“You want to speak to Admiral Woods? I can plug you into a circuit with him and the Marine Corps general in charge of the Seventh MEU.”

“Fire away.”

“Bastian, you old bully — now what are you up to?” asked Tex Woods, popping onto the screen. Dog could only see his head; the camera didn’t pan low enough to show if he was wearing his trademark cowboy boots.

“Looking for my people. They bailed out.”

“Yes, and we’re helping with that,” said Woods. He was more enthusiastic than he had been the last time they’d spoken. “The admiral told you what we’re up to?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Good. Jack, you on the line yet?”

Marine Corps General Jack Harrison cleared his throat. Harrison was a dour-faced man; he seemed to personify the nickname leatherneck.

“General,” said Dog.

“Colonel, I’ve heard a lot about you. I’m glad we’re working together.”

“We’ll do our best.”

“That’s the spirit, Bastian,” said Woods. “Your people are to coordinate the intelligence, the Marines will be the muscle. Aircraft from the Lincoln will fly cover. Everybody on the same page?”

Dog reached for his coffee as Woods continued. The specific operation plans would have to be developed by the Marine Corps officers.

“Your people would be very valuable, Colonel,” said Harrison. “Your Whiplash crew?”

“My officer in charge of Whiplash is aboard the Abner Read,” said Dog. “I don’t—”

“We’ll airlift him to the Lincoln,” said Woods. “What other problems do I have to solve?”

“No problems,” said Dog. Harrison remained silent.

“Good,” said Woods. “Gentlemen, you have my authorization to do whatever it takes to make this work. This is the chance of a millennium. History will remember us.”

I hope in a good way, thought Dog as the screen blacked out.

The new search program Jennifer had developed called for the Megafortress to fly in a path calculated from the weather conditions and known characteristics of the ejection seats and the crew members’ parachutes. The flight path aligned the plane with the peculiarities of the survival radio’s transmission capabilities; while it didn’t actually boost its range, the effect was the same.

The program gave Englehardt the option of turning the aircraft over to the computer to fly or of following a path marked for him on the heads-up display projected in front of the windscreen.

“Which do you think I should do, Colonel?” the pilot asked. “I’m comfortable with however you want to fly it,” Dog said. “If it were me, I’d want the stick in my hand. But completely your call.”

“Thank you, sir. I think I’ll fly it myself.”

“Very good.”

Lieutenant Englehardt was one of the new wave of pilots who’d come to Dreamland in the wake of the Megafortress’s success. Young enough to be Dog’s son, he was part of a generation that had known things like video games and computers their whole lives. They weren’t comfortable with technology — they’d been born into it, and accepted it the way Dog accepted his arms and legs.

Still, the fact that Englehardt would rather rely on himself than the computer impressed Dog. It was an old-fashioned conceit, but some prejudices were worth keeping.

Dog went over to the techie working the sea surveillance radar, Staff Sergeant Brian Daly. Aside from small boats anchored near the coast for the night, Daly had only a single contact on his screen: an Indian patrol vessel of the Jija Bai class. Roughly the equivalent of a small U.S. Coast Guard cutter, the ship carried two 7.62mm guns that could be used against aircraft, but posed no threat to the high-flying Megafortress.

“Two Tomcats from the Lincoln hailing us, Colonel,” said Kevin Sullivan, the copilot.

“Say hello.”

While Sullivan spoke to the pilots in the F-14 fighters, Dog looked over the shoulder of Technical Sergeant Thomas Rager, who manned the airborne radar. With the exception of the Tomcats, which had come from the Lincoln a good six hundred miles to the south, the Megafortress had the sky to itself. Neither Pakistan nor India had been able to get any flights airborne following the total collapse of their electrical networks, and the Chinese carrier Khan, now heading southward at a slow pace, had been damaged so severely that she appeared no longer capable of launching or recovering aircraft.

“Squids wish us well,” said Sullivan, using a universal nickname for sailors. “They’re on long-range reconnaissance for the carrier group. They haven’t heard anything from our guys or seen any flares over the water. They’ll keep looking.”

“Thank them.”

The weight of his fatigue settled on Dog’s shoulders. He’d tried to sleep in the cot in the unused upper Flighthawk bay earlier but couldn’t. He went to the back of the flight deck and pulled down the jumpseat, settling down, watching the crew at work.

He had to find his people. All of them, but Breanna especially.

