Breanna expected a nod, or some other sign of acknowledgment. Instead, Todd’s expression turned even more grim, her lips pursing together.

“Bring the chiefs on-line, please,” the President told her communications aide.

SEVERAL ROOMS AWAY IN THE WHIPLASH BUNKER, Ray Rubeo stared at a screenful of numbers. Technically, they described a parabola, a line following the plane section of a cone. In this case, they described one movement in the flight path the last nano-UAV would have to take to breach the final research chamber at Site One. The flight path was trivial for the computer. The problem was fitting the instruction into the limited memory of the small aircraft. Rubeo’s team had been working for hours on what at first seemed a trivial problem. But math was an unyielding master, and in the end the numbers simply would not yield. There was not enough space in the onboard memory to fit the instructions.

The only possible solution was to have the pilot take over and fly the last leg.

To the people down the hall, Breanna and Reid included, it would seem a trivial matter: the pilot was there precisely to guide the aircraft. But to Rubeo the difference was immense—he would fly the last few planes, not tell the computer how to fly them.

Human error would greatly distort the probability equation.

But there was no choice. The scientist sighed, then clicked the screen to review the instructions he would give.

BREANNA GLANCED AT HER WATCH. SHE HAD TO AUTHORIZE the launch in exactly three minutes.

If the President decided to abort the mission, what would she do?

Tell Turk to get the hell out of there; a war was about to erupt.

He was as good as dead already. They’d never make it to the border without being detected, and Sergeant Ransom was under orders to kill him if they were in danger of being captured.

If the mission hadn’t changed, if they had only gone for the one site and left, maybe he’d be in the Caspian by now.

“All right, gentlemen and ladies.” President Todd looked around her room, then back at the video camera projecting her image to the Pentagon and Whiplash. “We will proceed with the Whiplash plan as outlined. The bombers will be on standby. If the mission fails, they will proceed on my order. On my order only,” she repeated.

There were murmurs of assent. The chief of staff’s face, which was centered in the feed from the Pentagon, reddened as he nodded.

“Let’s get to work,” said Todd, and the feed died.

Breanna rose, glancing at her watch. She had exactly sixty seconds to authorize the launch. She strode from the room, moving toward the command center down the hall. The entire team was there, waiting.

So was Ray Rubeo.

“Problem solved?” she asked.

“We have a solution,” said Rubeo tersely.

There wasn’t time to ask him to elaborate. “I am authorizing launch,” she announced. “We may have to go with Plan B on the download, but we’re moving ahead with the attack.”

20

Iran

THE ROCKS GOT SMALLER AND EASIER TO GET OVER, but the slope steepened. Turk wondered if they couldn’t simply stop. He didn’t have to be in line of sight to get the download or guide the aircraft. But with Grease pushing ahead, he couldn’t give up. He kept climbing, finally resorting to all fours, moving up slowly under the growing weight of the ruck.

“Just a little bit,” said Grease every few feet. “Keep coming.”

“Man, you’re inhuman,” said Turk finally. “You’re a machine.”

“No, but I ain’t giving up.”

“Neither am I.”

Grease had to stop and wait for him every few moments. Finally he scrambled ahead, disappearing into the darkness.

Hell of a place to die, Turk thought. Somehow, he’d never believed he would collapse from a heart attack; going down in a fireball seemed much more likely.

And somehow more hospitable. He kept pushing, practically crawling now.

Why the hell didn’t you eat?

When was the last time you had water?

It was Breanna’s voice, upbraiding him. The real problem was sleep—he needed it. His mind was starting to float away from his body, swimming in some sort of disjointed consciousness.

When this was done, he was sleeping. No matter what. Let the damn Iranians kill him; he didn’t care.

Sleep.

Something started to lift him.

“What the hell?” he said, spinning around to sit up.

“I’ll take the pack,” said Grease. “It’s only about fifty feet to the ledge.”

Turk held his arms up, as if in surrender. Grease lifted the pack, slung it on his shoulder, then reached his hand down. Turk took it and heaved himself to his feet.

“You think we’ll make it after all this?” Turk asked.

“Damn straight,” said Grease. “We’ve put too much into this now to fail.”

“Yeah. Absolutely.”

21

Over Iran

PARSA VAHID POINTED THE NOSE OF HIS MIG UPWARD as he left the runway, feeling the press of gravity against his chest. No matter how many times he flew, what he flew, or why he flew, the initial boost off the runway still gave him a thrill.

When his wingman Lieutenant Kayvan checked in—he’d taken off right behind him—Vahid told the control tower they were heading north. He banked slightly, coming to the proper course, then checked in with the controller. He needed special permission to fly in the Exclusion Zone; this had already been granted, and he was handed off to the special zone’s controller, who used a reserved and scrambled frequency for even the most routine communications. The officer informed him there was one other flight already working the area, a small plane that Vahid knew would be practically useless in a night search. The controller gave him the flight’s contact information; Vahid dialed in and hailed the pilot, who was currently near Qom.

“We’ll go north of that,” said Vahid. “We’re available for support.”

The other pilot thanked him. He sounded like an amicable sort; Vahid guessed from his voice that he was an older man, probably pressed into service for the Guard.

“God is great,” said the man.

Vahid echoed him and signed off.

A few minutes later the controller told him to stand by for a communication from Colonel Khorasani. The colonel came on the radio within seconds of Vahid’s acknowledgment.

“One of our units has had an incident,” said Khorasani without any preliminaries. “A truck has been stolen. The unit is approximately nine kilometers south of the cave where the truck was discovered. It is headquartered at Kushke Nosrat Airport.”

“Manzariyeh,” said Vahid, almost in wonder—that was the military name for the airport. Once an air force base, it was now directly controlled by the Pasdaran. It was an open secret that it played a critical role as a transport hub for the nuclear program in the area. No planes were kept there, a calculated tactic to keep it from being targeted by the West. But there were healthy antiair missile defenses in the vicinity, and even though it was in the zone he’d been cleared to patrol, Vahid decided he could take no chances.

“Colonel, you’ll have to alert the forces there that I’m in the vicinity,” he said. “Or they will shoot me down.”

“That’s being taken care of. The unit whose vehicle was stolen is conducting a thorough search, as are other units. The controller will be in constant communication with you.”

“Understood.”

“Captain, there is one other matter that you should be aware of. Five minutes ago we received word from one of our sources that an American bomber was taking off from Incirlik, Turkey. We do not have it on radar, and we may not have them on radar until a critical point.”