Cyclops One af-1 Page 3

  “Air Force?”

  “Contract test pilot. Works directly for NADT, like just about everybody else here. She’s about thirty. Supposed to be a dish. Haven’t seen the photos yet.”

  “Put me in for the eight by ten. What kind of underwear does she wear?”

  Gorman frowned severely in their direction, then looked back to her groupies in the front row. “I’m in the process of requesting more people for the monkey work. Again, I remind you: Everywhere you go on this base, you go with security. You know the drill. Questions?”

  “I have one,” said Fisher quickly. “Where’s the smoking lounge?”

  “For those few of you privileged not to know Special Agent Andrew Fisher, that is him in the rumpled gray suit. He is our lone representative from the FBI, assigned to be as annoying as possible. Obviously the Bureau does not believe this is a very important case. Agent Fisher likes to play class clown, though fortunately today he has left his red nose and floppy shoes at home. He will act as FBI liaison and attempt to grab as much glory as he can, while at the same time doing nothing more than drinking coffee and smoking cigarettes, though not in that order.”

  “I thought grabbing glory was your job,” said Fisher innocently.

  Gorman gave him some dagger eyes, then turned to answer other questions from the assorted teacher’s pets. The only one that interested Fisher was the one she shrugged in answer to: Why hadn’t the emergency locator beacons on the downed planes been picked up yet?

  The answer was, there were no locator beacons. Because of the nature of the project, the planes flew without ident gear that would identify them if properly queried. They didn’t have black boxes or any of the otherwise useful gear that would, presumably, have made them easier to find. In fairness, all the monitoring gear they were carrying for the trial exercises would ordinarily be more than enough to supply pinpoint positions in the case of an emergency. But whatever had blanked the systems in all the planes had made them impossible to track as well.

  As the questions faded, Fisher got up to leave. A few people nodded at him, but with the exception of Kowalski and Gorman he didn’t know anyone here very well. Probably just as well: It would make it easier to bum cigarettes the first few days.

  “Hold on, Andy,” said Gorman as he started toward the door.

  “Hey, Gorgeous.”

  “Knock off the crap. This is my show.”

  “I saw your name in lights outside.”

  “Just do your job.”

  “And save your ass like in Italy?”

  “There are two opinions on that.”

  “Yours and everyone else’s?”

  “Oh, you’re a master comedian.”

  “Yeah, I’m doing Vegas next week,” said Fisher. “Look, I’d love to trade bon mots with you, but I’m dying for a smoke. Where do I find the pilot of the F/A-22. Howe, right?”

  “Who says you’re talking to Colonel Howe?” Gorman’s cheeks not only colored red but seemed to rise on her face. “I just went through the various assignments. This—”

  “If you’re going to be a pain, we can call General Whatzhisname and ask him to read that long paragraph from DOD Memorandum 17-85B. The verbiage is a bit obscure, but I think it says something to the effect that you have to cooperate with me or get a good spanking. Of course, if that’s what you’re interested in…”

  “Just stay out of my way,” said Gorman, walking away so quickly her escort had to double-time down the hall.

  “Let’s go, Kato,” Fisher said to the sergeant looming at his elbow. “Smoke, food, meaning of life. More or less in that order.”

  “Sir?”

  “You can knock off the ‘sir’ routine,” he told the noncom, who looked to be about thirty. The patch on the pocket of his combat camos declared his name was JHNSN. “I know you don’t mean it. Just call me Fisher. Or Andy, if you’re pissed off. Come on, I need a smoke.”

  “We have to go outside.”

  “Yeah, or the men’s room,” Fisher told him. “But today we’ll go outside, because it’s always nice to make a good first impression.”

  Chapter 3

  Howard McIntyre settled into his first-class seat, indulging in a fantasy about the stewardess who was pouring the champagne. He was just removing her bra when one of the two cell phones he carried in his suit jacket — he had a third in his briefcase, along with an encrypted phone — rang.