He’d almost lost her twice before. Each time, the pain seemed to grow worse. Now it felt like an arrow the size of his fist, pushing against his heart.

Though they worked together, Dog couldn’t honestly say they were very close, at least not if closeness was measured by the things fathers and daughters usually did together. Every so often they’d go out to eat, but he couldn’t remember the last time they’d fished or biked or hiked. They didn’t even run together, something they both liked to do.

And yet he loved her deeply.

He felt himself drifting toward sleep. He started to let himself go, falling down toward oblivion. And then a shout startled him back to consciousness.

“We’ve got them!” yelled Sullivan.

“This is the bridge? I figured it’d be a lot bigger. God, it looks like an amusement arcade.”

Storm bristled but said nothing as Major Mack Smith surveyed the Abner Read’s bridge.

“Cool table. Moving maps, huh?”

“We call them charts, sir,” said the ensign who’d been assigned as the Dreamland contingent’s tour guide.

The rest of the Air Force people were crowding sickbay, but Major Smith claimed his sojourn in the water had left him refreshed. He certainly had a lot of energy, Storm thought.

“How does this work?” asked Mack, raising his hand above the holographic display.

“No, sir! No!” The ensign grabbed Mack’s hand before the major could swipe it through the display.

“Hey, take it easy, kid. I wasn’t going to touch anything.”

“The ensign was trying to point out that in some modes, the holographic table accepts commands much like a touchscreen,” said Storm stiffly. “So we look, don’t touch.”

“I get the picture.” Mack smirked at Storm, then went over to the helm. “Almost like jet controls, huh?”

It must have taken the helmsman a monumental effort not to elbow Mack as he breathed over his neck, looking at the ship’s “dashboard.”

Pity he was so disciplined, thought Storm.

“I didn’t think we’d be so low in the water,” said Mack. “I mean, did you guys take a hit during the battle?”

“We took several,” said Storm. “None of which were serious. The ship is designed to sit very low so it can’t be seen by radar, or the naked eye for that matter, except at very close range.”

“Wow. That’s wild,” said Mack. “It’s weird, though, you know? I mean, it’s a great boat and all. Don’t get me wrong. Glad to be here. But it’s low. What are we? Eight feet above the waves? Six?”

“I’m afraid that’s classified, sir,” said the ensign.

Storm decided the man would get shore leave and double beer rations for the rest of his life.

“Sharkboat Two is one mile north, Captain,” said the helmsman.

“Very good. Prepare to rendezvous.”

“Aye aye, Captain.”

“Two more of your Dreamland people are aboard the Sharkboat, Major,” added Storm. “Captain Freah and one of his sergeants.”

“No shit. Man, it’s like a regular reunion.”

“Isn’t it, though? Would you like to meet the captain on the fantail?”

“There or the bar. Whatever you got.”

Danny Freah restored some of storm’s good humor, modestly taking very little credit in the disabling of the Iranian minisub that had helped provoke the war between India and Pakistan. Storm had already heard a full report from his men in the Sharkboat and was well aware that Danny and his sergeant had nearly drowned while disabling the craft. Had it not been for the two Dreamlanders, the sub surely would have gotten away.

In Danny’s account, however, the Sharkboat arrived just at the critical juncture. The Navy people saved the day, securing the craft and fishing him out of the water.

Storm was still soaking up the praises of his men when Eyes interrupted to tell him that several more downed Dreamland crew members had been found.

“They’re from the Levitow,” Eyes told him over the ship’s intercom system. “They have six people in the water. They’re not far from the coast. Eighty miles southwest of us.”

“All right, we’ll pick them up, too,” Storm said. “Are the Chinese near them?”

“Negative. But there’s an Indian ship in the area. A guided missile frigate.”

“I’m not afraid of an Indian frigate,” said Storm. He ordered the crew to plot a course to the downed airmen and set sail at top speed.

“I’d like to participate in the rescue,” said Danny Freah after Storm finished issuing his orders.

“I’ll tell you what, Captain. If my medical officer releases you to participate, you’re welcome to help.”

“Thanks, Captain.”

“No, the pleasure’s mine.”

“The Levitow is Breanna Stockard’s plane,” said Danny. “She’s the colonel’s daughter.”

“Bastian’s daughter?” Storm hadn’t realized Colonel Bastian had a child, let alone that she was in the Air Force and under his command. “Bastian doesn’t seem old enough to have a pilot for a daughter.”

