their own signals to their people, requesting information, no reply.'
Jackson nodded. He'd waited this long only to get the confirmation he needed to take the next step.
'Okay, let's get a warning signal drafted, distribution to all the CINCs. Alert SecDef and the Chiefs. I'm calling the President now.'
'Dr. Ryan, NMCC on the STU with CRITIC traffic. Admiral Robert Jackson again.' The use of 'CRITIC' caused heads to turn as Ryan lifted the secure phone.
'Robby, this is Jack. What's happening?' Everyone in the communications room saw the National Security Advisor turn pale. 'Robby, are you serious?' He looked at the communications watch officer. 'Where are we now?'
'Approaching Goose Bay, Labrador, sir. About three hours out.'
'Get Special Agent d'Agustino up here, would you, please?' Ryan took his hand off the phone. 'Robby, I need hard copy…okay…he's still asleep, I think. Give me thirty minutes to get organized here. Call me if you need me.'
Jack got out of his chair and made his way to the lav just aft of the flight deck. He managed to avoid looking in the mirror when he washed his hands. The Secret Service agent was waiting for him when he emerged.
'Not much sleep for you, eh?'
'Is the Boss up yet?'
'Sir, he left orders not to do that until we were an hour out. I just checked with the pilot and—'
'Kick him loose, Daga, right now. Then get Secretaries Hanson and Fiedler up. Arnie, too.'
'What's the matter, sir?'
'You'll be in there to hear it.' Ryan took the roll of fax paper off the secure machine and started reading. He looked up. 'I'm not kidding, Daga. Right now.'
'Any danger to the President?'
'Let's assume that there is,' Jack replied. He thought for a second.
'Where's the nearest fighter base, Lieutenant?'
The
'You call them and tell them that the President would like to have some friends around ASAP.' The nice thing about talking to lieutenants was that they weren't used to asking why an order was given, even when there was no obvious reason for it. The same thing didn't apply to the Secret Service.
'Doc, if you need to do that, then I need to know, too, right now.'
'Yeah, Daga, I guess so.' Ryan tore off the top section of the thermal fax paper when he got to the second page of the transmission.
'Holy shit,' the agent thought aloud, handing it back. 'I'll wake the President up. You need to tell the pilot. They do things a little differently at times like this.'
'Fair enough. Fifteen minutes, Daga, okay?'
'Yes, sir.' She headed down the circular stairs while Jack went forward to the flight deck.
'One-six-zero minutes to go, Dr. Ryan. Has been a long one, hasn't it?' the Colonel at the controls asked pleasantly. The smile faded instantly from his face.
It was mere chance that took them past the American Embassy. Maybe he'd just wanted to see the flag, Clark thought. It was always a pleasant sight in a foreign land, even if it did fly over a building designed by some bureaucrat with the artistic sense of—
'Somebody's worried about security,' Chavez said.
'Yevgeniy Pavlovich, I know your English is good. You need not practice it on me.'
'Excuse me. The Japanese are concerned with a riot, Vanya? Except for that one incident, there hasn't been much hooliganism…' His voice trailed off. There were two squads of fully armed infantrymen arrayed around the building. That seemed very odd indeed. Over here, Ding thought, one or two police officers seemed enough to—
'
Clark was proud of the lad just then. Foul as the imprecation was, it was also just what a Russian would have said. The reason for it was also clear. The guards around the embassy perimeter were looking in as much as they were looking out, and the Marines were nowhere to be seen.
'Ivan Sergeyevich, something seems very odd.'
'Indeed it does, Yevgeniy Pavlovich,' John Clark said evenly. He didn't let the car slow down, and hoped the troops on the sidewalk wouldn't notice the two
'The name is Arima, first name Tokikichi, sir, Lieutenant General, age fifty-three.' The Army sergeant was an intelligence specialist. 'Graduated their National Defense Academy, worked his way up the line as an infantryman, good marks all the way. He's airborne qualified. Took the senior course at Carlisle Barracks eight years ago, did just fine. 'Politically astute,' the form sheet says. Well connected. He's Commanding General of their Eastern Army, a rough equivalent of a corps organization in the U.S. Army, but not as heavy in corps-level assets, especially artillery. That's two infantry divisions, First and Twelfth, their First Airborne Brigade, First Engineer Brigade, Second Anti-Air Group, and other administrative attachments.'
The sergeant handed over the folder, complete with a pair of photos. The enemy has a face now, Jackson thought. At least one face. Jackson examined it for a few seconds and closed the folder back. It was about to go to Condition FRANTIC in the Pentagon. The first of the Joint Chiefs was in the parking lot, and he was the lucky son of a bitch to give them the news, such as it was. Jackson assembled his documents and headed off to the Tank, a pleasant room, actually, located on the outside of the building's E-Ring.
Chet Nomuri had spent the day meeting at irregular hours with three of his contacts, learning not very much except that something very strange was afoot, though nobody knew what. His best course of action, he decided, was to head back to the bathhouse and hope Kazuo Taoka would turn up. He finally did, by which time Nomuri had spent so much time soaking in the blisteringly hot water that his body felt like pasta that had been in the pot for about a month.
'You must have had a day like I did,' he managed to say with a crooked smile.
'How was yours?' Kazuo asked, his smile tired but enthusiastic.
'There is a pretty girl at a certain bar. Three months I've worked on her. We had a vigorous afternoon.' Nomuri reached below the surface of the water, feigning agony in an obvious way. 'It may never work again.'
'I wish that American girl was still around,' Taoka said, settling in the tub with a prolonged Ahhhhh. 'I am ready for someone like her now.'
'She's gone?' Nomuri asked innocently.
'Dead,' the salaryman said, easily controlling his sense of loss.
'What happened?'
'They were going to send her home. Yamata sent Kaneda, his security man, to tidy things up. But it seems she used narcotics, and she was found dead of an overdose. A great pity,' Taoka observed, as if he were describing the demise of a neighbor's cat. 'But there are more where she came from.'
Nomuri just nodded with weary impassivity, remarking to himself that this was a side of the man he hadn't seen before. Kazuo was a fairly typical Japanese salaryman. He'd joined his company right out of college, starting off in a position little removed from clerkship. After serving five years, he'd been sent off to a business school, which in this country was the intellectual equivalent of Parris Island, with a touch of Buchenwald. There was just something outrageous about how this country operated. He expected that things would be different. It was a foreign land, after all, and every country was different, which was fundamentally a good thing. America was the proof of that. America essentially lived off the diversity that arrived at her shores, each ethnic community adding something to the national pot, creating an often boiling but always creative and lively national mix. But now he truly understood why people came to the U.S., especially people from this country.
Japan demanded much of its citizens—or more properly, its culture did. The boss was always right. A good employee was one who did as he was told. To advance you had to kiss a lot of ass, sing the company song, exercise like somebody in goddamned boot camp every morning, showing up an hour early to show how sincere you were. The amazing part was that anything creative happened here at all. Probably the best of them fought their way to the top despite all this, or perhaps were smart enough to disguise their inner feelings until they got to a