  The attendant was just good-looking enough to tempt him not to answer, and he might not have if the call hadn’t been on his “A” phone, a special encoded satellite phone with global coverage reserved for his boss, National Security Advisor Michael Blitz.

  “McIntyre,” he said.

  “Where are you?”

  “Sitting on the airplane, about to take off for Hawaii,” McIntyre told Blitz.

  “Get off and call me.”

  “It may be too late. We’re about to taxi.”

  “Then find a parachute.”

  “Doc—”

  “Don’t give me the Doc line and don’t call me Professor,” said Blitz. “Get off the plane and call me back.”

  McIntyre stifled a curse and got out of his seat, reminding himself for the one millionth time in the past year that being a public servant meant putting off personal pleasure in hopes of much greater rewards in the future.

  Though at times it was hard to imagine what those rewards could possibly be.

  Twenty minutes later McIntyre found himself standing in the middle of the rental car lot, briefcase and carry-on in one hand, secure KY-118 phone — handheld computer in the other.

  “Mac, what’s the latest?” asked Blitz. The NSC head was already in Hawaii, which was obvious from the background noises of the reception.

  McIntyre could have played dumb, but that would only lessen the already infinitesimal chance that he could talk Blitz into changing his mind about what he wanted him to do. Both men knew each other well enough — McIntyre had been Blitz’s graduate assistant a million years before — to guess exactly what the other was thinking.

  “Uh, nothing new on Cyclops One as of two hours ago, Doc. I had a secure videoconference with them to do the rah-rah thing, but—”

  “I want you up there ASAP.”

  “Aw, Professor.”

  “To the best of my knowledge, my current employer is the U.S. government, not Harvard.”

  “I’m due in Hawaii for the augmented-ABM tests,” pleaded McIntyre. “I mean, my main area is technology, and if that’s not technology…”

  “There are plenty of people here. More than we need.”

  “But, uh…” It was difficult to argue that he was needed in Hawaii — in fact, almost no one was, outside the actual work crews who monitored the test missile firings. Three different company coalitions were taking part in the tests, which called for long-distance, low-altitude strikes of small warheads, such as those that could be carried by cruise missiles.

  The augmented system would greatly enhance “standard” ABM capabilities, closing a serious gap in the defense system and making the U.S. impervious to attack. While the tests involved surface-launched missiles, the production model would include satellite batteries that would eventually provide global coverage. It would be the last and most powerful part of a complicated blanket that would include tactical coverage from Cyclops laser planes — great at short-range interception but very limited beyond three or four hundred miles — and high-altitude ballistic interceptions from the “normal” ABM system, which couldn’t target short-range warheads, let alone cruise missiles. When built, the augmented ABM system would revolutionize warfare. It might even make it obsolete.

  Assuming, of course, the system could be made to work. Surprisingly, none of the companies responsible for the standard ABM system had done very well in the tests so far. The surprise winner in the simulations had been a team headed by Jolice Missile Systems.

  McIntyre didn’t particularly like the Jolice people — arrogant rich bastards well connected
in Washington. He expected them to fall on their asses in the Hawaii tests, though not before their hospitality party — which, if past was prologue, would feature the best available babes in Hawaii.

  “You’re stuttering, Mac,” said Blitz.

  “I don’t know that I can do anything Gorman and Bonham can’t. They assured me twenty minutes ago that they’d be recovering the planes anytime now,” said McIntyre.

  That didn’t draw an immediate response, so McIntyre added, “There’s a couple of hundred — must be a thousand — people involved in the search. The weather was a bitch, and that’s the only reason it hasn’t been wrapped up yet.”

  “The President just asked me why you weren’t there.”

  “Yes, sir,” said McIntyre. “So, how do I get to North Lake?”

  “I have a jet en route from Edwards right now.”