“You’d have to take that up with the colonel himself, sir.”

Dog grabbed one of the handholds on the auxiliary control panel of the surface radar station as the Megafortress plunged closer to the water, pushing into a low orbit around the tiny rafts bobbing about twenty miles from the Indian coast. A fitful splash of white blinked from three of the small boats, emergency beacons showing the Bennett where they were.

Captain Jan Stewart, who’d been the Levitow’s copilot, was on the radio with Sullivan, telling him that all six of the crew members who’d gone out together had been able to hook up. There were no serious injuries, said Stewart, and now that they saw the Megafortress’s flares bursting through the cloud deck, they were in excellent spirits.

But the Levitow had been carrying eight people, not its usual six.

“Breanna and Zen went out after us,” Stewart told the Bennett’s copilot. “They were going to jump through the holes left by the escape hatches. None of us saw their parachutes. We’re sure they got out.”

Her voice sounded almost desperate.

“Indian Godavari-class frigate, four miles due south,” reported Sergeant Daly over the Bennett’s interphone circuit. “Godavari is equipped with OSA-ME surface-to-air missiles. NATO code name Gecko SA-N-4. Radar guided; range ten kilometers. Accurate to 16,400 feet.”

“How long before the Abner Read gets here?” Dog asked Sullivan.

The Bennett’s copilot told him that the ship had estimated it would take about two and a half hours.

“I’ll bet the Indian ship saw their flares and is homing in on the signal from Stewart’s radio,” added Lieutenant Englehardt, the pilot. “They’ll be close enough to see the beacons in a few minutes, if they haven’t already.”

“Let’s find out what they’re up to,” said Dog. “Contact them.”

He put his hands to his eyes. He was tired — beyond tired.

“Colonel, I have someone from the Indian ship acknowledging,” said the copilot. “Ship’s name is Gomati.”

Dog pushed his headset’s boom mike close to his mouth and dialed into the frequency used by the Indian ship. “This is Lieutenant Colonel Tecumseh Bastian on Dreamland Bennett. I’d like to speak to the captain of the Gomati.”

“I am the executive officer,” replied a man in lightly accented English. “What can we do for you, Colonel?”

“You can hold your position away from my men,” said Dog. “We are conducting rescue operations.”

The Indian didn’t immediately reply. Dog knew he had a strong hand — the Bennett carried four Harpoon missiles on the rotating dispenser in her belly. One well-placed hit would disable the frigate; two would sink her.

And despite his orders not to engage any of the combatants, Dog had no compunctions about using the missiles to protect his people.

“Colonel Bastian,” said a new voice from the destroyer. “I am Captain Ajanta. Why are you warning us away from the men in the water? We intend to offer our assistance.”

“If it’s all the same to you, we’d prefer to take care of it ourselves,” Dog told him.

The Indian officer didn’t reply.

“I think you insulted him, Colonel,” said Lieutenant Englehardt over the interphone.

“Maybe.” Dog clicked back into the circuit and took a more diplomatic tact. “Gomati, we appreciate your offer of assistance. We already have a vessel en route and are in communication with the people in the water. We request that you stand by.”

“As you wish,” replied the Indian captain.

“I appreciate your offer to help,” said Dog. “Thank you.”

With his arms completely drained of energy, Zen drifted along in the blackness, more flotsam than living being. He’d never been broken down so low, not even after he woke up in the hospital without the use of his legs.

Then all he’d been was angry. It was better than this, far better.

For the longest time he didn’t believe what they told him. Who would? Doctors were always Calamity Janes, telling you about all sorts of diseases and ailments you might have, depending on the outcome of this or that test. He had never liked doctors — not even the handful he was related to.

So his first reaction to the news was to say, flat out, “Get bent. My legs are fine. Just fine.”

He kept fighting. His anger grew. It pushed him, got him through rehab every day.

Rehab sucked. Sucked. But it was the only thing he could do, and he spent hours and hours every day—every day—working and working and working. Pumping iron, swimming, pushing himself in the wheelchair. He hated it. Hated it and loved it, because it sucked so bad it didn’t let his mind wander.

Thinking was dangerous. If he thought too much, he’d remember the crash, and what it meant.

Breanna was with him the whole time, even when he didn’t want her to be. He took a lot of his frustration out on her.

Too much. Even a little would have been too much, but he took much more than that.

The amazing thing was, she’d stayed. She still loved him. Still loved even the gimp he’d become.

