calling in such an earnest tone.
'Terminate, Firehawk One. Cancel.'
It was Raymond Harris's voice.
'Return home immediately… no further action…. over.'
The way that Harris stressed the word over underscored an intense finality to his orders.
'But—' Troy started to say. He had been involved in — was still involved in — an intense dogfight during which either he or the Sukhoi pilot might have died. Several times over, either of them might have killed the other, and Troy was seconds away from delivering the coup de grace and successfully completing his mission.
Terminate?
Why should he stop now? He had almost given his life to get to this point in the battle.
'Terminate. Now,' Harris said.
Troy wondered. Should he just ignore Harris for thirty seconds?
He ignored Harris for ten seconds, maintaining his position above the cloud in which the Su-25 was flying.
He ignored Harris for twenty seconds, waiting and gritting his teeth, ready to dive, open fire, and get this over with.
'Terminate. Now,' Harris repeated.
He ignored Harris for thirty seconds, and still no Sukhoi.
'Roger, Firehawk One… message received and understood.'
As Troy banked to turn back toward Mundo Maya, he hoped that the Su-25 would suddenly break out of the clouds and come for him.
But it did not happen.
As he taxied into the Firehawk hangar, Troy could see Joe Turcios and Raymond Harris waiting. Turcios had a sort of bewildered expression, but Harris wore an ear-to-ear grin.
Troy shut down the Pratt & Whitney F100 engine and popped open the canopy. As he climbed out, he looked down at the black powder stains around the M61's muzzle and thought of what might have been.
Why was Harris grinning so broadly?
The mission had not been accomplished. The Svartvand, or Zapatista, or whatever it was, Sukhoi was still there. It was still flying around on the Chiapas-Peten border when Troy left it.
Maybe Harris thought Troy had downed the aircraft? Maybe he'd better just play along and break the news to him gently?
'Great news,' Harris shouted.
Troy merely nodded. If the boss was happy, who was he to complain?
'We're done.' The retired general smiled as he patted Troy on the shoulder. 'We're out of here. Dinner in town tonight… It's on Firehawk… We'll celebrate.'
With that, and without asking Troy for a mission debrief, he turned and strode out of the room with Joe Turcios.
'What was that all about?' Troy asked Andy Preston.
'I'm not sure,' Preston replied. 'He was pacing the floor for about an hour after you launched this morning, then he got a phone call. He had the driver take him somewhere. He came back all excited, ran into the radio room, and contacted you to stand down.'
'Why?' Troy asked. 'I was in the middle of fighting that guy in the Frogfoot.'
'We're not here to ask questions, man,' Preston said. 'We're here to follow orders, and my last orders from him were to pack my gear and get ready to move out tomorrow. He said that the same applies to you.'
Rory's steak house, as its American-accented name implies, is one of those places that caters to gringos and to the members of the Guatemalan elite who find themselves in the provincial city of Flores. If nothing else, the prices on the menu — printed in English and Spanish, with English first — keep the riffraff at bay.
As with all such places in less-than-stable corners of less-than-stable banana republics, Rory's has high security, with razor wire atop the pinkish, hacienda-style wall that surrounds the palm-studded compound.
Subtly armed security welcomes guests, and the only people carrying weapons inside are bodyguards who have been prescreened by Rory's and issued photo IDs.
Beyond the perimeter, Rory's is just a typical Spanish-colonial style restaurant, with ceiling fans and heavy, dark wood furniture.
Harris had booked a private room in the back. Margaritas had already been poured when Troy and Andy Preston arrived, whisked from the Firehawk hangar in one of the bulletproof cars leased by the company. In all their weeks in Guatemala, the short drive from Mundo Maya was the only time that either of them had seen anything that could be construed as the 'real' Guatemala. Certainly Rory's could have been anywhere in Florida or Southern California.
A dozen people were standing around in the room. In addition to the two pilots, Harris, and Turcios, there were four other Firehawk employees, including two mechanics, the radio operator, and another man to whom Troy had never been introduced. The four others were men whom Troy had never seen:
'Nice party,' Troy said, approaching Joe Turcios. 'I hear that we're headed out tomorrow.'
'Yes, the steaks are really good here in this place.' Turcios nodded. 'Really a cut above what we're used to out at Mundo.'
'So are you pulling up stakes tomorrow, too?' Troy asked.
'I expect so,' he said, glancing at Harris, who was across the room talking to one of the men whom Troy had not previously seen. 'My orders haven't quite been finalized.'
'This deployment sure ended kinda suddenly, didn't it?' Troy asked, hoping to elicit some sort of clarification from Turcios.
'It sure did.' Joe nodded as he stepped away to refill his margarita glass.
The head waiter entered the room, announcing that it was time for everyone in the room to take their seats and open their menus.
Troy picked the bone-in rib eye, which was listed a few price points below the one he'd eaten on Firehawk's tab in Las Vegas, and turned to the man seated next to him to make idle conversation. His name was Aron Arnold, and he was from near Orlando, Florida. He was a slender man with dark, short-cropped hair who looked to be about Troy's age. They had gotten past exchanging pleasantries and had ascertained that they both had served in the U. S. Air Force as pilots when Raymond Harris stood up from his place at the head of the table, tapping the back of his steak knife against his water glass.
'I'd like to thank all of you for coming tonight.' He smiled. 'But I think the prospect of a free steak dinner was ample inducement.'
Everyone chuckled at the lame humor. The Firehawk people were there under orders, and yes, the prospect of a free steak dinner was ample inducement.
'Some of you know already, but for the benefit of all concerned, I'd like to take this opportunity to announce the merger of Svartvand BV and Firehawk, LLC. From this point forward, Svartvand will be known as the Svartvand Division of Firehawk, LLC. Let's all raise our glasses in celebration.'
Troy was stunned. Less than seven hours earlier, Fire-hawk and Svartvand had not merely been competitors, they had been at war. Troy had been on the front lines, risking his life.
'With this turn of events, I'm pleased to announce a full cessation of air combat between Zapatista forces and the Guatemalan government. If diplomats could cut deals as easily as we do in the private sector, there would be a lot less war in the world.'
There was a murmur of chuckles around the room at Harris's second attempt at lame humor, although on second take, the Firehawk people realized that he meant it.
'I'd like to introduce Enrique Girarcamada of Svartvand, who has a few words.'
Another Enrique? Troy growled to himself. He had bad memories of the other Enrique in Culver City, and he had bad recent memories of Svartvand, the company that had tried to kill him.
'Thank you so much, Raymond; it is such a pleasure to be here with you and your people tonight,' this Enrique said in polished but accented English.