  * * *

  Dr. Michael Blitz paced the length of the room, his right hand rubbing the nubby outline of his goatee, his left hitched back into his belt. It was a pose the students in his international relations seminar at Harvard would have recognized as presaging a major pronouncement, more than likely some wild metaphor comparing a campaign in the Napoleonic Wars to a Cold War tête-à-tête between Nixon and Mao Zedong, with a snide reference to Henry Kissinger thrown in for laughs.

  But this wasn’t Harvard. And while the suite of rooms in the Hawaiian hotel where he was pacing was considerably more luxurious than his usual academic haunts, at the moment he would have gladly exchanged the surroundings.

  Not the job, just the surroundings.

  The two floors below him swarmed with contractors whose companies had staked billions on the right to build the next phase of America’s global augmented ABM system. The name itself was anachronistic, considering that the intent of the next phase was actually to defend against non-ballistic warheads, but it was difficult enough to get the administration and Congress to agree on a goal; changing the name to something more appropriate — long-range, high-speed automated interceptor, for example — would have required political skills beyond even Blitz’s impressive repertoire. Integrated with the standard ABM system and short-range weapons such as the airborne laser and theater defenses, the augmented ABM system would provide a true, extendible shield for the world, finally fulfilling the Reagan vision of the 1980’s of making nuclear weapons obsolete.

  For Blitz, the system represented an opportunity for an entirely new view of the world. America wouldn’t simply be the most powerful country on the globe; it would be the ensurer of peace. The augmented ABM system represented a chance at completely altering global politics, and even though he was cautious and conservative by nature, he couldn’t help but be awed by the possibilities.

  On the other hand, the missile system would also make many rich people even richer. Thus, the representatives of the three coalitions in Hawaii for the tests were like rival motorcycle gangs who’d happened to pick the same town to rampage through. They were nice to Blitz, of course — overly nice, and very eager to run down their competition. Rumors of malfeasance, chicanery, and corruption were more common than the olives in the hospitality suites. And there were a lot of olives.

  The tests were hardly Blitz’s only or even main worry at the moment. Losing Cyclops One and its F/A-22V escort during testing, probably over Canada, was a major headache, though he might be able to use it to persuade the President to dispense with NADT and the other quasi-governmental agencies and independent firms that had moved into place during the last administration to facilitate weapons development and procurement. To Blitz’s mind, farming out national security to private interests undermined the military and therefore national security itself, but it was a difficult notion to sell in these days of shrinking government.

  Even the Cyclops accident paled next to the situation in India and Pakistan. Blitz and the rest of the National Security Council were receiving hourly updates on tensions there. Militants on both sides of the border were pushing for a serious confrontation, not just in Kashmir, but across the Rann of Kutch to the southeast. U.S. intelligence estimates had both countries mobilizing large parts of their armies and placing their nuclear forces at or near their top levels of alert.

  “Dr. Blitz, it’s time for the conference call with the Japanese defense minister,” said Blitz’s assistant, Mozelle Clark, calling through the door. “And, uh, room service left a coffee cart outside. And, uh, goodies.”

  Blitz had ordered the coffee but not the dessert. He opened the door.Goodies was an understatement: A two-tiered cake stood in the middle of several hundred assorted Italian cookies, along with a phalanx of profiteroles and rum cakes. An envelope stood amid the pile in the corner of the table, undoubtedly announcing which contractor had bestowed the sweets.

  “Make sure there’s no cash in the envelope,” said Blitz. “Then dump the cookies.”

  “Want me to give them to the security people?”

  “No way,” insisted Blitz. “Take them downstairs to the lobby, find some four- or five-year-old, and tell them it’s an early Christmas.”

  “They look good,” said Mozelle, who was eyeing one of the rum cakes.

  “The Devil always does. Please, before I’m tempted to find out who sent them and hold it against them.”

  “Secretary of State’s office called: They want another conference on India and Pakistan in half an hour. Word is, the secretary wants to send a delegation,” added Mozelle.

  “Just great. You volunteering?”