Gradually, Zen realized he had two motivations. The first was anger: at his accident; at Mack Smith, who he thought had caused it; at the world in general.

The second was love.

Anger pushed him every day. It got him back on active duty, made him determined to pull every political string his family had — and they had a lot. It made him get up every morning and insist that he was still Major Jeff “Zen” Stockard, fighter ace, hottest match on the patch, a slick zippersuit going places in the world.

Love was more subtle. It wasn’t until he got back, all the way back as head of the Flighthawk program, as a pilot again, as a true ace with five enemy planes shot down, that he understood what love had done for him: It had kept the anger at an almost manageable level.

Zen nudged against something hard in the water. He put his arm up defensively. The only thing he could think of was that he was being attacked by a shark.

It wasn’t a shark, but a barely submerged rock. There were others all around. A few broke the surface, but most were just under the waves.

He stared into the darkness, trying to make the blackness dissolve into shapes. There were rocks all around, as if he were near a shore. He pushed forward, expecting to hit a rise and find land, but didn’t. He dragged himself onward, the water too shallow to swim, expecting that with the next push he would be up on land. But the land seemed never to come, and when it finally did, it was more rock than land, somewhat more solid than the pieces he’d bumped over, but still rock.

He’d expected sand, a real beach. He wasn’t particularly fond of beaches, except that they gave him a chance to swim, which was something he’d liked to do even before it became part of his daily rehab and exercise. They also gave him a chance to watch Breanna come out of the sea, water dripping off her sleek body, caressing it.

He shook off the thought and concentrated on moving away from the water, crawling up a gentle incline about twenty or thirty yards.

Exhausted, he lay on his back and rested. A cloud pack had ridden in on a cold front, and as Zen closed his eyes, the clouds gave up some of their water. The rain fell strongly enough to flush the salt from his face, but the rest of him was already so wet that he barely noticed. The wind kicked up, there was a flash of lightning — and then the air was calm. In a few minutes, the moon peeked out from the edge of the clouds. The stars followed, and what had been an almost pitch-black night turned into a silver-bathed twilight.

Zen sat up and tried to examine the place where he had landed. There were no large trees that he could see, and if there were any bushes, they blended with the boulders in the distance. He groped his way up the hill, maneuvering around loose boulders and outcroppings until he reached the crest. There was another slope beyond, and then the sea, though it was impossible to tell if he was on an island or a peninsula, because another hill rose to his right.

He turned back to the spot where he had come in, perhaps a hundred feet away. The water lapped over rocks, the tops of the waves shining like small bits of tinsel in the moonlight. The sound was a constant tschct-tschct-tschct, an unworldly hum of rock and wave.

One of the rocks near the shoreline seemed larger than the rest, and more curiously shaped. Zen stared at it, unable to parse the shadow from the stone. He scanned the rest of the ocean, then returned, more curious. He moved to his right, then farther down the slope.

It wasn’t a rock, he realized. It was a person.

Breanna, he thought, throwing himself forward.

Danny Freah crouched against the side of the Abner Read’s boat, waiting for the chance to pluck one of the fliers from the water. The boat was a souped-up Zodiac, custom-made for the littoral warcraft that carried her. Special cells in the hull and preloaded filler made the boats difficult to sink, and the engine, propelled by hydrogen fuel cells, was both fast and quiet. Danny decided he would see about getting some for Whiplash when he got home.

Jan Stewart was the first of the Levitow’s crewmen to be picked up. Her teeth chattered as Danny helped her in. One of the sailors wrapped a waterproof “space blanket” around her and gave her a chemical warming pouch. Dork — Lieutenant Dennis Thrall, a Flighthawk pilot — was next. His face was swollen and his lips blue.

Dork’s hands were so swollen that he couldn’t activate the warmer. Danny took it from him and twisted gently, feeling the heat instantly as the chemical reaction began.

“Thanks, Cap,” said Dork in a husky voice. “Where’s Zen?”

“Still looking.”

“He and Bree were going out after us. They had to jump.”

“Yeah, I know,” said Danny.

“They should be south of us,” said Lieutenant Dick “Bullet” Timmons, huddling next to Dork. Bullet had been the Levitow’s second-shift pilot. “We were flying west. They would have bailed only a few seconds later.”

“We’ll find them,” said Danny.

