Halabi found herself in two minds. She agreed that the best role for the Trident was as a floating early-warning center. But she felt isolated here in her own country, and the brief prospect of rejoining the community of Multinational Force ships was quietly appealing.

She had retired to her ready room and suddenly realized it was the first time in over a day and a half she'd been alone. Kolhammer looked tired, but not as tired as she felt.

"I'm sorry, sir. Excuse me," she said, stifling a yawn.

"That's all right, Captain. You've earned some rack time."

"Soon enough, Admiral. The Germans are in retreat. The bulk of their invasion fleet didn't make it past the halfway point. And they're not reinforcing the airborne forces that did land."

"I read the last burst," said Kolhammer. "There's some hard fighting around Ipswich. But infantry against armor? It won't last."

Halabi frowned. "Your burst is a bit out of date, I'm afraid, sir. The British First Armored had to pull back. The Germans were a mix of Fallschirmjager and SS Special Forces. They were pretty well equipped with portable antiarmor systems. Panzerfaust Two-fifties, I think. Or a variation on that theme, anyway. A lot of them had good, basic body armor and they were all packing assault rifles with an over-under grenade launcher. They chewed up a lot of our men."

Kolhammer's mouth was set in a grim line. "So what's happening? Do they have any kind of squad-level antiair systems?"

Halabi shook her head. "No, sir. So that's what's happening. The RAF have regained tactical control of our airspace, and those Cyclone gunships are near permanent fixtures above the German strongpoints."

"I see. How's their ammunition holding up?"

"I think we'll run out of Germans before we run out of ammo, sir."

Kolhammer sighed. "Well, we can't do much better than that."

The link dropped out.

Halabi stared at the wall of static for a full minute, wondering if the admiral might reconnect, but he didn't.

She rubbed her eyes, which felt as though they'd been baking inside a pizza oven. She sent a quick note to McTeale, updating him on the schedule for Metal Storm reloads. The Trident hummed under her feet. They'd withdrawn into the comparatively safer waters south of Ireland. It meant that the ship's own sensors weren't available to directly monitor the main battlespace over the Channel and the southern counties, but the Admiralty had decided that with the German attack effectively broken, they could afford to downgrade to drone cover only.

Halabi chuckled: a dry, mirthless sound.

A few months ago, the 'temps wouldn't have thought of drone coverage as a "downgrade." It would have been a bloody miracle.

Indeed, it was a bloody miracle, in the literal sense of the phrase, and it had saved her homeland.

As she slumped into her bunk, she refused to think about the fact that some people didn't agree it was her home at all.

COMMAND BUNKER, RASTENBURG, EAST PRUSSIA

It took many hours for the true state of affairs to emerge, but the Reichsfuhrer had begun to suspect that Sea Dragon might fail when his own contribution, the Sonderaktiontruppen, were shattered before they had even reached the British Isles.

Reports had to be filed via landline, because of the Allies' ability to read and decode all the Reich's radio traffic. When Himmler finally got word that over half his own airborne regiment had been annihilated in transit, the magnitude of the disaster was already coming into focus.

Nearly two hundred Allied fighter planes had drilled right through the insane confusion of the air battle over the seas around England to attack the transports carrying the SS regiment. It was as though a vengeful God had lead them there. But he knew better. The Trident had guided them onto the target. He'd known the ship had that capability. But how had it known which flight, out of the many thousands of sorties flown today, had been the crucial one? There was only one answer to that. A very old-fashioned answer.

Treachery.

"It is just not possible. How dare they, how dare they?" the fuhrer raged.

The atmosphere in the command bunker was bleak, tending toward ominous. There would be many, many people to punish for this calamitous failure. Himmler's unforgiving gaze fell upon Goring. He was drunk and blustering about the large numbers of Spitfires and Hurricanes his men had shot down. That may well be, but the RAF's air defense net was nowhere near as badly degraded as the Luftwaffe chief had insisted. And the Trident had survived every attack thrown against it with apparent ease.

Yes, it was the fuhrer himself who had downplayed the importance of the ship's electronic senses. What had he said?

What did it matter if the British had a perfect view of their doom as it came rushing at them? It was still their doom.

Well, that was hardly his fault. The fuhrer had repeatedly stated that he had no feel for naval combat. It had been Raeder's job to advise him on those matters. The senior Kriegsmarine officer hadn't spoken since news of the Tirpitz had come in via safe-hand courier. Preparing his excuses, thought Himmler.

Hitler alternated between screaming at his subordinates-ordering them to deploy units already confirmed as lost-and muttering to himself about the depth of betrayal he had been forced to endure.

Himmler kept to himself, wondering what could be salvaged.

All his hopes now lay with Skorzeny.

37

Stealing the truck had been remarkably simple. Tens of thousands of military vehicles were on the move, and contrary to the comic book school of war, not everything ran smoothly. Vehicles broke down. Drivers didn't know which turn to take. Whole divisions got lost. Convoys were attacked and shot up from the air. Many trucks were abandoned, pushed off the road, simply because their drivers knew nothing about them beyond how to start the ignition.

Harold Philby wasn't much of a mechanic himself, but two of Skorzeny's men were. They had the broken down deuce-and-a-half running again within fifteen minutes. As a bonus, it was fitted out as a medical transport, with a red cross painted prominently on the canvas tarpaulin that covered the rear bed. After a hurried conference with the German commander, it was agreed that this would provide even better cover than a normal military truck, in which they ran the risk of being commandeered and attached to any combat unit they might run into.

Skorzeny had his men wrap themselves in the bloodied uniforms and bandages of the previous, missing occupants. Then they all piled into litters in the back. One of the most fluent English speakers was nominated as their "medic" to attend the wounded.

"Let's go then, tovarich." Skorzeny grinned.

He reminded Philby of a fox licking shit from a wire brush. The traitor put aside his visceral dislike of the fascist and gunned the engine. It kicked over after two attempts, and he pulled back onto the road.

They were well north of London, with at least half a day's travel in front of them and absolutely no guarantee of surviving it. He doubted that he would survive, even if they made the objective. Number Five had been quite explicit about the steps he should take to escape when he'd delivered Skorzeny, but after six months on the run, the rogue spy knew just how hard it was going to be to avoid detection once he'd put his head up. Unlike Burgess and Maclean, he'd gone to ground immediately upon learning of the Transition, and he was still alive because of it. The others, he had no idea. They could be dead, or more likely they were being detained somewhere by the SIS, tortured with the drugs and interrogation machines that were said to have arrived with the dark woman and the Trident.