  Mozelle laughed, then grew serious. “You are joking, right?”

  “Yes.” Blitz folded his arms. “All right, I give in.”

  Mozelle gave him a quizzical look.

  “Give me one of those cookies. Then get rid of the tray.”

  Chapter 4

  Howe sat in the steel chair, staring at the blank white board at the front of the room, arms crossed, feet flat on the floor. The latest of the marathon debriefings had ended only a few minutes before, more or less as the others had ended: with his voice trailing off mid-sentence and the investigators standing around nervously waiting for him to continue.

  Most likely they thought he was haunted by the accident, affected because he’d lost his wingman and lover. That wasn’t it: He just didn’t know what else to say. He’d gone over and over and over it until the words had no connection to what had happened.

  Probably they didn’t know Megan was his lover. They’d always been pretty careful about that, and no one had brought it up yet.

  He could feel her next to him, laughing.

  “You’ve never seen Ben-Hur? The greatest movie ever made?”

  She’d said that three weeks ago, in the Starr Bar, the little place they’d found “off campus” a good fifty miles away. Megan had started to explain the movie to him, shifting her body to take the different parts in the chariot race, moving fluidly in the dim light of the small room, mesmerizing him. She’d continued after they paid up and walked to the car, pausing for a kiss, continuing as they rode down the deserted highway back to North Lake.

  That was the moment he’d realized there could be many conversations like that — long, meandering talks in the middle of the night. When they lived together, or got married, conversations would go on for hours and days, even; he’d hear her talk and watch her hands moving through the air, mimicking the beautiful curves of her body.

  When they got married…? Had he thought that then?

  No. That was something he was thinking now. He — they — hadn’t gotten that far. It wasn’t even hinted.

  Howe had been married once, and it was a bust. But Megan was different, ideas flowing from her, thoughts—

  And the sex, of course.

  She had promised to buy Ben-Hur from Amazon.com so they could see it. The DVD had to take a roundabout route because of the covers involved in protecting the secrecy of the base; it hadn’t arrived yet.

  It wasn’t so much her death as her complete disappearance that drove a hole in his c
hest.

  “You’re Colonel Howe, right?”

  Howe jerked his head around. A tallish man with a pallid face stood in the doorway, shadowed by a tall Air Force security sergeant. The civilian wore a somewhat disheveled gray suit; he might be athletic under it — he didn’t look fat or particularly thin — but his body slouched in a way that made it hard to tell.

  “Who are you?” asked Howe.

  “Fisher, FBI.”

  “You think the planes got kidnapped?” said Howe, getting up. He decided he’d been interviewed enough today.

  “Actually, I think they were used in a bank robbery. Got a minute?”

  “No,” said Howe. “I have to go check on the search.”

  “Ah, Jemma can screw that up on her own,” said Fisher. “And if not, she has about a million people helping her. I want to know about Captain Williams.”

  “What about him?”

  “What kind of guy was he?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “As a person.”

  Howe shrugged.

  “Did he like money?” asked Fisher, as if he knew the answer was yes.

  “Money?” The other investigators had gone over the flight procedures and the myriad details of what had happened ad infinitum, but this came completely out of left field. “What the hell are you getting at?”

  “How about York?”

  “Megan York’s family’s richer than hell. One of her cousins is a congressman. What is it you want, Mr. Fisher?”

  “Rest of the people on her crew? There were four all together, right, counting her?”

  “You think we crashed the planes for money?”

  “ ‘We’?”

  Howe’s anger had risen so quickly it surprised even him. He felt as if he were looking at himself from across the room, watching his body pitch forward, his arms stiff at his sides, hands balled into fists. He stuck his face about six inches from the FBI agent’s; they were nearly the same height, with Fisher maybe an inch taller.

  The agent didn’t flinch. His expression, in fact, remained the same: quizzical puzzlement mixed with a certain reserve wariness. Howe pulled his face back, sensing he’d been purposely provoked.