He glanced over his shoulder at the Indian frigate, sitting in an oblong splash of moonlight a mile away. The Indians had volunteered to help with the rescue, but no one knew whether they could be trusted. It had been Indian missiles, after all, that had shot down the Levitow.

“We were jumped by Indian MiGs and Sukhois on our way to deploy the EEMWBs,” Bullet told Danny. His voice was rushed; he seemed to need to tell what had happened to them, to explain why they were down in the water. “They kept nicking us. The Flighthawks were gone because of the T-Rays. Then finally, one of the Sukhois got us with an AMRAAMski. Plane held together but there was too much damage to keep it in the air. Bree did a hell of a job getting us out over the water and just holding it stable enough to jump. Really she did.”

“We’ll debrief back at the ship,” Danny told him gently. “It’s all right.”

But the pilot kept talking.

“She ordered everyone else to jump. She and Zen stayed behind. She was going to jump, though. Definitely. She was going out. Zen too. She knew she couldn’t fly it back. And there was no way she was landing in India. The Levitow was shielded against the T-Rays. She wouldn’t have let them have the plane, even if she could have landed it. No way.”

“Relax,” Danny said, grabbing another warmer for him. “We’ll find them.”

Zen knew better than to flail against the waves, but he did it anyway, throwing himself into the teeth of the tide, pushing and pulling and swimming and dragging himself to his wife.

It was Breanna. He knew it before he could see her face in the pale light, before he could make out the raft, or the horse-shoelike collar she still wore. He just knew it.

What he didn’t know was whether she was alive.

He fought against doubt, battering his arms against the rocks.

Ten feet.

But those last ten feet were like miles. The water rushed at him as if the ocean wanted to keep her for its own. Zen clawed and crawled forward, pushing toward her, until finally he touched the back of her helmet.

His fingers seemed to snap back with electricity. His guard dissolved. If she hadn’t even taken off her helmet, how could she be alive?

“Bree,” whispered Zen. “Bree.”

His voice was so soft even he had a hard time hearing it over the surf.

“Bree, we have to get to land. Come on, honey.”

Not daring to look at her face, not daring to take off her helmet, he reached into the raft, looped one hand gently around her torso, and began pulling her toward shore.

Jennifer Gleason folded her arms as the argument continued over which weapons to ship to Diego Garcia.

“Anaconda missiles give the Megafortress pilots a long-range antiaircraft option,” said Terrence Calder, the Air Force major who headed the AIM-154 program. “In addition, they can use them against land targets if necessary. You don’t have to worry about the mix of Harpoons and AMRAAM-pluses. It’s win-win.”

“Not if the guidance systems don’t function perfectly,” said Ray Rubeo.

“They’ve passed most of the tests.”

“There’s that word ‘most’ again,” said Rubeo. “Most means not all, which means not ready.”

There was no question that the Anaconda AIM-154 long-range strike missile was an excellent weapon. A scramjet-powered hypersonic missile, it had a lethal range of nearly two hundred miles. It could ride a radar beam to its target, use its own onboard radar, or rely on an infrared seeker in its nose to hit home. For long-range or hypersonic engagements, the missile’s main solid motor boosted it to over Mach 3. As it reached that speed, the missile deployed air scoops, turning the motor chamber into a ramjet, boosting speed to Mach 5. Its warhead could be fashioned from either conventional high explosives or a more powerful thermium nitrate, which was especially useful against ground targets.

The only knock against the missile was the fact that, as Rubeo pointed out, it still had not passed all of its tests. Like any new weapons system, the Anaconda had a few teething problems; in this case, they were primarily related to the target acquisition system and its interface with the Megafortresses’ computer systems, which Jennifer had been helping fix for the past few weeks.

“I think we will err on the side of capability,” said Major Catsman finally. “We’ll ship the missiles to Diego Garcia and let Colonel Bastian make the final call.”

Rubeo frowned. A smug look appeared on Calder’s face.

Catsman looked frustrated. Unlike Colonel Bastian, who sometimes went out of his way to encourage dissent on military options, the major seemed frazzled by the differing opinions on how to help reinforce the Dreamland team. Since Colonel Bastian would have the final say on Diego Garcia, whether to send the Anaconda missiles or not was more a personnel issue than a weapons decision since sending the weapons would necessitate sending maintainers and techies to deal with them.

The real problem was the fact that only one radar-equipped Megafortress was available for deployment, and there was no answer to that; Catsman knew she couldn’t flip a switch and speed up the refurbishment process. The EB-52 Cheli, just barely out of final flight testing, was already en route to Diego Garcia and would arrive shortly. The next radar version of the Megafortress wasn’t even due to get to Dreamland from the refurbishment works for another month.

