Debt of Honor

'They've had a minimum of four aircraft up for the past eight hours, sweeping south. By their operating radius I would estimate that they're carrying air-to-air missiles and aux fuel tanks for max endurance. So call it a strong effort at forward reconnaissance. Their Harriers have that new Black Fox look-down radar, and the Hummers caught some sniffs of it. They're looking as far as they can, sir. I want permission to pull the Hummer south another hundred miles or so right now, and to have them go a little covert.'

By which he meant the surveillance aircraft would keep its radar on only some of the time, and would instead track the progress of the Indian fleet passively, from the Indians' own radar emissions.

'No.' Admiral Dubro shook his head. 'Let's play dumb and complacent for a while.' He turned to check the status of his aircraft. He had ample combat power to deal with the threat, but that wasn't the issue. His mission was not to defeat the Indian Navy in battle. It was to intimidate them from doing something which America found displeasing. For that matter, his adversary's mission could not have been to fight the United States Navy—could it? No, that was too crazy. It was barely within the realm of possibility that a very good and very lucky Indian fleet commander could best a very unlucky and very dumb American counterpart, but Dubro had no intention of letting that happen. More likely, just as his mission was mainly bluff, so was theirs. If they could force the American fleet south, then…they weren't so dumb after all, were they? The question was how to play the cards he had.

'They're forcing us to commit, Ed. Trying to, anyway.' Dubro leaned forward, resting one hand on the map display and tracing around with the other. 'They probably think we're southeast. If so, by moving south they can block us better, and they know we'll probably maintain our distance just to keep out of their strike range. On the other hand, if they suspect we are where we really are right now, they can accomplish the same thing, or face us with the option of looping around to the northwest to cover the Gulf of Mannar. But that means coming within range of their land-based air, with their fleet to our south, and our only exit due west. Not bad for an operational concept,' the battle-group commander acknowledged. 'The group commander still Chandraskatta?'

Fleet-Ops nodded. 'That's right, sir. He's back after a little time on the beach. The Brits have the book on the guy. They say he's no dummy.'

'I think I'd go along with that for the moment. What sort of intel you suppose they have on us?'

Harrison shrugged. 'They know how long we've been here. They have to know how tired we are.' Fleet-Ops meant the ships as much as the men. Every ship in the Task Force had materiel problems now. They all carried spare parts, but ships could remain at sea only so long before refit was needed. Corrosion from salt air, the constant movement and pounding of wind and wave, and heavy equipment use meant that ships' systems couldn't last forever. Then there were the human factors. His men and women were tired now, too long at sea. Increased maintenance duties made them tireder still. The current catchphrase in the military for these combined problems was 'leadership challenge,' a polite expression meaning that the officers commanding both the ships and the men sometimes didn't know what the hell they were supposed to do.

'You know, Ed, at least the Russians were predictable.' Dubro stood erect, looking down and wishing he still smoked his pipe. 'Okay, let's call this one in. Tell Washington it looks like they might just be making a move.'

'So we meet for the first time.'

'It's my pleasure, sir.' Chuck Searls, the computer engineer, knew that his three-piece suit and neat haircut had surprised the man. He held out his hand and bobbed his head in what he supposed was a proper greeting for his benefactor.

'My people tell me that you are very skilled.'

'You're very kind. I've worked at it for some years, and I suppose I have a few small talents.' Searls had read up on Japan.

And very greedy, Yamata thought, but well-mannered. He would settle for that. It was, all in all, a fortunate accident. He'd purchased the man's business four years earlier, left current management in place, as was his custom, then discovered that the real brains of the outfit were in this man. Searls was the nearest thing to a wizard that his executive had ever seen, the man had reported to Yamata-san, and though the American's title hadn't changed, his salary had. And then, a few years ago, Searls had remarked that he was tiring of his job…

'Everything is prepared?'

'Yes, sir. The initial software upgrade went in months ago. They love it.'

'And the—'

'Easter egg, Mr. Yamata. That's what we call it.'

Raizo had never encountered the expression. He asked for an explanation and got it—but it meant nothing to him.

'How difficult to implement it?'

'That's the clever part,' Searls said. 'It keys on two stocks. If General Motors and Merck go through the system at values which I built in, twice and in the same minute, the egg hatches, but only on a Friday, like you said, and only if the five-minute period falls in the proper time-range.'

'You mean this thing could happen by accident?' Yamata asked in some surprise.

'Theoretically, yes, but the trigger values for the stocks are well outside the current trading range, and the odds of having that happen all together by accident are about thirty million to one. That's why I picked this method for hatching the egg. I ran a computer-search of trading patterns and…'

Another problem with mercenaries was that they could never stop themselves from telling you how brilliant they were. Even though it was probably true in this case, Yamata found it difficult to sit through the dissertation. He did it anyway. Good manners required it.

'And your personal arrangements?'

Searls merely nodded. The flight to Miami. The connecting flights to Antigua, via Dominica and Grenada, all with different names on the tickets, paid for by different credit cards. He had his new passport, his new identity. On the Caribbean island, there was a certain piece of property. It would take an entire day, but then he'd be there, and he had no plans to leave it, ever.

For his part, Yamata neither knew nor wanted to know what Searls would do. Had this been a screen drama, he would have arranged for the man's life to end, but it would have been dangerous. There was always the chance that there might be more than one egg in the nest, wasn't there? Yes, there had to be. Besides, there was honor to be considered. This entire venture was about honor.

'The second third of the funds will be transferred in the morning. When that happens, I would suggest that you execute your plans.' Ronin. Yamata thought, but even some of them were faithful after a fashion.

'Members,' the Speaker of the House said after Al Trent had concluded his final wrap-up speech, 'will cast their votes by electronic device.'

On C-SPAN the drone of repeated words was replaced by classical music. Bach's Italian Concerto in this case. Each member had a plastic card—it was like an automatic teller machine, really. The votes were tallied by a simple computer displayed on TV screens all over the world. Two hundred eighteen votes were needed for passage. That number was reached in just under ten minutes. Then came the final rush of additional 'aye' votes as members rushed from committee hearings and constituent meetings to enter the chamber, record their votes, and return to whatever they'd been doing.

Through it all, Al Trent stayed on the floor, mainly chatting amiably with a member of the minority leadership, his friend Sam Fellows. It was remarkable how much they agreed on, both thought. They could scarcely have been more different, a gay New England liberal and a Mormon Arizonan conservative.

'This'll teach the little bastards a lesson,' Al observed.

'You sure ramrodded the bill through,' Sam agreed. Both men wondered what the long-term effects on employment would be in their districts.

Less pleased were the officials of the Japanese Embassy, who called the results in to their Foreign Ministry the moment the music stopped and the Speaker announced, 'HR-12313, the Trade Reform Act, is approved.'

The bill would go to the Senate next, which, they reported, was a formality. The only people likely to vote against it were those furthest away from reelection. The Foreign Minister got the news from his staff at about nine local time in Tokyo and informed Prime Minister Koga. The latter had already drafted his letter of resignation for the Emperor. Another man might have wept at the destruction of his dreams. The Prime Minister did not. In retrospect, he'd had more real influence as a member of the opposition than in this office. Looking at the morning sun on the well-kept grounds outside his window, he realized that it would be a more pleasant life, after all.