Of course, had he been trained as a weapons operator, a glance at the panel would have told him all this. But then if he’d been a real weapons operator, he wouldn’t have been fooling around in the first place.

Actually, the same might be said for a pilot, or any officer of the U.S. Air Force, Navy, or Army, whose duty might reasonably be said to include restrictions against being a bonehead in a potential war zone.

Without saying anything, without breathing, Mack slid back into his copilot’s seat, sure that his career in the U.S. Air Force had just ended.

At least he hadn’t shot down the planes. The J-11s pulled off to the north, making tracks.

No one else said anything as he pulled on his headset. Mack glanced toward the prince. His face was red.

Probably, he couldn’t be jailed for what was just a dumb-ass mistake. Court-martialed, sure.

But jailed?

If they did jail him, would it be in Brunei or the U.S.?

A communication came in from the Australian frigate.

Mack listened as the prince gave his position and intentions; they were homeward bound.

“Scared those buggers off, mate,” said the Australian. “Good for you.”

Obviously, it wasn’t a flag officer talking. Bin Awg acknowledged with his ID, but said nothing else.

“I, uh, I—” started Mack. He intended to apologize, but apologies had never exactly been his strong suit. His tongue froze in his mouth.

“Major?” said the prince.

“Um.”

“Major Mack Smith, you have just done something I wish I had the guts to do ten years ago. You sent the devils packing. This is a great moment. A very, very great moment.”

If Mack had had trouble speaking a moment before, he was utterly speechless now. He wanted to tell the prince that, in all honesty, he was exaggerating by a country mile.

Then he thought he’d apologize, say he hadn’t thought the gun was loaded, and throw himself on the mercy of the court. Maybe the prince might say a few words on his behalf.

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But nothing came out of his mouth.

Bin Awg turned to him. “Well done. Well, well done.”

“Uh, thanks,” was all Mack could manage to get out of his mouth.

Aboard Penn, over the South China Sea

1424

DOG CHECKED THESITREP. They had Chinese J-11s to the south of them, J-11s to the west, a big ol’ Russian Coot, and even a U.S. Navy P-3—but no ghost clone, at least not that they could see. He hoped Raven was having better luck.

“They’re getting to be at bingo now, sir,” said the copilot, whom Dog had asked to keep track of the Flighthawk status. “Bingo” in the Flighthawk referred to the point at which they had to refuel.

“ Hawk One, this is Penn. How’s your fuel state?” said Dog.

“Getting edgy,” replied Starship.

“What’s edgy?”

“Uh, we’re getting there.”

Dog shook his head. The nugget was like a kid who’d been swimming in a pool all afternoon and didn’t want to get out even though his lips were chattering and his body was blue. As long as he didn’t admit being cold, he wouldn’t be.

Didn’t work that way with jet fuel, though.

“ Hawk One, have you discovered the secret to perpetual motion?” Dog asked.

“Um, excuse me, Colonel?”

“Time for you to refuel, no?”

“Yes, sir. I’m ready.”

“All right, let’s radio the fleet that we’re breaking off and going home,” Dog told the entire crew.

STARSHIP SLID BACKin his seat as the computer took the Flighthawk in and began the refuel.

He was tired and more than a bit frustrated. All that flying and no sight of the ghost clone.

Not to mention the fact that the Chinese fighters had stayed well clear of him.

“Tired?” Kick asked.

“Nah,” said Starship.

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“Zen’s probably tracking him right now.”

“Yeah.”

“You hear what happened with the Brunei Badger?”

“Something happened?” Starship had been too intent on his own mission to bother with anything that didn’t concern him.

“Couple of J-11s buzzed them just about an hour ago. Mack Smith sent them packing with a burst of cannon fire across their bow.”

“Live gunfire?”

“No shit,” said Kick.

“Wow. He allowed to do that?” Starship’s ROEs strictly forbade him from firing except in the most dire of circumstances, and if he had tried that Zen would have found a way to kick his butt back to Dreamland.

“Got away with it. Nobody’s complaining.”

“Those the planes we saw earlier?”

“Yup.”

“They were probably just out of fuel,” said Starship. “They were operating at the edge of their range.”

“Yeah, well, that’s not the way the Brunei prince sees it. They’re sending airplanes out to escort them back to a hero’s welcome. I’m not making this up.”

“Man, I wish I had Mack Smith’s life,” said Starship as the computer buzzed him. The refuel complete, he took over from the electronic brain, ducking down and then zooming ahead of the Pennsylvania to lead her back to the base.

Dreamland

10 September 1997

2344

DANNYFREAH GOTup from his desk in the security office, his eyes so blurry that he couldn’t read any of the papers on his desk. He’d been staring at computer reports along with summaries of regulations, laws, and previous investigations for over four hours.

For all that, he probably knew less now than when he’d started. As head of security at Dreamland, Danny had extraordinary powers to investigate possible espionage; he didn’t even have to rely on Colonel Bas-tian’s authority in most cases. Everyone who worked at the base had to sign long, complicated agreements that essentially stripped him of privacy and made Danny Freah Big Brother. If events warranted, he could tap their phones, read their mail, even enter their homes.

But what he needed in this sort of case was the ability to read people’s minds. Because it just wasn’t clear to him that anyone—Jennifer Gleason especially—had betrayed his country, knowingly or Page 94

unknowingly.

Occasionally during the Cold War, technology theft was straight-out obvious—the Soviet Union produced a four-engine bomber based on a B-29 a few months after the plane landed in the country’s Far East, for example. But much more often, the theft was considerably more subtle and nuanced.

The Soviet Tu-95 bomber, for example, had probably been influenced by American designs—yet it did not directly correspond to anything in the American inventory. Were similarities between American jets and advanced MiGs and Sukhois due to similar design requirements and constraints, or espionage?

When was a copycat simply that—and when was it an act of treachery?

Danny needed more extensive data about the ghost clone before he could even decide whether there might be a case here. Even then, he’d need really, really hard evidence to take to Colonel Bastian—or to Bastian’s superiors, if Danny decided the colonel couldn’t be unbiased.

Cortend, on the other hand, worked on the premise that espionage had occurred, and therefore she would find it. She didn’t really care what effect she had on the base, much less on the people she was grilling. And because she wasn’t conducting an official investigation—not yet, anyway—she could ignore a lot of the standard rules and procedures designed to prevent abuses. She bullied people into cooperating “voluntarily” and then screwed them, or tried to.

Danny wasn’t like that. He didn’t nail people without damn good reason to do so.

Should he?

Maybe Jennifer did know something, or had done something really wrong. She was pretty antagonistic, and hadn’t been acting particularly, well, innocent.

She’d answered all the questions, though. She claimed she didn’t remember the conferences or the paperwork.

Probably that was true. He couldn’t remember back a few years himself. And as for paperwork …