At least they had solved the problem of the two warheads that were missing from the projections. Rubeo found an error in the modifications that had been used to adapt the tracking program to its present use. But even that didn’t satisfy the scientist. Rather than accepting congratulations gracefully, he answered with the question: “And what else did we miss?

“The new Flighthawks will give the Megafortresses better capability,” said Rubeo, still not done arguing his point. “That’s all they need.”

“No, Ray, the matter is settled,” said Catsman. “We’ll send the Anacondas. And the new Flighthawks.”

Similar in appearance to the original U/MF-3, the U/MF-3D had more powerful engines and a control system that would let it be piloted much farther from the Megafortress. While they, too, were in short supply, the aircraft had already passed their tests and were ready to deploy.

Jennifer found her mind drifting as the discussion continued. She couldn’t concentrate on head counts and spare part contingencies; all she could think of was Dog.

He hadn’t even looked at her, or asked how she was, when he briefed the Command Center.

And he looked like hell.

He needed her. She needed him.

“I’m going with the MC-17,” she told Catsman as soon as the meeting ended. “I’ll help the technical teams. The new Flighthawks may need some work.”

“They don’t need a nanny,” said Rubeo.

Major Catsman just looked at her. Rubeo was right — the technical teams were self-contained. While she had worked on C³, the Flighthawk computer, her contributions were completed long ago.

“The Anaconda missiles also need work,” she said.

“Another reason not to send them,” said Rubeo. “And it’s not your project.”

“I’ve worked on them,” said Jennifer.

“We need you to do other things,” insisted Rubeo. “There is a great deal of work.”

“If you think you should go,” said Catsman, “then you should go.”

“I think I should,” said Jennifer. “And I am.”

Zen cradled Breanna in his lap as he pulled himself up toward the peak of the slope. Finally he stopped, collapsing on his side. Breanna fell with him, her weight dead against his body. At first he was too exhausted to think, too wiped to feel anything. Then gradually he realized where he was and who was lying on top of him.

“OK, Breanna,” he said. “Breanna? Bree?”

He lay on his back for a few minutes, an hour — it was impossible to tell how long. Clouds covered the moon then slowly slipped away. Finally, he shifted Breanna off him, sliding her weight away gently.

Far in the distance, he heard a groan.

The sound was so faint he wasn’t even sure he’d heard it at first. Then he thought it was an animal. Then, finally, he realized it had come from his wife.

“Bree,” he said, pushing up. “Bree?”

Zen rolled her onto her back, then undid her helmet strap, still not daring to look at her face. Without the ability to kneel, he had to shift himself around awkwardly until he was sitting and her head was resting on his thighs. He closed his eyes and removed the helmet, prying as gently as possible, cradling her head down to the ground.

Her face was badly bruised. Zen guessed she’d hit the plane going out, probably harder than he had.

She looked peaceful, except for the purple welts. She looked like she was sleeping.

Tears came to his eyes. He was sure he’d imagined the sound; sure she was dead.

Until her lips parted.

Cautiously, he pushed his face down to hers. She was breathing.

“Bree?” he said, pulling back upright. “Bree?”

She didn’t say anything, but he thought she stirred.

“I’m here, baby,” he said, leaning back down as close as he could. “I’m here.”

“Search pattern is complete, colonel,” Englehardt told Dog as the Megafortress completed the last orbit. “Nothing.”

“The Lincoln’s search assets will be up within the hour,” added Lieutenant Sullivan. “We’ve given them the flight projections Dreamland ran.”

His men were subtly telling him that it was time to get on with the rest of their mission — finding the warheads. They had roughly six hundred miles to go before getting into the search area.

Dog pushed a long breath from his lungs.

“All right.” Dog couldn’t quite force enthusiasm into his voice; he had to settle for authority. “Mikey, get us on course. I’m going to take another shot at taking a nap. Wake me up when we’re starting the search.”

“You got it, Colonel.”

Dog tapped the back of the pilot’s seat and started for the upper Flighthawk bay. Daly put up his hand and stopped him as he passed.

“We’ll find her, Colonel. Starship or someone will get her. And Zen. Don’t worry.”

Dog patted the sergeant on the shoulder.

“Thanks,” he told him. “I know we will.”