for storage and then forgotten. The inventory showed several B-29’s and B-50’s, as well as three C-47’s (or DC-3’s, as they were known in civilian guise). There were also the remains of Dreamland failures, aircraft tested here that didn’t quite make the cut or no longer had much value. The shadows were a graphic reminder of the old Latin maxim, carpe diem; your time came and went very quickly.
Dog walked up the short crushed-stone path to his door, his shoes crunching stones that reportedly had been smuggled in a duffel bag by the past commander of Dreamland, General Brad Elliot. It was undoubtedly an apocryphal story, but Dog liked it; it added a touch of eccentricity to a commander well known for his efficiency and precision.
He hit his access code for the lock, then pushed in the door. Cool air hit him in a wave, refreshing him. As he turned and locked up, someone grabbed him from behind, wrapping his arms around his neck.
“Hi,” said Jennifer Gleason as they kissed. “About time.”
“How long have you been waiting?”
“Hours,” she said, and even though he knew it must be a lie, he apologized and kissed her again. He slipped his hands into the back of her jeans, beneath her ultrasensible cotton briefs, feeling the coolness of her skin. She folded into his body, sliding her own fingers to his buttons. Colonel Bastian moved his hands to her sides and lifted her shirt over her head; she writhed out of it like a snake shedding its skin, he undid her bra, her peach-sized breasts gently unfolding from the material. They kissed again, tongues meshing, lips warming each other, and still kissing they began walking toward the bedroom. They made love in a long moment that shattered the boundaries of time, then gave way to a warm bath of sleep.
Hours later, Colonel Bastian found himself walking down a long stairway, the entrance to a subway, maybe the Metro in Washington, D.C. The stairs were much longer than at any stop he’d ever been on. He knew he was dreaming, but felt fear.
He’d lost something and had to turn back. At first, he didn’t know what it was. As he reached the second landing, he saw the luminescent white rectangle thrown on the concrete floor by a light panel below the banister rail.
He was looking for his daughter. It wasn’t Breanna as he knew now — it was Breanna as a four-year-old. In real life, he’d rarely, if ever, been with her at this age. He’d been divorced right after she was born, and sent overseas besides; he didn’t see much of her until she was twelve or thirteen, when he was back in California, and then D.C. In the dream, she had been with him when he started down the steps, and now he felt panic that she wasn’t there.
He kept on going up the steps, turning and twisting with each flight, expecting, hoping to find her. His knees and calf muscles started to hurt, the tendons pulling taut.
Why had he let go of her hand? How could he have come so far without her?
He told himself it was a dream, and yet that made the panic more real. He walked and he walked, the staircase unending.
Jeff Stockard joined him, not as a boy but as a man. In the dream, Jeff could walk, wasn’t Bree’s husband or even in the Air Force, but just a friend of his, a man trying to help. He asked where he’d last seen her, and assured Dog she’d be just up the next flight.
He pushed on, starting to run. “Where is she?” he said out loud.
Finally, he woke up. It took forever for his eyes to focus. When they did, he saw Jennifer had gone.
It wasn’t a surprise really — she was a workaholic, used to keeping odd hours; he knew he’d probably find her over in one of the computer labs working on the latest project. In a way, her habit of sneaking out late at night was a blessing; it lessened the chances of others getting embarrassed if they happened to trop over her in the morning.
But he wished she were here now. He wished he could fold himself around her warmth, sink into her, fall back to sleep.
He pulled the covers over him for a moment, but when his mind drifted back to the dream, he pulled himself out of bed, got dressed, and headed back to Dreamland Command.
From the outside, the Whiplash mobile command center looked like an RV trailer pained dark green, with twelve squat wheels and an array of satellite dishes and antennas. Inside, it looked like a cross between a powerplant control room and a frat-house living area. About two thirds of the interior was wide open, dominated by a pair of tables just big enough for a serious game of poker. They could be joined together and extended by panels that folded up and out from their sides. At the far end from the door was a counter with several video monitors; a large, flat television screen sat against the wall. The monitors were worked from a dedicated control station that looked like a slight oversized personal computer desk; the gear tied into Dreamland Command via a dedicated secure satellite link.
On the other side of the partition was a bathroom, a storage area crammed with spare parts for the computers, a com section, and a tiny “suite” that was intended as a bedroom for the Whiplash commander. Since the trailer always had to be manned, Danny Freah had found it more expedient to sleep in a tent on their last deployment and intended to do so this time as well — assuming, that is, he ever went to bed. He’d been up since they landed.
Quicksilver’s crew sat at the pushed-together tables, going over their patrol for Stoner — and just as importantly, themselves. though exhausted, they’d described the encounters minutely, several times pausing to work out the exact details. Stoner listened impassively; his only comments were aimed at the Kali weapon. Unfortunately, the Megafortress had gathered relatively little data on the missile.
“So why are these guys shooting at each other?” Zen asked him finally.
“They don’t like each other,” said the spook blandly. “Advances their agenda.”
“Yeah.”
Stoner shrugged,
“All right, it’s getting late,” said Bree. “We can all use some sleep.”
“I have to finish uploading the data,” said Collins.
“Yeah, me too,” said Torbin. “The radar hits we got on the way back kind of distracted me.”
“Which hits were those?” Stoner asked.
“Couple of anomalies we read as we tracked back here. Looked like radars coming on real quick and then turning off, but they were real weak. Collins got some radio signals as well. We think they’re spy stations.”
Stoner glared over the map spread across the table.
“No ships out there?” he asked.
“Not that we saw,” said Breanna. “You have a theory?”
“There could be spy posts on these atolls here.” He pointed his finger at some brown dots on the map. “That might be one way the Indians or Chinese are keeping track of what’s coming down the pipe. Or the Russians. Or us.”
“Us?” asked Zen.
“You never know.”
Danny looked over at the islands, which were part of the Spratly chain extending southward. The Spratly Islands — more like a vast series of atolls — were claimed by several different countries, including China, Vietnam, and the Philippines. For the most part uninhabitable mounds of rock, they were valuable because vast gas and petroleum deposits were supposedly located beneath them.
Not that most of the claimants needed such a good reason to disagree.
“We can dogleg off a mission and check it out,” said Zen.
“What if it’s defended?” asked Breanna.
“That’s why we use a Flighthawk.”
“We could get on those islands with the Osprey,” said Danny. “Give them a real look. MV-22’s due here in about an hour.”
“Yeah,” said Stoner. Danny thought it might be the first time he’d said anything nonbelligerent since he’d landed.
“I think we ought to recon it first,” said Zen. “You guys got enough to do here. Besides, we don’t even have a
