they’d tried not to act out of character. The aircraft Jia sent from L.A. were no different than their usual patrols except that these fighters dropped tiny, explosive-free bomblets into enemy lines.
The wind was unfavorable in Vancouver, blowing south, not east. “Begin our next wave now,” Jia said. “All of you. Secondary targets.”
His team murmured to faraway pilots, their fingers clacking through several keystrokes and preset commands. Jia was struck again by Dongmei’s elegance, not her physical perfection but the fine clarity of her voice. In their own way, the men were even more graceful, like dancers. Jia was cautious to watch Dongmei instead, pretending the same habit as everyone else. For once, he didn’t resent her. The first-wave fighter she’d preserved went dark on her screens, then realigned itself — a red triangle now moving east instead of homeward. Other fighters rocketed inland from the coast. Jia hoped to see strikes deep within British Columbia, Montana, and Wyoming within minutes.
“Sir, we have contact over Arizona,” Yi reported.
“There are also American fighters scrambling out of Cheyenne,” Huojin said.
“Advise your crews,” Jia said calmly.
The enemy knew something was very wrong. More aircraft would get off the ground, but their options were limited. When the American planes ran low on fuel or ammunition, or if they were hit, where could they go to? They might touch down in no-man‘s-land west of the plague zone, where they would be useless, unable to rearm — or they could take their chances in the deepest stretches east of the Rockies.
Either way, a few aircraft made no difference. Jia had every advantage of surprise and position. He was up- weather.
He allowed himself another measure of satisfaction as he studied his team again, taking in their display screens, their voices, and their rapt young faces. The American West lay before them like the pieces of a puzzle. Dongmei’s three screens each held slightly more than half of Idaho or northern Utah, with the state borders digitally superimposed along with major landmarks such as GREAT SALT LAKE and BOISE.
Most of the terrain was captured in low-res satellite video. Even more resolution was lost because the displays were nearly colorless. Still, these maps were sufficient. Freeways and old cities marred the land like dark veins and clusters, and, in many places, those features were closely tied to the data that most interested Jia.
The People’s Republic of China did not possess the same presence in space as the United States, not even after the Americans’ losses during their civil war. In fact, the Zi Yaun series were also known as CBERS, the jointly developed China — Brazil Earth Research Satellites. The Brazilian Space Agency had provided a significant percentage of the technology and also funded much of the launch costs, sharing in the satellites’ operating time until China took full control during the plague year.
Nominally, the Zi Yuan satellites were for weather and geological studies. Of course they also contained military grade optics and communications systems. First launched in 1999, the satellites were the result of a not- unlikely alliance between two developing nations who hoped to close the gap with the United States. Bringing those eyes to bear on the American West had been the easiest part of Jia’s preparations, because China had long since realigned its orbital assets. After the near-total destruction of traditional enemies like Japan, Vietnam, and South Korea, all four of China’s Zi Yuan satellites were aimed solely at India and the U.S. The same was done with most of China’s other, far less precise weather and communications satellites. Jia had simply patched into several eyes that were already perfectly arranged, supplementing his surveillance grid with ASN-104 unmanned aerial vehicles. The UAVs provided the best video, yet those feeds were limited to small areas, less than a square mile, whereas the satellites saw everything.
There was no way to track the mind plague itself. In many places, the disorder it created was easily visible, but for the most part Jia’s team was only able to track the spread of the mind plague via computer projections. They combined wind and atmospheric models with military intelligence on American population centers and eyes- only data on the nanotech’s parameters and replication speed.
The projections were conservative. Even so, Jia worried about missing some pockets of enemy territory. The nanotech was shown on his screens as swirls and clouds of darker blue. The mind plague blossomed as it touched American populations, especially the larger military bases that had grown alongside the old cities. In some places, there were also pathetic evacuation attempts. Vehicles and pedestrians lunged in chaotic stampedes for the highways, which were the clearest routes into the mountains.
Nearly all of them ran for elevation. That instinct was strong even in Jia. Every survivor would always think of the highest mountaintops as safe, although none of the enemy made it that far. The clumps of people and trucks all darkened with the same unstoppable blue shapes. Then the wind carried the plague deeper into American and Canadian lines.
There was a deafening crash behind him. The door was only reinforced wood, the weak point in the box. It splintered open as a trooper in black assault gear fell to the floor, thrown off-balance by the steel ramming cylinder in his grip. Light slashed into the room — the yellow, searing brilliance of floodlamps. The light was as much of a shock as the assault itself, although it rippled as other men rushed the door.
They were Second Department troops. A dozen of them burst into the room, pinning Jia’s team with short- barreled Type 5 submachine guns. “Down!” they yelled. “Get down!”
Dongmei leapt up with her pistol drawn, still tied to her equipment by her headset.
“No!” Jia shouted. “Don’t fight!”
The other men continued to yell. “Get down! Get down! On your knees! Down!”
But it was Jia’s command that Dongmei answered. She lowered herself to the floor, placing her weapon as far from herself as possible. Her teammates obeyed, too, kneeling with their hands lifted high. Huojin and Gui winced in the dazzling light. Jia also saw Yi react to a voice in his headset, wanting to respond but stopping himself.
Was there a problem with Yi’s planes? Were the pilots receiving new orders on the same frequency? Jia’s thoughts surged with frustration, but he was far more unsettled when he saw Sergeant Bu Xiaowen among the Second Department troops. The black-uniformed men had spread out, encircling his team. Bu stood to Jia’s right. He must have been among the first soldiers into the room. Their eyes met for a single, startled instant until Jia wrenched his gaze away.
“I said get down!” another sergeant yelled.
Jia remained standing, looking for their commander. The Second Department was the electronic counterintelligence division of the Ministry of State Security, the top intelligence wing of the Communist Party, and Jia was hardly unfamiliar with the MSS officers in Los Angeles. Obviously someone had traced his signals to this room. But who had given the order to shut him down?
Two of the troopers stepped closer, patting at Jia’s uniform. “Don’t move,” the first one said, taking Jia’s sidearm and his combat knife. Then they relieved the rest of his team of their pistols, too.
Jia heard Yi’s headset mumble again and it was only with great discipline that he kept his back to their electronics. What was happening above Colorado and Wyoming? Did they need to concentrate their aircraft in other places?
More black uniforms paced into the room, creating an ever-greater obstacle for him to deal with before his team could return to their work, yet it wasn’t until one of the Second Department troops moved to disconnect the data jacks by the door that Jia spoke.
“Don’t touch those,” Jia said.
“Be quiet,” a different man snapped.
Jia immediately turned to direct his words at him. “This is a sanctioned operation,” he said. The officer might have frowned. Jia couldn’t be sure, because his face was obscured in the shadows of the floodlights behind him.
“You’re under arrest,” the officer said.
The governor himself hurried into the room once a signal was given that Jia’s people had been secured. He was followed by a Ministry of State Security general. Jia snapped to attention, saluting General Zheng. All of the Second Department troops did the same, except two who continued to aim their submachine guns at Jia’s team.
