except that he needed me alive. We're improvising on a stage where there's no room to screw up.'
'We won't.'
'How can you be sure?' Battat asked. 'Tell me something. If this car had been a stick shift, could you have driven it?'
'What does that have to do with anything?' Aideen asked.
'Just answer me,' he said.
'No,' she replied. 'Could you have driven it?'
'Yes,' he replied.
'So where's the problem?' she asked.
'My point is, at any given moment, we are going to face those kinds of unknowns even with a plan,' Battat said. 'Without a game plan or a playbook, the risks are extreme.'
'Then we have to be that much more alert,' Aideen said. 'We have knowledge, and we have skills. That's why General
MISSION OF HONOR
317
Rodgers put the two of us together. We obviously make a good team.'
'Aideen, we were the only ones who showed up in time to be shipped here,' Battat reminded her.
'It wasn't just that,' the woman replied.
'Oh?'
'Mike Rodgers would not have sent us if he didn't think we could pull this off,' Aideen said.
'Mike is a general, and generals have to field armies, or they have nothing to do,' Battat said.
'He's not like that,' she insisted. 'Besides, I think you're looking at this all wrong. We have options. We have the right to exercise our own judgment.'
'Do we? If I wanted to turn around and go back to Gaborone, is that what we would do?' Battat asked.
'You would,' she said.
'And what would you do?' he asked.
'I would stay here,' she said. 'I'd walk.'
'You'd be dead before morning,' Battat said. 'This is Africa. There are predators that don't check passports.'
'I would take my chances,' she said. 'Don't you get it?'
'Obviously not,' Battat replied.
'Most people would kill for the kind of freedom we've been given out here,' Aideen said.
'Speaking of which, we may have to do that, too,' Battat said.
'Do what?' Aideen asked.
'Kill people,' Battat told her. 'Are you prepared to take a human life? Will you push a knife into a person's back if you have to, or crack their head open with a rock?'
'I faced that question in Spain,' she replied.
'And?'
'If it's my life or someone else's, they're dead,' Aideen said.
'What if it's my life or someone else's?' he asked.
'We're a team,' Aideen replied. 'They're dead.'
Battat smiled. 'I'm glad to hear that, anyway7*
318
OP-CENTER
'Don't doubt my resolve,' Aideen said sternly. 'I'm here. I'll do whatever the job requires.'
'Fair enough,' he said. 'What about Maria Corneja? Is she as tough as everyone's been saying?'
'The first person I worked for at Op-Center was Martha Mackall,' Aideen said. 'Martha was a tough, tough lady. No bullshit. She was confident and strong as steel.'
'She was the one who was killed in Madrid?' Battat asked.
'Yes, a drive-by shooting, totally unexpected,' Aideen said. 'Interpol became involved, and Maria was assigned to the case. I was asked to tag along and help her find the assassins. If Martha was steel, Maria is iron. Not quite as polished, but I never saw her break. I can't even imagine that happening.'
'That means she'll want to make all the decisions when we hook up,' Battat said.
'She'll want to, but she'll follow the orders Op-Center sends over,' Aideen said. 'Including who is in command.'
