And he didn’t feel guilty now. Not exactly. He saw wars as a very regrettable but unfortunately necessary aspect of reality. This war was a righteous one, to stop the abuse of the people who were being persecuted by Gaddafi’s heirs. It was justifiable.

Accidents happened in wars.

He knew all this. He had thought about these things, lived with all of these things, for his entire life. And yet now, for the first time, he was upended by them.

Rubeo worked for hours. If he could just figure out what had happened, then he would be able to deal with it. He could fix the machines—his people would fix the machines—and this sort of thing wouldn’t happen again.

If it was a virus, how would it have worked? It would have had to be extremely sophisticated to erase itself.

Not necessarily, he thought. The aircraft recycled its memory when it transitioned off the mission. It had to do that so it had enough space for data.

But where would it be before you took off?

The only empty positions were the video memory.

Actually, you could easily slot it there—it would be erased naturally, as the aircraft engaged its targets and recorded what happened.

Impossible, though—who among his people would do this?

So interference from outside? A radar signal they couldn’t track?

That NATO couldn’t track. He could easily believe that. Certainly.

But it could interfere with just one aircraft, not the others? Did that make sense?

Need to know more about the source.

Need to know more . . .

I have to have this checked out. This and a dozen other things. A hundred . . .

Twelve lives. Was that all it took to unhinge him?

Weren’t his contributions greater than that? Without being boastful, couldn’t he say that he had done more for mankind than all of the people killed?

But it didn’t work that way, did it? And guilt—or responsibility—were concepts that went beyond addition and subtraction.

He was focused on a virus because he didn’t want to take responsibility. He didn’t want it to be a mistake he had made.

Same with the interference.

Maybe he had just screwed up somewhere.

Rubeo pounded the keys furiously.

It might be possible to throw the mapping unit off by varying the current induced in the system . . .

Hitting another stone wall as his theory was shot down by the data, Rubeo slammed the cover of the computer down in disgust.

He was a fool, tired and empty.

But he had to solve this. More—he had to know why it bothered him so badly. It paralyzed him. He couldn’t do anything else but this . . .

Rising from the hotel desk, the scientist paced the room anxiously. Finally, he took out his sat phone and called a number he dialed only two or three times a year, but one he knew by heart.

The phone was answered by the second ring.

“Yes?” said a deep voice. It was hollow and far away, the voice of a hermit, of a man deeply wounded.

“I am stumped,” said Rubeo, trusting his listener would know what he was talking about. “It’s just impossible.”

“Someone once told me nothing is impossible.”

“Using my words against me. Fair game, I suppose.”

“There was a beautiful sunset tonight.”

“It’s night there,” said Rubeo. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to wake you up.”

“You know I seldom sleep, Ray. I wasn’t sleeping.”

“The problem is . . . I . . . the thing is that I feel responsible. That something we overlooked—that I overlooked—caused this. And I have to fix it. But I don’t know how.”

“Maybe it wasn’t anything you did. I don’t really have many details, just what I saw on the news. I don’t trust those lies.”

“What they’ve reported was true enough, Colonel.”

“They made me a general before they kicked me out.”

“One day I’ll get it right.”

“I think it would sound strange coming from you, Ray.” The other man laughed. “Besides, they did take that away. Along with everything else.”

“I don’t know what to do,” confessed Rubeo.

“Go there. Go there and see it with your own eyes.”

“I don’t know about that.”

“What other choice do you have?”

“It’s not going to tell me what happened. The failure—or accident or attack, whatever it was—happened in the aircraft. Not on the ground. There may have been interference. It’s possible—it is possible—but it’s a real long shot. I think—”

“Ray, you’re not going there to find out why it happened. You’re going there to see. For yourself. So you can understand it, and deal with it. Otherwise, it will haunt you forever. Trust me.”

Rubeo said nothing.

“You saw my daughter recently?” asked the other man.

“I spoke to her yesterday. She’s in Washington. You should call her. Or better yet, visit. Let her visit.”

“Thanks.”

“You’re very good at giving advice. If you were in my position—” Rubeo stopped, realizing he was wasting his breath. Dog—the former Colonel Tecumseh “Dog” Bastian—was in fact excellent at giving advice, perhaps the only person in the world that Ray Rubeo respected enough to take advice from. But Dog was terrible at following it, and there was no sense trying to push him; they had been over this ground many times.

“Your son-in-law is over here,” Rubeo told him instead. “He’s looking as fit as ever.”

“Good,” said Bastian, with evident affection. “Take care of yourself, Ray.”

“I will.”

“Take my advice.”

“I wouldn’t have called if I didn’t intend to.”

18

Over Libya

Visor up, Turk leaned against his restraints, peering through the A–10E’s bubble canopy toward the ground. Dirty brown desert stretched before him, soft folds of a blanket thrown hastily over a bed. He could hear his own breathing in his oxygen mask, louder and faster than he wanted. Chatter from another flight played in the background of his radio, a distant distraction.

The target was a government tank depot near Murzuq. Eight tanks were concealed there beneath desert camouflage, netting and brown tarps. Shooter Squadron would take them out.

“Ten minutes,” said Ginella in Shooter One. Paulson was her wingman, flying in Shooter Two.

“Roger that,” said Beast in Shooter Three.

Turk acknowledged in turn. The planes were flying in a loose trail, slightly offset and strung out more or less behind one another. Turk was at the rear, flying wing for Beast.

He swiveled his head to check his six, then pulled the visor down, automatically activating his smart helmet.

Ginella directed them to take a course correction and then split into twos for the final run to the target. The first element—Shooter One and Two—would make their attack first. Beast and Turk would move to the north, watching for any signs of resistance from another camp about two miles in that direction. Depending on how well the initial attack on the tanks went, they would either finish the job or look for targets of opportunity before saddling up to go home.

Turk found the new heading, checked his six, then nudged his Warthog a little closer to Shooter Three as the lead plane ran through a cluster of clouds.

“Shooter Four, let’s bring it below the clouds,” said Beast. All laughs on the ground, he was nothing but business in the sky. “We need to be low enough to get an ID on anything we hit.”

“You see something?” Turk asked.

“Negative. I just want to be ready.”

Turk slid his hand forward on the stick. The threat radar began bleeping.

“We have an SA–6 battery,” said Ginella calmly. “Beast, you see that?”

“Looking for it,” said the pilot.