It’s looking at our radar, Dazhou realized. The Russians had sold Brunei a radar homing device, and they had been smart enough to use it.

“Turn off the radar,” said Dazhou quickly. “Fire more chaff. Helm, resume evasive pattern.”

The mortars with the chaff roared at the back. The Barracuda hunkered down as her helmsman, worried that turning too sharply would tip them over disastrously, shunted left vaguely, then back right.

“Harder, helm,” said Dazhou. He reached to the control wheel, placing his hand on his crewman’s. He was not showing the man that he didn’t lack confidence in him—he was taking responsibility for the brash maneuver.

The Barracuda roared and shot left, nearly pirouetting around on its wing and flipping over as it tried to follow the harsh jerks on its controls. Dazhou barely stayed upright as they jinked across the ocean left, left then right and right again, left, right, left.

“Chaff!” he called again. “And flares.”

The diversionary weapons exploded from the rear.

Dazhou pulled his arm up. For a second, two seconds, he did not breathe.

And then he knew they were safe.

“Very good,” he told the helmsman, even before the defensive weapons operator and the radarman reported that they had lost track of the enemy missile.

“Head back toward our targets,” Dazhou said calmly. “Let’s make sure they don’t need to be finished off. Remain in stealth mode. Do not activate radar except on my command,” he added.

Within seconds, they were pointed back toward the two Brunei patrol ships. Both were on fire, one clearly taking water. A distress signal came over the radio band.

“Go no closer than ten kilometers,” Dazhou told his helmsman.

“Aye-aye, captain.”

His crew had performed well. He himself, however, might have realized why the SS-N-9 had stayed on them much sooner than he had. In truth, the earlier attacks had made him far too cocky; he should have approached without his radar as he had before.

An important lesson. He would remember to apply it tomorrow, when the stakes would be even higher.

IV

H IGH S TAKES

South of the Philippines

12 October 1997, 0308

MACK CHECKED HIS GPS READING AS HE APPROACHED THE dark island, making sure he was in the right place before taking the Megafortress down through the storm. Jalan, his copilot, seemed calmer than he had been yesterday; maybe the fact that the man had had very little sleep before being roused for the mission had calmed him somehow.

“Infrared still blocked:’ said the copilot as Mack pushed the Megafortress downward.

“Yeah, the rain’s going to play havoc with our sensors:’ Mack told him, speaking over the interphone. “I want you to watch our altitude and that little lump of sugar guarding the approach”

“Yes, Minister.”

The “lump of sugar” was a mountaintop 1,335 meters above sea level which Mack had to skirt to get onto the runway. As an added bonus, the runway would have no lights and be wet besides. But then again this was probably the perfect weather for arms smugglers.

McKenna’s contact had promised eight Sparrow missiles, two Sidewinders, and a dozen five-hundred-pound bombs. To pay for this windfall, Mack had emptied the air force treasury of the hard currency kept in the safe for operational emergencies—essentially petty cash, though fifty thousand American dollars was hardly petty. The cash was just the down payment; he had had to authorize wire transfers from a number of accounts, including his own. All together, the black marketeer had demanded $265,000 for the weapons. That was a veritable bargain, as the U.S. air force reckoned the cost of one Sparrow missile at $225,700, but then again, these guys didn’t have the same overhead costs.

“There, Minister,” said Jalar, pointing to the peak, a shadowy lump of danger materializing in the right half of the windscreen.

Mack was closer to the mountain than he’d thought. He nudged the stick slightly, blowing a wad of air from his lungs. The computer helping him fly the plane now came into its own; he selected the synthetic landing assist module and a ghost of the unlit airfield appeared at the top of a small square on his HUD. Mack had programmed the destination into the computer before takeoff; the silicon brain was able to find the airfield in its extensive database even though it had been abandoned by the U.S. and Filipinos a decade before. As they approached, the Megafortress used its sensors—in this case its radar and GPS—to verify the preloaded image, confirming that there was an air base there. Mack could proceed in as if the airfield were broadcasting a set of guidance signals the same way a commercial airport system would show an airliner how to land in inclement weather.

Almost. Mack was not only landing completely in the dark, but there was no way to know whether someone with an antiaircraft cannon was waiting on the nearby hillsides.

“Landing gear down,” confirmed the copilot as they worked through their routine.

The Megafortress’s wheels hit the end of the slick runway hard as a burst of wind pushed Mack down a split-second sooner than he anticipated. Computer or no, the nearly 350,000 pounds of aircraft, fuel, and men represented a massive amount of energy trying to go in several different directions at once. Mack broke into a serious sweat as he worked to keep the plane moving in a straight line toward the end of the runway, applying brakes and going to reverse thrusters all on cue from the computer. As they came to a stop, Mack spotted a tiny pinprick of light on his left. It blinked twice, the signal they had agreed on. Mack was supposed to kill his lights to confirm that they’d seen the signal.

It seemed a bit superfluous—how many other big jets would be landing on this runway tonight? But he did so, bringing them back on as he found the small apron on the right and turned the aircraft around, trundling back gingerly on the narrow ramp to the point where he had landed.

The rain was now an intermittent drizzle, but it still made it difficult for the IR gear to see anything. Mack switched over to the low-light video, making sure Jalan would be able to monitor what was going on once they were outside.

“Keep the motor runnin’,” he told the copilot, undoing his restraints.

“Yes, Minister,” said Jalan.

Mack pulled off his helmet and survival vest, exchanging them for a com set, flak vest, and small radio. The two soldiers who’d been sitting on the flight deck had already gotten up and were checking their weapons. Brown got up somewhat shakily from the jumpseat at the rear. He’d spent the flight memorizing the instructions from the computer library on how to work the AIM-7s into the Megafortress weapons controller.

Mack went to the weapons locker at the far end of the deck and retrieved his own weapon, an MP5 submachine gun, as well as an attaché case with the cash.

“Let’s do it, boys,” he shouted over the loud hush of the Megafortress’s idling engines. He tossed the attaché case to Brown and started down the ladder.

Two other soldiers had ridden on the Flighthawk deck; the four men fanned out behind Mack as he walked forward along the edge of the concrete, striding toward the edge of the white-yellow halo thrown off by the Megafortress’s landing lights. His heart pounded; he moved his finger away from the trigger of the MP5, aware that his adrenaline level was off the board.

“Yo, assholes, let’s get this show on the road. I don’t have all night;” he yelled to the darkness.

A set of truck lights switched on in the distance. Mack stopped.

“Fan out, men,” he told the soldiers accompanying him. “Don’t shoot the bastards unless I say so. Jalan, what’s coming at us?”